Education + Resources, Lighting Industry

What To Know About “Sales Motion”

David Shiller November 11, 2026

“Sales motion” is a startup and tech-industry buzzword that gained mainstream adoption around 2020 in the context of Go-To-Market (GTM) strategy and SaaS (Software as a Service) scaling.

Origin and Popularization

Pre-2020 Roots: While broader terms like “go-to-market strategy” trace back to business literature from the 1990s (such as Harvard Business Review articles on hybrid marketing systems), the specific pairing of “sales” with “motion” is largely a product of Silicon Valley and modern tech revenue architecture.

Rise in Popularity: Industry observers and business writers note that explicit usage of the phrase surged around 2020, driven by the need to distinguish between different high-growth operational models (like product-led growth vs. traditional enterprise sales).

Metaphorical Meaning: Borrowed from sports, military, or physical choreography (like a “motion” in football or a repetitive physical action), the word motion implies a repeatable, dynamic, and coordinated sequence of physical or organizational steps rather than a static, linear document or checklist.

What It Means Today

A sales motion refers to the specific, repeatable way an organization engages, acquires, and expands customers. Rather than just a list of sales stages (the process) or a philosophical approach (the methodology), it defines the entire operational engine of how a deal gets done.

Top image courtesy of Pexels.com.

David Shiller

David Shiller is the Publisher of LightNOW, and Senior Business Development Consultant at Capacity Consulting, a North American consulting firm providing business development services to advanced lighting manufacturers. The ALA awarded David the Pillar of the Industry Award. David has been co-chair of the ALA’s Engineering Committee since 2010. David established MaxLite’s OEM component sales into a multi-million dollar division. He invented GU24 lamps while leading ENERGY STAR lighting programs for the US EPA. David has been published in leading lighting publications, including LD+A, enLIGHTenment Magazine, LEDs Magazine, and more.

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