The TL;DR
Adam Schoenfeld woke up and chose violence with his hot take on this one. Adam (Keyplay) joins Trinity Nguyen (UserGems) and Jarod Greene (Vivun) to dig into some of the most common misconceptions around TAM, ICP, and ID’ing fit.
What’s working when defining your ICP
LET DATA LEAD THE WAY
Set it up in your CRM. Track your customers. What’s changed? Who’s churned? Why? Is our hypothesis for who’s a fit actually our best fit?
What’s not working when defining your ICP
OBSESSION OVER INTENT SIGNALS
Fit > intent. For real.
The key takeaways
- Importance of a defined ICP: Precisely defining the Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) is crucial. Adam Schoenfeld stresses the need to establish clear parameters around the ICP to ensure sales and marketing efforts are aligned and focused. Trinity Nguyen’s approach of regularly revisiting the ICP at UserGems illustrates the dynamic nature of ICPs and how companies must adapt to shifts in customer fit and market trends.
- Patience with strategy implementation: Give new strategies time to take effect before making changes. Trinity Nguyen points out that particularly in a commercial SaaS context, it’s important to allow time for the market to absorb and react to advertising efforts. The pitfall of frequently changing ICPs can be counterproductive and may not provide sufficient data on what works and what doesn’t.
- Utilization of multi-source feedback: Utilize both wins and losses to refine your ICP. Jarod Greene’s insights into Vivun’s process of refining their ICP by considering various attributes signal the importance of using diverse feedback channels. This informs a more strategic and adaptable approach to targeting customers.
- Alignment across teams: Ensure alignment across all teams regarding the ICP. The importance of keeping sales, marketing, product development, and customer success teams on the same page regarding the ICP cannot be overstated. This unity ensures a cohesive go-to-market strategy and ensures that all customer-facing teams are targeting and supporting the same customer profile.
- Focus on fit over intent: Fit should be a priority over intent signals. While intent data platforms can suggest potential customer interest, understanding whether a lead truly fits the ICP is more valuable. The episode discusses the tendency of B2B marketers to over-prioritize intent signals, yet the panel agrees that a deeper understanding of the customer—including their challenges and fit within the ICP—is essential for effective marketing strategies.
The things to listen for
00:00 Deeply understand customers for building ideal profiles
05:02 Focus on serving the best customers effectively
09:46 Tracking customer criteria, part of company DNA
12:48 Learning to navigate variance for business success
15:07 Set boundaries, focus on strategic growth mindset
17:26 Challenges in using limited historical data explained
20:36 No’s and not nows provide valuable insight
25:25 Rely on accurate CRM data for sales
27:27 Listening to gong recordings for sales improvement
30:59 Implement strategy into operations, test and analyze
34:05 Companies expand product offerings due to complexity
38:23 Champion needs to handle objections, targeted messaging
42:17 Team enjoys memes, aims for brand recognition
The recap
Ready for some real talk on nailing your ideal customer profile?
Host Mark Huber, along with big brains Adam Schoenfeld, Trinity Nguyen, and Jarod Greene, spill the tea on all things ICP and why getting it right is like hitting the marketing jackpot for your company.
Trinity from UserGems gets real about the hustle her team went through to hone in on that perfect ICP. You’ve got multiple product lines or services? They talk about why you might need more than one ICP to truly connect with your customer base.
Jarod’s all about ditching old-school titles and instead, zeroing in on what your buyers are actually looking to accomplish. And can we talk about how Mark throws some shade at just using big TAM numbers without getting down to the nitty-gritty of who’s really going to buy into your product?
The gang doesn’t just throw theories around; they’re serving up some fresh, actionable tips. They chop it up about why it’s key to let your ICP strategies marinate for a bit and how to keep your sales messages on point by actually listening to customer calls (yeah, that’s right, sneaky, but genius).
Oh, and get this – Trinity even talks about a downright bold marketing campaign using memes to charm CFOs. Because why not blend a little fun into the finance world, right?
If you’re tired of the same old sales spiels and looking to really click with your customers, ‘The Proof Point’s’ latest episode is your go-to. It’s jam-packed with straight-up advice about sharpening your ICP game and making every marketing dollar count.
