sales advice

By Malla Haridat 

Starting a business is a funny thing.  You start out with one idea and before you know it, it’s blossomed into a huge company with tons of employees.  You are making moves and raking in the dough.

Why? Because you have no shortage of good ideas. And ideas are great. But the big difference for those that have successful businesses is their execution of the good ideas.

And how do you do that? You start selling your ideas and see if they have value.

When you come up with an idea for your business, jot down the basics of how you will market it, how much it will cost to make and/or supply, and some rough estimations for how you will measure that you are successful. Make it one page max.

Then get started selling.

Stop writing endless business plans. Stop fantasizing about what it could be. Just get out there and start talking to people.

Notice what gets their attention when you share the idea.  And pay attention to where their eyes start glazing over.

Starting to get sales?  Good.  Find out why they are buying and start tracking the feedback.

Not getting sales?  Good.  You haven’t wasted a ton of money at this point creating the product/service only to find out that no one wanted it.

Just get back into the game.

Thinking you need a full-blown product or service in order to sell?  Nope.  Start with a beta launch and tell customers that they can get the product in the next _____ days.

I challenge you to get comfortable with this area of your startup: selling to and hearing directly from clients.

Malla Haridat is an award-winning strategist for small business owners who are tired of being overwhelmed and want to see real results in their business.  Malla produced the  “Save Your Sanity” Small Business series and works with entrepreneurs who want to build a business that earns $100k with fewer headaches.