Source: X

The outage disrupted daily life, businesses and governments around the world. Numerous industries and institutions were affected – from stock markets and airlines to hotels and hospitals. Within hours, the error was discovered and a fix was provided. However, because affected computers had to be fixed manually, outages lingered for several days. 

At the time of the incident, CrowdStrike had more than 24,000 customers, including 60% of Fortune 500 companies. The bill for the global glitch will run into billions of dollars.

The outage raised questions about centralisation in information technology. The majority of global computers use Microsoft Windows, creating a monoculture that reduces resiliency. As a result, there has been widespread and public anger at the failure of political leaders to regulate for diversity and competition.

Questions raised about cloud and third-party software

IT leadership teams are facing questions about how they were impacted and their true exposure to these types of incidents. The history-making outage highlights the vulnerability of companies that rely on cloud services and third-party software. 

Businesses are being encouraged to integrate robust contingency plans to manage disruptions. Advisors and policymakers are telling tech companies to do rigorous testing and ensure quality assurance to avoid similar failures that may damage their reputation.

The incident draws into sharp focus the potential legal liabilities of B2B tech firms and financial losses from service outages. This may lead to increased demand for insurance and clearer terms regarding liability in service agreements​​.

Putting all your eggs in one basket?

The global CrowdStrike meltdown shows the risk when IT operations depend on a single point of delivery. IT leaders are now focussing on concentration risk and how supply chain exposure can be managed. B2B tech companies will have to consider how this may affect their operations and whether client organisations will trust them to be their single service provider in the future. 

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Digital experimentation and AI

Leading tech firms are increasingly investing in digital marketing experiments and the application of AI technology. This approach helps them adapt to market changes, optimise customer engagement and innovate marketing strategies​​.

Revenue-leading organisations in the survey (defined as having high revenue and website traffic growth over the past three to five years) devote 50% more budget and 80% more staff hours to digital marketing experimentation compared with laggards, in part to extract value from innovations such as AI. Other companies that treat experimentation as an afterthought or only pursue it with surplus budget, do not realise the same performance gains.

Firms that are more mature in their experimentation have greater AI adoption (see Figure 1). They realise 30% higher productivity gains versus those without an experimentation strategy. Firms that embrace AI report a 16% average improvement in customer conversion rates. 

Figure 1

Source: Bain and Google B2B Technology Marketing Survey 2023

‘Game-changing experiments’, also featured in this month’s In-Flight, delves deeper into this subject.

Advanced measurement techniques

High-growth companies use a broader array of marketing measurement methods across the customer lifecycle. They track a wider range of metrics and exhibit 30% greater confidence in these methods. 

This comprehensive measurement allows for improved decision-making and better alignment between marketing initiatives and revenue goals​. According to the survey, they are two to three times more likely to measure signals such as account engagement and intent-based data.

In-house skills and technology

The study found that successful companies build robust in-house capabilities, particularly around digital marketing and AI. This internal expertise enables them to execute sophisticated marketing strategies effectively and efficiently (see Figures 2 and 3). 

Specifically, the survey found, revenue-leaders are two to six times more likely to have advanced in-house capabilities such as data science and analytics, marketing automation and account-based marketing. 

Figure 2

Source: Bain and Google B2B Technology Marketing Survey 2023

Figure 3

Source: Bain and Google B2B Technology Marketing Survey 2023

Leaders also report tight collaboration between marketing and sales through aligned revenue incentives. Some companies have broken the silos separating sales and marketing by creating revenue marketing teams that oversee the end-to-end sales funnel and measure the effects of marketing campaigns. The joint approach makes marketing more agile, gives a company a clear view of the entire customer experience and accurately gauges the impact of marketing campaigns.

Keeping customers

In the B2B software space, as in most industries, holding onto customers is key.

Without customer retention and renewals, it’s game over.

Companies that segment customers based on potential value and risk, and tailor their retention strategies to different customer groups, boost their results. This approach helps maintain revenue and leverages existing customer relationships for upselling and cross-selling opportunities​​.

Outsize revenue growth

By learning from the leading lights of B2B tech and adopting proven strategies, ambitious firms in the sector can increase their odds of consistent revenue growth and stay ahead in a competitive and fast-moving marketplace.

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Jennifer is no stranger to the software industry, boasting over 20 years of experience in marketing. Her rich career history includes roles at renowned companies like Progress, SAP, Ixia and Kaseya. As part of Vista Equity Partners’ Value Creation Team, Jennifer’s collaboration with Xactly resulted in a notable increase in their pipeline and the generation of higher quality leads. This successful partnership was a testament to her capabilities, leading to her well-deserved permanent position on Xactly’s senior leadership team.

As a platform developed by salespeople for salespeople, Xactly thrives on synergy between sales and marketing. Jennifer’s commitment to fostering this alignment, backed by streamlined processes and shared KPIs, promises a future where customers can harness a unified approach to achieve even more remarkable revenue outcomes.

At PaperplaneCo, we’re excited to witness this new chapter for Xactly and look forward to supporting them in their continued journey of innovation and growth.

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Adobe launched a new web portal for online inflation data. Powered by the Adobe Digital Price Index (DPI), it provides a comprehensive view into what consumers pay for goods online. As a complement to the Consumer Price Index (CPI), the DPI provides a more complete view of the overall cost-of-living picture. Adobe’s analysis covers over 1 trillion visits to retail sites, 100 million SKUs, and 18 product categories.

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Bizible is Adobe’s tool that helps marketers attribute pipeline, revenue, and ROI to relevant channels, content, and campaigns. Since it is deeply integrated with Marketo, which has been renamed Adobe Marketo Engage, it was time to give Bizible a fresh new name too — Adobe Marketo Measure. Now, engagement and measurement form the perfect combination.

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Nowadays, it’s increasingly easy to create a video or image that looks legitimate but has been altered to completely change its meaning.

As part of its effort to fight deepfakes, a coalition of tech companies co-led by Adobe has finalized the details for a standard way to verify how a photo or video was captured and to document any subsequent edits.

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