Profit on the first sale? Or sell at loss?

[kommen]

Hello guys, so I met an old friend of mine and talked about his goals, dreams and struggles. And now I have a few ideas on how to help him.

I feel like taking the "sell first, then build" approach, but I struggle with making a goal for the price. Should I aim to make profit straight away, or sell at loss for the first customer? If sell at loss first, how would I afford to scale for the next sale? Persuade an investor?

 

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[Edgar King]

Hello guys, so I met an old friend of mine and talked about his goals, dreams and struggles. And now I have a few ideas on how to help him.

I feel like taking the "sell first, then build" approach, but I struggle with making a goal for the price. Should I aim to make profit straight away, or sell at loss for the first customer? If sell at loss first, how would I afford to scale for the next sale? Persuade an investor?

Why would you aim to sell at a loss?

It seems like the main goal here is to confirm there's a market need for your product. And if the problem it could solve is a big enough problem to be paid for.

You want to use this method to confirm someone is willing to pay, and if they are, how much are are they willing to pay for it? Once you confirm that, you can do it again with another potential customer until you've received enough validation to build it.

 

[kommen]

Why would you aim to sell at a loss?

It seems like the main goal here is to confirm there's a market need for your product. And if the problem it could solve is a big enough problem to be paid for.

You want to use this method to confirm someone is willing to pay, and if they are, how much are are they willing to pay for it? Once you confirm that, you can do it again with another potential customer until you've received enough validation to build it.

I aim to sell at profit, but I don't know if I need to invest money back to him again to get him to find his friends who is also struggling with the same problem. (it's more of a birds with the same feather flock together thing)

Obviously this is a last resort, what I did instead was to start with an absurdly high price, then let him try to negotiate down to my target price. I feel that this was a small mistake though, I should've straight up asked him how much he was willing to pay, then make the offer. I mean I would never know if he actually would pay more than that absurd price. Small chance but still a chance.