• by Michael Baer , May 8, 2024

I work with and mentor a lot of early-stage companies. These organizations are focused on growing their businesses quickly, but due to the size of their team, they need to be super-scrappy. Thus, they are driven by an agile, “always-in-beta” mindset. When it’s working, it’s amazing how much a committed team of just a few can accomplish and make happen.

Unfortunately, this agile mindset can be a killer when it comes to your go-to-market strategy and implementation. When a “make-it-work” ethos pervades a company’s go-to-market and sales approach, it creates a lack of strategic focus on who represents their best, first customer segment to build their business around, leading companies to position themselves differently to different buyer sets, or to address vastly different challenges and needs.

Though agility can be a helpful model when it comes to getting things done, a “try-anything-and-see-what-sticks” approach to targeting and sales is guaranteed to waste time, resources, and money.

The main reason for a fragmented or unfocused go-to-market is a fear of giving up any sales opportunity. Strategic focus requires sacrifice -- if we decide to focus on one audience, by definition it means we are going to avoid another. However, founders, CEOs and CROs generally want to remain open to anything that drives revenue.

Sadly, the things you give up by being unfocused are significantly worse than lost sales

A diffusion of purpose. Your purpose as a company is built around your passion to solve a problem for a set of customers. If you instead choose to address a variety of problems for a variety of customers, it can be hard to create a clear and authentic narrative -- and it creates confusion around who you are for and what you do for them.

Another problem with this type of confusion is that it can frame your company simply as a set of  product attributes or features, vs. a benefit for someone. When a product or service doesn't clearly address a problem or speak to a need of a specific consumer, it can be hard to spark adoption.

Time is as much a scant resource as money. Because of this, what you choose to spend time on needs to be intentional, focused on strategic clarity, and driven by your best chances to continue to grow into the company you intend. Chasing un-strategic customers costs you more than you think.

Strategy is a destination – and defines where you want to go. If your approach is so open-ended at the beginning of your journey, it’s likely you’ll end up in a different destination than you intended.

When targeting different customer types, you’ll need to create different value propositions for each. That can be challenging from a resource standpoint (needing to create a variety of messaging and content) -- but also from an awareness and brand equity one, as well. That is, each of these different angles may drive a very different perception of your company.

A startup’s (or any company’s) go-to-market strategy is about deciding which market to go after, specifying how your company will win in these markets, and allocating your resources accordingly. And strategy is about sacrifice -- it’s just as important what you choose not to do, who not to prioritize, where not to spend your time on, as well as, what you do. And while you should think about your long-term goals,  your early focus should be on what you need to do in the next 12 months to take you there.