Choose the right prospects.
Four steps to turn your ideal customer profile into a list worth working.
Michael Wills has spent more than a decade helping small-business owners build sales organizations. Glenn Nixon spent 29 years in corporate sales and sales leadership before advising small businesses. Their experience speaks to a familiar problem: you have a list of names, but you’re still figuring out who belongs on it. Pursuing the wrong fit can cost you time and eat into the margin you needed from the sale.
In this guide, we draw on our interviews with these two sales pros to show you how to turn your ideal customer profile into a list worth working. Four practical steps take you from the problem you solve to the people you should approach and the questions you need to ask.
Read on, then put their advice to work with the accompanying worksheet. You’ll define a good fit, set useful boundaries, choose the next move for each prospect, and improve the list as you learn.
Start with why customers needed you.
An ideal customer profile describes the companies you can help and serve well. Industry, size, and location narrow the search. Michael adds the problem you solve, why your approach fits, and what makes the timing right. Start with his question:
“who are we uniquely built to help?”
Go back to good customers. Read the early emails and call notes. What was happening before they bought? What did they need help with? Look for a problem that repeats.
For example, as a founding AE, ask the founder to walk through three good customers with you. Get the reasons behind the wins onto the page.
No customers yet? Start with your earliest customer conversations and mark what still needs checking.
That gives the prep a direction. With Topsail ONE, we prepare contacts around your customer criteria. You define the market; we handle sourcing, qualification, research, and verification.
Know what would make it a no.
Glenn uses a service business with pricing built around a one-hour drive. A prospect is an hour and twenty minutes away. Close enough? Only if someone deals with the extra cost. Otherwise, the sale can look good while the margin gets worse.
A boundary needs a reason. Geography, delivery requirements, and price matter when they affect whether you can do the job well. Glenn puts it plainly:
“sometimes it's just as important or more important to know when to say no.”
Fits the boundaries
You have a reason to approach. Use the conversation to check the need.
A key fact is missing
Make the unanswered question your next move. Don’t fill the gap with a guess.
Fails a firm requirement
Take it off the active list. Resolve any exception before pursuing it.
Separate what you know from what you need to ask.
Michael looks for problems like those his clients solve. A company’s fit doesn’t confirm its need. Find who owns the problem; if you don’t know, make that your first question.
Three prospects. Three next moves.
Illustration: an IT service supports offices with 10–50 staff within a one-hour drive. It handles employee IT problems, but not specialist compliance.
- Acorn · approach
- 24 staff; 40 minutes away; opening another office. The expansion is known; IT pressure is unconfirmed. Ask who is arranging support for the new site.
- Birch · remove
- 120 staff; two hours away; needs specialist compliance. It fails the requirements. Remove it.
- Cedar · check
- 25 minutes away; staff count unknown. Check whether the office fits the 10–50 range before treating it as a fit.
Acorn gets an opening question. Birch comes off. Cedar needs a fit fact checked.
Fictional companies and criteria applying both guests’ advice. These are not customer results.
Improve the target without quietly widening it.
Glenn wants sellers involved in improving the fit questions. They’re the ones hearing where the criteria are fuzzy. Michael also brings sales conversations back to leadership so the strategy stays connected to the market.
A founder selling alone can review the same evidence. Which needs keep coming up? Which requirements keep failing? Change a criterion for a reason you can explain. A tempting deal shouldn’t quietly redraw the whole market.
Is this list worth working?
Check before you add more names.
Start with the first unchecked item.
One-page, fillable PDF · No email required
Clear criteria still need prepared contacts. Topsail ONE handles that prep and organizes the daily work. You bring the market knowledge and have the conversations that make it better.
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