“Time, dear friend, time brings round opportunity; opportunity is the martingale of man. The more we have ventured the more we gain, when we know how to wait.”

Martech vendors have promised and conditioned B2B buyers to expect quick, easy, and cheap wins. Nothing could be further from the truth. Marketing, especially enterprise marketing is F#%KING hard! Everyone who works (or dabbles) in this ecosystem should be crystal clear and honest about this.

I’m constantly amazed by the short-sightedness of the C-suite. Marketing success doesn’t happen without the most important leg of the three-legged table… PEOPLE. But, not just any people, highly skilled and experienced people. Yes, martech vendors are selling technology, a platform, a product, a widget, but left in the hands of novices, revenue generation is simply a pipe dream.

Sure, CEOs want to save money, and once we were all D’Artagnan. But hiring an enterprise greenhorn whom last month was managing a retail Instagram account is not the best choice to be your next…

– campaign strategist
– data lead
– content strategist/marketer
– head copywriter
– SEO lead
– graphic/web designer
– marketing ops lead
– technical consultant
– project manager
– change management lead
– reporting/attribution lead
– etc, etc, etc…

Enterprise marketing is an experience play. There’s a reason “people, processes and technology” is listed in that order. Pitching the truth is a great story.