The Software Marketing Machine

This is my definition of the software marketing process. It covers organization, teams, tasks, and key deliverables. I use it to drive and focus discussions with my marketing consulting clients.

Here's the process in detail. Feel free to print and share.

I find that many startup executives have a rough idea of what marketing does, but sometimes lack a holistic view of the end-to-end process. I also find that they have a decent understanding of the execution phase of marketing (leads!), but don't always appreciate the foundation work (product story) that's a critical prerequisite for Marketing to generate high-quality leads that drive desired pipeline (qualified opportunities) and revenue (sales).

With this holistic view, it's easy to figure out where pipeline problems lie. They usually boil down to some combination of a weak marketing foundation and poor marketing execution. My framework helps isolate the issues so they can be fixed.

I've kept this overview as short and sweet as I can. Google any of the italicized words for more details on topics that interest you.

Note: Scroll to the end for a Google Sheets template you can use to build your own Software Marketing Machine.

WHAT IS A SOFTWARE MARKETING MACHINE?

After 30 years as a startup marketing executive or founder/CEO, I've distilled software marketing down to a repeatable process for driving pipeline and revenue.

I call that process the Software Marketing Machine. Its purpose is to convert marketing dollars into sales dollars as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Read on for details.

WHAT IS MARKETING'S JOB?

Before we discuss a Marketing process, we need to agree on Marketing's job. I believe that Marketing's primary job* is to drive pipeline (qualified sales opportunities) and revenue (new customers).

The most visible and recognizable face of Marketing is the Demand Generation programs that generate qualified sales opportunities, and the Sales Enablement training and tools that help Sales teams convert qualified opportunities into new customers. What's less visible is the strategic foundation that you must establish in order for your Demand Generation and Sales Enablement teams to work their magic. More on that in the next section.

* While not covered in this article, Marketing should, of course, also help Customer Success teams retain and grow existing customers. And help Product teams prioritize the product roadmap.

SOFTWARE MARKETING MACHINE FLOW

There is a proper flow of Marketing activity. At the highest level, Marketing is a two-phase process:

1. Strategic Marketing Foundation = Targeting + Positioning + Messaging
2. Tactical Marketing Execution = Demand Generation + Sales Enablement + Corporate Marketing programs

In the strategic foundation phase, you define your target customers and develop a simple and compelling product story (product positioning and messaging) that will compel ideal customers to consider and buy your product.

During the tactical execution phase, you deliver your product story to your target customers via your Demand Generation, Sales Enablement, and Corporate Marketing functions. These latter functions are your Go-to-Market (GTM) functions.

Why you must nail your strategic marketing foundation first

You must build a strong strategic foundation before you start tactical execution. If you don't, you risk sub-par performance from your programs. You'll spend a lot of money delivering the wrong story to the wrong people in the wrong place at the wrong time. As a result, you will not get the superior engagement and conversion rates you're looking for.

Put another way, marketing execution is a garbage-in, garbage-out process. Feed it with superior targeting and a superior product story that engages and excites target customers and you'll get superior results. Feed it with weak targeting and a weak product story and you'll get inferior results.

HOW TO ORGANIZE YOUR SOFTWARE MARKETING MACHINE

To execute a marketing machine, a typical Marketing team requires the functions described below. In smaller Marketing teams, you might have one individual managing multiple functions. In larger teams, you'll find a function head (e.g. Head of Demand Generation) who manages one or more specialist managers (e.g. Paid Search Manager) who in turn might manage a team of specialist individual contributors.

Here are five core Marketing functions:

1. Product Marketing: Researches markets, competitors, and customers. Owns audience targeting and product positioning and messaging.
2. Content Marketing: Uses the product story (targeting, positioning, messaging) to create content for the Demand Generation, Sales Enablement, and Corporate Marketing teams. Content is the bridge between marketing strategy and marketing execution.
3. Demand Generation: Manages marketing campaigns that convert raw leads (unaware of your product) into sales opportunities (aware of your product and seriously considering it for purchase). Campaigns include specific programs for email marketing, paid search, paid social, and SEO.
4. Sales Enablement: Provides the Sales team with the training and tools they need to convert sales opportunities (pipeline) into customers (revenue).
5. Corporate Marketing: Manages Press Relations, Industry Analyst Relations, and Corporate Events.

Let's dig into each function in detail.

1: PRODUCT MARKETING

Product Marketing researches markets, competitors, and customers. Product Marketing also defines target customers (the companies that need your product) and buyers (the individuals that work at those companies who will actually purchase and/or use your product), and develops product positioning and messaging.

Research

The goal of market research is to estimate the size of the available market for your product. One simple approach to market sizing would be to estimate the number of potential customers in your addressable market multiplied by your average ARR (annual recurring revenue) per customer.

The goal of competitive research is to understand how your competitors are positioning and messaging their products. Be rigorous in your definition of a competitor. While you may have many potential competitors, in practice your actual competitors are the companies that your prospects say they are comparing you against in sales deals.

The goal of customer research is to understand what your best customers and buyers look like (aka Ideal Customer Profiles and Buyer Personas), their needs, wants, and fears, their buying triggers, where and how they research new products, and, most importantly, why they choose you over alternate solutions. Here are my seven favorite customer research questions:

1. How did you hear about us?

2. Where did you research us?

3. What's the biggest benefit we provide?

4. What was your old solution?

5. What prompted you to find a new solution?

6. Why did you choose us?

7. Why do you stay with us?

The answers to these questions let you replace guesswork with data when choosing your marketing channels (where you engage your prospects) and your product messaging (what you say to drive pipeline and revenue.) (1) and (2) help you choose your channels. (4) - (7) help you nail your messaging.

During your customer research process, you'll find it helpful to map your target customer's buying journey through three major stages:

Awareness = They know you exist and they know you can help them solve a pressing problem

Consideration = You're on their shortlist as a solution provider

Selection = They've chosen you over all alternate solutions on their shortlist

In the marketing execution phase, most marketing teams will develop different types of content designed to engage target customers at each stage of their buying journey.

You'll find it helpful to track leads as they pass through these three stages (or more stages if you choose to be more granular in your lead tracking and content targeting). Marketing and Sales teams use the concept of a funnel to visualize and report leads as they pass through the three stages of their buying journey. With funnels come funnel metrics, an important tool for optimizing the customer acquisition process. These metrics include stage-to-stage conversion rates and velocities (days to convert)

Target customers

Defining target customers involves identifying company attributes that include locations, verticals, employee count, annual revenue, and deployed technology. Defining target buyers involves identifying company contact attributes that include, department, function, role, and seniority.

Defining your target customers and buyers allows you to build lists for email and ABM (Account-Based Marketing) demand generation campaigns, and to create custom audiences for paid social and paid search ad campaigns.

Positioning

Positioning requires you to answer these four questions for your prospects:

1. What do you do? — I.e. your product category.
2. Who do you help? — I.e. your target customers.
3. How do you help? — I.e. your product's primary business benefits.
4. Why choose you? — I.e. your advantage over alternate solutions.

The why choose you question is critical. You must give your target customers one primary reason why they should pick you over your competition. Think about the most pressing problems your target customers need to solve and stack rank them. Then think about the most unique benefits of your product and stack rank them. Your position will be the intersection of the most pressing problems they need to solve and the benefits that only your product can deliver.

Your positioning should be:

• Simple — So your prospects remember it.
• Compelling — So it drives prospect purchase decisions in your favor.
• Credible — So your prospects believe it.

Example: We offer the first intelligent product adoption platform (category and differentiation) for SaaS Success teams (target customers) who want to reduce churn (primary benefit) by guiding their customers to the product experiences that correlate to upgrades and renewals (primary benefit driver).

Messaging

Messaging involves developing a list of feature-benefit-impact statements that support your positioning plus a list of your counters to common questions and objections.

Collectively, targeting, positioning, and messaging create your product story. Your product story feeds your Content Marketing function which, in turn, feeds your Go-to-Marketing (GTM) functions.

Product story testing and validation

Before you feed your new product story into your GTM process, you must test and validate it thoroughly with customers and prospects that match your ICP. As we said earlier, your marketing execution programs will only engage and excite your target customers if you have nailed your product story.

An excellent way to test your product story is to create a test landing page that presents your product story with these key elements:

• Headline
• Subhead
• Product/explainer graphic/video
• How it Works
• How we help (your top 3 business benefits)
• Why choose us section (top 3 reasons to choose you over competitors)

Your positioning and messaging are only validated if the ICP customers and prospects who review your test landing page overwhelming agree that your product story is:

• Clear — They understand what you do, where you fit in their tech stack, and how you can help.
• Compelling — They see how it will help them address an urgent need or desire, and want to learn more asap.
• Unique — They believe your product is unique and unavailable elsewhere.

If your new product story fails this test, rinse and repeat until you get it right. Never forget that marketing execution is a garbage-in-garbage-out process.

2: CONTENT MARKETING

Content Marketing provides the bridge from your strategic marketing team (Product Marketing) to your tactical execution teams (Demand Generation, Sales Enablement, and Corporate Marketing). The Content team creates content (copy plus images) that tells your product story in ways that are easy for your target customers to digest and remember. Typical marketing content includes:

• Website content, including your home page, solution pages, landing pages, blog posts, explainer videos, customer testimonial videos, etc.
• Social content, such as social media profile pages and posts.
• Demand generation content, such as email and ad copy
• Marketing collateral, such as product data sheets and brochures.
• Sales tools, such as sales decks and product demo videos.
• Marcom content, such as press releases, event booth signage, etc.

Content Marketing teams typically include copywriters and graphic designers. Copywriters turn pragmatic and factually accurate messages into simple language that is easy for prospects to digest and remember.

People often confuse messaging and copy. Here's the difference: Messaging is what you say about your product. Copywriting is how you deliver your messages using words that delight and engage your prospects while reinforcing your brand.

Software example:

• Messaging = "New collaborative document tool that combines numbers and words (like Excel and Word)"
• Copy headline = "Enough of this sheet!"

Non-software example:

• Messaging = "Affordable flights to over 83 Asia destinations."
• Copy headline = "Cheap enough to say Phuket, I'll go."

3: DEMAND GENERATION

The Demand Gen team manages marketing campaigns that deliver your product story to target customers across multiple marketing channels.

Marketing campaigns focus on a specific combination of an audience (e.g. a customer segment) and an offer (a year-end discount, a competitor replacement discount, an event, a case study, etc.)

Common marketing channels include your website, email, paid search and paid social ads, organic social posts, webinars, SEO, and more.

Each campaign aims to attract and engage target customers with the goal of advancing leads through your marketing and sales funnel. One campaign might focus on building awareness with a particular target customer segment while another might focus on driving consideration.

Larger Demand Generation teams will often include specialist teams for each marketing channel. So, for example, dedicated teams for Email Marketing, Paid Search, Paid Social, SEO, etc.

Key performance metrics for each campaign and channel include:

• Lead quantity and lead quality (see conversion rates below)
• Cost per lead and cost per customer acquisition
• Conversion rates and conversion velocities (days to convert) as leads move through your funnel from awareness to consideration (shortlist) to selection (sale).

4: SALES ENABLEMENT

The Sales Enablement team uses your product story content to provide sales training and sales tools that help Sales convert pipeline (qualified opportunities) into revenue (new customers).

Typical sales tools include sales decks, datasheets, case studies, ROI calculators, competitor battle cards, explainer videos, product videos, and more.

5: CORPORATE MARKETING

The Corporate Marketing team uses your product story content to educate key influencers, including press journalists, industry analysts (Gartner, IDC, Forrester, etc.), and, for public companies, financial analysts. Larger Corporate Marketing teams will include specialist teams for each influencer channel.

MARKETING MACHINE SUMMARY

Software Marketing can be broken down into a simple, repeatable process. With a properly implemented Software Marketing Machine, you can feed in a compelling product story and watch it drive superior pipeline and revenue.

HOW TO IMPLEMENT YOUR OWN SOFTWARE MARKETING MACHINE

Use this template to build your own Software Marketing Machine and track your progress toward a fully implemented and highly optimized machine. Here's a snapshot of what it looks like:

NEED HELP?

I help startup CEOs establish or refine their Software Marketing Machine. Check out my LinkedIn profile for details, and message me on LinkedIn if you'd like to learn more.