Distribution for before your first dollar
Channel strategy is a problem you don’t have yet. Sell direct, learn what works, then think about channels at $250K to $500K ARR.
Find out where you standWhy this matters now
Founders read about PLG vs. sales-led vs. partner-led and try to pick a channel before they’ve sold to anyone. The right move is to sell directly, in whatever way it takes, until you’ve closed enough deals to see what’s actually happening: what triggers buyers, what objections show up, what closes the gap. Without that grounding, you’re guessing at a channel based on category fashion. Worse, you’re locking in commitments (partnerships, listings, integrations) that you’ll have to renegotiate or abandon when reality intrudes.
Questions you should be able to answer
Have you closed deals through direct, founder-led conversations before committing to any channel?
Do you know which channel your first 5 customers would have come through if you hadn’t reached them directly?
Are you considering a channel because the data points there, or because it sounds right for your category?
Could you defend your channel choice with three specific learnings from real customer interactions?
The trap to avoid
Locking in a channel before you’ve sold
Distribution decisions made pre-revenue are decisions made without information. Founders sign reseller agreements, build marketplace listings, or commit to a self-serve motion based on what they read. Then they discover that the actual buyer wants a sales conversation, or the actual sales conversation needs a deeper integration. By then the channel is wired in and undoing it costs months.
What changes next
At early-revenue, you have enough deal data to evaluate one channel hypothesis at a time. The key word is “one.” Founders who try to launch three channels with $300K ARR are running three half-experiments and learning from none.
The full distribution guide