You might be right about the direction and still get outplayed. Not because the product is bad, but because the market doesn’t yet realize it needs it.
This is one of the toughest situations for a founder: you have a product, a vision, and your first enthusiasts, but the pipeline isn’t growing, the sales cycle is unpredictable, and every conversation with a potential customer starts with explaining why it’s even worth talking. The problem isn’t with the product or the sales team. It’s that you’re trying to sell a solution to people who haven’t even named their problem yet.
The Problem You Can’t See on the Slides
Imagine you’re building a tool for managing asynchronous work for distributed teams. It’s 2018. The market isn’t looking for “asynchronous communication.” It might be looking for “a better Slack” or “something to replace email.” Your product solves a problem that most potential customers don’t even recognize as a problem yet.
This is the trap of products that are ahead of the market: the customer doesn’t know what to look for because they don’t know such a thing exists. There’s no category, no keyword, no point of reference.
Geoffrey Moore described this dynamic in Crossing the Chasm as early as 1991, and his analysis remains relevant today: there’s a chasm between the early adopters, who will buy anything new, and the pragmatic majority, who buy proven solutions. Most innovative companies fall into this chasm not because the product was bad, but because their GTM strategy was designed for the first group, not the second.
Why the Classic GTM Won’t Work
The standard GTM logic assumes that there is a market with demand that you want to reach better than the competition. You choose a segment, define a value proposition, and design channels. You measure, optimize, and scale.
When a product is ahead of the market, none of these steps work in the usual way:
- Demand doesn’t exist: you can’t take it away from competitors because there are no competitors. You have to create it.
- The customer doesn’t speak the language: they aren’t looking for your solution because they don’t have the words to describe it.
- There are no references: a pragmatic buyer wants to see who’s already using it. At first, you have nothing to show them.
- The sales cycle is unpredictable: the purchasing decision first requires a shift in beliefs, and only then a signature on the contract.
This doesn’t mean GTM is impossible here. It means it requires a different sequence of decisions.
Entry Strategy: Instead of Creating a Category, Hijack an Existing One
The most common mistake a founder with an innovative product makes: trying to explain to the entire market why the category exists in the first place. This is a trap. Before anyone understands the message, the budget runs out, and competitors enter the market you’ve just prepared for them.
A more effective strategy is to anchor yourself in an existing category, positioning the product as a better version of something the customer already knows, and only over time, as the market matures, revealing the full vision.
Classic examples:
- Salesforce didn’t sell “cloud CRM,” because no one knew what that meant. It sold “the end of software.” It addressed a pain point everyone recognized: expensive licenses, lengthy implementations, and IT that hinders sales. The cloud SaaS category emerged later.
- Airbnb didn’t start with the “sharing economy.” It started with “affordable lodging for a conference when hotels are fully booked.” A specific problem, a specific situation, a specific group of people. The rest came with time.
- Slack was positioned as the “email killer,” not as a new category of internal communication. Users understood email and understood what it meant to kill it.
The rule is simple: a customer needs a point of reference to make a decision. If your product has no analogy in the customer’s mind, the customer won’t buy it, even if they need it.
Who Buys First, and Why Aren’t They Your Target Customers?
The first customers of innovative products are enthusiasts and visionaries. They buy because they want to be first. They tolerate rough edges, provide feedback, and pay, often less than the product is worth.
The problem: this group is small and doesn’t represent the target market.
The pragmatic majority, who account for the real sales volume, won’t buy from you just because the product is innovative. They’ll buy because:
- they see a recommendation from someone they know and respect,
- they understand what specific problem it solves,
- they feel that the risk of buying is under control.
That’s why the GTM sequence for products that are ahead of the market looks different from the standard one:
- Find a niche where you’re the only sensible choice. Don’t try to be everything to everyone. Choose a segment where the problem is so acute that the customer is willing to take a chance on a new supplier.
- Dominate that niche completely through testimonials, case studies, and a strong presence in the conversations taking place within that segment.
- Use that niche as a springboard. Only once you have a proven track record in one segment should you move into an adjacent one.
Moore calls this the “bowling pin” strategy: the first pin must be firmly in place before you tackle the rest.
How to Talk About a Product That Doesn’t Yet Have a Category
The message for a product without a category must meet one criterion: the customer must recognize their problem before they hear about the solution.
In practice, this means reversing the typical structure of the message:
- Common mistake: “We’re a platform for asynchronous knowledge management in distributed organizations.”
- What works: “Your team spends 40% of its time in meetings, half of which could be handled by email. We fix that.”
The difference is fundamental. The first sentence describes the product; the second describes the pain and only then suggests that a solution exists.
A few communication rules for products that are ahead of the market:
- Start with the symptom, not the diagnosis. The customer knows their pain, not its cause.
- Use the language the customer already uses, even if it’s imprecise. You can educate them later, once they’re on board.
- Show the “before” and “after” without jargon. What specifically changes when the customer starts using the product?
- Avoid making up your own terms during the acquisition phase. “Our unique framework for process synergy” isn’t a message. It’s just noise.
When Market Education Makes Sense, and When It Just Burns Through the Budget
Market education is one of the most expensive decisions in GTM. Done right, it builds the category and establishes a leadership position. Done wrong, it funds training for future competitors.
Market education makes sense when:
- you have enough budget and time to survive until the market matures,
- you’re able to build a barrier to entry before competitors enter the market you’ve created,
- your product has network effects or high switching costs that reward the first mover.
Education burns through your budget when:
- your barrier to entry is low, and any major player can copy the product within 12 months,
- you’re educating a segment that has neither the budget nor the decision-making authority,
- you confuse “a lot of content” with “changing minds.” They’re not the same thing.
A better alternative to mass education is targeted education. Instead of explaining to everyone why the category exists, find 20 people who already intuitively understand the problem and help them name it. They will become ambassadors who educate the rest of the market for you.
Key Takeaways
- Products that are ahead of the market don’t fail because of poor quality. They fail because of a go-to-market (GTM) strategy designed for a market that doesn’t yet exist in the form that sales expects.
- Instead of creating a category from scratch, anchor the product in what the customer already knows and reveal the full vision gradually.
- Your first customers aren’t your target market. Treat them as a springboard to the segment that will truly scale.
- Your message must start with the customer’s pain, not a product description. Customers buy a solution to a problem they recognize, not a category they don’t know.
- Market education only makes sense if you have a sufficient barrier to entry to reap the rewards of that investment. Otherwise, you’re funding the category for your competitors.
