Buying and selling are opposite lanes on the same street, yet I see founder friends miss the opportunity to learn from driving in both lanes. The reason is straightforward: they usually turn off their brain when evaluating other companies' products, especially in B2B. You should become a good customer, because one of the fastest ways to be great at sales is to be a great buyer.
Why bother being good at buying? Sure, you could become a vendor without ever purchasing from another, but you’d miss a critical perspective.
In today’s markets, it’s almost always faster and cheaper to purchase a solution than to reinvent it. Good buying can be a quick path to solving your business problems if you can do it well.
Your vendor choices express your taste and worldview. Buying and selling both express judgment about which problems matter and how to solve them. Thoughtfully buying helps you develop taste.
Smaller companies need to adopt new tools quickly—only buy what clearly helps you reach product-market fit. That focus reveals what will get you to PMF.
A clear “no” is an active, positive outcome; it’s decisive and builds the muscle for rapid transactional decisions. The same muscle is critical for sales.
Great. So what does it mean to buy well?
Be relentlessly focused on your top 1–3 outcomes (ship faster, reduce burn, grow revenue) and open‑minded about the problems to solve.
Reevaluate your problem list frequently and confirm each item is still worth solving.
Communicate early and clearly when something drifts; surface the issue and propose paths forward.
Hire and fire vendors quickly — track whether they deliver the promised value and act accordingly.
When selling into a disciplined buyer, flipping these same observations makes sales straightforward. It almost exactly lines up with classic 0 → 1 sales advice. 1
Take the buyer’s stated priorities at face value and work with them to see how you can solve those problems.
Keep revisiting the buyer’s needs to ensure you’re building something that really matters.
Communicate proactively; if something breaks, align on the facts and fix it together.
Hire and fire customers quickly — if you can’t deliver real value, let them go.
The good news: early‑stage startups are sold to constantly — payroll, banking, credit cards, payments, and productivity tools. Every purchase is a chance to sharpen your buying skills. Feed those lessons straight back into becoming the seller you wish you bought from.
I highly recommend Pete Kazanjy and Jen Abel. I’d read Pete’s book Founding Sales and regularly read each account.
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