Startup Sales — 5 Common Sales Mistakes by Founders
August 12, 2025
Founders are responsible for the first sales a startup will make. For many founders, this is one of their very first experiences of sales and mistakes are often made.
Today we’re talking about when to hire your first salesperson.
- First criteria: you must have sold the product yourself. If you sell to enterprises, then 3 customers is usually enough. If you’re selling to SMBs 10 is enough if you’re charging more than $1k/month and 15 is better if you charge a lower amount.
- Next you’ll need a basic sales playbook, so your new recruits have guidelines on what does and doesn’t work, from your experience.
- Lastly — basic corporate infrastructure is required. That means an entity setup — for example a Delaware C corp. You need a payroll system and health insurance etc.
We do all this to set up these first salespeople for success, so we know that the product can be sold and there’s a basic outline of how those sales happen.
