How to sell to Heads of Sales at Cybersecurity companies
The Head of Sales in a cybersecurity company is primarily measured on quarterly revenue growth. They respond positively to outreach that demonstrates a clear understanding of their specific sales cycle challenges, such as lengthy compliance processes that can stall deals. Highlighting how you can accelerate these processes can make your outreach compelling and relevant.
Written and maintained by the SoloRiff team, who build outbound software and run outbound with it. The figures below are our own: we measured 569 cybersecurity company domains over public DNS on 2026-09-03. Last updated 2026-09-03.
What actually hurts
- lengthy sales cycles
- regulatory compliance delays
- lost deals due to non-compliance
- team capacity issues
The playbook
- 01
Identify recent compliance challenges
Research recent news articles or press releases that mention compliance issues faced by cybersecurity firms. Use sources like CyberScoop or Dark Reading. If a company has recently reported SOC 2 compliance delays, this is a strong trigger for your outreach.
- 02
Segment by sales team size
Filter your list for companies with sales teams of 10-50 people. This size often indicates a need for scalable solutions to manage compliance-related sales delays. Use LinkedIn Sales Navigator or ZoomInfo to refine your list based on team size.
- 03
Quantify the impact of compliance on sales
Craft your message to include data on how compliance issues can extend sales cycles by an average of 30%. Use industry reports or case studies to support your claims. This demonstrates an understanding of their pain points and positions your outreach as relevant.
- 04
Address the fear of regulatory fines
In your outreach, acknowledge the fear of potential fines due to non-compliance that may lead to lost deals. Offer insights into how your solution can mitigate these risks. This specific concern resonates deeply with Heads of Sales in cybersecurity.
- 05
Follow up after industry events
If a relevant cybersecurity event has recently occurred, follow up with leads who attended. Reference discussions around compliance challenges from the event. Timing your outreach within a week after the event increases the chances of engagement.
Can cybersecurity companies even receive your mail?
We measured the DNS of 569 cybersecurity companies, sampled evenly across company sizes, to see how many authenticate their own email. It matters in both directions: a domain that does not authenticate is a domain whose team is used to mail going missing — and if your own domain is in the gap, yours is the mail going missing.
Publishes a DMARC policy of quarantine or reject — the domain actually asks receivers to act on failures.
The gap is the finding: 30.3% of 1–10-person companies against 91.3% of the largest — 61 points apart. Small companies are where the unauthenticated domains are, and small companies are who most cold outreach is aimed at.
Where does your domain sit?
Same three lookups, run live against your domain. Nothing is stored and nothing is emailed to you.
How this was measured
Company domains were sampled within employee-count bands, then queried over public DNS for SPF (TXT at the apex), DMARC (TXT at _dmarc.) and MX. One domain per company, deduplicated. Anyone can reproduce any single row of this with dig.
DKIM is deliberately absent. A DKIM key lives under a selector that cannot be enumerated from outside the domain, so a company with flawless DKIM under a name we did not guess would be counted as having none. That would measure our guess list, not the industry.
Domains with no MX record are excluded rather than counted as failures — parked and redirect-only domains would otherwise drag every figure down and make the result an artefact of the sample.
Sampled within bands, so this describes the population of companies, not of employees: a 10-person company counts once, as does a 10,000-person one. Each band is at least 60 domains; bands below that are not published. Figures are percentages of the sample, not of the whole industry, and we publish no company names — only counts.
Measured 2026-09-03. Re-measured monthly.
The full census across every industry — sortable, with sample sizes, free to reuse under CC BY 4.0.
Subject lines that fit
- Overcoming compliance hurdles
- Speeding up your sales cycle
- Addressing compliance delays
Questions
- Why do Heads of Sales in cybersecurity ignore outreach about compliance solutions?
- Heads of Sales may perceive compliance solutions as secondary to immediate revenue generation. If your outreach does not clearly connect compliance issues to lost sales or extended cycles, it risks being overlooked. Ensure your messaging ties compliance directly to their revenue goals.
- What common objections do Heads of Sales have when approached about compliance tools?
- A common objection is the belief that compliance tools add unnecessary complexity to the sales process. They may also worry about the cost versus the perceived benefit. Address these concerns by clearly showing how your solution simplifies compliance without adding overhead.
- How can I demonstrate value to a Head of Sales in cybersecurity?
- Demonstrate value by providing case studies or examples showing how your solution has helped similar companies reduce sales cycle times and improve compliance efficiency. Tailoring your examples to their specific industry challenges can significantly enhance your credibility.
- What timing is best for reaching out to Heads of Sales?
- The best timing is typically at the beginning of a quarter when they are setting sales targets and strategies. Additionally, reaching out shortly after major cybersecurity events can be effective, as they may be reflecting on insights gained from those discussions.
Or have it run itself
SoloRiff does every step above on its own — finds the companies, finds the people, writes each of them individually, and handles the replies. Drop your URL and watch it work before you sign up for anything.
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