What do GTM strategies look like when you work on a whole category creation?

For category creation, your GTM plan - in my experience - needs to be a multi-year affair. You may need to start with market education, analysts influence, etc even before you launch a product. Also, after launching the product you will need to keep ongoing market education to help get the new category in the minds of your customers.

Some key elements to help your GTM in this case are:

• Customer proof: the more customer testimonials, case studies, quotes, and videos you can create and disseminate, the best. Have your customers talk about the category so that others will hear them saying it, not you.

• Analysts: In the B2B Tech world, you want to have Gartner, Forrester, IDC and other top analyst firms on your side because they can help tremendously in establishing the new category. It takes time and multiple briefings and meetings but is well worth it.

• Competitors: identify the other players in the market... after all, you don't want to be the only vendor talking about the new category. The more the other vendors mention the category, the more validity it has.

• Channel partners: leverage implementation or consulting partners, resellers, and other channel companies based on your industry to help augment your own brand and messaging efforts.

• Thought leadership: prepare to create a lot of content to educate the market, and have a good distribution strategy to get your POV published and read.

• Trade shows: identify specific trade shows and events your target customer attends and submit speaking sessions and promote the category in your messaging at the booth.

• Advertising: be ready to spend in both online and off-line advertising to promote the category via thought leadership and look for opportunities where you can place stories and customer testimonials.

• Community: a big element of new category creation is understanding who will be the decision-maker for that category, what job titles the person has, what they care about, and how to get that group together so they can discuss their needs and challenges. At one startup we started with a small happy hour event that grew into multi-city user groups. I've seen first-hand how user groups and community-driven gatherings can light a fire under the people that care the most about the category.

The advice I give about category creation is to first think hard on whether you truly need a new category. It takes a lot of time, effort, and budget to launch a new category and if you need to show results soon, you might be better off latching to an existing category and dominating it.

In my previous role at a real-estate investing marketplace we were doing just that as we were working with private money loans and lenders, an investment vehicle unknown to many. The biggest element to a GTM strategy when you're defining a category is extensive market education on the problem space and need for a new solution. This could be done through customer testimonials, press and media, thought leadership and content based on research.

It will be super critical that you understand your ideal customer profile, their pain points and the way they consume content. Then all of your efforts should be educating this ICP through the channels they learn and with data-backed content. This will be an exercise in patience as you will continuously need to iterate your GTM strategy as you learn.

Creating a new category presents unique challenges and is not an easy task, especially since you likely won't have any benchmarks to compare or learn from.

In addition to the typical GTM strategy components, I believe there are three main areas that deserve special attention:

Category Education:

Educate potential customers and the broader market about the problem your category solves and the benefits it offers. Highlight the pain points your category addresses and why existing solutions are inadequate or insufficient.

Collaboration & Partnership:

Even if you're creating an entirely new category, there may be companies and industries that serve similar roles in the market. Learn from them and, if it aligns with your business goals, consider forming partnerships. This can help you focus on the new category rather than problems that have already been solved. Another way to look at it is to seek partnerships that complement your category, allowing you to create an ecosystem around it.

Marathon, Not a Sprint:

Creating a new category requires a long-term commitment, sustained effort, and a willingness to adapt and learn along the way. Focus on education and community building. Community building will help you gain your first "sponsors," who will be essential loyal customers when you consider expanding the category.

That's a great question! This reminds me of my time as a PMM lead for a 360-degree camera company almost a decade ago. Not only were we launching a new brand of consumer electronic cameras, but we were also creating a new product category that was unfamiliar to most people. Here’s how we approached our GTM strategy:

1. Education-Focused Marketing: A significant part of our strategy was educating potential customers about what 360-degree cameras were and how they could benefit from them. We ensured that every marketing tactic had an educational component.

2. Demo Stations: We set up demo stations at every Best Buy, allowing customers to experience the technology firsthand. This hands-on approach helped demystify the product and demonstrated its unique value.

3. Content Creation and Sharing: We created and shared a wealth of content aimed at educating customers about the technology. This included blog posts, videos, and social media content that explained the features and potential uses of 360-degree cameras.

4. Customer Support and Handholding: We provided extensive customer support, making sure there was plenty of handholding to guide new users through the learning curve. This helped build trust and confidence in the product.

5. Resource Allocation: Recognizing the challenge of creating a new category, we allocated a substantial portion of our marketing resources to education. This ensured that customers not only knew about the product but also understood its benefits and how to use it effectively.

Creating a new product category is a tough challenge, but focusing on educating your customers is crucial. It helps build awareness, understanding, and ultimately, adoption of the new technology.

While all marketing aims to solve a customer problem. When it comes to category creation, you are going to focus a significant portion of your time convincing Analysts and Press that your articulation of the problem is unique and hasn't been done before.

You then use your product-adoption/sales momentum to convey how the customer is voting with their money to convince the analysts that this is indeed a new category and not a substitute product for an existing category.

Category creation is a long game and a hard one at that.