The DATE framework is a newly introduced approach for navigating market strategy and product development. It is an acronym representing four key steps: Diagnose, Analyze, Take a different path, and Experiment. This framework suggests that instead of merely attempting to be better or cheaper than existing options, which can lead to a "race to the bottom," organizations should focus on differentiation. The emphasis is on identifying a distinct path in the market. The steps involve: Diagnose (D): Understanding the current situation and identifying challenges or opportunities. Analyze (A): Evaluating the findings from the diagnosis. Take a different path (T): Choosing a strategy that offers genuine differentiation and novelty that users are seeking, rather than just being a slightly improved or less expensive version of what already exists. This involves aligning with user values and goals by deeply understanding their needs and problem space. Experiment (E): Testing the chosen different path through small-scale experiments to validate the approach before significant investment. Experimentation is highlighted as a crucial element, particularly when there is no established playbook. The core idea is to move beyond incremental improvements and create something truly distinct that resonates with user needs and market timing. ( , , , , ) Consistent marketing is considered highly important for several key reasons. Firstly, marketing serves as the initial point of contact customers have with a product and is viewed as an extension of the product itself. Maintaining consistency helps set clear expectations for what customers will experience once they begin using the product or engage with the company. Secondly, consistent and high-quality marketing communication is crucial for building and maintaining a strong brand identity. It ensures that the brand is presented to the audience in a uniform manner, which helps in establishing recognition and trust. Furthermore, understanding brand consistency can actually empower an organization to operate more efficiently and move faster. When there is clarity on how the brand should appear and communicate, teams can work more cohesively and make decisions more quickly. Holding marketing materials to a high standard, similar to product quality, reinforces the brand's credibility and professionalism. ( , , , , ) saying how do you copy something that led someone else to success because those criteria may not apply to you at all.. so let's follow that thread because everyone's like, god damn, I need a play. Just tell me how to do this., Uh,, okay.. so, if there's no playbooks that like if your advice is, don't just copy what other companies do that have done well, what should people be doing?? how do they approach figuring out how to market their product and help it grow faster? yeah,. so, I was an engineer before I became a marketer and so I have brought a little bit of an engineer's framework to the marketing side of the house and so something that I've tried to do is put together like a four--step process that has served me pretty well. the the first step here is diagnosing. so diagnosing the actual problem. again, this usually means taking a zoom back when a founder comes and asks like, hey, we really need to hire a demand Genen leader. like who do you know in your network that we should be thinking about? and I'm like, let's talk about your funnel. do you have a lot of people coming in at the top of the funnel? and when they do come in at the top of the funnel and you start talking to them and having a sales conversation, how likely is it that you close them? how likely is it that you win that deal? that usually tells you very astutely, do you have product market fit? like once you're already in the room and people are converting, you have found that problem statement that is uh critical to them, that is hurting them the most and your solution is resonating as uh a as a solve to that problem. and so that means yes,, probably throwing in more at the top of the funnel is a very good move to make at that time. but on the other hand, if you say, "yeah,, I mean,, like we get a lot of interest, but once they're in the room, they have a bunch of questions. they're asking about, you know, how do you compare to x competitor and y competitor and why does it cost so much and etc, etc., that probably means that there's more to be done in the product market fit zone rather than throwing in more at the top of the funnel because you have a leaky funnel at the bottom.. And so hiring a demand generator may be the worst thing that you can do versus thinking about more of a product marketer who's thinking about the competitive differentiation, the positioning, the sales enablement that gets more people through at the bottom.. so that's that diagnostic step at the top. second to me is like analyzing your competitor's approaches.. so to me, this is not about like being super laser focused on your competition because that leads to these local maxima rather than thinking about phase shift changes and breakthroughs that you can make as a company. but when you analyze your competitor's approaches, evaluating what others do in the space can kind of give you a useful baseline and identify opportunities and gaps and niches that your company can take in instead.. And then this is the critical step.., the next one is you have to intentionally take a different path than what everyone else is doing.., And so, driving a strategy that sort of sets the company apart is really critically important.. I think it's so core to the discipline of marketing,. ensuring that differentiation in the market, and you don',t have to go into a cave to come up with these ideas and strategies., you can usually go and look at domains that are far outside of your own rather than your direct competitors, and come up with some great ideas that you can cross apply and bring in and steal into your own domain or vertical instead.., And then the final piece is just experiment, test, validate all of that, and then scale, what works and kind of discard what doesn't. so you really have to have a lot of that ability to throw away work when you might have spent a ton of calories on this wonderful piece of content, but if it's not working, don't double down on it. like that that bias of sunk the sunk cost fallacy really comes into play, especially when you've poured your heart and soul into creating artifacts for marketing. so experiment, test, validate, give people that psychological safety to fail, especially your teams and organizations. and then yeah, once you find what works, really double down on it. let me summarize what you just shared here. so essentially, if you uh think you're like, i need help with marketing or i have a problem and i think i'm going to i need to hire a demand Genen person or a paid growth person or seo person or uh, i don't know content, right? or something like that. before you do that, first of all, go through these four steps. so step one is diagnose. spend time understanding what's the specific problem you want to solve. then analyze. this is this is so interesting. i've never heard it this way. so then it's analyze what your competition is doing so that you can then one find opport like uh inspiration and see where gaps exist and then sounds like the core part of it is just make sure you differentiate and choose a different path versus just try to be the better thing or the cheaper thing and then the final piece is just like okay here's our path let's test run some small scale test i'm a marketer through and through now so i In contrast, "lowercase m marketing" is a broader concept that encompasses what a company stands for and the narrative it presents. It is described as a "whole company motion" where various teams, including product and sales, contribute to the overall marketing effort. This perspective views marketing not just as a departmental function but as something integrated across the organization, influencing everything from product development to customer interactions. "Capital M marketing" refers to the formal marketing function or team within a company. This team is typically responsible for specific channels, artifacts, and engines designed to drive the company's sales funnel. It represents the dedicated department focused on traditional marketing activities. This distinction highlights that while a dedicated marketing team (Capital M) handles specific responsibilities, the essence of marketing (lowercase m) is a pervasive element reflecting the company's identity and story, involving contributions from across the business. they want to bring into the world.. the the reason that they want to work with thrive is not because we are bringing our past experiences to the table, but rather because they're trying to do something new that has never been done in the world.. and so those are the engagements that are the most exciting is that you're building and going into uncharted territory alongside these founders. I bet they're all like critica, what is the playbook for growing this b2b sas company? and you're like, no. and I say there is none. damn. but we got we got the framework that we talked about. okay. I want to zoom out a little bit and talk about just career advice for marketing people whether it's early stage or later stage. you have this uh concept the chameleon CMO. talk about that and why that's important for marketing folks to think about. yeah. the conventional wisdom for many CMOs is to be t like a t-shaped marketer. and uh what that means is go deep in one of these pillars that we talked about product marketing, demand marketing, brand marketing. and that kind of becomes your calling card in the world. like if a company needs brand expertise, they go for this kind of flavor of cmO. or if a company needs to really grow their pipeline or their demand-gen or their consumer growth,, they go for more of like a demand-and growth-oriented CMO. And I think this chameleon CMO concept is, is a bit of a novel one in that, again, I think modern marketing leaders have to be really good at a bunch of different things.. they have to be very analytical,. they have to be best friends with the data science pod, because they need to understand the impact of their marketing.., they of course, have to bring creativity, but it is in service to the buyer journey.. it is in service to revenue goals and goals that they share with the sales team or the product team, and so on.., so marketing operating in a silo is no longer a real possibility.. so the ability to diversify your interest, maybe going from T-shaped to comb-shaped, is probably the right approach. here so that you can go deeper in different domains when it is useful for the company through the diagnostic that you do.. that sounds very hard. I I love this meta visual of the COPE shape. it sounds like I have so much to learn, so many little skills to build. this is where AI can come in handy. you know,, some of the most like brand marketers can become very analytical with the support of a tool like chatbt. if your eyes glaze over when you look at giant dumps of CSVs, it's it's nice to have a partner that is non-judgmental to kind of push your thinking and to help you understand the details of, you know,, the data behind the brand work that you might be doing. or vice versa.. Like if you're a very creative product marketer, a very analytical growth marketer, you can work with chatbt to be more of a brainstorm partner and really push your thinking on the creative side. so I think becoming a non--just t--shaped marketer is Marketing Lessons from OpenAI, Stripe and Retool Two Pillars of Marketing Product Marketing: This pillar focuses on helping customers understand and navigate a product or product ecosystem. It involves bringing discipline to launch excellence, customer engagement, and differentiation in the market. Product marketing is crucial for positioning the product effectively, especially when there are many features and customers might struggle to keep track. It is seen as an extension of the product itself, serving as the first touch point for customers. Demand Generation: This pillar is particularly relevant for companies with a sales-driven buyer journey. It focuses on building demand engines and generating leads. This can involve scaling paid marketing channels and analyzing the quality of leads coming through the funnel. ( , , ) DATE Framework in Marketing