Everyone loves a good origin story.

The garage. (Think Apple, Amazon, HP.)

The dorm room. (Facebook)

The late-night epiphany.

These are the moments we love to tell.

And honestly? I’m drawn to them too—because they show the spark. The scrappiness. The moment someone decided to pursue a crazy idea.

But that’s not the part your audience is trying to figure out.

They’re not asking how you started.

They’re wondering why now?

Too often, a company's origin story focuses on the founder’s motivation:

“We started because we care about [insert big idea].”

That’s important. But it’s only half the story.

What’s missing is the external market trigger:

“Something changed that made our solution urgent.”

What cracked open the opportunity that made your solution make sense?

That’s your inflection point.

☞ It could be a shift in behavior.

☞ A breakdown in the old way of doing things.

☞ A moment when the cost of inaction got too high to ignore.

Whatever it was, your audience needs to see it.

If you’re skipping over it, you’re missing the one part of your story that actually creates conviction.

Belief is built on showing people exactly why the world needed your idea when it showed up.

In fact, 87% of B2B buyers say a recent shift in priorities or pain is what prompts them to engage—not product specs (Forrester).

Want to build a story that actually earns buy-in?

Start there.

How to Build a Story That Starts at the Inflection Point

If your story doesn’t clearly explain why the world needed you when you showed up, you’re missing the unlock of your message.

As the authors of Play Bigger explain, every breakout company is built around a meaningful shift—a change in the world that renders the old way obsolete.

It’s not just about solving a problem. It’s about showing up at the exact moment the problem becomes unignorable.

That’s what makes your story feel inevitable.

Here’s how to reframe your narrative around the inflection point, so your timing becomes your strongest proof:

1. Name the Old Way—and Make the Pain Real

Most founders rush into describing the solution.

But urgency doesn’t come from your product.

It comes from the gap between what people were doing before… and what it was costing them.

Before your company existed, what was the “good enough” status quo?

What were people tolerating because they didn’t have a better option?

Don’t talk about “inefficiency” in the abstract.

Describe the duct tape. The manual workaround. The quiet burn of wasted time, money, or trust.

“Teams were still relying on [outdated tool or method], wasting [X hours/days] each week just to [inefficient task or workaround].”

2. Isolate the Shift That Made the Old Way Break

The problem may have always existed—but what suddenly made it impossible to ignore?

This is your inflection point—the shift in the environment that raised the stakes.

It could be macro (AI, policy, cultural shifts). It could be micro (costs tipping, fatigue building). But it must be specific.

The moment you can point to and say:

“After this, the old way just didn’t cut it anymore.”

If you skip the shift, your solution isn’t bound by time.

And unattached to time = non-urgent.

Your goal: Draw a bold line between “before” and “after.” Don’t just say things changed, show what changed.

“After [specific change: new regulation, market shift, user behavior], the old way didn’t just slow things down—it started costing real [money/customers/trust].”

3. Position Your Company as a Direct Response to That Shift

Now that we’ve named the shift, this is where you answer:

“Why you?”

“Why now?”

Your company didn’t just appear because you had a good idea.

You appeared because the world changed, and no one else was solving for it.

This is where most founders want to talk about their mission.

Resist the urge.

Instead, show that your solution was shaped by the shift.

That you saw it coming. That you built for it because you saw what others didn’t see.

Make your solution feel inevitable.

“We built [x product] because [insert shift] made [old solution] obsolete. That’s why [insert feature or approach] was designed to [insert clear result].”

4. Tie the Story to What’s at Stake for Your Audience Right Now

You’ve explained the shift and your response—now connect it to their priorities.

Where are they trying to gain traction, reduce friction, or hit key goals?

When your message overlaps with their agenda, belief turns into alignment.

Help them realize: “We’re already solving for this—we just didn’t have the right tool yet.”

“Today, [role or team] is under pressure to [priority goal]—but they’re still relying on [outdated method or workaround], which makes [insert consequence].”

5. Keep Reinforcing It With Proof Over Time

The inflection point is what gets attention.

But proof is what keeps belief alive.

One story earns the meeting…

Ongoing evidence earns the buy-in.

This is where most founders treat the story as static.

But your job is to keep layering in results that confirm the shift is real—and your solution is working.

Customer wins. Market signals. Adoption trends.

All of it makes the story more believable after you tell it.

We saw this firsthand with one of our clients, Notabene.

Instead of centering their story around technology or compliance jargon, we anchored it in the shift:

The crypto industry had reached a tipping point—where trust and transparency were no longer optional.

Notabene’s new story wasn’t just, “We make compliance easier.”

It became:

"We showed up when the crypto world realized trust was the cost of entry—not a nice-to-have.”

That shift in framing helped their teams rally around a shared purpose—and positioned their platform as a category leader.

Your "why" explains your passion.

Your "why now" proves your relevance.

But your inflection point?

That’s what builds conviction.

🎯 Action Step: Map Your Inflection Point (And Make It Stick)

If your story only explains why you care—but not why the world needed you when you showed up—you’re leaving belief on the table.

This is where timing becomes your proof.

Open a blank doc and answer these 3 questions— no founder-speak:

• Before your solution existed, what was the “good enough” way?(What were people settling for? Be brutally honest.)
• What external change made that old way no longer viable?
  (Think: tech shifts, policy changes, rising expectations, broken workarounds, market shakeups.)
• How is your solution specifically built for that change?
  (Show how your product is a direct response to what changed. What makes it right for this moment?)

Now that you’ve mapped your inflection point story, put it to work.

Take what you just wrote and turn it into a 1–2 sentence explanation of your timing.

Not a pitch. Not a tagline.

Just a clear, audience-facing way to say:

“Here’s what changed—and why we showed up when we did.”

🤖 Bonus GPT Prompt:

Use this prompt to find out if your story actually explains why now—or if it’s just a feel-good founder anecdote.

Prompt:

You are a B2B buyer, investor, or stakeholder hearing a company’s backstory.

You don’t care how passionate the founder is. You want to know what changed in the world that made this solution necessary right now.

I’m going to share the current version of our origin story.

Please review and answer:

• What’s the moment that made the old way stop working?
• Is the “why now” clear and specific, or could this story apply to any company, any year?
• Does the company feel like a timely response to real market pressure—or a passion project looking for a problem?
• Where is belief earned? Where is it lost?
• What would make the story feel sharper, more urgent, and harder to ignore?

Here’s the origin story:

[Insert your current version here]

💬 Your Challenge:

This week, rewrite your company's origin story, but start where the old way broke.

What was the moment the status quo stopped working for your industry, your customers, or your team?

📌 Your only rules:

• One paragraph.
• Start at the break point.
• Make it clear why the world needed you when you showed up.

Then hit reply and tell me—

What changed that made your business necessary, right now?

I’d love to know. 🙂

‍