GTM strategy during a recession. A VC’s perspective

how would you describe the current market environment it's it's a difficult Market I mean we've known since the the public market started to drop over a year ago that we were going to head towards this uh it's finally starting to hit companies in a meaningful way Enterprises are starting to cut their budgets you know obviously marketing is an area that when you get into a downturn people start to look at because they see it as a soft area of spend and and we'll talk more about in terms of how do you how do you prove that the value of what I'm doing is really important even in a downturn on the Venture side what we're seeing and this has been true I mean I've been through this is the third major cycle of 2000 and 2007 2008. there's still the capitulation honestly is yet to come so we're seeing Venture firms and the industry start to wake up to the reality but over the last few years there was a huge bubble in terms of valuations and how things got marked up and it's really hard to work through that on the down on the downslope and so I think in 2023 we're going to see it's going to be difficult for a lot of companies how is the upcoming recession affected

the current go to market process we're seeing a few things one just budgets are getting cut and in some cases in a lot of cases the the people whose budgets are cut don't know until the day it happens so they may be in the process of buying something and you know on the 11th Hour they have to come back and say sorry we can't do it so that's one area where I think you see headwinds and and and that's just around there's not much you can do about that you just have to to sell through sell harder the other thing we're seeing and large Enterprises do especially ones who've really got this experience is they're making they're extending the buying process so we've we've seen in some you know Fortune 50 companies they've added people to procurement who are literally there just to slow the process down it's not necessarily the right thing strategically for the companies but it's a way to to slow the burn so yeah it's going to be harder you know if you're selling to the Enterprise that said this is a point in time where Enterprises are very much looking for we have to continue to grow ourselves we have to generate revenue and so they're looking for Solutions that can help them do that that can they can sort of show

analytically this is how we grow and they're looking for things that really can overall help you know how do we how do we perform in this environment how do we manage to our budget uh and everything else I think you're going to see is you know it's going to be a risk and I think from a marketing to sales point of view the focus is going to shift much more towards the sales organizations right and how to make them successful and sometimes to the detriment In fairness to marketing they sort of get the short shift and marketing is an easier thing to spend I know we're going to talk about that with some other questions but I think that's an important area where you can make real mistakes is not understanding the value that marketing can bring to that but at the same time for marketers to understand that they need to be able to show that value from a sales perspective and show it analytically how can marketing succeed in this market environment the only way you can be successful market I'll look at the camera that says the only way you can be successful in marketing is when you can show that you're contributing to growth and revenue in the company ultimately whether it's branding whether it's product marketing whether it's positioning all those things eventually

those have to roll up and do how is this driving the business forward and growing and I think in this market environment that's just critical so you know it's hard because marketing execs and sales execs are different humans they think differently they operate differently sometimes they're incented very differently if you're a marketing exec today you should be doing everything you can to make sure you're aligned with sales and frankly if you're a sales leader today you should be really working with that marketing team to talk to them out here's what I need here's what we're looking for because they shouldn't be operating separately what are the biggest mistakes marketing should avoid right now I think honestly the biggest mistakes is is there shouldn't be any sacred cows in terms of where you're spending your money and what you're doing like take as as a leader in marketing as a marketing person just take a really serious look at everything you're doing across your spend and this isn't people necessary this is programs things like that and really understand are we getting the value we need from that and maybe in a great Market that made sense do we need it today and what's the value it adds and those are things like how many consulting firms do we need to be working with how many you know of the

Gardeners of the world not that I love Gartner but at the same time is this something you need right now or is there a different program you want to work with them don't be shy about going back to some of these folks and saying hey we want to keep working with you but things are changing because they're having that conversation time and time again and they would rather keep you as a customer than lose you but but again I think figuring out how do I simplify my marketing strategy how do I reduce spend in doing that and then and where there's opportunity reallocate those dollars to things that are much more clearly aligned where I can get analytics I can prove the metrics I think that's an important piece and that's true across all parts of the org but I think very much you know more so for marketing this environment how can marketing leaders align with the board when I when I work with marketing execs I personally resonate very well with people who come in and and tie kind of everything they're doing exactly what I said here are the metrics here's what it's driving and I'm not talking about mqls I'm talking about we're doing this work and here's how this is generating specific leads I don't care if you've got 100 000 sqls what I care about is how many

companies that you're touching how many people you're working with convert into true customer prospects that the sales team can go and sell and I think a lot of times you know you talk about this disconnect a lot of times that's this mql to SQL piece and there should never be a debate I don't personally and don't want to offend any marketing people but I don't really care if it's a marketing qualified lead I care if it's a deal that we can go and close and there's there's metrics I understand how that's done but understanding like I just want to go get as many companies as I can put in front of my sales team where they say this is great we can go try to close them and then it's on them to go and do it and then that gets back to things like what else can I do from a marketing perspective help that sales team how are we doing from a brand perspective do we have the content that they need to be able to go and sell with then you start to open up that conversation with your sales team and say what else can we do to help you be successful on the marketing side because let's clear be clear you're in marketing because you know probably you're a creative person you enjoy this process sales people aren't necessarily that they need you to help them with that but but you've got to be there to ask them and then sometimes guide them and say here's what

we think we can help you with so when I see that alignment when I sit in a board meeting I see the Marketing sales leader sitting next to each other and I can tell it's not the first time they've talked in the last month that they're collaborating I I really get excited about seeing that kind of work because that means that go to market team is really working together to be aligned how should you approach long-term strategic initiatives in a downturn it's a great way it's really hard because there there are and I assume if they're marketing people watching this they're going wait a minute there's all these like to what you said they're all these strategic things that I'm doing that have a longer term impact and those you absolutely should be continue to support those I do think again there should be any sacred cows in that process but if you can come to the board and say we're doing X we're investing in the brand or we're building this awareness because this is important over the long term and and show how this makes it easier over time I think those are easier conversations to have now that said in this environment a lot of those programs will get cut in the short term becoming the sort of the the if you're an earlier Stage Company trying to becoming sort of

the established Authority and leader in a space you know yes spend some time on that but don't get too far over your skis on that because the best way to do that is grow your business have a lot of customers who believe in you who want to reference you um I think to me those are areas that that those are the areas that end up getting cut and as a marketing exec you really if you're going to defend make sure you have the data to explain here's why this is valuable here's why it's important here's why we're investing in it and be willing to admit that there's some that you know in a big Market where there's plenty of cash you know to go around those are easy to do and in markets like this just like every other part of the org yeah there's things we should be cutting back what are the deadliest signs that your marketing and sales are misaligned the marketing team comes in and says we're way ahead of all our targets and we're crushing everything and on the sales side we're not close to where we need to be there's a huge disconnect because first of all you should never be coming in and saying we're doing a great job but ultimately the team that we're working with and go to market who's supposed to deliver Revenue isn't sure they could have their problems but

there's a disconnect there because that's a conversation that should be happening between the sales leader and the marketing leader to make sure they're balanced on what's going on I've never seen a company that's 50 ahead on their mqls and 25 ahead behind on sqls where the marketing didn't need to really do a reset to show the value they were adding so to me that's an area I get I get really frustrated with how do you know if your marketing is on the right track you're running a program that is is you know you feel comfortable in terms of where the spend is and your sales organization is successful and your sales leaders and team are saying we're getting on a value you should be smiling as a marketing when sales people are are and and one of the things I love in board meetings when sales execs are giving the marketing exact credit for their success that's working really well so there's plenty of metrics we look at and multiples and all these kinds of things and those are you know you can find those on a number of websites for me it's that component like are are am I seeing the alignment in a way where the sales organization understands and respects the value they're getting from

the marketing organization and clearly that relationship is set up in a way where they're collaborating they're talking they're going to have tough conversations like you have different objectives in some cases but they're willing to have those conversations and they come out of those stronger as a team and if you're doing those things the rest of it will flow very well because if you're doing the wrong thing from a sales perspective where you're not spending money in the right place in marketing and you have that dialogue going those problems get fixed very easily it's when you have these silos and people aren't talking and they're frustrated but they don't bring it up that's when things really break down and and this is a time to make sure you're opening those doors engaging those conversations and and if I'm a marketing exact going to sell and saying what do you need from me what should we be doing differently and having very open Frank conversations and then really listening and thinking about how to adjust and again sales people are different explaining to them the things maybe they don't understand where you're adding value they might be missing it so to me when that's going on from an alignment perspective those those are really the metrics I look for because the the dollar metrics the mathematical

analytics we look at those are all going to flow from how those relationships are built