Qualified announces Scott Beechuk to its Board along with raising $12m Series A funding led by Norwest Venture Partners

– USA, CA –  Qualified, the conversational marketing platform for companies that use Salesforce, today announced a $12 million Series A funding round led by Norwest Venture Partners with additional participation from existing investors including Redpoint Ventures and Salesforce Ventures, bringing the total funding to $17 million.

Concurrent with the financing, Scott Beechuk, partner at Norwest Venture Partners, will join the board of directors.

“The conversational model is simply a better way to connect with new customers. Buyers love the real-time engagement, sellers love the instant connections, and marketers have the confidence that every dollar spent on demand generation is maximized,” said Scott Beechuk, partner at Norwest Venture Partners. “The multi-billion-dollar market for Salesforce automation software is going to adopt this new model, and Qualified is perfectly positioned to capture that demand. If your company uses Salesforce, Qualified will be a multiplier on your sales and marketing investment.”

The financing will be used to meet the growing demand for conversational marketing in the Salesforce ecosystem.

Qualified is solving a multi-billion-dollar problem for enterprise marketing and sales teams. For B2B brands, building sales pipeline is a slow, inefficient process with delayed handoffs and missed opportunities to meet with qualified buyers.

“Your website should be your brand’s biggest marketing asset to drive pipeline, but instead, it’s your biggest blind spot,” said Kraig Swensrud, co-founder and CEO of Qualified. “What if your sales team could meet with your most valuable buyers at the magic moment they’re on your website and ready to connect? That’s the future of B2B sales and marketing.”

Qualified turns a B2B website into a real-time selling machine, enabling marketing and sales teams to identify when target buyers arrive on the website and instantly start a conversation. Qualified ties directly into Salesforce to give companies a 360-degree view of their website visitors, and arms them with tools to have a high-fidelity sales meeting, including live chat, chatbots, voice calls, and screen sharing. Within months of using Qualified, ThoughtSpot increased conversations with its target accounts by 10x, Bitly grew its enterprise sales pipeline by 6x, and Gamma drove over $2.5 million in new business pipeline.

Qualified takes a unique approach as the only conversational marketing platform designed to work seamlessly with complex Salesforce configurations. The platform is rated highest in its category on the Salesforce AppExchange, and built for enterprise-grade reliability and security with 99.9% uptime, GDPR compliance, SOC2 compliance, and Salesforce ISV certification.

“Qualified’s conversational marketing platform is built natively on Salesforce, is custom-built for Salesforce customers and a natural fit for our ecosystem,” said Matt Garratt, managing partner, Salesforce Ventures. “Qualified’s innovative technology accelerates the timeline from lead to opportunity, making the pipeline more efficient and creating loyal customers around the globe.”

Qualified was founded in 2018 by former Salesforce executives Kraig Swensrud and Sean Whiteley. During their time at Salesforce, Kraig served as chief marketing officer and Sean as GM and product SVP. This is the third company that the duo has built in the Salesforce ecosystem. With this funding, Qualified will more than double the company’s size in all key functions including sales, marketing, customer success and product, with additional features coming around artificial intelligence and Salesforce Einstein.

About Qualified.com

Qualified is the conversational marketing platform for companies that use Salesforce and the highest-rated solution on the Salesforce AppExchange. Enterprise sales and marketing teams at leading brands such as ThoughtSpot, Adecco, Bitly, and Zero Motorcycles trust Qualified to grow their sales pipeline by turning their greatest untapped marketing asset — their corporate website — into a real-time selling machine. Headquartered in San Francisco, Qualified is led by former Salesforce CMO Kraig Swensrud and former Salesforce Product SVP Sean Whiteley, and funded by Norwest Venture Partners, Redpoint Ventures and Salesforce Ventures.

For more information: https://www.qualified.com/

About Norwest Venture Partners

Norwest is a leading venture and growth equity investment firm managing more than $9.5 billion in capital. Since our inception, we have invested in more than 600 companies and partner with over 150 active companies currently in our venture and growth equity portfolio. The firm invests in early to late-stage companies across a wide range of sectors with a focus on consumer, enterprise, and healthcare. We offer a deep network of connections, operating experience, and a wide range of impactful services to help CEOs and founders scale their businesses. Norwest has offices in Palo Alto and San Francisco, with subsidiaries in India and Israel.

For more information: https://www.nvp.com/

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