TPF: 5 principles for answering VC questions on sales and marketing


Persistence Beats Resistance

I've raised ~$7M in funding from the CEOs of Fortune 500 corporations to New York and Bay Area Venture Capitalists.

Whenever the conversation got serious, the toughest challenge for me was to convince the investors that I knew my customers inside out and had the right go-to-market strategy to scale.

There were the 5 key questions around Go-To-Market I got asked every time I went to raise capital.

Why do investors ask these 5 questions?

To understand what it takes for your company to make money...

In less than 5 minutes today you will get:

1. 5 principles for answering VC questions on sales and marketing

2. Top 5 reasons for founder burnout

Let's go πŸš€

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5 Principles for Answering VC Questions On Sales & Marketing

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Here are the top 5 investor questions on sales and marketing and how to answer them.
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⏰ What is your sales cycle?​
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Investors want to know how long it takes you to get from your first conversation to a signed deal.

If you don't have data, here is a rule of thumb:

  • SMB: 4-8 weeks
  • Mid-Market: 3-6 months
  • Enterprise: 6-18 months

Once you have data, look at the average time to win a deal from your first conversation.

You can get quite granular here:

  • Time to win pilot after first conversation
  • Time to expand pilot after completion
  • Average pilot/trial length
  • Time to expand from one division/segment to across the org

I used my CRM HubSpot to track sales cycles. If you do not have a CRM today, I highly recommend you get HubSpot, it's free.

Log every customer conversation and deal in your CRM, you will thank yourself later.

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πŸ•΅οΈβ€β™‚οΈ Who is your buyer?​
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Investors care deeply about how well you know your customers. They want to know what are the job titles and roles of the people who end up buying from you.

Here are the 4 parameters you should be ready with:

  • Job title: For example manager, director, VP, etc.
  • What role does this person play?
    • Is he/she an influencer, decision-maker, buyer, or detractor?
  • Budgetary authority: What amount of dollar value can this person authorize before they need to escalate it to their boss?
  • How is this person's job impacted by your product/service?

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βš™οΈ How do you run a customer trial? What are the trial KPIs?

Running a successful customer trial is pretty much the only way to win large B2B sales.
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Investors want to know if you've turned it into a machine that can scale.
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They want to understand how your customers measure trial success and what is your performance on those KPIs.

How to answer this question:

  • Define the standard length of a trial. Don't discuss the variability, it's understood there will be some variability on a case-by-case basis.
  • Define the dollar value you charge for a pilot. If it is free, make sure you have a good reason for why it's free.
  • Define the success criteria for a typical pilot. There is usually one metric that everyone cares about most, and that's Return on Investment (ROI). ROI usually falls into 2 buckets: dollars saved/earned, or time saved.
  • Share case studies and testimonials from past pilots. Most founders forget to ask their customers for a case study after completing a pilot, and that's a huge miss.

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πŸ§‘β€πŸ€β€πŸ§‘ What is your customer onboarding process?

Investors want to know how efficient your sales deals are.
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If it takes months of work and an army of people to onboard a customer, you need to be selling high-value deals.
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If you sell low-value deals but spend weeks/months onboarding a customer, that's a huge red flag about your product, process, or pricing.

How to answer this question:

  • For highly automated PLG sales: We have used user behavior data to refine our onboarding process. We see an X% self-onboarding success rate and it's typically completed within Y days/weeks. For customers who struggle, we have an AI-support chatbot backed by human support.
  • For complicated/high-touch onboarding: We have a customer success manager who is able to handle anywhere from 5-10 customer onboardings at a time. The onboarding involves a combination of in-person/virtual training, followed by white-glove data import and account setup. We then have weekly check-ins with the customer until onboarding is complete and then run quarterly business reviews to check in on their health.

Feel free to customize the above template to your exact needs.

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β›” What’s stopping your customer from rolling out to all their business today?

Investors want to know why your pilot programs haven't scaled.
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They want to understand what it will take to go from where you are to total domination.

You must be honest here and explain the hurdles to jump in order to get to total domination.

Typically your answer here will involve the sales cycle, product challenges, and budgetary cycles.

A good answer after a pilot is successful might look like this:

  • Currently we are in the post-trial budget evaluation. We have shown clear ROI and are awaiting budgetary approval for the next fiscal year.
  • Once the budget is approved, we expect a geo-by-geo (or division-by-division) rollout.
  • A typical geographical rollout should take between 3-6 months, so we expect the full rollout to be complete by 24Q4.

Again, the above is just an example. Feel free to modify it to your needs.

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Top 5 Reasons for Founder Burnout

Why do so many founders burn out?
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πŸƒβ€β™‚οΈ Focusing on tactics over strategy​
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The bias for action is also the Achilles heel for founders. It was for me.
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There is a time to act and there is a time to think.
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Think, plan, act. Review. Repeat.
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πŸ˜ͺ Feeling guilty when taking a rest
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Well-timed rest will recharge your creative energy.
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It enables you to think clearly and work better.
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Your rest period is a time to pause and reflect.
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πŸ’ͺ Trying to do it all yourself​
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You won't have the expertise to do everything right.
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Just learn to do it well enough until you can afford to delegate it to someone else.
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You are going to be the biggest chokepoint to your company's growth.
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πŸ‘Ή Surrounding yourself with the wrong people​
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They say you are the average of the 5 people you surround yourself with.
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For founders, you are the minima of the people you surround yourself with.

Why?

Because you will constantly be fixing everything that your poorest performer breaks.
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πŸ€‘ Sabotaging your own financial security​
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Too often, founders put their business before themselves. I did it too.
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It means you will cut your own paycheck to pay your bills.
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Yes, we all have to do it, but if it's happening too often, then start cutting your bills.
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Your business should work for you, not the other way around. Otherwise, you're just an underpaid overworked employee.

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Are you starting a new business or feeling challenged in your current business? Here's how I can help:

1. If you're a founder in the early stages of launching a business (just curious/have an idea/planning phase/tight budget):

β†’ My affordable digital course on How to Build a Tech Startup with No Experience gives founders like you the ultimate library of proven playbooks to build a business from scratch. All my best content is already in there and more gets added every month πŸ‘‰ Get your course access here.

2. If you're a founder currently building a business and want to unlock growth:

β†’ I run a 1on1 coaching program to help growth-mindset founders like you accelerate their business (read testimonials). In my program, I teach you the exact systems I used to raise $7M in VC funding, launch cutting-edge AI & Robotics products, build a high-velocity B2B go-to-market program where we sold $300,000+ deals, and collaborate with global Fortune 500 brands like Pepsi and John Deere. Let's set up a quick 30-minute strategy session to see if my coaching program is right for you πŸ‘‰ Click here to book your strategy call.

That's it for today. I'll see you next Sunday at the same time.

Cheers

Sawruv

p.s. I'm on a mission to impact 100,000 founders positively. If you think this newsletter can help 1 other founder in your network, then forward this email to them or ​Share this link so they can subscribe to accelerate growth.

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