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It’s 2021. An early stage cybersecurity startup’s technical founder made a bold move. He stepped back from sales and handed it to a seasoned manager. No prep, no context, no process. Just: “Here’s the CRM. Go.” Deals didn’t stall. They closed faster. Pipeline grew. Conversion rates jumped. But in my view? That wasn’t process. That…
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When AI Overselling Backfires While I witness a European cybersecurity vendor saw a drop in proof-of-concept conversions after prospects flagged “AI-washing” in their messaging. The lesson? Idk, timing? With CrowdStrike adding generative AI to Falcon and Microsoft baking Copilot into Defender, customers face a paradox: they want AI-powered efficiency but distrust vendors who overpromise. The…
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Not all early stage capital is created equal. Especially in cybersecurity, where GTM cycles are long, trust is hard to earn, and technical depth matters more than shiny pitch decks. So when you’re raising your first real round, the question isn’t just “Who will fund us?” It’s “Whose model actually fits how security companies grow?”…
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Startups don’t fail because they hire the wrong people. They fail because they hire too many before the system can support them. That’s why your first scale hire shouldn’t be HR. It should be ops. HR sets policies. Ops builds engines. If you’re under 30 people and already hunting for a Head of People, you…
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Raising your first capital is hard enough without navigating the fine print of deal instruments. SAFE notes. Convertible notes. They sound interchangeable. They’re not. For UK cybersecurity start-ups, where burn is real, traction is lumpy, and buyers move slower than you’d like, the wrong instrument can box you in before you ever close a Series…
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Sometime ago, a startup I was advising got blindsided in a client meeting. A major prospect had asked if they “also owned the productivity plugin”a tool that was, in fact, built by one of their own engineers. On company time. The plugin was good. Too good. It had more traction than their core product. There…
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Most Account-Based Marketing (ABM) campaigns rely on firmographics, technographics, and intent data. But in cybersecurity, that’s table stakes. The real opportunity? Using threat intelligence to personalise outreach based on the risks your prospects are actively facing. This isn’t about fear-mongering. It’s about relevance. When a target account is dealing with credential stuffing, supply chain compromise,…
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Discounting is one of the most abused levers in B2B pricing. It feels tactical, harmless, even helpful—especially at quarter-end. But poorly handled, it distorts buyer expectations, drags out sales cycles, and quietly erodes revenue quality. The problem isn’t discounts themselves. It’s lazy or reactive discounting. In some cases, they absolutely work: But discounting fails when:…
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B2B buyers abandone vendor evaluations when they get lost and marketing materials don’t reflect current product capabilities. Meanwhile, engineering teams churn out features at sprint velocity. This disconnect isn’t just embarrassing—it’s revenue-leaking. I have seen content calendars still mirror org charts rather than customer problems. But, CISOs now evaluate vendors against three criteria: platform breadth,…
