The Samy Award: celebrating Utah's Top Sales and Marketing Executives.

• Author: Francom, Sarah Ryther

In many ways, sales and marketing executives are the lifeblood of an organization. As SAMY award honoree Chris Harrington says, "It doesn't matter how amazing a company's product is--if that product is not sold, the company will die."

To be successful in sales and marketing, one must possess a unique combination of skills. A sales and marketing professional must have the inherent ability to develop and nurture key relationships. They must be able to listen to others, and to recognize and creatively solve their clients' problems. They must understand that hearing "no" doesn't mean the opportunity to sell is over but has just begun.

In our fourth annual SAMY recognition program, we pay tribute to the sales and marketing professionals who have excelled not just individually, but have also pushed their teams forward and helped their companies become industry leaders.

Sales

Dave Bethers

Vice President, Sales and Operations

TCN, Inc.

Dave Bethers joined TCN as its customer support manager when the company was a small, 12-member organization. X Bethers, who was brought on board to grow the company, directed his efforts toward developing relationships among employees and customers. "Client by client, we developed a clear and distinguished reputation of excellence that started to spread by word of mouth into the industries that we serviced," he says. "I believe early on that we set a standard at TCN to service clients to the fullest extent possible regardless of their size. This determination has paid dividends in word-of-mouth referrals and our overall reputation."

Bethers' commitment to the company and its growth has been critical to TCN, which is a cloud-based call center technology provider. Under his leadership, TCN experienced 75 percent growth during the last five years and now has 60 employees. He also spearheaded the company's global expansion into Canada, India, Mexico, Argentina, the UK and Australia.

"I have come to understand that 'sales' can be synonymous with 'service,'" he says. "[A sale] begins the moment you have a receptive audience. It grows as comprehension of the specific needs of the prospect is discovered and climbs when you and the prospect jointly realize that what you are offering is exactly what they have been looking for."

Favorite way to unwind: I ride a street-legal dirt bike to work. The fresh air really wakes me up in the morning and helps me decompress at night. It is also illegal and almost impossible to text or take a phone call while you are driving a motorcycle. That means that I get at least 20 minutes twice a day where I am free to think. So that is really my time to decompress and prepare for my family.

Chris Harrington

President

Domo

Chris Harrington started his nearly 30-year sales career by hitting the pavement and "uniting Ginsu knives with every American in need of a better set of cutting utensils," he recalls. Harrington excelled at his first and subsequent sales positions, including stints at DIRECTV, Computer Associates and Omniture, because he found reward in solving

customer problems.

"[The sales] job is simply to bridge the gap between the problems that the customer may have and what their company has to offer," he says. "If a sales professional feels like they are bothering customers, they will not last long and will not be successful."

While at Omniture, Harrington led all enterprise sales for the Americas, where he had $890 million in annual sales responsibility and received worldwide recognition for sales leadership.

Today, Harrington serves as president and board member at Domo, focusing on customer acquisition, retention and growth. "Managing 20 to 40 percent quarter-on-quarter growth and the significant infrastructure required to sustain this growth and customer acquisition has been the most challenging and rewarding experience in my professional life," he says. "We now have more than 500 employees and more than 600 customers and have been selling for just a little more than two years."

Out-of-work passions: While I love cars, travel and am a recovering timepiece addict, I don't know if these things are passions or not. But having grown up...