Front Lines

We spoke with Tine Karlsen, CEO of Vev, about revolutionizing enterprise web development workflows. Here are the key go-to-market lessons from their remarkable journey: → Look for absurd workarounds. Vev spotted enterprises converting PDFs to web content - a clear signal of broken workflows that became their entry point for innovation. → Turn complexity into competitive advantage. Instead of simplifying for a single user, they built distinct experiences for designers, marketers, and developers - making stakeholder complexity their strength. → Make edge cases your foundation. Rather than accepting no-code limitations, they built developer extensibility into the core platform, transforming the typical "what if" objection into a selling point. → Target high-stakes production environments. Their focus on media companies producing content at scale provided the perfect stress test and compelling proof points for broader enterprise adoption. → Lead with time compression. Vev reduced production time from three weeks to 30 minutes - making value immediately tangible rather than theoretical. → Strip away marketing complexity. They abandoned elaborate concepts for direct communication, discovering that sophisticated buyers responded better to straightforward value propositions. These insights from Vev demonstrate how rethinking traditional development workflows can create breakthrough value for enterprises. Listen to the full conversation with Tine Karlsen on Category Visionaries to learn more about their approach to transforming web development here: https://lnkd.in/e7vpndcH

We spoke with Will Sealy, CEO of Summer, about transforming from a government insider to B2B fintech founder. Here are the key go-to-market lessons from their journey: → Turn regulation into competitive advantage. Summer built a "TurboTax-like" platform that navigates 120+ federal and state loan programs, transforming regulatory complexity into a scalable product. → Design partnership models for ecosystem fit. Rather than forcing a one-size-fits-all approach, Summer created bespoke distribution models that adapt to each financial institution's unique requirements. → Build hybrid engagement systems. Summer discovered that financial products need both digital and human touchpoints, leading to a dual-track support system that serves diverse user preferences. → Strategic face-to-face in a remote world. Despite being remote-first, Summer identifies crucial moments for in-person meetings, using the scarcity of face-to-face interaction as a competitive edge. → Expand through adjacent problems. After mastering student debt, Summer methodically expanded into college savings and tuition assistance, using established channels to solve related challenges. These insights from Summer demonstrate how deep domain expertise can be transformed into scalable B2B solutions. Listen to the full conversation with Will Sealy on Category Visionaries to learn more about building in regulated markets. #B2B #Fintech #StartupGrowth #ProductStrategy #GoToMarket

We spoke with William Sankey, CEO of Northspyre, about transforming real estate project delivery through technology. Here are the key go-to-market lessons from their journey: → Target high-stakes validation. Instead of chasing multiple small deals, Northspyre landed the Museum of Modern Art's $400M expansion as their first customer, creating an undeniable proof point for their solution. → Convert time into intelligence. They discovered industry leaders spent 30-50% of time on administrative work. Rather than just automating tasks, they turned this data into proactive insights that prevented project overruns. → Build value through aggregation. By analyzing $125B worth of projects, they transformed workflow software into market intelligence, helping customers understand vendor performance and regional cost variations. → Make complexity predictable. Northspyre identified that project uncertainty drove up investor premiums. Their platform reduced risk by making complex development more repeatable, directly impacting project economics. → Bootstrap to truth. Despite being rejected twice by Y Combinator, they spent two years iterating with early customers before seeking rapid growth. This patience led to explosive growth in 2019 once they achieved product-market fit. These insights from Northspyre show how deep industry understanding can unlock category-defining opportunities. Listen to the full conversation with William Sankey on Category Visionaries to learn how they're transforming an industry that shapes our cities here: https://lnkd.in/eExu6ADi #B2B #SaaS #PropTech #StartupLessons #ProductLedGrowth

Building the Future of Compensation Tech: Lessons from Pequity's Journey We spoke with Warren Lebovics, co-founder of Pequity, about building a new category in HR tech. Here are the key go-to-market lessons from their journey: → Validate through high-ticket consulting. Pequity started by offering $20K consulting projects, using each engagement to deeply understand market needs before building software. → Challenge B2B design conventions. They rejected the industry norm of clunky enterprise software, bringing B2C-grade user experience to HR tech. As Warren notes, "B to C feels amazing... why should it be that when they're spending eight or more hours at work, it just feels like crap?" → Target systemic impact points. By focusing on mid-market companies (500-5000 employees), they discovered where compensation decisions create industry-wide ripple effects. → Bridge system gaps intentionally. Instead of building another HR tool, they created solutions that connect isolated data between applicant tracking and HR information systems. → Let competitors validate pricing. Rather than competing on price, they focused on product excellence. Customers who initially chose cheaper alternatives often returned after experiencing limitations. → Build expertise into software. They combined compensation software with market insights, helping companies execute strategy faster with built-in best practices. These insights from Pequity show how deep market understanding and unconventional thinking can create new categories in crowded markets. Listen to the full conversation with Warren Lebovics on Category Visionaries to learn more about their approach to transforming compensation tech here: https://lnkd.in/epCbp6Ki #B2B #StartupGrowth #ProductStrategy #HRTech

We spoke with Virgile Raingeard, Founder of Figures, about scaling from a €400 spreadsheet to category leadership in compensation intelligence. Here are the key go-to-market lessons from their journey: → Validate with minimal tooling. Figures started by selling access to a simple Google Sheet with compensation data. They got 15 companies sharing data before writing a single line of code. → Turn regulatory barriers into competitive moats. Instead of fighting Europe's strict privacy laws, they used GDPR compliance as protection against US competitors who struggle to enter the market. → Price for network effects, not revenue. They intentionally underpriced early to build their data network, then successfully tripled prices once they achieved critical mass without hurting win rates. → Let competitors educate your market. Rather than competing head-on with $100M-funded US players, they let them handle broad market education while focusing on European execution. → Balance security with personality. Despite handling sensitive compensation data, they maintained a playful brand voice while investing heavily in security certifications - proving you can be both trusted and engaging. These insights from Figures demonstrate how European B2B startups can turn local market complexities into strategic advantages. Listen to the full conversation with Virgile Raingeard on Category Visionaries to learn more about building category-defining companies in fragmented markets today: https://lnkd.in/ei_z6aDK #B2BSaaS #StartupStrategy #ProductLedGrowth #GTM

We spoke with Tomas Reimers, Co-Founder / CPO of Graphite, about growing from an internal tool to 2,000 weekly active users. Here are the key go-to-market lessons from their journey: → Let customer demand redefine your product. When a competitor shut down, Graphite discovered enterprise customers wanted their internal code review tool as a hosted solution rather than open source. → Control access to perfect experience. Despite 3,500 waitlist signups, they maintained controlled access. "A user who you give the wrong first impression to is really hard to recover," Tomas explains. → Replace marketing with education. Instead of traditional marketing, they created educational content about code review. "Developers don't want to be sold to, they want to be taught." → Turn user feedback into product innovation. They embraced users who built Chrome extensions to modify their product, turning critical feedback into product improvements. → Split the value proposition. They solved individual developer problems for free while monetizing enterprise needs, creating natural expansion opportunities. → Position as an internal team. Rather than acting as a vendor, they approached customer relationships as collaborative partnerships: "One of the success modes for companies that work with us is that they just view us as another team." These insights from Graphite demonstrate how deep user engagement and controlled growth can build sustainable B2B products. Listen to the full conversation with Tomas Reimers on Category Visionaries to learn more about their approach to developer tools here: https://lnkd.in/eYQNQsfC #ProductLedGrowth #B2B #StartupGrowth #DeveloperTools #GTM

We spoke with Joselyn Lai, CEO of Bedrock Energy, about transforming geothermal from a niche solution into a scalable clean energy category. Here are the key go-to-market lessons from their deep tech journey: → Target immediate pain, not future promises. Bedrock Energy focuses on real estate owners who need power demand reduction now, not just those interested in sustainability. They found success by solving urgent operational problems rather than selling future benefits. → Use existing knowledge networks to scale. Instead of building market education from scratch, they tapped into architects and engineers who already understood geothermal's benefits. This accelerated adoption through trusted advisors. → Structure for 24+ month sales cycles. With projects breaking ground in 2025-2026, Bedrock Energy developed systems to maintain momentum through extended development periods. They built pipeline strategies specifically for multi-year enterprise cycles. → Make first deployments learning laboratories. Their CIM Group installation provided insights across hardware, software, and operations. They captured data from construction site setup to HVAC integration, transforming early challenges into scalable processes. → Align environmental and financial benefits. Bedrock Energy structured their offering so customers could profit from sustainable choices. As Joselyn notes, "Nothing good for society can scale unless it has a financial value proposition." These insights from Bedrock Energy demonstrate how deep tech companies can accelerate market adoption by focusing on immediate customer needs while building for long-term transformation. Listen to the full conversation with Joselyn Lai on Category Visionaries to learn more about their approach to scaling clean energy innovation here: https://lnkd.in/eFgdC_rc #Startup #CleanTech #Innovation #GTM #VentureCapital

Justin Leigh built an Amazon agency to $25M ARR with 150 employees, then sold it to start over with a radically different approach. His new company, Workflow Labs, automates e-commerce management at scale—replacing the human-driven processes that dominate the industry. After raising $3.5M, Workflow Labs has a clear mission: sign 3,000 brands in 2-2.5 years. But they quickly realized that selling one-by-one would never get them there. The key insight came when they identified where the market was heading: "Retail media is driving all advertising dollars onto retailer platforms like Amazon. Brands used to spend on NBC, then on Google, now directly on Amazon." Instead of approaching brands individually, they targeted partners who already aggregated them—major ad agencies like Omnicom, WPP, and Kublasys—to sign up "tens, twenties, fifties, hundreds at a time." Their initial pitch bombed. They thought customers would care about reducing labor costs: "You have a 50-person team in India updating titles, we can make 80% of that labor go away." The market response? Silence. "No one cared because they didn't really know what the people in India were doing," Justin admits. "We had to create a box that you could put any problem into...a comprehensive solution was much more important than being an automated solution." They pivoted their messaging and created market pull through a clever approach: getting brands to include automated product management in their RFPs, making Workflow Labs the only viable provider. As for their brand strategy? "I want our brand to be subtle and to not be the brand. When Omnicom delivers their service, we want that customer to feel like Omnicom was the driving force." Unlike many founders who dodge exit questions, Justin is refreshingly transparent: "Everyone on the team knows what happens when we get to 3,000 brands...that's when liquidity events start to be on the table." Having learned from his first company, Justin now follows the "rule of three"—focusing on just three objectives per quarter. "If you're trying to do more than three things, you're doing too many." Listen to our conversation with Justin Leigh on Category Visionaries to hear the full story of how Workflow Labs is automating e-commerce management at scale today: https://lnkd.in/emNb8kSX

We spoke with Stephany Kirkpatrick, CFP®, founder of Orum.io, about transforming payment infrastructure from a technical necessity into a strategic advantage. Here are the key go-to-market lessons from their journey: → Rewrite the MVP playbook. Orum discovered that "move fast and break things" fails in infrastructure. They built a new framework where reliability trumps feature completeness and "minimum" means "can't stop functioning." → Transform technical demos into customer stories. Instead of showcasing API specifications, Orum demonstrates how instant payments transform end-user experiences. As Stephany notes, "What we've learned is that if you build a demo that shows the customer experience, people go, 'oh, I get it.'" → Deploy a barbell go-to-market strategy. By serving both enterprise giants and innovative startups, Orum creates a virtuous cycle: enterprise relationships build credibility while startup innovation expands market possibilities. → Price for transformation, not transactions. They continuously evolve pricing to capture value from enabling new business models, not just processing payments. Pricing and positioning are treated as distinct strategic levers. → Make infrastructure tangible. Orum illustrates the infrastructure gap through relatable contrasts: "You can get a massage on demand in under an hour, but moving money takes 5-7 days." These insights from Orum demonstrate how infrastructure companies can move beyond technical sales to become strategic enablers of innovation. Listen to the full conversation with Stephany Kirkpatrick on Category Visionaries to learn more about building transformative infrastructure here: https://lnkd.in/ef7NSWps #Infrastructure #Fintech #ProductStrategy #GTM #CategoryCreation

Marty Ringlein just raised $3M to give away DocuSign's core product for free. Here's how they're disrupting a 22-year-old incumbent: It started with a fundraising call where an investor mistakenly called them "Agree.com" Marty and his co-founder realized they needed that domain. After finding the owner on LinkedIn, Marty knew a standard low-ball offer wouldn't work. Instead of leading with money, he pitched the owner on being part of their story: "What if you're a part of this really awesome thing we're building?" 4 months of relationship building later, they had their domain. But the real story is their GTM strategy: They identified a pattern: after most signatures, someone has to pay someone money. Instead of building another e-signature tool, they're creating a fintech platform disguised as free DocuSign alternative. Their entry point? B2B sales teams who: → Hate their current e-signature tool → Can adopt new tools without approval → Care deeply about deal velocity The strategy is working: → Give away e-signatures completely free → Get sales teams hooked → Expand into finance teams with invoicing and payments → Build towards owning the entire contract-to-payment flow Marty's approach to B2B marketing is equally unconventional: At Dreamforce, instead of paying for a booth, they set up coffee carts outside when the conference ran out of coffee. Result? Lines down the block while their competitors handed out postcards inside. At an upcoming conference, they're building a s'mores station instead of a traditional booth - because sometimes standing out matters more than fitting in. Their thesis: If you own the contract, you can own the money movement. The vision: → Start with mid-market ($1-50M revenue) → Expand into real estate (25% of DocuSign's business) → Add escrow services → Launch invoice factoring → Offer high-yield accounts for contract payments Sometimes the best way to compete with a giant isn't to build a better version of their product - it's to give their product away while building something bigger. Full conversation with Marty Ringlein on the latest episode of Category Visionaries here: https://lnkd.in/ehAs7Ufa #B2B #StartupStrategy #GTM