When AI can crunch numbers faster than your coffee maker brews a cup, the real advantage for product teams isn’t in sitting behind spreadsheets. It’s getting out of the building and actually talking to customers. Even better—selling to customers. Yes, I said it. Product teams need to sell.
Why Sell When You Could Be Building?
It’s simple: selling forces product teams to face the harsh truth. You’re no longer guessing what features people might like—you’re hearing it directly from those who have a vested interest. Suddenly, the hypothesis you had about a earthshaking feature is met with the cold stare of a prospect who couldn’t care less.
That’s what happens when you sell. You learn what matters.
Product leaders, designers, devs, and PMs all need to stop pretending that selling is someone else’s job. It’s everyone’s job. When product teams sell, they stop focusing on what’s “cool” and start focusing on what actually provides value. Spoiler alert: often times those two things don’t overlap.
When Done Right, Selling Isn’t Sleazy—It’s Research
Most product teams will cringe at the idea of “selling.” That’s understandable, given that sales often gets a bad rap for overpromising or pushing features that don’t exist (we see you, sales team). But here’s the twist: when product people sell, they’re not just pitching—they’re learning.
When you’re in front of a prospect, explaining how your product solves their problem, you’re not just selling—you’re running a live test. You’re validating assumptions. And if you’re paying attention, you’ll see what makes customers lean in and what makes them tune out. Most importantly, there's no filter between your customer's reaction and you. You can feel it!
Want a real-world example? Imagine calling a prospect and saying, “Hi, I’m Jane, I'm a product designer at ABC Corp and I’m trying to gather feedback on whether this product feature makes sense to you. You mind listening for a minute?” Turns out, customers are more willing to give you honest feedback when you’re not trying to shove a sale down their throats. You won't get them off the phone. In almost every case that I've done this I've had to end the call before the prospect or customer did.
Why You Learn More in 5 Sales Calls Than in 500 Hours of Research
You can read all the user feedback reports in the world, but there’s nothing quite like the truth bomb of a customer’s reaction in real-time. You learn more in a few sales conversations than you ever will in hours of internal meetings, designing without real-world input.
Separately, and possibly more importantly than the research is the connection to money. Selling isn’t just about revenue. It’s about understanding the problem your product is trying to solve. If you can’t explain it well enough to sell it, then you don’t understand the problem—and neither does your team. By getting product teams to sell, you expose them to the raw reality of customer expectations, and they’ll be better equipped to create something that actually solves a real problem.
Stop Hiding Behind the Desk: Get Out and Sell
Think of selling as stepping out into the real world—away from the safe confines of your desk and the warmth of feature roadmaps. The uncomfortable truth is that most product teams hide behind the research phase, convincing themselves that collecting feedback is the same thing as selling. Spoiler: it’s not.
Selling forces you to face uncomfortable truths about your product, but that’s a good thing. It’s in this discomfort that real insights are gained. And no, “selling” doesn’t mean aggressive cold calls or being pushy. It means understanding the value of your product, engaging directly with prospects, and—yes—asking for the sale to see if your product really holds up.
The Role of AI in All This
In a time where AI can do a lot of the heavy lifting—automating data analysis, building customer feedback matrices, and even predicting behavior—there’s still one thing it can’t replace: human interaction. AI might be able to tell you who to talk to, but it can’t have that tough conversation for you. It can’t stand in front of a customer, get rejected, learn, adjust, and go back with a better pitch. That’s where product teams come in. And no AI is going to take away the value of that firsthand experience.
Closing Thoughts: Selling Is Part of Building
So, do product teams need to sell? Absolutely. Not because they need to hit sales quotas, but because selling is part of building. It’s how you refine your product, validate your assumptions, and—let’s be honest—get out of your own head. In the end, product teams that sell are product teams that learn. And learning is the only way to build something that actually matters.
So get out of the building. Sell something. You’ll thank me later.