A good strategy is to start with a fairly week LOI like this one and reduce the “escape clauses,”...
Sounds like good advice. In Ries's recent book on Lean Startup, there's a story of one of Votizen's unsuccessful pivots which were based on letters of intent.
This is a really important step to remember. The 'decreasing discount' method is only really effective when you not only decrease the discount but increase the concreteness. The steps should be from oral agreement -> non-binding LOI -> binding LOI -> payment. And you want to get to a confirmed payment; without that step you don't have any idea what someone's actually willing to pay.
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[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 16.8 ms ] threadSounds like good advice. In Ries's recent book on Lean Startup, there's a story of one of Votizen's unsuccessful pivots which were based on letters of intent.
Either you can get an actual contractual commitment with a check or you still have not closed the deal...
Don't waste time crafting LOI language and focus on the actual sales process of getting the customer to commit to buying your solution.
Nobody is going to be impressed by LOI that does not bind customer to anything. Don't break out a champagne unless they actually put skin in the game.