n

r
a
Le
METHOD

Mr iLnessu) tes

45

in

(O

How thousands of people all over the world are

creating freedom in their lives and value in the world
through entrepreneurship in 2015

by JON BLAZQUEZ
2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

PREFACE
Im Jon Blzquez, Ive written this book to understand deeper The
Foundation and evaluate if it was worth joining. As you may know,
I finally joined. I decided to start melding all this knowledge shared by
these incredible persons in a clear, understandable manner.
The text is the output of a process in which Ive read, listened, digested, understood, sorted,
connected and finally boiled-down to the essence what have been said by Carl, Dane, Andy,
Sam, Josh, Esther, and some experience on myself.
The illustrations are made by me and inspired by the style of the great Mike Rohde, who is a
designer, Sketchnoter, illustrator and author of The Sketchnote Handbook.
As I say several times in the book, its not a substitute of joining The Foundation. It couldnt.
The Foundation is an experience, a new language, the content is so powerful and its
community is irreplaceable. The aim of the book is to explain in 45 minutes (or less) the big
picture of The Foundation and to illustrate it giving some concrete examples, numbers, stories,
tactics and details based on my own experience and the experience shared publicly
by Dane, Carl, Andy, Sam, Josh, Esther in sites like SPI, Mixergy, The Foundations blog or
Carl Mattiolas blog.
The information contained in this ebook is for informational purposes only. The material in this
guide includes information by third parties so I dont assume responsibility or guarantee of
this information.

CLICK HERE and Apply To Become A Member Of The Foundation

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

INDEX

INTRO: WHAT IS THE FOUNDATION?

PHASE ONE THE MINDSET OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP

PHASE TWO - IDEA EXTRACTION:

Find Market, Contact Market and Find Problem/PAIN

PHASE THREE - SKETCHING THE SOLUTION IN A WEEK

Think Solution, Sketch it, Contact Market and Validate Solution

PHASE FOUR - PRE-SELLING:

Creating The Info Pack or Marketing Website and Pre-Sell
Your Product to Fund your Project

PHASE FIVE - BUILD THE PRODUCT IN 10-12 WEEKS

PHASE SIX - LAUNCH & SCALE

OUTRO

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

INTRO: What is the Foundation?

The Foundation is the six month mentoring program for
entrepreneurs who want to start and scale a software business,
from scratch, as quickly as possible.

Does this book show me how to do it?

No. This book goes through the process and describes it, giving some examples and specific
recipes. It is based on my own research and tips on the theme and the resources available on
the Internet, such as: interviews and blog posts from the founders and students. All of them in
order, boiled-down to the essence and put into context.
To learn it, you have to experience it, because it is like a new language.
In words of Dane Maxwell:
It's not, not having the information, I'll tell you that. It's not, not having the how tos.
I feel like I've cracked the code on creating successful entrepreneurs. I work every
single day we're doing an hour of phone call Q&A, direct access to me, because what
I've found is that people just get stuck a LOT.
And they have a really specific issue that's really pertinent to just them, and they need
personal help with that, so they come on those calls and they ask, and theres a secret
language of millionaires, if you will.
Just like any foreign language, you can't learn it in a day. If you hear it, it's likely going
to go over your head. That secret language is direct response marketing. You couple
that with the whole concept of idea extraction and finding the pain, and then you
couple that with selling a product that doesn't exist and using that to fund--there's this
whole language to it. You really just can't buy a book and learn this; it's got to be
an experience.

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

The Foundation process is based on 6 phases or steps.

Here is the Summary: Find a market that you love thats big enough. Make sure people are
accustomed to paying, then start to make calls to that market (via mail, Facebook, phone,
LinkedIn, etc). When you talk to them, look for their problems or pains in that market.
Sometimes you just let them ramble until you hit on a pain. Find a pain thats consistent, that
several people have had. You come back, after youve found several and then you look for the
one thats the most painful, and you go back to the people that expressed it. And you ask: is
this what youre feeling?. Then you say: I think I can solve it. If I solve it with this, would you
be willing to pay?. Then you send them a mock-up with that solution and you say: if I build
this, will you pay? And in fact, if you pay, here are the different levels that you can pay at. You
can fund your product doing using a method called pre-selling. Then you can build the
product, outsourcing it, with the minimal set of features. Finally you can scale it.
So, it's very easy to get, say, 100 people at $100 a month and make $120,000 a year just
servicing those 100 people with your software. It's a lot easier to build than you'd think. Start
from scratch, even before having an idea, find the market, analyze it, find out exactly what this
market needs and get paying customers for this idea even before it is built. Complete
validation before spending more time and effort on it.

The 6 phases are:

1. The mindset
2. Idea extraction: find a market, contact and find a pain worth solving.
3. Sketch the solution and validate it
4. Pre-sell the solution to fund your project.
5. Build the solution with indispensable features (notice that building the product
is in Phase 5, where most entrepreneurs think it is Phase 1)
6. Launch and Scale

CLICK HERE and Apply To Become A Member Of The Foundation

6

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

PHASE ONE: The Mindset of Entrepreneurship

Now that the intention is set and aligned, you can dive into your first
few questions to get the ball rolling.
Because when people think they need an idea, or money or credibility or to be an expert, its
typically a lot of internal stories and internal dialogues going on inside their body. Imagine
this dialog moving from their chest to their heart to their throat to their stomach. Thats
actually where most of their beliefs and fears are locked. And when we move that energy in
the body, the person gets better.
A lot of people get stuck because they're very me-focused. "What's my passion? What are my
interests? What are my skills?" Get away from you and completely shift to what the pain of the
customer is and become passionate about improving their life. That's where a lot of freedom
can open up. Shift your passion to just improving people's lives. Think with a virgin brain and
find a problem that causes a great pain to your customers, define it, understand it deeply and
make software to help your customers.
You will learn about solutions that people would be willing to pay for, if you just ask and take
action. That's really what it's all about. Usually, we are afraid of letting other people see us fail.
So we hide our projects our attempts at entrepreneurship. Once you get over that, you can
move forward uninhibited.

Welcome and embrace the fear!

That means it's something worth doing, something that might take your business and your
life to the next level. Appreciate the small winds along the way. There are always days that you
have a super high: things are going great and you talk to a new customer, potential customer
who could be awesome, or somebody gives you a great idea.

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

Then you talk to another person who is totally negative and down and tells you you're never
going to come up with anything because there's tons of software out there already. That's
going to happen, and it puts you in a bad mood for the entire day, it can, until you learn to
control it.
What stops people from realizing goals is their limiting beliefs about themselves. People are
not actually only afraid of failure, they're very afraid of success. For them to become instantly
successful within six months and going through the program shines a light on them. All of
their family members and friends are like oh my gosh, this guy is so successful now.
There are people who sabotage their own success, normally it is because of a limiting belief:
"I'm not good enough unless I've achieved something". We feel like we are always in control
of what's going on when we don't even know what's going on in our heads sometimes. If
you've got a limiting belief, you've got something you're stuck with, you've got a road block
and you're not going to be successful until you get that thing reversed. Unless you have a
kind enough, compassionate enough, gentle enough teacher that without judgment will
help you reverse that, you're not going to move forward.
If you think that you need an idea to start a business, if you think that you need money or you
think that you need to be an expert, you are wrong. Those are all lies, all three are limiting
beliefs that are keeping you from joy and happiness.
The six months of The Foundation are more or less like this: Month 1 - you find the pain in a
market. Month 2 - you validate and try to sell it. Month 3 - you hire the team and put the place
in to build that software and get the sales to fund development. Month 4 - you start building
a list of people that are interested in the software. Month 5 - you build a relationship and a
rapport with that list while the software is being developed. and Month 6 - you start charging
users and observe.
Each one of those months, people get stuck. Every single month they get stuck! They just
need access to people that can help see what they can't see so that they can become
unstuck. They need that personal level of attention.

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

PHASE TWO: Idea Extraction

Find Market, Contact Market and Find a Problem / Pain

The most dangerous word in business is guessing. The strategy is to find the pain and solve it.
That is the key. The tactics to do that can be different. To avoid guessing and building
something that it is not needed, we can pick a market with a virgin baby brain, talk with them
and find the pain.

Lifes too short to build something nobody wants.

Ash Maurya
To simplify our process and increase the chances of success, there are a few principles we can
operate on. We want automated sale, we want reoccurring revenue, we want no accounts
receivable, and we want to sell tools to markets. Finally, one of the things is that the client
does NOT have to change their behavior all that much when they sign up.
We do not believe in being an expert. We believe in being an expert at defining problems
and then putting experts in place to solve them. There's a very freeing space that opens up
once you stop trying to be the expert. You do need to be an expert at one thing. You have to
be an expert at the problem.
You have to understand the problem better than the customer, better than the competition,
and better than anybody else on your team. That's what keeps you the leader, because you
direct the team with the vision. You understand the problem so well.
That's why we say these opportunities are available everywhere. Solutions are available, but
custom-made solutions are what people want, because it just makes their life easier. And you
have to make sure you show it to them.

11

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

Find the Market

Phase A - Search for a Market and a Niche
You can do it in two ways: You can search lots of industries and then filter some of them with
some patrons or you can start with a small list of industries that you like and then prioritize
them. Option one takes more time but it open your eyes more than option two.
You can find structured information about markets in Google, markets list and how big they
are. You can use for example Research Industry Profiles, IbisWorld Industry Reports,
sbdcnet.org and Hoovers.com. And also this video how you can estimate a market size on
Facebook in 2 minutes
The next step is filtering your choices to find a green light market:
1. It must be big enough to serve you: Filter the industries with 5,000 or 10,000
businesses or less for example.
2. The industries must be profit driven and want to save time (you can score them from
1 to 4): think about which businesses want to grow and make money and which ones
care less about that.
Companies or small businesses (example: lawyers) would not be the best company to
idea extract on. They actually want to spend more time, because they charge hourly for
clients. So if youre going to idea extract to try and to try to find time for the pains and
save them time somewhere, that might not work out the best.
3. Is the industry growing or not? Find out if they are hiring (for example indeed.com)
4. Look for industries that interest you and allow you to communicate well with the
client. Look for industries that you like and involve persons you like. You can put it in a
spreadsheet.

12

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

Phase B - Once you have about 10 possible markets, you

will need to narrow down your options:
1. Choose the market in which you are more confident. You are going to have to talk with the
people in that market.
2. They must use internet, email and software (Search in Google market name + software).
They must use monthly paid software.
3. Make sure that they are making at least enough money to pay for software, for example
$100,000 in revenue per year. Check out Bizben: business for sale and what money they
make.
4. A franchise can give you lots of information. Give them a call to open one: How big is the
market? Who are your competitors? How much does the average franchise make? Do you
provide software? You will get very good information.
5. How hard is it to get to the decision maker? Pick a market in which you can have the
decision maker on phone. (For example, dentists are tough to reach. You get receptionists
and theyre always working on their clients. And they get sold to all the time.). Its better to
choose businesses where the owner answers the phone.
6. Research the market in Google trends.
7. The most important tip: Which industries do you believe in? Which ones would you love to
help? Which ones would you be happy to talk to every single day? Always try and do
something that you may have a little bit of advantage in already.

CLICK HERE and Apply To Become A Member Of The Foundation

13

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

Phase C - Once you have reduced your list to 2 or 3 markets,

call them and choose the one you connect best with.
CONTACT THE MARKET - Theres no better way to find out exactly what a target market
needs than to ask them. There's software out there that can do whatever already, but when
you build something specifically and with the input from your target market, it's going to be
exactly what they need. Thats why contacting your market and finding the pain is so
important.
Our limiting beliefs will say that we will be perceived as sleazy salesmen on the phone, but if
you try to help your contact, you will surprise them and reverse your own limiting belief.
As Carl Mattiola says:
And I did this in 2 hours a day and in the beginning I was so nervous that I didnt want
to make a phone call, I was scared that the whole thing was a scam. I was sick to my
stomach and I wasn't sleeping and learning to get over that stuff.yeah, really helped.
I felt like people perceived me as a sleazy sales guy on the phone, which was totally not
true, especially if you're trying to help people, you know, they're--they look at is as like,
it's awesome, you're there to try to help them and they get to rant to you about their
problems and you're listening! And they really like to be listened to and understood.
Everybody does.
Contact them without fear. Dont wait to have a domain, email signature or logo. You do not
need these things.
We can contact our market by mail, by phone, by Facebook or LinkedIn groups. It all depends
on the market. Once you contact them the first time, then, normally you would have to get a
conversation with them in order to find their pain. Use this first contact to get bigger
interaction with them.

14

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

How do I get their contact info?

There are several ways. You can make a list of persons with Google. Start with your country or
city : Search niche + profession + city.
Let's just say San Diego real estate companies. Go to get the top ten Google results, go to
each one of them. Find the broker / owner on the roster and find the office manager and/or
their assistant. Email all of them individually.
You can also try some emails in markets you dont mind testing and build confidence. Emails
written by women get more responses. Consider it, use oDesk to hire a person overseas to
gather the emails and then a few websites. You can hire someone from oDesk for around two
bucks an hour that would actually go on manta.com and basically get lists of companies
within your desired industry. They would get their email address, their name, their company
name, and everything and go from there.
The site manta.com is just a list of businesses that you can segment via industry. You could
select any industry you want in different regions, and generate results from all over the world.
It also gives you a market too, so, for example, you can discover that there is around 18,000
security patrol businesses in the US and over 108,000 in the world.
FIRST CONTACT - Once you have hundreds of contacts, contact them initially saying you
want to study which are the biggest problems in that industry. Just a small message. Then,
from the people who answer, you will need to get them onto a long phone, video or physical
conversation in which you will do idea extraction properly and find the pain. With some of
these conversations done, you must find a common pain which needs to be solved. Think
about the solution and validate. Are the ones who have this pain willing to pay for a solution?
If you use email, the recommended way is to send individually the first email. You can also
use something like Toutapp to do mass emailing. Remember that you are contacting them to
help them, not spamming.

15

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

In the first email, it is normal to get few responses. Sam Ovens got a 25% response rate from
the first email, which is high. A 15-20% response rate is also ok. It depends on several
variables: the industry, the subject (Strange Question works well), if you are a man or a
woman, the hour of the day, etc You can split test several of variables. It must be a simple
email with a few lines.
Here we have Danes example:

Hey, we're doing some research on the real estate software market.
Just curious--is there any software that you've been looking for over the last
few years that you're having trouble finding?
Thanks, can't wait to hear back from you.

Here is an example of the email written by Sam Ovens:

EMAIL 1 To Cold List Of 100 Prospects In An Industry

Subject: Strange Question?
Hi (NAME),
My name is (YOUR NAME) and I am currently doing research on making property
management more fun, productive and profitable.
As a (JOB TITLE) what are the biggest problems you face on a day-to-day basis?
This is not spam and I am not going to try and sell you anything, I would just like to
learn about the pain points you experience in your profession.
I would love to hear back from you, even if it is only one sentence!
Kind Regards,
(YOUR FULL NAME)
(YOUR MOBILE NUMBER)
(YOUR LINKEDIN OR FACEBOOK LINK)
(YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS)

16

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

In the first emails responses they will only give you some clues or superficial problems.
Basically what they have in their head just now. You have to wait and go deeper, find some
recurrent problem. It doesnt matter if they already use software to solve this problem. It is
possible they dont like it or you can substitute it. Focus on the problem, not the solution.
SECOND CONTACT - The answer does not matter much, but now is when you take the
opportunity to schedule a phone call. You can contact the people who have answered your
first email and agree to call them when is ok for them. You CANNOT continue to do this over
an email. If you try to do it over email, you're not going to do this well. You've got to get on
the phone/video/skype/meet.me. You need to connect with them emotionally. They have to
feel that someone is listening their problems.
Sam Ovens was able to call 12 of 25 persons (50%), however, setting up calls for 20% of the
people who answer the first email is ok.
Here is an example of the second email Sam sent to people who responded:

EMAIL 2 To People Who Respond To First Email (Dont Bulk Email,

Write Each One Personally).
Subject: RE: Strange Question (Just Reply To Their Message)
Hi (NAME),
Thank you for getting back to me.
You sound very knowledgeable in your industry.
Can I give you a call to ask you a few more questions?
Please reply back with a time and number that suits and Ill call you.
Thanks in advance.
(YOUR FULL NAME)
(YOUR MOBILE NUMBER)
(YOUR LINKEDIN OR FACEBOOK LINK)
(YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS)

17

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

People get a little deeper when you get them on the phone, however it is a lot harder to get
people on the phone. Theres a give and take there, you probably need to send more emails
to get some people to respond. It is very important to get that contact on the phone. You
could ask questions to people in your target market via email, however, youll only get the
surface level answers. When you are having a phone conversation and you ask these
questions, you can go deeper. You can find out more. 5, 6, 7, 8 levels of deep within the one
single seed question, and that's where the gold comes out.
You can send emails to get them on the phone or you can do it a little bit more sophisticated.
When you use something like Toutapp or email marketing software, you can see which
people open and click your emails. Usually there are few people who would actually respond
(15-20%). Those are really awesome people, so you want to call them right away. You can
follow up on all the opens and clicks as well. You can be alerted when someone opens your
email. It is also recommended to include a Linked-In profile within the email. You can start
calling the ones who responded to the email, then all the clicks, and then the opens.

Conversation - Find the problem / pain

A common fear is actually picking up that phone and having people responsive to you.
People are very responsive when you call them the right way. If you call them to just try to sell
them something, theyre not going to respond to you. When you call them just being honest
and open and tell them what youre doing, its really, really easy to have a conversation and
people are very open to talking.
Although we all have fear, it's not that hard, you pick up the phone and say Hey, we were
talking over email, and you told me that you've been looking for XXXX software, what are
some of the solutions you've been looking for? What about them is it that you don't like?"
and then you just start asking anything you can to try to understand that problem. If you're
just curious, the questions will come to you. If your contacts know exactly what they want, it is
awesome, it is pure gold.

18

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

The main principles to follow when you call someone is : First, telling them why youre calling,
and then giving them value. If you can do those two things when you call someone its not a
sales call any more, its just helping them. Those are the main things that work when you
begin a process like this.
You can also push for one or more of the idea extraction phone calls to meet with you in
person. If you see people face to face, you can see their body language and actually connect
with them a bit more. And its really hard to do that on the phone. Doing phone calls is fine,
and it is something that you need to do, especially when youre calling out of state or out of
province. But anytime that its possible, meet someone in person. You can connect more with
them and actually sell. And its easier to usually find their pain and actually offer the solution
to them. When you meet them in person it is also easier to pre-sell.
You can sit down and go over their problems, just get them talking about what is challenging
for them. And then you can ask them if they could wave a magic wand, what would they want
as a solution to this?
The goal is to know the problem deeply:
If you can define the problem better than your target customer, then they will assume
you have the solution. Yes. You won't really need to make them understand it, because
they'll beg you. If you've dug and found the pain well enough, they will be pissed at
you if you don't! If you've dug deep enough and you've found the pain, customers will
be pissed if you don't give them it.
It's not like you actually even have to talk them into it. I don't have to prospect; they
come to me, because I've found a deep enough pain.
Dane Maxwell

19

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

What kinds of questions would you ask?

The idea is to try to start broad, to just to ask them questions like "Tell me about what you do
day to day and what are the challenges that you have in your business day to day?" When you
talk about that and you hear one, go further and ask more questions about that challenge.
Carl Mattiola explains it with an example:
Hi, my name's Carl, I'm a software entrepreneur, and I'm doing research on the physical
therapy practice industry in hopes of finding the biggest problems in order to
hopefully create a product that can solve them for you, and I'd just like to ask you a few
questions about your day and the biggest challenges that you have in your business
right now.
And then he continues the conversation:
An example would be, this one doesn't have to do with my product so I'll use it, they
once would tell me "I have to take all this documentation for each patient and it sucks"
and then you might ask "What kinds of documentation do you have to take? And how
does that work? How often are you doing it? How much time does it take you each
day?" And you start to drill in and figure things and map out a process.
Carl Mattiola
Also you can see how Sam Ovens did it (next page)

20

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

Phone Script for Call (Do Not Need To Follow Exactly Just An Outline)
Hi (NAME) this is (YOUR NAME) calling, how are you?
Awesome. Hey thanks so much for your reply with the painful problems youre
currently facing that was very insightful.
I just want to ask a few more questions so I can get a better idea of what you do on
a day-to-day basis and whats most painful for you.
ASK Any of these questions to get an idea of a problem. Once you have a problem,
keep probing and dig deeper. You dont need to ask every question:
Can you walk me through a typical day for you?
Whats the most painful task you have day-to-day?
What takes up most of your time?
What are you currently doing that frustrates you?
What tasks are you doing that you believe can be made easier or less tedious?
(You get the point. You can make up your own questions here).
Sam Ovens.

You can see here some of the questions you could ask. You dont have to ask all of them. Start
broad with one and then dig. Use another one if you get stuck. The silence is a good thing
also because makes them think. Also ask : What else? Tell me more? And wait. You keep
asking those questions until they can't think of anything else, and it's usually that fourth or
fifth response (a layer 4 or 5 idea) where the golden, most painful idea will come out that you
can start really defining accurately.
Another Tip - Ask: So how often does this happen? How much time does it take you each
day? Always try to help people get specific.

21

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

Some possible questions

What's the most important area of your business? And do you have any pain associated with
this activity?
Is there any pain associated with that particular activity? What else?
What software have you been looking for but you just can't find a good solution?
What are some of the repetitive tasks that you have to do on a day to day basis?
Whats the most painful task you have day-to-day?
Who's responsible for those tasks?
How do you feel when you have to do those tasks?
If you could wave a magic wand related to that task, what would happen as a result?
What are the tasks that you do that take up the most time?
What problems are costing you the most money?
What current software out there have you been looking for, but can't find a good solution?
Have you ever tried to solve this problem in the past? Try to know how much did they
invested trying to solve the problem.
What problem costs you the most money?
What are some of the software programs that you use that make you want to punch your
computer?
What are you currently doing that frustrates you?
Can you walk me through a typical day for you?
What tasks are you doing that you believe can be made easier or less tedious?

22

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

The most important point is that you don't actually go through the entire list of questions
when you talk to people. Dig after you get the initial answer. So what else,? and tell me
more That is where you will find the gold.

To know the business

Every business can be broken down into three areas. Before the sale, during the sale, and
after the sale. So there are all the tasks that happen before sale, all the tasks that happen
during a sale, and all the tasks that happen after a sale.
If you're going into a market that you have no idea about and you're not even sure what
questions to ask and you want to understand it, you'd say "Hey, let's just break this down"
"Hey, tell me about all of the things that you do before the sale. What are some of the things
that like--if you meet a customer--" all this stuff. "Well, we enter them into the database, we
enter them into Facebook, we add them to this." Whatever it is! "Okay, during the sale, what
are all of the things going on?" And you get this list of things. "After the sale, what are all of
the things going on?" You get all of this information.
And then within those three areas, you will find what we call a layer 4 or 5 idea that's very
focused on solving a specific problem within that niche.
When you ask people what kind of software they want, almost all of them are always going to
inevitably say "I want an all-in-one solution." You do not want to build an all-in-one solution.
Not only do they not want an all-in-one solution, if you actually built it for them, they probably
wouldn't buy it and implement it because it takes way too much to implement. Their entire
business has to change in order for them to start using this software product.

23

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

Give more than you get

It is important to make them think. Give them time. In 10 or 15 minutes you can go through
three or four problems. Try to help them with other things that you have learned in previous
conversations or that you just know. Try to give more than you are taking from them every
single time. See if a pattern emerges.

Usually with less than 10 conversations some pattern emerges. Continue until you understand
deeply the problem. Repeat them their problem to make sure you understand the problems
and to show that you listen to them. They will appreciate. Then ask them which problem is the
worst if you have to choose one? Finally, take the problem which causes the most pain and is
easier to solve. Also consider that it has to bring you enough revenue.
Carl Mattiola found 8 problems from 32 phone calls (Duration: 1 hour each call)
and as he says:
After diving deep: 5, 6, 7 questions deep after asking the initial one to really
understand what would benefit or what would be the solution or what would be perfect
to serve this audience, then you go out and build it and this is a software and the idea
behind software, it's great because you can have customers that pay a reoccurring fee
every month, and the more customers you get, the more income you're going to have
month after month.

Its not the solution, its the problem

As soon as you have it defined so accurately and clearly, the solution just comes to you
subconsciously. The subconscious is so powerful it'll tell you the solution when you're
defining a problem.

24

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

The good thing is that if you find a solution with, for example, an iPad app, if the iPad app
bombs, the idea is not dead. The idea is not married to the solution of the iPad app. You
understand the problem so well that you can probably shift to something else to solve that
problem in another way. So when you define the problem, you're not locked into your
solution. Versus what happens when, someone comes up with their own idea, they try to sell
it, they find nobody wants it. They get married to the solution, they fall in love with the
solution and they try to tweak this, tweak that, maybe if we tweak that... They're so married to
the solution and completely disconnected from the problem they're actually solving.

Connect to hundreds
So remember: You have to send the first mail to enough people to have some responses.
Think about between 100 and 400 contacts. From that, they will answer you 10 to 20% and
you will be able to set a phone call to another 10 to 20%.

You will need 10 phone calls or more to find a pain. Something like 30 is a good number
because you will like to convert these persons into your 5 to 10 first pre-selling customers.

CLICK HERE and Apply To Become A Member Of The Foundation

25

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

PHASE THREE: Sketching the Solution in a Week

Think Solution, Sketch it, Contact Market and Validate the Solution
Once you have selected the pain-worthy solving (the solution will arise from your
subconscious). Think how to solve it with software. Make a diagram in paper or in the
computer and show it to the people who had the problem. Find out what they think. Dont
make it too complex. Start sketching the solution with a notepad or a computer. Keynotopia is
a great tool for a more professional look. The Minimal Viable Product is a keynote or
PowerPoint presentation.
Show your contacts how solving their pain can bring them greater benefits than they may
have realized. Involve them in the process of designing and creating the application. Reach
them by mail or by phone, or screen-share with GoToMeeting/join.me/Skype or in person.
Listen to the feedback and reiterate the solution. That is the key. Then make a working
(clickable) demo prototype, with Keynotopia.

How to say no
Perhaps you cannot implement all the features that the client asks you for. Filter them and
build only the basic ones that solve the pain being addressed. Cut down your Keynotopia to
a few slides. Ten will do the work.
Strip away features within the software to the point where it makes you nervous. You may
question, can I really get away with launching with this little?" Take away dont build the
whole thing out the way everyone described at first. Start by getting it to the point where it's
usable and people can get some benefit from it.

27

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

Picture 20 features listed out. Since you're talking on the phone, you talk to the person like:
"Hey, we're thinking about cutting this feature, would you sign up for the product if we cut
this feature for the first version?" "Yeah, Id still sign up." "Cool." Cut it out from the first
version, put it in version 2.
And it's so easy to do because of the reoccurring revenue coming in every month, simply
dedicate 20% of the budget to development and then let your customers fund the evolution
of your software.
Youre going to have say no quite a bit, because you cant do everything. Youre also going to
have to say no to people who paid you and believed in you. You can say thats under review.
I personally find that its about building trust and a relationship. When a customer asks, can it
do this? Saying no can often build more trust. The truth is, your clients may not actually want
everything they are asking for. Theyre just speaking their mind. Being honest and unafraid to
say no will build trust.

Presenting the sketch

This is how Carl Mattiola did it:
So I used paper to sketch it and then Keynotopia wired frame, and reviewed it with the
people who said they wanted it. I basically showed it to them and iterated it maybe 2-3
times and then when I was ready I put together an information pack that had some
screenshots based on wireframes I put together, and it really defined the problem and
how the problem was going to be solved, and all the benefits the user would get and
made an offer, and so from there I pre-sold the product using that information pack
and using an applicable demo that I made with the wireframes to these people to
prove that it was a worthy idea. So you can sell it in advance.

28

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

Presenting the sketch (continued)

This is how Carl Mattiola did it:
What I asked for was what it would cost them for 3 months to pay me in advance for the
product, and what I said was once I got 3, that would be enough for me to feel
comfortable moving forward. So I did that.
In the info pack there's a process--there's a diagrammed process of the old flow that
they used to have to go through in there that's still, when I show that to people makes
them cringe and that's what sells the product.
Dont be afraid of other solutions to your problem (CRM market for example). You are
listening to the market and that makes you different.
It is like Lean Startup mentality. Launch a product and get the feedback on it, and be
prepared to get some backlash, but also be prepared to hear whats good about it, too. That
way you can develop and youre a bit more agile.

CLICK HERE and Apply To Become A Member Of The Foundation

29

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

PHASE FOUR: Pre-selling

Creating an Info Pack or Marketing Website. Pre-Sell Your Product

to Fund Your Project.
You must pre-sell to 5, 15, 20 or 50 customers before you build a product. It depends how
much you need and how much are you going to charge. You need to estimate your cost and
how much profit you would like to make before you can establish your customers price.
Money is the validator. You can do everything right, but if you dont have the guts to ask for
the money, it wont work. I would pay is nothing.

How to pre-sell
First you will need to establish value by expelling all of the benefits. This process is know as
Price Anchoring. Show them what the return on investment could be. Your objective is to
pre-sell by offering a price discount and influence over the product.
For example: They pay three months up front for the software, they got 10% off for life of the
fees. And access to the beta program and to give you input as you develop it, and that whole
beta program would be free for them.
You can go to a software development enterprise with the softwares specification to get a
quote. You could also use their proposal as inspiration for your own.
You can create a little Kickstarter program and insert a slide into your info pack. You can
offer some benefits to pay in advance (three months, six months, yearly, forever?, life
discount, promise that you wont change the prices or life-support ). You must tell them that
they are going to be like the founders. Make them to feel the project as their baby too.

31

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

You can say: Were not going to build it unless we have people that buy into it before. And
you are the first person. So if you want this bad enough, we need the first person to say yes
and our offer is to pre-pay, for example, three months of the software up front. And youd be
the first person to say: hey, I want this, and come in on the beta.
You dont need a payment system. An account number is enough. Carl tells us how to show
the benefits. He got 50% of the people talked with this script:

What Ill give you in return for that[paying in advance] is 20% off that price for life, and I
won't change the prices on you. You'll get to work with me and dictate features as we
go. You'll get support. You can call my cellphone whenever you want, and I will
personally help you implement this into your business. In exchange, the catch is that
it's not going to be ready until May, and in the end I'll want to use you as a testimonial.
Dane show us how to do the math and present a return on investment:
So if we helped recruit one new agent a year, that would be worth $10,000 to you?"
They're like "Yeah!" I was like "Great, so how does $200 a month sound? $2400 a
year?" "Pfft, no, that's great. One agent and we've 5x our return." Now I'm selling a
WordPress platform that most people use for free for $200 to real estate companies
because I understood and could clearly define the problem better than anyone else.
The goal is to get multiple paying customers before the product exists. You have guaranteed
paying customers. There is virtually no chance of failing because you have a paying customer
before launch. The concept generates the funding for development.

32

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

How can I charge for something that is not already built?

Number one, you must believe that you have the integrity to fulfill what youre saying youre
going to fulfill. So if you get money for something and youve told them youre going to build
this youve got to field that, and youve got to believe that youre going to provide that.

Another way to take the pressure off you and off your client is an agreement for a full or
partial refund in the case that the project does not succeed in development or in reaching its
funding goals. Having integrity is key.

Learn Pre-Selling from the Pros

CLICK HERE and Apply To Become A Member Of The Foundation

33

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

PHASE FIVE: Build

Build the Product in 10-12 Weeks

After achieving some pre-sales ($10.000, $15,000 or $50,000) it's time to build the product.
You must outsource it in order to continue pre-selling it and growing up your audience. You
must try to sell the product to other people who have not been involved in the process. Call
explaining the benefits. Inform the contact that the software is in beta development and that
if they purchase now, they will get 10% off. There will always be some objections, but some
will buy regardless. In this phase you must also start building a website.
In words of Dane Maxwell: If you build a product in The Foundation before youve pre-sold it
or youre caught writing code because if youre a developer, we dont let you code inside The
Foundation. You have to hire it out. Theres no way youre going to write your own code, thats
not how a business owner thinks. If youre caught building a product, before you even pre-sell,
we kick you out of The Foundation. We dont let you sabotage yourself.
You must simplify it in order to build it up from 8 to 12 weeks. That will cost roughly $12,000
to $20,000. The more you pre-sell, the less money of your own needs to be spent.
You can pay a programmer or you can save money on development by hiring a programmer
and giving him equity. A programmer's not going to give you equity unless they believe in
the product, unless they see the revenue potential. Heres what happens: when you recruit a
developer, the more experience they have, the more likely they are to take equity. This is not
always the case. But really good developers are keen on equity.

35

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

How to find a good developer

You can hire a programmer in Odesk, eLance, vWorker, find someone locally or send a
proposal to India
Normally you pay $600 to $800 a month for a programmer
Ask for a good language (python, ruby).
Write a good job description
Include mockups
Filter the programmers (independents are better than agencies)
You can ask to put a word in the application or If you are human, put human!
in the application. With this you know they have read the job description
You can do some test programs and revise them. Pay them $30 to do a test program.
The communication with the programmer must be good

36

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

PHASE SIX: Launch & Scale

Ok, so youve launched the product and you have some paying customers. However, you
need more new customers to continue development and be profitable.
You have to keep in mind and monitor the retention rate (drop off). It is true that the lifetime
value of a membership website versus software from a quantified perspective is usually
something like 10x - 50x higher.
You can use AdWords once you have revenue or continue using email to get new customers.
You can Google-search top cities and then buy lists of email addresses. This is a little on the
sketchy-side, but what you can do is to send an email with such tremendous value that you
would get barely any spam complaints. So you might get that list of 3,000, and you might find
the very best tip that you could ever give, to this industry and related to the pain your product
solves. Then you would cold email them. For example: "Recruiting tip to recruit an agent. Hey,
if youve been looking to recruit agents, try and do this XYZ thing on Facebook to agents, and
you might recruit them. Hope this helps, signed Dane. P.S. If you have any agents in recruiting
agents using the Internet, check this out."
You can go to meet-up groups to be where your customers are. You can use your website,
which can get leads from Facebook and Twitter. So its basically ground and pounding the
first 100 customers. It's all about going to where the customers are.

CLICK HERE and Apply To Become A Member Of The Foundation

38

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

OUTRO: This is the Recipe

If you want to start something, be open to listening to what the
challenges are and the pains that are presented to you. And when you
find something and you hear a pain, jump on it.
And those are the main principles I followed these, and I think they can be replicated. Can
they be replicated exactly? Its going to take different forms. The process of just being open
to solving peoples problems, no matter how theyre presented, thats what you can replicate.
To succeed you must know why you are doing this. Know your mission, have integrity, have a
good mindset and focus (no distractions).
You CANNOT accomplish this with only the help of this book. You must experiment with it in
the Foundation. As I mentioned before, it is like learning a new language.
This book: Integrity: The Courage to Meet the Demands of Reality just goes to this model of
leadership and how to be a leader in your organization and with customers. I think that doing
the pre-selling model, integrity and trust are a huge thing. You cant pre-sell people if youre a
sales-type person. You must have integrity to do it. It is key if youre going to embark on this
journey.

CLICK HERE and Apply To Become A Member Of The Foundation

40

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

Learn The Foundation Process

in

45

Minutes)
(Or Less

THANKS!
II hope youve enjoyed this eBook as much as I loved writing it.
I cant thank enough The Foundations founders and members for
their continued support and shared advice..
I appreciate each and every one of you taking time out of your day or evening to read this, and
if you have an extra second, I would love to hear what you think about it.
Please leave a comment at The Foundation Community, or if youd rather reach me in private,
dont hesitate to shoot me an email.
Thanks again and I wish you nothing less than success!
Jon

[email protected]

Want More?
You'll Learn How To Build A Profitable, Recurring Revenue Web Based Product in 6 months...
Even If You Don't Have Any Ideas Or Development Experience.

CLICK HERE and Apply To Become A Member Of The Foundation

41

2015 The Foundation. All Rights Reserved.