January 26, 2023

By Andy Miller, Managing Partner at True North Advisory

At True North Advisory, we have a number of both emerging companies as well as larger more mature companies that come to us asking the question, “What is the right framework to begin to develop the overall go-to-market strategy for my company?” 

Many of our early stage companies have pieces of the “framework puzzle” in place, but not an end to end strategy of how to come out of the framework exercise with an executable plan.

We have found that there are several key elements of a go-to-market framework that enable companies not only to execute the strategy, but are modular enough to be tailored to the key focus areas such as geography, vertical and distribution.

A brief overview of the framework elements are listed below, and when engaged with our True North team, we can provide a in-depth tailored solution geared to improve to time to market and revenue growth trajectory:

1. Review of Market Requirements – such as segments, verticals, partners, selling motion, packaging, billing models, branding, and deployment models to name a few. 
2. Segments – Focus on areas such as product complexity vs simplicity, distribution via Direct, VAR’s and SI’s vs Telco/Wireless/MSO’s, LE/Enterprise/Mid Market or Micro Business.
3. Verticals – What are the verticals to focus on including federal government, education, retail, financial services, hospitality, healthcare.  Each one needs integrated applications, work flows and user experiences matching specific requirements.
4. Partners – What type of partner should be engaged? Look at the addressable market, complexity, time to revenue, resources, solution fit, product readiness, organizational readiness. SI’s, VAR’s, Master Agents, Strategics and SP/Carrier. 
5. Packaging – OEM or Pre Packaged Solution via Partners. Review each element around the OEM vs Pre Packaged such as complexity, product, support, repeatability, selling, margins, revenue and resources required.
6. Geographies/Regions to Begin Go-to-Market – Each geography and/or region has different and sometimes unique requirements such as security, compliance, government regulations. Almost all large enterprises are global and multinational, so in many cases it requires the ability to serve multiple countries to participate in the opportunity. Also each region has different competition and incumbents. 
7. Billing Models – Based upon application (software/SaaS) and how the solution is being sold (direct, channel, resell, wholesale), the billing models vary and need to review options/elements such as contract, billing, term, transfer price, retail price, revenue and resources. 
8. Branding – Branding could be a direct brand or could be whitelabel or even co-branding based upon distribution and end user buying behavior. Elements to be reviewed around branding include marketing, content, sell thru, support, analysts, revenue and investment.

While it can be daunting for an early stage company, the sooner a framework can be in place for items such as stated above, the sooner it can become a tool to execute to and modify as the business grows and over the course of time needs to be enhanced/modified to meet changing market conditions.

We have many clients that, prior to engaging with True North, have either just several pieces of the framework puzzle in place. We’ve also had clients where they were trying unproven approaches to move faster, but failed to engage in the process that is in fact necessary to create a viable and growth oriented plan/strategy.

“At True North, we have several proven frameworks around the go-to-market and channel that have yielded material changes to the clients time to market, revenue uplift as well as a framework in place to grow off of”, says Andy Miller, Managing Partner at True North Advisory. 

“In addition, what we bring to a client is not only a framework, but introductions to key strategics/customers/partners that would take years to engage with, so both framework execution and executable CXO introductions/engagements are our differentiators”. 

Add on top of the challenges of launching a go-to-market strategy and a challenging economic backdrop, execution is key as well as time to market and the combination of a well vetted GTM Plan and Channel Plan/Framework which can make the difference of success or failure. We aim to make every client plan something that exceeds expectations.