Going From Start-Up to Acquisition with the CEO & Co-Founder of the RevOps Co-op, Matt Volm

The RevOps & ABM Alignment

In this episode, Romeo is joined by Matt Volm, CEO and Co-Founder of RevOps Co-op.

Matt's journey into Revenue Operations (RevOps) began as a VP at ALLY.io, an early-stage startup focused on developing OKR software. As one of the initial ten employees, he managed various aspects, including accounting, legal, finance, and revenue operations. Despite his extensive finance and strategy background, Matt was new to RevOps. In just two years, the company expanded to 150 employees, experienced increased revenue, and was eventually acquired by Microsoft, becoming what we know today as Viva Goals. Subsequently, Matt ventured into building his own company in the RevOps space, founding RevOps Coop—a global community of 10,000 individuals passionate about revenue operations.

The main RevOps challenges, according to Matt, include its evolving nature, the transition to a more strategic approach, and resource allocation. On the other hand, Romeo emphasizes RevOps professionals' need to understand various business processes, such as sales ops, marketing ops, funnels, sales processes, customer success, and finance. Matt elaborates that RevOps is an evolving field, with its scope aligned with revenue-supporting operations like marketing, sales, post-sales, customer success, and customer support. The guest stresses the importance of identifying revenue drivers and investing resources strategically.

When hiring a RevOps candidate, Matt suggests looking for adaptability and a willingness to tackle new challenges. Established companies may prefer specialists, while early-stage ones benefit from versatile generalists. To cultivate strategic thinking in RevOps professionals, Matt suggests constantly asking "why" and learning from internal and external sources, such as team meetings and communities like RevOps Coop. Continuous improvement is crucial in this broad field. The initial period in a RevOps role, Matt advises, should be focused on understanding problems, prioritizing them by impact, and delivering quick wins to gain trust. Building internal relationships and aligning with business goals is essential.

Matt also underscores the importance of reporting structure, recommending that RevOps reports to a Chief Revenue Officer, COO, or VP of Business Ops rather than sales or marketing leaders.

Tune into the full episode to learn more on how to go from a start-up to an acquisition!

HIGHLIGHTS
01:00 Introducing Matt
05:00 Pitfalls of RevOps
12:00 The evolving role of RevOps
19:35 The perfect internal RevOps candidate
23:15 Becoming a strategist
26:30 Hiring internal vs external candidates
30:15 Resource allocation in RevOps
35:45 The big buckets of projects in RevOps roadmaps
40:40 RevOps resource allocation and priorities
44:00 Reporting in RevOps

Connect with Matt:
LinkedIn | Webpage
Connect with Romeo:
LinkedIn | Webpage