5 GTM Lessons I Learned the Hard Way
After years of launching products, these are the go-to-market lessons I wish someone had told me earlier.
Go-to-market strategy sounds simple in theory. In practice, it's where most products go to die. Here are five lessons I learned through painful experience.
1. Your First Channel Isn't Your Best Channel
When I started, I assumed social media was the way to go. Everyone was on Twitter, so that's where I'd find my customers. Wrong.
My best customers came from cold email and LinkedIn outreach — channels I almost didn't try because they felt "old school."
The lesson: Test at least 3 channels before committing. The one that feels least exciting might be the one that works.
2. Positioning Is More Important Than Product
I've watched mediocre products outsell great ones because of better positioning. If you can't explain why someone should care in one sentence, your product isn't ready for market.
Bad: "An AI-powered productivity platform for teams"
Good: "Stop losing deals because your team forgot to follow up"
3. Speed Beats Perfection
Your first launch doesn't need to be perfect. It needs to be fast. Every week you spend polishing is a week you're not learning from real users.
Warning
This doesn't mean ship garbage. It means ship the minimum that's genuinely useful, then iterate based on feedback.
4. Talk to Customers Before Building
I can't stress this enough. Before you write a single line of code, talk to 20 potential customers. You'll learn more in those conversations than in months of building.
5. Distribution Is the Product
The best products in the world fail without distribution. Your GTM strategy IS your product strategy. Build distribution into everything you do from day one.
These lessons cost me time and money to learn. I hope they save you some of both.