"Value-first" is usually a pitch in a trench coat

"Value-first" is usually a pitch in a trench coat

Popular advice: lead with free value, like a quick audit, before you ask for anything.

Myth. Prospects clocked this play years ago. An unsolicited "audit" reads as a setup for the sale, and a list of their flaws from a stranger lands as an insult, not a gift. The reciprocity you wanted curdles into defensiveness.

It's not that giving value fails — it's that conditional value isn't a gift, it's bait. Make the helpful thing genuinely zero-strings, or don't pretend. They can smell the hook through the worm.