Industry:
Corporate and Education Software

Geographies:
Mostly U.S., Canada, Australia, and western Europe

Challenges:
  • Lack of marketing knowledge
  • Massive amounts of unqualified leads
  • Competition taking best customers
  • Primitive website

Solutions:
  • Lead generation strategy & execution
  • Lead nurturing programs
  • Increasing awareness and supporting PR with social networking
  • Better, stronger universal messaging

Results:
  • 212% increase in qualified leads
  • 85% increase in average sale size
  • 225% more multi-product sales
  • Webinars accounted for 20% of new revenue
  • 81% decrease in costs

Aximum will continue to be a major asset to both my firm as well as any company seeking to build a strong brand.

— Aximum client

Success Stories > Filling the pipeline

Filling the pipeline: an Aximum success story

A medium-sized, privately owned organization that specializes in developing collaboration software for the corporate and education markets. They have approximately 125 employees distributed across the U.S., Canada, and parts of Europe. The company has experienced high growth due to the increased interest in remote communication technologies, as well as universally-accessible broadband connectivity. However, the company has experienced hard times recently. The lack of understanding regarding systematic marketing/sales processes has increased the number of unqualified leads (and subsequently tail-chasing by the sales team) while drastically reducing the number of qualified leads and revenue opportunities. Consequently, many of its long-time sales champions have left the company, and the exodus continues as financial results worsen. In addition, the company’s website was in desperate need for a transformation from mid-90’s information source to 21st century lead generation machine.

Aximum recognized that our client was at a crossroads in their evolution, and it needed to take a hard look at its current marketing/sales processes, which were mostly developed when the company only had 3 or 4 people. The "tribal knowledge" these founders possessed was not enough to sustain operations beyond its current size.

The Client’s Needs

Working closely with the client’s management team, we utilized all aspects of our Marketing Success Cycle : assessing its current situation, reporting our findings, diagnosing the problems, developing the solutions, executing on the agreed-upon objectives, and measuring the results. We concluded the following objectives were necessary:

  1. Fill the pipeline with qualified leads
  2. Develop systematic, automated eMarketing program to nurture leads for sales teams and drive prospects to buy
  3. In the face of constantly increasing competition (for-profit and open source), increase awareness for company within industry and measure results from activities
  4. Create better, stronger, more universal messaging strategy for marketing, sales, and all customer-facing teams

My approach

1. Fill the pipeline with qualified leads via the website, webinars, newsletters, and collateral

Website. The technology used on the client’s website was solid, but the content was tired and unfocused. In addition, there were no forms, links, or any other lead generation tools that would enable customers to connect with the company. With the development of all-new messaging and an emphasis on lead generation and search engine optimization (SEO), I was able to modernize the website’s look and functionality. By connecting it with industry-standard analytics tools (most of which are free), I was able to determine how well each area of the website performed, and could even analyze the communication "funnels" that were created to make sure they were effective.

Webinars. Along with website redesign, I focused on the power of webinars as a lead generation tool, especially considering that webinars are considerably lower cost than phone calls, and have much higher success rates. I recommended that the company utilize its own collaboration software to step up its webinar activities and tie them back to the sales management software, creating qualified leads rather than just browsers. Not only does this provide a highly interactive experience for the prospect, but it also demonstrates the effectiveness of the company’s products under real-world conditions.

eNewsletters. Additionally, I worked with the client on developing targeted, segmented enewsletters for initial prospects, as well as creating an enewsletter series for prospects that downloaded the client’s trial software. In the past, ecommunication was limited to a single, generic enewsletter that was broadcast to everyone in their database. Open and click rates were low, while unsubscribes and costs to send each enewsletter continued to climb. We asked customers about their preference regarding type of information, frequency, and promotions that they’d like to see, while developing a reconnection campaign to those that hadn’t opened an enewsletter in more than six months.

Collateral. Finally, I redeveloped the brochures and other value-added collateral so they were sharper, needs/benefit-focused, and suitable for both online and print distribution. The strategy moving forward was to encourage electronic distribution of the collateral, but to still make smaller amounts of paper-based brochures available as needed. This was better aligned with the overall philosophy of the client’s target customers, who are very technologically- and environmentally-oriented.

2. Develop systematic, automated eMarketing program to nurture leads for sales team and to drive prospects to buy

The client was already using SalesForce.com, and its sales team was familiar with the basic functionalities of the sales modules. However, there was a whole new aspect to SalesForce.com –the marketing modules and supplemental applications– that they hadn’t capitalized on yet. And the best part was that they were already paying for the module and applications, so it was just a matter of utilizing their power to drive leads.

I helped to develop processes and content for web forms, landing pages, software trials, email forms, webinar follow-ups, personalized demos, and trade show contacts. We developed a lead scoring and stratification matrix that coincided with the sales pipeline activities so that a prospect’s online activities were matched one-for-one with pipeline progress. We helped create "triggers" in the system so that the sales team only focused on prospects and activities that yielded the highest results. For example, if a prospect visited the website, filled out a form, and attended a webinar, they would be scored as a "hot" lead and immediately contacted by a salesperson. If they downloaded the software trial, but indicated in a form they were not ready to purchase, they would be classified as a "warm" lead and received timely, targeted email communications, effectively "incubating" them until a later time when they were ready to be contacted about a purchase.

For the first time in the company, Marketing activities were completely synchronized with the Sales activities, making the process much more tangible, understandable, and useful.

3. Increase awareness for client within industry to stay ahead of the competition

Since the target audience is very forward-thinking and fully embracing of the latest technologies like social media, I felt it would be worthwhile to develop a social marketing program that incorporated Social Media Releases, a blog/wiki, a community, and a Twitter presence. Each element has its advantages in the ever-evolving social environment:

  • Social Media Releases are similar to traditional press releases but have more soundbites, hyperlinks, and more Calls To Action (CTAs).
  • Blogs and wikis enable customers and prospects to engage in more active, two-way communication with the client.
  • Communities are a great way to encourage socially conscious customers to take an active stake in the organization, communicate with other customers, and share digital assets like add-ons and APIs (Application Programming Interfaces).
  • Twitter empowers customers to connect one-on-one with specific employees, and develops a professional relationship, further strengthening the bond between client and customer.

Better, stronger, more universal messaging strategy for marketing, sales, and all customer-facing teams

I helped the client develop a Core Messaging Platform, which is essentially an all-in-one document utilized by all internal employees to develop universal messages that are conveyed to the external audience. The advantages of a Core Messaging Platform are to get everyone on the same page, literally, and to provide customers with a unified, cohesive voice that conveys confidence, consistency, and clarity. Our approach to the development of Core Messaging Platforms are described in more detail in our "Getting the message" Success Story

Results

  • 212% increase in total number of leads
  • Development of "hot" and "warm" lead scoring reduced number of sales interactions by 40%, and shortened average sales cycle by over 35%
  • 85% increase in average sales size due to better customer knowledge
  • 225% more multi-product sales
  • Using webinars as a primary sales tool accounted for 20% of all new revenue
  • 130% increase in email open rates and 315% increase in clickthrough rates
  • 81% decrease in email distribution costs due to change in frequency of communications, as requested by customer. At the same time, customers gave a 70% "favorable" rating on our email communication, with the most popular response being "they listened to my needs."
  • $200K reduction in print costs with no reported customer complaints
  • 32% increase in brand awareness, and 68% increase in favorable awareness

Read additional Success Stories

Subscribe to our newsletter