EPISODE 03 - Script

B2B GTM Live #03: B2B Enterprise Buyers Do Not Behave Like Consumers

Core Thesis:  Consumer behaviour has actually distorted B2B GTM strategies, tactics and architecture.

You probably have an idea about marketing too, but I think there are hundreds of thousands of marketers out there.  I mean, everyone's a marketer these days:).  But they do actually all fall into one of two camps.  They're either B2C or they're B2B

I can say as an expert consumer - if I see something // and I like it, I'll buy it or I'll desire it.  But / and it's a big but / as a business owner, I absolutely do not have the same feelings about tech, SaaS, or services, or anything that is connected to my business as I do / my consumer.../ desires.  

Yes - I like the latest technology, but that’s personal.  My business uses a variety of products that make it / and help it function in the direction I want it to go.  And so I wouldn't think that a SaaS platform would make my business look attractive or 'cool'.

So when it comes to the strategies and tactics of B2B marketers / do you know / where they're pulling their strategies from?  Is it from the CONSUMER pool of ideas / or is it the B2B ideas?  Keep that / in the back of your mind for now.

 Now that's out of the way.  Where I want to start, is to ask the question, why is there such a constant disconnect with understanding of how businesses buy?  Personally,  I think it's because MarTech developers who listen to marketing people in the B2B space, keep saying the same thing over and over / and that is / they believe business owners buy in the same way and for the same reasons as consumers do.  However, with just a small amount of research / you know... the kind that actually asks business owners and directors the question "how / and why do you buy?" You will very quickly find out we've all been getting the woefully wrong.

 I've been doing this for 40 years and it seems the R&D people are frightened to ask /  So much for Product Marketing teams.  I mean, it seems they're constantly trying to put a square peg in a round hole.  Or perhaps it’s because / the people who have developed the software or the product marketers don't want to be proven wrong / or is it because they've had it so good for so long why change.  By that I mean, they're simply selling the same platforms to both B2Bs and B2Cs.

And let's face it, the B2B marketers have done nothing to change it and put this right - they're still holding ABM summits and trying to justify the previous ten years or so.

 The disconnect is very clear.  The Martech SaaS companies have a relationship with the CMOs and senior marketing people in B2B, they are THEIR customers and are most definitely / their advocates.  It's Not the CEO and / and it's not the salespeople.  But the way this rolls / the CEO has agreed to incur these ongoing costs / and gradually / over this time / marketing / has cornered more and more budget.  

In many cases sales have no budget at all.  Yet marketing provides attribution reporting and states they are achieving all their so-called targets.  Meanwhile, sales are floundering, targets are not being achieved, the pressure is on and as a result, sales have no option but to revert to telesales and cold calling and a 3-400-1 shot to try and get appointments.  [TIMELINE SLIDE]

 We have not moved forward in 50 years! 

We have all been told that Enterprise buying is / committee-driven / and risk-managed.  Yet there are a growing number of people who say this is wrong / I'm one of them.  Buying is not complicated; it's the people who put all these obstacles in the way of helping people buy, and in my opinion, they do it as a mechanism to attain / attribution - 'cos it ain't helping the buyers!

If you been doing this for decades like me, and by that, I mean as a CEO and involved in sales - you'll recognise the CEO buyers' timeline - and it’s about six months.  It starts off with them discovering you.  

We've still got the business strategy, tactics and ops, look at this graphic.  So we all have this 'silent' period here... [SALES STAGE SLIDE]

I'll run through what I say happens and what this looks like because anyone and I mean anyone trying to communicate how businesses buy, they either get this or they don't / and if anyone is recommending a new way of working, it better make sense or they haven't got a hope in hell's chance of getting anyone on side.  This is not just about me selling our platform, this is about how your prospects buy from you too.

This is how we've defined this:

Firstly, there's a prolonged period of time when a business grapples with a certain issue or problem / and sooner or later the solution reveals itself to the business / it takes as long as it takes / if could be a financial issue holding them back or a practical or operational thing holding them back.  Nevertheless, they or should I say we arrive at a point where we're acutely aware of the problem and we decide how we're going to deal with it.

MONTH 1 - Discovery [SHOW SLIDE]

 After this indeterminate period of time, we get to / say  MONTH 1 / when we discover a potential vendor.  You could say this where we are now.  So to keep the party's right, I'll refer to prospects as 'them' and those people out there, we'll call them our prospects :). 

Our market begins to notice something different appearing in their online feeds / on say LinkedIn.

They see the documents, the LinkedIn assets, the livestream invitations, and the repeated  messaging around the new product, or old product and in our case a new business architecture.

They don’t act yet.  They simply observe.  Typical behaviours:  opening PDFs, scanning sections, reading executive summaries, visiting the website once or twice.

Our numbers reflect this behaviour perfectly.  In a couple of weeks we had over 250 PDF document downloads that shows early discovery behaviour.  Not conversion. Not evaluation. Just recognition.

MONTH 2 — Intellectual Curiosity [change slide]

 This is where a portion of the market becomes more attentive.  Some people start thinking:  “This is different from the usual [marketing] advice.”  They begin consuming more content.  Typical behaviours now include reading multiple PDFs, watching part of a livestream, revisiting the website, checking our LinkedIn profile

At this stage buyers are not evaluating us yet.  They are evaluating the idea.  Do they believe our thesis?  [INFLECTION POINT SLIDE]

And our thesis is / I think very clear:  The GTM problem is architectural, not operational.  And that idea alone is causing different leaders to stop and think / which is great.  But what is your thesis, what is you purpose or reason for them letting you in?

MONTH 3 — Internal Comparison [change slide]

 Now things get more interesting.  Some people begin comparing  what you're saying / with their own organisation.  They ask themselves questions like why is this happening, or why that / and in our case / the questions are:  Why is our ARR-per-FTE declining?  Why do we keep adding Martech?  and why are BDRs/SDRs struggling to generate meetings?

We have this The Audit document speaks directly to this stage because it reframes the problem:  so we say "Most GTM engines fail due to architectural misalignment rather than execution failure." [REVENUE RESET SLIDE]

While we're here, we've got these three PDF downloads, The Revenue Reset, The GTM Landscape and the GTM Audit - so now over 250 people have these documents.  That's exactly what we want / because the documents explain everything, have all our contact details on them so if someone relates to / or acknowledges a situation they've read / they will eventually get back to us / you because it resonates / and now / they know who and where you are, and how to get hold of you.

When buyers start applying your thinking to their own company, the engagement deepens.  Typical signals now include multiple document downloads, repeated website visits, longer livestream viewing time, and possibly following you on LinkedIn.

Here's the thing, they are still anonymous.  They're still quiet.  But mentally engaged.

MONTH 4 — Silent Shortlisting [change slide]

  I say month 4 / it could be month 10, they could park it,  something more urgent came up!

This is the most misunderstood stage in B2B buying.  / Buyers have already decided the direction of THINKING they agree with.  Now they begin evaluating who represents that thinking.  / At this stage they start asking:  Is this person or company credible?  Do they actually understand the field, and in our case it’s about new business development, GTM transformation, and revenue operating systems?  and most importantly, they're thinking "could this approach, or your product, work in their company?

[MARTECH CONFUSION SLIDE] 15,000 Marketing SaaS offerings!

If you think about this / They might now watch full livestreams, read the entire document series if you have one, which you probably would by this time.  They'll want to explore your product SOME HOW and, in our case, / B2Bs want to explore our new business operating system platform, which is all available on our website / and you'd have the same too in terms of video and product explanations and so on.  And they'll review your background.

The most interesting thing here is that THEY STILL DON’T CONTACT YOU.  Senior buyers and definitely CEOs avoid premature / vendor conversations.

MONTH 5 — The Internal Trigger [change slide]

Now something happens inside their company.  Typical triggers include board pressure on growth.  A department or again in our case / marketing spend / is under scrutiny / poor pipeline forecasting / declining conversion rates / leadership restructuring

When that trigger occurs, your material becomes suddenly relevant.  Because the thinking has already been absorbed.  At this moment your content moves from being interesting → useful

MONTH 6 — First Contact [change slide]

 This is when the first real conversations appear.  Usually through:  LinkedIn messages / email replies / possibly introductions / strategy call requests / and then ultimately by them booking a meeting online / and we have sX Connect which structures and schedules the meetings and everything.

But typically the message often looks like this:  “We’ve been following your content for a while…”. That sentence, // that sentence, is the hallmark of a thought-leadership driven process / and system.  They didn’t discover you yesterday.  They’ve been observing you for months.

What I've just said is not out of the ordinary.  It certainly does not assume that some 'target company' needs to be sold to / so let’s get our salespeople on it.  My experience says the salespeople are not driving the close rate, the buyers are / and always have.  We're not selling double glazing or conservatories!

But what is happening here is / success happens / when information + timing + open access engagement all converge.  

And that's why I say / because of the structural failure of GTM, it has contributed to the way in which all businesses communicate their messages / which has led to this / lead capture obsession / and the MQL illusion and I would also say the imposition of / friction-heavy journeys that start with demanding someone’s contact details / which we, as CEOs won't give out as a matter of course! Well, I won't and I'm sure you won't either.

 So [IF] that's the sequence of the events / that we as CEOs or / business owners / or founders agree with / because it's how we've always behaved // it stands to reason that it's going to be the same for any of the prospects we're trying to sell to, not matter where they are in their sales stage.

This is where it gets very clear as to what we have to do.  Because we have started businesses already, and whilst hindsight is a wonderful thing, we have to work with what we've got.

[BIG SLIDE 10,000]

 Imagine this is your big, enormous, massive total addressable market (TAM).

Then these are the people who might be in the market now.

And this is how many you can currently connect with - one at a time through BRDs and SDRs.

The music industry analogy - From playing in pubs, to being support, to stadiums 

Money Shot: If your GTM assumes impulse behaviour, enterprise revenue will stall.

·      Module Anchoring

·      sX Reach (TAM visibility)

·      Open Access model

·      sX Live (trust acceleration)

·      sX Connect (activation layer)

[Final sX Course]