Commercial Discovery & Review
You've built the technology. Let's work out how to get it bought.
A focused working session to pressure-test your technology business and identify the route to your first or next commercial opportunity.
A founder session with Justin Taylor for people who have launched a technology product or technology-led business and need to work out what happens next commercially.
The offer
A working session,
not another strategy document.
You bring
- Your product
- Your proposition
- Your current customers or prospects
- Your commercial challenge
Justin brings
25+ years of commercial technology experience, and a session that works through the business from a customer's perspective.
The objective is to identify who should buy it, why they should buy it, who to approach, what to say and how to get to the first meaningful commercial opportunity.
What you bring
Bring your real business problem.
No need to prepare a large presentation. Bring whatever you currently have — the session starts from where the business actually is.
- Product
- Website
- Pitch deck
- Existing proposition
- Customer feedback
- Pilot
- Early customer conversations
- Investor deck
- Target market
- Commercial problem
The route
From what you've built to something customers buy.
- 01
Technology
- 02
Proposition
- 03
Right customer
- 04
First contact
- 05
POC
- 06
Proof of value
- 07
First revenue
- 08
Repeatable GTM
What we work through
Eight things we work through together.
The product
What have you actually built?
- What does it do?
- What is genuinely different?
- What problem does it solve?
- What evidence do you have that the problem matters?
The customer
Who has the strongest reason to buy it?
Don't start with a huge market. Identify the most credible initial customer.
- Who has the problem?
- How painful is it?
- Who owns it?
- Who has budget?
- What triggers them to act?
- What would make them take a meeting?
The proposition
Can you explain the value in a way a customer understands?
We work from technology, to problem, to business outcome, to reason to buy.
The objective is to make the proposition commercially understandable, not simply technically impressive.
The first ten customers
Who should we actually approach?
This is where the session becomes tangible — a starting target-account approach, not a theoretical TAM exercise.
- Target organisations
- Relevant sectors
- Buyer roles
- Potential contacts
- Existing connections
- Potential introductions
- Partners or channels
The first conversation
What do we actually say?
- Why this company?
- Why this person?
- Why now?
- What is the message?
- What are we asking for?
Moving from "we need customers" to "we know who we want to talk to and why they should take the call".
The POC
How do we get someone to try it?
We work backwards from the customer's decision: the customer problem, the proposed solution, what needs to be proved, what a POC would look like, what success means, who needs to sponsor it and what happens afterwards.
The key question: is this POC designed to create a customer, or just demonstrate the technology?
Turning the POC into money
Don't let the POC become the destination.
- What happens if it works?
- Who pays?
- What is the commercial offer?
- What does expansion look like?
- What evidence will demonstrate value?
- Can the customer become a reference?
- Can the same proposition be taken to similar customers?
POC → proof of value → customer → reference → next customer.
The funding story
Does the commercial story stand up?
Before going to investors, we pressure-test the commercial case: what problem are we solving, who will pay, why will they pay, how big is the opportunity, what traction do we have, what have customers told us, what evidence do we have, how will we acquire customers, what will the funding unlock and what commercial milestones should it achieve?
This isn't investment advice. It's making sure you aren't presenting a great technology story without a convincing commercial story.
What you leave with
At the end of the session you should have.
A sharper proposition
A clearer explanation of what you sell, who it is for and why it matters.
An initial target customer profile
A much clearer idea of who should be approached first.
A route to the first conversations
Who to approach, why to approach them and what to say.
A POC hypothesis
What the first customer should test and what success should look like.
A commercial next step
A clear action plan for moving towards revenue.
A stronger commercial story
A more credible basis for customer, partner or investor conversations.
The role Justin plays
Not a sales trainer. Not a technical consultant.
Your commercial voice.
Justin works alongside you to challenge the commercial thinking, asking the questions that get missed when everyone is focused on building the technology.
- Who actually needs this?
- Why would they buy it?
- Why would they buy it now?
- Who do we need to speak to?
- How do we get the introduction?
- What would make them agree to a POC?
- What are we actually trying to prove?
- What happens if the POC succeeds?
- Does the commercial story stand up to an investor's questions?
Why Justin
Experience on the customer side of the table.
Justin has spent more than 25 years working across technology, commercial strategy, pre-sales, solution design, sales and strategic opportunities — understanding how customers think about buying technology.
Experience includes working with organisations such as BP, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Sony, Barclays, Virgin Media and Swiss Re.
- Defining technology strategies and operating models
- Advising executives on technology investment and business value
- AI, ERP, cloud and digital initiatives
- Translating business challenges into technology propositions
- Discovery workshops and executive presentations
- Building and leading pre-sales and solution capabilities
- Proposition development
- Complex technology sales
- Go-to-market strategy
- Strategic customer relationships
Start-up and growth experience
Large-organisation experience,
applied to smaller technology businesses.
Alongside enterprise work, Justin has worked with start-ups, incubators and growth businesses, helping them think about commercialisation and go-to-market.
Recent examples include Noel Copper Technologies and Hire Hop, along with involvement in the Cambridge innovation ecosystem.
The experience comes from large organisations. The application is for smaller technology businesses working out how to get bought.
Who this is for
You've built something real. Now you need to make it commercial.
- A launched product
- Technology that works
- Early users or customers
- A pilot or POC opportunity
- A strong technical team
- An investor conversation coming up
- A commercial opportunity you aren't sure how to pursue
Particularly relevant to AI, quantum, enterprise software, data and emerging technology businesses. It isn't intended for pure idea-stage businesses.
Who this isn't for
This isn't a service you outsource the problem to.
- A technical development service
- A fundraising service
- A generic startup mentoring programme
- A sales training course
- A corporate transformation consultancy
It is practical commercial thinking for founders who have built something and now need to work out how to sell it.
Commercial Discovery & Review
You've built it. Let's work out how to get it bought.
Bring your product, your proposition and the commercial problem you're trying to solve. Let's work through it together — a founder working session, not a long consultancy engagement.