How to Attract More Customers & Close More Deals

Patrick McFadden • April 19, 2017

You Win The Sale Before You Close

A great deal about marketing has changed over the last few years, but most importantly what’s not changed is the need to narrowly define your ideal customer and that’s what you have to understand in order to thrive in the world today.

Discovering your ideal customer is critical if you want to attract more customers and close more deals. You need to understand their pain points, wants, and needs and be able to address those in your communication and sales efforts.

Below is my step-by-step approach for helping organizations attract more customers with an eye on closing more deals.

Segment Your Customer Base

Begin by segmenting your customer base between normal accounts and your most successful (profitable)accounts. Think about whom your 10 best customers are and what you need to do to attract 10 more just like them! Your best customers or most successful accounts have the following two key characteristics: they are profitable and also refer business to you.

The key here is to understand if there is a certain product, service, program, package, offer or even a problem that is the most profitable.

Dive Deeper for Timing or Buying Triggers

The secret to attracting customers, as opposed to hunting customers, is to get a better understanding of what triggers them to go looking for a service or product like yours?

Closing more deals most naturally happen when there is a problem or change in a buyers life or business. Without knowing exactly what these problems or changes are, you can’t make ANY sale effort work effectively.

In every business something happens that makes buying your product or service a priority on a clients to-do list. Here are some great examples of buying/timing triggers:

Business2Consumer (B2C) Timing Triggers

  • car breaks down,
  • going on a date
  • graduation
  • marriage
  • birth of a child,
  • illness
  • divorce
  • purchase of new house
  • moving to another state
  • the doctor says to lose weight,
  • attending a big event that requires a new outfit,
  • someone or something interrupted you and made this product or service a necessity right now (e.g. impulse buy at the cash register or price sensitive deadline).

Business2Business (B2B) Timing Triggers

  • hiring first employee
  • moving to new office space
  • expansion or acquisition
  • open new business
  • funding (loan, grant, investor, etc.)
  • product or service launch
  • fire and loss of files
  • updated website
  • revenue goal
  • damaged or malfunctioning equipment/technology
  • buying advertising services

I believe any business that seeks real growth will devote time or resources to developing a list of buying/timing triggers that, if heard by employees, vendors, suppliers, referral sources or strategic partners, signal it’s time to talk.

Seek Feedback From Your Customers

Now take your 10 best customers, email or phone them asking for feedback. Customer feedback has always been like a secret cash hideout.

What kind of feedback should you get from customers? There’s no limit — it can be any kind of information that would help you get better and plug sales and marketing gaps. Get started with these 5 questions:

  1. Why did you decide to hire us or buy from us in the first place?
  2. What’s one thing we do better than others you do business with?
  3. What’s one thing we could do to create a better experience for you?
  4. If you were to refer us what would you say?
  5. Can you tell me about three other companies that you love?

Remember, asking for feedback is indispensable, but it’s just one step. To truly attract more customers and close more deals, make sure you listen to customers’ responses and find ways to implement their suggestions.

Create an Ideal Customer Profile

With all of this information, develop a detailed profile of your ideal customer. Then, show up in the right places (social media channels, networking events, publications, search engines, mobile) at the right time (when ideal customers are looking to solve a problem or research a solution). You may be featured in fewer publications and meet with fewer people, but you’ll close more deals.

Follow us NOW to get more tips on attracting customers and closing deals for your business!

The Missing Layer in AI: Why Judgment, Not Just Data, Will Define the Next Era of Intelligence

By Patrick McFadden • May 2, 2025
Everyone is scaling outputs. Almost no one is scaling judgment.

Everyone Talks About AI Judgment. We Built It.

By Patrick McFadden • May 2, 2025
Ask anyone in tech where AI is headed, and they’ll tell you: “The next leap is reasoning.” “AI needs judgment.” “We need assistants that think, not just answer.” They’re right. But while everyone’s talking about it, almost no one is actually shipping it. So we did. We built Thinking OS™ —a system that doesn’t just help AI answer questions… It helps AI think like a strategist. It helps AI decide like an operator. It helps teams and platforms scale judgment, n ot just generate output. The Theory Isn’t New. The Implementation Is. The idea of layering strategic thinking and judgment into AI isn’t new in theory. The problem is, no one’s been able to implement it effectively at scale. Let’s look at the current landscape. 1. Big Tech Has the Muscle—But Not the Mind OpenAI / ChatGPT ✅ Strength: Best-in-class language generation ❌ Limitation: No built-in judgment or reasoning. You must provide the structure. Otherwise, it follows instructions, not strategy. Google DeepMind / Gemini ✅ Known for advanced decision-making (e.g., AlphaGo) ❌ But only in structured environments like games—not messy, real-world business scenarios. Anthropic (Claude), Meta (LLaMA), Microsoft Copilot ✅ Great at answering questions and following commands ❌ But they’re assistants, not advisors. They won’t reprioritize. They won’t challenge your assumptions. They don’t ask: “Is this the right move?” These tools are powerful—but they don’t think for outcomes the way a strategist or operator would. 2. Who’s Actually Building the Thinking Layer™? This is where it gets interesting—and thin. Startups and Indie Builders Some small teams are quietly: Creating custom GPTs that mimic how experts reason Layering in business context, priorities, and tradeoffs Embedding decision logic so AI can guide, not just execute But these efforts are: Highly manual Difficult to scale Fragmented and experimental Enterprise Experiments A few companies (Salesforce, HubSpot, and others) are exploring more “judgment-aware” AI copilots. These systems can: Flag inconsistencies Recommend next actions Occasionally surface priorities based on internal logic But most of it is still: In early R&D Custom-coded Unproven beyond narrow use cases That’s Why Thinking OS™ Is Different Instead of waiting for a lab to crack it, we built a modular thinking system that installs like infrastructure. Thinking OS™: Captures how real experts reason Embeds judgment into layers AI can use Deploys into tools like ChatGPT or enterprise systems Helps teams think together, consistently, at scale It’s not another assistant. It’s the missing layer that turns outputs into outcomes. So… Is This a New Innovation? Yes—in practice. Everyone says AI needs judgment. But judgment isn’t an idea. It’s a system. It requires: Persistent memory Contextual awareness Tradeoff evaluation Value-based decisions Strategy that evolves with goals Thinking OS™ delivers that. And unlike the R&D experiments in Big Tech, it’s built for: Operators Consultants Platform founders Growth-stage teams that need to scale decision quality, not just content creation If Someone Told You They’ve Built a Thinking + Judgment Layer™… They’ve built something only a handful of people in the world are even attempting. Because this isn’t just AI that speaks fluently. It’s AI that reasons, reflects , and chooses. And in a world that’s drowning in tools, judgment becomes the differentiator. That’s the OS We Built Thinking OS™ is not a prompt pack. It’s not a dashboard. It’s not a glorified chatbot. It’s a decision architecture you can license, embed, or deploy— To help your team, your platform, or your clients think better at scale. We’ve moved past content. We’re building cognition. Let’s talk.

We Found the Missing Layer AI Has Been Waiting For

By Patrick McFadden • May 2, 2025
In every era of innovation, there’s a silent bottleneck—something obvious in hindsight, but elusive until the moment it clicks. In today’s AI-driven world, that bottleneck is clear: AI has speed. It has scale. But it doesn’t have judgment . It doesn’t really think . What’s Actually Missing From AI? When experts talk about the “thinking and judgment layer” as the next leap for AI, they’re calling out a hard truth: Modern AI systems are powerful pattern machines. But they’re missing the human layer—the one that reasons, weighs tradeoffs, and makes strategic decisions in context. Let’s break that down: 1. The Thinking Layer = Reasoning with Purpose This layer doesn’t just process inputs— it structures logic. It’s the ability to: Ask the right questions before acting Break down complexity into solvable parts Adjust direction mid-course when reality changes Think beyond “what was asked” to uncover “what really matters” Today’s AI responds. But it rarely reflects. Unless told exactly what to do, it won’t work through problems the way a strategist or operator would. 2. The Judgment Layer = Decision-Making in the Gray Judgment is the ability to: Prioritize what matters most Choose between imperfect options Make decisions when there’s no clear answer Apply values, experience, and vision—not just data It’s why a founder might not pursue a lucrative deal. Why a marketer might ignore the click-through rate. Why a strategist knows when the timing isn’t right. AI doesn’t do this well. Not yet. Because judgment requires more than data—it requires discernment . Why This Is the Bottleneck Holding Back AI AI can write. It can summarize. It can automate. But it still can’t: Diagnose the real problem behind the question Evaluate tradeoffs like a founder or operator would Recommend a path based on context, constraints, and conviction AI today is still reactive. It follows instructions. But it doesn’t lead. It doesn’t guide. It doesn’t own the outcome. And for those building serious systems—whether you’re running a company, launching a platform, or leading a team—this is the wall you eventually hit. That’s Why We Built Thinking OS™ We stopped waiting for AI to learn judgment on its own. Instead, we created a system that embeds it—by design. Thinking OS™ is an installable decision layer that captures how top founders, strategists, and operators think… …and makes that thinking repeatable , scalable , and usable inside teams, tools, and platforms. It’s not a framework. It’s not a chatbot. It’s not another playbook. It’s the layer that knows how to: Think through complex decisions Apply judgment when rules don’t help Guide others —human or AI—toward strategic outcomes This Is the Missing Infrastructure Thinking OS™ isn’t just about better answers. It’s about better thinking—made operational. And that’s what’s been missing in AI, consulting, leadership development, and platform design. If you’re trying to scale expertise, install judgment, or move from tactical to strategic… You don’t need a faster AI. You need a thinking layer that knows what to do—and why. We built it. Let’s talk.
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