What's in a name?
We think others do marketing a bit Inside Out ... so we do it Outside In.
The techniques used within the marketing organization of a typical B2B software company results in mediocre product positioning, go-to-market strategies, sales tools, customer-facing materials, and lead generation programs.
The Problem is the Process
The core of the issue is that the marketing team tasked with developing the marketing messages and the programs used to disseminate these messages into the marketplace, are typically dependent on another group to provide background information: the product Subject Matter Experts. For software products, those SMEs are either the engineers that designed and built the product, or the product managers that specified what should be built.
Both of these groups, the engineers and product managers, are very focused on developing the right features for the users of their product.
Yet the sales force is very focused on the buyers of the products. The sales team would like to engage with the people that hold the budget, and explain to them, in no uncertain terms, how they will achieve significant business benefit from purchasing this software.
So we have a mismatch. The product marketing and lead generation teams are trying to serve the needs of the sales force with the information they get from their colleagues at headquarters. And it’s often the wrong information.
In this case, the flow of information is from the inside->out. From within the depths of the company’s development organization, out to the marketplace.
We think that the basis of excellent marketing is outside-in.
That is, excellent marketing is generated from factors that are outside the company headquarters… the marketplace, your customers, and the needs of everyone in the buying cycle.
Because we have a solid grounding in technology, we have the confidence to applaud the features of the product and move beyond them. We focus on increasing sales by developing marketing programs that talk to people, not about software.
We look into the marketplace and analyze the sales engagement process. Who would use this product? Who would buy it? What are their motivations?
When we look at the product, we concentrate on its differentiating features.
Then, we build go-to-market strategies; sales tools and training; customer-facing materials and lead gen programs.
It seems simple enough, but take a look at your product’s positioning. Does it talk more about what your products do, and not enough about who could benefit from them? Are you finding that your demand gen programs don’t deliver qualified leads?
Those are both symptoms of a marketing process that works from the inside, out. Your solution is to start working from the outside, in.