Founder: Exit Five | Former CMO | The marketing I did helped Drift to a $1B valuation & Privy to a $100M+ acquisition. Now helping B2B marketers build successful careers with Exit Five.
Here’s one of my favorite B2B SaaS marketing plays you can steal. It’s called “The Objection Smasher.” Create a public facing landing page and list out the brutally honest 5-10 reasons customers don’t buy your product and why they churn. Every buyer is working through 2-3 vendors and hundreds of features. But they all know they are being sold to. Of course everything you say about your product is going to be glowing. But that’s what everyone is doing. You can shift the conversation to you by earning trust and credibility from sharing the top reasons people don’t buy. Help them buy. Plus: I’d rather have a chance at sharing our POV on the reasons why people don’t buy and controlling the message vs letting them wonder and maybe never even talk to us. Handle the objections upfront before you even get to a sales call and then your sales team isn’t playing defense right from the first call. Sit down with your sales, customer success, and product leaders. Take insights from each team and handle those objections in advance. This could also easily start with a blog post.
To illustrate how your technique works, it would be great to see a follow-up post(s) that analyze landing pages.
Love this strategy Dave Gerhardt - what’s the best example of a page like this you’ve seen?
Similar to "putting the turd on the mantle" amiright, Richard Sharp?
"Handle the objections upfront before you even get to a sales call and then your sales team isn't playing defense right from the first call." Yes!! The best way to address any objections is to address them BEFORE they become objections in the first place! This is a brilliant take, Dave. It works!! 🤘👊💥😎
Dave, I like this thinking a lot, but curious, do you think every company at every stage should do something like this? What if you’re an early stage company and not quite clear on your ICP yet?
I like this a lot - we've noticed that when on demo calls we are honest with clients about why they might not be a good fit for us...it earns us trust and they tend to still want to buy but now with eyes wide open about the challenge. Or they don't buy and still appreciate the. honestly and come back to us when more things are aligned.
This is a proven strategy. In a research piece, it was found that a 5 star review may have 30% conversion and a one star maybe at 5%. However, when companies take control of that one star review and actively use that for marketing, that same review now has a conversion of 57%. Its from the entire concept of, "This is not for them, it's for you."
A smart marketing strategy for B2B SaaS providers would be this! The Objection Smasher may unquestionably aid in establishing confidence and trust while also assisting customers in making wise judgments. You can manage the dialogue and address any concerns up front by developing a public-facing landing page that lists the main deterrents to purchasing your goods. Additionally, by doing it this way, you have the opportunity to communicate the proper message before making a sales contact, which will greatly improve your team's chances of success.
MARKETER/DESIGNER
1yAny real example of this approach? Let's not make this post like others about marketing on linkedin. The ones with thoughts and no actionable advice 😉