ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Most sellers walk into a discovery call with a thing they want to sell. Julie Mall thinks that's exactly why deals take longer than they should — and why the work piles up at the end of the cycle, right when it's hardest to do.
Julie is the Chief Revenue Officer at Zoovu, the AI product discovery platform behind ecommerce experiences for brands like Microsoft, Bosch, Canon, and Honeywell. She didn't come up through quota. She started at PwC running change management on Fortune 50 ERP transformations, deployed B2B ecommerce through the first dot-com boom, built and led global solutions teams, took on customer success, and now runs sales, customer success, and solutions as one organization.
In this conversation with LeanScale co-founder Anthony Enrico, Julie breaks down her one-word edit to the oldest line in software sales — not always be selling, but always be solutioning — and what it looks like in a discovery call, in a proof of concept, in a board meeting, and in a renewal you should never have to fight for.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN
Why "always be solutioning" closes faster and bigger than "always be selling"
How a fire-safety deal closed fast with one demo — by starting with the customer's own ROI metrics
The best discovery question Julie has heard: what does this pain really mean to the business?
Where AI actually helps GTM leaders today: Gong deal patterns, a private AI workspace, and board prep
CHAPTERS
00:00 — Intro: Julie Mall, CRO at Zoovu
01:38 — Dot-com B2B ecommerce and the costliest 80% of customers
03:41 — Always be solutioning, not always be selling
08:50 — Discovery is for learning, not for scoping the demo
13:00 — The best discovery question: what does this pain really mean?
17:43 — The solutions-engineer edge in the CRO seat
25:29 — Making AEs solution-led; TAMs over CSMs
31:38 — AI in GTM: Gong deal patterns, Langdock, and board prep
41:00 — Solutioning after the sale: renewals that sell themselves
44:41 — Closing thoughts: the CRO role is solutioning at scale
ABOUT THE GUEST
Julie Mall is the Chief Revenue Officer at Zoovu, the AI product discovery platform powering ecommerce experiences for brands including Microsoft, Bosch, Canon, and Honeywell. She began her career at PwC leading change management for Fortune 50 ERP transformations, then spent the first dot-com boom deploying B2B ecommerce for large SAP customers including Occidental Chemical, Chevron Phillips Chemical, and Pennzoil-Quaker State. From implementation she moved into sales engineering, built and led global solutions teams, took on customer success — rebuilding it around technical account managers — and today runs sales, customer success, and solutions as a single commercial organization.
ABOUT THE LEANSCALE PODCAST
The LeanScale Podcast is the show for GTM operators building the next generation of revenue infrastructure. Hosted by Anthony Enrico, co-founder of LeanScale, we go deep with the operators, founders, and executives shaping how modern go-to-market teams are designed, scaled, and transformed.
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▶ Learn more about LeanScale: https://www.leanscale.team
▶ Follow Anthony Enrico on LinkedIn
▶ Learn more about Zoovu: https://zoovu.com
KEYWORDS / TAGS
RevOps, Revenue Operations, GTM, Go-to-Market, CRO, Chief Revenue Officer, Solutions Engineering, Sales Engineering, Solutions Consulting, Pre-Sales, Discovery Call, Sales Discovery, Value Selling, Solution Selling, Proof of Concept, ROI Modeling, Customer Success, Technical Account Manager, Net Revenue Retention, Renewals, Sales Enablement, Gong, Salesforce, AI in Sales, AI in GTM, Board Meeting Prep, Deal Velocity, B2B Ecommerce, AI Product Discovery, Zoovu, Microsoft, Bosch, PwC, SAP, B2B SaaS, Enterprise SaaS, Sales Leadership, LeanScale
HASHTAGS
#RevOps #GTM #GoToMarket #AI #CRO #SalesEngineering #PreSales #SalesDiscovery #SolutionSelling #CustomerSuccess #NetRevenueRetention #SalesLeadership #B2BSaaS #Ecommerce #Zoovu #LeanScale #LeanScalePodcast
