Invest in Purpose-Built Solution, or DIY?

Imagine trusting the future of your business's go-to-market (GTM) strategy to a coin flip. 

Sound reckless? Perhaps. 

But choosing between building your own AI systems or buying a pre-built solution feels just as monumental and, at times, just as random. 

This post uncovers why the traditional wisdom of "if you want it done right, do it yourself" doesn’t hold water in the context of AI. 

Plus, we help you determine which external solution best suits your GTM needs (not all tech is built the same). 

So, let’s dive into the ultimate question: Is the risk of innovation better managed within your organization, or is it better trusted to those who live and breathe AI innovation? 

Build vs. Buy: An Age-Old Dilemma

The decision to 'build' or 'buy' isn’t new. 

Building and maintaining Generative AI systems in-house presents a unique set of challenges but can also offer a highly tailored solution. On the other hand, buying AI capabilities from an external platform can provide up-to-date models and optimize go-to-market (GTM) speed. 

Each path has its own set of benefits and drawbacks. Let’s look at both. 

Challenges of Building In-House GTM AI

There are several major challenges associated with building an AI platform in-house:

• In-house AI requires significant, dedicated engineering resources for model development, deployment, and maintenance.
• Testing and validation can be extremely difficult due to the probabilistic nature of Generative AI.
• The rapid progression of the field can quickly render in-house systems outdated, requiring constant updates and reworking.
• The cost of hiring and maintaining a team of specialized AI engineers, and the necessary associated infrastructure, can be prohibitively expensive.

The bottom line? Building, testing, fixing, maintaining, and finally updating an in-house platform is a huge investment. 

Like most projects, it usually sounds easier and less expensive on paper than it ends up being in reality.

Benefits of Buying from an External GTM AI Platform

Choosing to leverage an external GTM AI platform also comes with several key benefits:

1. Always Up-to-Date Models

With an external AI vendor, your team doesn't have to worry about maintaining and updating models. 

External platforms are dedicated to staying on top of the latest advancements in AI and will, therefore, ensure that the models you’re using are always cutting-edge.

For example, Copy.ai began with OpenAI’s GPT models (currently on GPT-4 Turbo). But now we also include Anthropic models (Claude, currently Claude 3 Opus and Sonnet). 

This gives our clients an advantage in avoiding downtime when certain models have technical issues. As more models hit the market, we’ll continue to update the platform for our customers. 

2. Faster Time to Market

Companies can save time and quickly bring their products to market by avoiding the need to build and maintain AI infrastructure. They can focus their resources on product development rather than AI-related concerns.

Because, let’s be honest, your company probably didn’t set out to build AI products. 

But now, due to consumer expectations, there’s pressure to have an AI component to every digital product. 

Rather than try to be one of the thousands of AI companies booming this year, why not leverage a platform other people have already made to bring the product to life much faster? 

3. Optimized Engineering

Relying on external platforms lets internal engineering teams focus on core product development tasks. 

As a result, businesses can prioritize their resources more effectively, reducing overall costs and enabling a better return on investment.

4. Enables Business Agility

Using an external AI platform allows businesses to stay flexible, respond quickly to innovation, and avoid getting bogged down in building, testing, and maintaining complex models. 

External platforms regularly update models, ensuring businesses maintain access to state-of-the-art capabilities without constant maintenance.

So, Build or Buy? 

Choosing a GTM AI platform over building one in-house equips your business with cutting-edge AI capabilities without any maintenance stress or resource drain.

It pushes your product to market faster, optimizes your engineering resources, boosts business agility, and regularly updates you with AI advancements. 

But the biggest reason to buy an external GTM AI platform comes down to this: why divide your team’s attention (and budget) in half? 

If you build an in-house GTM AI platform, you’re rebuilding something that already exists with a small part of your time and attention, whereas companies like Copy.ai are giving it 100% of ours. 

While your competitors are cruising through existing processes enhanced by external AI solutions, you’ll be stuck fixing bugs, updating new models, and hiring, onboarding, and then replacing new talent when they get poached by a higher-paying AI product. 

If you decide to buy an external GTM AI platform though, which one should you go with? 

How do you know where to start, and how do you know which AI products will truly unclog your GTM playbook? 

Got Bloat? The Problem with AI Point Solutions

Many companies are now eager to leverage AI to improve workflows and drive better business outcomes. This has led to over 1000 AI point solutions that target specific tasks. 

Sure, point solutions can provide value for narrow use cases, but they often fail to satisfy broader business needs.

The problem is that point AI solutions lack sufficient context and data to address complex real-world problems. 

They’re designed for singular purposes and not readily adaptable. 

For example, a chatbot trained solely on customer service data won’t understand product information or a sales process.

Plus, the value of an AI application depends heavily on how frictionlessly it integrates into existing workflows. Dropping in a pre-packaged chatbot that can't seamlessly connect with CRM data limits its usefulness. 

The fragmented nature of point solutions also makes it challenging to scale AI across the organization. With data and capabilities siloed, there’s no way to leverage learning across applications. 

Finally, point solutions lack robust mechanisms for continuous improvement. As business needs evolve, point AI does not adapt accordingly.

If requirements change, the technology becomes stagnant and may need to be ripped out and replaced. 

And with all the changes happening in AI, you can easily get caught in a cycle of buy, research, replace, repeat (yes, this is as exhausting and expensive as it sounds). 

Get Velocity: The Need for Comprehensive AI Platforms

AI solutions are most valuable when tailored to a company's unique needs and workflows. But this level of customization is difficult to achieve through individual point solutions that only address very narrow capabilities. 

AI platforms provide more flexibility through composable building blocks that can be adapted and combined as needed.

A single customizable platform streamlines workflows and data sharing across the organization. It also reduces the training and maintenance workload compared to managing many separate AI tools and vendors.

With a platform-based approach, companies gain the advantage of consolidating GTM AI capabilities while still being able to tailor solutions. 

The flexibility to add or modify components allows the platform to evolve alongside the business. 

This ensures a solution optimized for current and future needs, not just one-off projects.

GTM AI Platforms Improve Outcomes and Decrease Costs

An integrated GTM AI platform that spans different business functions like sales, marketing, customer service, etc. can greatly improve outcomes while decreasing costs.

Rather than having siloed AI point solutions for each department, an integrated platform unifies data, workflows, and capabilities. 

This consistency powers better performance across the organization.

With a unified platform, insights uncovered in one department can be seamlessly leveraged by other teams. 

Plus, shared workflows and automation reduce overall costs. 

Eliminating redundant AI applications avoids overpaying for overlapping capabilities. Integrating systems, data, and models is more efficient than disjointed point solutions.

Unified platforms empower employees to take advantage of AI-assisted workflows spanning different teams. With easy access to real-time insights and automated tasks, workers can become workflow creators instead of just operators.

The flexibility to build optimal workflows for any job function improves productivity and outcomes. 

Seamless hand-offs between departments—facilitated by integrated data—enhance the end-to-end customer experience.

Overall, integrated AI platforms yield better results and lower costs than fragmented point solutions. Unifying systems and data unlocks AI's full potential across the organization.

GTM AI for Sales: We Drink Our Own Champagne

AI platforms are revolutionizing sales teams' ability to perform large-scale, personalized outreach. 

We’ve seen this internally as we implement GTM AI into our sales process. 

Traditional manual sales processes limit reps' capacity for thorough research and custom messaging. 

This results in ineffective, generic outreach.

With AI, reps can automate tedious tasks and focus on high-value selling activities. Here are a few of the ways we do this internally at Copy.ai:

1. Research accounts and contacts at scale

• We use AI to quickly analyze troves of data on accounts and contacts.
• Then, we get a 360-degree view into prospects to uncover initiatives, pain points, and strategic priorities.
• Plus, our tech updates accurate records with organizational chart mapping and contact role identification.

2. Generate customized sales collateral

• Our team leverages AI Sales OS to draft customized emails and outreach sequences tailored to each prospect's specific needs.
• This gives us personalized messaging with insights from prospect research to address individual needs.
• And that ultimately lets our reps fine-tune drafts to their own voice and style in a fraction of the time it used to take.

3. Increase productivity and performance

• Now, we can automate manual tasks like data entry, CRM updates, and list building to improve rep efficiency.
• We’ve seen more free-up time for reps to focus on complex selling scenarios that require human skills.
• And we’ve improved key metrics such as connect rates, sales velocity, and conversions through data-driven personalization.

With automated assistance, reps can deliver coordinated, tailored experiences to turn more prospects into customers.

The Bold Promise of GTM AI: Future Proofed. 

We understand that the world's first GTM AI platform can sound like a big promise. But the obvious question remains: “Is it ready to deliver results now, and will those results last tomorrow?” 

Here are just a few of the benefits you can access by using GTM AI today: 

1. Enhanced Sales Productivity and Efficiency

By leveraging the GTM AI platform's workflows, sales teams can automate repetitive tasks and optimize their workflows. 

This automation saves valuable time and allows sales reps to focus on more high-value activities, such as building relationships with prospects and closing deals. 

As a result, sales productivity and efficiency increase, leading to improved revenue generation.

2. Personalized and Tailored Sales Outreach

Our GTM AI platform enables sales teams to deliver personalized and tailored outreach to prospects. 

With AI-generated insights and data, the tool can create tailored email sequences incorporating information about each person's role, company, interests, and more. 

This level of personalization helps sales reps cut through the noise and engage prospects effectively, increasing the chances of conversion.

3. Accurate Deal Analysis and Sales Forecasting

The AI-powered workflows within the GTM platform can provide accurate deal analysis and sales forecasting. 

When you understand the probability of win rates and identify at-risk deals, sales teams can make informed decisions and allocate resources effectively. 

This capability empowers sales leaders and revenue operations managers to optimize budget allocation, evaluate outbound and lead generation channels, and accurately predict quarterly sales performances.

4. Continuous Learning and Improvement

With the GTM AI, sales processes can continuously learn and improve. 

The platform adapts to changing market dynamics and customer preferences by analyzing data and identifying effective selling methods from top-performing reps. This knowledge can be shared across the entire sales team, leading to faster ramp-up times, fewer mistakes, and higher close rates. 

Sales managers can also leverage AI insights to effectively coach their teams and drive overall performance improvement.

What Is the Future of GTM AI? My Best Guess… 

As AI platforms advance, their capabilities will expand to empower more employees and drive the next level of digital transformation for companies. 

Here's what we can expect to see in the future of AI platforms:

Expanding Capabilities with Developments in AI

• Advancements in deep learning, NLP, computer vision, and other AI techniques will allow platforms to take on more complex tasks. This includes higher-level analysis, prediction, personalization, and automation.
• AI platforms will become adept at deriving insights from unstructured data like documents, emails, chats, and videos. This will uncover hidden patterns and opportunities.
• As models are trained on more data, the platforms will become smarter and more accurate. This improves decision-making and outcomes.

Empowering More Employees to Be Workflow Creators

• With easier-to-use no-code/low-code interfaces, more employees beyond technical roles will be able to build AI-powered workflows.
• Democratizing the development of AI workflows enables faster iteration and innovation.
• More employees can customize workflows to their team's needs instead of relying on a centralized IT team. This agility drives value.

Driving the Next Level of Digital Transformation

• AI platforms will enable automation and augmentation across all business functions from marketing to customer service to HR.
• Companies that adopt AI platforms gain competitive advantages through improved efficiency, insights, and experiences.
• Integrating predictive intelligence into workflows and processes will optimize decisions and outcomes.
• An AI-powered workforce will become a key driver of digital transformation and business performance.

In short, I believe companies that leverage GTM AI will move faster and further with less fuel than the ones who don’t. 

Beat the Bloat for Good

At the end of the day, adopting comprehensive AI platforms trumps fragmented point solutions.

It unlocks the full potential of AI to enhance efficiency and lower costs while delivering better business outcomes. 

These platforms offer bespoke workflow customizations, seamlessly integrate with existing systems, and enable data-driven decisions across all departments. 

In breaking free from GTM bloat with AI platforms, companies stand to revolutionize key functional areas and achieve sustainable success.

Ready to dive in? Get started by joining our GTM AI launch event!