Mastering B2B Positioning at Every Stage of Growth

For most B2B startups, the default instinct is to be everything to everyone. 

Founders, eager for traction, often define their products in the broadest possible terms, hoping to appeal to the largest market. Robert Kaminski says this common approach is a direct path to failure. 

In a recent episode of the Attributed podcast, Robert, co-founder of the consultancy Fletch PMM, explained why this strategy almost always backfires.

Both Robert and his co-founder, Anthony Pierri, a previous guest on the podcast, have built their reputation on the counter-narrative that for a startup, true strength lies in specificity. 

Good positioning is just positioning that you can actually pull off. 

Success is found in a sharp, focused plan. For companies with limited resources, this means making the difficult choice to ignore most of the market to win over a select few. 

We break down Robert’s essential takeaways on how startups can master their positioning at every critical stage of growth. Don’t have time to read the full post? Listen to the entire conversation. 

Don’t have time to listen? Here’s the TL;DR:

• Stop trying to sell to everyone. The biggest mistake a B2B startup can make is defining its market too broadly. True strength lies in specificity.

• Dominate a niche first. Identify your top 20% of "sticky" customers and focus all your energy on winning that segment before trying to expand.

• Saying "no" is a sign of success. When you can confidently turn down customers who aren't an ideal fit, you know your positioning is clear and effective.

• Positioning is a business strategy, not just marketing. It requires founder conviction and a willingness to make tough choices about who you are and who you are not for.

The Positioning Mindset

Before diving into the stages of positioning, Robert explains that founders need the right mindset. Positioning isn't just a marketing task; it's a foundational business question that requires conviction and a willingness to take a leap of faith.

Stage 1: Experimentation and Finding Your Footing

When a company is brand new, it’s not always clear who the best customer is. 

In this early phase, Robert says a strategy of experimentation positioning is valid. This is the period of selling to almost anyone who will listen, not as a long-term plan, but as a data-gathering tactic.

You by design broadly position because you're like, 'I don't even know. I've got loose hunches, but I'm not ready to commit.’

However, it is not advised to stay in this mode for too long. It leads to what Robert calls “product bloat,” an overwhelmed customer success team, and a marketing department stretched thin trying to create campaigns for ten different audiences at once. 

During this phase, analyze those first 20, 50, or 100 customers and ask the hard questions: Who was the easiest to sell to? Who is getting the most value? Who is sticking the most?

Stage 2: Dominating the Market With a Sharp Edge

After experimenting, the next move is to go narrow, so narrow it feels uncomfortable. 

This is the stage of picking one ICP, one core use case, and focusing all your energy on dominating that small slice of the market.

The pushback is predictable. 

Founders may lament that the market is too small, often with the voices of venture capitalists echoing in their heads, demanding a massive TAM, or total addressable market. But Robert argues this is a false choice. 

A big TAM with an inefficient marketing program makes it impossible to stand out. The alternative is to dominate a small market first. To do that, he advises focusing intently on the customers who already show the most promise.

If you look at even some of these extremely successful companies, almost all of them had one super sharp edge.

The sign that this stage is working is counterintuitive: you start saying “no” to potential customers. This act of strategic rejection is one of the most powerful tools a startup has.

This focus not only makes the entire organization more effective, but it also builds a potent form of word-of-mouth. 

They go back and tell people, ‘There’s this company. They were crazy. They said no to me.’

Once your strategy is set, how do you communicate it to the market?

Robert argues against simple promotion, advocating instead for a strategy of building trust by being relentlessly helpful.

Stage 3: Expanding and Earning the Right to Go Broad

Only after a company has dominated its niche can it successfully expand. 

This broadening leverages the momentum built in stage two. Robert points to a recent move by the e-commerce marketing giant Klaviyo, which has begun positioning itself as “the CRM for B2C.”

He noted that many of Klaviyo’s longtime customers don’t see it as a CRM. But this is their longer-term bet. Klaviyo earned the right to make such a bold move because it had already won its initial market.

Making these shifts requires buy-in from every department: sales needs new decks, product may need new messaging, and customer success needs new onboarding protocols. It's a heavy lift, which is why it can’t be taken lightly.

Should You Lead with AI in Your Positioning?

The current AI boom has sent many companies scrambling to slap “AI-powered” on their homepages. But Robert urges caution. 

AI is just a technology, it is not the product.

Whether to lead with AI in your positioning depends entirely on your audience. For a small group of early adopters, the technology itself is the draw. They want a competitive edge and are willing to experiment. For this group, leading with AI makes sense.

But the mainstream market is different. They are pragmatic.

They don't care about AI, they care about what they're doing, what problem they're bumping into, and all they care about is: do you solve it better? They don't care about what's under the hood.

For most companies, AI will become a feature, a "box to check," rather than the core marketing proposition.

Ultimately, the lesson is one of focus and earned confidence. Startups don’t win by being vague; they win by being undeniably valuable to a specific group of people first. As Kaminski puts it, the path to market leadership is paved with hard choices and a clear, unwavering message.

Until you can own a really niche market, you have no chance of winning a bigger market, if you can't win in the minor leagues, what makes you think you're going to hit home runs in the big leagues?

About the Speaker

Robert Kaminski is the co-founder of Fletch PMM, a consultancy focused exclusively on positioning and messaging for B2B startups. He has advised hundreds of venture-backed companies on how to define their value and connect with their ideal customers.