GTM 87: The Future of Media and Marketing with Anthony Kennada
Mar 26, 2024
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In this discussion, Anthony Kennada, former CMO of Gainsight and founder of AudiencePlus, shares insights into the evolution of B2B marketing. He emphasizes the shift from product-first to distribution-first strategies. Kennada elaborates on the power of owned media, stressing its role in building direct audience relationships. He highlights the importance of guided content journeys and personalization in engaging consumers. The conversation also covers lessons learned from high-growth environments and the transformative power of strategic marketing.
Emphasizing owned media allows businesses to forge direct relationships with their audience, enhancing engagement and fostering brand loyalty.
Transitioning from a product-first to a distribution-first approach in marketing is essential for optimizing audience building and conversion rates.
Deep dives
The Future of Media and Owned Media
The discussion highlights the evolving landscape of media, emphasizing the concept of owned media as a crucial strategy for businesses. Traditional marketing approaches, largely reliant on paid and earned media, are becoming less effective as audiences increasingly desire direct relationships with brands. Owned media allows companies to build meaningful connections with their audience through content marketing, community engagement, and events without relying on third-party platforms. The rise of subscription-based models through channels such as Substack and Patreon exemplifies a shift toward fostering deeper brand loyalty and engagement.
The Importance of Community and Value Creation
A significant theme is the role of community in driving business growth through value creation rather than direct selling. Companies are encouraged to invest in building communities that prioritize delivering value to their audience through resources, knowledge sharing, and events. This approach fosters organic growth and customer loyalty, as potential buyers develop trust and familiarity before any sales interaction. Emphasizing the balance between providing value and the eventual transition to monetization is essential for long-term success.
Navigating the Shift Towards Revenue Generation
The transition from cultivating an audience to generating revenue poses challenges, particularly in proving the effectiveness of media efforts. Businesses often struggle with attribution, making it difficult to showcase to stakeholders how media investments translate into revenue. Emphasizing the importance of building a subscriber base can enhance this transition, as a direct relationship with the audience enables more precise tracking of engagement and conversion. By leveraging first-party data, companies can create tailored marketing strategies that effectively convert subscribers into paying customers.
Learning from Past Experiences and Mistakes
Reflecting on past experiences, the conversation reveals that focusing solely on brand building without adequate product marketing can hinder growth. Companies need to ensure that their marketing strategies align with their product offerings to optimize monetization opportunities. Lessons learned emphasize that while creating a strong brand presence is important, it must not outpace the development and promotion of the product itself. Striking the right balance between brand equity and product messaging is vital for achieving sustained success in a competitive landscape.
Prior to founding AudiencePlus, Anthony Kennada served as the CMO of incredible companies like Hopin and Front. He was the founding CMO of Gainsight where he and his team are credited with creating the Customer Success category -- a novel business imperative, profession and software category that helps subscription companies grow sustainably by becoming customer obsessed. By focusing on human first community building, content marketing, live events and creative activations, they developed a new playbook for B2B marketing that built the Gainsight brand and fueled the company’s growth from $0 to $100M+ ARR, and eventual acquisition by Vista Equity at a $1.1B valuation.
Discussed in this Episode:
Owned media is a crucial component of go-to-market strategies, allowing companies to build direct relationships with their audience.
Transitioning from a product-first approach to a distribution-first approach can lead to more effective marketing and audience building.
The future of media lies in guided journeys and providing value to networks through relevant and personalized content.
Building an audience and collecting subscribers can lead to higher conversion rates and provide valuable first-party data for better attribution.
It is important to connect brand messaging to the software or product being offered to ensure a cohesive and effective marketing strategy.
Highlights: (02:58) The Gainsight story: Creating a category and building a brand.
(05:46) The power of owned media in B2B marketing.
(17:51) The evolution of media: from content to software.
(20:41) The challenge of measuring media's impact on revenue.
(27:08) Learning from Gainsight: Successes and missteps.
(38:12) One thing revenue leaders believe to be true that Anthony thinks is bull$***.
(41:00) One thing that is working for Anthony in go-to-market right now.
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The GTM Podcast The GTM Podcast is a weekly podcast hosted by Scott Barker, GTMfund Partner, featuring interviews with the top 1% GTM executives, VCs, and founders. Conversations reveal the unshared details behind how they have grown companies, and the go-to-market strategies responsible for shaping that growth.
Visit gtmnow.com for more episodes and other interesting content.
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