How To Get Your First Customer As A Start Up

So, this past Tuesday, I got to check out Loyola's Demo Day for the third time! It feels like just yesterday I was up there pitching in front of my buddies, investors, and family. And now, here I am, having worked with big agencies, school bus companies, and a handful of private businesses too. We've had our wins and our misses along the way, but hey, that's just how the journey goes, right? I count it all joy especially because–I actually sucked at pitching. 

As I chatted with various founders, listening to their stories, successes, updates, and challenges, there was one question that kept popping up: "How did you land your first customer?"

In my head, I thought, "Do they know they're talking to me?" I still tie my shoes bunny hoop style. I am the last person to be giving anyone any sort of advice. Have they seen my archived pitch performances? LOL 

But hey, even a broken clock manages to stumble upon the correct time twice a day, right? And let me tell you, in my adventures, I've stumbled upon a few nuggets of wisdom! So, in today's article, I'm going to shake things up a bit from my usual transit tales. Let's hope LinkedIn's algorithm doesn't decide to suppress my content me for this.

So today I'll be dishing out five practical tips that miraculously helped me land my first customer. Get ready for some chuckles and hopefully some useful advice – or at least a good laugh at my expense!

Raise Your Ceiling

It took me over three years to learn this, but it might just be the most important lesson I've picked up on my journey: Your business will only grow as far as you grow. I hope that makes sense. Sometimes, as entrepreneurs, we're so focused on achieving big things – and there's nothing wrong with that. But what we should really be concentrating on is becoming big people. Because when you grow personally, the big achievements become a natural byproduct of who you've become.

Ever notice how millionaires can literally lose everything and still somehow bounce back into the 1%? It's because they've become the kind of folks who can achieve a defined result over and over, regardless of circumstances. In my first few years of business, I landed customers by pure luck – and I mean sheer luck alone. Why? Because that was the extent of my skills at the time. It took me a while to realize that while entrepreneurship does involve luck and timing, a big chunk of it is about acquiring skills. It's about learning how to achieve a desired outcome repeatedly by following proven steps. This is why many founders can start multiple startups. It's not all luck; it's about understanding repeatable steps that they can apply time and time again.

I can't possibly list all the things I've learned over the years without risking boredom So, I'll just touch on them briefly and move on to the next point. I've spend a lot of time diving into books and scouring various threads on Reddit and Discord. My main areas of focus were team building with no money, sales, understanding how money works, and mastering influence. In my opinion, these are core competencies for any founder to raise their ceiling.

It's about surrounding yourself with brilliant minds, understanding the financial intricacies of your company, and knowing how to sway people on a large scale.

Put Your Oil In a Jar and Sell it.

Alright, so if you're on my page, you've probably noticed that my college of choice was actually seminary. I mention this because I'm a sucker for a good Bible reference. So, can I take you all to church really quick? In the book of Kings, there's a story about a woman whose husband dies. Now, back in those times, that was basically a doomsday sentence. She tells the prophet her story and mentions that they're facing death. The prophet then tells her to go get some glass jars from her neighbors, fill them with oil, and then sell it. That's the Cliff Notes version. But what I really want you to see here are two big components: a product people can use, and a simple, quick way to get it to them. The key word here is "simple": a product that's clearly defined and an easy way to get it to the people who want it. This is something I literally just discussed with my team because, from a marketing standpoint, I believe our web content isn't as clear as it could be. And here's the golden rule: confused customers don't buy.

Marketing is huge. I believe every founder should have at least some understanding of it. However, if you don't have a way to harvest the crops or distribute the product, it will cost you business down the road.

When you have a moment, set up a Trello board. They're free, and on it, map out your customer's journey from the first contact to the sale. What does it look like? How quickly can you get it done? How much does it cost, etc.? What are those repeatable steps you can take to deliver your product consistently?

The widow in the story had three steps: Borrow a jar from her neighbor, pour oil in it, and sell it. Now, your process might be a bit longer with onboarding contracts or whatever, and that's okay. Just make sure you have repeatable steps in place so you can deliver your product consistently, in the cheapest yet fastest way possible.

I guess what I am trying to say is, you need a product or service delivery system that allows you to get the product in the customers hands, and money in your pocket as soon as possible and it needs to be congruent as identical as possible from customer to customer.

What I'm really trying to emphasize is the need for a product or service delivery system that gets your product into the customer's hands and money into your pocket as quickly as possible. And not just that, it needs to be consistent, as identical as possible from customer to customer. That's the key to scaling your business efficiently.

Get a Content Distribution Network

When I talk about content, I'm not just referring to blogs. Sure, blogs are a valuable part of a content distribution network, but what I'm getting at here is you need a method to reach the people who can benefit from your product and get it in front of them. I could have simply called this section "advertising," but it's more than that. As a founder, you probably don't have the money to splurge on online advertising – heck, I don't either! With ads, it often boils down to experimentation until you find what works, but let's face it, we can't afford that kind of trial and error! So, a content distribution network serves as a free or cheaper alternative to get your product in front of the right people.

First and foremost, you need to know who your actual audience is. When I first started out, I thought my audience was Transit CEOs. So, like any logical person, I spammed all their inboxes with horribly bad, lengthy sales messages. Bro, even if they had been interested, I wouldn't have known what to do next. That's the truth. I think a lot of entrepreneurs can relate to that feeling of, "Yeah, I'm building this amazing thing, but what happens if the CEO of First Transit actually says yes?" I would have fumbled that deal into oblivion anyway. That's why the previous step is so crucial. Any who, sorry for the ramble!

In short, you need to figure out where your prospects naturally hang out, whether it's online or offline. Then, find a way to get yourself or your product in front of them for awareness, not sales. The goal is simply to make people aware that you exist. For me, I achieved this through poorly written blogs and speaking at Transit town halls. Just being willing to speak publicly about the ups and downs of transit, even at the bare minimum, gave me the opportunity to at least say, "Hi, my name is Patrick Parents." And trust me, that's worth a lot more than saying nothing at all. Afterwards, I would post those blogs or recordings of myself on every free site possible, and then share the links across every social media channel I knew my targets were using. For me, it was LinkedIn and Reddit. But for you, it might be Instagram or another platform entirely.   

Do What Your Good At.

Here's the reality check – I'd love to build a product that cures baldness or at least helps me keep cleaner fingernails when I use my hair fibers. But let's face it, I know absolutely nothing about the hygiene world. Zero. Are dirty fingernails a problem? Sure. Could something be created, produced, and sold at scale? Definitely. Am I the person to do it? Absolutely not. Why? Because I have no relationships in that sector, no connections, no influence, no story, and no understanding of how that industry actually operates in the real world. If I tried to create that product, I'd spend the first three years just learning how the culture worked.

Transit was where all my relationships, connections, and influence lay. Truth be told, a lot of your first clients, especially on a large scale, will be people you know directly or who know of you indirectly. Remember, word-of-mouth marketing is still the number one sales generator. When you stray into other industries, not that it's a problem, but you lose a lot of the stuff that would accelerate you. If you read a lot of founder stories, you'll see the common theme that many of their first customers, clients, investors, and champions were all people in their direct network. 

Go to Market

This is probably the most important point, so let's address it head-on. Your product will not be perfect. Along the way, you'll make mistakes, and the first few versions of your product might even annoy a few customers. I won't lie to you, during our Supir days, there were customers we didn't serve well. In fact, we were fired from a few places. That's the reality for some of us, and that's okay. It's all part of the growing pains.

But here's the thing: many entrepreneurs never make that first sale or ever experience getting fired for the first time, or having an unsubscribe. Why? Because they never really try to get it.

Don't get stuck endlessly building and perfecting your product.

The reality is that as founders, we often live in an echo chamber. We build something, think it's amazing, and expect everyone else to feel the same way – but they don't. And that's okay! You need feedback, even failures, from your user base to develop a product that goes beyond serving your ego – one that genuinely helps your customers.

You don't need a ton of coaches, courses, and fancy CRM software. All you need is a phone and a way to get your product to people if they say yes. This approach works for both B2B and B2C. If you want people to buy your product, you have to identify a clear pain point that they're willing to pay for, and then ask them.

I know it sounds simple, but it really is that simple. Cold calls, emails – you have to get out there and ask people to buy your stuff. Here's a fun fact: I mail Old Bay seasoning to out-of-state prospects to try to get a demo with them. It costs me all of $6. My largest client to date was a result of a cold call. Sure, I got told no by probably 60 other people that week, but that's just how it goes.

I know you might want to raise more capital to hire salespeople to talk to the big scary customers for you, but that's not going to happen in your pre-seed or seed round. It's going to have to be you, the CEO and founder, asking people for money. Doesn't that sound exciting? Okay, maybe not, but you have to get out there and try to sell the product yourself. Yes, it sucks when people shoot it down because it's your baby, but there's value in that because you're getting firsthand feedback.

Talking to customers or potential customers teaches you how to transition from making a product that you think is great (but may have founder bias) to making a product that people actually want to pay for. My many failures have taught me that in some instances, these are different things.

Ultimately, you need to get used to being told no. Aim to get told no. I think the national conversion rate is only around 3% anyway. So statistically, if you talk to 100 customers, you'll only land 3.

But here's another way to think of it: in order to get 3 customers, I have to talk to 100, and every 32 no's get me closer to that yes!

Anyway, I'm done rambling! I hope this article was helpful.

If you have any additional questions, feel free to DM me or post them in the comments section.