Over the last 20 years, we've built two $100M+ companies and made hundreds of mistakes along the way. Everything we do runs on our GTM Operating System frameworks. We even wrote a book called MOVE — which became a WSJ best-selling book on go-to-market, quoted by Geoffrey Moore (author of the iconic Crossing the Chasm).
Bryan, Sangram & Charlie (guess who’s who)
Our mission: help 100,000 businesses run on GTM OS to build profitable companies. We're at about 3,000 now so we have a long way to go.
We also run the GTMarketplace — connecting CEOs with 100+ certified fractional CMOs, CROs, and ops leaders all over the world who know the GTM Operating System.
With that intro, let's get moving!
First Some GTM and AI research for you.
67% of B2B buyers can now spot unedited AI content. Yet everyone is using it.
58% say it makes them trust the brand less. Yet the board wants you to use AI for everything.
AI-powered outbound is the baseline now. And it's getting worse every day. Cold email response rates have dropped to 1.2%. Inboxes are flooded with messages that all sound the same because they're all coming from the same tools.
So may be it’s time to slow down.
Think before… AI does the thinking for us.
And before we talk about what AI changes, here are 7 GTM truths that haven't changed and worth their weight in gold instead of another AI workflow that leads to zero progress.
Here you go:
7 GTM truths unchanged by AI
GTM is the growth lever. Think of AI as a tool that can unlock that growth. Now start working on the strategy first and AI second.
If the CEO doesn't own GTM, nobody does. This one thing will fix 90% of your GTM challenges and you know it.
Revenue leaks don't disappear. They just hide better. Pick one problem and work until it gets fixed. Don’t jump. Stay focused.
A great product with a broken go-to-market still loses. If you ship slop, AI workflows won’t save your business.
Trust is the only thing that scales without a budget. Brand building is still the best form of demand generation.
Buyers don't buy frameworks in vacuum. They buy confidence. So pick a framework that aligns teams to your goals and stick to it.
The fundamentals compound. The shortcuts don't. Growth happens in stages, specifically - Problem to Product to Platform stage and not overnight so patience is a GTM virtue.
We've had 18 months of "AI will transform your GTM" and the teams that are actually winning haven't replaced their fundamentals. They've automated the repetitive work and doubled down on the human parts.
Here's what we keep seeing when I talk to CEOs and over 3000 companies running on GTM OS:
the companies struggling with AI aren't struggling because they picked the wrong tools.
They're struggling because they deployed AI on top of a GTM motion that was already broken. AI didn't create the problem. It just made the problem move faster.
The companies seeing real results?
They got their GTM Operating System right first. They know their ICP. They have clear positioning. Their demand gen connects to their pipeline motion. Then they layer AI on top of that foundation.
The edge isn't AI. It's knowing what to do and how to sequence it. Which is why people still matter. AI can execute tasks. It can't tell you which tasks matter most. That's judgment. And judgment still comes from the people running the company.
Our blunt advice to CEOs and GTM teams right now…
AI will make good GTM, better.
But AI won't make bad GTM, good.
If you're not seeing results from your AI investments, don't buy another tool.
Do this, instead:
Audit your GTM foundation first.
Figure out where the system is broken.
Fix that.
Then let AI accelerate what's already working.
Spicy take, so let the AI bots begin their comments first.
Then the humans are welcome to comment so I feel valued.
love,
sangram
p.s. 100,000+ GTM leaders read our content every day. If you want more strategies like this, follow along at runongtmos.com — and let's get moving.