How to Execute a Successful Pivot To Grow: Creating a New Product Category | Ev Kontsevoy, Teleport

Focus on a single product/solution rather than trying to maintain multiple products simultaneously - having split focus damages growth potential and operational efficiency

Product-market fit can be validated when customers proactively reach out wanting to buy your solution and you see consistent patterns in 50+ customer conversations

Talk to customers in person to truly understand their problems - don’t rely on emails, calls or marketing. Let them speak freely about their challenges

When creating a new product category, build around solving a fundamental problem that affects a broad market and has a large total addressable market (TAM)

Look for signals in the labor market - areas where companies struggle to hire certain engineering roles often indicate problems that need technological solutions

Repackaging/narrowing product focus can be more effective than maintaining multiple divergent products, even if individual products have product-market fit

Platform expansion should come from customer pull rather than company push - wait until customers actively request additional capabilities

Revenue acceleration and sales cycle compression are key indicators that product focus is aligned with market needs

Open source can be an effective go-to-market strategy to build brand awareness and trust before introducing enterprise features

Success in creating a new category requires solving problems that are: universal across industries, growing in importance, and difficult to solve with existing tools