♾️ The groundwork your strategy needs

You’re reading The Content Loop — a weekly 5-min read on how B2B SaaS marketers can use original research and product-led content as a growth lever.

Did someone forward this email to you?

Most marketers start building a strategy before they understand what they're building. I've seen this time and time again with in-house marketers and consultants. 

They usually walk in with preset playbooks (and assumptions) that worked in another company/industry. And now that they’re here, they think this works. 

Two months in, they realize they've been building on shaky ground.

Their campaigns don't resonate. Their messaging feels disconnected. Their content lacks the specificity that actually moves buyers.

I'm all for building playbooks—especially when you work in a specific industry/niche, but it all comes crashing down when you don’t understand the unique context of the business.

Ultimately, it comes down to this: they haven’t accounted for the “immersion period.”

Why does an immersion period matter?

When you join a new company or start working with a new client, you're an outsider looking in.

You don’t know:

• What the product does (beyond the marketing speak)

• How customers truly use it

• Which features drive the most value

• What the sales team is hearing in conversations

• What keeps customers around (and what makes them leave)

• How leadership sees the company's future

Without this foundation, you're essentially operating in the dark.

Sure, you might create content that looks good on the surface. You might even generate some traffic. But will it drive pipeline? Will it support retention? Will it build true brand authority?

You simply don’t know yet.

That’s why I use an immersion period to tease out the gaps and find ways to fill the holes. Some companies aren't a huge fan of saying you're spending time on research, but I usually position it as a way to:

1. Build trust with the teams you'll need to collaborate with

2. Identify knowledge gaps across the organization

3. Understand internal perspectives on the product/market

4. Understand where they stand in the market right now

5. Learn the language your customers actually use

Without this groundwork, your content strategy becomes an expensive exercise in guesswork.

How I usually conduct an immersion tour