Article • 18 min read

What is a go-to-market (GTM) strategy? How to build one in 11 steps

Learn how to use a go-to-market strategy to turn your product concepts into tangible offerings—without chaos or confusion.

Donny Kelwig

Contributing Writer

Last updated January 13, 2026

Sales strategy

Free GTM template

Launching a new product can be terrifying. You’re taking what you believe is a unique selling proposition and telling the entire world about it in hopes that people will give you money for your idea. With fear, anticipation, and deadlines running you ragged, product launches can spiral downhill faster than you can say your elevator pitch—especially if you don’t have a go-to-market strategy to fall back on.

If you have no idea what a go-to-market strategy is or how to make one—fear not. In this article, we’ll take you from product conception to launch with the expert tips and tricks you need to develop a foolproof go-to-market strategy and framework that fits your sales methodology.

More in this guide:

What is a go-to-market strategy?
What sections should you include in a GTM strategy?
Why your business needs a go-to-market strategy
Who needs a GTM strategy and when?
Benefits of a go-to-market strategy
Types of go-to-market strategy
Elements of a go-to-market strategy
How to build a go-to-market strategy
Go-to-market strategy examples
Go-to-market strategy template
Frequently asked questions

What is a go-to-market (GTM) strategy?

A go-to-market (GTM) strategy is a comprehensive plan for how a company launches a new product or expands an existing one. It aligns sales, marketing, product, and customer success teams towards a shared goal of reaching target customers and driving company success.

What sections should you include in a GTM strategy?

You can add or remove sections in your GTM strategy plan according to your needs, but here are the fundamental components that most businesses will want to include:

GTM section title	Contents
Timeline	Create product roadmap with deadlines.
Customer pain points	List customer pain points and the category they fall under (e.g., productivity, process, etc.).
Ideas	Brainstorm solutions to customer pain points.
Industry analysis	Assess your competitors and industry trends.
Product concept	Use the solutions you brainstormed earlier to come up with product concepts.
SWOT analysis	Analyze the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of your potential product(s).
Pitch	List everyone you’ll need to pitch to get buy-in and outline how you’ll sell the product to customers.
Goals and KPIs	Set GTM strategy goals and establish key performance indicators (KPIs) for monitoring them.
Status log	Keep track of key tasks, who’s accountable for them, and deadlines.
Journey map	Map out everything about your ideal customer experience as they move through the sales funnel.
Promotion	Settle on the marketing and sales enablement tools you need to meet launch sales goals.

Why your business needs a go-to-market strategy

More than ever, customers expect consistent, connected experiences when using your product. According to Zendesk’s 2026 CX trends report, 85% of customer experience (CX) leaders believe that customers will drop brands over an unsatisfactory experience.

A go-to-market (GTM) strategy helps prevent early customer loss by setting up teams to deliver consistent, reliable experiences from day one. It defines how a product is planned, launched, and supported by covering key phases like targeting, positioning, and enablement. A GTM strategy also establishes clear success metrics such as adoption, retention, and time-to-value, so teams can measure whether the launch is delivering results.

For example, as Uber expanded into new services and cities worldwide, maintaining consistent messaging and support operations across teams became critical to scaling effectively.

Who needs a GTM strategy and when?

Any business bringing a product or service to market benefits from a go-to-market strategy. It becomes essential during periods of change or growth.

It’s especially useful in SaaS, B2B, and startup environments, particularly for teams navigating enterprise sales. It’s also relevant for B2C teams that need coordination from product ideation through post-launch performance.

You should prioritize a GTM strategy when you:

Expand a product into a new region
Test a new market or customer segment
Launch a new product to an existing audience
Build a product without a clearly defined market

At each of these inflection points, a go-to-market strategy gives your teams the structure they need to move forward with clarity.

Benefits of a go-to-market strategy

By helping teams build a shared understanding of the customer and their expectations, your go-to-market strategy drives measurable business outcomes.

Here are the key benefits of a successful GTM strategy.

Maximizing profit potential

Without a clearly defined go-to-market strategy, interactions with new and existing customers often happen in isolation. This can lead to high acquisition costs, slow expansion, churn, and inefficient revenue growth.

When acquisition and expansion efforts are connected through GTM, you’re more intentional with who you acquire. You focus on product-market fitand customers who are more likely to grow with you, driving more efficient revenue growth and higher profit potential.

Meeting business objectives

Clear goals matter, but your teams need direction to achieve them. A go-to-market strategy bridges that gap by translating high-level objectives, like revenue or adoption, into concrete actions across teams.

This reduces the risk of teams staying busy without making progress, and helps them maintain a focus on company-level outcomes over individual goals.

Drumming up brand awareness

A go-to-market strategy supports brand awareness by defining the problem you’re solving, who it’s for, and why it matters. This clarity creates a clear path to finding the right channels and messaging for your brand.

Marketing, sales, and all other customer-facing teams can then use the GTM strategy as a foundation to build resources that will support brand awareness efforts.

Sticking to your budget

Unclear scope is one of the most common causes of budget overruns. Your GTM strategy helps you avoid this by defining priorities, ownership and timelines early in the launch process. This reduces surprises and reactive spending, making it easier to stay on budget over time.

Reducing time to market

Reducing time to market starts with removing friction before execution begins. A well-defined GTM strategy establishes ownership, goals, success metrics, audience, and positioning upfront. This allows teams to start work without delay. It also sets clear timelines and dependencies, enabling teams to work in parallel instead of waiting on approvals or missing inputs.

Minimizing productivity-related expenses

Productivity-related expenses are the hidden costs of misalignment, often showing up as duplicated work, delays, and rework caused by unclear ownership. With a GTM strategy in place, these issues are far less likely to crop up because roles, responsibilities and timelines are defined early. Fewer handoffs and less rework allow teams to spend more time executing and less time resolving confusion.

Types of go-to-market strategies

Your business can choose from several go-to-market strategies based on your unique objectives. But we’re going to focus on the top four:

Outbound
Sales enablement
Account-based marketing (ABM)
Demand generation

Infographic outlining the top four different go-to-market strategies and when to use each based on business goals.

Outbound

Overview: This strategy primarily comes into play at the “promotion” phase of your GTM strategy when you’re ready to begin selling rather than planning the product itself.

Best for: If you’re looking to quickly achieve a high sales volume or close larger accounts, your business may benefit from an outbound strategy.

Use cases: Once you’re ready to drum up sales for your new product, you can generate demand through several outbound sales prospecting and outreach techniques, including:

Cold calling
Trade shows
Cold emailing
Direct mail
Social media messaging

Sales enablement

Overview: Sales enablement strategies help salespeople seamlessly guide prospects through each stage of the sales cycle, maximizing profits and productivity.

Best for: This is a great strategy if you’re a newer company or launching a product in a saturated market. Customers aren’t going to give you a chance if they already trust your competitors and don’t know much about what you have to offer.

Use cases: Sales enablement assets help salespeople:

Create positioning statements
Close deals faster and reduce time to revenue
Distribute knowledge and resources to prospects

New products require a bit more oomph from sellers, but too much can chase customers away. If sales enablement is your GTM goal, equip yourself with the proper engagement platforms to assist your team.

Account-based marketing (ABM)

Overview: Rather than selling a product to the general population, these companies develop a product with high-value customers in mind. There’s nothing wrong with this strategy, but you’ll need a firm understanding of what it takes to close a deal with your target customer.

Best for: Typically used by channel sales companies (parent companies that sell through another company). Account-based marketing GTM strategies also work well for businesses that target high-profile clients.

Use cases: To see success with this strategy, you should:

Discover intricate details about the accounts you want
Get to know the business’s key stakeholders and decision-makers
Personalize messaging to each business
Lean on case studies, word-of-mouth referrals, and customer success stories

These steps help your teams focus their efforts on building stronger, more relevant relationships with high-value customers and buying groups.

Demand generation

As the name suggests, this GTM strategy is all about creating reliable demand for your new product. Demand generation usually leverages outbound marketing techniques such as cold calling, email marketing, and advertising. If you have a unique product with a very specific niche, this strategy can put you in the public eye much faster than other tactics.

This tactic also places your value proposition at the forefront, fostering a clear picture of your product’s unique selling points in the eyes of consumers.

Elements of a go-to-market strategy + example applications

All GTM strategies are based on the three Cs:

Customers
Company
Competition

These Cs inform every decision you make while developing your GTM strategy. You can break down each C by who, what, when, where, and why for a more detailed approach.

For example, let’s examine an office supply store that conducts B2B and B2C sales. Say the store is launching a back-to-school bundle in the summer to get kids ready to return to the classroom.

Customers

First, you need to determine what problem your target customer is experiencing and some other key characteristics about them. Ask yourself the following questions to get to know your ideal customer:

Who is your target market? In this case, the target market includes parents who have a household income of over $85K, work busy schedules, and have elementary to high school-aged students who are involved in several activities. They are looking for quality products but also value convenience. Their children may have some leftover supplies from the previous school year, but they will likely need to buy new materials.
What do they need to buy? They need to purchase new school supplies for their kids.
When do they need your product? Most schools in the U.S. begin classes in August or September. That means your back-to-school bundle would need to be on store shelves by the end of June or the first week of July.
Where are they shopping? Many parents that do in-store back-to-school shopping do so at big-box stores like Walmart, Target, Best Buy, and Staples—where they’re likely to find everything they need in one place. It’s a bonus if they can grab the school supplies while grocery shopping.
Why do they need it? Oftentimes, schools have strict supply lists, and they expect busy parents to buy all the items on them.

Company

Next, think about what your business offers customers and how it adds value.

Who do you serve? Your product serves busy parents who are back-to-school shopping for their kids.
What problems do your products solve? Your back-to-school bundle is a convenient way for parents to get all the items on their kids’ supply lists. For added convenience, you can customize bundles based on district lists so parents can grab one and go.
When do you plan to launch? Launch in June or July to give parents enough time to shop. If you’re unsure of the best launch date, you should always review historical data to arrive at a decision.
Where will you sell? You’ll need to sell in stores where your target market shops the most to maximize convenience. This will likely include stores like Walmart and Target.
Why should people shop with you? Parents should buy your bundle because you’ve taken the tedious work out of back-to-school shopping. Now that they don’t have to worry about supplies, they can focus on the happenings of their daily lives or do the “fun” back-to-school shopping, like picking out new clothes and shoes with their kids.

Competition

Finally, keep an eye on the competition to ensure you maintain your competitive advantage.

Who are your competitors? Crayola, JanSport, and Paper Mate all sell school supplies, but they stay within their own lane. This is great because they create awesome products within their niche. It just means that customers are missing out on the convenience of picking up all their school supplies at once.
What is their selling proposition? Generally, brands that sell school supplies stick to a single category: writing tools, technology, organizers, textbooks, etc.
When do your competitors start selling school supplies? Most back-to-school sales begin in early July and wrap up at the end of August.
Where are they selling? You may have some regional competitors, but the aforementioned brands will likely also sell their products in the big-box stores you’re going after.
Why would shoppers buy from you instead of you? They should choose you because you created a bundle of high-quality school supplies that are affordable and convenient to purchase.

How to build a go-to-market strategy

Build a go-to-market plan to launch your new product in 11 steps:

Infographic presenting the 11 steps to build your go-to-market strategy framework.

Set realistic launch goals based on sales forecasts
Establish deadlines
Identify your product’s key value propositions
Define your target customer
Select your KPIs
Analyze and repurpose old GTM strategies
Finalize sales cycle updates
Optimize lead funnels
Align sales activities with the customer journey
Prepare your customer service team
Schedule a mini-launch

1. Set realistic launch goals based on sales forecasts

A common mistake is to assume a new product will be a revenue-generating game changer. When you do that, you will spend more on marketing and production than you should and risk not breaking even.

Always assume your new product won’t generate more money than your other products. It’s better to be pleasantly surprised than deeply disappointed. And remember, your sales forecast is there to keep you honest.

Tip: Start smaller if you need to ensure you have the resource allocations and inventory to keep up with sales volume for a successful launch.

2. Establish deadlines

Task deadlines keep your team on track and ensure your product gets released when it’s supposed to. Just make sure all your departments’ deadlines align so that sales, inventory, marketing, and finance are on the same page for launch day.

Tip: Create a live project management document to keep track of deadlines and core accountabilities.

3. Identify your product’s key value proposition

Before you start your new product journey, look at what you want your company to gain from that product. New products are expensive to create and launch with no guarantee of sales, so if the answer isn’t clear, try asking yourself some of these questions:

Why are you launching?
Have customers requested updates on older products?
Are you looking to increase quality?
Do you plan to offer a cheaper solution?
Are you going head-to-head on a competitor product?

Tip: Know where your new product falls in your company’s value chain to ensure it’s doing its job.

4. Define your target customer

Understanding your audience is one of the most important parts of a successful GTM plan. As you think about your ideal customer, consider the following:

What pain points are they experiencing?
How can you resolve their problem(s)?
How does the customer feel about their current situation?
What features are most important to your target customer?
How do they intend to use your product?

Tip: Use data to segment customers and create buyer personas to refine product messaging.

5. Select your KPIs

You can’t assess the success of your strategy if you don’t know exactly what you’re measuring. For example, do you want to track conversions, brand awareness, customer retention, or something else?

When you start tracking your metrics from the very beginning with sales funnel software, it’s easier to pinpoint any problems and find solutions. A few of our KPI suggestions include:

Number of visits to your product page
Number of inbound interactions
Revenue per customer
Cash burn rate
Customer satisfaction score
Number of ad clicks
Number of outbound interactions

Tip: Before you select specific KPIs, determine which categories are the most important to you and how you will track them. Do you have proper access to track performance-related metrics?

6. Analyze and repurpose old GTM strategies

Comparison graphic showing how repurposing a GTM strategy supports consistent messaging and customer experience, while reinventing GTM strategy increases risk and customer confusion

If you’ve used a GTM strategy in the past and it worked, consider using it again. Consistency isn’t just beneficial for your company; it’s also beneficial for your customers.

Brand consistency means your prospects and repeat consumers will feel secure buying from you. A huge shift in tactics can sometimes backfire and deteriorate customer trust.

Tip: Create a GTM template and make copies to customize the launch strategy for each new product your business creates.

7. Finalize sales cycle updates and establish data collection methods

If you know your sales team is working on implementing cycle changes and new sales strategies, make those improvements before you launch.

Changing or condensing a sales cycle usually involves a fair amount of experimentation. If you’re trying to analyze sales data on a new product during cycle changes, you won’t be able to separate your product data from your sales activity data.

Tip: If you’re expecting internal updates, plan out all product and sales-related activities at least a year in advance, so your product launch team isn’t tripping over other departments.

8. Optimize lead funnels

It doesn’t matter how much you hone in on your target audiences or buyer personas—each new product will have its own niche.

A new audience niche means your teams need to take the time to do a bit of market research, create a new market strategy, and optimize your lead funnel for maximum conversions. If your new product is a huge shift for your company, it’s worth updating your prospecting strategies and creating an alternate sales pipeline.

Tip: Pack your lead funnel with prospects who are a good match for your new product before you officially launch.

9. Align sales activities with the customer journey

Sales activities will vary based on where your prospect is in the customer journey. Here are some examples of activities your sales reps can do as a buyer progresses through the sales funnel:

Awareness: Let buyers know you’re an option through prospecting and marketing.
Discovery: Score leads and schedule discovery meetings to assess their needs.
Evaluation: Send the prospect a proposal.
Intent: Negotiate and finalize the contract.
Purchase: Collect payment and send the buyer to onboarding.
Loyalty: Deliver the product and follow up for customer feedback.

Tip: Clearly outline what actions you expect salespeople to take at each stage of the sales funnel to ensure consistency across your entire organization.

10. Prepare your customer service team

No one wants to think about product issues during a launch, but new products always come with an unavoidable onslaught of customer questions and complaints.

That’s why it’s critical to brief your customer service team on new products and prepare them for any known issues.

Tip: Host product demonstrations for your support team to make sure they’re equipped with the knowledge to answer customer questions when the time comes.

11. Schedule a mini-launch to test performance

Your launch doesn’t have to go from zero to 60 with no seatbelt on. If you’re jumping into new territory, try setting up a mini-launch with a small group of loyal, valued customers.

These customers know your company, so they’re primed to offer insights into your product’s successes and failures. Mini-launches can also be huge money savers. If you find out your product needs to go back to the drawing board, you’re not stuck shutting down a full-size launch.

Tip: If you want to A/B test your product, you can set up a couple of mini-launches and test results with two sets of customers.

Go-to-market strategy examples

Here are examples of how some popular brands have used GTM plans to launch new products.

Starbucks: International go-to-market strategy example

Let’s start with a company we’re all familiar with—Starbucks. Even huge businesses need to use clever GTM strategies when expanding into new markets. Starbucks first expanded into China in 1999.

Obstacle: While Starbucks now serves over 6.4 million Chinese customers a week, there was major concern 20 years ago that the launch would fail. Starbucks marketers at the time worried that opening a coffee-driven brand in a country with a national tea-drinking culture would backfire.

Solution: Starbucks researchers spent months studying culturally appropriate advertising methods, drink preferences, and population demographics. They also examined the different regions of China and any cultural and financial differences that might impact expansion.

Result: In the end, the company settled on opening its first stores in busy metropolitan areas of China where more wealthy citizens and heavier tourist traffic would bolster its brand credibility and market feasibility. Starbucks also altered its American menu to include more tea-based products that would entice locals to try the brand.

The launch was an undeniable success. China remains Starbucks’ fastest-growing market, with a new store opening every 15 hours. Starbucks thrived by listening to its new audience and appealing to what they already loved.

Huawei: Oversaturated market GTM strategy example

Huawei is a telecommunications equipment company (like Apple or Samsung) based in China. In 2000, the company started considering expansion into India despite numerous market hurdles—the most pressing being the political and economic tensions between the two countries.

Obstacle: The company needed to address two key roadblocks:

Competition: The telecommunications market in India was already large and populated.
Biases: At the time, much of India considered Chinese products to be inferior in quality. To succeed, Huawei would need to establish general trust and relationships as a Chinese company.

Solutions: Huawei created service centers and R&D facilities in India that provided local jobs, sourced local components, and ensured Indian employees determined product quality.

The second Huawei triumph was advertising its smartphones as “aspirational products” by partnering with English language channels. Huawei users were not only buying a product, they were buying the chance to improve their English skills and move up in the job market.

Result: These strategies led to an influx of revenue into the surrounding communities, creating trust that the brand didn’t simply want to leech off of its customers.

Establishing this trust led Huawei to great success, and today, India is Huawei’s second-largest research base outside of China.

Slack: B2B go-to-market strategy example

Slack is an interoffice communication system designed to align teams and ease file transfers, confirmations, and email overuse. Slack’s launch and development relied almost entirely on customer feedback—and it wasn’t always good.

Obstacle: According to founder Steward Butterfield, the first mini-launch went so poorly that the company scrapped the product and started anew.

Solution: In August 2013, Slack launched a second preview where users needed to request an invite to join. The company gained 8,000 users within 24 hours and 15,000 within two weeks. The word-of-mouth reputation grew, and the narrative centered around the company’s willingness to listen to consumers and adapt the product to user feedback.

Result: Combined with Slack’s low cost and simple installment, the product rocketed through the market and created a unique need for an affordable, easily installable communication system that could connect entire companies. Today, Slack continues to thrive by offering a free version of its software so that no one feels excluded from the Slack experience.

Mailchimp: SaaS go-to-market strategy example

Mailchimp is now one of the most popular email automation tools, especially for small businesses, but the company entered the market with baby steps.

Obstacle: Mailchimp started as a side project for founders Ben Chestnut and Dan Kurzius while they worked as web designers. After learning that 70 percent of emails were classified as spam, the duo decided to develop smarter email marketing methods. But in a world with so much spam, it was difficult to convince users to give Mailchimp a try.

Solution: All Mailchimp services remained free for the first several years of the product launch. After years of relying on SEO tactics and word-of-mouth marketing, Mailchimp was popular enough to launch tiered pricing—but that wasn’t what made it a market success.

Result: Mailchimp was one of the first products to hone in on email marketing and the power of contact management. As a result, investors pushed the founders again and again to target enterprise levels. They didn’t. Mailchimp soared to over 12 million users because it kept its strategy focused on smaller businesses and individuals. After all, enterprise companies had more money but were few and far between.

By keeping a lower-tier free version and targeting small startups and individual freelancers, Mailchimp skyrocketed from a side project to a $12 billion company.

Thinx: Equitable GTM strategy example

Thinx creates reusable underwear for people with periods, replacing the need for disposable pads and tampons.

Obstacle: Thinx’s GTM strategy was all about socio-political and economic pain points. As the cost of pads and tampons rose (and continues to rise), people were starting to look for more affordable alternatives—especially once discussions around the pink tax hit the public consciousness.

At the same time, many consumers were concerned about the environmental impact of using disposable pads and tampons, especially plastic tampon applicators.

Solutions: Thinx provided a solution to both problems. Not only does reusable Thinx underwear save money at the drugstore, but it also eliminates the need for disposable menstrual products. Additionally, Thinx provides this option to both pad and tampon users. In comparison, similar products like menstrual cups only appeal to tampon or other insert-based product users.

Result: By focusing on inclusivity, sustainability, and socioeconomic change, Thinx quickly rose to the top of the market.

Fitbit: Community-based GTM strategy example

Fitbit is a fitness-tracking watch that connects to an app on your smart device. After a bumpy start in manufacturing, it now dominates the fitness market as the most downloaded fitness app on the Apple App Store—even against key competitors like Nike. The key to Fitbit’s success? Its GTM strategy.

Obstacle: Fitbit as a product is not unique, especially today. Apple Watches and other smart fitness devices also track steps and exercise.

Solution: Fitbit doesn’t solely market the abilities of its products—it also harnesses the psychological and social elements of fitness. Many people do lose weight or tone muscle as a result of using a Fitbit product, but the real payoff comes in achievements and social media connections.

Like social media platforms, Fitbit allows you to find and “friend” contacts. When you hit a certain number of miles or steps on Fitbit, the app automatically posts your achievement to the masses. More recently, Fitbit has plunged into gamifying fitness, encouraging contests and challenges among friends. This fosters natural competition and creates a deep sense of FOMO (fear of missing out) among non-users.

Result: By partnering with celebrities, Fitbit also became known as the go-to fitness monitor of the stars. Capitalizing on the promise of the “Hollywood Body,” Fitbit raked in numerous users hoping to achieve new fitness goals. Fitbit continues to lead the market today.

Go-to-market strategy template

Use the editable sections in this template to conceptualize a new product idea, document your research, and prepare a launch strategy. You can also check off the boxes of the built-in checklist to keep track of your outreach decisions. Inside, you’ll find a template for determining:

Plan and timeline overview
Consumer pain points
Idea generation
And more

Download template

Frequently asked questions

What’s the difference between a GTM strategy and a marketing plan?

Go-to-market strategies and marketing plans generally go hand in hand, but they have some key differences.

GTM strategy: This is a large-scale blueprint that guides your team through every stage of the product launch process, from research and development to release. It includes crucial steps for the sales, marketing, and product development teams to complete a specific launch or market expansion, and can be reused and adapted as the business grows.
Marketing plan: This builds on a small subsection of the GTM strategy and outlines plans for promoting a product to the target audience, including channels, messaging, strategies, and more. Marketing plans also provide long-term suggestions for increasing brand awareness and profitability, which may go beyond a single product.

What’s the biggest mistake to avoid when creating your go-to-market strategy?

What are the 4 P’s of GTM?

The 4 P’s of go-to-market (GTM) strategy are a framework defining how you bring a product to market and how customers experience it:

Product: What you’re offering, the problem it solves, how it differs from competitors, and how it delivers value to your target market.

Price: How much customers pay and how pricing is structured. This should align with customer expectations and the value you provide, while also supporting your business goals.

Place: Where and how customers buy your product or service. Examples include sales-led, self-serve, partner channels, marketplaces, or a combination of approaches.

Promotion: How you communicate your value and generate demand. This includes messaging, positioning, marketing channels, sales enablement and launch tactics.

This framework ensures you’re delivering a cohesive customer experience, instead of just launching a product.

Plan your product launch with customer service in mind

A go-to-market strategy helps ensure your product is ready to succeed—but the real test comes after launch, when customers expect fast answers and smooth support. Your CRM organizes valuable buyer data, and Zendesk customer service software applies it to create seamless experiences from day one.

With AI-powered automation, integrated workflows, and full visibility into customer interactions, Zendesk helps your team personalize support, resolve issues quickly, and keep new customers engaged long after launch.

Start your free trial of Zendesk customer service software today and make every launch a success.