Your Product Isn’t the Problem. Your Conversation Is.

I’ve spent 40 years selling to K-12 schools. I worked at Pearson, HMH, EPS Literacy & Intervention, and Matific before going full-time with my own consulting business. Over the years, I’ve seen the same thing happen again and again: founders with great products who can’t figure out why their deals keep stalling.

They have conversations. Demos go well. District leaders seem interested. Proposals are sent. Then there’s silence. No rejection. No, “we went with someone else.” Just nothing.

Most of them think the problem is leads. They invest in marketing, hire sales consultants, and set up outreach campaigns. But they end up with lots of cold contacts and very few paying clients.

The real problem isn’t leads. It’s what happens during the first conversation.

The Silence Has a Source

When I join founders’ calls with district leaders, I almost always see the same thing. The founder is ready to present. They know their product inside and out. They have the data, case studies, and ROI points. But they start talking about everything before finding out what the district really needs.

Not just the surface-level need, but the real one. The one that keeps the superintendent or curriculum director up at night before board meetings. The one connected to a specific mandate or a problem they need to fix this year.

If you skip that step, your proposal ends up on a desk with three others that all look the same. Busy district leaders won’t chase you down to figure out the difference. They just move on.

That’s where the silence comes from. It’s not because of a bad product, but because of a missed conversation.

What Happens When You Fix the Conversation

Travis spent 20 years as a teacher and principal before starting AT Learning, a company that helps K-12 schools grow enrollment and improve teacher quality. He knew education well, but selling was a different challenge.

His business depended almost entirely on Title funding. When districts worried about those funds being cut, his pipeline dried up. He went seven or eight months without a single sale. Deals were small, between $2,000 and $4,000, and he had to chase many just to keep going.

He tried other consultants and spent money on marketing campaigns. He got plenty of contacts, but very few became clients.

When we started working together, I saw the same thing I see with most founders. Travis didn’t have a lead problem. He had a conversation problem. He came to calls ready to talk about what he offered, instead of asking what the school actually needed.

We changed his approach to focus on one idea: stop selling and start listening. We created a structured, question-based outline for his calls. Travis keeps it by his screen every time he talks to a school.

The change happened quickly. On his first big call using this approach, he doubled his price the morning of the meeting. The school leader agreed without any pushback because the conversation focused on solving their problem, not just comparing prices.

His average deal grew from $2,000–$4,000 to $25,000–$35,000. Several deals are now close to six figures. He has fewer clients, more revenue, and time to build new services instead of chasing small contracts.

Price Isn’t the Problem Either

Travis’s story shows something I see all the time. Founders undercharge because they don’t know how to talk about pricing without risking the deal.

Here’s the pattern: a founder builds something that truly helps schools and sets a low price to get started. It works for a while. Then they realize they need five times as many clients to reach their goals, and they spend all their time on small contracts instead of growing.

The solution isn’t a new pricing strategy. It’s about how you frame the conversation. If you lead with features and pricing, the district compares you to every other vendor on a spreadsheet. You become just a line item, and line items get negotiated down or cut.

When you lead with outcomes, like what changes for their teachers, students, and schools, price becomes just part of the context, not the main focus. This isn’t overselling. It’s having the confidence to charge what your work is worth because you’ve taken the time to understand its value to them.

What I Got Wrong Before I Got It Right

I’ll be honest. Early in my career, I made the same mistakes. I thought being prepared meant knowing my product inside and out. I would walk into meetings full of information and share it all. I talked more than I listened and left feeling like I did great.

Didn’t close nearly as many deals as I should have.

It took me longer than I’d like to admit to realize that the best preparation isn’t about what you plan to say. It’s about what you plan to ask. Now, before any call, I spend more time researching the district than practicing my pitch. I look at board meeting notes, recent news, and who’s involved in the decision and what matters to them. Then I write down two or three questions I truly don’t know the answer to.

That’s it. No complicated framework. Just enough preparation to walk in curious instead of rehearsed.

The Shift That Matters

Every founder I work with comes to the same realization eventually. They don’t need more leads, a better deck, or a lower price. They need to change the conversation.

Ask questions before you present. Listen before you try to solve. Find out what’s keeping that district leader up at night before you explain how you can help.

Travis’s business went from seven months without a sale to consistently closing five- and six-figure deals. It wasn’t because he changed his product, but because he changed how he approached conversations.

The product was never the problem. The conversation was.