This week I pulled back on the prospecting. Two warm leads were already in motion and both needed attention, not another name on the list.
The first prospect is one I've been working on spec. That sounds worse than it is. Getting the process down on a real engagement, with real stakes, is worth more right now than the invoice. The reps are the point. The second is an enterprise opportunity. I've been doing internal reviews and research, getting to know their systems before asking them to sign anything. We're moving to NDA stage next. I'm hopeful it turns into an engagement. It's pretty clear they need help. I doubt they'd even know who or how to hire for this kind of work. Their stack is robust and complicated.
Amy Picks Up the Phone
The first prospect had a sales problem. Calls coming in after hours, nobody answering. Leads going cold overnight. The kind of thing that sounds small until you count the money walking out the door.
So I offered to set up AI voice routing using their existing software. I had never done this before. The IVR system was complex. The UI was complex. The sales script was theirs. I sat down with Claude as copilot and started building.
We created an AI character called Amy. She answers the phone, follows the prospect's own sales script, handles objections, routes calls, and sounds human enough that I'd rate her about an 8 out of 10. If you count the fact that Amy never misses a call, never takes a sick day, and handles every after-hours ring without complaint, that number climbs to a 9.
We made a test call. I was impressed. Not in the "wow, technology" way. In the "this is going to make this guy money" way.
The plan now is to split-test conversions against a human. That's the real measure. But the math already works in his favour: if Amy lands one deal per month from calls that would have otherwise gone to voicemail, my service pays for itself. Even at the 50%-off bro-deal rate I'm charging while I get this thing off the ground.
That's a high-leverage task. One setup. Recurring value. The kind of work that makes a flat-rate model actually work.
The SaaS Thought
I was thinking today about a previous project — a SaaS I was building — and how much I don't want to go that direction anymore. Not when I can build custom workflows this quickly and easily. The tools are so good now that the gap between "I had an idea" and "it's running in production" is measured in hours, not months. Building a SaaS product feels like renting a building when you could just show up with a toolbox.
I'm trimming my software stack near daily. There are still some tools out there that are genuine must-haves. But not many. And the list is getting shorter. Another topic for another day.
The Numbers
Revenue: $0. Clients: 0. Prospects: 5.
Two sales calls this week. One booked for tomorrow. All warm leads with zero outbound prospecting — they came in from the work itself. Cold outreach restarts today.
Still zero revenue. But the pipeline feels different than it did on Day 0. There's weight in it now. Amy is answering the phone.