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Marketing and Sales Messages Not Aligned? Tie Your “Message Map” to a “Solution Blueprint” (Part 5 of a Series)
Over the past year, I’ve done a continuing series on what it means to market and sell “Solutions” Today’s post is Part 5 of the Series
- What 3 Questions Indicate Whether You Need to Sell “Solutions”? (and when does selling “Product” work better?…) (Part 1_
- Do Your Product Business Units Lead to (Product) “Push” Marketing (and Missed Revenue)? (Part 2)
- The Three Types of “Solutions”: Which One Do You Use to Market and Sell? (Part 3)
- The Solution Blueprint: A Visual Tool for Connecting with Your Customers (and accelerating product revenue…) (Part 4)
- Today’s Post – What are the Steps to Create Solution Messaging? (Part 5)
I’ve talked a lot about the advantages of using “Solution” (rather than “Product” messaging to connect to customers, and drive more revenue for your products, but the question I often get sounds something like this:
“OK, I see the advantages of using Solution Messaging – What do I do now?”
That question is the focus of my post today.
The key to messaging Solutions is a tool that I call “The Solution Blueprint”, a visual tool that helps technology vendors communicate the value of their offerings in terms of “Solutions” to customer problems – and accelerate revenue. I talked about this tool in more detail in my Solution Blueprint post. In Figure 1 below, you can see an diagram that describes the key elements of the Solution Blueprint. (more…)
Startup or New Product? When Should You Plan and Build Your Route(s)-to-Market (RTM)?
In my post last week, I talked about planning route-to-market for a startup, or a more established company launching a new product category. The framework for approaching the situation is that you need to “Build a Bridge” to connect your products your target customers. As shown in Figure 1 below, that bridge consists of 4 key elements (Solution, GTM Model, Sales Plays, Sales Channel) that every company needs to take into account – if they want to drive revenue for their products, and alliances…
Figure 1: Building your Foundational “RTM Bridge”
But the Focus of this post is WHEN you need to plan and build this RTM Bridge?
To be honest, it is always a bit surprising to me that when I talk to folks in the industry (even very experienced executives and folks that I consider to be friends), the assumption seems to be that this needs to be done AFTER the product is ready. I’ve had quite a few discussions with prospective clients or with clients talking about future needs, where they told me something like: (more…)
Startup or New Product? Building a “Route-to-Market (RTM) Bridge” as the Foundation for Revenue
In a number of my posts in the past year, I’ve talked about the importance and best practices for “Building a GTM Bridge” to create a repeatable approach to marketing and selling your products – and drive more revenue. This process is shown in Figure 1 below.
Figure 1: Building a “GTM Bridge”
Building a GTM Bridge – to Make Your GTM Approach More Effective
What I have seen is that within a vendor, many organizations are involved in supporting the marketing, selling and delivering of products and solutions through sales channels – but often this alignment does not occur. The dynamics of why this process breaks down is covered in more detail in my series, “Why do Companies Struggle to Build the GTM Bridge?”
Here are some examples of what happens without a repeatable “GTM Bridge”: (more…)
Are You Jumping to the “Product Sale” Too Early (and Missing out on Revenue Opportunities)?
If you are a regular reader of my blog posts the past year you have seen a lot of discussion about the importance of “Solution” messages to connect to customers (and sell more of your products). My most recent series provides a good overview of the issues and the best practices in connecting with customers with Solution messages.
- Does Your Messaging Work in the “Cocoon”- But Fall Flat with Customers?
- How to Build the “Hook” into Your Messaging to Create “Pull” and Accelerate Revenue
- A Case Study: Building a Message Map that Connects to Your Customers and Accelerates Revenue
By now, I’m sure there are some folks out there that are saying to themselves – “This is getting old, we all know that selling products works (why else would everyone be doing it?)” It is true that I’ve made the discussion too much of a battle between “right” or “wrong” approaches, when the reality is that the right time to sell Solutions is more nuanced. (more…)
Podcast: Driving Revenue by Bridging the Gap Between Your Alliances and Channels
Listen to the recent podcast – from Steve Andrews
Overview
Over the past couple of years, we have been talking about the challenges for vendors to drive revenue for their products and partnerships, and how many of current practices are based on old business models for selling hardware, then software, and now being misapplied for cloud.
But how can technology vendors change to drive revenue in today’s world?
- The Mission for the Andrews Consulting Group is to “Help Technology Vendors Unleash the Revenue Potential of their Products and Partnerships”
- To accomplish that goal, we’ve developed a new approach to “Climb Out of the Box”™: A New Approach to Drive Revenue for your products and Partnerships
Learn More
Does Your Messaging Work in the Internal “Cocoon” – But Fall Flat with Customers?
I often create customer presentations for clients, and talk to friends and ex-colleagues to see how tech companies are positioning their offerings to customers. What I’ve observed is that staff inside tech organizations get very comfortable with their products and their internal acronyms and tend create messaging in a sort of internal “cocoon”, and as a result, position their products in a way that often does not connect well to customers.
We’ve all heard the term “pull marketing” and know it is a desired marketing outcome where the customer is reaching back to you as the vendor for information about your product. That makes the life of sales easier because customers are saying they want to talk to them – and that can lead to an easier and shorter sales cycle. Think of “Push” marketing as the opposite -– when a vendor broadcasts their message to customers and hopes that something about their message resonates and leads to sales pipeline and closed deals. Declaring that one of your messaging pillars is “accelerate I/O performance” sounds like a good thing, but how does it connect with a problem the customer has? In other words, Why should target customers care?
“Push” marketing is often the result of being internally focused and this is often driven by product-focused org structures, as discussed in my blog earlier this your, “Do Your Product Business Units Lead to (Product) “Push” Marketing (and Missed Revenue)?” (more…)
Struggling with Channel Demand Gen? Escaping “Boxed” Marketing Strategy and Execution (Part 3 of Series)
The last two weeks I’ve discussed common misconceptions about Channel Demand Generation as part of a series called,
“Struggling with Channel Demand Generation?
- Maybe Your Partners Don’t Want the Same Things You Want…
- What Should You Do When Channel Partners Say They Need Leads? Run!
Today we will talk about the root causes of these differences in strategy and execution – and what tech vendors can do about it. This topic is a great example of the “boxed thinking and execution” that stems from long term practices that were developed in the past – but no longer apply or work in the current environment. I’ve detailed “the Four Boxes in previous posts and they are the root causes of many of the challenges the tech industry faces driving revenue for their products and partnerships. (more…)
What Should You Do When Channel Partners Say They Need Leads ? Run!
We’ve all heard the request (even plea) from channel partners, “Give me leads and I can sell more of your product!” It seems like a reasonable request, right? After all, your channel partners have every reason to expect a 2-way street partnership with their vendors.
The problem is that of all the things that the vendor can do to help their partners be successful, providing leads is at the bottom of the list. That seems counterintuitive and today when I “Googled”, “leads for your channel” I did not have to look far to find the conventional wisdom – “You know you have to do it – and they expect it….”
This topic had come up in a number of discussions with partners over the years and I had my “A-Ha” moment on this issue in mid- 2000s. I remember the conversation over late night beers at a Partner Advisory Council. When this topic of leads for the channel, came up, a partner owner leaned over and in a hushed voice said something like: “You know, we all like to get leads, but… (more…)
Struggling with Channel Demand Gen? Maybe Your Partners Don’t Want the Same Things You Want… (Part 1 of Series)
I recently attended a webinar by a consulting firm on how to optimize the lead waterfall and I was interested in seeing how they dealt with the nuances of working with a channel. They discussed the very real issues regarding lead rating, qualification and follow up, system challenges, and the lack of marketing skills in many channel partners, and they outlined some best practices.
What they did not talk about was that for many channel partners, leads just don’t play a very big role in their business model – so it is any surprise that they don’t market the way vendors want…
- Every tech vendor starts from a point of zero penetration and has to build awareness and start customer conversations with accounts that are new. They hire Reps that know the local customer base, but a Rep only has so many accounts and relationships – and they need to continuously add customers to grow.
- On the other hand, a mid-sized channel partner often can build a strong business selling 80% of their business into 5-10 accounts. They try to sell more to these customers and develop profitable services to support product sales.
Do You Have Holes in the “Tire” of Your “GTM Wheel” That Prevent Revenue from Your Products and Partnerships?
The last few weeks I’ve been talking about how to build a GTM Program Wheel, shown in Figure 1 below, that aligns your company to drive revenue for your products and alliances.
- First we defined the layers of a GTM program in “Is Your Channel Program an “Onion”? Leveraging the GTM Wheel to Build a Program that Drives Revenue”
- Then we talked about 2 Common Mistakes in Defining the “Hub” of the “Channel GTM Wheel” that limit revenue for products and channels
- Last week we talked about the program elements, of the GTM Wheel, in “Are the Spokes of Your “GTM Wheel” Aligned to Drive Revenue?”
Figure 1: The “GTM Wheel”
This week we will be talking about the underlying foundation, or “The Tire” of the GTM wheel highlighted in Figure 2 below. The “Tire of the GTM Wheel is the Operations and Infrastructure that take your GTM program and make it a reality for your team and your partners. (more…)
“Climbing Out of the Box”™ 