Minimum Viable Sales Method (MVSM)
For founders who need to sell but lack sales experience, the Minimum Viable Sales Method (MVSM) provides a straightforward, problem-centric, and adaptable approach that emphasises simplicity and buyer-centricity. It combines key elements of a strategic sales process tailored to early-stage founders with the flexibility to work in both mid-market and enterprise sales.
Here's a breakdown:
Minimum Viable Sales Method (MVSM)
1. Core Principles:
The MVSM focusses on delivering practical and essential sales guidance for founders to implement immediately without overwhelming them. Key principles would include:
Problem-Centricity: Start with the buyer's problem. Sales conversations focus on identifying and addressing critical pain points, not pitching the product.
Buyer-Centricity: The method adapts to how the buyer buys, with a strong emphasis on understanding their internal decision-making process and timelines.
Simplicity & Clarity: Founders need a simple process that works whether they're selling to small or large accounts. Every step must be actionable and clear, without unnecessary complexity.
Adaptability: The MVSM should work for both mid-market and enterprise sales. It must be flexible enough to address both short sales cycles for smaller deals and longer cycles for large, complex ones.
Iterative Learning: Founders must regularly learn from their deals and adjust their approach. The process encourages continuous improvement based on feedback from real-world buyer interactions.
2. The Sales Stages of MVSM:
Each stage of the sales process in the MVSM is easy to understand and crucial for advancing a deal:
Research & Preparation: Understand the buyer's industry, specific pain points, and decision-making criteria. This can be done in short, structured sprints to avoid overwhelm.
Connect & Build Trust: Build initial credibility quickly by focusing on the buyer's needs. The goal is to gain "vision lock" (aligning the buyer's goals with your solution).
Problem Qualification: Ask questions to uncover pain points and business challenges. Focus on what is driving the urgency for the buyer to solve these problems.
Value Hypothesis: Present a tailored, simple, and specific solution to address the buyer’s key problems. Use clear business outcomes rather than technical jargon or features.
Advancing the Deal: Founders should learn how to manage multiple stakeholders, identify champions, and keep momentum. This step emphasises defining next actions with clear timelines.
Closing with Consensus: Ensure that all key decision-makers are aligned and bought into the solution. The close should feel like the natural outcome of a well-managed process, not a pushy sales effort.
3. Key Concepts:
Here are the essential tools and concepts embedded in the MVSM:
Problem Hypothesis: A structured way to engage buyers by suggesting potential challenges based on research. It allows founders to open conversations with credibility.
Impact Questioning: A framework of questions that help uncover the deeper impact of the buyer’s challenges (e.g., What happens if this problem persists?).
Buyer Journey Mapping: A simplified process to map how the buyer makes decisions, who is involved, and what stages they go through to get buy-in.
Deal Scorecard: A simple checklist of deal health indicators to assess whether a deal is progressing well or at risk. This can be adjusted based on early vs. later-stage deals.
4. Secret Sauce:
The secret sauce of MVSM lies in its focus on minimal complexity combined with high impact. Founders are typically overwhelmed with other aspects of running their business, so this method provides them with the least amount of process necessary to drive results, while ensuring they are constantly aligned with how and why the buyer buys.
The adaptability to both short- and long-sales cycles allows founders to start closing smaller deals quickly but also have the confidence and structure to take on larger, enterprise-level opportunities as they grow.
5. Where the MVSM Shines:
The MVSM is most effective in fast-paced environments with founders who don’t have time to master complicated sales methodologies but need to sell. It works best in industries where founders are selling solutions that solve real, high-value problems, like tech, SaaS, or services, and need to close deals with mid-market and enterprise buyers.
6. Execution Tactics:
Short Sales Sprints: Founders work through sales efforts in short, focused bursts (e.g., weekly or bi-weekly sprints), iterating based on outcomes.
Exit Criteria for Every Stage: Each sales stage has a clear "exit" milestone (e.g., buyer confirms a specific problem, shared criteria, identified decision-maker). This keeps deals on track and founders focused on the right activities.
Pre-Call Planning: Founders must plan each conversation based on insights about the buyer’s situation, ensuring each interaction has a clear purpose and outcome.
Continuous Learning Loop: After each deal, founders reflect on what worked and didn’t, refining their approach in a feedback loop that encourages learning and improvement.
7. Situations Where MVSM Is Ideal:
Early-stage founders without sales teams
SMBs or startups selling to both mid-market and large enterprises
Fast-growing companies needing to move quickly from founder-led sales to a repeatable, scalable sales process
The Minimum Viable Sales Method delivers a structured, yet lightweight, approach to sales that aligns with how buyers buy and ensures founders stay focused on solving problems and driving results. It is problem-centric, easy to understand, and designed to evolve with a business as it scales.
