Mark Donnigan Consultant

Mark Donnigan develops disruptive innovative start-ups. Mark's superpower is architecting go-to-market strategies and marketing motions that drive real organization results for technical and product-centric founders. Mark's growth and market advancement experience covers 20 years as a transformative B2B marketing and service leader, driving demand, brand development, and method for start-up and growth-stage business.

As an expert and virtual marketing leader (fractional-CMO), Mark Donnigan deals with startup creators and CEOs from B2B disruptive innovation technology companies to help them develop, bootstrap, and scale their marketing and go-to-market actions.

LEARN MORE: https://growthstage.marketing

Mark Donnigan has managed teams as large as 25, making up SDRs, AEs, and marketing, producing $29mm/year. Mark brought spending plan commitments to $3mm/year for operations and $400k/year for marketing. Offer sizes varying from mid-five figures to mid-six figures every year.

As a startup marketing consultant, Mark Donnigan's inbound and outbound marketing experience consist of building and mentoring high-performance groups that carry out as needed generation, brand and product marketing, PR, digital, and occasions where he develops and carries out high-impact programs that drive income, produce ROI, trigger the marketplace, and provides company results.

Mark Donnigan believes that the finest marketing specialists and marketing leaders are doers. Mark's marketing experience includes all elements of need generation, ABM, SEO, e-mail marketing, paid marketing, occasions, PR (internal & company), and item marketing.

Mark is a problem solver and a first-principles thinker who is creative and analytical. Mark always works cross-functionally and has shown success, building, leading, and mentoring marketing, sales, and organization development groups that have really produced more than $500mm in revenue/shareholder worth.

Mark has actually found that building a classification ought to be the leading objective for every marketing leader and it is the foundation of his technique and method. Mark Donnigan has extensive B2B marketing experience that consists of building and mentoring high-performance teams.

Mark Donnigan is a systems thinker, and he positions a high worth on teamwork. Mark has extensive experience working along with sales, product, operations, and finance to make sure that business and income objectives of the business are constantly gone beyond.

Development Stage Marketing exists to provide entrepreneurs and creators services for:

Architecting the market category that is finest fit to the special worth proposition of your technology.
High impact marketing assistance so that you can reach your earnings objectives and scale sustainably.
Attaining go-to-market positioning throughout the sales and marketing organizations.
Extracting the greatest value from every marketing dollar.
Insider understanding and insights about the B2B buying journey and how to navigate a progressively fragmented client choice hierarchy.
Operationalizing marketing, from system and process advancement to making the very first hires.

Thoughts on what it requires an effective marketer and CMO today.

If you are a CEO who feels your B2B marketing does not have a clear connection to the company, you are not alone. A research study completed by the marketing consultancy Fournaise discovered that 80% of Chief Executives are not delighted with the work their top Marketing leader is doing. Examining what the present business reality suggests for marketing leaders, I remembered the concept of a Peacetime leader and a Wartime leader from Ben Horowitz's book "The Hard Aspect Of Hard Things."

Horowitz explained the concept in an article where he made up that the Peacetime CEO "focuses on the big image and empowers her individuals to make in-depth choices." The Wartime CEO, on the other hand, "values a speck of dust on a gnat's ass if it interrupted the prime directive."

The Peacetime CEO "comprehends what to do with a substantial advantage," while the Wartime CEO "is paranoid." Peacetime CEO "works to minimize dispute," and Wartime CEO "heightens the contradictions."

Peacetime in service is when a company has the ability to grow in its core market due to a significant benefit vs. the competitors. In times of peace, business focuses on broadening the market and boosting the organization's strengths. For CMO's, Peacetime is when we are totally free to be imaginative with our brand name structure by attending each exhibit with an even larger cubicle than in 2015's and investing exorbitantly on sponsorships, all under the guise of building the brand.

Wartime is a different thing totally because, in Wartime, the life and death of our service might be on the line.
As I compose this post, the whole world is combating an invisible opponent called COVID-19, which has let loose a discouraging dose of business uncertainty worldwide. For CMO's, the COVID-19 pandemic is service equivalent of war. No longer do our 2020 marketing methods make great sense.

This is more than being in an area with the light on, and all of a sudden you discover yourself in pitch-black darkness, so you walk tepidly, continuing in the same guidelines understanding that you were heading towards the door prior to the lights got turned off. No, not just has the pandemic turned the lights out, its blown a huge crater in our course that was not there prior to, and devoid of light in the room, can not be seen. Nevertheless we should prevent at all expenses falling into the crater.

No one wish for war, however a Wartime leader does not avoid the fight, instead, they acknowledge that Wartime is the single finest opportunity to leapfrog sidetracked competitors and take ground away. What follows is a set of ideas and ideas to assist you find your "Wartime CMO combat strategy."

How to act as a Wartime CMO.

During Wartime, everyone is in uncharted waters, but this is where the possibility is for many companies who previously had a difficult time to compete against larger competitors and dominant market forces. Now, for the very first time, you might be on comparable footing as your more powerful competitors. It's the perfect possibility to define your future.

In a global decline like what COVID-19 has set off, absolutely nothing makes good sense. And yet, a few of your rivals will continue to perform their typical "attempted and genuine" marketing playback, presuming that building the trademark name with business interactions messages from the CEO is going to contribute to their company goals. Now is the best possibility for the Wartime CMO to take ground in the market.

Take strong action.

Imaginative marketing is required in Wartime more than ever. Now is the time to examine your necessary assumptions. As the around the world organization environment has modified, and the stability of the core service cast doubt on, CMO's needs to be prepared to reassess their initial strategy.
Think about that less consumers will correspond to decreased requirement. And decreased requirement suggests markets will not respond as they did prior to the crisis.

Think about it in this manner, when individuals purchase less, advertisers invest less. However prior to you follow a slash and burn the marketing invest playbook, here are a number of things to be educated about:

Investment bank Cowen and Company examined the last 6 financial downturns considered that 1950 and discovered that costs on direct marketing grew throughout the previous economic recessions. Significance, you will want to consider your mix of trademark name marketing carefully compared to sales activation marketing. It's not time to stop marketing. Remember, there will be deals throughout the board as media outlets see business cut their advertising and marketing spends. Press marketing and branding drops in a downturn, but sales activation marketing always increases.

Shift spending to more quantifiable channels so that you can adjust rapidly. Speed is whatever. Marketing initiatives able to be tracked with uniqueness will be a lot more important than broad mass-market tasks. Slowdowns accelerate the reduction of interruption-based mass marketing. In its place will be an increased concentrate on quantifiable and relationship-based techniques.

Downturns create a chance for companies that are more efficient at turning marketing financial investments into income. In the middle of a decrease when advertisers are cutting their costs is an enjoyable time to take advantage of low CPMs and Licensed public accountants.

The Institute of Practitioners in Marketing completed a study in 2008 that discovered, "Following a budget cut, a brand name will continue to get from the marketing financial investment made over the previous few years. This will reduce any short-term service impacts, and will result in a dangerously deceptive increase in short-term success. The longer-term company damage will be more substantial, but will not be seen in the beginning."

Millward Brown reported in their research study "Marketing Throughout Economic Recession: To Invest or Not to Invest?" that 60% of trademark name that went 'dark' throughout an economic recession by cutting their TV marketing invest for 6 months experienced a decline in Trademark name Use by 24% with a 28% decrease in Brand name Image. Brands that cut their ad spending plan at a greater rate relative to their competitors were at an even greater danger of share loss.
There are an unbelievable number of marketing studies that verify in a decline, trademark name that continue marketing and advertising efforts recuperate quicker. It takes strong action to invest when the information suggests that ROI is not possible. A Wartime CMO battles to maintain the budget required to continue marketing.

Maximize the worth of each lead produced.

In a slowdown, risk-averse buyers take even longer to research study purchases, and this uses similarly to B2B and B2C purchasers. When you first recognize a prospect, they will likely stay in the awareness phase of your funnel and will not be all set to engage with an SDR or BDR. Do not require this interaction. Marketing needs to make sure not to move a prospect through the funnel too quickly. Keep in mind, the prospect's skilled life has been turned on its head. What was a concern simply a couple of weeks or months ago, is most likely not top of mind today.

It's tempting in a decrease to tighten your grip on leads considering that the rationale is that now more than ever, all leads are necessary. Here is where lead scoring can be an important tool to recognize extremely engaged prospects from those who are not likely to become your consumers. Now is the time for Marketers to hold on to MQL's for a prolonged duration so that you can groom the possibility to the maximum possible level prior to handing them off to sales as a SQL.

Without lead scoring and a perfect prospect tracking system throughout your digital channels, as lots of as 9 out of 10 MQL's who are not yet sales-ready may be lost. They will buy, just not now. You do not want to lose out on the future sale given that you didn't keep in contact and include worth though the journey. In a "Wartime" economy, you need to do everything possible to optimize the worth of your MQL's.

CMO's that do a better task of handling leads and establishing early-stage prospects into sales-ready leads will remain in the finest position to win during the crisis and most absolutely once it has actually passed.

Concentrate on your present customers.

It's more affordable to grow incomes with your existing clients. Think of whether now is the time to downsize your mass list building programs and focus on structure much deeper relationships with those who currently understand your organization. This does not imply to stop your need gen efforts, but it does imply that you might wish to explore with product and sales how you can offer more to your existing clients.

In Peacetime, marketing groups are working on auto-pilot Growth Stage Marketing Consultant in pursuit of driving MQL's to satisfy sales reps. For a business that has actually obtained traction on their method to ending up being a category king or queen, this method, though costly feels excellent considering that of the exceptional volume of activity that is being produced. However, without careful analysis, the high degree of activity fools lots of CMO's and management groups into thinking that their need generation engine is carefully tuned when, in reality, it's releasing huge contamination, i.e. extremely high CAC, greater than typical churn for the category, low CLTV, and so on.

Marketing needs to line up with sales.

A brand-focused Marketing leader worries business with an exceptional education and pedigree, having really held significant titles with big business. There was a time when the marketing group may manage all business and product details and messaging with the market. If a buyer preferred to learn about a new product or check out whether a service may satisfy their requirement, they had no option however to call the company.

Reactions to concerns such as, Who's real and who isn't? - Who's item works, and whose does not? - What's coming? Now where available with a single post on the proper forum or LinkedIn group. As a result, the power shifted to the buyer.

We know that online marketers are no longer in control of the purchaser's journey. It is necessary to define a funnel that lays out expulsions a prospect must hand down the way to doing organization with the service. Buyers can link with us on the platform of their choosing. As the buying group has actually expanded to as many as 2 lots people, the idea that they will follow our procedure as we have really prescribed is seldom genuine.

You need a worth designer CMO who is revenue-focused.

A revenue-focused CMO will manage the engine behind a CEO's advancement plan. The shift from business being physical product developers or service business, to digital development companies where the item is dispersed as software application or software as a service through the Internet, has actually decreased the function of marketing. And is the element a revenue-focused CMO who is a worth designer is what all start-ups and disruptive development companies need today.

Today, marketing requires higher levels of technical capability as an outcome of the explosion of digital media and the marketing technologies that are associated with internet marketing. This transformation has actually been highlighted by Forrester, discussing a 20-year-old transition to digital as the driving force behind CMOs moving from being brand-builders to revenue motorists. Forrester goes on to report that a worth designer, revenue-driven Online online marketer, must be a story maker and not just a writer.

The CMO today should be a professional at creating and leading creative engagement and organization approach to establish a classification for business to dominate.

Here are a couple of techniques that a revenue-driven CMO requirement to run:

They will work carefully with the sales group to discover and map the buyer's journey. Where presumptions do not match what is occurring in the market, a value designer CMO will leave the office and hang out in the field. This leader comprehends that you can not drive revenue if you aren't near where the sale happens.

A revenue-focused CMO produces content targeted at each phase of the buyer's journey. Believe about the purchaser's journey as a set of gates where the material reacts to the main concerns a buyer has at each action so that they can complete the purchasing journey.
The brand-new generation CMO will gather engagement metrics for each gate while evaluating the success of the end-to-end marketing cycle to deliver the most prompt and licensed leads to their sellers. A worth designer CMO sees marketing as close allies to the sales group.

The revenue-centered CMO is always finding from and fine-tuning the procedure so that they can enhance the quantity and quality of leads that contributed to the pipeline and closed service.
Profits attribution and marketing ROI styles will show real results, not theorized or "presumed" requirements. This details is crucial for the revenue-focused CMO to solve considering that they care about marketing's influence on organization.

A revenue-focused CMO will concentrate on how their marketing efforts map to closed/won offers that drive the earnings and business goals of business. Vanity metrics like traffic, click-thru rates, CPM, and CTA conversions tell just a piece of the story.

What to attempt to discover in your next CMO.

In the vibrant state of business today, working with an efficient CMO is amongst the most hard things to do. Every market, business, and market section is various. Even where you can recognize prospects from the same organization community or environment, it's inadequate to simply take a look at years of experience or education. You require to examine the motivations and thought patterns of the individual. Ask:
Is the CMO a problem solver?

The most considerable risk today is on the marketplace side and not innovation. A marketing leader who isn't a concern solver will have a hard time to deal with the fast-changing nature of the marketplace and community structure.

Are they a doer?
In many marketing groups, there will be specific professionals who can operate at the greatest level throughout the series of abilities required. It's incumbent for a marketing leader to command consider as a doer. The CMO, who can show functional ability in the core locations that the group runs, will be more reputable than a supervisor simply.

Has the CMO held cross-functional positions?

The finest way to make sure that you bring in a CMO who is earnings and not brand-driven is to hire somebody who has actually shown up through item, sales, and corporate technique. Having direct exposure to the inner functions of product and sales is particularly useful as organization technique is becoming a more significant part of the CMO's series of obligations.

Do they think in systems or method service in a structured way?

As digital has actually exploded the variety of marketing user interface points, enabling purchasers to disaggregate business from the buying journey, a CMO needs to have the capability to think about systems and structures rather of safely defined marketing lanes. It is no longer appropriate to prepare in concerns to the social task, material marketing job, occasions, and PR, all as different activities. The successful CMO will start with business objective they are serving and be prepared to question whatever.

Can they communicate outside the walls of the service to the marketplace?

To end up being a story-maker, you should deserve listening to. A CMO remains in the perfect position to presume the evangelistic function for the organization. The most effective CMO's in any market are extremely visible spokespeople for their business.
Are they an incentive?

As the CMO will need to work cross-functionally to make sure that they have positioning with item and sales, the marketing head need to be a motivator. To establish a category needs discussion, settlement, and the ability to search for and reach an agreement.

Do they enable their group, or run by command and control?

A CMO who attempts to lead with ultimate authority will struggle to achieve service goals of business. Marketing groups today must work as engineering groups work in an agile fashion. Instead of nicely arranged 90-day job cadences, an agile marketing group performs a constant flow of initiatives while keeping the flexibility to change as the marketplace or company requirements identify.

Does the CMO comprehend category design?

I have in fact made up about category design and why every organization needs to own a classification to accomplish its optimum potential. There is a structure for executing category style. Still, whether a Marketer follows the summary or techniques category design another way, a CMO needs to be putting routine thought and preparation into how they specify the classification they mean to dominate. Without input from the CEO and other members of the executive group, there is no other way to complete a correct classification style.

The Wartime CMO will need to increase the accountability of marketing by showing the result of each marketing activity on the pipeline as determined by revenue contribution.
In a decrease, marketing ought to move the understanding of being a cost center to an income vehicle driver. Reporting beyond the variety of marketing qualified leads produced to consist of the general possibility worth for each lead source is an excellent way to represent the function marketing is playing to drive the economic goals of company.

Studies have really exposed that a correctly developed landing page can double your conversion rate over sending traffic to your home page, which tends to do not have the correct call to action that matches the ad. Since of this, inspecting landing pages can increase conversions as much as 50% or more. Together, these methods can supply a 2.5 X increase for each single dollar you buy marketing. Yes, conversion rate optimization makes a distinction.

During Wartime, every marketing dollar is important, and a Wartime CMO understands that winning will not boil down to a single technique or "silver bullet" approach. Instead, numerous little things executed well. The CMO, who can not understand the interaction of copy, messaging, creative style, and innovation, will struggle to find and acknowledge rapidly where little adjustments can use better conversions.

This content technique worked, for a season, sort-of. Nevertheless with the increase of Google RankBrain, the method has actually not worked for numerous years. Without being in the middle of a crisis, you require to stop this ineffective activity. Now as budgets are under pressure and every marketing activity ought to count, the method that we do content marketing needs to be upgraded.

Now, the material that we produce needs to interest somebody trying to discover our service, and it should include purchaser intent triggers like keywords and expressions that a purchaser would utilize as they get close to purchasing decision. A Havas Group research study revealed that 84% of people anticipate trademark name to produce material, yet 60% of the material produced is of bad quality or unimportant, stopping working to satisfy the requirements of the audience. Despite a 71% correlation in between content efficiency and a brand's influence on personal wellness, just 40% of the world's leading 1,500 brand names produce content that meets this requirement. Trademark name's are failing to produce significant material.

Stop producing assembly line material that is just indicated to establish the trademark name or introduce the product. Rather, material should target particular personalities to deal with any troubles avoiding the prospect from moving on. This material will take longer to produce and require a greater neighborhood and item understanding level.

CMO's in Wartime must have an outstanding understanding of the buyer psyche and their mental requirements so that they can develop material that relieves worry and addresses the sincere issues they have.

CMO's in Wartime double down on Classification Style so that their organization will come out as the leader, making them the dominant choice, putting them in the enviable position to take as much as 76% of the economics from the whole classification.

Find out more about Category Design.

The B2B sales procedure today is fragmented and complex, with lots of stakeholders needing to verify a purchase decision. This renders standard marketing ROI and attribution methods less beneficial for anything besides scholastic research study.

The marketing function today breaks down into 3 functional pillars making up Item, Need Generation, and Category Style. Since lots of marketing leaders have in fact not entirely embraced category design, it's a remarkably easy method to beat an incumbent during a crisis. As quickly as the sector starts to talk about the category as you have in fact defined it, your company will end up being the category and the apparent choice.

To do Classification Style needs a different working cadence. Wartime is the perfect time to start Category Style given that definitely nothing is "regular" throughout a crisis.
To manage the challenge of building a Category King service needs a lots of grit, determination, and an unfaltering drive to win. For the Wartime CMO, who takes on the obstacle, there can be no bigger pot-o-gold if effective.

Check out the book Play Larger to find out all about category design.