7 Go-to-Market Lessons from Building a Data Security Startup Without Connections

7 Go-to-Market Lessons from Building a Data Security Startup Without Connections

Two technical founders with zero startup connections and no sales experience managed to land paying customers within six months. In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, Rina Galperin, CTO and Co-Founder of PVML, a data access platform that’s raised $8 million, revealed the tactical go-to-market playbook that worked when conventional wisdom said they had no chance.

1. Understand the Buyer, Not Just the Company

Most first-time founders focus on understanding their target companies. PVML went deeper. “We spent a lot of time digging into the problem domain and understanding the pain of not only our potential clients, as in the companies, but specifically the buyer in the company, what drives and motivates him, what sets him back, and so on,” Rina explains.

This granular focus on individual buyer motivations proved critical. The company’s pain points are abstract—data security, compliance, efficiency. But the buyer’s pain points are personal: career risk, budget constraints, political capital within their organization, fear of making the wrong choice.

PVML’s six-month journey to their first customer wasn’t about perfecting their pitch deck or product demos. It was about understanding what kept their buyers up at night and what would make them look like heroes to their bosses. “So it really helped us target our ideal customer profile very well and lend our first clients,” Rina notes.

For technical founders entering unfamiliar markets, this lesson is foundational: companies don’t buy products—people do. And people have motivations that extend far beyond spreadsheet ROI.

2. Risk Getting Doors Slammed in Your Face

In crowded markets, playing it safe means blending in. PVML adopted a different philosophy. “I think it’s important to be bold and take risks with marketing. Otherwise you’re just blending in,” Rina states. “You sometimes need to risk having a door shut at your face to potentially land something big and suppress competition.”

Their tactics ranged from simple to surprisingly personal. They handed out coffee vouchers at conferences to land coffee dates with prospects. They created customized mugs for clients on onboarding days. These aren’t scalable playbook tactics—they’re relationship-building moves that require time, creativity, and the willingness to have some people think you’re weird.

The underlying principle: in B2B cybersecurity, where every vendor claims to be innovative and every pitch deck looks identical, memorable beats perfect. A coffee voucher might seem trivial, but it’s the difference between being another LinkedIn message and being the company someone actually remembers.

3. Choose Your Events by Customer, Not by Category

Here’s a counterintuitive move: PVML, a cybersecurity company, stopped prioritizing cybersecurity events. “We do try to look for clients not specifically in, I mean, you mentioned events and not specifically in cyber events, but maybe branch out more to domain specific events that we’re seeing traction specifically in fintech, mobility, healthcare,” Rina shares.

The logic is sound. Cybersecurity conferences are saturated with vendors. Every attendee is being pitched constantly. The signal-to-noise ratio is terrible. But at a fintech conference? Healthcare mobility event? PVML stands out as the data security solution built specifically for that vertical’s unique challenges.

This vertical-first approach also solves a market education problem. PVML uses differential privacy—a technology most buyers haven’t heard of. Rather than educating the entire cybersecurity market, they can focus on specific verticals where the pain point is acute and the value proposition is immediately clear.

4. Know Which Type of Marketer You Need Right Now

PVML’s biggest go-to-market regret? Not hiring a head of marketing sooner. But their search revealed an important framework for technical founders building marketing teams.

“I think there are many people in marketing that are either closer to the sales and understand the sales process and others who are more like proactive and more technical,” Rina observes. “I mean, both are good. It really depends on what the company needs at a certain point of time.”

The sales-oriented marketer understands buyer personas, nurture sequences, and conversion optimization. They excel at turning awareness into pipeline. The creative-technical marketer excels at brand positioning, thought leadership, and market education. They build awareness and credibility.

Most founders assume they need one or the other. The insight is that you need different types at different stages. Early stage, pre-product-market fit? You probably need the creative type to help define positioning. Growth stage with clear ICP? The sales-oriented marketer becomes critical.

“We found out how difficult it is to find this unique person, the person that is creative enough, bold enough, but also deeply understanding the buyer Persona,” Rina notes. That unicorn exists, but while you’re searching, knowing which 80% you need most matters.

5. Frame the Round, Frame the Meeting

Through raising $8 million, Rina learned that fundraising success hinges on a single skill: framing. “I’ve learned that fundraising is a skill that you can learn and improve on. But I think the main thing is that frame is key in fundraising.”

This breaks into two components. First, framing the round: “You need to frame the fundraising ground, and you need to find the right clinic to kick it off and decide how long you’ll keep the opportunity open for investors to join.”

Most founders let investors control the timeline. Investors who are interested will slow-roll due diligence. Investors who are on the fence will ask for more meetings. Before you know it, six months have passed and you’re running out of cash with no term sheet.

Rina’s approach flips the dynamic. Set clear parameters upfront. This is when we’re starting. This is how long the round is open. Move with urgency or miss the opportunity. “Even if investors may not see it that way as an opportunity, but that’s okay. I believe this should be your mindset anyway.”

Second, framing individual meetings: “You have, let’s say, 1 hour to cover everything that’s important. It’s not an easy task, and it kind of goes back to the mindset again because you need the confidence to manage the meeting effectively and stay in control.”

The worst fundraising meetings meander. An investor asks about market size, and forty minutes later you’re still on TAM/SAM/SOM while your product demo and traction slides remain unseen. Controlling the frame means having the confidence to say, “Let me make sure we cover X, Y, and Z in our time together, then we can go deeper on whatever is most interesting to you.”

6. Position Against the Category’s Fundamental Assumption

PVML operates in data access, but they’ve positioned themselves as the anti-data-access company. Traditional solutions restrict and limit access. “Basically, let me hide or remove your data because I don’t want to risk a data breach,” Rina summarizes.

PVML’s positioning: “I would say it’s data access, but it’s enabling instead of limiting.”

This works because it challenges the category’s core assumption. Data security doesn’t have to mean restriction. Protection doesn’t require hiding data. Their differential privacy technology unlocks data for analysis without alteration or risk—something that sounds impossible under the old paradigm.

The lesson for category creation: don’t just claim you’re better at solving the problem everyone acknowledges. Challenge the fundamental assumption about how the problem must be solved. That’s what creates genuine category differentiation.

7. Play Where You Have Edge

As two technical founders new to entrepreneurship, PVML faced a choice: compete on relationships and connections they didn’t have, or compete on hustle and technical depth they did have. They chose the latter.

“We both were quite new to the whole entrepreneurial world, first timers, two techie people, and we really just went door knocking,” Rina recalls. “We had close to zero inside connections, and we’re new to the startup ecosystem. We just started reaching out to people on LinkedIn and email and just trying to get meetings booked.”

No warm introductions. No network effects. Just cold outreach, deep technical understanding, and relentless follow-through. It took six months to land their first customer, but they got there.

The broader principle: don’t apologize for what you lack. Double down on what you have. Technical founders often feel disadvantaged against sales-oriented founders with extensive networks. But technical depth, product vision, and genuine understanding of customer problems create their own form of credibility—especially when selling to technical buyers.