The 5 P’s of True Demand
Why identifying your ICP is not enough.
How many problems do you have right now that you haven’t paid anyone to solve?
How many tools do you know would help you that you’ve never bought?
That’s the default state: not buying.
Most people, most of the time, ignore most relevant products and services. Pain, need, and ROI don’t automatically cause purchases.
True B2B demand is rare.
And when I say demand, I don't mean demand gen, channels, or lead volume. I mean whether a specific buyer is in a position to buy right now.
The job is not convincing more people to buy. It’s finding the few people who would be weird not to. The question “Who would be weird not to buy?” comes from Rob Snyder. It’s one of the cleanest demand filters I’ve heard.
Where most ICP work breaks
Demand exists at the individual buyer level. Companies don’t have demand. People do.
Often, B2B ICP work loses sight of that.
You talk to a few clients, pull some firmographic data, maybe run a survey, and mash it all together into one “ideal customer profile.” A little of this client, a little of that one. Some attributes from the project you loved working on. Some from the deal that paid the most. The result is a Frankenstein ICP: a profile that describes nobody specifically.
Even when the ICP work is sharper than that—industry, company size, tech stack, qualifying characteristics, key personas—it still only tells you who could buy.
But demand tells you who is likely to buy now.
Even within a perfect ICP, only a subset has demand right now. Most have the same project sitting on their backlog, but treat their current options as good enough. Of the ones who don’t, only some are blocked in a way you can solve.
The 5 P’s of true demand
This is the filter I use with clients to help evaluate where they have the strongest signals of true, repeatable demand.
The first (Person) is what good ICP work already gives you. The other four (Project, Priority, Paths, Pitfalls) are what ICP work often misses.
Person, Project, and Priority tell you that demand exists. Paths and Pitfalls tell you where the existing options fall short for the buyer (and where your offer can stand out).
1) Person
Can you name a specific human at a specific type of company?
A buyer in a specific role, not a persona, not a segment, not a Frankenstein ICP.
If you can’t name them, you’re describing a market or segment, not a person.
2) Project
What’s actively on their plate this quarter?
The rock they’re trying to move now. The project on their task board, not the thing they’re “interested in” or “open to.”
If they’re not actively working on it, they’re not in a buying situation.
3) Priority
Why is this in their top three right now?
If it’s not, you don’t have demand. There’s almost always a trigger that put it there:
Missed quarter
New executive hire
Board pressure
Churn spike
Pipeline collapse
Big launch or fundraising milestone
Without a trigger, even “important” projects stay buried in the backlog.
4) Paths
What options have they already considered or tried?
DIY. Internal hire. Agency. Freelancer. Existing tool. Do nothing.
If they haven’t explored paths, they’re often not in an active buying moment yet. Active consideration leaves a trail: people they’ve talked to, tools they’ve tested, money they’ve already spent.
5) Pitfalls
Why isn’t each path working for them?
Cost. Speed. Expertise. Risk. Trust. Internal politics. Credibility.
This isn’t pain in the abstract. It’s the failure of the specific options they’ve already tried or considered. Most pain in life never causes a purchase. Path failures do.
If you can’t name the Pitfalls with their current Paths, you don’t know if your offer is relevant.
An example of true demand
Here’s how a previous client of mine described his situation when we first talked:
“I’m trying to figure out where to focus our marketing and sales investment so it actually drives pipeline. Our fractional CFO just told us we’re underspending, and it’s one of my rocks to fix it this quarter. But I don’t know what to do. I’ve read the books and tried to DIY it, and we also hired a demand-gen agency last year, only to waste six figures. An internal hire is too expensive and too early for our stage.”
Each piece maps to a P:
Project: figure out where to focus marketing and sales investment
Priority: fractional CFO surfaced the underspend; on this quarter’s rock list
Paths: DIY, demand-gen agency, internal hire
Pitfalls: DIY didn’t move; agency wasted money; internal hire was too expensive and too early
This is true demand: an unavoidable project running into unworkable options. If a buyer says all five, and your offer solves the Pitfalls, they’d be weird not to buy.
That’s why this client of mine closed in 3 days. He told me later he was sitting through my pitch thinking, “shut up and take my money.”
What to ask prospects
Knowing the framework helps you know what to listen for during sales calls. Here are examples of questions I use in early conversations.
For Project:
“What made you reach out or agree to a call?”
“What are you trying to fix right now?”
“What’s actively on your plate this quarter?”
For Priority:
“Why is this the priority now for you versus six months ago?”
“What changed recently that put this on your list?”
For Paths:
“What have you already tried?”
“What other options are you exploring?”
For Pitfalls:
“Why isn’t [the current option] working?”
“Where does that approach break down for you?”
The point of these questions is to find out whether the prospect has demand you can help with. If they do, the call naturally moves to how you can help. If they don’t, you save both of you from going through a process you weren’t going to win. You can only confirm demand, not create it.
That’s the difference between a sales call that feels like helping and one that feels like a used-car lot.
The harder problem: choosing where to play
The framework is the easy part. Choosing where to point it is harder.
The most common failure mode I see is that solos and agency owners keep testing new offers, messaging, channels, lead magnets, and experiments.
It feels productive, but rarely is. Adjusting any variable alters your demand equation.
The work that moves the needle is naming which clients you’re already 5-of-5 with and rebuilding your sales process around that pattern. Less new. More repeating.
The client mentioned above had been on the testing treadmill for years. This led to low margins, six-figure spending on ineffective marketing, and to accepting any work that came through the door.
After we identified his best-fit customers, clarified the demand pattern, and rebuilt his messaging and offer around it, everything shifted. Prospects self-identified before the first call, margins increased, and he experienced his highest revenue quarter ever.
Same skills. Same delivery. Completely different demand pattern.
What to do this week
For any live opportunity you have, ask: Can I name all 5 P’s in this buyer’s own language?
If yes, you’re likely in a demand conversation.
If no, you’re probably trying to force something.
After that:
Pull your last 10-20 sales conversations.
Score each one across the 5 P’s. (Or ask Claude to help.)
Find where all 5 P’s appear.
Tighten targeting, messaging, and discovery around that pattern.
This is where momentum comes from.
When the 5 P’s are present, sales is easy and feels like helping. When they’re missing, sales feels like pushing.
Stop trying to convince broad ICPs. Start finding the few buyers who would be weird not to buy.
Keep building,
Garrett
P.S. If you’re a solo consultant, fractional, or agency owner and want help pressure-testing your demand assumptions, DM me. I’d love to see if I can help.
Have questions or comments about today’s topic? Share them below. 👇
Great insights. I've definitely felt the lack of the 5 P's. I'm quickly realizing that to help B2B marketers with launching their webinar program, they need to be actively in the process of trying and failing to launch. Otherwise, I'm just an option sitting on the shelf for "someday."