CEO of How To SaaS | Fractional CMO + Advisory Services for PE and B2B Companies | 📖 Bestselling Author of Post-Acquisition Marketing | 🎙️ Host of the PE Value Creation Podcast
Too many companies get caught in producing content in the wrong order. For example, what good is SEO content if you don’t have your core messaging and product marketing pillars figured out? The right order of doing things: 1. Sort out your Product Marketing (core messaging, value prop) 2. Enable and empower the Sales team with the right materials and assets 3. Run customer marketing campaigns to capture expansion opportunities from the existing base 4. Set up nurture campaigns to help prospects make their way through their buyer journey 5. Build thought leadership content with a unique perspective and story to differentiate yourself in the marketplace 6. Create content to rank for organic search Obsessing about number 6 when numbers 1-5 have not been figured out is a recipe for disaster. #marketing
It's also a recipe for complete frustration as a content marketer, and it gets harder and harder to drive value and ROI the further you get along that line. As a content leader and consultant, I've started approaching content from a product marketing perspective and often have to do a lot of the research and define a lot of positioning myself so that I have a strategy to execute off of.
100% agreed, however, we have to consider that not every strategy happens in a neat, top-down way. For example, many startups that don't have Product-Market Fit have to keep the lights on and they probably won't be able to spend that much time learning about their market (although they should). Any extra brand awareness, whether it comes from their SDR outreach, SEO, social, or any channel gets them more eyeballs, and more traffic - which they can use as a signal to understand the first point: what do people want?
Shiv Narayanan love the visual. When you say "4. Set up nurture campaigns to help prospects make their way through their buyer journey" are you talking about sending email touches? Often there's no clear buyer journey, it's more like a playground and the buyer has the control to decide what playground equipment they want to hang out on 🙂 Also there's more than one way to "nurture" and so I think #4 and #5 can go together. You can do both at the same time.
The same is true for content. Many times I talk to potential clients, and they don't even have the core company messaging established. Or they don't have any customer research done. If you don't have these core pieces, your content strategy will be 'fishing'. It's like throwing out a bunch of sh* without any indication that it might work.
Strongly agree that product marketing should be step 1. After that, I think you can do the rest in whatever order makes sense for your business.
Absolutely, I encourage every company to start with figuring out their messaging, BOFU and sales enablement before focusing on top of funnel SEO. Said the same in this talk I did for OnDeck Marketing https://docsend.com/view/dr9ufhf84u7gdcfh
Agree with your order, I am a massive advocate of starting with the end point of the funnel and work it back up. Although reality also kicks in and many teams have to sometimes manage different agendas/ priorities and timelines from others not just their own.
I agree with the content creation order, however, reading your post, some marketers might think they can totally neglect the SEO part and not plan it: no keywords, no structure, uploading huge images etc. This will be a huge mistake! Don’t miss out on the most powerful B2B lead-gen source – Organic search.
Great tips, Shiv. Starting with a strong foundation will build an understanding that elevates each later step. I’m curious if you could share more on how you convinced clients to start at the beginning? Often, our clients are set on leading with SEO, with orders coming from the top.
CEO of How To SaaS | Fractional CMO + Advisory Services for PE and B2B Companies | 📖 Bestselling Author of Post-Acquisition Marketing | 🎙️ Host of the PE Value Creation Podcast
1yIf you've been enjoying my daily drawings on LinkedIn, join my newsletter: SaaS Marketing Simplified. It features bite-sized content on SaaS marketing, growth and strategy sent to your inbox a few times a week. https://www.howtosaas.com/saas-marketing-simplified