Short answers to the commercial questions founders ask
Each video takes one question we hear from B2B founders and investors and answers it in about two minutes, based on what we see in our work. Watch it, read the summary or the transcript, and if it raises a question about your own business, book a free 30-minute GTM call.
What does Grow Commercial do?
Watch · 43 seconds
Grow Commercial helps B2B founders and leadership teams build a way of selling that keeps growing without every deal running through the founder. We start with evidence, not opinion. We talk to your customers and look at where you win, where you lose and where deals stall. From that, we build a prioritised plan your team can actually run. Then we help you deliver it, with senior commercial leadership working inside your business, without the commitment of a full-time hire. That might mean building early traction, getting past a growth plateau, or entering the UK or a new market. Whatever the stage, the approach is the same: work out what matters, put it into practice, and step back once your team can run it.
A GTM diagnostic tests your commercial plan against what your customers actually do, rather than what the leadership team believes is happening. We look at three things: how you win, how you lose and where deals stall. That means finding out who really buys from you and why, following deals to the point where they get stuck, checking whether your pricing and packaging reflect what customers value, and seeing whether your CRM and sales process tell the truth. Where it is relevant, we also look at partnerships and other routes to market. You come away with a clear assessment of your commercial gaps and a plan in priority order, with an owner and a measure for every action. Timing depends on scope and on access to your customers, team and data, and is agreed upfront. Hands-on support can follow if you want it.
Fractional sales leader or full-time VP Sales: which do you need?
Watch · 2 min
It depends less on who you hire and more on whether the way you sell is repeatable yet. A full-time VP Sales makes sense once sales already repeat: you know who your ideal customer is, and there is enough pipeline for a permanent leader to scale what is working. Fractional commercial leadership fits the stage before that, when you are still fixing how you sell. Conversion might be patchy or pricing unsettled, the CRM might not reflect reality, or most deals still need the founder in the room. A fractional leader gives you senior ownership of pipeline, conversion and forecasting now, without making a permanent hire before the business is ready for one. For many teams we see, the order that works is a diagnostic first, then fractional leadership, then the permanent hire. At that point, the fractional leader steps away.
Usually not entirely, and not all at once. Founder-led selling makes sense early on: the founder knows the product and the problem, and buyers want to hear from the person who built it. The trouble starts when every deal still needs them, because the founder's diary becomes the limit on how fast the business can grow. What needs to stop is the founder closing everything. That means separating the founder's relationships from a process the team can run: a sharper ideal customer profile and proposition, qualification the team can run without checking in, pipeline stages that follow how buyers actually buy, and coaching on live deals. The founder stays involved where their credibility matters, in a key relationship or an important introduction. One simple sign it is time: deals slow down whenever the founder is busy.
Should you fix pricing before you hire more salespeople?
Watch · 2 min
Often, yes. If your pricing and packaging don't match what customers value, hiring more salespeople takes the same problem to more buyers, and every deal gets harder than it needs to be. Pricing problems are easy to miss, because a price can look fine for most of a deal, right up until the proposal lands. Three simple tests show whether pricing is your bottleneck. First, look at your last ten lost or stalled deals and note the stage where price first became a problem. If it keeps appearing after the proposal, the package probably doesn't match what buyers expected. Second, ask three recent customers what they would miss most if your product disappeared, and check that your pricing page and proposals lead with it. Third, ask everyone who sells, the founder included, to explain your price in one sentence. Different answers mean buyers are hearing different stories. If the tests come back clean, pricing probably isn't your bottleneck.
Usually it's conversion and process, not lead volume. More lead generation rarely fixes it, because it adds more of the same deals to a pipeline that is already leaking. The leak tends to sit in weak qualification, stages that don't match how buyers buy, a CRM that doesn't reflect reality, or pricing that looks fine until late in the deal. A simple test helps. Ask four questions of every open deal: has the buyer described a real need in their own words, is there a credible fit, are you talking to someone who can say yes, and is there a next step with a date the buyer has agreed to? Any deal that fails one is a conversation, not pipeline. Then check your stages. A good stage is defined by something the buyer has done, not something your team has done. With both in place, you can see where deals stall and fix that before spending more on new leads.
Often it doesn't, and every forecast built on it inherits the error. That flows into decisions about hiring, spend and targets. CRMs rarely drift on purpose. Deals get added after a good first call and never updated, stages move forward because a proposal went out, and close dates slide a month at a time. A ten-minute check fixes most of it. Go through every open deal and look for three things: a named owner, a next step the buyer has agreed to with a date on it, and a stage the buyer would recognise if you described it to them. A deal that fails any of those is a hope, not an opportunity. Then look at close dates. If one has moved more than once, ask the buyer directly: either there is a new date they have agreed, or the deal comes out of the forecast. The fix is usually a habit rather than a new tool, so define stages by what the buyer has done and run the check every week.
Build it on what buyers have done, not on how the team feels about a deal. Most forecast misses aren't a maths problem. Start with a look back. Put the forecast you made at the start of last quarter next to what actually closed, and for every deal that didn't land, note the stage it was in when you forecast it. If most misses sat at the same stage, that stage is too generous, because deals reach it before the buyer has committed to anything. Tie each stage to something the buyer has done, such as asking for a demo, agreeing a trial or bringing their finance lead onto a call. When you set the number, separate the deals you'd genuinely bet on, with someone who can say yes involved and a dated next step they've agreed, from deals that are only possible. Repeat the look back every quarter, so the forecast gets closer to what closes and holds up when your board or investors question it.
