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How Startups Close Their First Big Sales
Don’t ever discount, but do throw in freebies
No matter what your startup is selling or who you’re selling it to, in order to survive you’ll need big customers and you’ll need lots of them. But how do you land million-dollar deals with limited resources and no credibility?
In over 20 years of building companies and products, I’ve learned that in the grand scheme of the startup lifecycle, acquiring your first customer is relatively easy. Any good salesperson can sell a good product to the prospect of their choice. Hell, any mediocre salesperson, even when they’re hawking complete crap, can get lucky once. Your first customer is a great signal, but it’s just a signal, not a savior.
What actually matters is what we learn from that first signal and all the signals that follow.
Aggregate value to target prospects
The process starts way before the first sales pitch. Your chances of closing your first big sale are going to be directly related to how well you’re targeting your prospective customers. So let’s begin with a discussion of aggregation and targeting.
All product and service sales come down to usage and aggregated value. It doesn’t matter if your target customer is a consumer or a business. It…
