From Engineering to Explosive Growth: Lessons from a GTM Pioneer

For years, tech companies across Africa and globally have struggled with the same challenge: building great products that fail to find their market. According to Harvard Business School, 95% of new products ultimately miss revenue targets—a statistic that highlights a critical disconnect between creation and demand generation.

I’ve spent my career bridging this gap, starting from an unexpected foundation in metallurgical engineering at the University of Lagos. While I initially envisioned a future designing materials, I discovered that marketing offered another form of creative problem-solving: instead of building physical structures, I could engineer systems to connect products with their ideal customers.

The GTM Engineering Approach

The term “GTM engineering” was coined in 2023 to describe this emerging discipline. At its core, it’s about leveraging automation and AI to give small teams the impact of larger ones—building systems that generate revenue rather than just announcing products.

Think of traditional marketing: manually searching for leads, crafting individual emails, tracking responses across multiple platforms. Now imagine automating those processes with tools like Clay, n8n, and Claude Code. The same goal is achieved with far less manual effort, allowing teams to focus on strategy and optimization.

Beyond the Build: Creating Demand

The most common mistake I see in product launches? Confusing shipping with creating demand. Teams invest heavily in building something amazing, select a launch date, make an announcement—and then wonder why the market doesn’t respond.

A successful launch isn’t about making noise; it’s about ensuring the right people hear your message and understand why they need what you’ve built. It requires:

• Identifying precisely who will benefit most (ideal customer profile)
• Crafting clear positioning that resonates with their pain points
• Building automated systems to reach them efficiently
• Measuring results and iterating based on data

My experience at companies like Simpu, Distrobird, Chatbase, and Tecno has reinforced this principle: marketing is less about creativity for its own sake and more about engineering solutions that deliver measurable outcomes.

Your First Automation Project

If you’re curious about GTM engineering, I recommend starting with a practical project. Identify a repetitive task in your current workflow—lead research, follow-ups, reporting—and build an automation to handle it. Document the process and add it to your portfolio as proof of your capabilities.

This hands-on approach is more valuable than any degree or certification. In this field, demonstrable results speak louder than credentials.