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Audit score 70

founder-sales

refoundai/lenny-skills

Help founders close early customers and build repeatable sales processes through founder-led selling.

What is founder-sales?

This skill guides founders through closing their first customers and establishing repeatable sales processes. Use it when doing founder-led sales, writing cold outreach, preparing for early sales calls, or deciding when to hire your first salesperson.

Diagnose sales bottlenecks (lead generation, qualification, discovery, closing, or implementation)
Craft personalized outreach and discovery call strategies based on your stage
Design sales processes around how buyers actually buy, not how you want to sell
Document repeatable patterns so you can eventually hand off sales
Identify when you're ready to hire your first salesperson (typically ~$1M ARR)

How to install founder-sales

npx skills add https://github.com/refoundai/lenny-skills --skill founder-sales

Claude Code

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How to use founder-sales

1.Assess your current stage: how many customers you've closed, whether you have a defined ICP, and if you have a product to demo or need to validate with mock-ups
2.Identify where deals are stalling in your funnel: outreach, qualification, discovery, closing, or implementation
3.Apply the core principles: keep the laptop closed during discovery, qualify ruthlessly for active problem-solving, use manual personalized outreach, and don't consider a sale complete until implementation is done
4.Document what works in your sales conversations so the process can be repeated and eventually handed off
5.Use the diagnostic questions to refine your approach and uncover what's actually blocking deals

Use cases

Good for

Writing cold outreach emails to potential early customers
Preparing for and running discovery calls focused on customer pain rather than features
Deciding whether to demo your product or use mock-ups to validate demand first
Handling objections and moving deals forward through implementation
Documenting your sales process so it can be handed off to a dedicated salesperson

Who it's for

Founders doing founder-led sales
Early-stage startups seeking their first customers
Founders deciding when to hire their first VP of Sales
Product leaders building repeatable sales motions

founder-sales FAQ

When should I hire my first salesperson?

Wait until you're around $1M ARR and have a repeatable process with a defined ICP and documented discovery questions, objection handling, and demo flow. Hiring too early typically means hiring someone to fix messaging that isn't landing. Founders must prove the motion works first.

Should I use AI tools for outreach?

Manual, highly personalized outreach is more effective than AI tools for high-value deals. AI tools pull from the same saturated databases everyone uses. Instead, find prospects not in standard databases through back-door approaches. Keep emails to 3-4 sentences focused on shock value and relevance.

How do I know if someone is a real prospect vs. just being polite?

Qualify ruthlessly by verifying if the prospect is actively measuring or managing the problem today. 'That sounds interesting' is not buying intent. Focus on leads showing active problem-solving, not politeness. Stop chasing deals that won't move forward.

What's the biggest mistake founders make in early sales?

Defaulting to product demos instead of diagnostic discovery. Keep the laptop closed in early meetings and focus entirely on understanding the customer's pain using a pen and paper. Also, treating a signed deal as the finish line—a sale isn't complete until implementation is done.

How do I maintain momentum in sales conversations?

Book the next meeting while you're still on the current call. Pull up calendars together and identify other stakeholders who should be involved. This keeps deals moving forward and prevents stalling.

Full instructions (SKILL.md)

Source of truth, from refoundai/lenny-skills.

name: founder-sales description: Help founders close their first customers and build repeatable sales processes. Use when someone is doing founder-led sales, trying to get their first customers, writing cold outreach, running early sales calls, or asking when to hire their first salesperson.

Founder Sales

Help the user close early customers and codify a repeatable sales process using insights from 16 product leaders.

How to Help

When the user asks for help with founder sales:

Understand their stage - Ask how many customers they have, whether they have a repeatable ICP, and whether they're pre-product or have something to demo
Diagnose the bottleneck - Determine if the problem is lead generation, qualification, discovery, closing, or implementation
Guide the approach - Help them craft outreach, prepare for discovery calls, or design their sales process based on their specific situation
Document for repeatability - Encourage them to capture what works so they can eventually hand it off

Core Principles

The founder IS the product in early sales

Jen Abel: "Founder led sales is really that first milestone... the founder is the product." In early stages, the founder's novel insight and subject matter expertise are the primary drivers of interest. Leverage your status as founder to gain market access. Use your ability to see "budding moments" in conversations to refine the product vision.

Your biggest competitor is indecision, not other vendors

April Dunford: "40 to 60% of B2B purchase processes end in no decision... they couldn't figure out how to make a choice confidently." Focus on helping buyers make a choice confidently rather than just pitching features. Act as a guide to help them navigate the market. "No decision" is the safest path for overwhelmed buyers.

You cannot outsource early sales

Pete Kazanjy: "The founder's got to do that stuff... it's going to be way easier for you to get minimally viable good at selling." Don't hire a VP of Sales until you've closed the first couple dozen customers yourself. Use early sales calls as customer development. Focus on becoming "minimally viable" at selling, not a master.

Sell it before you build it

Todd Jackson: "I want to sell it before I build it, because I really want the signal from customers to be the guide and the oxygen that drives what I'm building." Use Figma mock-ups to secure the first 5-10 customers before writing extensive code. Determine the fidelity required for a demo based on the product type.

Close the laptop and diagnose first

Geoffrey Moore: "Shut the laptop. Just don't open it... 'We understand there's this really serious problem and we believe your company might have it, is that true?'" Early sales to pragmatists should be diagnostic and focused entirely on the customer's pain. Use a physical pen and paper so customers can see you capturing their specific words.

The "Collison Install" - don't leave until it's implemented

Dalton Caldwell: "They would just install Stripe into the customer's website... they basically would not go away until you finish the implementation." Don't consider a sale finished until the product is fully implemented. Offer to manually install or set up the software. Be persistent through the "last mile."

Founder-led sales is about learning, not revenue

Jen Abel: "Founder led sales is not about revenue on day one. It is about learning as fast as humanly possible to get to that pulse." Treat early sales calls as research sessions. Be vulnerable about being early-stage to elicit more honest feedback. The goal is to find the repeatable pattern.

Qualify ruthlessly - it's never a bottom-of-funnel problem

Jen Abel: "If you spend your time on the wrong leads, that equates to a zero. It's never a bottom of funnel problem. It's always qualification." Verify if the prospect is measuring or managing the problem today. Stop chasing leads that are "just being nice" but have no intent to buy.

Manual outreach beats AI tools for high-value deals

Jen Abel: "AI tools are all pulling from the same databases. I want to email someone not in the database... I want to take a back door in." Manual, highly personalized outreach is more effective for enterprise deals than automated tools using saturated databases. Keep emails to 3-4 sentences max. Focus on shock value and relevance over generic personalization.

Book the next meeting while you're still on this one

Jen Abel: "Get the second call booked on the first call. Pull up calendars. Look at calendars. Who else should be invited?" Maintain momentum by securing the next meeting while still on the current call. Identify other stakeholders who should be included.

Stay in founder-led sales until you have repeatability

Jeanne Grosser: "Wait until you're around a million in ARR. When you have a repeatable process... there's some repeatability there." Don't hand over sales until you can define an ICP and have documented the discovery questions, objection handling, and demo flow that work.

Design the process around how they buy, not how you sell

Bob Moesta: "Instead of trying to base the sales process on how we want to sell, we need to actually design the sales process on how they want to buy." Map the buyer's timeline through six phases: first thought, passive looking, active looking, deciding, first use, and ongoing use. Tailor your approach to their phase.

Questions to Help Users

"How many customers have you closed personally? What's your ICP?"
"Where in the funnel are you losing deals - outreach, discovery, closing, or implementation?"
"Are you talking to people who are actively trying to solve this problem, or just 'interested'?"
"Can you describe the last deal you lost? What happened?"
"What does your current outreach message say? What response rate are you getting?"
"Have you documented what works so someone else could run this process?"

Common Mistakes to Flag

Hiring sales too early - Don't hire a salesperson to fix messaging that isn't landing. Founders must prove the motion works first, typically to ~$1M ARR
Defaulting to product demos - Discovery should focus on the customer's pain, not your features. Keep the laptop closed in early meetings
Treating "yes" as the finish line - A deal isn't closed until implementation is complete. Follow the Collison Install approach
Using generic AI outreach - Automated tools pull from the same databases everyone else uses. Manual, personalized outreach wins for high-value deals
Chasing polite leads - "That sounds interesting" is not buying intent. Qualify for active problem-solving, not politeness