An in-depth look at what investors are truly seeking in early-stage ventures today, and how to position your pitch effectively.
Entering a fresh geography feels exhilarating—right up until the end of month one, when your CRM is still empty and the board is asking why. During the last decade we’ve guided more than a hundred B2B tech firms into unfamiliar regions, from the Gulf to the Nordics. The pattern never changes: teams that generate early pipeline all follow a handful of simple, disciplined habits. Ignore them and you’ll burn budget on splashy announcements that never translate into revenue. Embrace them and you’ll have genuine opportunities—and genuine feedback—inside a single quarter.
Founders love a total-addressable-market figure with lots of zeroes. Investors do, too. But while you’re polishing that slide deck, a local competitor is already talking to prospects. Pick the niche where your product’s edge is unmistakable—say, mid-market insurers running multilingual portals—then write a one-page battle card: pain points, proof points, three micro case studies and a concise price anchor. Circulate it until every rep can recite it. The sharper your focus, the faster complete strangers start to believe you understand their world.
A cheap list of “IT managers” will clog your cadence tool with bounced emails and spam traps. Spend the money on a properly enriched data set—firmographic filters, technographic tags, funding history, hiring velocity. Yes, it hurts the budget up front, but it saves human hours you’d otherwise waste chasing ghosts. In our launches we treat list quality as the single strongest early indicator of month-one pipeline; get this wrong and no amount of clever copy will save you.
Everyone rings the flagship brand in a new city. You’ll meet gatekeepers who have heard every pitch this quarter. Instead, approach prospects who share the same pain but receive far less vendor attention—a regional retailer, a challenger bank, a second-tier telco. Conversations are warmer, feedback is frank, and you can still trumpet the win: “First UK deal closed with a tier-two carrier.” Early momentum beats early prestige every time, because it gives the flagship a case study in their own backyard.
Most outbound sequences are bloated—seven emails, four LinkedIn nudges, two calls strewn across six weeks. Decision-makers forget you between touches. Compress everything into ten business days: email, call, call, email, LinkedIn, final email. Keep each note under 120 words, reference a metric they actually track, and include one clear ask—usually a fifteen-minute discovery call. The short runway keeps your name in the prospect’s working memory and surfaces intent signals quickly. You won’t annoy people who were never going to buy; you’ll simply get to a “yes” or “no” faster.
Most outbound sequences are bloated—seven emails, four LinkedIn nudges, two calls strewn across six weeks. Decision-makers forget you between touches. Compress everything into ten business days: email, call, call, email, LinkedIn, final email. Keep each note under 120 words, reference a metric they actually track, and include one clear ask—usually a fifteen-minute discovery call. The short runway keeps your name in the prospect’s working memory and surfaces intent signals quickly. You won’t annoy people who were never going to buy; you’ll simply get to a “yes” or “no” faster.
Prospects can tolerate a foreign accent on a Zoom call, but unfamiliar contract clauses can stall procurement for months. Translate key proposal pages, swap out U.S. governing-law boilerplate for the local jurisdiction and quote in the currency your buyer reports to the board. Removing legal friction often shaves entire weeks off the sales cycle.
A new-market launch is noisy by nature. The temptation is to tackle everything at once: hire a PR agency, translate the entire website, sponsor a trade show and spin up a local podcast. Resist. Nail the moves above and you’ll finish the quarter with genuine opportunities in flight, reliable data on pricing and at least one reference customer. After that, the larger bets—events, partnerships, headcount—will compound rather than cannibalise your momentum.
Gearing up to enter a fresh geography and want operators who’ve already felt the bumps? Drop us a line at hello@ea.partners. We’re always happy to compare notes over a quick call and share the playbooks that work in the markets you’re targeting next.
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