Don't decide from runway alone: calculate the cash and time available to test the current hypothesis, then compare it with a narrower repositioning or a genuinely different market. Your immediate output is an explicit test-and-stop decision with a date, not an inspiring rebrand.
- Build a 13-week cash forecast and a separate longer-view scenario; list actual cash, payroll, contractual commitments, collections and contingencies.
- Define evidence of progress in paying customers, repeat usage, activation or gross margin appropriate to the business—not founder enthusiasm or pipeline anecdotes.
- Run 5–10 targeted conversations as a research-plan suggestion, not a universal statistical sample, prioritising customers who recently bought, declined or churned; cross-check interviews with behaviour.
- Compare persist / narrow / pivot / orderly wind-down in a one-page decision memo, with cash required and what each would have to prove.
- Write an objective checkpoint: a measurable threshold, accountable owner and next review date. If it cannot be reached within the cash you can responsibly risk, stop the test.
YC's pivot lecture warns against both changing direction to dodge sales and persisting purely because of sunk costs; its talk on customer interviews explains how to seek useful information rather than compliments. All about pivoting — Y Combinator How To Talk To Users — Y Combinator