The Net New Logo Reboot — 60-Min Training
Direct Answer
Run this 60-minute live training on a Tuesday morning when net-new logo bookings have flatlined and expansion has been quietly carrying the number. A logo reboot resets the org — re-segment reps into *hunters* and *farmers*, rebuild named-account lists from scratch, enforce a 5-touch minimum cadence, settle the "logo discount" debate with a written policy, and track logo velocity (new logos / rep / quarter) alongside ARR.
Mike Weinberg's bluntness: "Most reps have become farmers — the hunting muscle has atrophied." This session forces the team to choose: hunt or be reassigned. Sources: Weinberg, Blount, Bertuzzi, Iannarino, Ross.
SECTION 1 — Why Net New Logos Matter More Than You Think (5 min)
Trainer script (verbatim): *"Expansion revenue is easier and safer. It's also a slow death. If you're not adding net-new logos every quarter, your TAM is shrinking and your next pricing increase will trigger churn you can't replace. We are here because we have become farmers in a hunter's market."*
- Expansion has a ceiling. Net new is the only uncapped lever.
- Logo count drives valuation. Public SaaS investors price on logo growth + NRR, not ARR alone.
- Mike Weinberg in *New Sales. Simplified.*: "Most sales organizations have become farms — the hunting muscle has atrophied."
Open with a stat the team can't argue with: pull last 4 quarters of net-new logo count. If the line is flat while ARR is up, you are an expansion-dependent business.
SECTION 2 — Hunter vs. Farmer: Redesign the Roles (15 min)
This is the longest block on purpose. Hybrid "do-everything" AEs are why net-new is dying.
Whiteboard the role split:
- Hunter (New Logo AE) — pipeline target: 2-3x quota, comp weighted toward new-logo bookings, no installed-base accounts, weekly prospecting block enforced.
- Farmer (Account Manager / CSM) — owns retention + expansion, comp weighted toward NRR and seat growth, does not chase new logos.
- SDR — feeds the hunter exclusively. Compensated on meetings booked into ICP, not generic activity.
Trainer script: *"You cannot ask the same human to spend Monday morning saving a churning account and Monday afternoon cold-calling a Fortune 500 stranger. The context-switch kills production. Trish Bertuzzi calls this 'role specialization' in *The Sales Development Playbook* — specialized teams outperform generalists by 30% on new-logo attainment."*
- Aaron Ross's Predictable Revenue model institutionalized the split — SDR hunts cold, AE closes, CSM farms.
- Comp plan rewrite is non-negotiable. New-logo accelerators should be 1.5-2x the expansion rate, or hunters will quietly work expansion.
- Hybrid stragglers. Reps who insist they "can do both" almost never hunt. Reassign or release.
Exercise (5 min): every AE writes down what % of last quarter's bookings came from net-new vs. Expansion. Anyone under 40% net-new is a farmer, regardless of title.
SECTION 3 — Named-Account List Construction (10 min)
Trainer script: *"A territory is not a list. A list is 50 named companies, ranked, researched, with a named champion and a named economic buyer per account, and you can recite them from memory. If you can't, you don't have a list — you have a wish."*
Anthony Iannarino's *The Lost Art of Closing* is dogmatic: every hunter carries a "Dream 100" of high-fit named accounts they are accountable to break into within 12 months.
The construction process — do this live on screen:
- ICP filter. Industry, headcount, revenue band, tech stack, geography. Outside ICP gets cut. No exceptions.
- Tier the list. Tier 1 = top 25 dream logos (multi-stakeholder siege). Tier 2 = 75 high-fit. Tier 3 = the rest.
- Annotate each account. Trigger events, recent hires, funding, current vendor, two named contacts minimum. If you don't have two humans, it's a logo, not a researched account.
- Lock the list quarterly. No mid-quarter add/drop without manager approval.
Drill: ask each AE to name their top 5 dream accounts and the economic buyer at each. If they hesitate on more than one, the list isn't real.
SECTION 4 — The 5-Touch Minimum Cadence (10 min)
Trainer script: *"One email is not prospecting. Five touches across three channels over ten business days is the minimum acceptable effort to claim you've worked an account."*
Jeb Blount in *Fanatical Prospecting* documents the math — most prospects need 5-12 touches before they respond. Reps who quit at touch two do 40% of the work of reps who push through.
The mandatory cadence (post it on the wall):
- Touch 1 — Day 0 — Personalized email referencing a trigger event. Not a templated pitch.
- Touch 2 — Day 2 — Cold call. Voicemail counts only if followed by a same-day email.
- Touch 3 — Day 4 — LinkedIn connection request with a one-sentence reason.
- Touch 4 — Day 7 — Second cold call + value-add email (industry insight, peer reference, not a pitch).
- Touch 5 — Day 10 — "Breaking up" email or a hand-written note for Tier 1 accounts.
Enforcement: pull cadence-completion reports weekly from your sequencer (Outreach, Salesloft, Apollo). Accounts marked "worked" with fewer than 5 touches get sent back.
SECTION 5 — The Logo Discount Debate + Logo Velocity KPI (15 min)
This is the spine of the training. Two questions every leadership team must answer in writing.
Question 1 — Will you give up margin to win the logo?
Trainer script: *"Camp A says never discount — the logo isn't worth eroding price discipline. Camp B says strategic logos justify a 15-30% discount because brand halo, reference value, and future expansion pay it back. Both are defensible. What is NOT defensible is making this decision in a Friday-afternoon panic."*
Write the policy live, on the board:
- Tier 1 dream logos — up to 25%, VP Sales approval, written reference + case-study commitment required.
- Tier 2 / Tier 3 — ceiling 10-15%, AE authority.
- No verbal commitments to discount before procurement enters the room.
- Track post-close expansion. If logo-discount Tier 1 accounts don't expand 2x within 18 months, kill the policy.
Question 2 — How will you measure new-logo health?
Introduce Logo Velocity as the new board metric:
- Logo velocity = net-new logos / hunter / quarter. At $25K-$500K ACV, a healthy hunter closes 2-4 per quarter.
- Logo win rate = closed / dream-100 worked. Healthy = 10-15% annually.
- Report logo velocity on the same board slide as ARR or leadership will keep optimizing for the wrong number.
SECTION 6 — Wrap, Homework, Q&A (5 min)
Homework (assign live):
- By Friday, every AE submits a Dream 50 named-account list, tiered, with two named contacts per account.
- By Monday, each hunter enrolls 10 Tier 1 accounts in the 5-touch cadence in Outreach/Salesloft.
- RevOps publishes the logo-discount policy in writing by next Wednesday. No verbal exceptions.
Trainer close (verbatim): *"Net-new logos are the only thing that proves your company still belongs in the market. Expansion proves you're not dead yet — net-new proves you're still alive. Pick the side of the line you want to stand on, and let's see what your pipeline looks like in 30 days."*
FAQ
Q: Our AEs hate prospecting. How do we force compliance? A: You don't force — you measure and replace. Publish weekly cadence-completion leaderboards. Reps under 80% completion for two quarters get reassigned or coached out. Jeb Blount: "Prospecting is the most important non-negotiable skill in sales — and the one most reps avoid."
Q: We're a 12-person team. Can we really split hunters and farmers? A: Yes — but the split can be *day-based* rather than role-based. Reps spend Monday-Tuesday on net-new only, Wednesday-Friday on expansion. Calendar enforcement matters more than title at small scale.
Q: How long before logo velocity moves? A: With clean role-split and enforced cadence, expect first-meeting volume to move in 30 days, qualified pipeline in 60 days, and closed-won logos in 90-180 days depending on ACV.
Q: What if leadership keeps approving "strategic" discounts above policy? A: Then there is no policy. The CRO must hold the line in writing, in front of the board. If the CRO won't, the reboot will fail.
Sources
- Weinberg, Mike. *New Sales. Simplified.: The Essential Handbook for Prospecting and New Business Development.* AMACOM, 2012.
- Blount, Jeb. *Fanatical Prospecting.* Wiley, 2015.
- Bertuzzi, Trish. *The Sales Development Playbook.* Moore-Lake, 2016.
- Iannarino, Anthony. *The Lost Art of Closing.* Portfolio, 2017.
- Ross, Aaron & Tyler, Marylou. *Predictable Revenue.* PebbleStorm, 2011.
- Iannarino, Anthony. *Eat Their Lunch: Winning Customers Away from Your Competition.* Portfolio, 2018.
- SaaStr. "Logo Growth vs. ARR Growth — Which Matters More to Investors?" saastr.com, 2023.
- Gartner. "The Future of B2B Sales: Role Specialization Returns." Gartner Research, 2024.