Frank Poore has sold his startup not once, but three times over. He’s learned a lot about sales skills, raising money and the benefits of thinking differently in the process.
While you may not have heard of Frank’s little e-commerce company, it powers much of today’s online retail. Chances are you’ve ordered many products handled by this technology without even realizing it. Probably even this week. QVC, Walmart, Costco, Home Depot, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Lowes, Macy’s are all some of his 12,000 customers. They processed around $20 billion of merchandise last year.
Frank Poore recently appeared on the DealMakers Podcast. Listen in to the full interview to learn how he built CommerceHub from the ground up, how he raised money before running out of cash, and how he was able to get his company acquired three times being the last transaction $1.1 billion in an all-cash deal (listen to the full podcast episode
Frank’s tips on selling:
- You’ll be a good salesperson if you really believe in what you are selling, terrible if you don’t
- Listen more than you talk so you can really understand the customer’s needs
- Tailor everything to that customer or company from the presentation to pricing
He dove into entrepreneurship with a video game store, back before there were any and before Amazon existed. He says his MBA did offer some broad management thinking and knowledge of finance and operations, and how it all fits together. Though most of what he learned in his MBA had little real application.
Then on his first day, he discovered the Mosaic browser. Realizing the internet had gone beyond textual, to pictures, he knew it was going to be a commerce platform. He knew he would become some kind of online retailer. This discovery even gave him his inspiration for building the online bookstore for the University of Albany while still in school.
Listen in to the full podcast episode for all the details, as well as how to contact him directly with your ideas and questions (listen to the full podcast episode here).
