8 Things We’ve Learned So Far At Axonius
Brief observations from a cybersecurity startup solving a big problem while rising above the noise
This morning, we launched our new website which includes new branding, messaging, and new content that more clearly and concisely describes the problem we’re trying to solve and why we’re the right team at the right time to solve it. We figured this would be a good time to share some of what we’ve learned so far.
1. Competition Is About Time And Approach, Not Product
While we will always look at other companies that do something tangential to us as competition, that’s not the real competition. The only real competition is the set of questions every company asks when they are considering a product:
- Is this a problem worth solving?
- Given everything else we’re doing right now, is this a problem worth solving right now?
- If it’s worth solving, is the approach something that makes sense given our organizational structure and processes?
Notice that the above doesn’t even consider which product to go with.
2. Feature-based Differentiation Isn’t Enough Anymore
The speed at which companies can copy and add new features makes differentiation based on product features a losing battle. Just coming up with a bundle of cool features isn’t enough to rise above the noise and capture attention. David Cancel at Drift put it clearly:
The solution is to engineer an experience that fundamentally changes the way your customers do their work, removing friction and eliminating the dozens of annoyances that amount to frustration. You want to build something that makes it painful for the customer to imagine going back to the way they worked without it.
3. Enough With FUD
It’s really easy for cybersecurity companies to lead with headlines like “Use this product and you’ll never have a breach”, and “military-grade endpoint protection that will keep your name out of the news.” The minute WannaCry hit, we started seeing vendors putting out press releases stating that they were the only provider that prevented all customers from any damage.
It’s just lazy.
The patronizing tone that some security vendors use with prospects justifies the eye rolling I see when security professionals walk the show floor at conferences.
4. Security Teams Are Tired Of Empty Promises
When I first started in cybersecurity many years ago, I remember thinking “wow, these guys are tough.” These are people that have a healthy disrespect for sales and marketing and aren’t afraid to tell you that.
Turns out, they’ve just been burned by vendors selling empty promises.
5. The “Buy More Stuff” Approach Isn’t Cutting It
I’ve heard many cybersecurity professionals say that they have more than 50 or even 100 security products at any given time. This leads to both fragmentation — where do I go to get an answer to a question — and frustration — I bought all this stuff….why can’t these solutions talk to each other and work together?
We’re at a point now where we have:
- More products than people
- Products that do a fantastic job for their particular niche/functionality
- No way to get a universal view to answer the question “are our devices secure”?
6. Caring And Understanding More Is An Unfair Advantage
The company that best understands the challenges the customer faces wins. The closer you are to the pain the customer feels, the better you’ll be at trying to solve it. There’s a big difference between:
- I want your money, so I’ll build something I can get you to pay me for.
- I want to solve a big, annoying problem that I’ve felt personally and know you are feeling now. If I can solve that and make your life better, you’ll be more than happy to pay me for that product.
7. Make It Easy To Say “Yes”
This one is a personal annoyance: you spend hours researching a problem and find something that should solve it. You fill out a form on a website. You try emailing someone from LinkedIn. Crickets.
Companies spend millions on marketing and lead generation to get prospects to say “yes”, only to ignore them when they indicate interest. We want to make it incredibly easy for anyone to tell us that they’d like to lear more.
8. Create Something Tangible, Measurable, And Memorable
It’s certainly an oversimplification of a remarkably complicated process, but if you can create something that customers will create a connection with, they can measure the impact it has on their work, and it’s done in a way that it’s a story worth sharing, you’re good.
The new Axonius website just went live today, and we’re planning a LOT of new content including videos, white papers, customer testimonials, and more. And of course, if you’d like to see what’s possible with unified device visibility to see and secure all, let us know. We love this stuff.
