Last month at Bowery’s annual Marketing Summit, we were joined by Amit Makhani, VP of Growth at BentoBox and Eric Vreeland, Head of Marketing Lead at People Data Labs, to talk about “Marketing During a Pivot.” You can find the full video replay of their session below (or here).
Below we have summarized some of the key takeaways:
1. There are two major reasons why a company may choose to pivot. Reason one: your existing customer base likes a new product better. Founders and marketing leaders should always be thinking about how their ICP and buyer personas are evolving over time. Reason two: you can acquire more customers by deciding to pivot.
2. Pay attention to your channels. Not only does your value prop change with a pivot, but your go-to channels often do, too. Now during COVID-19 is a good time to reevaluate your channels – you may find that some channels where you weren’t getting wins previously will now prove more fruitful. On the flip side, just because a channel is working really well, doesn’t mean you should rest on your laurels. One day that channel is going to dry up, so it’s important to set aside some experimental budget to constantly be testing out new channels.
3. Measure what matters. Sometimes you have to shut off one channel to actually see how it’s performing. Eric shared an example of when a startup shut off Facebook ads, they were able to identify that their CPL was pretty good, but the conversion from lead to customer was very low. It’s important to keep in mind sales cycle length, retention, and LTV when measuring the efficacy of various channels, and each of these elements can change significantly during a pivot.
Amin Makhani (left) is the VP of Growth at Bentobox. Previously, Amin was the VP of Digital Marketing & Acquisition at JW Player and the Director of Demand Generation at Yext.
Eric Vreeland (right) is the Head of Marketing at People Data Labs. Previously, Eric was the Marketing Lead at Avochato and the Director of Marketing at Jobr, Inc. Prior to that, he was an Analyst at Bowery Capital and a Marketing Manager at Yext and HubSpot.
If you liked “Marketing During a Pivot” and want to read more content from the Bowery Capital Team, check out other relevant posts from the Bowery Capital Blog.
