When I stepped into my role as head of content at Gong, I didn’t come with a decade of marketing experience. I came with a sales background and a whole lot of time spent chasing leads. That experience turned out to be my unfair advantage.<\/p>\n
Here\u2018s what I knew from the trenches: Most people aren\u2019t ready to buy when you reach out. Most of them don\u2018t care about your product, at least, not yet. They\u2019re not waking up hoping for another cold email or wondering if they should check out one more demo page. They’re busy doing their jobs.<\/p>\n
That mental model led me to a question that changed everything. What if we could earn attention before someone was in-market? What if, instead of trying to \u201ccapture demand,\u201d we could <\/strong>create<\/em><\/strong> it?<\/strong><\/p>\n That’s what we set out to do at Gong. And, we did it by flipping the typical SaaS playbook on its head.<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n The 95-5 Rule,<\/a> popularized by the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute<\/a>, came out a few years later and instantly validated everything we\u2019d been doing.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s what it says: At any given time, only 5% of your total addressable market is actively buying. The other 95% isn\u2019t.<\/strong><\/p>\n Yet, most marketing teams invest heavily in bottom-funnel, high-intent tactics targeting just that 5%. This approach is shortsighted and easily exhausted.<\/p>\n When I joined Gong, we took a completely different path. For the first year, we were top-of-funnel focused. So, my team had one hard rule: No talking about our product.<\/strong> None. Zero. We wouldn’t write about Gong, push features, or create comparison posts. We would leave that to product marketing.<\/p>\n Instead, our mission was to produce the most engaging sales content on the planet. We focused entirely on our audience and their problems, positioning ourselves as peers rather than vendors.<\/p>\n If you\u2019re only marketing to buyers when they\u2019re ready to buy, you\u2019re too late. The real opportunity is to win mindshare with the 95% who aren\u2019t ready yet.<\/p>\n So, how do you actually implement this strategy? Here are some practical approaches we used at Gong that are still relevant and effective today.<\/p>\n We made a conscious decision to understand our audience better than anyone else in our category. Not just who they were on paper \u2014 job titles, company size, vertical \u2014 but how they thought, what they struggled with, and what kept them up at night.<\/p>\n At Gong, our audience was sales reps and sales leaders. And no surprise, their primary focus was hitting quota. So, we started with that goal and worked backward. We mapped the entire journey to that goal, identifying all the barriers along the way:<\/p>\n Creating pipeline Then, we turned that sales process into a content roadmap. We didn\u2019t talk about Gong. We talked about the everyday friction points and pains of being in sales.<\/p>\n We focused on the problem, not the product.<\/p>\n This is where most SaaS companies get stuck. They default to writing about their product. That\u2019s what they know. Because it\u2019s easier to say, \u201cHere\u2019s what we do,\u201d than to say, \u201cHere\u2019s what you\u2019re struggling with \u2014 and here\u2019s what might help.\u201d<\/p>\n But our belief was simple: No one cares about your product until they believe you understand their problem.<\/strong><\/p>\n That meant going deep on the \u201cbefore\u201d state \u2014 the messy, frustrating, day-to-day challenges that reps face. And from there, offering useful, actionable guidance that made people feel seen and supported.<\/p>\n We asked ourselves:<\/p>\n What are they doing today that\u2019s no longer working? For example, most reps accept that a 1% cold email reply rate is normal. So, they send more<\/em> emails. That\u2019s the \u201cold way.\u201d<\/p>\n We reframed it. What if you could improve<\/em> your reply rate and actually send fewer<\/em> emails? That story is instantly more compelling.<\/p>\n Even small details matter. Using insider language signals that you truly understand the audience \u2014 it\u2018s “pipeline,” not “pipelines,” and “end of quarter,” not “end of the quarter.” These subtle differences make your content feel like it\u2019s coming from a peer rather than a marketer.<\/p>\n They seem like small things, but they signal insider knowledge. They tell your audience, \u201cWe\u2019re one of you.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Making the shift from lead gen to audience nurturing is a considerable mindset shift. You have to let go of short-term dopamine hits like MQLs and attribution charts, and start thinking like a media company. Then, ask, \u201cHow do we earn attention today to win trust tomorrow?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Here are five things we did at Gong to build future demand and grow a brand that scaled.<\/p>\n If you want people to pay attention before they\u2019re ready to buy, you have to help them. You need useful content that solves real, frustrating problems.<\/p>\n We mapped the buyer\u2019s journey and zoomed in on all the micro-pain points along the way. Each one became a chance to create something helpful:<\/p>\n How to write a better cold email. These weren\u2019t feature pages in disguise. They were standalone, high-signal resources, and we often didn\u2019t even mention our product.<\/p>\n Why? Because we weren\u2019t<\/em> trying to sell. We were trying to earn trust.<\/p>\n To do this well, you need subject matter expertise, either your own or from someone in your organization.<\/p>\nWhat is the 95-5 rule?<\/h2>\n
What Gong Did to Make the Most of the 95-5 Rule<\/h2>\n
We got obsessed with knowing our audience.<\/h3>\n
\n Writing effective cold emails
\n Making successful cold calls
\n Running discovery calls
\n Managing demos <\/p>\n
\n What have they accepted as \u201cjust the way it is\u201d?
\n What assumptions can we challenge with a better way? <\/p>\nTips for Shifting from Lead Gen to Audience Nurturing<\/h2>\n\n
1. Create high-value content that solves real problems.<\/h3>\n
\n How to run a discovery call that doesn\u2019t feel like an interrogation.
\n How to handle pricing questions without fumbling the deal. <\/p>\n