Play Bigger

What Play Bigger does

Play Bigger is a privately held, boutique category-design advisory firm (Play Bigger LLC, California) that helps companies define, develop, and dominate new market categories. The firm was co-founded by Al Ramadan, Dave Peterson, Christopher Lochhead, and Kevin Maney — the authors of the discipline's defining texts — and operates with a core practitioner team of approximately five full-time members based in the San Francisco Bay Area (with a Livermore, CA registered address). Its core deliverable is strategic consulting engagements scoped around the proprietary Play Bigger Blueprint (Define the problem, Frame the category, Mobilize the company, Own the market), supported by execution frameworks including the Lightning Strike Mobilization methodology and the EMT (Existing Market Trap) Diagnostic that maps 13 Deadly Sins inhibiting category leadership. Customers range from early-stage startups to public companies (DocuSign, Qualtrics, Cloudflare, Palo Alto Networks, Sysdig, Nimble Storage, Cornerstone OnDemand, Phenom, Mural, Airtable) and the firm publicly attributes more than $50B in cumulative partner-company market cap and 50+ new categories created to its work.

The firm's technology stack is methodology and IP rather than software: it is grounded in a proprietary dataset of 508,628 private companies, 18,430 investors, 52,055 M&A deals, and 51,889 VC funding rounds that powers its TTMC (Time to Market Cap), IPO Sweet Spot, and 6-10 Law research reports. Productized extensions of the methodology include the bestselling 'Play Bigger' book, 'The Existing Market Trap' primer, the Lightning Strike Mobilization Kit (freemium PDF or $30 printed copy), the EMT Diagnostic web assessment, and the Founder's Workbook eBook.

Play Bigger's revenue model is predominantly professional services — quote-based consulting engagements priced by scope and stage, sold directly to founders and executive teams via a sales-led motion, with no public pricing or channel/reseller network. Secondary revenue comes from book sales through Amazon, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, and Google Play, and modest direct-to-consumer revenue from the printed Mobilization Kit. The firm is privately funded, has no disclosed institutional investors, no parent company, no subsidiaries, and no completed M&A.

Name

Play Bigger

Legal name

Play Bigger LLC

Website

https://playbigger.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2014

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Headquarters

HQ city

San Francisco

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices2 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Marketing or Sales, Operations, Others

Revenue model

1. Category Design Consulting: Direct engagement with companies to design and develop new market categories. Works with companies at all stages using approaches specifically designed for early, mid and late-stage/public companies.
2. Publications and Books: Sale of books including 'Play Bigger' and 'The Existing Market Trap' through retailers like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Apple. Lightning Strike Mobilization Kit available as free download or $30 printed copy.
3. Lightning Strike Mobilization Kit: Practical field guide to the execution phase of category design, available as free downloadable PDF or $30 printed copy.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels2 records

Marketing channels9 records

Core offering

Play Bigger is a strategic advisory firm that helps companies design, develop, and dominate new market categories through its proprietary Category Design methodology. Engagements target founders and executive teams at early, mid, and late/public-company stages, with services including category definition, framework execution (Define-Frame-Mobilize-Own), Lightning Strike mobilization, and EMT diagnostic-driven repositioning to escape the Existing Market Trap.

Product overview

Play Bigger is a category design advisory firm that operates as a single integrated service offering rather than a software platform. The core offering is strategic consulting and methodology, which includes the Play Bigger Blueprint process (Define the problem, Frame the category, Mobilize the company, Own the market). Supporting the core service are published intellectual properties: the 'Play Bigger' book (bestseller on category design), 'The Existing Market Trap' primer (on the 13 Deadly Sins framework), and the Lightning Strike Mobilization Kit (practical execution guide). The company also offers digital tools including the EMT Diagnostic (assessment tool) and Founder's Workbook eBook, plus proprietary research reports (TTMC Report, IPO Sweet Spot Report, 6-10 Law Research).

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Category Design Services Strategic consulting engagements that help companies design, develop, and dominate new market categories using the Play Bigger Blueprint methodology (Define the problem, Frame the category, Mobilize the company, Own the market), with approaches tailored for early, mid, and late-stage/public companies.
• Play Bigger (Book) A bestselling business book by Al Ramadan, Dave Peterson, Christopher Lochhead, and Kevin Maney that introduces the concept of category design and how companies can create, develop, and dominate new market categories, sold through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, and Google Play.
• The Existing Market Trap: A Primer to Play Bigger A founder-first primer that names the Existing Market Trap (EMT) problem, maps the 13 Deadly Sins that cause companies to get stuck, and reveals the escape route for building belief in new markets.
• Lightning Strike Mobilization Kit A practical field guide to the execution phase of category design, specifically created for the person assigned to plan and execute a company's first lightning strike, covering planning, mobilization, and execution phases.
• EMT Diagnostic A 3-minute diagnostic tool that identifies which of the 13 Deadly Sins are slowing belief, sales, and scale, providing a personalized belief profile and tailored next-step belief plan.
• Founder's Workbook eBook An eBook co-authored by Mike Bruno and Sean Regan that covers five common pain points experienced by early-stage founders, addressing market myopia and how to overcome it.
• TTMC (Time to Market Cap) Report A category design research report introducing TTMC as a new metric measuring valuation/market cap growth, analyzing how quickly Category Kings rise to dominance, backed by analysis of 508,628 private companies and over 51,000 VC funding rounds.
• 6-10 Law Research Updated version of the IPO Sweet Spot research, presenting findings about when enduring value is created for VC-backed companies in the United States.
• IPO Sweet Spot Report Research discovered by the Play Bigger Data Science Team revealing powerful insights about post-IPO enduring value creation for VC-backed companies.

Quantifiable outcome

• $50B+ in market cap created with partner companies
• +4 more outcomes

Named customers12 records

Segments4 records

Ideal customer profiles4 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature4 records

Partnerships

Four partnerships are on record, tiered minor.

• Montgomery SummitminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerAl Ramadan delivered keynote at Montgomery Summit investor conference unveiling Category Contenders investment framework.
• S2G VenturesminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerJason Wellcome and Mike Bruno participated in S2G CEO Summit with workshop sessions on category design for climate tech companies.
• AllRaiseminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerHosted Category Design Workshop for AllRaise, an exclusive community of female business leaders.
• Australian-American Chamber of CommerceminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerHosted webinars with former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and awarded Al Ramadan Innovation Award at 2025 Gala.

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Category Pirates: Founded by Play Bigger co-founder Christopher Lochhead, Category Pirates is a category design education and media platform (podcasts, newsletters, courses) targeting the same founder/operator audience with overlapping frameworks on category creation.
• April Dunford: Positioning consultant and bestselling author of 'Obviously Awesome' and 'Sales Pitch.' Operates a boutique advisory helping B2B tech companies reposition and win their category, directly competing for the same type of founder/executive client.
• Force Management: B2B sales and go-to-market methodology consultancy serving enterprise technology companies. Sells proprietary frameworks (Value Framework, Command of the Message) similar in structure to Play Bigger's category design methodology and shares the enterprise SaaS client base.
• Winning by Design: B2B SaaS go-to-market consultancy built around the SPIN-style 'Bowtie' framework. Provides strategy, sales, and customer success advisory to enterprise software companies, overlapping with Play Bigger's mid- and late-stage client segments.
• Activate: B2B go-to-market strategy and execution consultancy serving enterprise technology clients. Competes directly for category design, messaging, and product marketing engagements at the same buyer (CMOs, CROs, founders).
• Pavilion: Membership-based community and learning platform for GTM and revenue leaders at high-growth companies. Offers education, benchmarking, and peer networks that overlap with Play Bigger's audience of founders and GTM executives pursuing category leadership.

Emerging players

• Reforge: Education and community platform for growth, product, and engineering leaders at tech companies. Adjacent to Play Bigger in audience and methodology-driven content, with a more productized/SaaS-style offering.
• Section4: Live, cohort-based business education platform delivering strategy, marketing, and leadership courses for executives. Overlaps with Play Bigger's thought leadership and education extension while operating a more scalable online learning model.

Broad incumbents

• Prophet: Global brand and marketing strategy consultancy serving large enterprises across categories. Provides overlapping brand positioning and category strategy capabilities at much greater scale and broader scope than Play Bigger's boutique offering.
• Bain & Company: Global management consulting firm with deep strategy, M&A, and growth advisory practices. Competes with Play Bigger at the high end of the market for category-defining strategic work, especially for late-stage and public companies.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/@PlayBiggervideos
• Facebookfacebook.com/playbigger
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/play-bigger-advisors-llc-
• Instagraminstagram.com/playingbigger
• Xx.com/playbigger

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles5 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Play Bigger