B2B GTM in 2025 = B2C GTM in 1990s?

B2C GTM in 1990s

Remember the B2C targeting methods of Age, Gender, Location in 1990s? The Recency x Frequency measurement methods? Thats where B2C GTM was when the world relied only on 3rd party data.

Fast forward to late 2010s, each B2C business built deep profiles built for all their prospects. These profiles are built by unifying 1st party and 3rd party data. Combining website and app behavior, with transactions, and customer support etc.

Segmentation and targeting changed to Behavior based, interaction based, real time personalization within 100ms page load budgets. 3rd party attributes like Age, Gender, Location continue to be used but they have been surpassed by more nuanced, and 1st party interpreted data.

B2B GTM in 2025

Top of funnel B2B GTM in 2025 relies primarily on 3rd party data - Industry, Employee Count, Location. This seems very similar to Age, Gender, Location of 1990s B2C.

While such 3rd party data is everywhere, marketing and sales teams have struggled with 3rd party data:

• Different meaning for the same thing - e.g. industry classifications may be very different for a given company across sources
  

  

  
  For example: Etsy is listed on LinkedIn as “Software Development” company. This will work for someone selling DevTools to software companies. However, completely misses the point for someone selling logistics or payment solutions to ecommerce marketplaces.
  
  

• Different levels of accuracy requiring combination of multiple data sources - e.g. identifying parent / child relationships across accounts can be tedious and ambiguous

  

  
  For example: identifying parent/child relationships for corporations is a non-trivial exercise. Different kinds of relationships between companies may be interpreted in different ways for different GTM motions. Standard 3rd party databases can only do so much and so many GTM teams struggle with this.
  

• Lack of proper systems of record beyond MOFU / BOFU data in your CRM lead to TAM prospect data lying in spreadsheets - static and not actionable without human intervention
  
  

  

  
  For example: 3rd party sourced TAM data lying in spreadsheets is not only silo-ed but also not actionable or continuously updateable. It also introduces many manual steps in each prosect qualification process.

3rd party data alone is NOT enough. It is NOT your secret sauce.

It is YOUR ALWAYS ON, REPEATABLE INTERPRETATION of the data which makes your GTM motion unique. Thats your secret sauce.

Embedding LLMs and AI in the right places in your GTM motion can help SCALE YOUR SECRET SAUCE.

It can help you create repeatable, standardized and scaled processes to build your own Unified Account & Person Prospect Profiles. Living and breathing ones. Not something living in disconnected spreadsheets. It is only then that you can come out of the Age/Gender/Location paradigm and use deeper targeting methods for reaching out to your prospects.

Similar to the B2C of late 2010s, it is only by building these 1st party prospect profiles that your GTM motion can scale and go beyond standard 3rd party data. Start segmenting and targeting based on:

• the signals, these prospects have exhibited pertaining to your world,

• the content they have engaged,

• the proprietary research and interpretation your systems have inferred on them,

• the actions you have taken in terms of engaging and reaching out to them

• …

Each B2B business is going through the journey from static, silo-ed 3rd party data to active, unified 1st party context. Where in the spectrum are you?