Podcast · 40 min
Understanding your ideal customers and how to sell to them
Steli Efti · Inside Intercom Free Intermediate
Steli Efti explains how Close.io picked startups and small businesses doing inside sales as their ICP because it was a market the founding team understood from the inside, and just as importantly, wrote down a non ideal customer profile to name who they would turn away. That second half, defining who not to serve, is the part most ICP advice skips and the part that saves the most time later. Listen for the story about turning down large enterprise deals that did not fit.
- Pick an ICP you understand from lived experience where possible, it speeds up every early decision.
- Write down your non ideal customer profile alongside your ICP, both are useful filters.
- Being willing to turn away a big deal that does not fit protects your focus more than any framework.
