Photo by Jo Szczepanska on Unsplash
Ask ten founders to show you their GTM strategy and you'll get ten different documents, several of which aren't actually GTM strategies at all. They're a content calendar, a list of channels someone wants to try, or a launch event timeline, all wearing the label because nobody clearly defined what the term is supposed to contain.
That ambiguity isn't harmless. A team that doesn't know what belongs in a GTM strategy can't tell when something important is missing from theirs.
A real GTM strategy answers a small set of specific questions, in a specific order, and almost everything that genuinely belongs in the document is in service of answering one of them clearly.
Who is the first customer, specifically. Not a broad demographic, but a real, narrow description of the person or business most likely to buy quickly, evangelise the product, and represent a wider segment once they're won. Everything else in the strategy depends on this being precise rather than comfortable.
What does that customer compare this to, and why would they choose this instead. Not a feature list, but the actual competitive set as the customer sees it, including doing nothing at all, and the specific reason this option wins that comparison for this specific person.
How does that customer actually make this kind of decision. Fast or slow, alone or with others, on trust or on proof, through a relationship or through self-serve research. This determines the entire shape of the motion that follows, and it's the question most plans skip straight past on the way to picking channels.
What sequence of channels and motions matches that decision process, in what order. Not a list of channels run simultaneously, but a deliberate sequence, where each stage is chosen because the conditions for it to work are actually in place, building toward something more scalable rather than starting there.
What does the price signal, and does it match the trust the motion can actually build before someone has to decide. Pricing belongs inside the GTM strategy, not bolted on afterward by finance, because it directly shapes who self-selects in and what kind of motion the company ends up needing to support.
How will the team know if this is working, and on what timeline. Specific enough that a clear miss is recognizable quickly, rather than discovered eighteen months later when the runway has already absorbed the cost of not knowing sooner.
What doesn't belong, despite frequently being mistaken for the real thing: a content calendar, which is an output of the strategy, not the strategy itself. A list of channels with no sequencing logic connecting them. A TAM slide, which describes opportunity, not a plan for capturing any particular slice of it. A launch event plan, which is a single tactic inside a much larger motion, not a substitute for one.
A quick audit worth running on whatever document currently calls itself your GTM strategy: does it answer each of the six questions above with something specific, or does it skip straight to channels and tactics without ever clearly stating who the first customer is and how they actually decide to buy?
Most documents labelled GTM strategy are really just a list of activities, organised by channel rather than by logic.
A real one reads less like a content calendar and more like an argument, each piece following from the one before it, building toward a specific customer making a specific decision, for specific reasons the team actually understands.
Every business has its own version of this story. If you're working through something similar, drop me a note at [email protected]. Whether it's to exchange ideas, brainstorm a challenge, or just have a thoughtful conversation, I'm always happy to make time for a complimentary 30-minute chat.