A go-to-market strategy for PropTech startups whose buyers hate switching
A go-to-market plan for startups whose buyers love their spreadsheets, built as four moves you make in order.
Marketing strategy
Tech and SaaS
The Leapyn team
6 min read
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A leasing team that has run renewals out of the same spreadsheet for eight years does not see that spreadsheet as a problem. It is free, everyone knows where the tabs are and the person who built it still works there. A PropTech startup arriving with a better tool is asking that team to give up something that feels safe, which is why go-to-market for real estate software is mostly the work of making change feel small.
A go-to-market strategy is the plan for how a product reaches its first customers and then scales. For a PropTech startup, it has to solve a specific problem, which is that the buyer already has a way of doing things, it mostly works and switching feels risky. Every part of the plan should make saying yes feel smaller and safer.
We use four moves, in this order. Skip one and the next gets harder.
Move one, choose the first segment
Agents, brokerages, investors and property managers buy for different reasons and on different timelines, so trying to sell to all of them at once is the most common mistake we see. Pick the segment with the most urgent pain, the shortest sales cycle and a clear way to reach them. For a lot of startups that is a specific slice, such as independent brokerages of twenty to a hundred agents, or operators with one to five thousand units.
Write that segment down in a sentence your whole team can repeat. If you need a refresher on the four buyers, our what is PropTech guide breaks them down.
Move two, make the first yes small
Property professionals rarely commit to a company-wide switch on the first call. Offer a pilot on one team, one property or one market, with a clear success measure and an end date. A small yes lowers the risk for the buyer and gives you the data you need for the next sale.
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Move three, build proof that travels
In real estate, a named result from a peer beats any feature list. Turn every pilot into a short story with a name, a number and a timeframe, then put it in front of the next prospect who looks like that customer. Proof travels fastest inside a segment, which is another reason to start narrow.
How to message the switch
Your biggest competitor is the spreadsheet, the old system or the way the team has always worked. So the message has to answer three questions before it talks about features.
What is staying put quietly costing them?
How small and safe is the move?
Who like them has already done it?
Write those answers in the buyer's vocabulary, such as occupancy, days on market, net operating income or hours per closing, and test them on sales calls before you put money behind them.
Pricing the first segment
Early pricing should make the pilot easy to approve. Many PropTech startups price per unit, per door, per agent or per transaction, because those match how real estate teams already think about cost. Keep the pilot price low enough to fit inside someone's existing budget authority, and agree up front what a successful pilot converts into.
Move four, pick launch channels for the buyer you chose
Agents respond to peer recommendations, social proof and tools that spread office to office.
Brokerages respond to referrals, industry events and account-based outreach to brokers.
Investors respond to data-led content and credible industry publications.
Operators respond to conferences, peer references and targeted LinkedIn campaigns by portfolio size.
Choose the two channels that fit your first segment and run them properly before adding a third.
The five go-to-market motions
Most go-to-market guides describe five motions, and most PropTech startups end up blending two of them, such as product-led for agents and sales-led for brokerages.
Sales-led suits bigger deals with several decision makers.
Product-led suits tools individuals can try alone, like many agent apps.
Marketing-led uses content and campaigns to create inbound demand.
Partner-led sells through integrations, associations or resellers.
Account-based targets a named list of high-value accounts.
Rules of thumb that help
The 80/20 rule shows up everywhere in startups, and in go-to-market it usually means a fifth of your accounts will bring most of your revenue, so find the pattern in your best customers and chase more of them. The 70/20/10 rule is a useful way to split a marketing budget, with most of it on channels that already work, some on promising ones and a little on experiments.
The four moves across one first year
Put the four moves on one calendar and the go-to-market plan for a startup selling renewal software might run like this. In the first quarter the founders choose mid-sized multifamily operators in two Southeast metros as the segment and talk to twenty of them. In the second they offer a sixty-day pilot on one property, free to start, with a renewal baseline agreed before day one. By the third quarter the first pilots have become a short case study with named results and a reference call, and that proof goes into every sales conversation. In the fourth they pick launch channels the segment already trusts, such as a regional apartment association event and targeted outreach to the operators who missed the first wave.
Nothing in that year depends on a big launch moment. Each step makes the next yes a little smaller, which is how a PropTech go-to-market strategy works with buyers who hate switching instead of against them.
How long does a PropTech go-to-market take?
Expect the first segment to take two to three quarters to prove, because pilots, references and procurement all take time in real estate. Plan your runway around that, and measure progress by pilots started, pilots converted and referenceable customers rather than by launch-day buzz.
The first call felt like talking to someone who already understood our business. We didn’t have to explain the basics. They showed up with questions that mattered.
James L.
Director of Growth, HR tech
Client
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
What is a go-to-market strategy for startups?
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A go-to-market strategy is the plan for how a startup reaches its first customers and scales, covering the target segment, positioning, pricing, sales motion, channels and how success is measured.
What is the best go-to-market strategy for a PropTech startup?
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Start with one segment that has urgent pain and a short sales cycle, offer a small first step like a pilot, turn early wins into named proof and focus on the two channels that segment trusts.
What are the five go-to-market strategies?
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The five common motions are sales-led, product-led, marketing-led, partner-led and account-based. Most startups combine two depending on the buyer and deal size.
How long does a SaaS go-to-market take?
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For PropTech and other vertical software, proving the first segment usually takes two to three quarters because pilots, references and procurement take time.
What is the 70/20/10 rule in marketing?
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It is a budget split where about 70 percent goes to proven channels, 20 percent to promising ones and 10 percent to experiments, so growth stays steady while you test new ideas.
Written by
The Leapyn team
Senior marketing team
Senior marketers who run strategy, creative and demand gen for B2B companies. We write about what’s working for our clients right now.
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