←back to thread

Ask HN: How to learn to sell?

355 points rasulkireev | 1 comments | 16 Oct 22 15:19 UTC | HN request time: 0.23s | source

Hey HN,

I am a solo founder that just finished writing code for my project (MVP) and am ready to find clients.

- for the sake of the question, my clients will be small physical businesses. Think, Family Doctor's Office, Local Cafe, Small barber, etc.

I will be developing a blog for SEO purposes and doing other things to promote my business online. However, I believe the key to success here will be "Cold Sales". I have never done that before. So, if you could recommend a book, a blog post, other online resources, or you just have a random advice that I could learn from, I would be very thankful.

Suffice it to say I will be starting out ASAP, even though I don't know anything. I believe practice is the best teacher. However, if there are any resources that could help me get up and running quicker that would be awesome. Thanks a ton in advance.

1. sagarpatil ◴[17 Oct 22 05:17 UTC] No.33230015[source]▶
You haven’t told us what problem you are trying to solve. I’m afraid most of the advice you are going to get will be generic.

I’ve started and sold some businesses (had to shut two down)

Business #1 I have experience with outbound/inbound marketing and online marketing. Outbound marketing is the toughest. In my experience, people don’t like to be sold. They will most often just ignore you. I did have success with inbound marketing (Google Ads, SEO, referral) and was able to acquire more than 100+ small businesses as customers, but I had to put in a lot of work and hire sales people to close the deal. The sales cycle are long and slow. After that point on, I decided I’m never going to do offline sales.

Business #2 For my next businesses, an e-commerce store, I used Facebook/Instagram ads to generate $1M in sales.

Business #3 Created an add-on product for a company, partnered with them, built a relationship, sold the venture after 3 years and I still get royalties on sales.

Business #4 A plugin for a CMS, focused on SEO and the venture generates closes to $7k/m like clockwork.

So yeah, the sales strategy depends on what problem you are trying to solve, where your customers live, what’s the most efficient way to reach them, and so many other factors.

If you have specific questions, I’d be happy to answer them.