Arun Lal | Contiq
ARUN LAL
Co-Founder & CEO of Contiq, an AI-powered buyer intelligence platform helping B2B sellers win more deals faster.
What Is Contiq? Tell Us About What You Do And What The Company’s Mission Is.
Contiq is reimagining the B2B sales and marketing in the age of AI. The B2B buying reality has entered a new era as demonstrated by the following buying behaviors over the last decade:
B2B buyers spend 65% of the buying time in independent research: Buyers today are overwhelmed by the amount of high-quality information available to them and struggle to prioritize and deconflict various competing perspectives.
B2B buyers spend less than 5% of buying time with sales reps: Increasingly B2B buyers prefer a “B2C-like” seamless, easy, informative digital buying experience instead of talking to sales reps, who they see as offering little distinct value.
On average there are 11 stakeholders involved in a B2B purchase decision: Buyer stakeholders struggle internally to align and build consensus to drive to a purchase decision.
The B2B buying experience has become even harder with COVID as suppliers are getting even less face-to-face access to buyers and being forced to sell remotely. Traditional sales and marketing systems are challenged to support these shifts in B2B buying behavior. The implications of these changes are as follows:
84% of suppliers state that B2B sales cycles are getting longer: Buyers are taking longer to make buying decisions as they find the process of navigating through the purchasing process very complex.
Average deal-sizes are getting smaller: Due to the complexity of the purchase process buying committees are looking to reduce risk and committing to smaller purchases.
To address the challenges brought forward by changes in B2B buying behavior, a new transformative approach is needed for selling that simplifies the process.
Designed for B2B sellers, Contiq is an AI-powered Buyer Enablement Platform that enables a digital, highly personalized buying experience for B2B buyers that is unified, collaborative and data-driven. This experience delivers higher buyer engagement, shorter-sales cycles and larger deal sizes. Current customers include: VMware, Deloitte, Diodes, Snowflake.
What Is Your Background? What Led You To Starting Your Own Company? And How Did You Choose This Space?
My background is primarily in product marketing and management. Most recently, I led product marketing at VMware for the Software-Defined Data Center (SDDC). I helped launch that business and scale it to over a billion dollars in revenue in less than a year. Prior to that, I was at Microsoft and did product marketing for Office 365. Before that I was part of the founding product management team for Microsoft Dynamics CRM, I shipped three versions of the product and helped that business scale to a billion dollars+. Prior to that, I worked as a software engineer at Microsoft and Askme.
As a product marketer I frequently authored sales enablement and customer-facing content. I often wondered who is using this content, in what context and if it was really effective with buyers or not. There was no data-driven way for me to gauge usage and engagement of the content I produced. Similarly, I found that sellers had a hard time locating the information they needed in context and within their native workflows. In addition, I noticed that buyers were dissatisfied with piece-meal information delivery and a poor collaboration experience with sellers.
My insight was that the whole B2B buying and selling process is fundamentally broken.
With that insight, my co-founder Rahul and I sought to reimagine the B2B buying and selling process in the era of data ubiquity, machine learning and AI. This was the genesis of Contiq.
What Have Been Both Your Favorite And Least-liked Parts Of Your Entrepreneurial Journey? What Have Been Your Most Challenging And Most Exciting Moments For You And The Company?
Favorite:
Waking up every morning ready to innovate for customers
Having control over my time and priorities plus the adventure of building something on your own
The process of designing software to address customer problems
Thinking through and executing a go to market strategy
Coming up with new ways to disrupt established players
AI is something I became fascinated with. It is already transforming how work is done across industries
Applying new technologies within AI to solve business problems
Least favorite:
Chasing prospects and investors for meetings
Working through very long sales cycles
Encountering resistance to change
Working through administrative and accounting details
What Was The Fundraising Process Like For You? Tell Us About Your Investors And What You Use The Money You’ve Raised For.
The fundraising process was quite good, we raised money from large investors as well as through crowdfunding efforts. I managed it similar to a sales process, meeting with numerous prospective investors, pitching them and converting them to investors.
We now have an investor pool including Jason Calacanis (Investor in Uber and Calm App), DNX Ventures, Hourglass Ventures, Z5 Capital and they are incredibly invested in making us successful. They have put in their own resources to help us grow faster. In terms of fund allocations, we have put 50% towards product development and the other 50% is being used for Sales, Marketing and Customer Success.
What Was The Inspiration Behind The Company Name?
Contiq is a combination of two words, Content and IQ. As a product marketer, I used to author sales and marketing content and I had observed it was growing exponentially. Any buyer engagement insights attached to that content were essentially in a black hole. We wanted to find the intelligence for sales and marketing content.
Tell Us About Your Typical Workday Schedule. What Are Your Morning And Evening Routines, And What Are Some Of Your Favorite Products You Use That Makes Your Day More Enjoyable?
I start my day at 5:30am with a workout. I found an efficient way to workout via Zoom with a personal trainer from India who trains Bollywood movie stars. I try to get my creative and best thinking time before lunch. I reserve the time after lunch for work that doesn’t require as much creative energy. I find the process of taking notes very efficient so I keep a diary for note taking during meetings.
I listen to the following podcasts to keep me updated and energized:
I use Audible to listen to books as I usually have 2-3 books in progress at the same time. I’m currently listening to “Thinking Fast and Slow”. I also use the Art of Living Journey App and I’ve been a meditator for over 15 years. I do my morning yoga and meditation practice for about 30 minutes a day after my workout.
What Are Your Top Three Favorite Books?
How Has The Transition To WFH Over The Past Few Months Impacted Contiq Both Within The Company, And Externally In Terms Of Demand And Product Application?
We’ve given up our office space and the company has gone completely virtual. All employees have more flexibility in their work schedule. Given the fact we’re a highly distributed team across US, Europe and India, this WFH has been beneficial for us.
It has impacted us positively as our product has been designed for a remote selling experience. Contiq helps in situations where you’re not able to meet your buyers. It helps you gather buyer insights based on what the buyers are doing digitally and you can use that information to make better decisions about how to move the deal forward.
How Do You Think Your Industry Will Change Post-COVID?
Our industry is fundamentally changing. B2B buying behavior has completely changed and has been accelerated due to COVID. Previously a sales person could walk into the building, speak to all 14 stakeholders face to face, read body language and get engagement signals. In the Post-COVID world, people even turn off their Zoom cameras, it is challenging for a seller to use those cues.
Buying will get virtual and distributed
AI systems which leverage buyer intent data will become very important
The role of the salesperson will have to change from being just an information provider to someone who will help make sense of the information and advise the buyer
Buyers want to run the sales motion instead of a sales run sales motion. 68% of B2B webinar content gets consumed after the webinar is done. Buyers are distributed and want to consume information on demand. As a result the old sales model needs a major overhaul. Technology such as Contiq, which help give you insights into buyers based on their digital behavior across multiple channels, are going to be imperative for salespeople in the future.
What Are The Most Important Skills A Modern Day Entrepreneur Needs In Order To Be Successful? What advice do you have for entrepreneurs who are just starting out?
Strong analytical capabilities - to understand market trends, shifts in customer needs and behaviors
Strong sales skills - the ability to excite people with a vision
Grit and persistence - there will be a lot of ups and downs but the longer you stay with it, the higher your probability of success
Staying positive and upbeat
Tell Us A Story Of Something That Happened To You, Something You Heard, Or Something You Saw, That Either Made You Laugh Or Taught You An Important Lesson.
I was in the process of fundraising and I made it a point to be open and talk to all investors, even if they were only investing $1K. One investor came in and said I want to invest $25K in your company. I took the meeting and we started talking about the idea, my background and the support I have. During that same day, we spoke during the afternoon, that evening and the next day. We were both getting excited about the business, the team and the traction. That $25K has now converted into a $1M investment from the same person. He also brought in another investor for $250K. That openness to talk to people converted into hard dollars. That investor has now joined our company to help with Sales.
Look for the magic, miracles can happen. You never know what a small conversation can lead to.
If You Can Have A One-Hour Meeting With Someone Famous Who Is Alive, Who Would It Be And Why?
Stuart Butterfield - the founder of Slack.
He has found a way to take the old, boring category of real time messaging and converted his products into a multi-billion dollar business quickly. His product has become part of company standards across the globe.
He innovated by selling enterprise software to senior level executives at large enterprises successfully AND by selling to small and medium sized businesses as well. He sold from top to bottom as well as bottoms up effectively, which is really very unusual. Stuart created a sales system with a low sales and marketing investment. COVID has helped accelerate this growth, there’s no doubt about it, but the true genius lies in how he approached selling his software.
What Does Success Mean To You?
Success to me means not just financial success but more. It means:
Having the freedom to create and innovate with a sophisticated and knowledgeable team
Enjoying the work and having fun with what you’re doing. One of our investors says our priorities should be:
A. Having Fun
B. Making MoneyC. Not getting the order wrong
Being able to reflect back and feeling proud that you’ve created something of value to the world
Having financial success
