Last Updated on March 26, 2021 by David
I want to share some of my experiences from talking to potential customers about trying out Reamaze. Sales have never been a strong suit for me, I’ve always thought of myself as more of a business development guy. You know, building warm and cuddly relationships with customers.
It’s not uncommon for startups like us to start talking to potential clients early. Reaching out to a wide variety of businesses in different verticals will give you the ability to set reasonable expectations, understand what will or will not work, and hear what businesses are currently doing to offset their pain points. It’s also not uncommon for clients to tell you that they’re interested and understand the value you’re providing. So why do some keep putting you off?
While smaller companies such as startups are focused entirely on building their minimum viable product, larger companies tend to split different departmental responsibilities into separate teams. It’s only natural then for the individual person you converse with to see value but it hardly translates to value for the entire company or the decision makers at the company. These are some of the most common reasons for why companies put you off:
- They like your product but are just too busy with other core, feature related projects.
- They see the value but need to get the engineers to see if it’s easy to implement.
- They like it but just don’t have the manpower or the resources available to implement something like this.
- They want to try it but will need to have it reviewed by the entire team as well as upper management.
- They need to evaluate it against their existing tools and processes.
- They are already using something similar. It doesn’t work that well but they’re too used to it by now.
The key to avoiding these scenarios is to distance yourself from being a “nice to have”. A “nice to have” easily becomes a diversion from a company’s task at hand. A diversion is sometimes simply too risky for companies small and large to undertake or try. Instead, focus on the long term value you are bringing to the table. How value is defined can change during different phases of the fitting process.
What has worked well for us is to ask companies what kinds of successes they’ve had in the past when it came to addressing a specific problem. This aligns your potential value proposition with something that is top of mind for the company. Next, probe at what difficulties they’re currently facing when either trying to make that successful process repeatable or scalable. This reveals the underlying pain points and offers you the “in” for developing your arguments further. Ask them if they’re doing what your product is naturally good at doing. Do whatever you can to bring them down to a lower hierarchy of need. This series of questions is designed to lower the perception of risk and hassle because it’s already something they do and deserve. They just don’t do it well. Following the experiences listed above, we’ve been able to on-board more than 12 beta partners in under a week.
Instead of focusing on the promise of better conversion rates, more sales, and more profit, focus on how your product will make their staff happier and more effective, take the hassle of out of what they’re currently doing, and ultimately do what they’re already doing but in a way that is far more scalable and desirable without the risk. Framing your product in a way that aligns with the immediate interests of a company is highly effective. Startup companies are usually technical and not always focused on turning an immediate profit. Instead, their interests lie in minimizing the risk of diversion. If their immediate need is to develop a product, your focus might just be reach out, say hello, and plant a seed (like Inception). The point is, keep track of a company’s hierarchy of needs.