For early-stage founders, few things are more disorienting than being pulled in multiple directions by well-meaning mentors. One day, you’re told your ideal customer is the enterprise buyer. The next, someone suggests focusing on scrappy startups. A third insists your best bet is to dominate a niche. These experts are all respected, all experienced—and all giving you completely different advice.
Welcome to the ICP confusion zone, where even the most driven founders can lose focus. At the heart of the problem is the challenge of defining your Ideal Customer Profile—and the reality that every mentor seems to have their own definition of what yours should be.
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Why Every Expert Has a Different Take on Your ICP
Let’s start with the root of the issue: mentors aren’t objective observers. They bring their own background, biases, and industry-specific experience to the table. A mentor who scaled a B2B SaaS platform with an outbound strategy will naturally push enterprise ICPs. One who succeeded in DTC will talk about brand, community, and social proof. Neither is necessarily wrong—but neither is universally right.
There’s also an ego factor. When someone has a “proven formula,” they tend to see it as the formula. And when founders hear these differing opinions in back-to-back meetings, it leads to a dangerous mix of self-doubt, overcorrection, and inconsistent execution.
The Trap of Theoretical ICPs
Most early-stage startups create their ICPs in a vacuum. They use pitch decks, assumptions, or idealized personas based on who they want to sell to—usually influenced by investor expectations or mentor advice. This approach feels strategic, but it’s not rooted in reality.
Theoretical ICPs might get you through a demo day, but they rarely lead to paying customers. The better path is to discover your ICP through first-hand learning: conversations, feedback loops, behavioral data, and sales cycles. That’s the difference between a nice-looking slide and an actual business strategy.
Real-World Case: From ICP Chaos to Clarity
Consider one founder at M Accelerator—let’s call her Maya. She was building a digital workflow tool for solopreneurs. One mentor told her to shift to marketing agencies for higher contract value. Another pushed her toward HR departments in mid-market companies. A third told her to “go enterprise or go home.”
For three months, Maya chased each idea in turn. The result? Scattered messaging, a bloated roadmap, and minimal traction.
The breakthrough came when Maya paused the cycle of external advice and launched a focused customer discovery sprint. She reached out to her earliest adopters and discovered they were all independent wellness professionals and niche consultants. They weren’t the biggest customers—but they were the most engaged, fastest to onboard, and easiest to convert. That insight reshaped her entire GTM strategy, leading to faster growth and stronger word-of-mouth.
A Framework for Founders Navigating ICP Confusion
You don’t have to choose between mentor opinions or gut instinct. There’s a third way: structured validation. Here’s a lightweight framework we use at M Accelerator to help founders clarify their ICP in weeks, not months.
1. Anchor in the Problem
Instead of focusing on who you think your customer is, ask: who feels the pain your product solves most acutely? That’s your starting point.
2. Build Hypothesis Segments
Identify 2–3 candidate ICPs based on different personas or use cases. Avoid the temptation to “pick one” too early.
3. Run Discovery Sprints
Have 5–10 structured interviews per segment. Don’t pitch—learn. Ask about their workflow, pain points, current solutions, and willingness to pay.
4. Track Real Signals
Which group responds quickly? Books meetings? Pays with the least friction? Use behavior—not opinions—as your decision-making compass.
5. Iterate and Lock
Your ICP is a living document. Revisit it quarterly as your product, brand, and market evolve.
Context Matters: Timing and Stage-Specific ICPs
One of the biggest mistakes we see founders make is applying Series A advice at the pre-seed stage. Enterprise sales? Sounds great—but not when your MVP is still duct-taped together. Wide horizontal markets? Maybe later—first you need a wedge.
Your current context—funding, product readiness, team bandwidth—should determine your ICP strategy. Mentors often skip this nuance. They’re speaking from their playbook, not yours.
This is why coaching-based support can be more valuable than traditional advisory. Coaches guide you to build your own answers based on discovery and experimentation, not templated advice.
Don’t Let Contradictory Advice Stall Your Growth
When it comes to defining your ICP, the only “right” path is the one that aligns with your market, product, and current capabilities. Expert advice is useful—but only if you know how to test it. The best founders treat mentor input like hypotheses, not commandments.
If you’re spinning your wheels trying to please every expert, it’s time to shift from advice overload to clarity-driven action.
From Advice Overload to Clarity: Join the Founders Meeting
If you can’t communicate your business with a powerful idea, you won’t be able to build it. Join our weekly Founders Meetings, where early to pre-Series A founders learn how to leverage AI and strategic messaging to sharpen customer targeting, validate their ICP, and unlock traction.
In these live sessions, we reveal the key patterns that stall startups—gleaned from reviewing 2,000+ founder applications annually. You’ll learn how to avoid the ICP trap, see live examples of AI-powered go-to-market tools, and access frameworks that drive clarity and action. Plus, you’ll connect with a thriving community of 500+ founders who’ve collectively raised $50M+ in venture funding.
Join the next Founders Meeting to get our Clarity Formulas and meet the experts helping founders navigate the challenges of early-stage growth.
