By sector
Messaging for B2B software companies
In B2B software the story breaks in a specific way: the product grows faster than the words, so the pitch becomes a list of features, the website describes the category rather than the result, and every salesperson sells the demo they are most comfortable with. The buyer who signs is rarely the user who loved the demo, and the summary that reaches them says nothing about their problem. The fix is one proposition written in the economic buyer's language, with the product underneath it rather than on top.
How the problem shows up
A software company three years in has usually added more capability than it has added story. The homepage lists what the platform does. The deck has a slide for every module. The salespeople each have a favourite demo path, and prospects come away impressed by different things. Then the deal reaches procurement or the CFO, who never saw a demo and reads a two-line summary written by a champion who could not say in one sentence why this and not the incumbent.
Two more patterns. Positioning that was right for the first 20 customers, usually a narrow use case in one sector, held on long after the product moved up-market. And a category label borrowed from analysts that puts the company in a crowded box with bigger budgets.
What makes software different
- Three buyers in every deal. The user, the technical evaluator and the economic buyer want different things. Most messaging is written for the user, who does not sign.
- The demo substitutes for the story. A great demo wins the evaluation and loses the board, because the board never sees it.
- Change is constant. Quarterly releases pull the message towards whatever shipped last.
- Renewal is the second sale. If the customer cannot restate why they bought, the renewal becomes a price conversation.
What the fix looks like
Interviews with won customers, lost deals and churned accounts, because the three groups tell three different stories about the same product. One proposition built around the result the economic buyer pays for, then a version for each of the three buyers. A demo narrative that follows the story rather than the menu. And the proof: three customer results with numbers the sales team is allowed to say out loud.
A typical case
Picture a UK software company selling into mid-market finance teams that has grown from one module to seven. Five salespeople describe the company five ways. Buyer interviews would almost certainly find that the people who sign care about one thing, say the month-end close finishing two days earlier. That becomes the story, the seven modules become the proof, and the sales team stops demoing features the CFO will never see. The product has not changed; what the decision maker hears has.
Where to start
Ask three customers who signed in the last year why they bought, and three who chose someone else why they did not. If the answers do not match the homepage, the story has drifted. The Growth Story Score is a faster first check, and the first 90 days shows what the work involves.
Questions people ask
Is this product marketing?
Product marketing owns it inside the company, and this work gives product marketing the evidence and the agreed story to own. The diagnosis from outside is what product marketing rarely gets the licence to do.
Do you work with pre-revenue software start-ups?
With funded start-ups that have paying customers and a sales team. Before that there is nobody to interview and the story is a hypothesis.
What about product-led growth companies?
The same problem, one stage later: the product converts users and the story has to convert the buyer who approves the enterprise contract. The words for that buyer are usually missing.
Can messaging help with churn?
Often. Customers who cannot restate why they bought renew on price. A story they can repeat to their own board makes the renewal a value conversation.
Get your Growth Story Score Or speak to Dan or start with the free sales pitch audit