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The best way one can describe Nikhil Gupta is a restless soul and a fearless explorer. He believes in “Dream big and dream often — As dreams do come true if you never give up”. Giving up is not an option for Nikhil. He was not scared to leave a company that was soon going public and then go without a salary to bootstrap his venture. He sold his first startup, Avid Secure, on Jan 8th, 2019 to a large public company, Sophos. He just accomplished another milestone which is extremely difficult in this environment, securing a $14 Million Series A Investment to Scale AppSecOps Platform company, ArmorCode. He is used to doing things that ain’t for the faint-hearted.

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Let’s hear a fUNDA/framework/growth hack that has worked for Nikhil that could benefit early stage entrepreneurs in Nikhil's words- Any startup that desires to go from $0 to $1M has to innovate at multiple levels- technology, business models and processes. One of the innovations I initiated was a new sales process.  I believe that the founder/CEO should be responsible for the first million. BANT is a framework salespeople often use to qualify customers. B stands for budget, A for authority, N for need, and T for timing. I have found that this is an effective sales strategy for larger companies, and I have evolved it to BANTEC specifically for startups. Lets look at all the six alphabets in greater detail-
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B - Budget. If the potential customer does not have the financial resources set aside for your product, it is unwise to pursue them any further. It would be similar to documenting a research project; while it has benefits, an early-stage startup wouldn't gain anything from doing so without budgeting first.

A - Authority. It is not uncommon for founders to make the mistake of validating their idea with someone who is not the buying authority, such as a acquaintance or friend.. Although it's key to speak with customers and learn about their pain, you must also identify who has the final say in spending.

N - Need. According to Philip Kotler, it is imperative that you understand the difference between a "need" and a "want." When speaking with potential customers, you must be certain that they have a pressing need for the solution your company provides. If you're a startup, you might speak to a prospect for months who doesn't have an "immediate need" and waste time and money when the project gets put on hold during market turmoil (like now).

‍T - Timing. It is most important in sales. In the beginning stages of discovery, it's crucial to comprehend where the customer is in relation to timing. If the customer is experiencing discomfort and would like to find a resolution within the next few months. If you don't qualify your prospects, many of them will waste your time by stringing you along without any intention of buying from you. I am not suggesting that "you don't talk" to a customer without an immediate need, but you should use your time wisely. You may only need to touch base with a customer every few months if their needs aren't likely to change much over the next year or so, rather than spending weekly time on calls or meetings.

‍C - Competition.  If you have a fast follower strategy, this is especially important. In addition, competition does not always mean another company in the same field, it could also be a replacement for a manual process. For e.g. before we had SFDC or Hubspot, companies were using "excel sheets" to manage the contacts, and thus the competition for early-stage SFDC/Hubspot was excel sheets, manual databases, and not competing products. Counterintuitively, competition is good, especially for Enterprise sales, as that validates that customers' pain is real and that they are actively looking for a replacement, which indicates there is a need and most likely will have a budget.

E- Early adopter. Startups in their early stages drool over enthusiasts who want to try novel technologies. Since we started the company in the heart of COVID-19, we had to work extra hard to break the sales sound barriers of seven-digit ARR in the first year of sales and then doubling it in a short period. So, we innovated the process to add another qualification metric. As several learned people, including Steve Jobs, said, innovation is saying "NO" to 1000 things, and similarly meticulously defining your ICP (Ideal Customer Profile) and then classifying them as an "Early Adopter" and then saying "NO" to the remaining can significantly save you a lot of time. As a Founder/Entrepreneur, it's very difficult to say "NO" to a prospective customer, but again coming back to the "laser focus", this innovation played a key role in ArmorCode’s $0 to $1M journey in a short period and in adverse circumstances.

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