Differentiate or Die: The Irrelevance of Marketing

We hate to break it to you but the old way of doing B2B marketing doesn’t work. It’s time to put a fork in it. It doesn’t work.

Fundamentally, we are in a completely new era of B2B technology. And as a result, the old marketing model is dead.

In the past, the B2B tech go-to-market model looked like this:

• Selling features and functions
• It was all about “fast time to market”
• A transactional sales model – license fee
• A single selling motion – direct sales channel
• Categories of 3 major competitors

Now the B2B landscape is completely different, and looks like this:

• Buyers are looking for outcomes, not features
• In a SaaS model, it’s not about time to market, it’s about “time to revenue”
• The transactional license model has been replaced – now, its all about CLV and monetizing relationships over time
• Land and expand vs. big band deals
• A blended selling model, direct, partners, inside sales, download, open source
• Competing in categories of hundreds

In today’s market, it’s harder and harder for companies to separate from the pack and get heard above the noise. Buyers don’t want another tech vendor. So you better bring a viewpoint and solve a problem they deeply care about to engage with them.

All the top B2B tech leaders have powerful stories. Today, it’s all about building a compelling narrative about “why your product matters to the buyer” vs. “how the product works”.

And that’s why positioning is the new strategic lever. When used right by CEOs, it can help companies wake up the market, separate from the pack, drive clear differentiation and carve out a unique category leadership position.

It’s time to build positioning that “owns” a multi-million dollar problem and builds a case for unique differentiation. Don’t get left behind in the old B2B marketing model.