Get the Yes - Lessons in Startup Sales

Sales is all about getting the word YES!
Sounds simple, but everything else is just window dressing that surrounds that essential word.  You need to be able to provide something that people want and they have to be prepared to pay for it.

Early stage startups are full of teams that haven't done much of this before and people who may have done it before but not in the same context.  For example, "How do you sell something when you have a zero dollar marketing budget?" is a common area first time founders hit a brick wall.

So where to begin....here are my top 4 lessons learnt over the last years of success and failure at sales

Firstly, lets not pretend that startup sales (B2B or B2C) is a part time job.  It is full time, full on and essential.  Good deal flow alongside sustainable pipeline is life blood for the startup.  It is a founder responsibility.  You can't outsource it effectively and you can't delegate it effectively because it is too important to the very survivability of the new venture.

Secondly, lets not compromise our thinking about whether startup sales requires a lot of effort.  It is a hyper responsive, all in, double down, exhausting and continuously demanding activity in a startup that is living on the edge of the product roadmap and cash flows for the business.

Thirdly, lets also recognise that sales requires a particular kind of DNA and that DNA is a key influence on the development of the product, the team and the organisation.  It has to have a voice at the top table of decisions.  An equal voice, but not an unequal voice (up or down).

I've got great respect for people who are natural sales people.  I've met good and bad, and been good and bad at it myself.  Throughout it all I can tell you that a sales process is essential for the best sales people, as well as some form of appropriate tool that helps bring it all together.  That tool can be a spreadsheet or something likes Salesforce.com, but it must be there and integrated to the process for all.

(More about Sales process another time)

Surrounding these four lessons is the acknowledgement that all the theory, planning and work that goes into sales amounts to nothing if you don't get that YES!

Stop failing before you even start - Explore and Validate then build

Lots of startups fail, it's true!  Of the many reasons for this, some are completely predictable and common to so many it could almost be called criminal.   It certainly can't be regarded as sustainable.

Take market validation for example.  Too many startup founders (me included) try to build product without rooting it in the true needs of the customer.  They perceive those needs through their own filters and in their own minds, but don't examine those needs enough with their target demographic and then the product doesn't get the traction they hope for when the market sees it.

Two tools I have found incredibly useful in this early stage (and also to repeatedly use in future stages of product evolution) of the development cycle are the Exploratory and Validation Interviews.

Put simply, the exploratory interview helps you understand your target demographic and their frame of reference.  The interview consists of two or three open questions like "tell me about your last experience going to x" and then listening to the answers.  

Validation interviews are where you take the key learnings from the exploratory interviews and present them to a new set of target demographic so they can validate what is most important to them.  A neat way to do this is with the use of cards - one card per learning - and putting them in front of the interviewee simply ask something like "when you last went to x, what was most important to you?".

They key to success with these tools is to ensure you don't bring your own frame of reference to bear on the subject.  No questions like - "if I built a system that did this would you buy it?".  Let their views and observations flow uninterrupted.  Record them.  Learn from them.  Rewatch and relearn regularly.

These tools are simple, cheap and effective.  You need some empathy, some confidence and an iphone along with a little bit of time to both plan and execute the interviews.  They become powerful when the number of interviews is increased to around 50.  100 accumulative across both sets (Exploratory and Validation) and there should be a really clear message coming through about what your target wants, why they want it and the value they see from having it.

The MVP should be built to address the top 1 (or maybe 2) areas that have been clearly identified as a priority by your target group - not by you!

Founders must never delegate these interviews and where possible these should always be done face to face.  The nuance and interpretation of both the answers and the body language are essential to the end result.  Founder instincts and insights are unique.  As much as I encourage the 'open filter' review, it is the special way that founders see the world that creates a difference in what comes next -> finding a solution.

Why do I keep forgetting this lesson?  I don't know!  

Why do so many others?  I am equally at a loss to comment.  

When we use these tools we are much more likely to build products that people want and need.  That must surely be our goal :)