Tea Leaves
We are heading to Outsell’s 31st anniversary next week and last year’s blog reflected the tech cycles we have seen and the economic ones too. Another is in our crosshairs.
It doesn’t take much to read the tea leaves, and while it may not become a full blown “R,” what’s going on is enough to give anyone the jitters. For years, we have chronicled our industry lagging on the downturn (the blessing of renewal businesses) and leading on the upturn. B2B technology, data, and information services businesses reflect the economy. Spend for them is tied to enterprise budgets. It’s a universal truth in our industry, which we have tracked, written, and spoken about over the years.
Read the headlines. They are tea leaves. Media frenzy, panic, mania aside, sort through the noise and there is an abundance of caution, cash conservation, spend reduction, travel restrictions, and belt tightening going on. That doesn’t lead to good things.
In 2023, we started out with optimism only to have Silicon Valley Bank melt down in March, and the tech sector along with it soon after. Then came the PE squeeze that became their 2008–2009, while the rest of the economy did sort of OK.
In 2024, we started out with optimism only to have high interest rates persist — inflation persist — and a President and his candidacy melt-down in front of the entire world. Early hope for the year went by the wayside as sales pipelines aged, buyer decision-making extended, and more people got involved in purchase decisions in what we called the accountability gap. The year ended OK despite itself and with some general optimism once again.
In 2025. Optimism again. Now only one quarter in we have what we have — — an economic roller coaster that once again has optimism hitting the skids.
When the market talks and says it’s not you it’s me; it’s not you it’s Trump; it’s not you it’s my PE owner; it’s not you it’s the economy… It’s Brexit, tariffs, China, quiet quitting, or God knows what — Guess what? It’s about you. It’s always about you.
It’s about your value proposition, your “I can do ok without your product,” your product market fit, your competitive positioning. The market is full of alternatives today and people’s time is precious.
In B2B, tech, data and information, they want answers, mitigated risk, new sales, cost savings. It is about results. Companies either solve for them or do not. What’s that saying about tides going out? Well, it’s here again just like it’s been for the last three years, and Covid before that. We are hearing it in almost every call we hold and our industry and the clients we serve are a microcosm for the economy.
This is like engagement and MQLs. We must watch for false Gods and avoid blaming external realities rather than look inside and make the necessary changes. We think if we ‘drive more engagement’ or deliver more leads our work is done. It is not done because customers and markets talk with money in B2B. There is no beating around that bush.
As BCG says just this week, and in the complexity of CEO roles these days, leaders and exec teams don’t get a bye. Businesses must perform despite tariffs, a roller coaster in the White House, currency and stock market ups and downs, and anything else that goes on by the minute.
In this media-crazed world we must simply improve and get on with it because in this industry customers keep us honest every day. They vote with their dollars, pounds, euros, yen or any other currency they use including their attention.
CEOs jobs are more complex, and they aren’t for the faint of heart. Stay ahead of the tea leaves because they, just like customers voting with investment, always tell the truth.