Your pitch got you funded.
Now it has to get you customers.
Fractional GTM and positioning for pre-seed to Series A founders
Your pitch got you funded.
Somewhere between six and twelve months after the raise, most founders hit the same wall. The story that convinced investors is not the story that convinces buyers. The early customers came from the founding team’s network, and that network is running out. The website says what the product does but not why anyone should care. And the team is too close to it to see the fix.
That is the moment I come in. I work as a fractional GTM and positioning strategist, embedded with the founding team for a defined engagement, to build the strategic foundation that growth actually requires.
What I Do
Positioning and messaging
Turning your pitch into clear value propositions and website copy, grounded in what your customers actually say. Not a tagline exercise. The specific claim: this product, for this customer, instead of this alternative, because of this reason.
Ideal customer profile (ICP)
Identifying which customer types convert fastest and easiest, based on your early customer evidence rather than guesswork. Who bought, why they bought, and who walked.
Persona mapping
Separating buyer from user personas. Trigger events, objections, and the anti-persona criteria that tell your team who to stop chasing.
Competitive landscape
Direct competitors, indirect alternatives, and the one competitor every startup underestimates: the status quo. The manual process, the spreadsheet, the internal tool your buyer is already using.
How It Works
Most engagements run four to eight weeks.
01
Working session
We start with what you already know and what you’ve already tried. Your customer conversations, your sales calls, your current site, your competitors.
02
Research and synthesis
I spend time with the evidence and bring back a point of view: where the positioning is strong, where it’s leaking, and what the fix looks like.
03
The foundation
A positioning document your team can build on. Messaging hierarchy, ideal customer profile (ICP), and persona definitions, competitive narrative, and the copy to carry it.
Who This Is for
This is for you if
You’re seed to Series A, six to twelve months post-raise
Real customers are buying, but you can’t yet explain why in one sentence
The founding team’s network got you here, and it won’t get you to the next hundred
Your website still reads like your pitch deck
You’re pre-seed and need a clear story before you build or sell
Probably not if
You’re looking for a tagline or a logo, not a decision about who you sell to
You need someone to run campaigns or ads, rather than define what they should say
Your product is for everyone, with no specific buyer to define yet
You’ve got traction. You don’t have anyone whose job is to now turn that into a story. Hi. That’s me.
Why Me
I have spent fifteen years turning complexity into clarity for audiences who do not have time to be confused. I built brand and go-to-market infrastructure from zero for an early-stage gaming startup in Africa. I held voice, tone, and strategy together across six lines of business during a full Wells Fargo brand refresh. I have presented positioning rationale to Fortune 500 boardrooms and to founders at a kitchen table. Same discipline, different scale.
I don’t need an established playbook to create one.
0 to 1
Brand and go-to-market built from scratch for an early-stage startup
15+ years
Agency-side, client-side, and now founder-side. The playbook changed every time. The discipline didn’t.
22 countries
Where the work has run. Shanghai to Nairobi to São Paulo, Fortune 500 boardrooms to emerging-market founders.
2 Effies + 1 Grand Prix
The global benchmark for work that moves the numbers, not just the needle.
