Part 1: Go-to-Market Strategy in the 'New Norm'

What strategy have Marketers been leveraging since May 2020?

Go-to-Market Strategy in the 'New Norm'

Insight 1: Medium Term Recovery Planning at the Core of Current Strategy
Insight 2: A Combined Focus on Both Current Clients and New Prospects Rises Back to the Fore
Insight 3: A Content Focused Strategy Still Reigns King in a Post-Covid Environment, Bringing about a New Set of Challenges
Insight 4: Pressure from the Business Continues Across the Board
Insight 5: Proprietary Digital Events and Digital Content Syndication Plug the Standstill in F2F Events

Insight 1: Medium Term Recovery Planning at the Core of Current Strategy

Aligning brand and marketing activities has become more important than ever. Investors seek clarity in a very uncertain environment

Since May 2020 there has been a decrease in the number of respondents focused on short term reactive planning, with a majority of 34 respondents focused on medium-term recovery planning. It is clear that marketers are now moving out of reactive crisis communications and looking to the more immediate future in terms of marketing plans. With Covid uncertainty still on the horizon, most marketers are still less able to plan for the long term.

Insight 2: A Combined Focus on Both Current Clients and New Prospects Rises Back to the Fore

Back in May 2020, in an immediate reaction to Covid-19, 38% of EI's Barometer respondents had shifted their focus to current clients as opposed to a mere 13% in January, pre-Covid, where there was a majority focus (76%) on a combination nurturing strategy. It is heartening to see a few months on, now in August, the balance shifting again to a majority combination nurturing strategy (81%), and the focus on just current clients dropping back down to 17%.

It is important to note, however, from extensive conversations with clients, that this combination strategy does not necessarily point towards a focus on net new accounts, but rather also includes a focus on new prospects within existing accounts where there are low hanging fruit and the ability to leverage existing deep relationships for 'quick wins.'

Since January 2020 how has focus changed?

Insight 3: A Content Focused Strategy Still Reigns King in a Post-Covid Environment, Bringing about a New Set of Challenges

In August 2020, Account Based Marketing, Vertical Industry Marketing and Segmenting by Company Size all remain equally important as at the onset of the pandemic. Content-driven marketing is still clearly the focus area for the majority of respondents. Interestingly there has also been an increase in the number of marketers focused on persona and job titles potentially indicating a move that focuses on an increased personalisation and 'solution' focused content of products and services.

On average, 49 Barometer respondents agree or strongly agree that coping with the volume of content required and keeping pace with the speed of change to keep it relevant as being the greatest challenges post Covid. c.42 of respondents also feel this is compounded by challenges in identifying current pain points for clients, identifying white space for an organisation's content amidst a sea of content being produced, and producing additional content in the midst of other continuing global issues such as BLM.

How has COVID–19 directly affected marketers Go-to-Market focuses?

What are the greatest challenges faced in regards to content?

Insight 4: Pressure from the Business Continues Across the Board

What are the greatest go-to-market pressures from internal business stakeholders?

The 'Virtual Fatigue' complex: With all business currently being conducted in the digital realm, it is not surprising that the challenge of both keeping people engaged through unique relevant content and creating exciting digital meetups have risen to the top of the marketing and business agenda.

As was the case in May 2020, there is continued pressure from internal stakeholders to produce content that is differentiated, relevant and highly visible in a noisy virtual market. Marketers are also still struggling to engage and network with target audiences in the absence of face to face events and are looking to select the best virtual event solutions. Given that since May, there have been advances in virtual event options to leverage, it is very telling that EI's clients still consider the ability to engage target audiences through the virtual medium as one of the highest pressure points and challenges.

How have marketers plugged the gap created by the standstill in F2F events?

Insight 5: Proprietary Digital Events and Digital Content Syndication Plug the Standstill in F2F Events

With Covid uncertainty set to continue, the industry is still reeling from the loss of F2F events in the Go-to-Market strategy. In August 2020, proprietary webinars, proprietary virtual roundtables and digital content syndication still lead for businesses in plugging the gap created from the standstill in F2F events (Graph 1). In the wake of budgets flat-lining, this strategy continues to make sense for businesses who are working harder to keep existing clients, as well as support them with relevant content to navigate this volatile period. In this new era, companies products and services also become more relevant for new buyer groups within existing clients making a proprietary account-based strategy appropriate at a time where businesses are unable to engage new prospects F2F.

Graph 2: In support of the narrative above, this pie chart shows that the majority of barometer respondents utilising an ABM strategy as part of their marketing mix are doing so to develop an understanding of key accounts for the business, to identify new stakeholders for the business to engage with, and to pursue hot new prospects within accounts. It is also interesting to note most respondents are employing an ABM strategy of some form into their marketing mix.

What have the main aims of ABM strategies been since May 2020?