Startup Sales Execution

Practical playbooks to turn interest into revenue: run discovery, qualify deals, close cleanly, and drive expansion without breaking trust or economics.

When to Use

• You need a founder-led sales motion that actually closes (not just "leads")

• Discovery calls, qualification, objection handling, or pricing conversations

• Building a pipeline with stages, exit criteria, and weekly deal review cadence

• Proposals, mutual action plans, procurement/security handling

• Renewals/expansion motion (especially in B2B SaaS)

• BD outreach, partner deal negotiation, co-selling execution

When NOT to Use

• Lead capture, demand gen, meeting booking -> marketing-leads-generation

• Pricing model design, unit economics -> startup-business-models

• GTM strategy and channel selection -> startup-go-to-market

• Onboarding/support systems -> startup-customer-success

Quick Start (Inputs)

Ask for the minimum set of inputs that makes sales advice concrete:

• Product: what it does, setup time, and “first value” moment

• ICP: buyer, champion, typical deal size (ACV/ARPA), sales cycle expectations

• Motion: PLG, sales-led, hybrid (who does what, when)

• Current state: current pipeline, win/loss notes, objections heard, pricing page link (if any)

• Constraints: legal/security requirements, procurement friction, implementation/services required

If inputs are missing, proceed with explicit assumptions and ask for 1 example deal (won/lost) to anchor.

Workflow

• Define the sales motion and handoffs

• Who qualifies (founder/SDR), who closes (founder/AE), who onboards (CS/product).

• Decide the primary close path: demo-first, trial-first, or audit/assessment-first.

• Set pipeline stages with exit criteria

• Use assets/pipeline-stages.md to define stages and “done means done” criteria.

• Keep stages few and behavioral (what the buyer did), not internal hope.

• Run discovery that produces a decision

• Use references/discovery-playbook.md and assets/discovery-call-script.md .

• Output: a clear problem statement, impact, stakeholders, and next step.

• Qualify with one framework (and actually use it)

• Use references/qualification-and-deal-review.md .

• Output: a deal summary that predicts close probability and exposes gaps early.

• Price and propose with guardrails

• Use assets/proposal-outline.md .

• Keep discounting rules explicit (who can approve, for what, and why).

• Handle procurement and negotiation without “random concessions”

• Use references/negotiation-and-procurement.md .

• Default posture: trade concessions for commitment (term length, volume, case study, prepay).

• Close with a mutual action plan (MAP)

• Use assets/mutual-action-plan.md .

• MAP turns “sounds good” into calendar-bound steps with owners.

• Drive expansion with usage + outcomes (not pressure)

• Define expansion triggers (seats, usage, additional teams, compliance).

• Coordinate with startup-customer-success for retention-first expansion.

• Run BD outreach and partner deals (when applicable)

• BD discovery differs from direct sales: focus on mutual value and long-term alignment, not pain selling.

• Qualify partners with assets/partner-deal-scorecard.md : audience fit, technical compatibility, incentive alignment, champion access.

• Structure deals explicitly: rev share, referral fees, integration commitments, co-sell SLAs, exit terms.

• BD negotiation is relationship-first: trade exclusivity for commitment, volume for better terms, co-marketing for access.

• Maintain a separate BD pipeline from direct sales (different stages, longer cycles, different success metrics).

• For partner strategy and program design: see startup-go-to-market.

• For detailed BD execution patterns: see references/bd-execution-playbook.md .

• Install a weekly operating cadence

• Pipeline review (30 min): stage hygiene + next steps.

• Deal review (30 min): top 3 deals + one stuck deal (diagnose gap).

• Win/loss (30 min): one deal, one lesson, one change to the playbook.

Metrics (Minimum Viable Sales Analytics)

• Pipeline created per week (by channel)

• Stage conversion rates and time-in-stage

• Win rate by segment (ICP) and by deal size band

• Median sales cycle length

• Discount rate and reasons

• Expansion rate (if applicable)

Resources

Resource Purpose

discovery-playbook.md How to run discovery and produce a next-step decision

qualification-and-deal-review.md Qualification frameworks and deal review templates

objection-handling.md Objection patterns by stage, price objections, competitor responses

negotiation-and-procurement.md Procurement, security, negotiation, and redline handling

bd-execution-playbook.md BD outreach, partner deal terms, co-selling coordination, BD pipeline

sales-metrics-and-forecasting.md Pipeline metrics, velocity formula, forecasting methods, board reporting

sales-enablement-content.md Sales collateral, battlecards, case studies, demo scripts, content tracking

crm-pipeline-setup.md CRM selection, pipeline stages, fields, automation, reporting dashboards

demo-methodology.md Demo types, 3-story framework, multi-stakeholder demos, metrics

Templates

Template Purpose

pipeline-stages.md Stages, exit criteria, and definitions

discovery-call-script.md Talk track + question flow

proposal-outline.md Proposal structure and pricing terms

mutual-action-plan.md MAP for closing and onboarding handoff

partner-deal-scorecard.md Partner qualification and deal evaluation

Data

File Purpose

sources.json Sales references

What Good Looks Like

• You can explain “why buy, why now, why us” in one paragraph per deal.

• Each pipeline stage has a buyer action and a next step scheduled.

• Negotiation trades are explicit (concession for commitment), not reactive discounts.

• You know your bottleneck (top-of-funnel vs close vs onboarding friction) from numbers, not vibes.