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You can have the best product & go-to-market strategy, but if you don't have the right people in the right seats, it doesn't matter Conversely, if you are a stellar GTM professional but you pick the wrong company, you are set-up for failure. In 2023, we have a interesting paradox we are looking at: many folks (myself included) were laid off this year or in 2022 but many companies are struggling to find the right GTM talent even with the surplus of supply. Thankfully, Graham Locklear, a stellar GTM recruiter and extremely knowledge in the fundamentals of GTM came on the show and shared his best practices for hiring the right go-to-market talent and finding your next role. Here is rundown of our conversation: [00:00:01] Strategies for Attracting Talent and Finding Your Next Gig [00:01:18] Graham Locklear Discusses the Current State of the Market in the Tech Industry [00:03:36] Challenges in Job Hiring despite Surplus Supply in the Market [00:05:51] Building High Performing Go-to-Market Teams [00:08:14] Taylor Wells Discusses Marketing and Sales Strategy Shifts for SaaS Companies [00:09:43] Graham Locklear on Successfully Scaling Your Sales Team Based on Business Stage [00:12:31] Discussion on Hiring and Compensation Strategies for Early-Stage Companies [00:16:46] Discussing Recruiting Principles and Strategies Amidst Challenging Times [00:18:58] Finding the best candidates for job positions [00:24:08] Identifying Key Aspects of a Candidate's Profile for a Job Role [00:25:16] How to Prioritize When Hiring and Evaluating Potential Candidates with Graham Locklear [00:33:36] Insights on Leadership & The Importance of Hiring the Right Employees [00:34:22] Effective Interview Process for Hiring Managers [00:36:54] Tips and Tricks to Finding Top Go-To-Market Talent [00:38:31] The Advantages of Specialized Expertise in Businesses and Employee Hiring [00:39:55] Job Hunting Best Practices for Go-to-Market Leaders with Graham Locklear [00:46:18] Graham Locklear discusses job-hunting strategies and the importance of maintaining emotional well-being

Cisco recently announced they were going to train 84,000 of their employees to become Linkedin influencers and create content on Linkedin. Employee advocacy at its finest. There are innumerable, ripple effect benefits for the employer and employee when employees build their own personal brands. But how do you get started and create a culture of employee advocacy, get over imposture syndrome and build your company's brand and your personal brand? I’ve learned a ton from interacting and watching Nick Bennett over the last few years. He generated millions in new revenue for the companies he worked for while building his own personal brand along the way. His former employer still gets brand awareness and leads from advocacy he did years ago. Spoiler alert: he’s now taken his personal brand to the next level with starting his own company from it all! Epic. A picture-perfect example of the exponential growth opportunity in employee advocacy Here are a few things we covered in our conversation this week: - How to provide leadership around employee advocacy in your organization - How employee advocacy has nothing to do with the employee-talking about the company - Simple strategies for creating content as an employee - How can employee advocacy help with recruiting - How to have to have a point of POV - And much more!

What if every advertisement you saw provided you value/impact/helped you solve a problem? Or, what if every ad gave you inspiration, encouragement, and entertained you? What if you were driving down the highway and the countless billboards you saw provided something of meaning and value to you in the advertisement; not just a weak promise to solve a problem if you give the company money? Not only have I seen this type of advertising work wonders to drive most efficient way to build brand affinity and drive revenue (especially in the B2B world), but I believe this is the future of marketing & go-to-market as consumers are tired of the same old direct-response type ads (i.e. "look at how awesome we are so buy my stuff") - Not including the fact that your buyers sees thousands of ads per day. Traditional advertising is getting less and less effective at delivering & creating trust (#1 currency in business) that is essential for large B2B purchases. This is why my conversation with Casey Hill was so great. Casey is a Senior Growth Manager at ActiveCampaign and is trailblazing all things demand creation through creating ads that leverage valuable insights from their team, customers, and partners. We talked about all things thought-leader ads, getting your customers and partners to help you create content / ads, and leverage your team to drive employee advocacy and create valuable content that can be turned into advertisements. A gold conversation and I learned a ton! We covered: Why traditional ads don't create or deliver trust What are thought-leadership ads and why are they so specials How to leverage your customers & partners to help you create content that you can turn into ads What is zero click content and why social platforms don't like links How to mobilize your internal team to create thought-leadership content Why content that is 2 or 3 degrees away from your product can drive revenue What types of thought-leadership ads work best

There is a misalignment between how buyers want to buy and how the B2B sales processes are set-up. G2 last year reported that 90% of the buyer's journey happen's before a buyer talks to a sales person. But many B2B buyer's have to sit through multiple sales conversation before they can get a demo or try a product. It's my opinion that those who provide impact the fastest (time to value ratio) will get the most customers at the most efficient cost. That's why my recent conversation with Natalie Marcotullio is so important. Natalie came on the show to chat through all things interactive product demo experiences and how they can substantially improve your buyer's experience leading to increased pipeline and higher win rates. We covered: How buyer's want to buy in 2023/2024 using dat and how B2B sales processes haven't kept up What is an interactive demo experience and how can a software or PLG focused organization use them How can a service-based company use them How can AEs use them in the sales process to get buy-in from busy executives & decision makers How to get started and what types of demo experiences you should create first What to avoid when creating a interactive demo experience

I know you feel it. In today's highly saturated market, acquiring new B2B customers has become increasingly challenging. Traditional outbound marketing and sales efforts were followed by the rise of inbound marketing and marketing automation, which allowed for a more personalized approach to the customer's journey. However, as these channels and tactics become more accessible to everyone, their effectiveness is diminishing, leading to higher costs in customer acquisition. To combat this issue, forward-thinking B2B go-to-market teams are turning to owned media assets and building their own audience of potential buyers. Owned media (vs. earned or paid media) refers to creating content that your audience chooses to engage with, whether it's through a newsletter, webinar series, or podcast. The key is to provide content that entertains, educates, and inspires, focusing on solving real problems and delivering actual impact. Unlike content that solely promotes your product, owned media aims to build a long-term relationship with your audience. It's about selflessly providing value and impact, rather than pushing sales. By leveraging first-party interactions and data, you can establish a deeper connection with potential customers, gaining their trust and loyalty. Bolaji Oyejide 🔥🎙 came on the GTM.news show to talk all things building an audience and the new era of go-to-market we are in. Let's listen in: BIG WARNING: This is not just another content marketing strategy to throw on your marketing team. This really needs to be an entire organization / go-to-market strategy (internal, customers, partners, etc) effort to make this work. Why would anyone want to watch your content when there is a million choices out there? There is now the need for content differentiation as everyone is competing for each other's attention. Think of owned media / building an audience as your organization's first product. Really invest in making it great. Other cool GTM stuff to check out: I did a conversation with Anthony Kennada from AudiencePlus on owned media earlier this year. Check out our conversation if you want more info on the subject. Sara Stella Lattanzio shares a great post on mind bending logic shift when it comes to outreach emails Great post from Wil Reynolds on why you should be careful what "thought-leadership" and success stories you read Mark Kilens talks about the success he's seen without using a pitch deck in his sales calls Until next week my friends, Taylor P.s. What are you learning in the world of B2B growth and go-to-market? Share your favorites in the comments. Love to learn from you!

Let's be honest, creating content can be a bear. Whether it's for your own personal brand or for your organization. Brendon Hufford, a thought-leader in the B2B SaaS space around content and marketing came on the show to talk through his simple Content IP framework. Yes, this framework can help you get views but the real power is driving business outcomes & revenue. We discussed: Why building a category is less important than really going deep on your customer's problem How to create content that resonants with your audience The power of a simple template How to think about case studies and sharing social proof How to tie all these different pieces of content into a journey to educate or connect with your buyer How to work overtime to get inside our customers shoes to try to understand them better And a bunch of rabbit trail / tangential topics! David Spitz posted on the power of ​vertical markets​ (did anyone say niche down?) Rand Fishkin shares an important lessons around ​why the best marketing channels are the least provable​ (basically the best 5 minutes you could spend all week) Taylor Wells (wait, is it ok to feature myself??) shared a post on ​how go-to-market motions have changed and which ones you should avoid ​based on your ACV - See you all next week! Taylor

With AI, the cost of creating great content is potentially going to go to zero. Google is also creating more zero click search results (SGE). So how will ranking on Google search change in the future? Gregory Brooks with SearchTides, an expert in all things SEO (search engine optimization) comes on the GTM News show to talk about the future of SEO as a go-to-market strategy. We discussed: What’s working now to get ranked on Google search Domain authority and how to analysis ranking factors What types of content is working now and theories on what will work in the future How Google organic search is a zero sum game Are backlinks dead? How we are in the age of the practitioners / influencer Who should and who should not invest in SEO as a marketing strategy Thoughts on Google’s zero click search results (SGE) and what that means for the future

We all get so many spam emails, sales calls, and people sending us annoying sales pitches on Linkedin. So, do the traditional outbound channels still work and if they do, how do we do it in the right way? Scott Martinis, a B2B outbound expert came on the show to shares his insights on how to stay ahead of the challenges of outbound. We discussed: - How to create the right type of outbound content - How to analysis your ideal customer profile & target the right prospects - How to reverse engineer your buyer's journey to match your future customer's expectations - What data providers, email senders, and other tech work best - How to leverage social networks and thought leadership to boost your outbound efforts #gotomarket #b2b #outbound #sales #growth

There is already so much content on the internet and AI is just getting started. So, how does your content stand out, continue to provide value, while driving revenue for your organization? Ross Simmonds, a dynamic content practitioner and expert in the B2B tech space, came on the show to shares his insights on how to stay ahead of the constant content changes. We discussed: - Selfless vs. selfish content - How to use AI to make your content better - How to use customer insights and research to craft the right content - How to turn one piece of content into dozens or hundreds of other pieces of content - Why you need to market your content better - And much more

Video podcasts can be one of the most powerful ways to create content at scale, provide value, and build an audience you don't have to rent or pay for (owned media). Here are some of the benefits: - Create a lot of content to repurpose - Associate your brand with industry experts - Showcase customers and even have your prospects on! - Build an audience that you don't have to rent or try to earn - Tap into other peoples audiences This 1-hour long session I went behind the scenes on how I created GTM.news and other B2B shows/podcasts. Here is what you'll learn: - My system for hosting & producing a video podcast - How to easily repurpose and 100x your reach with the content - All the tools and tech you need (under $75/mo) - How to get guests on the show easily - How to build your own audience from it Want to follow along with the deck? Click here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tXBojuRADKpkV8Cdow3E9XnG6ti91WI3/view?usp=sharing