A cyber security scale-up had the technical depth to win almost any evaluation it reached. Deals were stalling before they got there, because the pitch spoke fluent engineer to a room that needed a commercial answer.
The Situation
The product held up under any technical scrutiny a prospect threw at it. The problem sat one step earlier: the pitch led with architecture and capability, leaving the buyer’s own internal stakeholders — risk, procurement, the executive sponsor — to translate that into a business case themselves. Most didn’t. Deals that should have been straightforward wins were stalling in internal debate the sales team never saw.
Every serious deal still needed a technical co-founder in the room to close, which meant growth was capped by his calendar as much as by the market.
What We Did
- Ran a GTM strategy engagement focused on repositioning: reframing technical depth as risk removed for the buyer, not just capability delivered.
- Rebuilt the pitch and qualification criteria around the actual buying committee — risk, procurement and the economic buyer — instead of the most technical person in the room.
- Built a defined process for the compliance and security-review stage, so it became a planned, resourced step instead of an unplanned stall.
- Documented the technical narrative in commercial language the wider sales team could use without the founder present.
The technical story didn’t need to get simpler. It needed a second version, written for the people who had to defend the decision internally.
The Outcome
- Deals began moving through compliance and security review as a planned stage, instead of stalling there unpredictably.
- The wider sales team could carry serious deals further without the technical founder in every meeting.
- The forecast became meaningfully more predictable once the compliance stage had defined entry and exit criteria.
Nothing about the product changed. What changed was who the story was written for — and that was the whole fix.
Related: GTM Strategy · Fintech & Cyber Security · When “We Do Everything” Starts Costing You Deals.
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