Customers & Research

How do I find my ICP when I'm selling to Indian SMBs who don't fit clean B2B categories?

A starting point

Indian SMBs (kirana owners, small manufacturers, local service businesses) rarely map onto the tidy firmographics that Western ICP frameworks assume, so start from behaviour, not category: who is already spending money to solve this, in what informal way, and who feels the pain sharply enough to change. Go sit in 10 of these businesses and watch how decisions actually get made (often the owner and one family member). Your ICP is the specific slice where the pain is acute and the person deciding is reachable, not the whole "SME" bucket. Treat this as a starting point and let the paying customers narrow it further.

Go deeper

Hand-picked from around the web, each with a note on why it earns your time.

3 resources 3 link-checked Watch Read

Watch

▶️ Video
✓ Link checked Free Beginner

Why we picked it Before you have any data to cluster into an ICP, your job is to find and watch a handful of real customers up close. Michael Seibel (YC, co-founder of Twitch) gives a short, concrete talk on where those first customers actually come from and how to spot the ones who genuinely have the problem. It pairs well with the interview technique in The Mom Test: this is where to point that technique first.

How to get your first ten customers

On Y Combinator (YouTube) by Michael Seibel ~10 min

How to get your first ten customers
  • Your first customers usually come from people you already know, not scalable ads or viral growth
  • Look for buyers who are eager to solve the problem and willing to pay, and skip the merely curious
  • Getting something real in front of them teaches you faster than any amount of talking alone
Watch on YouTube youtube.com →

Read

📖 Book
✓ Link checked Paid Beginner

Why we picked it The single best thing ever written on customer conversations. It teaches you to ask about the customer's life and past behaviour, not your idea, so you can't be lied to. If a founder reads one thing before talking to a single customer, it's this.

The Mom Test

From momtestbook.com by Rob Fitzpatrick ~130 pages

  • Talk about their life, not your idea.
  • Ask about specifics in the past, not opinions about the future.
  • 'That's so cool, I'd totally buy it' is a compliment, not data, dig for commitment and evidence.
Open momtestbook.com →
📄 Article
✓ Link checked India Free Intermediate

Why we picked it Most ICP advice assumes a clean B2B buyer, which is exactly what breaks when you sell to Indian small businesses. This piece grounds the question in the real texture of that market: price sensitivity, relationship and trust before any order, and how needs shift across retail, manufacturing, and services. Treat it as a starting point for who your customer really is, not a definitive segmentation.

Selling to SMBs in India: it's difficult but not impossible

From LinkedIn by Aditi Puri Batra ~8 min read

  • Indian SMB buyers rarely subscribe cold online, they need face to face contact and word of mouth before they trust you
  • Every vertical (retail, service, manufacturing) runs differently, so you have to meet many of them before you can name an ICP
  • Localisation and empathy for immediate pain beat product or technology pitches with this audience
Open linkedin.com →

People also ask

What is an ideal customer profile and how do I define mine? An ICP is a precise description of the customer who gets the most value from you and gives you the most back, by firmographics, situation, and the ... Beginner 2 resources → How specific should my target customer be when I'm just starting? Absurdly specific, a single, describable type of person or company in a single situation. 'Small B2B SaaS founders in India doing their first cold ... Beginner 3 resources → What's the difference between an ICP, a buyer persona, and a target market? Target market is the pool, ICP is the best-fit company/account you go after, and a persona is the individual human inside it who feels the pain and... Intermediate 2 resources → How do I know if I'm targeting the wrong customer? Watch your best customers, not your loudest. If the people who onboard fastest, churn least, and refer most look nothing like who you're marketing ... Intermediate 2 resources → Should I focus on one customer segment or serve everyone who'll pay? One, ruthlessly. Serving everyone means your product, messaging, and support get pulled in ten directions and you win nobody's heart. Dominate a si... Intermediate 2 resources → How do I build customer personas that are actually useful and not fiction? Base every persona on real interviews, not your imagination, real quotes, real jobs, real objections. A useful persona changes a decision you'd oth... Intermediate 2 resources →