We want B2B marketing to be a respected management science around the world and we want to play a role in helping it get there.

As a part of that, I went looking for samples of go-to-market strategies, but in the top 5 results I didn’t find a single go-to-market strategy sample.

What I found was loads of theory about the processes that you should use to form your plan.

So if no one’s willing to share theirs, I’m going to share my Go to Market Strategy.

Watch the video:

Based on the 4000+ plans we’ve run on our software over the past 20 years, we understand that a go to market strategy needs to show:

  • Objectives;
  • The problem that you solve;
  • Who you solve it for (that’s your target market);
  • How you solve it (that’s your solution);
  • Who else solves it and why you win (that’s your competition);
  • The number of deals and the backward math (that’s velocity);
  • The tactics that you will use to generate that velocity; and
  • The measures that you’ll use to govern execution.

Let me take you through 5 go to market strategy articles that I did find on google. However, I am going to be super brief because they’re all deep in process and theory. No criticism in that per se, but I was looking to bring you a go-to-market strategy sample, not a missive on theory.

The 5 Articles we found on Go-To-Market Strategy:

…that weren’t very helpful.

Before I make any comment about any of these articles, I want to add, my comments are not a criticism of those articles. None of them set out to provide a go-to-market strategy sample. I went searching for go-to-market strategy samples and basically, Google found none, which is why I wrote this article. What I found were:

1. Developing a Winning Go To Market Strategy.

  • Again, great, from Cult Branding Company. It’s not what we are looking for on this day. Again, not a criticism of your article.

2. The Seven-Step Go-To-Market Strategy.

  • Great, but no sample.

3. How To Define A Go To Market Strategy.

  • From the title, you know it’s not going to be a sample.

4. What Does A Good Marketing Plan Look Like?

  • Interesting dialogue, but no samples.

5. Go to market insights for B2B marketers

  • Things you need to do.

Yet, all are disappointing. Again, not a criticism of any of those contributors. However, on this day I’m looking for go to market samples and I found none.

Here’s our go to market strategy

As a business, align.me is made up of a training business, a consulting business and a marketing execution business. I’m not showing you the plans for any of those three.

Instead, the following plan is a go to market strategy for our do-it-yourself sales and marketing planning software, Funnel Plan.

That’s right. We’re going to show you the go to market strategy… for go to market strategy software!

This plan is for a brand new part of the business that will give you a great example of what needs to be in your go to market strategy.

Today, Funnel Plan has 4000+ active plans, and has been used by us at align.me, our channel consultants, and B2B organisations from SME’s all the way up to big corporates.

To see what a go to market strategy could look like for your business, head over to Funnelplan.com and sign up.

Here is how to build your own go to market strategy sample

Here is the step by step process to create a go to market strategy for your business.

1. Objectives

  • 1,000 users by end December 2016
  • 10,000 users by early 2018
  • 100,000 users by early 2019
  • 10% of those paying

2. What problem are we solving?

My sales and marketing engine is underperforming and I can’t afford the level of expertise I need to fix it. This is important because Funnel Plan is specifically for who can’t afford to spend money on consultants.

3. For whom are we solving that?

  • The ideal customer is:
    • B2B;
    • Sales and marketing process is relatively complex or the buying process is complex;
    • English speaking;
    • Product/market fit has been established;
    • Poised for growth.
  • Within these roles/segments:
    • CEO of small businesses;
    • Sales or marketing leader for a small segment in a large business;
    • Head of sales marketing or strategy in a larger business;
    • Head of partner enablement in large channel-driven businesses;
    • Owner of agencies.

4. How are we solving that?

The do-it-yourself funnel plan. It’s an online application that:

  • Builds a plan:
    • Leads the user through nine proven planning steps;
    • Encourages the user to get some collaborators involved in the planning process;
    • Allows the plan to be presented easily, completely and succinctly. It is all on one page.
  • Measures the plan:
    • Links the plan to the CRM;
    • Reports on plan versus actual velocity;
    • Identifies the actual lag and leakage versus the plan, so what’s actually happening in your funnel.
  • Provides AI driven coaching for improvement:
    • It uses aggregated data from 100 different companies, comparing your plan to that aggregate and then it identifies area for improvement every week;
    • Optional consulting training and execution;
    • Free trial, we chose to go with limited functionality rather than limited time.

5. Against whom are we competing?

  • Mostly do-it-yourself, this could be a person with Word, Excel or PowerPoint;
  • Highly paid consultants, somewhat a competitor, but really we’re trying to serve the needs of people who can’t afford highly paid consultants;
  • Books and courses;
  • Go to market components to broader business planning tools.

6. How will we win?

  • Proven planning process, more so than any of our above competitors. We’ve done over 400 engagements and we have over 4000 plans;
  • One page plan, rather than a lengthy tome;
  • Uses deep data, to provide fact-driven coaching rather than anecdote or theory;
  • Super affordable

7. What velocity do we need?

We want 2,000 and then 10,000 and then 50,000 over the next three years of monthly visitors to our micro-site. Then we need 15% of visitors to sign up for the free trial, 15% to upgrade from the trial to the paid version and a roughly 7% monthly churn after the first 60 days.

8. What tactics will we use?

Your tactics don’t matter if you don’t know what velocity you’re trying to generate. So you need to determine the velocity first.

  • Find new names:
    We’ll need to find new names. To some extent, we don’t have to find very many names because most of our work is going to be inbound. We will encourage collaborators, so when you build a plan, I’ll encourage you to bring others in. When they come in, we’ll give them each a free trial plan of their own.
  • Positioning:
    • Video blogging on YouTube;
    • Search engine optimization of the blog;
    • Paid social posts;
    • Paid search ads;
    • Paid display ads;
    • Mentions from bloggers.
  • Gaining interest:
    • Visits to optimised landing pages.
  • Gap acknowledged:
    • This is how do we get you troubled about the limitations of the current approach.
  • Need agreed:
    • The coaching fixes will include help that you can apply. Some of the help that you can apply to the free only version, but also some that can only be applied if you have the paid version.
  • Offer understood:
    • By providing a clear upgrade path to more features and/or more plans and strong volume breaks to encourage deeper and broader use.
  • Preference formed:
    • By providing social proof on the upgrade pages using company logos and/or testimonials.
  • Decision made:
    • There is a very small monthly fee and super low friction. There’s no lock in.

We are genuinely setting out as a company to make a big contribution to making B2B marketing a respected management science around the world, and we can’t do that if we keep secrets. Sharing our own plan gives you a sample to work with, so you can see what a good go-to-market strategy looks like.

If like me, you would like B2B marketing to be better, then there are a few things that you can do;

  • Head to Funnelplan.com to start building your plan;
  • Show others your plan and invite comments;
  • Give me a copy of your plan by commenting below and then I’ll review it online.
  • If you want, I’ll make your plan public and I’ll comment and provide some free coaching for you, helping other create a go-to-market plan in the process.

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That’s all for this week. I hope that was useful for you and I look forward to bringing you more next week.

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