Traditional Sales vs. Startup Sales – Do You Know the Difference?

It’s a mistake I see made over and over again. A first-time entrepreneur assumes that selling at a startup is like selling at an established company. Many angel investors and mentors from established companies make this mistake too.
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If you have never been in a startup before or been the founder of one and run the startup sales gauntlet, you will likely make this mistake. And it is not a trivial one to make. Many first-time founders have sunk their companies because they did not approach startup sales correctly. Others that made this mistake just cost themselves and their investors a ton of money and wasted more time then they had to spend running a sales process that was ill-equipped from the outset.
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You approach customers and close deals in a startup very differently than you do at a going concern. Selling at an established firm usually means executing on a well-tested plan to sell a product with a track record of meeting the needs of customers willing to pay. Essentially, you follow a map down a well-traveled road.  Whereas at a startup, you are on the opposite end of that spectrum. At the beginning, usually, it is just the founder, some ideas, and grit.

​But there is a process and a rhythm and a methodology to startup sales. Done right, it allows a startup to move forward in a productive and results-oriented manner.

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