Adam Needles on Mastering the Customer Journey

The GTM Cheat Code | Season 3: Marketing - Episode #52

Tune in as hosts Josh Wagner and Justin Gray finally crack the code on what is an oft cited but rarely mastered tactic - truly mastering the customer journey. Adam B Needles , CEO and co-founder of ANNUITAS , joins the pod and not only explains the importance of the customer journey in go-to-market strategies - but actually reveals what that means in practice! Adam and his firm have been unlocking the power of customer journey mapping and it's resultant plays for some of the best brands in B2B, based on those engagements, he emphasizes the need for organizations to be customer-centric not only in product delivery but also in their sales and marketing efforts. Adam introduces the concept of conversation tracks, which are designed to activate the customer journey and align all aspects of the organization towards engaging with the customer. Together they highlight the challenges organizations face in understanding their customers and conducting in-depth customer research to gain valuable insights.

Listen now to learn more about the impact of post-sale demand and the need for live interactions to foster customer engagement.

Takeaways:

1. Customer Journey as the Core Focus: Adam emphasized the importance of aligning an organization's go-to-market strategy with the customer journey. He noted that while companies often claim to be customer-centric, many focus only on product innovation and fail to apply the same rigor to understanding and engaging customers effectively.
2. Context and Customer Insights: Many organizations are good at product research but neglect gathering insights on customer behavior, pain points, and content consumption preferences, leading to ineffective go-to-market strategies.
3. Importance of Conversation Tracks: Adam described the concept of "conversation tracks" as a simplified, actionable approach to activating customer journeys. This involves segmenting customers at different stages and building content and demand programs tailored to these segments, ensuring the entire organization is aligned around this strategy.
4. Avoiding Random Acts of Marketing: A common pitfall in B2B companies where they engage in random acts of marketing, trying various tactics without a coherent strategy. This leads to inefficiency and a downward spiral in go-to-market effectiveness.
5. Shocking Customer Insights: Adam shared an example of a software company discovering through data analysis that their outbound sales team, which was responsible for most customer interactions, was actually contributing the least to sales success. This type of insight, gained from thorough customer research, can drastically shift how organizations approach sales and marketing.

Quote of the Show:

"I think a lot of organizations know how to do marketing research around a product, but they don't really know how to do it around go-to-market execution, around sales and marketing phases. They're not looking at higher order pain points. What was the issue that someone had before they looked for your product? What were those steps that led to? What was the actual composition of how many people were involved with that buying process? Who were the influencers? What were their roles?” - Adam Needles

Links:

• LinkedIn: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/abneedles/?
• https://www.annuitas.com/

Shoutouts:

• Scott Cook
• Martin Schneider
• The Chief Growth Officer’s Handbook

Ways to Tune In:

• Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5GpM8myxsUinc5bfLIbjJz?si=0af576adfb8e49f8
• Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-cheat-code/id1692445190
• Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/cb0b3afa-063f-4f3b-96be-b98214c74912
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@CheatCodePodcast