Business Social Media and Updates

Proactively Leverage Raving Fans as Mid‑Cycle Champions

Pivot for 2026 - will be setting up my prospects and customers with more references. I’m lucky - I’ve worked to bring on 110 net new logos and work with 30 existing customers. We have raving fans here - and people that are more than willing to share their experience. Old me used to wait until prospects asked late in the cycle to speak with a customer. I’d shy away from it knowing the time and effort it took to coordinate as well as the chance it could slow down the deal. In 2026, I plan to use it as a more strategic play mid cycle to build stronger champions. I spent an hour and sifted through my most recent customers. Criteria: 1. Raving Fan 2. Can articulate the value of Gong + why us My list is 50+ deep. Across every persona. Allowing me to never have to ‘tap’ someone with a favor more than 2x in a year. Will look for strategic opportunities to run this play before it’s ‘needed.’ When someone is in a similar industry, facing a similar challenge, or would benefit hearing from a peer. Excited to report back on my win rate when I run this play. P.S. Super important to not ‘tap’ your raving fans too much and show extreme gratitude when they are willing. Always give them an out if they are short on bandwidth. And ALWAYS gift them afterwards as a thank you. P.S.S. We have a formal reference program too but that can be tough… you don’t always have full context and trust knowing that person, their style, their use case, etc.