The Minimum Effective Sales Tech Stack

Samantha McKenna (founder of #samsales Consulting) joins me to discuss the only 5 pieces of sales tech you need - and how to get more from what you already have

Meet Samantha McKenna of #samsales

A few years ago, I started noticing posts from a woman named Samantha McKenna on LinkedIn. Her writing had spice. She was direct, sharp, and refreshingly human. And she kept hammering a topic that’s always been near and dear to my heart: how to do outbound sales in a way that doesn’t suck.

Mett Sam, founder and CEO of #samsales (and kind of a big deal)

Digging deeper, I learned that Sam had built her entire sales philosophy (and a fast-growing training + consulting business) around a simple but powerful framework: Show Me You Know Me.

The idea behind the framework: Do your homework.

Make it obvious you’re not just another rep blasting the same message to 500 people. Instead of leading with a canned pitch, lead with proof that you actually understand something about the person you’re reaching out to—their role, their company, their challenges. It’s not magic. It’s just the kind of sales people actually want to respond to. And (spoiler) it works. Sam’s open and reply rates average at 43% and 20%, while other more generic sales outreach just gets more and more ignored (Sam points to 6% open and 0.9% reply rates as industry averages) as people become inundated with C-grade automated crap.

But just like reps fall into the trap of blasting out too many generic emails without stopping to reflect on whether their approach is working, sales teams have fallen into the trap of buying too much tech without asking what they actually need. More automation, more data, more dashboards—it’s fun to play with, but none of it will fix the poor fundamentals that are invisibly holding your team back.

That’s where this article starts - with a conversation Sam and I had a few months back about how too many sales teams out there are drowning in sales technology that they barely use. And why most of them would be better off stripping things down and getting more from their five most essential tools instead.

Let’s get into it.

Why Tech Bloat Happens

Paul:
A decade ago, sales teams had it a little easier. There were fewer tools, fewer choices, and a lot less noise. Today, the menu of sales tech has exploded, and the voices telling you what you must have are deafening. Every week it seems like there’s another AI-powered, smartly-automated, game-changing tool that promises to transform your go-to-market strategy. (For what it’s worth, I hate that word: “Transform.” Ugh.)

Sam:
And the result is teams are drowning in tech they don’t even know how to use. It blows my mind how fast leaders sign checks for software they A) don’t know how to use, B) don’t know how to deploy, and C) stack on top of ten other tools they bought this year.

Paul:
It’s wild. Nobody stops to ask, what’s actually working here? They just keep piling on more tools. More automation. More dashboards. More AI. And instead of making things better, it just creates more complexity for reps to wade through.

Sam:
Exactly. And half the time, there’s no implementation plan. No training. No roadmap. It’s like, Congrats, we bought this expensive new platform—good luck figuring out how to use it!

Paul:
And then leadership gets frustrated six months later when adoption is low and results aren’t showing up in the pipeline.

Sam:
Right. And then when the tool doesn’t magically fix everything, they don’t blame the buying decision—they blame the reps. “Oh, the team just didn’t adopt it.” Or “That software didn’t work for us.” No, you just threw money at a problem without a plan. That’s not a tech failure. That’s a leadership failure.

Paul:
Why do you think leaders keep falling into this trap?

Sam:
"Two reasons. First, there’s the magical thinking. People believe that if they just throw software at the problem, it’ll fix everything. Same reason bad sales orgs go on hiring sprees—'Let’s hire 10 more reps and hope revenue magically explodes.' It’s action theater. It feels like progress, but it’s just motion without impact.

"Companies do this all the time. Instead of stopping to ask, Do we actually know how to sell? Do we have the right people? The right process?—they just buy more tech. Because buying software is easier than doing the hard work of fixing a broken sales motion."

Paul:
And the second reason?

Sam:
"People are buying software to cover their own asses. They don’t actually care if it works. They just need to be able to say, 'We’re investing in innovation. We’re modernizing the tech stack.' It buys them time.

"This happens constantly. A sales leader gets pressure from the board or the exec team, and instead of fixing the fundamentals, they throw money at software to signal progress. They don’t ask, Will my team actually use this? They just need to show they’re doing something."

And then when it doesn’t work, they don’t take responsibility. They don’t say, 'We bought the wrong thing, and we didn’t have a plan to use it.' They say, 'Oh, the reps just didn’t adopt it.' They blame the team, blame the tool—anything but the fact that they made a bad decision with no implementation plan.

And then to make it worse, you’ve got vendors adding to the noise, selling solutions to problems sales teams don’t even have. Every little sliver of the sales process now has a tool. Oh, your reps are taking too long to write emails? Here’s AI-powered email grading! But that doesn’t actually fix the problem. It just optimizes a bad foundation.

Paul:
Right. Like if your outbound motion is broken, making your emails 20% shorter doesn’t change the fact that they still suck.

Sam:
Exactly. But that’s what’s happening. Companies keep adding Band-Aids instead of fixing the broken bones.

Paul:
So what do teams actually need? Like, if we built a minimum effective sales tech stack, what would be in vs. out?

The Five Tools That Actually Matter

1. A Place To Put Your Data - The CRM

Paul:
If there’s one tool every sales team needs to get right, it’s the CRM. No debate. If your CRM is a mess, everything else—your pipeline, your forecast, your strategy—falls apart.

Sam:
100%. But too many teams treat the CRM like a deal tracker when they should also be treating it like a learning tool.

Paul:
Right—because tracking opportunities is important. It’s how you maximize your chances of winning the deals you can win. But if you stop there, you’re leaving a ton of value on the table.

Sam:
Exactly. Your CRM should also help you track the people who create deals. Who was involved? Who was your champion? Who was the blocker? If you don’t have those answers logged, you’re making it impossible to build future pipeline.

Paul:
And even beyond tracking people, most CRMs aren’t even set up to track the right information about the deal itself.

Sam:
Right. And this is where most teams fall apart. They let reps enter whatever they want into the CRM—there’s no consistency, no mandated fields, no enforcement. Then, when leadership tries to understand the pipeline, it’s full of gaps.

Paul:
So what should every opportunity actually have in the CRM?

Sam:
At a minimum:

1. The Buying Team: Who was involved? Who was the decision-maker? Who was the champion? Who was the blocker?

2. Next Steps: What’s the next meeting, milestone, or action required to move this forward?

Paul:
And here’s what I’d add—your CRM should capture the core tension from your discovery call.

• What pain points are they actually trying to solve?

• Where does solving those rank against everything else on their plate?

Because if you’re using a qualification framework like MEDDICC or even BANT and don’t have a mandated field to capture what’s actually happening behind those acronyms, you have to fix that first. Otherwise, you’re flying blind on how real the deal actually is.

Sam:
Yep. If you don’t track the why, you’re stuck trying to close a deal without knowing what problem the buyer actually cares about solving. That’s how deals stall in late-stage purgatory—because no one took the time to write down why it was urgent in the first place.

Paul:
So the CRM should be two things at once—a tool for maximizing your chances of winning the deals in front of you, and a system for capturing what you learn every time you talk to a customer or prospect.

Sam:
Right. And a big part of that learning is knowing who needs to stay on your radar. If you don’t track the right people, their job moves, and their involvement in deals, you’re making life harder for future-you.

2. A Way to Automate Outbound – Sales Engagement

Paul:
A few years ago, cadencing tools were the shiny new thing. Now, they’re everywhere. But instead of helping, they’re making outbound worse.

Sam:
Because most teams confuse automation with effectiveness. They buy a sales engagement platform, load it up with cadences, and then blast out the same generic emails to thousands of people. And when response rates are garbage, they don’t blame the approach—they blame the tool.

Paul:
Right. I see so many outbound cadences that all say some version of: “Here’s what we do. Do you want to buy some?” It’s like they’ve automated the worst possible version of outreach.

Sam:
Exactly. One line of business we launched was specifically to meet this problem - we decided to teach customers how to write this content. When we’d dig in to their Salesloft cadences, for instance, we’d find two big mistakes I see over and over:

• Mistake #1: Letting marketing write all the cadences.

• Mistake #2: Letting every rep write their own.

Paul:
Both sound bad, but for totally different reasons.

Sam:
Yep. When marketing writes all the cadences, you get over-polished, brand-safe fluff that sounds great in theory but doesn’t get replies. It’s too formal, too self-promotional, and often completely ignores how real sales conversations actually happen.

Paul:
And when every rep writes their own?

Sam:
Then you get chaos. No consistency, no way to measure success, and no idea what’s actually working. Reps end up doing their own thing, and leadership has no way to coach or refine messaging at scale.

To add insult to injury: you’re putting teams in the driver’s seat who not only aren’t often great writers but they also have a hundred different versions of what the content should say.

Paul:
So what’s the fix?

Sam:
Every outbound sequence should follow one simple rule: The first 10-15% should be personalized. The rest should be standardized.

Paul:
Let’s break that down.

Sam:
The first few lines of every email should prove you actually know the person you’re reaching out to. Not just their name and company, but something real—an insight about their role, a challenge they’re likely facing, or a trigger event you noticed.

Paul:
And if you don’t do that?

Sam:
Then you’re just another name in the inbox. If your email starts with, “I see you’re in {Industry} at {Company},” you’ve already lost.

Paul:
So that’s the personalization piece. What about the rest of the email?

Sam:
The rest should be standardized so you can track what actually works. Too many teams think every email needs to be hyper-personalized, but that makes it impossible to scale or optimize. Instead, personalize the opening, but keep the body and CTA structured so you can test what converts.

Paul:
That makes sense. So if teams are getting this wrong, how do they know?

Sam:
Three big signs your sales engagement tool isn’t being used correctly:

1. Your response rates are terrible. If you’re getting 1% replies, you don’t have an automation problem—you have a messaging problem.

2. Your cadences all sound the same. If your messaging could be sent to any industry or persona with no changes, it’s too generic to work.

3. Your reps don’t know what’s actually converting. If there’s no system for tracking which messaging performs best, you’re just guessing.

Paul:
And the fix?

Sam:

1. Personalize the first 15% of email one authentically. Use something meaningful, not just first-name-company fluff.

2. Standardize the rest of the sequence. Make it structured so you can track and refine.

3. Ensure the cadences say not what you do, but what challenge you solve.

4. Skip asking for a meeting in every email. This will shock some but your clients know what you want. Ask once or twice and then lead with value and thought leadership.

5. A/B test for problems, not just features. The best cadences aren’t about what you sell—they’re about why the buyer should care; figure out what resonates most with your clients via testing.

Paul:
So a good sales engagement tool should do two things at once—help you create pipeline at scale, but also give you insights into what actually resonates.

Sam:
Exactly. Automation is only as good as the thinking behind it. If your cadences are trash, more automation isn’t the answer. Better messaging and more iteration is.

3. A Place to Store and Analyze Conversations – Call Recording

Paul:
Before call recording tools, sales leaders had to be in the room or on the call to know how their reps showed up in front of customers. If they weren’t there, they had to rely on secondhand reports or gut feel. Coaching was limited to the meetings they had time to join.

Now? That limitation is gone. Leaders can review any call, spot patterns, and actually see what’s working (or not). In theory, this should be huge. But in practice? Most teams barely use these tools.

Sam:
Because most sales leaders don’t know how to coach. They either don’t listen to calls at all, or when they do, their feedback is garbage.

Paul:
What do you mean?

Sam:
They’ll pause a recording and say something like, “What would you say here?” And when the rep hesitates, they realize they don’t even know the right answer themselves. That’s the problem.

Most sales leaders were never taught what great selling actually sounds like—so when they listen to calls, they’re guessing. They either focus on the wrong things (“Did you ask all the right questions?”) or they just nitpick small mistakes instead of helping reps understand how to run a better conversation.

Paul:
So when they don’t know how to coach, they just avoid call reviews altogether?

Sam:
Yep. They say, “I don’t have time for this,” but what they really mean is, “I don’t know how to add value.”

Paul:
And if managers aren’t using these tools, I’m guessing reps aren’t either?

Sam:
Exactly. No one’s reviewing calls, so no one’s learning. And you can hear it in the way teams handle objections—everyone is just winging it.

Paul:
Yeah. If you don’t have a shared understanding of what a good sales conversation sounds like, every rep is just making it up as they go.

Sam:
Right. And then you get sales leaders on LinkedIn talking about “coaching excellence” when they’ve never actually broken down a great call in their life.

Paul:
That’s the part that kills me. There’s a whole generation of people pretending to know this stuff. And some of them are managing teams.

Sam:
And their reps are out there drowning. But sure, let’s talk about “AI-powered objection handling.”

Paul:
That’s the thing—if your reps don’t even know how to handle an objection without AI, what exactly are we automating?

Sam:
Garbage in, garbage out.

4. A Place to Find Prospects – Data Provider

Paul:
Every sales team needs a workable list.

That’s what a data provider is really for—turning your target market into a list of people you can actually call.

And a workable list isn’t just about accounts. It’s about people.

Because at the end of the day, you don’t sell to logos—you sell to actual human beings.

Sam:
Right. But most teams don’t go far enough with how they use their data provider.

They pull a giant list of names, throw them into an outbound sequence, and hope for the best.

But the real value of a data provider isn’t just in finding new contacts—it’s in surfacing the people most likely to buy.

Paul:
Exactly. Your best leads aren’t strangers—they’re people who already know and trust you.

Sam:
And that’s where so many teams miss the mark.

The first thing every team should be doing? Tracking past champions.

People who’ve worked with you before and now have a new budget, a new team, and new problems to solve.

Paul:
But instead of prioritizing those high-intent, high-trust leads, most teams focus only on net-new outreach.

Sam:
Which is crazy, because most data providers can alert you automatically when a past champion changes jobs and lands in a target account.

If you’re not tracking those moves, you’re leaving deals on the table.

Paul:
Same thing with new executives in your target accounts.

New execs bring new priorities, new budgets, and new buying decisions. If they land in your territory or vertical, that’s your cue to start building a relationship.

Sam:
But most teams don’t set up alerts for this. They wait until a lead form comes in instead of getting ahead of the conversation.

Paul:
And those aren’t the only missed opportunities.

Another big one?

Sam:
Only tracking the contract signer—instead of the full buying team. Deals don’t happen because of one person. There’s a whole cast of characters involved—champions, influencers, decision-makers, blockers.

Paul:
And if you’re only tracking the person who signed the contract, you’re ignoring the entire network of future champions.

Sam:
That’s why teams should be using their data provider to track secondary and tertiary contacts, too. If those people move to another company, that’s a warm door opening somewhere else.

Paul:
And this isn’t just about having data—it’s about using it the right way.

Too many teams treat data providers as lead vending machines—dumping lists into automation instead of using them to prioritize the best opportunities.

Sam:
Yep. The goal isn’t to automate more outreach—it’s to find better reasons to reach out.

Paul:
So if a team isn’t making the most of their data provider, how do they know?

Sam:
Here are the biggest signs:

1. You’re not tracking job changes for past customers. You’re missing easy intros.

2. You don’t get alerts when execs join your target accounts. You’re losing relationship-building moments.

3. You’re only tracking the contract signer. You’re ignoring the full buying team.

4. You’re treating your data provider like a lead vending machine. If you’re just dumping lists into automation, you’re missing the point.

Paul:
And the fix?

Sam:

1. Build a job-move list. Track past champions when they land at target accounts.

2. Set up alerts for new execs. The faster you reach them, the more likely you are to win.

3. Expand your deal visibility. Know everyone involved in past deals—not just the primary contact.

4. Use data for smarter outreach, not more outreach. The best sales teams don’t automate relationships—they build them.

Paul:
So… this is really about "Show Me Who Knows Me."

Sam:
Nice. I see what you did there.

5. A Tool to Work Smarter - Artificial Intelligence

Paul:
AI is everywhere in sales tech right now.

Some teams are using it to work smarter. Others are using it to crank out more bad sales outreach at scale.

Sam:
And you can spot the difference a mile away.

The reps who win use AI to get smarter, faster. They use it to surface insights—what a prospect has been posting about, who they know, what’s happening in their industry—so that when they reach out, they actually sound like they’ve done their homework.

The reps who lose use AI to skip the work entirely. They fire up ChatGPT, type, “Write me an email to Paul at Hello Operator,” and send whatever it spits out—no thinking, no filtering, no personalization beyond a first name and company.

Paul:
Which is why so much AI-generated outreach feels like it was written by a robot that just discovered sales yesterday.

Sam:
Exactly. If your email starts with, “Chicago, burr, do you have a parka?” you’ve already lost.

Paul:
So where does AI actually help?

Sam:
Two places:

1. Speeding up research. AI can help you quickly surface useful insights—like what a prospect has been posting about, who they know, or what’s happening in their industry.

2. Making you more efficient. AI can summarize long calls, extract key action items, and draft responses faster.

Paul:
But what it can’t do is tell you what actually matters.

Sam:
Right. AI can give you facts—but it can’t tell you which of those facts actually make a difference. That’s your job.

Paul:
And that’s why the best reps use AI to inform their thinking, not replace it. If you’re relying on AI to write your outbound emails for you, you’re doing it wrong. If you’re using AI to find useful angles, refine your messaging, and write better emails faster, you’re doing it right.

Sam:
It’s like having a Ferrari engine in your car. It’ll get you there faster… but if you don’t know where you’re going, it won’t help.

Paul:
So if a team is getting AI wrong, how do they know?

Sam:
Biggest red flags:

1. Your emails sound like ChatGPT wrote them. Overly polished, robotic, full of buzzwords—it’s obvious.

2. You’re blindly trusting AI’s recommendations. AI is great at making things up. If you’re not verifying, you’re spreading misinformation.

3. Your team isn’t actually improving. If AI is doing all the work, your reps aren’t getting better—they’re just getting lazier.

Paul:
And the fix?

Sam:

1. Use AI to speed up research, not replace it. Have it surface insights—but make your own judgment calls.

2. Write like a human. Let AI assist, but don’t let it strip out your voice.

3. Focus on better, not just faster. The goal isn’t just efficiency—it’s effectiveness.

Paul:
So AI isn’t a replacement for good sales skills. It’s a tool that helps you spend more time on what actually matters.

Sam:
Right. Garbage in, garbage out. AI is only as good as the thinking behind it.

Paul:
If you treat AI like a shortcut, you’ll just get to the wrong answer faster.

Sam:
But if you treat it like a smart assistant, it’ll help you get to the right answer sooner.

Final Thoughts + Where to Start

Paul:
Alright, so if a sales leader reads this and wants to make immediate improvements, what’s the one thing they should go look at in their tech stack this week?

Sam:
Their CRM. Open it up and check the last 10 closed-won deals. Do they have all the key contacts logged? Can you see who was involved in the decision? If not, your team is closing deals but not building future pipeline. Fix that first.

What about you? If someone only does one thing after reading this, where should they start?

Paul:
Their call recording tool. Too many teams buy it and never use it. If you have one, go listen to a handful of calls this week—but don’t just look for mistakes. Find the moments that went really well.

One of my portfolio companies has started sharing "what good looks like" snippets from their call recordings in Slack. It’s reinforcing the right behaviors and making the whole team better. When reps hear a great discovery question or a killer objection-handling moment, they actually start using the tool—not just to get reviewed, but to improve.

Sam:
That’s the real unlock—getting people to actually want to engage with the tools they already have.

Paul:
Exactly. No tool is going to save you if your team isn’t using it the right way.

Thanks to Sam for co-writing this post with me. If you or your team are curious about her Show Me You Know approach, go drop her a line at www.samsalesconsulting.com. And if you don’t already, go follow her on Linkedin - she consistently puts out some of the best, most pragmatic sales advice you’ll find on the platform.