It all starts with the mission statement.
Written by: Pyrs Carvolth, Maggie Hsu, both partners at a16z crypto
Translated by: Luffy, Foresight News
For founders, being able to clearly communicate the company's vision is crucial, including conveying the company's stance, future direction, and differences from competitors. In the early stages, especially for companies that have not yet launched a viable product, they may feel that it is too early to articulate the company's mission. But well-considered core information can unite the team, help founders establish credibility and clear goals, and more effectively bring the product to market.
There are many resources available on building a brand and carefully crafting a mission statement that reflects the team's values. But integrating these elements can be quite challenging. Therefore, in this article, we will focus on how to adjust and differentiate the mission statement from the value proposition, as well as how to refine the elevator pitch for partnerships, sales enablement, fundraising, and more. We will also share the basic materials that founders need before launching their products.
A brief overview of ideal customer profiles (ICPs) and how to use them in the crypto space
In this article, we will use the concept of ideal customer profiles (ICPs). This is a well-known business development tool used to define potential customers who are most likely to purchase your product, from behavioral, environmental, and demographic perspectives.
Why is this important? Ideal customer profiles help you understand your target audience, the people you are "selling" to, and adjust your messaging accordingly when you receive feedback. For example, a technical audience may need more technical details, while business people may need fewer details but more focus on the benefits and outcomes of the product.
Sounds good, but in the crypto space, especially for pre-seed companies, defining ideal customer profiles can be tricky, as it means immediately considering business outcomes and goals while the product is still evolving. It's difficult to define an ideal customer profile when the product is not yet fully developed. So we encourage companies to think about their desired end-users, partners, and customers, and then craft messaging for their product launch materials that can easily adapt to different customers, conversations, and contexts.
In short, it's all about explaining in a clear and concise way to anyone why you are developing your product.
At the same time, there is one piece of information that should remain consistent regardless of the audience, and that is the mission statement.
It all starts with the mission statement
There has been a lot of discussion about how to write a good mission statement. But the core of a mission statement is the "why" - it succinctly describes the company's reason for being, its goals and values, and what makes it unique. This is crucial for positioning in pitch decks, website copy, follow-up emails, sales conversations, and more.
Importantly, the mission statement related to the go-to-market strategy is not about "how" to do something, or even "what" to do. It does not need to delve into the specifics of the company's business, nor does it need to detail the specific plans for achieving the goals. Instead, the mission statement outlines the company's objectives and helps define the company's position in the industry. The mission statement also serves the following purposes:
1. Establishes a core goal to unite the team
An effective mission statement provides much-needed direction when innovation and rapid growth may cause important goals to drift off course, helping founders stay focused on the idealistic long-term goals set when the company was founded.
This core goal is especially important when the market is hot and the team needs to scale. They can integrate the mission statement into the interview, onboarding, and performance review processes, as well as strategic planning, product roadmaps, feature prioritization, and marketing activities.
For example, Coinbase's mission has long been to "create an open financial system for the world".
Over the years, Coinbase has gradually rolled out a centralized exchange, wallet, NFT marketplace, layer-2 networks, and more. If the focus were solely on any one of these individual projects, the overall principle of this mission statement could be lost in translation. However, it is broad enough to allow the team to focus on this principle and then integrate it into decisions about cultural values and product investments, even as the Coinbase projects seem to extend beyond its core centralized exchange business.
On the other hand, many startups want to focus on perfecting a specific product or continuously focus on a particular technology or ecosystem. For example, Blackbird's mission is to "become a loyalty company that rewards people who love restaurants".
With this mission statement, whether it's partners, customers, or investors as the target audience, they can assume that as Blackbird's products evolve, it will prioritize and meet the experience needs of diners and restaurant operators, building loyalty and trust within a specific customer segment.
2. Differentiates the company from competitors
The crypto industry is still in its early stages, but is rapidly expanding into areas like scaling solutions (e.g., scaling solutions and staking). Combined with the open-source nature of the crypto industry, this has led to many different vendors offering seemingly very similar products.
For companies in these hot verticals, they need to dig deeper into their own unique advantages in both product and narrative. First, ensure that these unique advantages are integrated into the mission statement. Even if startups are still exploring their own unique advantages, it may be just as important to define the impact of these advantages early on as it is to provide a feature comparison chart against competitor products.
Consider this an early branding opportunity. Focus on what's unique about you as a founder, the unique team you're building, the unique company you're creating, and the unique product vision you have. Even companies offering very similar products may have vastly different styles, and partners and customers will ultimately consider these factors when comparing competitors. Why not help them draw these conclusions and enable them to share your narrative internally and advocate for your product?
For example, Towns (a way to build hometown communities on the internet) quickly established a distinct social network mindset, focusing on intimate, curated, and more localized gathering spaces rather than large global communities.
3. Refocuses when the market landscape changes
The mission statement is not set in stone. Consumer attitudes change, products pivot, and companies launch new initiatives. Founders inevitably encounter situations where the company's development exceeds the scope of the mission statement.
While it's important for the team to adapt to changes and keep the market informed about the company's direction, the mission statement should maintain enough flexibility to accommodate necessary strategic shifts while still reflecting a unique vision.
Mission statements that capture the things that keep founders up at night and the problems they are solving for users are the ones that will stand out in the noisy market and stand the test of time. This is better than mission statements that are overly focused on momentary market preferences, as the latter will ultimately leave the internal team feeling confused.
In summary
When planning your messaging roadmap, start by writing the mission statement, then build more specific value propositions on top of that (which we'll discuss below). Each company's situation is different, but here are some general guidelines:
Do:
- Focus on the long-term vision
- Differentiate from competitors
- Take a high-level view, focusing on principles and benefits rather than products or features
- Seek input from co-founders or employees across different functions
- Treat messaging as an early branding exercise by reflecting on questions like: What changes will my company bring? What do we as a company value, and why?
Avoid:
- Getting bogged down in the details of product and feature specifications
- Conveying different mission statements to different audiences
- Drafting a "universal" statement that would apply to any company in your industry
Similarly, each company has different needs and must evaluate its own approach. But once the mission statement is established, you can move on to crafting value propositions.
Best Practices for Value Propositions
At some point, startups need to shift the focus from describing their core mission to helping customers understand why they should care about the company's products. If the mission statement addresses the "why," the value proposition addresses the "what" and "how," outlining the key benefits of the product or service in a concise, customer-centric language.
Value propositions are crucial when pitching your products and will appear in your marketing and sales materials, serving the following purposes:
1. Provide Context Using Meaningful, Customized Language
Crypto products often require defining new terminology during the promotion process; it is crucial to articulate new terms using language and concepts already familiar to the customers.
Using common industry jargon is necessary, with the ultimate goal of avoiding alienating the target audience. For example, an audience familiar with the crypto space will be comfortable with abbreviations like DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization). If the value proposition were to spell it out or explain its meaning in detail, they might find it tedious. Conversely, if the value proposition does not explain the overall concept, it may lose the interest of a broader audience still needing an introductory guide.
Determining which terms are appropriate and which are not is actually quite difficult. Many founders think, "My audience is smart, they'll understand." But the reality is that people vary greatly in their use and comprehension of jargon. If you're unsure which terms are workable, don't make assumptions. You can always survey your audience or simply take the time to explain, reaching a shared understanding.
For example, Alchemy states that their Node API allows clients to "connect to top L1 or L2 with RPC infrastructure processing over 3 billion requests per week with 99.9% uptime." Here, there's no need to explain what L1 or L2 are, or even to spell out RPC fully. Their customers, likely crypto developers and engineers, probably use these terms regularly and don't need further explanation. And while these value propositions involve some details, they still align with the company's mission (a complete Web3 developer platform).
2. Focus on How the Product Makes the Customer's Life Easier
When crafting value propositions for potential customers and partners, be sure to describe the actual impact of the collaboration, not just the technical specifications. For example...
- Alchemy: Launching a reliable enterprise-grade scaling solution and immediately reaching millions of developers
- Base: A secure, low-cost, developer-friendly Ethereum Layer 2 network
- Solana: Leverage Solana's high throughput, low fees, and minimal environmental impact to meet your business-specific needs
All of these value propositions position the products from the perspective of improving efficiency for the user - how they help customers achieve their goals faster or better than before.
For products seeking entirely new audiences, describing how to do something better can be more challenging when it's something that's never really been done before. In these cases, founders may want to compare the product's benefits to adjacent existing domains, or even abstract some of the technology to make it more accessible to the audience.
For consumers, Blackbird removed specific crypto terminology and firmly positioned itself in the restaurant loyalty space. For example, they describe their points as a "universal rewards currency" that can be used at participating restaurants. This is much clearer for diners unfamiliar with crypto than terms like "non-transferable tokens." The key is that it taps into the existing behaviors of food enthusiasts who love dining out, rather than asking them to adopt new behaviors.
3. Help Founders Operate More Efficiently
Especially in the early stages of a product's lifecycle, having a clear value proposition checklist can help founders quickly understand the conversations with customers, investors, suppliers, potential talent, and other stakeholders. Additionally, the team can iterate on this list and use it for sales enablement and marketing, including the company website, social media, GitHub repositories, sales presentations, and more.
Good value propositions will follow the core principles outlined above. They can make products and services clearer, enhance customer understanding of the company and its developed offerings, and make early conversations more efficient.
Do:
- Use the language your customers use to connect with them
- Gather feedback on value propositions from customers, employees, and other stakeholders, but ensure the information is relevant to your product
- Reuse value propositions in sales enablement and marketing materials
- Link the benefits to the mission statement, which also helps internal product teams, designers, sales teams, and others
Avoid:
- Crafting overly broad or lengthy value propositions
- Excessive use of jargon, especially for audiences unfamiliar with it
- Trying to cover multiple different audiences with a single value proposition
Once you've established your value propositions, you can consider combining them with your mission statement to form an elevator pitch.
Refining the Elevator Pitch
You may have heard of the "elevator pitch" - the short spiel you can use to sell your product or company during a brief elevator ride. The elevator pitch succinctly articulates the company's "what," "why," and "how." Most founders have already done a lot of practice for pitching to investors, and may even be able to recite it effortlessly, but it's still worthwhile to delve deeper into this crucial piece of messaging, as it will be ubiquitous in your launch marketing materials.
First, the sooner founders start thinking about their elevator pitch, the better. Founders must continually assess their ability to bring the product to market and clearly articulate the company's core points. Their pitch not only needs to establish the company's brand, but also their own personal brand, showcasing who they are, what they're developing, and why they are the right people to be developing it.
The elevator pitch can also save time. Founders can complete the pitch in under a minute, and if done well, can gauge whether they are talking to the right people. This is helpful for building partnerships, sales, and fundraising, and also allows for immediate, useful feedback. For example, founders can immediately assess the effectiveness of their pitch and decide if they need to adjust their messaging.
Like the mission statement and value propositions, the elevator pitch reflects the company's values and culture, and will evolve over time. So regularly reviewing and updating it is a good habit to ensure alignment with co-founders, employees, and external company advocates.
Finally, here are some tips for refining the elevator pitch:
Do:
- Practice your pitch at crypto and non-crypto events and conferences
- Seek feedback from crypto advocates and skeptics, who are harder to convince
- A/B test and refine your delivery based on different objectives
Avoid:
- Undermining your pitch at the last minute due to lack of preparation
- Using the exact same pitch for different audiences: Adjust it based on who you're talking to, such as technical decision-makers or business decision-makers
Integrating the Above: Four Essential Elements of Messaging
All of this information should be integrated into a few different documents. Here are some basic content that each team should have before launching their marketing efforts:
- Standard Introduction Paragraph: This introductory paragraph can borrow heavily from the elevator pitch content, and the founders should be prepared to present it orally and in writing, including it on the "About Us" page of the website and in introductory emails.
- One-Page Overview: A one-page overview of the company, including some potential use cases. Incorporate information from the elevator pitch, mission statement, and value proposition, as well as any relevant data or proof points such as customer growth, uptime, or key partnerships. The team can send this one-page overview as pre-read material before meetings, and can also send it in follow-up emails if stakeholders request more information.
- Business Presentation Deck: This may differ slightly from an investment or pitch deck, and may actually be two or three customized decks for different ideal customer profiles. Each version of the presentation deck should be appropriately tailored to the situation, and should all include a slide discussing next steps. Note: We typically recommend that founders present this deck together with stakeholders, rather than sending it in advance, as the dialogue will guide the optimal order of slides and key points for each slide.
- Company Website: Early-stage companies sometimes use a GitHub code repository for marketing instead of a website. The website should combine the company's information with key assets (such as developer documentation and case studies) that can be very helpful in various conversations. While these key points and case studies can be shared temporarily, integrating all the content together helps facilitate better partnerships and customer dialogues.
As ideas abound and founders remain focused on iterating the product, it can be challenging to determine the direction of information delivery. Nevertheless, it is important to start thinking about information delivery as soon as possible. Founders who do so will have more valuable materials to use in dialogues with investors, customers, and potential partners. Companies with effective information delivery will also have a key advantage in this noisy industry: they can provide tangible expressions of their work culture and values, from product roadmaps to hiring. Do not skip this step.
