Upstream GTM strategy is the collection of decisions that precede marketing, sales, and even product development efforts. It’s understanding the problem your solving, who you’re solving it for, and what that means for your customer.

More importantly, it’s also identifying your unique competitive advantage that provides differentiation and separation in the market.

These “where to play” and “how to win” decisions will guide and maximize the impact of all other downstream GTM activities, including where investments are made, or not made.

It’s the fabric that ties together product, marketing, sales, and support around a unified strategy of who the business is serving and why.

Clarity here is critical to ensuring a strong brand, delivering a solid customer experience that earns loyalty, holding a position of strength in the market, and by way of these elements avoiding or pre-empting business disruption.

Getting upstream GTM strategy right is the difference between market relevancy (sustainable, profitable growth) and getting locked into a feature race and commoditization battle (margin compression, survival mode).

Early signals are seen within the acquisition funnel - primarily with decreasing conversion and close rates and increasing sales cycle times. More deals are being lost to key competitors.

Later lifecycle signals are seen with a reduction in average revenue per account and in the renewal and expansion motion - primarily with increased churn rate and decreased net retention value.

On the product side, new features and capabilities are not being adopted at expected rates. New products fall significantly short of sales and revenue targets.

Marketing struggles to capture testimonials and compelling case studies . . . your customers are not proactively promoting your service through their networks.

Internally, some signals to look out for:

• Product/Engineering don’t speak to customer impact, pains or gains

• Customer feedback collection is scattered and disorganized

• Customers are not involved in the development process

• Roadmaps are full of competitive parity items

• Product Marketing is a handoff point at time of product launch

• No customers using and advocating for a new product prior to launch

• Sales and Marketing using generic language, buzzwords, or overly focused on technology

We offer a range of go-to-market supporting services - whether you need hands-on help with a specific project, or need someone to step into your team on a fractional, longer term basis to drive your GTM effort. We can even serve in an advisory role providing ongoing feedback and guidance on your GTM strategy.

Our services are tailored to help your GTM teams move forward with clarity and confidence in whatever scope or fashion needed.

Getting started is simple. Reach out through our contact form or by email to schedule a call - we’ll talk through your situation and provide recommendations on approach and potential next steps.

First calls are always free as they’re used to discuss your needs and determine if our services will be a good fit or if another path is recommended.

Check out our About page for insights into our philosophy and approach, but we’re different in these areas:

• We focus “upstream” and help you tackle the highest impact strategy decisions that inform all other GTM efforts - unlike other Product Marketing firms that may start at launch planning

• We prioritize outcomes over actions; tailored strategy over boilerplate

• We offer unmatched flexibility in meeting most budgets and engagement models

• We meet your team wherever and however they need us - from guidance to roll-up-the sleeves execution

Our expertise is rooted in B2B technology / SaaS companies, and we’re typically best suited for established mid-market enterprise size businesses, though we have experience working within startups and large enterprises alike.

Reasonable per hour rates based on project type and complexity is our starting point, but as an independent consulting firm, we have flexibility to agree on creative pricing alternatives. The most important thing to us is that we have measurable, positive impact on your business.

After an initial conversation, we’ll determine the best approach and provide a transparent quote with all terms.

Collaborative, honest, and objective and outcome-oriented. And hopefully a bit fun as well - we love what we do.

We're here to guide the process, bring ideas to the table, and deliver measurable impact quickly.

To do our best work, we’ll take the initiative to understand your business and your market regardless of engagement scope or project focus.