Andrius Olechnovicius: SaaS Sales Mastery
In this episode of Startup Sales Talks, Dom Urniezius speaks with Andrius Olechnovicius, founder of Value Makers and long time SaaS and fintech sales leader.
Andrius has sat on every side of the table. Seven years in banking. Founder of a B2B lead generation agency. Head of Sales in several B2B tech startups. Sales coach in programs such as Startup Wise Guys and venture capital fund FIRSTPICK.
Today he works with SaaS startups across the Baltics, Nordics, Western Europe, and the United States, helping them design sales models, avoid the classic early stage traps, and build teams that can scale.
This episode is a playbook for founders and sales leaders who want SaaS sales to feel less like chaos and more like a system.
From banking and bicycles to SaaS sales mentor
Andrius did not start in tech at all. His first chapter was seven years at SEB bank. From there he moved into entrepreneurship and opened a very old school bicycle business, selling and renting bikes and running tours.
It was fun and full of lessons, but not very profitable.
In parallel he became fascinated by coaching, earned a formal coaching certification, and for a period worked full time as a life coach while studying psychology deeply.
Only later did he move into B2B lead generation. His agency booked meetings for tech companies and he personally made thousands of cold calls across Lithuania, the Baltics, Europe, and the United States. That experience showed him how hard outbound really is and how much discipline it requires.
When his daughter was born he decided he needed more stable income and went back into employment as Head of Sales in several tech startups. There he saw the same pattern repeating. Nobody really guides founders through SaaS sales. Most simply copy whatever they see in other companies and hope it works.
Looking back, all those random chapters now make sense. Banking gave him structure and finance. Bicycles and entrepreneurship taught him scrappiness. Coaching and psychology gave him tools to understand people. Lead generation hardened his sales muscles. Startup sales leadership gave him the pattern recognition he now uses as a coach.
What makes SaaS sales special
On paper SaaS looks very scientific. You have shared metrics such as sales cycle, conversion rate, churn, monthly recurring revenue, customer acquisition cost, lifetime value, net revenue retention. In theory you can compare any SaaS company to any other regardless of product.
At first that made SaaS feel like pure science to Andrius. But once he worked inside several startups he realised a harder truth.
The theory is universal. The reality is local.
What worked in one SaaS startup did not transfer to the next. Every product, segment, and motion required a different sales model and a different mix of metrics to focus on.
The first movers in a category always have to figure this out from scratch. There is no playbook to copy. That is why founders feel lost.
For Andrius, the real work is not plugging into generic SaaS benchmarks. The real work is helping each startup discover the specific sales motion that fits their product and market.
The founder’s illusion about the first sales hire
One of the most common mistakes he sees.
Founders believe that if they just hire a strong salesperson everything will magically work. That person will design the process, choose the right channels, and close deals.
It almost never happens.
In reality the company needs a sales process that is stronger than its people. When you have a clear process, you can hire motivated but imperfect people and still get results. Without a process, even an A player turns into a B or C player.
So the founder’s responsibility is to design and test the model first. Only then should they scale headcount.
The four layers of sales performance
Most salespeople only think about product knowledge. The better I know the product, the better I will sell. Some realise they also need sales skills, not just feature knowledge.
Andrius argues there are actually four layers.
- Product skills
- Sales skills
- Mental state and mindset
- Physical state and routines
The last two often decide the outcome.
If a rep sleeps badly, has no routine, eats randomly, wakes at midday, joins calls stressed and unprepared, then even the best script and perfect product market fit will not save the meeting.
The boring things such as sleep, food, exercise, and daily structure become strategic in a world where attention is short and calls are dense.
Case study 1
Hiring the right profile for complex enterprise sales
In one client company, the product was complex and trust based. It required deep industry knowledge plus strong sales skills. The team struggled to find candidates who had both.
Instead of waiting for a unicorn, they took a different risk. They hired a person with excellent industry experience and zero sales background but with a personality profile that suggested strong potential.
They invested heavily in coaching. The new hire absorbed everything, applied lessons between sessions, and kept improving. In four to five months he reached an average level compared to experienced sales reps. In around eight months he was among the top performers in the region.
The lesson.
For some products, industry expertise matters more than previous sales roles. Sales skills can be taught. The wrong habits and wrong attitude are much harder to change.
Case study 2
Using more meetings instead of fewer
Another client sold an enterprise product with a very new concept. Buyers struggled to understand it in one call. At first the team tried to compress everything into a single meeting or two and then wondered why deals stalled.
Together they made a bold decision. Instead of fewer meetings they introduced a longer sequence.
Discovery call one.
Deep discovery call two.
Solution presentation.
Business case review.
Sometimes a separate mutual success planning conversation.
They only showed pricing late in the process.
The chief executive was afraid prospects would run away. What happened instead was that key accounts followed the path without much resistance, because the structure made sense to them and mirrored their real internal decision process.
Conversion rates went up because the team finally had enough time to educate buyers, reduce risk, and involve all stakeholders.
Case study 3
Splitting churn prevention and upsell in customer success
Customer success teams often try to do everything. Prevent churn and drive upsell. Most customer success managers enjoy helping and supporting customers but dislike selling.
In one SaaS company Andrius helped test a different structure. They split customer success work into two roles. One team focused only on churn prevention and adoption. Another focused only on upsell and expansion.
At first people worried customers would be confused by having two contacts. With clear explanation and clean handovers that did not happen.
The results were better on both sides. Support minded people could play to their strengths. Commercial minded people could focus on expansion. Conversion improved, and internal motivation increased.
SDR and AE
Why full stack sales is disappearing
Some early stage founders still dream about one person doing everything. Researching accounts, prospecting, booking demos, running discovery, closing deals, and managing accounts.
Andrius compares it to football. Forwards, midfielders, defenders, and keepers exist for a reason. If everybody tried to do everything on the pitch the team would lose badly to any specialist opponent.
Full stack sales is expensive and inefficient.
Prospecting requires one type of person and one type of motivation. Closing requires another. Forcing the same rep to do both usually means they ignore the part they dislike and perform poorly at it.
The trend he sees.
Early SaaS companies used full stack sellers. Over time more and more split functions into SDR and AE, plus account management and customer success. In his view, in the future almost no serious company will keep one person covering the entire funnel.
Trends shaping SaaS sales
Andrius highlights three big shifts.
First, it is getting harder to earn attention. Buyers are flooded with content and cold outreach. The cost of a lead rises every year. That makes the account executive role more valuable because small changes in conversion have a huge impact on revenue.
Second, sales is moving from pressure and persuasion toward value based selling. Modern buyers resist pushy tactics. They respond to education, insight, and a partner mindset. The best salespeople increasingly act like consultants who first create value and only then ask for a decision.
Third, outbound itself is changing. Simple mass email with generic scripts is less effective. The future is a mix of intent data, communities, content, personal brand, events, webinars, and smarter outbound that begins from warm or semi warm signals instead of pure cold lists.
How to hire better salespeople
Because salespeople are great communicators they are also very good at saying exactly what hiring managers want to hear. Relying on interview talk alone is risky.
Andrius uses personality tests such as the sixteen personalities framework as one input. Certain personality types tend to fit sales roles more naturally. That does not mean others cannot sell, but it changes expectations and how much development is required.
He then looks at three things.
- Does the candidate have experience on the customer side or in the target industry
- How do they behave in real practice, not just in theory
- Are they investing in their own learning through books, podcasts, and training
He often assigns homework. For example, prepare a short discovery call simulation or a simple pitch. Watching how they act under realistic conditions reveals far more than a pleasant conversation.
Developing as a SaaS seller
For junior talent Andrius stresses one thing above all. You must take responsibility for your own development. That means reading, listening, and practicing outside of official work hours.
He recommends different material for different roles.
For SDR style roles he likes Grant Cardone’s approach in The 10X Rule, which focuses on massive action, iteration, and staying aggressive with outreach.
For account executives he points to Challenger Sale by Matthew Dixon and Brent Adamson which describes how to teach, tailor, and take control in complex deals using insight and value, not pressure.
For founders and anyone who wants leverage in life and business he recommends The 80 20 Principle by Richard Koch. That book sharpens the skill of focusing on the few activities that drive most of the results, rather than drowning in busywork.
Closing thoughts
Andrius Olechnovicius is a good example of how diverse experience can compound into real expertise. Banking, bicycles, coaching, cold calls, startup sales, and now structured SaaS mentoring all feed into his current work.
For SaaS founders and sales leaders his message is clear.
Do not expect a lone hire to save you. Build a process that is stronger than any single rep. Split roles so people can specialise. Take care of the human behind the quota. Move toward value based selling. And constantly search for the twenty percent of actions that create eighty percent of growth.
