You need to think twice if you're planning to launch a product without a go-to marketing plan. According to a study by a Harvard Business School professor, 95% of new products fail to launch successfully.

Why? A lousy marketing plan that does not cater to the market needs. Thus, brands must construct a top-notch go-to marketing strategy aligned with today's marketing trends.  

A marketing plan is all about a comprehensive document that is more focused on high-level company goals. On the other hand, a go-to marketing plan is niche-specific and gets developed for any specific product launch. It brings all your business components in harmony like marketing, sales, pricing, distribution, brand development, customer feedback, and competitive analysis. 

One of the best ways to document your go-to-marketing plan is to create a stunning presentation of it.

The visual appeal of the slide deck is sure to swoon your clients over your product launch. Render your plan a professional look by picking free PowerPoint templates catering to all your marketing plans.

Leverage a Go-To-Market slide template from SlideModel for a stunning PowerPoint to develop a marketing plan for any product launch. Before we move to the steps of creating a GTM plan, let us understand its meaning first. 

What is a Go-To-Market Strategy?

A GTM or go-to-market strategy refers to an action plan. It demonstrates the various steps that a company must take to launch a new product in the market successfully.

It is a short-term strategy as opposed to a long-term marketing plan. It defines the purpose of your product or service launch and its process. 

PowerPoint presentations act as the best companion for all marketers for creating a full-proof GTM. An embellished slide deck will elaborate all your processes with clarity while also appealing aesthetically.

Centering on both product launch and customer feedback, a good GTM defines a sales strategy.

A GTM may be crafted for:

  • New products/services entering an existing market
  • Already existing products entering a new market
  • New products testing market growth

Now that we know what a go-to-market strategy is! Let's move ahead and understand four critical phases of the same.

4 Critical Phases of Go-To-Market Strategy

Phase 1: Planning & Research

For any go-to-market strategy, one of the biggest strengths is planning and research. It is effective planning & research that help you determine the feasibility of your venture. Phase 1 helps you identify the problem your venture solves, recognize buyer and target market, discover struggles of the industry & ascertain the feasibility of your solution/product.

Phase 2: Develop a Product Roadmap

Once you've done a proper research, it is time to logistically outline how you will build or introduce your products and execute the services! In simpler terms, the step talks about strategic roadmapping. Phase 2 is important in any go-to marketing strategy since it acts as a ‘North' star that people will follow to accomplish business goals.

Phase 3: Creating the Marketing Strategy

Now, once you have the product roadmap handy, it's time to move ahead and create buyer personas, outline the buyer journey, work on your pricing strategy & unique selling points (USPs), respectively! We will talk about how you can produce an amazing go-to-market strategy in the next section.

Phase 4: Fostering a strong Customer Experience

For any business, it's imperative to ensure a delightful customer interaction and further encourage the patrons to come back for more. In simpler terms, the phases involve brainstorming and sorting out how customers will transition from just customers to loyal produce or service consumers.

What are the Steps to a Go-To-Market Strategy?

Prelaunch

In this phase, you decide on all the essentials of your GTM. Below are some steps to design your ultimate pre-launch GTM. 

Set SMART Goals

A go-to-marketing plan's initial base lies with your business defining its launch objectives and goals. Ensure to construct SMART goals that are specific, measurable, accurate, relevant, and timely. Identify your brand positioning and create a step-by-step unique selling strategy.

Some aims of a go-to-marketing plan may include:

  • Product brand awareness to determine the channels of engagement
  • Market to leads for identifying potential leads
  • Sales targets 
  • Customer satisfaction and retention
  • Setting product success metrics and KPIs

Product Definition

Product definition is the next step in your go-to-market strategy. Design an approach to define your product and its specifics. Take into view the customer pain points and the market that you're targeting. Establish a clear understanding of what your product will entail once it launches.

Below are some takeaways to note down while defining your product

  • Product
  • Pricing strategy
  • Product price
  • Promotion mix
  • Marketing process
  • Promotion place 

Analyze your Customer

New products and services are launched every day and fail to leave a mark due to several reasons. For example, the pricing might be high, or the demand may be off. A good GTM will help you to avoid these issues, followed by some research.

Here are a few points to note while analyzing your customers:

  • Market trend research
  • Coordinated product development 
  • Targeting customer persona

Identify Your Target Market

Your go-to-market strategy will be effective if you know you know your market well. Thus, the first step here is to have an in-depth analysis of your target market. Your product might not be for everyone. Here you can use Market Segmentation Slides from SlideModel to have a nuanced view of your psychographic segmentation.

Determine the buyer persona that can include the following points:

  • Demographics
  • Psychographics
  • Ethnographic
  • Geographical
  • Behavioral aspects
  • Age-related factors
  • Digital/Non-digital market

Research your Competition

Comprehending the place of your product in the existing market is a chief factor to all GTM strategies. Form a competitor profile with recorded data, surveys, and observation.

Based on this data, you will get to set your market plan based on:

  • Your USP 
  • Barriers to entry
  • Substitution threat
  • Consumer buying power
  • Competitive rivalry

Set Distributional and Promotional Strategy

Set your product distributors after meticulous thinking. Communicate the product value to your audience in a resonating way. Select the promotional channels and form a message that impacts your audience directly. 

  • Generate content buzz through social media channels
  • Go to market plan to use SEO tools for organic visibility
  • Select your channel of product distribution– Retail, E-commerce, direct partner, etc.

Launch

Your launch phase includes both inbound and outbound marketing efforts that include promotional channels and setting a communication strategy.

For outbound outreach, you could try tools like Cucomm to reach many clients automatically, without doing lots of manual work.

Launch Pricing

With in-depth information about the existing competition and the market, you have the data to set the product of your price. 

  • Initial low prices for market penetration
  • Constant low prices if you're a corporate
  • Price skimming- High price at the beginning with a gradual decline
  • Psychological pricing- $198 instead of $200
  • Bundled pricing- Combo offers

Content Marketing

Content is the new king of digital marketing. With more than 4.66 billion internet users globally, e-commerce and online retail stores are running on effective content marketing. Harness SEO strategies and social media channels like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and target your potential audience.

Use the right approach with:

  • Pay-per-click advertisements
  • Targeted advertisements
  • Brand website
  • Social Media
  • Blogs/Articles
  • Video Marketing
  • E-mail marketing
  • Micro-influencers

Promotional Offers

Every customer loves promotional offers provided by brands. Combine your new product with the already tested and successful items. It will provide your customer with a sample and also lower your risk of running into losses. Further, create an e-mail subscription list and push offers for e-mail marketing. 

Postlaunch

Here are some key Post Launch takeaways once your product is out in the market. 

Customer Interaction

Your customers depend on you for helping them in the navigation of channels and support in their purchasing journey. Thus, it is necessary to keep a steady flow of communication with them.

Here are a few ways to educate your customers about your product launch:

  • Customer-centric culture
  • Open communication channels
  • Query resolving
  • Customer loyalty rewards
  • Customer insights

Customer Feedback 

Your product launch will suffer setbacks if you do not consider customer feedback. Capture customer feedback through polls, surveys, and forms to find out what's working and what's not.

There are several means to collect customer feedback:

  • Customer surveys
  • Forum Feedback
  • Social media feedback
  • Customer support feedback
  • Employee feedback

Customer Support

Once you've set up your new product., it is extremely imperative to have round-the-clock customer support. Customers tend to like companies having flexible return and replacement policies, good customer care, and fast issue-solving. Ensure to provide your customer care employees with good sales training and support. 

Measure your KPIs

Your last but not least step is to measure the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) set at the beginning of your GTM. Use various metrics and assess your new product launch. Employing CRM will assist you in analyzing customer relationships with data to drive more sales. 

Wrapping It Up

Utilizing the time and effort in crafting your go-to-market plan can boost the chances of making your product launch successful. After all, a GTM can either make or break your product performance. Follow the steps elaborated in this blog post to have a go-to-market plan that sells. 

For further queries on GTM strategies contact us and talk to our team of marketing experts.

Frequently Asked Questions

Three key go-to-market strategies help businesses successfully introduce products. First, they focus on essential tasks needed to enter the market, like product development and testing. Second, they troubleshoot product positioning and messaging to ensure they connect with customers. Lastly, they clearly plan distribution and sales channels to maximize market impact. These strategies pave the way for a smoother product launch and better chances of success in the market.

A go-to-market strategy is like putting out a welcome mat for customers. Instead of chasing them down, you create interesting stuff like social media posts, videos, and blogs that make them want to come to you. This content connects with them naturally and helps your business grow. Think of it as sharing helpful information and stories to draw people in, like a friendly invitation, rather than pushing your products on them. It's all about building a relationship and trust, so when they need what you offer, they'll choose you because they already like what you're about.

The five pillars, like building blocks, help create a strong business strategy. Imagine them as steps. First, we analyze our product to understand it better. Then, we work on how we talk about it, which is product messaging. Next, we make our product appealing and unique, that's the sales proposition. After that, we figure out how to reach customers, which is marketing strategy. Finally, we plan how to sell our product effectively, our sales strategy. Doing things in this order makes sense because each step builds on the one before, like a staircase to success.

A good plan for reaching customers (GTM) includes ways to make people know and trust your brand. This means using smart marketing strategies that make your product or service easy to recognize. When customers see your brand often and easily, they start to trust it more. This trust is important because it helps your business grow and succeed in the market. So, it's important to have a clear and strong brand presence in your GTM plan.

Divya Verma is an experienced content creator dedicated to crafting SEO-friendly and engaging content. As a HubSpot certified writer, she excels in attracting visitors through high-quality content creation and publication. Her passion for assisting others drives her to conduct thorough research and deliver content that effectively converts.