People can like an idea and still have no reason to buy it this month. A founder who hears “I’d use that” can learn more by asking what happened the last time the person faced the problem. Maybe a shop owner lost an afternoon updating inventory. Maybe they already have software, but two employees keep entering the same information. Those details help the founder decide what a first offer should solve and what a customer could reasonably expect to receive.
Find the problem someone already spends time on
Ask about a specific recent event. Who noticed the problem? Who did the work to fix it? What made the result acceptable? For example, a freelancer considering a reporting service could ask an agency owner to describe how they compiled last month’s client reports. If the owner spent most of the time chasing missing numbers, a prettier report template may do little to help.
Talk to people in similar situations before writing the offer. A restaurant manager and a marketing director may both describe their work as reporting, but their deadlines and inputs could be very different. Several conversations with the same type of buyer make it easier to identify a problem you can address with one clear service.
Write an offer you can deliver in a short trial
Give the customer a specific result, a clear scope, and an expected delivery date. A first offer might cover reconciling one month of sales records and returning a list of discrepancies. State what the customer needs to supply and what happens if the records are incomplete. Put the price alongside the work so you can learn whether the result is worth paying for.
When the offer goes out, keep a record of five details:
- The customer and the situation that led to the conversation.
- The scope and price you proposed.
- The person who could approve the purchase.
- The reason the buyer accepted, declined, or postponed the decision.
- The work the team actually performed if the offer went ahead.
If you’re ready to turn those notes into a more complete business plan, why not find out more through GrowBizLab’s business planning resources?
Review the sale and the delivery separately
A customer may accept a price that covers the visible work but leaves out several hours of follow-up. Record time spent gathering information, answering questions, and correcting gaps. Compare the actual effort with what you thought the job would take. If the same request appears in more than one trial, decide whether to include it in the next version or explain the boundary before the customer buys.
If the buyer declines, write down their reason in their own words. Someone who needs approval from a manager presents a different problem from someone who already has a supplier. Make one change at a time so you can tell what prompted a different response. After a few conversations and deliveries, the founder should be able to describe the offer in terms of the buyer’s real task, the cost of doing the work, and a result both sides know how to check.