The Seven Deadly Sins of Startup Marketing

Tanya Candia just published this, and I thought it would be worth including in this blog. She covers all the basics which we oven overlook.

Startups have been around for a long time, and you would think that the mistakes made in the early days would be well-understood and avoided. However, in the past two or three years we have seen a series of errors in startups around the globe. They are easy to spot, and preventable. However, since they are so commonly seen, it is worthwhile discussing their importance and how to avoid them. Here are the seven deadly sins of startup marketing:

• Not enough market focus
• Not enough marketing focus
• Outsourcing the wrong things
• Failing to understand what goes on behind the scenes
• Producing random sales support materials
• Misunderstanding how PR works —and how to work PR
• Institutionalizing a we-they attitude with Sales

Now let uspresent each of these in a bit of detail, explaining why they are so deadly, and how to avoid their impact.

• Not enough market focus —Many startups go after two or three vertical markets and introduce a family of products. While this is normal in a large company, it can spell disaster for a startup. The lack of vertical market domain expertise, budget and market awareness can all contribute to failure to gain early market share. With a startup, less is more. Best practices indicate choosing one market, understanding it thoroughly, and then keeping things simple by introducing one product or service that brings clear value to that market.
• Not enough marketing focus— A green marketing exec will try to tackle all aspects of marketing: advertising, PR, web, direct marketing, analyst relations, collateral, etc. Quickly overwhelmed, he begins to outsource everything including copy writing and messaging. Much better to spend your time, efforts and budget in just a couple of areas: one should be the website, another should be PR (more about this below) and another has to be lead gen. Ask yourself: what bad thing happens if I don’t do any advertising or only attend one trade show a year? Will I lose sales, or will I free up time to focus learning what works in this market?
• Outsourcing the wrong things— Many startups spend money lavishly in the early days, bringing in high-end systems such as demand creation and lead nurturing. The most successful startups keep both in-house, and spend a lot of time and energy getting this right. I remember working at a startup where the VP of marketing tracked every campaign, looked at every incoming lead, and made sure that every lead was nurtured and followed up on. This attention to detail gave him a precise view of what was working and what was not. That way, he could tweak campaigns and quickly spot the effects. It takes a lot of time, but it’s time well spent.
• Not understanding what goes on behind the scenes
  A good marketer can do it all. The best VPs of Marketing can create the messaging, define the target market and value proposition, design and build the website, etc. Of course, they may not be experts at everything, but they understand first-hand what goes on behind the scenes. This doesn’t mean that the marketing exec has to do it all, but has to understand it all. Otherwise, budgets will be exceeded, deadlines will be missed, and results will be sub-optimal.
• Producing random Sales support materials
  How much collateral material is needed? Sales will say they need just the bit that will help them get the first meeting, overcome objections, and drive to a final sale. Marketing probably has a laundry list of pieces that are “needed” – based on past experience, board member requests, etc. Again, less is more. Before embarking on the quest for the ultimate collateral set, Marketing needs to understand what is really necessary to sell, by participating in sales calls, listening to the prospect, and thus determining the smallest set of collateral that will satisfy the needs.
• Failing to understand how PR works — and how to work PR
  PR is the startup’s best friend. A company that cannot afford to hire a PR firm early on can still do a lot to lay the groundwork and build awareness. Build story lines, get customer testimonials, measure customer satisfaction, do surveys— then pitch your own stories. Start to build your own relationship with the journalists and analysts, giving them information that is relevant and interesting to their constituents. Then, when you are ready to engage a PR firm, you will have laid the foundation and built an initial set of interested media.
• Instituting and institutionalizing a we-they attitude toward Sales
  This is one of the most potentially destructive attitudes for a startup. In a big company, an exec fights for his own department, and understands how to get budget, resources and recognition. In a startup, the boundaries need to be erased. The only entity that matters is the company, and it stands to reason that the only thing that matters is sales. The attitude has to be “We are all in this together, and we will work side-by-side to make sure we as a company succeed.” Here, there is no room for ego, animosity or isolation.

Learn from the mistakes of others, and make sure you don't repeat the past. Make your startup the best it can be, with a positive attitude, judicious incestment of scarce resources, and most of all, productive cooperation across the company.