Your startup needs a POV people can’t ignore

tl;dr

A bland POV turns your startup into a game of telephone. Misheard. Misaligned. Off-message.

A sharp, unforgettable pov should be the spine of your strategy. Without it, your team drifts, your message blurs, and your market forgets you.

A founders vision ≠ POV

Many founders and GTM leaders mistake vision for clarity. They write a tagline, a mission, a deck, and assume everyone is on the same page. But clarity isn’t what you say once. 

Clarity is what gets repeated without distortion. 

That’s the job of a POV.

Don’t start with a strategy. Start with clarity. 

And clarity starts when your POV resonates with your audience.

A POV is not… 

• Your mission

• Your tagline

• Positioning

A POV is…

• What you believe the world gets wrong and how you plan to make it right

• The lens that shapes how the world sees the problem, your role in it, and the shift you’re here to lead

• The throughline that tells your team what to build, your buyers what to expect, and your market how to think

Without this spine, even the smartest GTM teams spin their wheels. 

Every new hire, campaign, and customer touchpoint becomes a new interpretation of “what we do” and “why it matters.”

It creates misalignment. 

Think about it. How can your team stay aligned if no one is anchored in the same core belief?

It’s not your fault. Frameworks and playbooks promised if you followed “a few simple steps,” success would follow.

When the pressure’s on, teams check boxes. If you’ve launched a product, you know the drill:

• Positioning? ✅ The [solution] for [persona] in [industry] focused on [JTBD]...

• Website copy? ✅

• Sales enablement? ✅

But without a clear POV, it’s like baking bread without yeast. It cooks but doesn’t rise. Or eating a calorie-packed meal void of nutrition. You get full, but it doesn’t serve as fuel.

Unprepared, everyone improvises:

• Product chases shiny new features customers haven’t asked for.

• Marketing produces noise that adds to LinkedIn cacophony.

• Sales spins a story that fits the room.

It’s death by dilution. And worst of all?

You won’t even see it happening. Like the turkey from Christmas Vacation.

A POV aligns people and pulls prospects in

One B2B startup I advised had a brilliant founder and a great product. But every team described the company differently:

• Sales said AI automation

• Marketing pushed process intelligence

• The CEO wanted to coin a new category

Once we anchored around a single belief, everything snapped into place.
GTM synced. Messaging landed. Pipeline grew.

A strong POV is not a nice-to-have. It’s your multiplier.

• It creates cohesion inside and conviction outside.

• It tells your team where to push.

• It tells your customers what to believe.

• It tells your category what to expect next.

Test your POV before you go to market.

The POV Fit Test:

1. Does it name a problem your buyer feels, not just understands?

2. Does the team tell the same story?

3. Can people outside your org repeat your belief?

4. Does it point to a shift only you can deliver?

5. Are product, marketing, and sales aligned on what change you’re driving?

6. Do customers echo it back to you?

7. Can every function apply it in real decisions?

8. Can a new hire explain it in one sentence?

If the answers are vague, generic, or uncertain, you’re not ready.

Iterate your POV until it passes the fit test.

Your POV isn’t what you say. 

It’s what they repeat.

Next up: how to actually build a POV worth repeating.

Subscribe here to get it first