360° SaaS GTM Audit: 10 areas to diagnose your SaaS GTM strategy & execution
Bonus: The best 7 GTM Guides for Free
Hey - it’s Alex!
Today we cover:
1️⃣ The 2 areas of GTM assessment
2️⃣ How to diagnose your GTM strategy
3️⃣ How to diagnose your GTM execution
Bonus:
List of my vetted Go-to software tools for early-stage SaaS startups
In case you missed the last 3 episodes:
✅ The Ultimate Google Ads Guide for SaaS startups
✅ From Founder Sales to Founder-led Sales: Your first sales hire
✅ The 9 LinkedIn Social Selling Tactics that work in 2024
If you’re new to the newsletter: I share bi-weekly actionable SaaS GTM strategies and tactics that will help you grow your B2B SaaS business from €0 to €1 million ARR 🚀
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Diagnose your SaaS GTM
The success of your SaaS business depends a lot on your GTM success.
Over the last 12 months, I helped 15+ SaaS founders as a GTM advisor to work on their GTM.
My GTM advisory consists of 2 main parts:
1️⃣ GTM Audit
Founders share access to all their relevant GTM assets.
I will do a 360-degree assessment (aka. GTM audit) of the status quo.
The result?
A clear understanding of
✅ what's working
and
❌ what's not
This sets the foundation for our 6-month GTM advisory.
2️⃣ GTM Sprints
We usually work in 2-weeks sprints. Each sprint consists of the top priorities.
That way we have a clear focus and optimize for fast execution.
Today I want to share with you the 10 areas that you can use to self-assess your GTM health. The same 10 areas I cover in my GTM audit.👇
2-level GTM Audit (GTM Strategy & GTM Execution)
I recommend you audit your GTM on 2 levels.
1️⃣ GTM Strategy
2️⃣ GTM Execution
GTM Strategy
The GTM strategy sets the foundation for your GTM execution.
Without the right GTM strategy, your GTM activities will show 0 or very low success.
Most founders jump right into growth tactics/execution.
🔥They want to spread the word.
🔥They want to be present on all different growth channels.
🔥They want to reach everyone.
But...
❌ Running google ads is execution, not a strategy.
❌ Writing blog posts is execution, not a strategy.
❌ Doing cold emails is execution, not a strategy.
But without a clear strategy, you will attract 0 clients.
Your conversion rates will be very low and you'll burn your money. 🔥
👉 GTM Strategy first, then growth tactics.
Here are the 6 GTM strategy elements
1️⃣ Ideal Customer Profile
Ask yourself:
Do you have a clear ICP? Written down?
What are the criteria to qualify/disqualify
How is this applied in lead gen & CRM?
Do you know how to source/find your ICP?
If you don’t have a proper ICP for your SaaS business, work on it.
Here are some actionable resources to get started:
👉 The Ultimate SaaS ICP Framework
2️⃣ Positioning
Ask yourself:
Who is your direct & indirect competition?
What is your primary competitor (aka. status Quo)?
What sets you apart from the status quo?
How are you different from your direct competitors?
Here are some actionable resources to get started:
3️⃣ Messaging
Ask yourself:
How do you communicate what you do and for whom you are doing it?
How is the messaging applied on homepage, sales deck and emails?
Here are some actionable resources to get started:
👉 Ultimate SaaS Messaging Framework
4️⃣ Pricing
Pricing for early-stage startups is NOT about optimizing growth.
I believe pricing should rather be good enough to NOT stopping you to grow to 1€ million ARR.
So it primarily is about:
✅ pricing model aligns with growth motion (sales-led vs. product-led)
✅ finding the right value metric (for a value-based pricing)
✅ getting clarity on packaging
So you need to analyze:
Packaging & Value Metrics
POC, Free Trials or Freemium
Pricing terms (contract length, payment schedule, cancellation policy)
Here are some actionable resources to get started:
👉 The Ultimate SaaS Pricing Guide
👉 Optimize conversion rates with logos on pricing page
👉 Subscribe to Good Better Best newsletter (pricing-focused newsletter)
5️⃣ GTM Motion
Your GTM motion needs to align with your ICP, product category, and pricing strategy.
If you’re early stage, don’t do both motions in parallel.
Here are some actionable resources to get started:
6️⃣ Sales Funnel & Forecast
You need to measure your performance to see what’s working and what’s not.
Start with:
Review the last 12 months of performance
Understanding high level the progress over time
Focus on Leads, MQL, Deals, Customers, €
and especially conversion rates
do you have a Top or Bottom of the Funnel issue
Here are some actionable resources to get started:
👉 Reverse engineer your sales goals
👉 Financial plan for B2B SaaS (Senovo VC Template)
Once you analyzed the strategy part, you can move on to your GTM execution.
GTM Execution
1️⃣ Sales Process
Ask yourself:
Do you have a well-defined & executed sales process
What needs to happen to open a new deal?
What needs to happen to move deals through the pipeline
Do you follow a sales methodology? SPIN, MEDDIC etc.
Here are some actionable resources to get started:
👉 Sales Methodologies for SaaS
2️⃣ Sales Activities
The best way is to watch your call recordings.
Reviewing recordings of discovery calls and demos
How do you qualify prospects
How do you demo your tool?
I always hope that demos are NO Feature F****
Here are some actionable resources to get started:
👉 Sales Qualification (incl. 24 questions)
👉 Ultimate Guide for SaaS Sales Product Demos
3️⃣ Channels
Analyze all the activities you are doing on the different channels.
See what is working and what not. Really deep dive into each channel.
What channels do you use to get new leads?
How are they performing? (# of leads, cost per channel)
In case you run one or more of the following channels, check out my guides:
4️⃣ GTM Assets
Last but not least, review your most important GTM assets.
This includes 👇
Website (👉 Ultimate SaaS Homepage Template)
Sales Deck (👉 Ultimate SaaS Sales Deck Template)
Lead Magnet(s)
Content (Social, Blog) (👉 Content Marketing Guide + Repurposing Content)
Case Studies (👉 How to write powerful case studies + examples)
On top of these 10 areas, I recommend also auditing your GTM team & tech stack.
Check out these articles for more insights on GTM Team:
Happy growth 🚀
3 ways I can help you grow your SaaS to €1 million ARR 🚀
Build your GTM strategy with my free SaaS GTM Strategy Workbook (helped 4000+ SaaS leaders)
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Work 1-on-1 with me - GTM Advisory for early-stage SaaS founders on their way to €1 million ARR (1 free spot - limited to 8 founders).