Lenny's Podcast: Product | Career | Growth
00:28:28 · Rob Snyder, Lenny Rachitsky
[00:28:28] S0: So I am mostly in the B2B space, but I have seen quite a few people. I've been kinda surprised that a lot of people from the consumer space have have used this as well. And someone sent me the story of, like, Spanx, which was basically... She she did the same thing of of, like, selling one on one with people, seeing how they reacted to figure out all the different pieces of of what became Spanx. [00:28:51] S1: Yeah. And she solved her own problem, famously. Just tore off her pantyhose there. I think that's the story. Just I guess she needed it now. I think it was like, yeah, she's going to an event. So that's that's a cool example. You have this... We're gonna talk more about this, but you have this idea of the Hail Mary approach. Talk about that.
00:28:51 · Lenny Rachitsky, Rob Snyder
[00:28:51] S1: Yeah. And she solved her own problem, famously. Just tore off her pantyhose there. I think that's the story. Just I guess she needed it now. I think it was like, yeah, she's going to an event. So that's that's a cool example. You have this... We're gonna talk more about this, but you have this idea of the Hail Mary approach. Talk about that. [00:29:07] S0: So the Hail Mary... So we've been talking about the happy path here. You find something, you're talking with people, and they're like, oh my gosh. Yeah. This is exactly what I need. A lot of the time, that's not gonna happen. You're gonna get that kind of lukewarm feel. And so what I've tended to find is that's also an opportunity to what I call throw the hail Mary, which is, okay. This doesn't seem to be a thing. Is there anything on your to do list that you would pay me to do right now? Like, that you would pay somebody to take off your plate. And that's just an open ended Hail Mary. I've actually seen quite a few startups totally pivot and take off from the Hail Mary, which has been really interesting. There's one startup. They were trying to sell an applicant tracking system into governments, and they had a call with somebody. And the person was like, yeah. That's kind of interesting. But after the Hail Mary question, yeah. What I'd actually pay you to solve is this job description thing right now. And that became their first contract. That became their first customer, they've grown super fast since then.
00:29:07 · Rob Snyder, Lenny Rachitsky
[00:29:07] S0: So the Hail Mary... So we've been talking about the happy path here. You find something, you're talking with people, and they're like, oh my gosh. Yeah. This is exactly what I need. A lot of the time, that's not gonna happen. You're gonna get that kind of lukewarm feel. And so what I've tended to find is that's also an opportunity to what I call throw the hail Mary, which is, okay. This doesn't seem to be a thing. Is there anything on your to do list that you would pay me to do right now? Like, that you would pay somebody to take off your plate. And that's just an open ended Hail Mary. I've actually seen quite a few startups totally pivot and take off from the Hail Mary, which has been really interesting. There's one startup. They were trying to sell an applicant tracking system into governments, and they had a call with somebody. And the person was like, yeah. That's kind of interesting. But after the Hail Mary question, yeah. What I'd actually pay you to solve is this job description thing right now. And that became their first contract. That became their first customer, they've grown super fast since then. [00:30:10] S1: That's awesome. So the advice here is just sometimes feel free to just ask what problem can we solve for you.
00:30:10 · Lenny Rachitsky, Rob Snyder
[00:30:10] S1: That's awesome. So the advice here is just sometimes feel free to just ask what problem can we solve for you. [00:30:16] S0: Yeah. And that leads to how to think about sales. Well, I'll just give a little... And we can dig into this if it's interesting. But I always was kind of nervous to sell as a mega introvert and overthinker. It just feels like a lot of pressure, and it... Like, I need to convince you to buy. And so that question feels uncomfortable. But if you kind of reframe it in your own head of, no. I'm just seeing if they need help with anything that they are stuck on. And if they don't, that's fine. But if they do, cool. We can explore if it... If I can help. Then it kinda changes your orientation towards sales. [00:30:54] S1: I I am in the same boat as you, and that's a really nice way of thinking about it. I'm just trying to solve someone's problem. Yeah. That's why why is it so hard? Before we get to the next step, which is getting your first sales call, finding... Basically finding someone to talk to that you don't already know. Are there any anti patterns or just kind of signals or just like traps people fall into when they're coming up with ideas?
00:30:54 · Lenny Rachitsky, Rob Snyder
[00:30:54] S1: I I am in the same boat as you, and that's a really nice way of thinking about it. I'm just trying to solve someone's problem. Yeah. That's why why is it so hard? Before we get to the next step, which is getting your first sales call, finding... Basically finding someone to talk to that you don't already know. Are there any anti patterns or just kind of signals or just like traps people fall into when they're coming up with ideas? [00:31:15] S0: Yeah. The infinite. But the but the the main ones that I have seen that are, like, really, really brutal are feeling like you need to build it yourself first. So you come up with an idea, you're like, I don't think this is ready for prime time, or I think people have to see it to get it. And then you go heads down and build it. Now now with AI, you can kinda get that out of your system in a... In hopefully a couple weeks instead of, you know, months or not, but you do not... You you wanna face the cold wind of reality as soon as possible. And so don't delay the customer conversations where you can actually find pull. [00:31:58] S1: You're also not a fan of design design partners Oh, no. Which is... Okay. Say more because this is typically very standard advice to find design partners.
00:31:58 · Lenny Rachitsky, Rob Snyder
[00:31:58] S1: You're also not a fan of design design partners Oh, no. Which is... Okay. Say more because this is typically very standard advice to find design partners. [00:32:07] S0: Yeah. The... I don't know. Maybe in some context, it's helpful. I have yet to see it help... Be helpful. What I've seen in basically every single time I've seen somebody with a design partner is that you recruit a design partner who, quote, unquote, buys into your vision for the product, and they give a bunch of feedback and never buy from you. They never buy. And you realize that all of their feedback was just like them playing Steve Jobs. And there's like, I'm gonna help this startup versus I have something I'm actually trying to get done. And if you think about it, like, the people who actually have something really important they're trying to get done, they don't wanna be a design partner. They just want that thing done.