Chapter 6: Finding Conversations

Core Idea

Get your first conversations from cold outreach if you have to, then turn them into warm intros as quickly as possible. Better still, create situations where customers come to you. When a formal meeting can’t be avoided, frame it with Vision / Framing / Weakness / Pedestal / Ask, and go in looking for advisors rather than customers.

Frameworks Introduced

• Going to them (hard, but sometimes necessary):
  • Cold calls: if 98 of 100 people hang up, you still have 2 conversations. The rejection rate doesn’t matter unless you plan to sell through cold calls. The goal of cold conversations is to stop having them.
  • Seizing serendipity: when you overhear something relevant (“…my talk in Tokyo next week”), go and talk to that person about their life. The author’s first committed alpha user came from an engagement party.
  • Find a good excuse: for example, ask a café manager about the story behind their coffee beans. A PhD student cofounder gives you the ultimate excuse (“I’m researching problems around X”). The cost: you can’t move an excuse-based chat into a sales conversation without revealing the pretext, so treat it as one-time learning.
  • Immerse yourself where they are: the author gave free talks at conferences so the speakers’ lounge would supply conversations with speakers.
  • Landing pages: the value is in emailing every signup and starting a conversation, not in conversion metrics. This is how Buffer’s founder actually decided to proceed. A generic launch can do the same (Paul Graham’s suggestion): see who likes it most, then reach out to that type of user.
• Bringing them to you (better: they take you more seriously and want to help):
  • Organise meetups: host an event like an “HR professionals happy hour”. Being the organiser gives you instant credibility. The author calls it the fastest and most unfair trick for customer learning, and says almost nobody does it.
  • Speaking and teaching: teach at conferences, in workshops, in videos, on a blog, or through free consulting and office hours. Then talk to the keenest attendees.
  • Industry blogging: with an audience, post and ask people to get in touch. Without one, a blog on your email domain still makes cold emails more credible.
  • Get clever: one founder hosted a regular “knowledge exchange” call between department heads at top universities, open to other universities to listen in. He gained their credibility and direct access to leads.
• Creating warm intros (the goal):
  • 7 degrees of bacon: ask everyone. In a co-working space, the author stood on a chair and asked whether anyone knew someone at McKinsey, offering a beer. The founders had three chats and a calendar of intros.
  • Industry advisors: the author had 5 advisors at about 0.5% equity each, met each monthly, and got a new batch of intros every week. You can recruit advisors from good customer conversations.
  • Universities: professors have industry contacts who fund research and like new projects.
  • Investors: good for B2B intros, as is anyone important who already believes in your idea.
  • Cash in favours: reply to old “keep me in the loop” emails and ask for a specific intro. Don’t make it a habit, because it can burn bridges.
• Asking for and framing the meeting: VFWPA (“Very Few Wizards Properly Ask [for help]”):
  1. Vision: you’re an entrepreneur trying to solve horrible problem X, bring about wonderful vision Y, or fix stagnant industry Z. Don’t mention your idea.
  2. Framing: say what stage you’re at and, if it’s true, that you have nothing to sell.
  3. Weakness: name the specific problem you need answers on. This shows you won’t waste their time.
  4. Pedestal: show how they in particular can help.
  5. Ask: explicitly ask for help.
  • The parts can merge or change order. Move the weakness earlier if the email sounds like a sales pitch.
  • At the start of the meeting, repeat the framing, name the introducer as a voice of authority, then ask your first question straight away. You set the agenda, keep it on topic, and propose next steps.
  • This format is for warm intros. The author has no reliable cold-email format.
• To commute or to call: the author prefers meeting in person. You can read faces, the conversation can stay casual, and in-person relationships lead to intros. Phone calls tend to become scripted interviews. Other people like calls, so use what works, but start in person and don’t use calls or surveys to avoid awkwardness.
• The advisory flip: go into these meetings looking for industry and customer advisors, not customers. This removes neediness and puts you in control, because now you’re evaluating them. Willpower is limited, so change the context instead of forcing yourself. Don’t announce that you’re looking for advisors.
• How many meetings: keep going until you stop hearing new things. With a simple industry and good first guesses, 3–5 might be enough. If you’ve had more than 10 and the results are all over the map, your segment is probably too vague. Most individual questions should be answerable within a week.

Key Concepts

• Warm intro: an introduction through a mutual contact that establishes your credibility and reason for being there.
• Default sales meeting: if you don’t know why you’re there, the meeting becomes a sales meeting. Then the customer avoids topics like pricing, attention moves to you, and you give a bad pitch because you aren’t ready.
• Bad framings: “Can I interview you” or “Thanks for agreeing to this interview” (sounds boring); “Can I get your opinion on what we’re doing?” (sounds needy); “Do you have time for a quick coffee/chat?” (sets no expectations, so it sounds like a waste of time).
• Symptoms of an unframed meeting: “Um. So….” and “How’s it going?”

Mental Models

• Treat cold outreach as a starter that should turn into intros quickly.
• If it isn’t a formal meeting, you don’t need a reason to be there. Just ask about their life.
• People like helping entrepreneurs but hate wasting time. A clear, specific request answers their biggest fear.

Anti-patterns

• Optimising cold email response rates: put that energy into creating warm intros.
• Letting them drill you about your idea: that forces you to pitch and ends the learning.

Rules of Thumb (author’s wording)

• If it’s not a formal meeting, you don’t need to make excuses about why you’re there or even mention that you’re starting a business. Just ask about their life.
• If it’s a topic you both care about, find an excuse to talk about it. Your idea never needs to enter the equation and you’ll both enjoy the chat.
• Kevin Bacon’s 7 degrees of separation applies to customer conversations. You can find anyone you need if you ask for it a couple times.
• Keep having conversations until you stop hearing new stuff.

Worked Example

A VFWPA request, before you have a product (reconstructed from the book’s desk-rental example):

Hi Pete, I’m trying to make renting desks and offices less painful for new businesses (vision). We’re just starting and have nothing to sell; we want to be sure we build something that helps (framing). I’ve only seen this from the tenant’s side and can’t work out how it looks for landlords (weakness). You’ve rented out desks for years and could really help me understand it (pedestal). Could we meet for a chat in the next couple of weeks? (ask)

A version with weakness moved earlier (from the advertising example): state the vision, then immediately admit you’re struggling to see how the industry’s pieces fit together. Say they know the industry better than anyone (pedestal). Then explain that you’re funded with products out, but this is not a sales meeting (framing). End with a request for a little time over coffee (ask).

Opening the meeting: thank them, repeat the vision and framing, mention who introduced you and why (“Tom said you have unique insight into…”), then go straight to a specific question about their world, such as how one of their portfolio companies got from the classroom to where it is now.

Key Takeaways

1. Accept a high rejection rate on cold outreach. You only need a few yeses to start getting intros.
2. Organise an event, teach, or blog so that customers come to you.
3. Ask everyone you know for intros, and ask more than once.
4. Use VFWPA for any meeting you have to request, and take control as soon as it starts.
5. Meet in person when you can, and think of the people you meet as potential advisors.
6. Stop when you stop hearing new things. If answers stay scattered after 10 conversations, fix your segment.

Connects To

• Ch 4: chance encounters are casual chats; this chapter is about creating more of them.
• Ch 7: inconsistent feedback after many meetings points to a segment problem.
• Ch 8: VFWPA works only if you’ve prepared your 3 big questions and possible next steps.