Nine Startup Sales Mistakes You Should Never Make
“It’s too early to hire a VP of Sales!” Jim, the VC I was meeting with, said to me. “You should be doing the selling!”
“I hear where you’re coming from,” I said. “And believe me, I will be selling.”
“’Ken’s’ been part of the company since I started it.
“Without Ken, we wouldn’t have gotten funded,” I said. “One of our investors insisted we have the sales piece figured out.”
It turned out we were both right.
I did need Ken to start the company. I don’t think we would have been funded without him.
But Jim was right too. It was WAY too early to have a VP of Sales.
I was the most effective salesperson the company had early on. The company was my idea, and I was passionate about what we were doing in a way that Ken never could be. I’ll get back to this later.
So do the selling yourself when you are starting out. You’ll be…
- The most effective salesperson your company has because you know the product(s) the best, and…
- You, the CEO, will care the most about winning deals because it’s your company, and…
- You’ll learn the sales process for your company, so you’ll know what to…
