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From Marine Biology to Enterprise Payments: How Gr4vy’s Founder Navigated Product-Market Evolution
Enterprise software companies often struggle with a critical challenge: selling to the right people, in the right way, at the right time. In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, John Lunn, CEO and Founder of Gr4vy, shared hard-earned lessons about positioning, customer discovery, and enterprise sales that challenge conventional wisdom.
The Evolution of Product Positioning
Gr4vy started with a clear thesis about their ideal customer profile (ICP). “For us, an ICP is a mid to enterprise sized retailer looking to either expand geographically or increase their payment options,” John explains. But market feedback revealed an unexpected opportunity: “What has changed is we’ve realized that another large part of our client base is the people serving those peoples… rather than selling directly to the retailer, selling to the shopping cart that services the retailer is a different route to get to the same place.”
This discovery highlighted a crucial insight about enterprise sales that many founders miss. “Don’t sell to people who aren’t shopping,” John emphasizes. “When you’ve been in the consumer payment space, people will drive past the poster of the flashy new car every day and lust for it. That doesn’t really happen in enterprise software sales… unless you’ve got a problem you actually need a solution for right now, there’s really no point trying to sell to you.”
The Hidden Perils of Positioning
Perhaps the most valuable lesson came from understanding how product positioning can inadvertently create resistance. “When you’re building a product that could eliminate roles or positions organizations like a payments team, don’t go off and sell to the head of the payments team,” John reveals. This insight forced a strategic pivot in their messaging: “We had to definitely really think about how we positioned our product as a tool that will help payments teams move quicker, that will help companies innovate faster, rather than coming straight out and say, hey, we’re going to replace your payments team.”
Growth Through Focus
Despite challenging market conditions, Gr4vy has achieved impressive growth, “doubling month on month” in transactions and tripling revenue in the last quarter. The secret? “It’s about concentrating on doing a few things well,” John explains. “Early stages, you’re chasing after every squirrel, really, while you’re trying to find your market position.”
Rather than pursuing rapid customer acquisition, Gr4vy focused on growing with existing customers. “The rise in volume is not because we’re adding hundreds and hundreds of new clients, it’s because we’re growing with the customers we’ve got today,” John notes. This approach has fostered deep customer relationships: “You talk to a Gr4vy customer, they’ll say, Gr4vy feels like it’s part of our team, and that’s by design.”
Lessons From the Boom Times
Reflecting on lessons learned, John offers a sobering perspective on the recent boom-and-bust cycle: “We raised and launched during the boom times, and I think a lot of the advice at the time is grow very quickly, spend, grow, get as big as you can, as fast as you can. And then the wheels fell off that sort of model.” His advice to founders starting today? “Go a bit slower to start with… getting it right and then growing from there based on revenue is a better way to grow.”
The Essential Founder Skills
When asked about the most crucial skills for B2B founders, John emphasizes two: “Versatility… and resilience.” He elaborates: “As a Founder, you wake up every day and you have no idea what you’re going to be dealing with that day… You will be going through spreadsheets and maybe doing fundraising one hour. Next hour, you might be working on your next marketing campaign, then you might be flipping over to sales numbers, pitching to some clients.”
This journey of continuous adaptation and learning has positioned Gr4vy to achieve their ambitious vision: “We will be the central point of integrations for retailers around the world with their payment types… When you go and create a website and you want to sell things online, you’ll go, okay, the logical place to start is Gr4vy from a payments perspective.”
For B2B founders navigating their own journey, John’s experience offers a valuable roadmap: focus on solving real problems for customers who are actively seeking solutions, position your product to align with stakeholder incentives, and prioritize sustainable growth over rapid expansion.
Actionable
Takeaways
Solve a Real Pain Point:
Gr4vy's success stems from addressing a genuine frustration in the payments industry - the difficulty of adopting new innovations due to the complexity of integration. By focusing on a problem that John experienced firsthand, the company has been able to create a solution that resonates with its target customers.
Adapt Your ICP as You Learn:
While Gr4vy initially targeted mid-to-enterprise sized retailers directly, they soon realized that the service providers catering to these merchants were equally important partners. Be open to refining your ideal customer profile based on market feedback and opportunities that emerge.
Position Your Solution Carefully:
When selling a product that could potentially disrupt existing roles or processes, frame it as an enabler rather than a replacement. Gr4vy positioned itself as a tool to help payments teams move faster and innovate, rather than as a threat to their jobs, to reduce friction in the buying process.
Prioritize Depth Over Breadth in Enterprise Sales:
Instead of chasing after every potential lead, concentrate on a smaller number of high-value accounts and invest in building strong, collaborative relationships with these clients. Becoming an integral part of their team and growing together can be more effective than spreading yourself thin.
Differentiate Through Architecture:
In a crowded category like payment orchestration, technical differentiation can be a key advantage. Gr4vy's cloud-based, infrastructure-as-a-service approach sets it apart from competitors and aligns well with the needs of enterprise retailers, helping the company carve out a unique position in the market.
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