The act of selling is essential for any endeavor. I’m currently reading the book, “Ready, Fire, Aim” by Michael Masterson, a great book and a must read for any entrepreneur or would be entrepreneur.
He breaks down business in 4 stages.
The Infancy stage, 0-$1 million in revenue.
Childhood stage, $1 million to $10 million in revenue.
Adolescence stage, $10 – $50 million
Adulthood, $50-$100 million and beyond.
In the Infancy stage, the $0-$1 million, a business is typically or should be focused on sales. It might have 0-7 employees or executive employees (employees that have management positions), that are focused on sales.
7 people is a magic number because that’s the amount of people you can directly manage and keep the communications flow going. Any more and the communication suffers. This is from ‘The Tipping Point’.
What many small business and entrepreneurs fail to realize, Masterson says, at this early stage of business is that it’s 110% about sales. You have to prove your ideas have legs.
Sales is the most significantly linked to cash flow, the life blood of a small business. Instead of being focused on sales, young companies spend their times doing other things. Such as buying office equipment, leasing office space, doing initial paperwork etc.
The main thing you should be focused on, Masterson says, and I agree, is Sales. Getting that first order is key. Proving that people are interested and there’s a market for your product.
People spend too much time focused on the product or improving the product. Product quality is important, but in the beginning, get something good enough and go out there and try to sell it.
You will always thing your product is great, but you should realize your opinions doesn’t matter. It’s if your product can sell that’s the real indicator of a good business idea. You should be selling from the get go, keep on selling all the way up to the $10 million level.
Ready, Fire, Aim - Sales is Everything
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