Salespeople are taught to pitch. Great salespeople start by mapping. This week on SalesTV, we’re joined by Dr. Ryan O’Sullivan - Global Account Manager at Introhive and host of Deal Talk - to explore why the best sellers don’t lead with product or even with pitch, but with precision.

In this episode, we'll ask:

* How do you identify the 100 people who matter in a 200,000-person organization?

* Why is mapping relationships more important than mapping org charts?

* What’s the 3-step process for finding your real buyers in key accounts?

* When should the seller not be the one engaging the stakeholder?

With two decades in enterprise sales and a doctorate focused on defining and measuring B2B relationship quality, Ryan has built a framework used by global companies to win bigger deals, faster. His approach is rooted in data, backed by field experience, and focused on long-term growth—not quick wins.

Facts, the latest thinking, chat, and banter about the world of sales.

Come and join us for some lively discussion and debate.

This week's Guest was -

• Dr. Ryan O’Sullivan, Global Account Manager at Introhive and author of Building B2B Relationships: How to identify, map and develop key relationships to win more business

This week's Host was -

• Rob Durant, CEO of US Operations at The Institute of Sales Professionals

Transcript of SalesTV.live Mid-Day Edition 2025-04-01

Rob Durant [00:00:01]:

Good morning, good afternoon, and good day wherever you may be joining us from. Welcome to another edition of sales TV live. Today, we're learning why we should stop pitching and start mapping. We're joined by doctor Ryan O'Sullivan, a global account manager at Intohive and host of DealTalk, as well as the author of Building b two b Relationships. Ryan has built a framework used by global companies to win bigger deals faster. His approach is rooted in data backed by field experience and focused on long term growth, not just quick wins. Ryan, welcome.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:00:49]:

Thank you very much, Rob. Pleasure to be here.

Rob Durant [00:00:52]:

Great to have you here. Ryan, let's start by telling you have us, by having you tell us a little bit about you, your background, and, what led you to where you are today?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:01:04]:

Well, I'll I'll make it the short version, but, I consider myself a a salesman by trade. So started out new business salesperson historically. Worked for big global consulting company called called Infosys. Was there for for eight and a half years. Worked in their strategic deals, team mapping the key execs for some of their big deals and doing similar type of analysis for for strategic accounts as well. And also during that process, I'd understood the importance of relationships, and that's what led me to to start the doctorate research. So that took me seven years part time while I was, working at Intrahy at Infosys. And and during that time, I I found out about Intrahyve, which, is a software that actually helps you map relationships.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:01:57]:

So it was a bit of a match made in heaven, I guess, and, moved over there in my current role, been here for for five years. And as you, very kindly wave the book in front of you there, that's a newly published book just published at the beginning of the year. Took me about eighteen months to put together. So all of my pearls of wisdom around the the relationship mapping and measuring, of quality of relationships. So that's what's contained within that book and something that I think has really turned out to be sort of my thing, I guess, as I as I look back now. I'm 46. I look back the last ten, fifteen years. That's really where I've been focused on is about identifying, mapping, and developing these key stakeholder relationships.

Rob Durant [00:02:44]:

Excellent. Thank you for that. So, Ryan, I wanna jump right into the topic of the day. What do you mean when you say start mapping?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:02:56]:

Well, I think as as you alluded to in in the things about stop pitching, stop mapping, but the and I can give you a bit of a backstory, and I just told you my my background where I was working at at this firm and where where I went from look. Relationships are important. Nobody listening to this needs to be convinced that relationships matter. We all know that. We all experience it every day. So then I went, well, if your relationships are important, what is a good relationship? And I spent seven years researching that part time. It sounds quite a long time to to say that, out loud, but you can get your hands on my doctorate thesis just with my name and type in to Portsmouth University. You'll find the whole thing.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:03:37]:

I interviewed CXOs and a whole bunch of other stuff to really understand the detail around relationships. And as I was getting to the end of that, I realized that I actually missed a step out in that whole logical process. So relationships are important, but who do you need to build relationships with is a a critical factor before you then determine, do we or as an organization have strong relationships with that with those individuals? Because too often, whether it's in, prospect account or hunting side or whether you're looking at key accounts, you tend to gravitate towards the people who you already have relationships with. If we think about this in in the key account context, that's who you tend to gravitate to. But I'm I'm really espousing the fact to take a step back, look at the account as a whole, look at the key individuals that matter, the executive suite and the the key buying personas for your service lines, and identify them, literally map them. So identify and map the specific people that matter for you for that particular deal or for that particular account, and then you start the process of understanding the priorities, etcetera. So I think too often, we can just get ahead of ourselves and start pitching as we say without really understanding the context, who the right people are, and sometimes spending too much time with people we're comfortable with that already know us and and and not enough time with the with identifying the people that matter and maybe using those relationships with who we know to get to the right people as part of a more more broad strategy.

Rob Durant [00:05:22]:

So how exactly do you do that? How do you identify the 100 people who matter in a 200,000 person organization?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:05:32]:

Yeah. Good question. So what we the the process I talk about in my book, and I'll summarize it now, it's it's a case of understanding your service lines. So let's take an example for a of a a global IT services firm I'm currently working with. They have 12 service lines. You know, you got AI. They've got network services. They've got data analytics.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:05:53]:

So they've got these specific service lines. And then within each service line, you would have a a typical buying persona. So let's just say if it's data analytics, you're looking at head of chief data officer, head of data, head of business intelligence. So these types of profiles, titles match map to that specific, service line. And if you do that across the 12 service lines and you look at their executive suite, you end up with a template really with this typical buying personas for for that specific, organization. And then if you apply that to an account, it can be a prospect account or it can be a key account, equally applies. And then you identify the specific people. The obvious place to go is, LinkedIn or Sales Navigator and specifically find the people that match those specific, titles.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:06:51]:

So you do that as a as a project. It takes maybe an hour or two, to pull that out, and then you basically have your initial, identification and and mapping of the key executives. So what you'll find when you do that type of analysis is you may well have a a bank like, Wells Fargo, JP Morgan, or or any other company for that matter that have literally hundreds of thousands of employees generally and and often on LinkedIn. But when you focus it like that, you'll end up with maybe a 50 people. And that's the the the entire map for everybody that matters to you. So that's your universe.

Rob Durant [00:07:34]:

But what's the difference between, relationship map and does a simple org chart? Does it really matter?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:07:44]:

Yeah. So that, in essence, is a really big org chart. If you're able to then, organize where those people fit, that takes a bit of work and some internal tribal knowledge, I guess. But you've got the executive suite, which is often on the website. So you can find the CEO, the reporting lines of the CEO, and you've got these other organizations. And if if you understand the internal business units, you can start to cluster those people that you found in the right organ org structure. So that is quite an quite an a detailed organizational structure. But the the important part comes as you just suggested there, which is the relationship map side.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:08:24]:

So look. One thing I recognize from my, new business days, and I'm like, I'm talking about twenty years ago versus today. It was tough back then, but it's very, very difficult today with cold outreach and how are you able to engage with people. I know we all talk about social selling. We talk about engaging through through social media and and other forms, but it's so so difficult now to do that from cold outreach, whether it's email or any a phone or any anything else or more difficult than it's ever been. So what I'm espousing is to leverage the existing relationships. So this is where you start to build some context to that relationship map. You know who the people that matter.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:09:10]:

You know who they are now because you've identified them. So then it's a case of, mapping on top of their existing relationships with those specific people. And then beyond that, you've got, well, who else do you know that can provide intelligence and a pathway to get to those people? So this is where the hard work starts. That that the identifying and initial mapping element that I described is literally a few hours work. But the way I describe the relationship lens that you put on that is around three different legs. So I won't go into all the details, but it's basically the the internal relationship. So you look internally within your organization. You look externally, not including your company or the the target company, and then you look at the target company.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:10:00]:

So if you go through the the internal your internal piece for a start, what you're looking at there is all the history. So what engagements have you had with that organization? What's what are the management? So you might need to do walk the corridors a bit, understand from the CRM the diff the different activities that have happened, the different proposals that have gone in. And also an interesting one is do a do a Boolean search on LinkedIn to identify who used to work at the prospect company or target company, but currently works at your company. And I did this for one of the, for one of the the client I was just talking about, and they were they were doing this for JPMorgan. And we realized they had a hundred people that currently worked at their company that used to work at JPMorgan. So you start to build those that that insight internally. So just to get that perspective. And, obviously, with with software like IntraHive, you get a complete perspective on who internally has the the connected relationships, and you can get all that history as well going back, you know, as long as as many years as you have it.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:11:07]:

So that's a summary on the internal piece. The external side is really about, understanding the context of the partner ecosystem. So who have you got similar partners that could potentially help you? Who who do you know as an, maybe an adviser or an industry leader that can, that can give you some insights into that organization? And then another interesting one is, who do you know that used to work there that has since left? So this if you're using LinkedIn, you can use TeamLink, to identify within your own organization people that have since left there. And if you do some searches, you can find people that, that were very senior perhaps. Because they've left, they're more willing to share, intelligence about the organization, the competitor landscape, the different dynamics that are there, personal dynamics, personality wise, and other sort of business dynamics. And then the third leg is obviously the most important, which is internally within the organization itself. So who do you know within there? And doing that exercise with legs one and two, you start to build a picture of who might be the friendly people to talk to, who on your side are the right people to to engage with those individuals where there is a a specific relationship. You also look for existing clients that have maybe moved and now work at that organization as well so that you've got a history with them.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:12:40]:

This is especially useful. If it's a prospect account, you you I'll highlight a lot of people there that that potentially know your organization. You've been successful for them, and now they happen to work at the prospect account. So you can do that analysis. And then the the opposite of what I said before, who used to work at your company and now works at this organization. And and the same example I just talked about with JPMorgan, we realized that 350 people, believe it or not, used to work at this global IT services firm and now worked at JPMorgan all over the world. And when you did the analysis, you start to see there's some very senior people in market in, you know, in in The US, in in UK, in Europe, and you can leverage those relationships. So that is this mapping element, and it takes time, takes effort.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:13:31]:

I call it panning for gold, so you will understand which when when you find something that is potentially useful. And I think anyone that's been doing this for a while will realize that, you know, one relationship is all that matters between either opening a new account or closing that deal or or, you know, growing into a new park pocket of business or region or entity, subsidiary maybe. So that's that's a summary of the, the the mapping piece to to, to the org chart.

Rob Durant [00:14:06]:

I wanna pick up on that last bit, but first, I wanted to share, one of our viewers is saying, let's see. It's Duck Wynn shares, this is also the problem I'm facing right now. It's tough to know who my potential clients are. Doug, thank you for sharing that. Ryan, picking up on that last thought, how can I prioritize which stakeholders to build relationships with, especially in large accounts?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:14:36]:

Well, look. You've the the the the basic premise of building a relationship with any executive is you need to help them solve their problems. It's very simple, isn't it? Simple to say, difficult to do. So who having done that research, having identified who those key people are, having got some context to what they're working on and having understood, where you have existing relationships to leverage, My premise again is also is always back to where can you leverage your relationship. So who do you have the right pathway into? Who can you build the right context? Who can you who with who can you work with to gather some intelligence about the competitive landscape for for who has specific burning platform problem. But, obviously, then you gotta think to your solution. So where do you fit in all of this, and how how confident are you that you can have a a sensible business conversation with someone about something that matters to them, present yourself in the right way, assuming you don't know them personally, but you're having enough context to come to that meeting with that they they've recognized that you've done your homework. They treat you as a peer, as someone with respect, and you're able to then deliver, a compelling proposition, I guess, as as part of those conversations.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:16:01]:

So it's difficult to determine, you know, very objectively where to go, but I think you need to you need to subjectively assimilate all of those conversations. And and through the nuances of that intelligence gathering, I think you you will understand. I mean, I'm it's it's always about is sales an art or a science? I think there is a mixture of the two, and the art part is having that that instinct to to figure out, look, where is the right place to to to focus based on the, you know, the knowledge and the information that I've gathered.

Rob Durant [00:16:37]:

Picking up on that art and science, when should the seller not be the one engaging the stakeholder?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:16:46]:

Well, this is something I devote quite a bit of time in in, one of my, chapters, chapter nine, I believe, multithreading. So I think and and there's some Gartner research that I referenced where between probably higher now. I think it said eight to 13 people are involved in the decision from the client side. That's for any type of enterprise. And if you're doing a strategic, you know, tens of million dollar type of deal, it can be a lot more. But the point is they you are dealing with many people on the client side, whether it's a 50 k deal or whether it's it's a $500,000,000 deal. But you can't manage all of that for one. If you think you can, I I don't think you're able to do that? Anyone out there that believes they can.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:17:32]:

But the point is clients don't want to talk to you as as as as the there's the leader, the bid leader, the the account manager, the global client partner, whatever role you have. You need to to step back and and be the the maestro, if you will, or the director of the film. So and orchestrate the right people. And I think that when you do that well, and if you're talking on a deal level here and you're starting to match people with the with similar personality styles, maybe, but certainly the right domain and technical expertise. If you're dealing with a technical data privacy person or you're talking, with a business guy about sort of a specific industry that they're they're responsible for, bringing in the right people that you believe will be the right match. And again, you might be meeting for the first time, but it the most important thing is the intelligence gathering to position the right people and use people on the inside to help you. So you really need to to balance that and, and and and be there in the background, I'd say, obviously, orchestrating these things in the right way and bringing in an equal number of people from your side and the executives as well when when the time's right.

Rob Durant [00:18:45]:

So what signals should I look for to know if the relationship, is strong enough to influence a deal?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:18:58]:

On the client side?

Rob Durant [00:19:01]:

As the seller, what signals should I be looking for?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:19:06]:

So do you mean the relation the the strength of the the the relationship with someone on the client side? Yes.

Rob Durant [00:19:13]:

Oh, yes. Thank you. Yes.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:19:15]:

So, look, the point the point here is you don't always need to you you won't have strong relationship with all these decision makers. The point is how do you position yourself so when you get the opportunity, you you start off on the right foot. So if I start from that point and then back to my doctorate research, there's you you when when you meet these key executives, you need to have done the right amount of of of intelligence gathering and preparation. So this is, when I did my doctor, I I interviewed CXO, so very, very senior people from big global corporations. JPMorgan, actually, I mentioned them already, but, you know, Amex, BP. I asked them a simple question about who's the who's the best person you've ever worked with from the supplier side and what made them so special. And we went through all all these details, but one specific component we talked about is when you're meeting someone for the first time, what did these people do? And they talked about they all could remember to to for the most part, when they first met these special individuals that they talked about, and they just felt that they came to the meeting with the right level of knowledge, having prepared, talked to their direct reports, crafted a a a compelling conversation, thread, and that set them on the right stead. So I think don't need to be too concerned about having having the right level of relationship with the key decision makers.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:20:49]:

I think if you've got people on the inside, that's the common theme I I see across all the deals I've analyzed is having a champion or champions on the inside, people that are willing to help you. And and without that, I think it's more of so that's a real zero sum game. So you need the people on the inside that are going to help, choreograph these types of conversations and interactions with the key execs. And the people that's sitting beneath them and around them are the ones that actually execute on this stuff. So that's where you're building up the the level of support. So when it comes to meeting the execs, obviously, start off on the right foot. That will send you on the the right trajectory to build relationships. But when you're thinking about, entry points, you need to to start with people that that you already have some type of common common ground with.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:21:42]:

And that's not necessarily you, but it's it's the the the wider your your wider network that can that can help facilitate that.

Rob Durant [00:21:50]:

And you mentioned involving your team. What's the best way to involve my internal team in multithreaded outreach without really just overcomplicating things?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:22:05]:

Well, I think there is a bit of strategy that is required to be fair. So what cadence you might have if this is a specific account, you may well have weekly or fortnightly meetings. So bring in the right team. If it's a deal, you'd be going through the same type of cadence structure. So I think you need some planning. So apart lot of what I espouse in my book is actually the chestnut checkers analogy. So take the time. Don't rush into things.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:22:35]:

It's it's there's always the eager eagerness to sort of rush in to send an a LinkedIn request to somebody because you want to meet them. I'm really saying slow down on all of that stuff and actually take the time to build the strategy. And and when you're preparing for a a meeting, say, for example, you've got a session, a meeting with a client and you know there's gonna be a couple of additional people on that call that you want to try and multi thread around, you actually need to plan for that. So you can do your own research. It can be the soft stuff about sort of where they're from, which which hometown they're from, stuff you might have found on their social media about sports teams or any of the other visits. They might have been, on Twitter. They talked about an event they were at. So that needs to be choreographed a bit.

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:23:22]:

So you've got someone on your side who you're trying to pair with that individual. You'd need to to feed them with that type of insight and ask them maybe to to present that as part of the conversation. But, also, if it's if it's trying to build a more of a business type relationship, you you want to engineer some type of follow-up as part of the the engagement. So maybe send a case study or some specific outreach that you would say you've got the the soft side of stuff if someone you're trying to to team up with an individual to to to create that that, conversation. And then that same person would suggest a follow-up piece of content. And then after the meeting, they can I I'd always suggest they'd rather than do a a group email, you send a one on one email with some type of content, and hopefully that would foster a, a response, a positive response, and start that that channel, that multi multithreaded channel? But even if they don't respond, you you will be able to activate that network that that channel again later. So and and if you reply on to that email, they'll see that you actually re re reached out and shared something with them. So all is not lost if they don't don't react in the right way.

Rob Durant [00:24:43]:

Brian, if you were to emphasize one thing you would want our audience to take away from today's episode, what would that one thing be?

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:24:53]:

Well, I've mentioned it a few times and it I think it's the secret weapon today that that really helps get out of the the issues with AI and automation and the autumn automation of, research, it's intelligence gathering. If you can use your network to gather insights around the competitive landscape, the profile, and everything else, that is what you should take away. And and I I gave a few hints as to, like, how you can how you can orchestrate that in in the session. So that is really your secret your superpower.

Rob Durant [00:25:26]:

Fantastic. Ryan, this has been great. How can people learn more, and where can they get in touch with you? It'd

Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan [00:25:33]:

be a pleasure to connect on LinkedIn. I think that's the place place to be. So, reach out on that, and I share various content and and, do similar sessions to this. So it's a great place to to catch up with me.

Rob Durant [00:25:46]:

Excellent. If you like what you heard today, please take a moment to leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Substack, or YouTube. Let us know what you learned and what you'd like to learn more about. Your feedback helps us reach more people like you and fulfill our mission of elevating the profession of sales. This has been another edition of Sales TV Live. On behalf of everyone at Sales TV, to our guest Ryan and to our audience, thank you for being an active part of today's conversation, and we'll see you next time. Bye.

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