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Sam Floyd
Sr. Product Manager @ Close
Sam Floyd is a Senior Product Manager at Close, a position he has held since August 2023.12 Based in Atlanta, Georgia, United States, Floyd has extensive experience in product management, particularly in the B2B space.1
Career History
Floyd's professional journey includes:
- Senior Product Manager at Close (August 2023 - Present)1
- Senior Product Manager at Flashtract (August 2022 - August 2023)1
- Product Manager at Sonar (September 2021 - August 2022)1
- Senior Product Manager at SaaSOptics (January 2020 - September 2021)1
- Product Manager at SaaSOptics (October 2018 - January 2020)1
Prior to his product management roles, Floyd worked as an Application Specialist and Sales Development Representative at SaaSOptics.1
Military Service
Alongside his civilian career, Floyd served in the Army National Guard:
- 1st Lieutenant - Information Management Officer (November 2018 - April 2023)1
- 2nd Lieutenant - Disbursing Manager (May 2017 - November 2018)1
Education and Certifications
Floyd's educational background includes:
- Bachelor's degree in Business Administration and Management from Georgia State University1
- Product Leader, Product Management certification from Product School1
He also holds certifications as a Salesforce Administrator and in Product Management from Product Institute.1
Skills and Expertise
Sam Floyd is known for his problem-solving abilities, empathy, and strong background in B2B product management and customer success. His diverse experience across various roles in the tech industry has equipped him with a comprehensive understanding of product development and management processes.
Highlights
We've been thinking a lot lately about how we should incorporate AI into our product. (Who hasn't?)
A lot has already changed because of AI. It's easy to come up with dozens of ideas all "powered" by AI. And it's tempting to want to build as many AI features as possible.
But will any of those AI feature actually be valuable?
To answer that it feels critical to first focus on the core job your product helps customers do.
I love Des Traynor's example of the job of entertaining yourself on public transport. (podcast link in the comments)
People on long commutes used to read newspapers or look out the window to pass the time. Now, if you get on a train or bus you won't see a single person's face. What you'll see is the top of their head because they're looking down at their phone.
The job of entertaining yourself on public transport hasn't changed. It's just the technology that changed.
We have to become obsessed with the job and the problems we are solving for our customers. Not the technology.
When the customer's job is at the center, then we can better evaluate how AI could make that job quicker, easier, or better for more users.
I’m very excited to update my LinkedIn and share I'll be joining Close on their product team.
I’ve been an SDR, Support Rep, Product Manager, Part-time Admin, and even did a brief “consulting” stint... the common thread in all of these roles has been how much time I’ve spent learning, using, and administering CRMs.
• As an SDR, I lived out of Salesforce - praying I could update a Lead to “Demo Scheduled” • As a Support Rep, I got my Salesforce Admin cert so that I could be the internal SME and help our customers implement our integration in their Salesforce accounts. • As a Product Manager, I led the launch of new integrations with Salesforce, HubSpot, and Pipedrive. • I was a Product Manager at Sonar a company founded to help RevOps teams, which also happens to do a little with Salesforce as well. • As a part-time Admin, I built dozens of reports and automation to get the most out of our internal CRM
I’ve loved getting learn and use different CRMs over my career and I'm looking forward to continuing to learn and focus on CRMs full-time.
All this to say, I cannot wait to get up to speed and start contributing to the product at Close. Thank you Marcin Grajcar and team for the opportunity!
PS - If you’re a sales rep and want to vent about your CRM my DMs are always open….
