AK Operations was recently named the winner of a Bronze Stevie® Award in the Small Company of the Year- Business & Professional Services category in The 21st Annual American Business Awards®. More than 3,700 nominations from organizations of all sizes and in virtually every industry were submitted to The Stevie® Awards this year for consideration.
We are incredibly proud to be recognized for our impressive growth and success in providing effective sales and marketing solutions to our clients. Keep reading to see the stories we shared in our submission, as well as the judges' comments that highlighted our accomplishments.
The History & Purpose of AK Operations
Stevie® Award Judge's Comment
After pioneering a scalable revenue operations process for her then employer’s lean sales team, Amy Kohl founded AK Operations in 2018. She had spent her career acting as the wingwoman to the founders, but always found herself downplaying that she was a busy mom with three young children because she wanted her career to soar.
But Amy didn’t want to choose between being good at work or being a good mother—it was always an “and” to her. So she founded a company that would support this lifestyle. Fast forward to today and AK Operations is a team of 13 incredibly talented women. Our entire team is based in St. Louis and most are young mothers pioneering and hustling the most innovative sales strategies for teams all over the world.
The company mission has always been to focus on doing good work every day. Our partnership allows companies to stay leaner longer without sacrificing their growth goals. In fact, our clients typically accelerate their revenue goals because our program is so effective. This is a major factor in how we’ve grown entirely on client referrals, averaging 110% in YoY revenue growth since 2018.
Our Achievements Since 2021
Stevie® Award Judge's Comment
Since the beginning of 2021, AK Operations has achieved numerous business goals.
In the thick of the pandemic, AK Operations was recognized not only as Rookie of the Year but also a HubSpot Diamond Partner for our rapid growth and service to HubSpot-led companies.
Second, we diversified our offerings by launching a product, an interactive LMS that teaches our sales and marketing principles so any company with a lean sales organization can build a scalable revenue engine.
We’ve also served a dozen clients through successful exits and fundraising, launched 43 clients to market, and leveled up 39 existing growth teams with better sales automation and operations. Our clients partner with AK Ops with a four month commitment yet our average client tenure is 12 months. We are not an agency; we build out the foundation, perfect the process, and then teach the clients how to run this program long after we are gone. Our foundation sets our clients up for long-term, scalable success.
Last but not least, two women at our company got married in 2022 and three women started their families, bringing the total number of AK Ops’ kids to 14! Our company structure and team culture enabled us to flex during these overlapping maternity leaves and continue to grow our revenues throughout the whole year.
AK Operations’ Competitive Differences
Stevie® Award Judge's Comment
Most consultancies do not take as active a role as we do within the organizations they serve. We truly integrate and become members of their teams and share the same goals. So much so, every woman here is compensated based on performance of her client’s goals. This makes our alignment and partnership bar none. Amy’s founding mission to be compensated on impact, not time, holds true for the entire company now.
We also often work with companies that have failing sales metrics and dwindling runway, so there can be a lot of pressure to fix a struggling company. Although sales is traditionally a male-dominated world, every woman at AK Operations attacks these assignments and partnerships with confidence in our playbook and critically thinks through every strategic decision. We have learned how to empathize with the pressures of the sales leaders at these growth-mode companies. However, we also know when it’s time to push back in our partnerships, earning their respect and, most importantly, their trust.
Coined “the best investment we ever made,” our partnership provides clients with fast, data-driven results that will scale with their companies for years to come. In trying times like now, these wins are the godsend most founders and sales leaders need.
Partner with AK Operations
Access the full scope infographic here.
AK Operations is a fractional sales and marketing team deploying GTM strategies for clients using scalable marketing automation and pipeline generation processes.
We partner with lean sales teams who need top funnel consistency, an internally built revenue engine, and confidence in scaling their GTM operations - ultimately building bigger pipelines with better conversion rates!