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founders.menu 016 » the IF triangle to close sales & product-market fit archetypes

Understand your prospect's non-negotiables better, get last week's top startup news, new resources and learn about 3x product-market fit archetypes.

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Starter » a mental model

The IF Triangle to close sales ↓

During a sales, there are usually three variables at stake: timing, price and quality. A prospect is usually flexible on up to two of these variables, but never all three. They even go as far as asking themselves:
1. When can I have it? (timing)
2. How much will it cost? (price)
3. Will it do the job? (quality)

How to action this? If the product is [premium], then it may deliver [slow] and the quality should be [high]. OR → if the product is [cheap], then should deliver [fast] and the quality may be [low].

The through-line? Find two tops or two bottoms that your prospects expect from you and be aware of the weak point on the other side of the triangle – the opposite of your top or bottom alignment – that’s where your customer is not flexible.

In a negotiation, you can further apply the IF triangle like this: “If I have to deliver by X, then the price will increase” or “if you want to reduce the price, I will need longer to complete the job”.

This model shows us there is always a tradeoff, where two variables reach symbiosis, but another cannot suffer to satisfy a prospect’s expectations. So make sure you are always reaching alignment between two variables.

by Kevin Duncan & adapted by Julian Paul

Ponder this →  Where is your prospect’s weak point and what can you do to hack around their objections to close more sales?

Main course » founders.menu update

ϟ Tools

䷀ Reads

⦿ Streams

⟐ Templates

583 [+29]

72 [+5]

18 [-]

9 [-]

ϟ Tools update highlights

With 29 Tools added in the Distribution category, there are plenty of great customer support options alongside lead automation services now discoverable. Here are my top 4x tools added to help with LinkedIn outreach:

䷀ Reads update highlights

This week’s Read addition saw most additions in the [2] MVP → Business stage with a focus on PMF, monetization and operations.

What’s next? The blog is taking much longer than expected as I will incorporate it into a /guides section with more resources like terms and members-only guides yet to come. It should go live next week.

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