Leading a GTM team

When is category creation the right call for us, and when is it just an excuse?

The short answer

It is right when your buyer feels a real pain that no existing category addresses, and when the existing frame is actively making senior people ignore you. It is an excuse when you are inventing a word to escape a comparison you keep losing, which is a fear decision dressed up as strategy. The honest test is whether buyers already describe the problem in their own words without your vocabulary, because you can name an existing feeling but you cannot manufacture one. If you go ahead, budget years and a sustained point of view, not a launch.

Go deeper, your way

4 hand-picked resources, 4 link-checked. Pick how you want to dig in.

📄 Article
✓ Link checked Free Beginner

Why we picked it The clearest short explanation of why market category is one of five interdependent positioning pieces, with a real repositioning story attached. It is also where Dunford makes the case that most companies should not invent a category.

A Quickstart Guide to Positioning

From aprildunford.com by April Dunford 12 min read

Open aprildunford.com →

The same ground, at another level

How category design reads from a different seat.

What does category actually mean in go-to-market, and why does everyone keep telling me to pick one? A category is the mental shelf a buyer puts you on before they judge anything else about you. The moment someone hears what you do, they reach for ... Breaking into GTM 3 resources → How do I test whether a category name lands before we commit the whole website to it? Put the words in front of real buyers before you put them in a headline. Run the line past twenty people who match your ICP and ask them what they ... Doing the work 4 resources → How did Gong actually create revenue intelligence, step by step? Gong started life as conversation intelligence and found that senior revenue leaders heard that phrase and mentally filed it under sales enablement... How the best do it 3 resources →

Terms in this answer

Category Creation

People also ask

What does category actually mean in go-to-market, and why does everyone keep telling me to pick one? A category is the mental shelf a buyer puts you on before they judge anything else about you. The moment someone hears what you do, they reach for ... Breaking into GTM 3 resources → Should we create a new category or just say we are a better version of something that already exists? For almost everyone at the start, the answer is the existing category. April Dunford's own count is that around 90 percent of recently public tech ... Breaking into GTM 4 resources → How do I write the one line that says what category we are in? Write it as a comparison, not a description. The formula that works is simple: who it is for, what kind of thing it is, and why it beats the altern... Breaking into GTM 5 resources → Buyers keep comparing us to a big incumbent. How do I even respond in a first call? Do not dodge it and do not claim you beat them everywhere, because the buyer knows you do not and you lose credibility instantly. Name the incumben... Breaking into GTM 3 resources → How do I test whether a category name lands before we commit the whole website to it? Put the words in front of real buyers before you put them in a headline. Run the line past twenty people who match your ICP and ask them what they ... Doing the work 4 resources → We named the problem instead of the product. Is that a positioning mistake? It is usually the right instinct, badly executed. Naming the problem is what makes a category feel inevitable, because the buyer recognises the pai... Doing the work 4 resources →

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