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How I've approached founder-led sales - Alex Kracov
kracov.co
Quoted on this wiki
Every place a page here uses this source, in the order the words come in it.
Inbound Leads: Demo requests from websites “I built out unique opportunity stages that fit our current process.” I review this every day to see where people are in the funnel and then I ask myself how I can move them to the next stage. We also review this pipeline in our team meeting each week, so everyone is on the same page about how customer conversations are going along.
Template Follow up Emails “As I ran the above process, I quickly realized that I was sending the same type of email over and over again.” Inbound Demo Request - email I sent when someone requested a demo on the website. The goal of this email was to schedule a demo call.
When it comes to early stage sales, you’re still figuring everything out. You have a barebones process, a pitch you’re not sure will work, a product that’s still being developed and likely no formal pricing proposal. This makes the sales process very different. It needs to be a creative process that you’re constantly iterating on the fly. After every call, you need to look and think about how you can evolve the pitch. This is one of the many reasons why a founder needs to do sales themselves. “I was mainly asking myself the question - what are the features we needed to build in order to get the customer excited about the product?” This “feedback” positioning is also a lot easier to get sales conversations with folks. This is where the Silicon Valley culture of helping each other is incredibly valuable. Many people in SV have been in your shoes before and they want to help out. People are very willing to jump on a call and share feedback. It’s what makes the SV ethos so special.
What makes founder-led sales unique “The biggest thing that makes founder-led sales different is that you’re trying to get to product-market fit and have to build a sales process from scratch.” In post-product-market fit sales, you have a solidified pitch, formal pricing, qualification questions and process you’re trying to run. You’re confident in the product and the pitch because it’s been battle tested. You and the salespeople on your team have done it a hundred times. You know what resonates and you know what to look for as a red flag.
“He was always talking to a potential customer or meeting with someone who could introduce him to a potential customer.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“He would then take the insights from these conversations back to the Lattice team.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“He would talk to the product team about what we would need to build next.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“And then I’d work with him on how these insights would inform our positioning and go-to-market strategy.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“He was always talking to a potential customer or meeting with someone who could introduce him to a potential customer.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“He would then take the insights from these conversations back to the Lattice team.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“He would talk to the product team about what we would need to build next.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“And then I’d work with him on how these insights would inform our positioning and go-to-market strategy.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
What makes founder-led sales unique “The biggest thing that makes founder-led sales different is that you’re trying to get to product-market fit and have to build a sales process from scratch.” In post-product-market fit sales, you have a solidified pitch, formal pricing, qualification questions and process you’re trying to run. You’re confident in the product and the pitch because it’s been battle tested. You and the salespeople on your team have done it a hundred times. You know what resonates and you know what to look for as a red flag.
The biggest thing that makes founder-led sales different is that you’re trying to get to product-market fit and have to build a sales process from scratch. “In post-product-market fit sales, you have a solidified pitch, formal pricing, qualification questions and process you’re trying to run.” When it comes to early stage sales, you’re still figuring everything out. You have a barebones process, a pitch you’re not sure will work, a product that’s still being developed and likely no formal pricing proposal. This makes the sales process very different. It needs to be a creative process that you’re constantly iterating on the fly. After every call, you need to look and think about how you can evolve the pitch. This is one of the many reasons why a founder needs to do sales themselves.
“He was always talking to a potential customer or meeting with someone who could introduce him to a potential customer.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“He would then take the insights from these conversations back to the Lattice team.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“He would talk to the product team about what we would need to build next.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
“And then I’d work with him on how these insights would inform our positioning and go-to-market strategy.” Over the last six months, I’ve been doing sales for my new company, Dock. I’ve learned a ton about founder sales and wanted to share my experience so far. I’m still figuring this all out myself, but hopefully this is helpful for other startup founders.
I’ve mainly focused my energy on keeping the opportunity tab up to date. This gives us the ability to understand what our general sales pipeline looks like and provides a reminder for me to follow up with different folks. I built out unique opportunity stages that fit our current process. Here’s what it looks like… “I review this every day to see where people are in the funnel and then I ask myself how I can move them to the next stage.” Where did my conversations come from
In post-product-market fit sales, you have a solidified pitch, formal pricing, qualification questions and process you’re trying to run. You’re confident in the product and the pitch because it’s been battle tested. You and the salespeople on your team have done it a hundred times. You know what resonates and you know what to look for as a red flag. “You have a barebones process, a pitch you’re not sure will work, a product that’s still being developed and likely no formal pricing proposal.” A major difference with founder-led sales is the positioning of calls with prospects. All of my early calls were positioned as a “feedback call.” My main objective was figuring out how to make our product better, not generate revenue. I was mainly asking myself the question - what are the features we needed to build in order to get the customer excited about the product?
Demo Follow up V2 - email for folks who were still deciding whether they wanted to move forward with Dock. This email included action items, but had softer language around the timeline (“whenever you’re ready” language). “Demo Follow up V3 - email for folks who were not really interested. The email thanked them for their time and said we’ll stay in touch as the product evolves.” For anyone in sales, setting up email templates is an obvious thing to do to save time, but I see many non-sales founders still handwriting emails. This simple tactic will save you tons of time as you follow up with customers.
Am I talking to the right person? Is this our ICP? “What do I say to explain what we’re building? What words resonate with different ICPs?” I would take notes on calls, but these questions were just constantly floating through my head as I talked to people and reflected on the calls. When patterns emerged across features (multiple people asking for the same thing), then that helped to inform what we needed to build and in what order.