Built to Sell Chapter 3: Building a Process That Actually Works

This chapter opens with something every small business owner knows too well. You’re checking your bank account, doing math in your head, and wondering if a payment will come in before payroll goes out.

Alex is staring at $68,000 in overdue invoices. His biggest client, MNY Bank, owes him $52,000 and they’re sixty-five days late. His monthly payroll is $43,000. Rent is $4,000. The math is not great.

But here’s the thing. Alex can’t push the bank too hard because they’re his largest client. He sends a polite email and hopes for the best. Classic small business owner move. You depend on a big client, so you become afraid to even ask them to pay on time.

Testing the Five-Step Logo Design Process

While Alex waits for the bank to pay up, he starts doing something about his future. Remember the Five-Step Logo Design Process he put together with Ted’s help in the previous chapters? Now it’s time to test it in the real world.

He makes a one-page sell sheet. Gets his designer to print ten color copies. Then he goes through his company’s old Christmas card list, picks out people he hasn’t talked to in a while, and sends twenty-four emails trying to set up meetings.

I like this because it’s simple. No fancy marketing. No expensive campaign. Just a list, some emails, and a printed sell sheet. Sometimes the most practical approach is the right one.

The First Pitch That Works

Alex gets six meetings out of twenty-four emails. That’s a 25% response rate, which is pretty solid for cold outreach to old contacts.

His first two meetings are awkward. He’s still figuring out what to say and how to say it. But by the third meeting, he’s getting comfortable.

He meets with Ziggy Epstein, who runs Natural Foods Inc. They make organic yogurt and cheese. She’s launching a new ice cream line called “Natural Treats Organic Ice Cream” and needs a logo.

So here’s what happened. Instead of his old pitch where he would basically say “we do everything, hire us,” Alex talks about his specific process. He walks Ziggy through the five steps. He presents it like a defined product, not like “we’ll figure it out as we go.”

Ziggy’s reaction? She loves it. She signs up on the spot.

Alex prices the project at a flat $10,000. Not hourly billing. A fixed price for a defined product. He admits the price is part research, part gut feeling, and nothing scientific. But it works.

This is a big moment in the book. Alex goes from pitching “we can do anything” to pitching “we have a specific process that gets specific results.” The confidence shift is real.

Think Like a Product Company

When Alex reports back to Ted, he shares something interesting. He says that when he used to pitch the Stapleton Agency as a generalist firm, he felt like he was “groveling for table scraps.” But when he pitched the Five-Step Logo Design Process, he felt like an expert. He felt in control.

Ted tells him to stop thinking like a service company and start thinking like a product company.

Alex pushes back. “But designing logos is still a service,” he says.

Ted’s response is one of the best explanations in the whole book. A service company is a group of people with skills who customize their approach for every client. That’s fine, but there’s no scale. The people are the business. And people leave. So the business isn’t worth much.

But here’s the problem with that model. When someone buys a service company, they know the whole thing depends on the founder and the team. So they structure the deal with something called an “earn-out.” You get some money up front, and the rest depends on whether you hit certain targets over the next three to five years. During that time, the new owners are in control, and you’re stuck working for them hoping to get your full payout.

I’ve seen this in IT many times. A founder sells their consulting company for what looks like a nice number. Then they spend three miserable years working under new management, missing targets that the new owners keep moving. Not fun.

The Cash Flow Lesson

The second big idea in this chapter is about cash flow. And this one is really practical.

Ted asks Alex how he currently bills clients. Alex says he does the work over two to three months, sends a bill when it’s done, and waits sixty days for payment. So from the moment he starts a project to the moment he gets paid, four to five months pass.

Ted points out the obvious problem. The more projects Alex sells, the more cash he burns. Every new project is money going out for months before money comes in. No wonder the bank is on his case.

Then Ted flips it. If Alex treats his process like a product, he can charge up front. Like buying something at a store. You pay first, then you get the product. Alex does the work using the client’s money, not his own.

If Alex signs five clients at $10,000 each and charges up front, he has $50,000 in the bank before he even starts working. Ten clients means $100,000. The more he sells, the more cash he has. Completely opposite of his old model.

Alex’s reaction says it all: “I’ll never have to grovel to Mary Pradham again.” Mary is his banker. Every small business owner has a Mary somewhere in their life.

My Take on This Chapter

Two things stand out to me here.

First, the psychology of selling changes when you have a defined process. Alex went from feeling desperate to feeling confident. Same person, same skills, same team. The only thing that changed was how he packaged what he was offering. That’s something a lot of technical people miss. You can be great at what you do, but if you can’t explain it in a structured way, you look just like everyone else.

Second, the cash flow flip is huge. I spent twenty years in IT and I watched so many small companies struggle not because they didn’t have clients, but because their billing model was destroying them. They did the work, waited months to get paid, and meanwhile had to cover salaries and rent. Charging up front changes everything. It takes discipline and confidence, but the math is simple.

This chapter takes the idea from Chapter 2, the Five-Step Logo Design Process, and puts it into action. Alex tests it, gets his first client, and learns two fundamental principles: own your process and fix your cash flow.

The pieces are starting to come together.

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