The Struggles of Selling

Everyone says the hardest part of startups is building. But the longer I spend thinking about it, the more I realize selling might be harder. Not because the product is bad or the market is uninterested, but because even when the need is clear, people still don’t buy.

We hear the usual reasons: no market validation, weak product-market fit, not enough marketing, no awareness, too much competition. The kind of stuff that fits neatly on a slide deck. But what happens when your product solves a real problem, and your target customers agree, and they still don’t buy?

Sometimes, it’s not about fit at all. It’s about who can afford to care. You can build something that people need but simply can’t pay for. Is that still a product-market fit issue? Or is it more of an economic mismatch between the value you’ve created and the financial reality of your users?

It gets trickier when those same people are engaging with your content, responding to cold emails, showing up to demos, asking questions, nodding along. On paper, it looks like you’re doing everything right. But when the conversation turns to price, the interest drops. Is that a marketing failure, or a pricing problem? If someone loves what you’ve built but can’t act on it, is that your fault for targeting the wrong audience, or is it just a reflection of the environment you’re operating in?

Then there’s the challenge of building trust in a young market. You can undercut the incumbents on price, offer more flexible terms, throw in support, and still get outpaced by someone with a bigger name. It’s not always about the sticker. People buy what they trust, what they’ve heard of before, what they know won’t disappear in six months. Competing on price can help, but it’s often not enough when the real choice isn’t just about features. It’s about who they believe will still be standing in the long run.

Sometimes it’s not even the product or the market. It’s the machine behind the scenes. The emails that don’t get followed up. The demo that never turns into a proposal. The user who signs up and never hears from anyone again. Startups often obsess over the product but forget that great products don’t sell themselves. Not really. It takes people and process and patience. It takes knowing when to follow up, when to push, when to step back, and when to just listen.

So maybe the question isn’t just how to sell. Maybe it’s whether startups should sell something else first. Services, for example. Something that brings in revenue faster, builds trust, funds the development of the product, and helps refine the offering. Maybe the service is the foot in the door, and the product is what scales later. Or maybe both live side by side longer than expected.

All of this starts to make sense when you step back and look at the bigger picture. Selling is never just about the product. It’s about timing, affordability, positioning, trust, and the systems that help customers move from interest to action. In some markets, the real problem isn’t that people don’t want what you’ve built. It’s that they can’t act on that want. So maybe the question isn’t how to convince people to buy. Maybe it’s how to meet them where they are, and then build from there.