Cyberstarts' founder learned from his first startup, which invented CAPTCHA, that a great technology doesn't guarantee a business. He now advocates for reversing the process: find a painful market problem first, identify paying customers, and then build the solution for them.
Cyberstarts' "Sunrise program" invests in talented founders pre-idea. They leverage their network of CISOs to identify intense, unsolved problems, pre-sell a solution sketch, and only then build the product. This demand-first approach generates an extremely high hit rate.
Starting with a product forces you to search through infinite potential customer segments, most of which won't have intense demand. By starting with validated customer "pull," the product shape, sales process, and messaging become obvious and standard exercises, drastically increasing your odds.
Structure discovery into two distinct conversations for maximum effect. The first meeting should focus exclusively on uncovering the customer's blocked goals (demand), without mentioning a product. Use the second meeting to validate if a high-level solution sketch (supply) gets ripped out of your hands.
The idea that enterprise sales average 12-18 months is a misleading myth. Sales cycles follow a power law: if you're solving a C-level executive's number one priority, the deal closes in weeks. Anything else gets deprioritized and drags on for a year or more.
Don't just listen for positive feedback like "that sounds good." The true signal of intense demand—the kind that builds fast-growing companies—is a physical change in posture. A customer literally leaning forward and asking "How do we get started?" is the ultimate indicator of product-market fit.
Founders who've built a product but aren't seeing traction should stop focusing on the product. Instead, they must leverage their market knowledge to find the real customer demand, even if it means scrapping prior work. This pivot can unlock massive growth, as seen with a startup that went 0 to $34M ARR.
Counterintuitively, building a hyper-growth company can be easier than a "lifestyle" business. When customer pull is intense, they do the heavy lifting to close deals and provide rapid feedback. This creates a virtuous cycle where velocity begets more velocity, whereas a low-demand product requires constant pushing.