u/Leading-Substance-83

Built makeforme . Build online stores for Indian solopreneurs – handmade sellers, home bakers, coaches, tutors. Set it up in 4 minutes. UPI payments. ₹99 per month after 7-day free trial. No commission.

Month 2. 13 sellers onboarded. Bootstrapped.

The objection I run into on almost every single call, word-for-word:

"But I already have Instagram for free."

Yes. But Instagram does not allow people to purchase anything from you. It is a discovery platform, not a checkout one.

And when I say that, they nod. And when I follow-up with them a week later, they haven't set up their store yet.

Tried three different angles here. "DM chaos" angle (you are losing orders), "payment friction" angle (screengrabs from UPI are not actual payment receipts), and "professionalism" angle (URL for the store vs. DM).

But none of those close consistently.

Those who close – only the ones that have already lost a real order because of DM chaos.

Founders who have successfully sold to this type of customer (non-tech background, existing free workflow, low urgency):

For 3 years now, she has been creating handmade jewellery. She sells everything that she posts on Instagram. However, she was handling her orders through Instagram direct messages, hence there were always lapses.

The customer would approach her asking about something, she would quote the price, the chat would move up and when she responded they would have forgotten about it. Or they would place an order, show would not follow up, the money would never be transferred.

I made an ecommerce platform and that is literally what it is all about. More detail on my profile. She was my first user.

Now she has a link through which customers can select what they want and pay directly. She called me and left a voice note right after she launched telling me that she had 6 orders in just one evening without replying to even one DM.

Do you know how many small sellers in India are still running their business fully inside WhatsApp and Instagram. If you do, then what is that part that frustrates you the most?