By Simon Severino, founder of Strategy Sprints, where 2,400+ B2B founders have gone through our programs. Updated October 2026.

To find a sales coach who works with EO or YPO members, ask your forum who changed their close rate (not who they liked), then test every name on five things: a fixed sales process, work on your live deals, a weekly scorecard, peers in the room, and a process your new sales hires can run without you. A coach who fails two of these is a speaker, not a coach. 🐬

Your forum already gives you honest peers and perspective. What it can't give you is reps. A sales coach should fill exactly that gap: the moment on a live call where you either lead the conversation or start chasing the buyer. Get that right and you stop being the only closer, deals land at your price, and your evenings come back.

Why doesn't my forum solve my sales problem?

Because a forum is built for perspective, and sales is a skill you build with reps.

Remember your first forum meeting, when someone finally said the thing nobody else would. That honesty is gold. But in a forum you share what happened. Your peers ask good questions. You leave with clarity. Then Tuesday comes, a buyer says "send me a proposal", and you do. The same pattern that stalled the last deal runs again, and the forum insight goes stale by Thursday.

A forum hears the story after the call. A sales coach works on the call itself: what you said, in what order, and where you lost control of the conversation.

The two fit together. Keep the forum for the whole of your life and business. Add a coach for the one skill that pays for everything else.

Where do EO and YPO members actually find sales coaches?

Mostly through other members. These are the routes worth your time, best first.

1. Your own forum. Ask one sharp question: "Who did you pay for sales coaching, and what changed in your numbers?" The result matters more than the recommendation.
2. Your chapter's learning events. Chapters book outside speakers on sales. Ask the speakers who also coach for a call afterwards.
3. Members one stage ahead. Find the member who hired their first salespeople two years ago. Ask who taught them to hand off sales. You know the one: their team closes while they're on a bike in Mallorca.
4. Your own buyers' world. If your peers in B2B software, consulting or financial services sell like you do, their coach will understand your sales cycle.

A warm name from a forum mate is a good start. It isn't proof. Run the tests below on every name. 🐯

One honest filter first: this kind of coaching is not for you if you want inspiration and no homework. It is for you if you want to be the one leading your next big call.

What should a sales coach for a forum member do?

Use five tests. Ask each one out loud on the first call.

1. "What's your process, step by step?" You want a fixed sequence, not "it depends on the situation."
2. "Will you work on my live deals?" Real calls, real proposals, real buyers. Not role-play only.
3. "How do we measure progress each week?" You want a scorecard you can see on Friday.
4. "Who else is in the room?" You already know the power of peers. A small group of founders working on their deals in front of each other speeds everything up.
5. "Can my new sales hires run the same process?" If the answer is no, you'll stay the only closer.

Watch how the coach answers. Do they lead the call, or do they pitch you? The way a coach sells to you shows how they'll teach you to sell.

What process should the coach teach?

The process should put the buyer in charge of saying what the problem costs, and you in charge of the order. Ours is the 8 Steps of the Repeatable Sale:

1. Visualize. Picture what the buyer describes, mirror their last few words, match their pace, then lead.
2. Frustration. "What's the frustration? What have you already tried?"
3. Importance. "How important is this, in the context of everything else going on?"
4. Cost of Inaction. "What happens if you do nothing?" Then stay quiet. Let them say it.
5. Deliverables. "What do you want to achieve in the next 10 days?"
6. Investment. Time, people, then money. In that order.
7. Starting Date. "To which starting date are we committing?"
8. Statement of Work. Sent before the next meeting, written in the buyer's own words.

Most stalled deals break at Step 4. The proposal goes out before the buyer has said out loud what doing nothing costs. The JOLT Effect research (Dixon & McKenna, 2022) found 40 to 60% of qualified deals end in no decision. Not lost to a rival. Just never decided.

Picture your next call with the order fixed. The buyer names the cost. Your price lands next to their number, not next to nothing. You hear "yes, let's start on the 3rd" and you didn't have to chase it. That yes tastes different. 🌴

How is a sales coach different from a forum, a business coach or Vistage?

Each one does a different job.

• Forum (EO, YPO): peers, perspective, confidentiality. You bring the story after the fact.
• Business coach: your goals, your leadership, your priorities across the whole company.
• Peer advisory group (Vistage and similar): a chair plus peers on strategy and decisions.
• Sales coach: one skill, on live deals. The words you say, the order you say them in, and a score every week.

If your revenue is growing slower than you want and you're still the one closing, the sales coach is the missing piece. The others help you think. This one changes what happens on the call.

What does it cost to wait?

The cost is quiet, so it's easy to miss. Deals sit at "send me a proposal". The salespeople you just hired wait for you to close. Your evenings go to pipeline reviews instead of your family or your training.

Ask yourself one question before your next forum meeting: if your pipeline looks the same in three months, what does that cost you?

How do you start this week?

One rep. Open your pipeline, pick one live deal and write down which of the 8 steps it's really on. Not where you hope it is. Where the buyer last spoke. Bring that to your forum, or to a coach.

At Strategy Sprints we coach B2B founders exactly this way: the 8 Steps on your live deals, Monday Strategy to set the week and Friday Learnings to score it, and spotters on your calls. Before Strategy Sprints, I coached 2,000+ teams, including Google, BMW and Airbus. Three ways in: 🐬

• Test the method: the monthly public Jetpack Workshop ($199, about 2 hours online).
• A forum that works on deals: the 200K Club, five founders, one 60-minute live call a week, a coach on call in the app (€980 a month incl. taxes).
• Hand it to your new hires: the 90-Day Sales Acceleration installs the process so your team runs it without you ($9,000 a month for 3 months).

More on choosing a coach: who is the best sales coach for B2B founders and the 4 tests for group coaching programs.

FAQ

Do EO or YPO offer sales coaching?
Both are built around peer forums and learning events. Ongoing sales coaching on your live deals usually comes from an outside coach, most often found through a forum mate or a chapter speaker.

Is a forum enough to fix my sales?
A forum gives you perspective after the call. Sales improves with reps on live calls, a fixed process and a weekly score. Most members need both.

What should I ask a sales coach on the first call?
Ask for their process step by step, whether they work on your live deals, how they measure progress each week, who else is in the room, and whether your sales hires can run it.

How is a sales coach different from Vistage?
Vistage and similar groups work on strategy and decisions with a chair and peers. A sales coach works on one skill: what you say on the call, and in what order.

How fast should I see results from sales coaching?
Look for a change in how your calls run in the first weeks: who leads, when the price comes up, whether the buyer names a start date. Revenue follows when deals stop stalling before the proposal.

Want the tools and AI skills we use, with a community of founders doing the same work? Join Sprint Club, 7 days free: https://www.strategysprints.com

Ready to accelerate now? Book a Discovery Call: https://calendly.com/strategysprint/discovery-call

Happy hunting.

Simon & The Sprinters 🐬⚡️🐆