Planning for Anaplan
Landscape Assessment
The global pandemic accelerated digital adoption in every aspect of life – causing companies across industries to rewrite the rules of how and where work gets done and race to transform digitally to meet new customer expectations.
Against this backdrop, we see operational challenges emerge, increased competition in an incredibly noisy market and global economic pressures on corporate spending.
There has never been a more critical time for Anaplan to show its true value to customers and prospects who are quickly adapting and pivoting in our new normal. Yet while Anaplan is capturing attention of premier analysts and financial media, there is limited top-tier technology and business coverage.
We see opportunities to build thought leadership platforms that bring to life expertise, that offer guidance to prospects and customers navigating new business challenges and expectations. We want to insert executive opinions, weighing in on broader industry and technology trends to build the Anaplan brand in new conversations.
We believe in quality over quantity and being intentional with the right story to move your business forward. To shape our strategy, below you will find a high-level SWOT assessment based on external perception.
Strengths
- Notable street cred. Your continued leadership position in Gartner’s 2020 Magic Quadrant for Cloud Financial Planning & Analysis Solutions validates market need and reflects Anaplan’s strong industry reputation.
- Frank Calderoni frequently earns praise as a savvy industry veteran equipped to handle the challenging business climate.
- Public cloud sales partnership with Alphabet's Google Cloud, as well as software integrations with Amazon's AWS and Microsoft's Azure will broaden Anaplan’s customer base.
- Significant growth. Anaplan shows up as successful in both acquiring new customers and increasing sales with existing customers.
Weaknesses
- Existing media coverage is news-based, financially-driven and factual.
- Coverage is limited and functional, lacking an elevated and engaging narrative.
- Financial and trade press are main source of editorial vs. top-tier business and tech outlets.
- Minimal thought leadership stories for broader brand and reputation building.
- Old school PR approach ripe for modernization.
Opportunities
- Significant ERP growth with analysts projecting global spend to double over the next five years.
- Elevate narratives to sell the why and spotlight business implications – create strategies into tech and business media to expand industry recognition beyond financial media.
- Thoughtfully leverage Frank Calderoni’s respected reputation to drive feature editorial.
- Potential to expand thought leadership, particularly in more mainstream tech and business pubs as conversations about planning and digital transformation accelerate in the COVID era.
- COVID-19 has driven increased desire from executives for the type of end-to-end operational changes Anaplan can provide.
- Rapidly increasing distributed workforces and significant shifts in work should accelerate adoption of real-time planning solutions.
- Strategically spotlight customer cases to illustrate Anaplan impact.
- Experts predict companies will seek to replace legacy solutions that were ill-equipped for the pandemic.
Threats
- Weak economy post-pandemic may negatively impact Anaplan’s growth.
- Competitive, crowded market makes it difficult to stand out and differentiate in media coverage.
- Customer barriers to successful digital transformation are still commonplace.
- Shadow IT and tons of applications within an organization create hurdles for company-wide adoption.
- Competing against large, better resourced legacy ERP players may bring difficulty to lead the narrative in mainstream media.
- Employee behaviors and legacy habits can challenge new organizational changes in approach.
Brand Building Activation
Based on our research so far, it’s clear there’s a need to break into more tech and business outlets and an opportunity exists to bring more passion and purpose into the Anaplan narrative. For us, it all starts with a good story. If we were your partner, our first action would be to build a thought leadership platform that sets Anaplan apart from the noisy SaaS space. A good story can be an asset across the company and channels. The foundation for all creative and day-to-day programming to hang from…
Truth in Business — What’s Your Anaplan?
We need truth. Opinions matter, especially the passion of a perspective… but it can cause confusion, division, inaccuracy and can misguide. We believe truth in business is a competitive advantage, a global advantage.
Using a trusted source, together we can achieve more. Truth connects us. We can move faster and smarter. Unlock insights that define new products, experiences and paths to success. We are dynamic in collaborating around a shared outcome, ebbing and flowing as we learn and grow daily to improve and be our best and deliver the best.
Our world is in recovery. Truth in business brings stability and new opportunities. Truth in business can help companies of all sizes and geographies thrive and grow. There is a great global economic lift when we can arrive to success faster and more intentionally.
Truth in business is the plan. How do you activate your business truth?
How it Works:
Build a narrative that…
- Roots the Anaplan story in a broader purpose to help companies, and the economy, succeed
- Includes a unique and ownable POV on the need for truth in business to be redefined for the modern era
- Highlights the most impactful customer stories to illustrate the Anaplan advantage
- Becomes the thought leadership platform for Frank and roster of executive spokespeople to drive consistency in storytelling while building the Anaplan brand
Introduce and Activate the Truth Principle
- Partner with established expert like Youngme Moon, Harvard Business School professor, author and podcaster, to bring a third-party perspective and added credibility to the “Truth Principle”
- Introduce concept through Meeting of the Minds Virtual Cocktail Hour – Frank and Youngme host to discuss the theory of the Truth Principle, exploring the power of a trusted source across an organization
- Include analysts, select media, customers and partners (e.g. Gartner, Fortune, Axios, TechCrunch, Forbes, Business Insider)
- Link to a major customer win, who would join the panel to have a news angle
- Partner with media outlet (Fast Company or Business Insider) for paid integration to host and promote event which also ups appeal for customers to participate
- Pen op-ed from Frank on the Truth Principle, leverage content across company and executive channels to build momentum (branded content, LinkedIn, Anaplan blog, Instagram, etc.)
- Design “Truth Principle” programming that leads and guides customers and prospects to implementing one source of truth for greater outcomes
- Tips and best practices
- Expert perspectives and insights
- Vertical frameworks
- Department guidelines
- Virtual bootcamp(s)
Build Momentum, Drive Message Consistency
- 2021 marks Anaplan’s 15th anniversary – use this as a storytelling moment
- Content that speaks to Anaplan’s core values of speed, integrity, accountability, and disruption – and how our customers can stay aligned with their own values through planning
- Establish the Anaplan for Good program and launch with support for 15 non-profit organizations chosen by employees
- Find new ways to leverage founder story in publications like Inc. and Entrepreneur to recognize the 15-year mark and highlight how planning has evolved
- Develop mini executive-visibility plans for SMEs with unique swim lanes of the truth platform to drive evergreen stories across top markets and media
- Proactive pitching
- News jacking
- Insert perspectives
- Embed into speaking and owned content
- Work with in-house content team to create spotlight opportunities for the Truth Principle across owned channels
- Dedicated section of blog for Truth Principle perspectives (or consider a landing page to house programming and viewpoints)
- Customer use cases framed by true insights that led to greater outcomes
Envisioning Earned Media Success
Why it Works:
- Elevates narrative to step out of functional and instill more passion and purpose in the value of Anaplan while hitting on global, relevant topics
- Becomes a framing mechanism that underscores the why of Anaplan – the Truth Principle can be applied to activities including customer use cases, partnerships, news and milestones
- Illustrates the value of implementing Anaplan without leading from a product perspective
- Creates a conversation opener to engage broader set of media including tech, business and more mainstream outlets