From pilots to paying customers: finding clarity in the murky middle with Beyond Role Plays

The challenge

When Danielle reached out, Beyond the Sky was at an early stage of finding product-market fit for Beyond Role Plays. She was trying to work out how to run pilots, and these were big pilots. She wanted to do them really well.

She describes that period as murky. It is the ambiguous stretch where it is not quite clear what to do next. She believes that murkiness is there for every founder, technical or not, experienced or new.

Part of what held her back was confidence. She needed to know it would be okay to go and do it.

Danielle also knew what she did not want. She was looking for tactical next steps, but not tactics on their own. In her words, "it isn't tactics on their own that are useful." She wanted advice that fit inside a clear strategy for reaching product-market fit.

She had also seen the cost of the alternative. On an earlier venture, building without a roadmap or a strategy for product-market fit had cost her a lot of time and money.

What we did

The MVP program. Danielle went through Moshe's MVP program. What stood out to her was the structure. Each session gave a framework, and then built in activities to apply it right there in the session. She described the activities as "achievable, realistic, useful." The diagrams were there to make the content easier to understand, and the ideas tied together into one coherent thread.

One-on-one coaching. After the program, Moshe worked with Danielle directly on Beyond Role Plays. The coaching covered:

• Running the pilots. Through their conversations, Danielle got clarity on how to approach the pilots, and the reassurance to go and run them.
• Candid guidance for her situation. Moshe came to sessions well prepared, with insights and models to share. The advice was specific to Beyond the Sky, not generic.
• UX and UI feedback. At the end of one meeting, Danielle shared the platform's Figma designs. Moshe gave some offhand insights on the design. Danielle found he put into words something others may have felt but no one had been able to say clearly.
• The roadmap. As Beyond the Sky brought new features to market, Moshe helped Danielle decide where the roadmap was going, what to prioritize, and what not to prioritize.

Everything ran through one lens: finding product-market fit and pursuing it.

Results

The pilots went great. The confidence piece turned out to matter. Once she ran them, in her words, "they all were totally fine."

Pilots became paying customers. The pilot customers have since become paying customers.

Customers became champions. They have also become true champions of the platform. Danielle thinks their early involvement as pilots is part of why. She called this "delightful" and unexpected.

A clearer roadmap. Working with Moshe helped her decide what to build and what to leave out. It has been rewarding for her to see those features come to life, with UX and UI that reflect the design feedback from earlier sessions.

A framework that keeps working. Danielle now sees product-market fit as a journey of continual insight. That framework is still with her as the product keeps evolving, and she uses what she learned from the pilots to keep refining fit.

Her favourite part of the product right now is seeing its impact: people improving their sales skills.