Why Marketing with Intent Is Changing the Game and Driving B2B Growth

By Adam Herbert, CEO & Co-founder, Go Live Data

The marketing data industry has been stuck in a cycle of noise, obsessed with volume and indifferent to value, for many years. B2B strategies have centred around cold emails, outdated contact lists and campaigns built for reach instead of relevance. However, according to Go Live Data’s CEO, the tide is turning.

The rise of ‘marketing with intent’ marks a real shift away from a scattergun approach and it’s changing the rules of the game. At Go Live Data, we’re witnessing that change, as well as driving it and the results speak for themselves.

The disconnect

Traditional outbound marketing has, quite frankly, become out-of-date, resulting in a stagnant industry. Automation has made it easier than ever to send thousands of emails a day, but when recipients are bombarded with irrelevant content, that’s not really marketing and more importantly, it erodes trust.

Intent marketing flips that on its head because it’s about understanding and being considerate of who you’re talking to, what they care about, and having a good idea as to when they’re ready to listen. While it’s marketing informed by data, it’s data that is clean, ethical, as well as timely.

Putting the recipient first

The first principle of intent marketing is incredibly simple: put the recipient first.

At Go Live Data, we’ve pioneered this approach by creating what we call Frequency Rules. These govern how often and in what context our clients should communicate with their audience, and it’s a strategic shift from ‘how much can we send?’ to ‘what does this person need right now?’

Businesses who embrace this mindset will build trust as opposed to generating the most ‘clicks.’ They’ll see higher engagement, lower churn and most importantly, more clients leading to long-term growth.

One of the major advances in this space is having the ability to capture behavioural signals – in real-time. With the right technology, a number of things can be achieved. For example, by tracking the full digital journey of a prospect, and not simply where they landed on a website.

By identifying which pages someone visits, what content they engaged with and how often they return, creates what we call ‘Hot Intent Data’ which provides actionable insight into what matters most to the individual, so it becomes personalised, respectful, and timely. This is proving invaluable for our business clients.

By using this sort of data, businesses and corporations can move away from customer funnels and move towards responsive journeys that lead to higher conversion without compromising on trust.

Educate first, sell second

Another hallmark of intent marketing is a commitment to education. Over 80% of the campaigns we run for clients are informative or advisory. Only 20% are explicitly sales focused and this is an essential rule we continue to highlight, in order to build trust among B2B audiences.

Why? Because today’s business buyers don’t want to be sold to, they want to be informed. Therefore, marketing with intent means earning the right to appear in someone’s inbox. This doesn’t happen through pressure tactics; it happens through value data. We’re seeing this approach resonate across every sector, from financial services to technology and healthcare because businesses that lead with insight, build trust and customer relationships with integrity and there are the ones who will see the rewards for their efforts.

Compliance with regulations like GDPR and PECR is also a given. But intent marketing goes further than that, as not only does it ask; ‘what are we allowed to do?’ It asks ‘what’s the right thing to do?’

At Go Live Data, we’ve refused to work with agencies or resellers who don’t share our ethical values. We’re also building a global preference centre that gives recipients multiple options for how they engage, which goes much further than just an obligatory  ‘unsubscribe’ and nothing else. These are crucial when digital rights and trust are what’s needed.

Scaling with integrity

One of the biggest myths in business is that ethics and growth are at odds with one another. Since launching in 2020, Go Live Data has expanded into international markets, all while putting the recipient at the heart of everything we do, and it’s an example of how ethics and growth can and do work when combined.  

We’ve helped clients like Amazon Business and AXA Health reduce wasted spend, refine their campaigns and grow sustainably. Our tech, our team, and our ethos are all designed to scale, changing a stagnant industry which is long over-due. The future is already being shaped by businesses who recognise that relevance, ethics, and timing matter more than anything in B2B marketing, and being data-driven means being recipient-led. It’s a future where trust is a currency. That’s what intent looks like, and that’s why it works.