THE GTM TRUTH: Why buyers are ghosting your "perfect" GTM

What's up GTM friend?

Today's newsletter is about how AI services are reshaping GTM fundamentals, making your 2024 playbooks dangerous.

"We're growing 48% YoY," he said. "Why fix what isn't broken?"

This is what a $40M SaaS CEO told me in November after auditing their 2024 GTM strategy. He came back to me last week because their CAC increased 47%.

Their metrics:

• $75K ACV
• $45K CAC
• 22% win rate
• 180-day sales cycle

Looks normal, right?

But here's what's really happening:

THE AI TEMU EFFECT

Remember how Chinese manufacturing shocked retail?

AI is doing the same to SaaS:

• Features get cloned in weeks
• Launch costs near zero
• Differentiation disappears

Result?

• CAC up 47%
• Win rates down 35%
• Sales cycles stretching almost 2x

This isn't about AI. It's about buyer behavior.

100% Human - This wasn’t AI-generated. It’s hand-crafted, unedited, and I can pretty much guarantee that there is some sort of typo or grammatical error. But it’s real, and that’s the point.

Every week, I’ll break down a real-world business experience or challenge a GTM myth - and leave you with an actionable plan.

Why? Because GTM needs a reality check. We’re all drowning in information, with everyone claiming to have the “magic tool” or “magic service.” I'll try to be your GTM Truth-Teller: I’ll cut through the noise and give you the raw, unfiltered truth.

I do this because writing helps me stay sharp and default to action. Your comments? They push me to see things from angles I hadn’t considered.

THE BUYER REBELLION

Data shows:

• 71% trust their network, not your pitch
• 83% want async communication
• 92% make decisions before sales contact

Your traditional GTM is fighting your buyers.

Your buyers aren't rewarded for buying. While your sales team chases quarterly targets, buyers don't have OKRs for purchases.

Think about it:

• 25% more SaaS vendors yearly
• 8+ stakeholders per decision
• Zero incentive to move fast.

The SaaS surge made buying harder, not easier:

FRICTION KILLS DEALS

Traditional GTM creates unnecessary friction:

• Forcing 30-minute calls
• Generic pitch decks
• Complex evaluation processes

NETWORKS TRUMP MARKETING

Where decisions really happen:

• LinkedIn conversations
• Peer recommendations
• B2B influencer content

TRUST BEATS FEATURES

Real data shows:

• 67% of buyers choose "good enough" product from trusted vendor
• 81% delay purchases due to trust issues
• 92% consult peers before vendor calls

Your GTM isn't failing because:

• Your product lacks features
• Your sales team isn't pushing hard enough
• Your marketing isn't generating leads

It's failing because you're optimizing for your process, not your buyer's reality.

AI IS HITTING SAAS

But it's an opportunity.

AI is good for SaaS.

GTM will define software success for the next decade.

Dominating distribution + brand perception are the moats.

1. More AI = more productivity, more productivity = more enterprise budget for AI-native SaaS
2. AI will replace the interaction layer with data in many software categories much like the old IVR solutions replaced human operators in early call centers - Humans answering phones or looking at screens and typing data into text fields won't exist much longer.
3. Adding a chatbot won't save your broken processes, it's not magic.

THE 90-DAY FIX

Days 1-30: Friction Audit

• Map every buyer touchpoint
• Measure time-to-value
• Document unnecessary steps Impact: 40% shorter buyer journey

Days 31-60: Trust Architecture

• Build async value delivery
• Create peer advocacy program
• Develop personalized content paths Impact: 2.1x higher engagement

Days 61-90: Network Activation

• Identify key communities
• Deploy value-first content
• Enable peer recommendations Impact: 35% lower CAC

My Commitment to You

If you’ve made it this far, thank you for reading.

This newsletter will unpack these ideas week by week. If you’re a business leader staring at the “Lego pieces” of your GTM - data, tools, AI, and processes - and wondering how to put it all together, drop me a line with what else you'd like me to cover, or if you have a specific GTM challenge you want to discuss, grab some time here.

Let's build better revenue systems together.