How do you pre-sell software before you build it?

Pre-sell software by asking named people for money for something that doesn't exist yet, with a delivery date and a full refund if you miss it. Then build the payment side first, because the thing most likely to make you miss the date isn't the code.

The conversation

Keep it short. "I'm building a tool that does this one thing for you. It'll be ready on this date. It costs this much a month. If it isn't ready by then, or it doesn't do the job, you get every penny back. Do you want in?"

My first deliberate pre-sale was to a bookkeeper, for a tool that did her weekly export. I was ill for 2 days, we talked for 4 minutes, and she said yes. She asked what happened if it was late. I invented the full-refund promise on the spot. (It's been in every pre-sale since.)

One yes is a request

That bookkeeper's yes was real, and the tool did her export perfectly. It never sold to anybody else, because I'd only asked her. One yes is one person's problem. 3 yeses from people who don't know each other is the start of a market.

So ask about 10 people. Write their names down before you start, and count how many pay, not how many are interested.

Open the payment account on day 1

On a later product I pre-sold to 4 people with a date and a refund promise. I built the product first and opened the payment account on day 5. It wanted a document checked. The document sat in a queue for 3 days. I missed the date because of paperwork, not code.

Now the payment account is the first thing I set up, before the first line of the product. It's dull, and it's the part that can't be rushed.

What a pre-sale tells you

It tells you somebody will pay. It also tells you what they think they're buying, which is often not quite what you thought you were building. Listen to that before you write the code.

Ship Alone walks through the pre-sale in full, including what to say when the answer is no.