It's no secret that many new products face failure in the market.
However, with careful preparation and a well-structured go-to-market (GTM) strategy, you can significantly improve your odds of success.
A GTM strategy serves as your roadmap to introduce a new product or service successfully, addressing key elements such as product offering, target market, pricing, distribution, and operational requirements.
A go-to-market (GTM) strategy is a comprehensive plan outlining how a company intends to introduce and promote a new product or service.
It encompasses various aspects, including marketing, sales, distribution, and more, to ensure a cohesive approach to market entry.
GTM Strategy vs. Marketing Strategy vs. Business Plan. While these terms are often used interchangeably, they serve different purposes:
In an ideal world, launching a product would be as simple as a single click and a tweet, with customers instantly flocking to it.
However, the reality is more complex.
Here are three compelling reasons why a robust GTM strategy is essential:
While you can't predict every outcome, you can influence many factors when launching a product or service.
Instead of starting from scratch, let's explore how to construct a GTM strategy step by step, leveraging established components:
Begin with comprehensive market research to gain insights into your target audience and competitors. This step provides critical data to inform your strategy.
Once you understand the market, focus on identifying your ideal customers. This step involves both scientific methods (surveys, interviews) and educated guesses based on competitor data.
Develop a clear positioning strategy that highlights your product or service’s unique benefits. Pricing should align with your positioning and appeal to your target market.
Craft compelling messaging that resonates with your audience. Determine the core marketing tactics and channels you'll use to convey this messaging effectively.
Decide how you will make your product or service available to consumers. This choice varies based on whether you offer digital or physical assets, and it impacts your distribution channels significantly.
Ensure that your marketing, sales, and support teams are on the same page. Collaboration and communication among these departments are critical to a successful product or service launch.
Define your budget, timeline, and human resource requirements. This step helps you plan for a smooth launch without overextending your resources.
Determine the key metrics that will indicate the success of your GTM strategy. These metrics should align with your overall business objectives and guide your decision-making.
Let's draw inspiration from three real-world success stories:
LinkedIn: LinkedIn leveraged the network effect and a "double viral loop" to grow exponentially, providing professionals with a trusted online platform.
Ahrefs: Ahrefs started by excelling in one critical area (link analysis for SEO) and expanded its offerings based on user needs, harnessing positive word of mouth.
SEGA: To compete with Nintendo, SEGA employed a multi-pronged strategy, including price reduction, defeating Mario with Sonic The Hedgehog, offering more sports games, targeting teens, and using clever marketing.
Developing a robust go-to-market strategy is a crucial step in ensuring the success of your product or service launch.
It involves thorough research, careful planning, and cross-departmental alignment.
By following these eight essential steps and crafting a well-defined strategy, you can significantly increase your chances of a successful product launch and long-term market success.
For further guidance or questions, consider consulting with a marketing specialist to tailor your strategy to your specific industry and product.
Christophe Duhamel, co-founder on Marmiton, is a pioneer of the Internet in France. He started as a computer engineer in one of the first web agencies in France in 1995, before shifting towards marketing and consulting out of interest.He completed his training with a master's degree in marketing management at ESSEC business school.As Marmiton CEO for 20 years, he brought the site from zero to over 20 million unique users per month, managing all new leverages: communities, video, mobile, social networks, vocal interface, managed to launch a (profitable) paper magazine and more than 50 cookbooks.
He worked with most food brands, ad agencies, tech companies, and big media groups owning Marmiton (aufeminin, Axel Springer, TF1, Reworld).Christophe is also a writer and a teacher in several business schools (entrepreneurship, digital marketing), since he loves sharing his experience and helping companies to innovate.
Georges is a versatile and no-nonsense marketer with over 12 years of experience leading growth in both early-stage environments (eFounders/Hexa & YC alumni) and hyper-growth companies (as Vice President at Too Good To Go, Sunday, and Chance).
His expertise covers six key growth topics, allowing him to drive significant results and provide top-tier services to ambitious and purpose-driven organizations. Georges has honed this expertise through diverse roles at notable companies like Chance, Sunday, TooGoodToGo, Station, Hexa (formerly eFounders), and Capgemini Invent.
In his roles at Chance, Sunday, TooGoodToGo, Station, Hexa, and Capgemini Invent, Georges has driven impactful changes. He has aligned career goals with personal identities at Chance, streamlined dining experiences at Sunday, and promoted sustainable practices at TooGoodToGo. At Station, he enhanced web app productivity, and at Hexa, he played a pivotal role in developing cutting-edge SaaS solutions. His work at Capgemini Invent involved creating innovative solutions for complex business technology challenges.
As the Head of Growth at Too Good To Go and Sunday, Georges's leadership was crucial in accelerating their growth, leveraging his experience with eFounders and YC alumni to deepen his understanding of the startup ecosystem.
Georges's approach is straightforward: he cuts through the noise and focuses on what truly drives growth. This approach has been instrumental in both his success and the success of the organizations he has been a part of
With over 10 years of experience in B2B SaaS marketing, I have a proven track record of building go-to-market strategies, scaling acquisition efforts, and driving revenue and growth for tech startups across various industries and customer segments. I have co-founded and led the marketing function of Indy, a leading accounting software for freelancers, where we achieved remarkable milestones such as 50000 customers, $10M ARR, and $50M funding in five years.
With over a decade of experience in B2B marketing, Alice is a seasoned professional who has fueled growth for industry giants like Salesforce and Aircall. As a leader of large international marketing teams, she spearheaded the expansion of these companies into new markets, showcasing her prowess in global strategy execution.
Alice is a true expert in all facets of marketing and Go-To-Market (GTM) strategy. Her expertise spans from field marketing and strategic planning to campaign execution, brand development, and team leadership.
As the founder of her own consultancy, AG Marketing, Alice has refined her skills in consulting and advising businesses of all sizes and industries. She is ideally positioned to craft tailored strategies, offer actionable insights, and deploy proven tactics to drive marketing success.
In an intensive consulting session, Alice will offer a critical eye and actionable feedback on your marketing strategy, leveraging her wealth of experience to help you achieve your business objectives.
With 10 years of experience in B2B marketing, Eliott currently serves as the VP of Marketing at Skello, where he has been for over five years, starting as the first marketing hire. During his time at Skello, he has expanded the marketing team to 10+ members by 2024. Eliott manages both the Growth & Acquisition and Brand & Communication departments, focusing on strategies in demand generation, branding, communications, and managing events and press relations.His marketing skills include community engagement, go-to-market strategies, and sales enablement, while his management expertise is evident in his ability to develop corporate culture, manage P&L, and lead events and team-building efforts. Eliott is adept in integrating Generative AI technologies and No-Code solutions.Before his current role, he was Head of Growth at MyBestPro, specializing in professional-client intermediation in Europe, and began his career at a brand design agency. Eliott continuously enhances his skills to adapt to the evolving tech landscape, with educational experiences at Le Wagon in coding and entrepreneurial programs at The Family.
Additionally, Eliott has been a Trainer for more than two and a half years, mentoring executive committees, operational teams, and individuals in various industries, including B2C, B2B, luxury, fintech, advertising, and healthcare. His training is aimed at improving leadership and marketing skills within teams.
Gwenn has 12 years of experience in growth and digital marketing in fast-growing companies.
She started her career at Fifty-five, where she worked as a digital marketing & analytics consultant with banks and retail companies such as BNP Paris, La Redoute and Sarenza, defining their global strategy with data tracking, measurement & concrete business use cases.
She then became CMO of Captain Contrat, a French legal-tech start-up where she built the Marketing team from acquisition to activation & retention, contributed to increasing the number of new clients (x3.5 YoY in 2017; x2 YoY in 2018).
In 2019, Gwenn joined Qonto as Head of User Acquisition, she helped grow the customer base from 50,000 to over 450,000 customers (March 2024) in France, Germany, Spain & Italy. She led a team from 5 to over 50 people with experts on Ads, SEO, Affiliation, Referral Program, Marketing automation, Website, Analytics.
She just started her own business to advise startups on their Growth strategies: to grow revenue with a KPI & Go-to-Market framework but also Growth roadmaps, to expand on new markets and services, to structure and grow teams (hire, make people evolve, coach).
With 15 years of experience, including 8 in dynamic scale-ups like Botify, Skello, lemlist, AssoConnect, and Spendesk, Charles is a growth catalyst for companies.
He's an expert in Sales and Marketing and excels in driving strategic projects such as pricing and M&A.Today, as COO & GM at lempire (lemlist, Taplio), he brings strong expertise in Marketing, Sales, and Go-To-Market Strategy, having already guided many startups in their business strategies.
His career has immersed him in various contexts, from the SMB environment at Skello to the Enterprise level at Botify, working with clients like Amazon and Nike.Charles' experience in Product-Led Growth, gained at lemlist and AssoConnect, complements his versatile profile.
He combines a sharp analytical mind, honed by 5 years in M&A and as a CFO, with significant management experience, leading teams ranging from 10 to 170 people.He's ideally positioned to boost sales performance, identify growth opportunities, drive international or product launches, and provide M&A advice.
Julien is a digital marketing specialist with over 10 years of experience in various industry.
Julien started his career in real estate.
He was in charge of the growth hacking for a startup during 2 years.
After this first position, he worked for more than 3 years in the healthcare industry for another startup based in Paris (Carenity). He was in charge of social media and community management.
Julien used his skills to significantly increase the number of members and deploy it in several countries (Germany, Italy, Spain, etc.)
After this second experience, Julien joined Adeo Group (Leroy Merlin) as Head of Social Media for Delamaison, a e-commerce website. His mission was to leverage on social media to increase brand awareness, generate additional sales and manage customer support.
Julien finally joined Credit Agricole Group in 2018 as Head of Social Media for Sofinco and then the Corporate Center of Credit Agricole Consumer Finance as Digital Marketing Manager.
Julien is now in charge of supporting all of international entities (19 countries) in their digital acquisition, optimization of their customer journey (CRO approach) and improving the profitability of marketing channels.
Why it's a good idea to have a call with Julien:
1- A varied career path (startups, SMEs, large companies)
2- +10 years experience in digital marketing
3- International mindset
4- A capacity to challenge your strategic action plans and suggest very concrete quick wins.
Jean-Sébastien is an expert in business development and marketing with over 15 years of experience in the B2B sector.
Two years ago, he founded SIZE UP, a company specializing in implementing growth marketing and outbound marketing campaigns for its clients. If you're looking to energize your entrepreneurial project, discuss client acquisition strategies, or explore prospecting, Jean-Sébastien is the ideal person to guide you.
With 6 years of experience in tech scale-ups like Heetch, Partoo, Qobra, Simon is a Marketing leader who loves to build strategies to impact one thing, revenue.
He's an expert in Growth & Marketing on several channels, Go To Market, outbound, Nurturing, paid acquisition and demand generation to drive revenue.He loves to speak about Sales & Marketing organization and it's a marketing leader with a high revenue touch.After several years at Heetch & Partoo, he arrived at Qobra as a third employee and he's a big part of the Qobra Scale (from 4 to 50 employees with Seed and Serie A in two years). He has a strong appetite for market segmentation and creates Marketing strategies to achieve company targets.
In addition to being a T-Shaped Marketer with strong Sales & Marketing skills, he really enjoyed talking to people and helping them to bring real value.
With over 7 years of experience in the tech industry, I have carved out a distinguished career as a Chief Marketing Officer (CMO), renowned for driving business growth, enhancing sales operations, leading marketing activations, and steering strategic projects and management teams with unparalleled expertise.
Currently, I am at the forefront of establishing the entire marketing framework for @Openeat, a revolutionary offering in the food tech space. @Openeat stands out as the only restaurant voucher system that is universally accepted, designed to bolster purchasing power and transform the dining experience for users everywhere.
In addition to my primary role, I have initiated and lead @Partnershift, a groundbreaking side project. As the first B2B community of its kind, @Partnershift unites over 900 French partnership professionals—including Vice Presidents, Heads of Partnerships, and Managers—creating an exclusive network for collaboration, innovation, and professional growth in the realm of partnerships.
Marc de Zordo has founded and developed numerous companies, navigating them through phases of profitable growth and hyper-growth, and has made significant contributions to various projects across different sectors. His latest entrepreneurial venture, Getfluence, established in 2018, impressively scaled to a turnover of €10M within five years. Achieving profitability in just one year, he successfully raised €5M and led a team of over 50 employees, expanding operations across five European markets, with a footprint in five offices and three subsidiaries.
His approach is characterized by pragmatism and meticulous attention to detail, driven by a strong business orientation, a comprehensive perspective, and a robust tech/digital culture. This foundation has allowed him to excel in several key areas, including the definition and execution of digital, business, and marketing strategies; the creation and management of companies on both a local and international scale with effective deployment of resources; and the development of a business-centric product vision.
He has adeptly led wide-ranging 360-degree projects encompassing product and technology, from roadmap setting and objective definition to team management and deadline adherence. His strategies have consistently boosted productivity through the use of technology and automation while optimizing costs, ensuring the continuous growth of profitable businesses.
Maëlys is a specialist in digital acquisition tools with already 10 years of experience in digital marketing, especially in SEO, inbound marketing, brand content and SMO.
Initially trained as a Communications Research Engineer in Communications, she quickly turned towards digital technology and its myriad possibilities.
Her journey began with her own web and e-marketing agency (SEO/SEA/SMO/SMA…), which she co-founded and co-managed for 6 years until its sale in 2020.
To continue with her entrepreneurial spirit, she also co-founded the company Happy Tech in 2017 (until 2023), a business dedicated to well-being at work.
Since 2021, she has been leading her own professional training company specializing in video courses.
Passionate and always active, she works on several compagnies in the same time. Initially a Professor, then Head of Master's programs, and finally Head of the E-business division, Maëlys continue to teach in many Higher Education Schools
She is also the author of a book « Stratégie E-Marketing » and a doctoral candidate in 'Changes and Agilities'.
With 15 years of experience working with key players in retail marketing, such as Marie-Laure PLV Merchandising, Media6, and HKF FRANCE, Christophe has developed a comprehensive skill set covering the entire value chain. His expertise ranges from technical development to sourcing and procurement, including commercial development as well.
He is an expert in Point of sales and point of purchases, excels in successfully managing projects, developing innovative technical solutions, and sourcing materials for commercial furniture, displays, packaging, and windows display, across various materials as wood, plastic, metal, cardboard, resin etc.
Throughout his career, Christophe has collaborated with clients from diverse environments, including Coca-Cola, Ice Watch, Belvédère Vodka, Izipizi, Le Coq Sportif, Louis Vuitton, and Dom Pérignon.
Furthermore, he has established a network of partners capable of meeting corporate social responsibility requirements by using environmentally responsible and innovative materials.
With his critical and pragmatic mindset, honed through setting up a business unit in France for a Hong-Kong based company, Christophe can help with all your strategic needs for developing and implementing your point-of-sale support.
Whether it's decision-making, supplier discussions, briefing, or creative and technical guidance, he's here to make your projects successful.
Florian is a seasoned Marketing Expert, specializing in Go-to-Market and B2B Lead Generation.
With 12 years of dedicated hands-on experience in crafting and executing Go-to-Market strategies, Florian's journey includes valuable roles at renowned organizations such as Standard & Poor's, HSBC, and Cartier. He has worn multiple hats, including Chief Revenue Officer and Chief Growth Officer in Europe and North America, which has allowed him to gain insights into diverse industries and global markets, enriching his perspective as a marketing consultant.
As the founder of CEOS Marketing, he operates part-time as a Head of Marketing, assisting SMBs and Mid-Market businesses in designing their strategies, providing guidance on the execution process, and equipping and training teams.
Florian's expertise extends across various critical areas, encompassing Go-to-Market strategies, B2B Lead Generation, A/B testing, Marketing Analytics, and Team Training.
Juliette has been a Growth Marketing specialist for 7 years, including 4 in a challenging hyper-growth environment at Spendesk (26th French Unicorn). From the start until the series D fundraising, she set up the French Growth Marketing strategy, a market that has since generated the most revenue.
For the past 2 years, she has been helping companies create and optimize their marketing strategies. She also enjoys being a trainer and speaker on all topics related to Growth Marketing.
Overall, Juliette can help you with your 360° marketing strategy to help you scale. Let's talk about branding, personas, inbound marketing, growth hacking, social selling, SEO, data, nurturing, events, product marketing, recruitment, etc.
She is also very organized, always looking for ways to be more productive, and will share with you all of her templates and processes so you can easily replicate them in your company!
Michael has been a Website Specialist for the past 8 years.
He started to build his first websites back in 2010 and managed to ship more than 100 of them for companies at different stages of growth. His main skills are around designing and developing efficient websites with CMS. He currently is the Senior Website Manager at Spendesk, leading the web squad and roadmap globally in close collaboration with Developers, Designers, Marketing Specialists and Brand Experts.
Overall, Michael can help you challenge your landing pages and design strategy, advise on CMS choices, discuss how to build a dedicated team and processes for your website and challenge your web stack. Various topics you’ll be able to discuss with him: B2B websites, CRO, A/B testing, CMS, Analytics, Traffic growth, UX, Branding and Team organization.
Marie-Lou is an entrepreneur and growth marketing expert with 10 years experience at Canal+, Banque Populaire, ONU, Meero and various startups. She has built media and communities of several thousand people. She can guide you in shaping your marketing strategy, building brand awareness, creating media and communities, and boosting sales.
She has been coaching startups incubated at Station F for 2 years in this 30-minute format, and was voted one of her incubator's favorite coaches for her ultra-concrete advices and ROI-oriented approach.
Kevin is a b2b acquisition expert with 6 years' experience in B2B growth marketing.
After launching a marketplace in a startup studio, he helped Ankorstore structure its growth strategy and now advises high-profile post-Serie A startups.
Kevin has also created two SaaS software applications for b2b sales teams from scratch, with a total of 1,500 users.
Kevin will bring a critical eye to the structuring of your acquisition during an intensive consulting session
