Innovation or Distribution? | Analyzing R&D vs S&M Spend

Founders embark on a journey to change the world with their amazing new software tool only to eventually realize that more is spent creating a distribution engine through sales & marketing than the actual product. One of the flaws of many technical founders is the belief that the product will sell itself and that everything can be solved if the product is improved. This unfortunately isn’t usually the case. Side note - technical founders’ obsession with the product is also one of their greatest strengths The best product doesn’t always win. Yes, the product needs to be good, but…that isn’t enough. There are LOTS of good software products out there. Revenue growth provides the fuel for more innovation through R&D spend. If you don’t grow you can’t increase spend on innovation and things will slow down. If you can get to $10M in revenue with your existing product then you likely can get to $20M or $30M with the same product (same concept applies at larger scales). But if revenue growth s

Founders embark on a journey to change the world with their amazing new software tool only to eventually realize that more is spent creating a distribution engine through sales & marketing than the actual product. One of the flaws of many technical founders is the belief that the product will sell itself and that everything can be solved if the product is improved. This unfortunately isn’t usually the case. Side note - technical founders’ obsession with the product is also one of their greatest strengths The best product doesn’t always win. Yes, the product needs to be good, but…that isn’t eno