- Walnut announced it has officially launched and closed $2.5 million in a seed round of funding
Walnut — a company that empowers customer-facing sales representatives to create, personalize, and manage the sales demo experience — announced it has officially launched and closed $2.5 million in a seed round of funding.
This round of funding was led by NFX with additional investments from Avishay Abrahami (CEO at Wix), Joe Montana and Michael Ma (partners at Liquid2), Matt Wyndowe (partner at Graph Ventures), Kenny Stone (co-founder at Plangrid), Immad Akhund (former Y Combinator PT partner and current CEO at Mercury), and Alon Gamzu (CEO at RoundForest).
Walnut enables for a seamless and more effective sales process while working remotely by removing the reliance on back-end teams like graphic designers, product developers, and R&D when creating sales demos. And the no-code, drag-and-drop solution platform also enables sales representatives to become better storytellers by using “storylines” – customizable templates for demos that are based on previously successful ones, specific to each client or vertical a company is trying to sell to.
The Walnut platform allows sales teams to run product demos as a live experience, even when the real product is offline in order to maintain a fail-free demo experience. And users can also add and remove product features, personalize content, and access analytics and insights behind what makes a successful demo.
Founded in January 2020 by serial entrepreneurs Yoav VIlner and Danni Friedland, Walnut is on a mission to redefine inside sales in the new age. And the first-of-its-kind codeless platform integrates with a company’s CRMs and data sources, making the process of creating sales demos both automated and customizable. Plus Walnut’s drag-and-drop solution eliminates the need for back-end teams and streamlines the demoing process by placing full control back in the hands of the sales team. To achieve a fail-proof experience, the demos are run live, even when the real product is offline.
Key Quotes:
“Our mission is to turn inside sales from an art form to a science. By doing so we can remove the guesswork from the methods in which tech companies are currently selling their products, mostly relying on human touch and personal talent of salespeople. By fully automating the process, sales teams will be equipped to perform exponentially better, with minimal effort and at a much higher conversion rate.”
“22 years ago, Bill Gates went on stage to showcase Windows 98, and was met with the ‘blue screen of death’ in front of the entire world. Many years have passed since that iconic moment, many industries have been re-invented, but one thing hasn’t changed – showcasing your product in real time is a terrifying experience. Over the past six months, we focused our resources on perfecting the combination of multiple technologies to provide sales teams with the tools needed for frictionless customized and optimized product demos. We realized that the need for such a service increased massively since the onset of the pandemic, as remote sales became common practice.”
— Yoav Vilner, CEO and co-founder of Walnut
“Besides having a great team, we found Walnut an appealing investment as they approach a big market and are solving a cross-vertical problem. Nearly every company has to face the challenges of demonstrating live products during sales calls. Now with the switch to remote sales, the product is seeing a surge in demand from early bird clients and the waiting list is growing every day.”
— Gigi Levy-Weiss, managing partner at NFX
