Most startups don’t have an awareness problem. They have a legitimacy problem.

Senior marketing thinking early, when the decisions are cheapest to get right: positioning, go-to-market, the first marketing hire, and how not to burn a round on reach you don’t need yet.

Founders about to spend serious money on brand for the first time. Startups in categories that don’t exist yet, where broad awareness is expensive noise. Growth teams that have hit the ceiling of performance and don’t know what brand is supposed to do about it.

I led CoinSwitch’s agency-side launch when crypto’s problem was legitimacy rather than awareness, and Zepto’s first hyperlocal launch when quick commerce barely existed as a category — making one neighbourhood believe before telling a country. Those are the two shapes most startup marketing problems take.