Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing

Re:Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing by jt2190 on Tuesday June 03, 2014 @04:06PM (#7842407)

In addition, people are socialized to avoid giving insult, so even if they hate your product they won't tell you to your face. If all the user feedback you're collecting is positive but you're not seeing user uptake, you're probably not getting honest feedback.

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Re:Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing by paul on Tuesday June 03, 2014 @04:16PM (#7842462)

That's why I always tell them to get an LOI. Often people will say, "that sounds great, let us know when it's ready", and the founder will mistakenly think that's a sale. Even asking someone to sign a non-binding LOI forces a lot more honesty.

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Re:Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing by hglaser on Tuesday June 03, 2014 @06:40PM (#7843141)

This was one of the most helpful pieces of advice I ever got as a founder.

Pre-product, when customers would say "Yes, I would buy this," we asked them to sign a non-binding LOI to that effect.

Nowadays, if a prospect says they'll buy when we have feature X, we ask them to sign a modified customer contract that says they don't have to pay until we mutually agree that the feature is done.

It has saved countless developer months spent on features that were not the real reason the customer didn't want to buy. And it sometimes causes the prospect to start saying, "well, actually, the issue is..." and then you can get the real feedback.

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Re:Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing by SteliE on Tuesday June 03, 2014 @04:59PM (#7842695)

I always like to ask "What will it take for you to become a customer of ours?"

The key is to keep following up with questions until you arrive at a point when they say "and yes, then we'd buy"

See more about it here if interested: http://blog.close.io/sales-hacking-kung-fu-how-to-virtually-...

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Re:Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing by bernardlunn on Tuesday June 03, 2014 @07:57PM (#7843382)

Forcing to a yes or no is key. I prefer yes, can manage no, but I have no way to manage maybe, it just closes other options without delivering results.

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Re:Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing by wmeredith on Tuesday June 03, 2014 @04:33PM (#7842547)

LOI?

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Re:Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing by sebg on Tuesday June 03, 2014 @04:37PM (#7842564)

Letter of Intent - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_of_intent

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Re:Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing by hansyeakel on Tuesday June 03, 2014 @04:39PM (#7842576)

Letter of intent. Pre-selling also works well in these situations to judge actual demand.

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Re:Why Startups Need to Focus on Sales, Not Marketing by AndrewKemendo on Tuesday June 03, 2014 @08:37PM (#7843483)

Here is what I found when I was out selling: The only thing worse than getting a no is getting nothing.

At least with No, you get feedback and that is valuable. The only way you can get to "no" or "yes" is by pushing the customer to give you an answer and people in general are hesitant to be that pushy.

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