Modern B2B Marketing Demands a Clear Point of View

I thought since I did an article about brand D2C strategy yesterday, I would followup with a similar post for B2B, which is slightly different.

If you are a technical co-founder wondering how in the world you get noticed, here are the questions I would start with.

1 - Who are you trying to serve?

It's almost impossible to know the "what" until you know the "who." Marketing has become much more specific. If you are trying to serve everyone from SMB to Enterprise, you end up serving no one.

Be specific. What revenue range? Retailers or brands? Think about your ecosystem and partners too. Who can help you and why? In this segment, how would you know which retailer or brand is healthy or not?

2 - What problem domain are you tackling?

In eCommerce, I tend to think about the big "nouns":

Products Advertising Orders Customers (this can be acquisition or retention) Payments Shipments

I always encourage B2B founders to think about the average retailer or brand P&L. Why? At some point if your deal sizes trend above $100k, you are always going to end up having a conversation with the CFO. Thinking about P&L up front helps you have intelligent conversations later on.

Where are the biggest numbers in a brand's P&L?

It's almost always these areas like: Product, Shipping, Advertising, and Payments

Sometimes you pick one, and sometimes your unique value is at the intersection of one or more.

If you can create 10x returns in revenue and cost for a retailer, you will never be uninstalled, and your average contract value you continue to grow.

This helps your customers frame what you are about. It also gets you out of the place where you are thinking about what

3 - What is your point of view?

You need a clear "challenger statement" that articulates why your customers lives are shifting, or they have reached an inflection point. That inflection point reflects the changing world and clearly outlines both consumer and business trends that align with your broad goals.

Sometimes it helps to think about what you are doing as a "movement." A movement attracts followers. If you were a movement, what would be the principles? (hint: it's not about features).

The "movement" that launched Salesforce (a software company) was "no software", ironically.

If your point of view is not interesting, then you will not stand out.

Your point of view anchors the entire business and your entire content strategy.

4 - Are you able to generate a high volume of high-quality insights consistently?

In both B2C and B2B marketing, great content is not enough anymore. You need consistently high quality content, and OFTEN.

More later, but I thought this was enough to get people started. ;-) If you haven't nailed this, then you don't deserve to be thinking seriously about things like channels and tactics.