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Let’s Get Social: an Aximum success story

Our Client

Our client is a medium-sized software company that develops products for the automotive, aerospace, construction, and medical device industries. Both the client and its customers were feeling the pinch of the recent economic downturn, but still had ambitious revenue plans for the upcoming 12-month period. Many of their customers went out of business, so they needed to build their sales database to keep the pipeline full.

In the past, the client had mixed results with traditional marketing tools like advertising, trade shows, PR, and direct marketing, mostly because they didn’t have the expertise to develop a strategy that would maximize effectiveness. In addition, their target audiences — engineers, scientists, architects, and biomedical Ph.D.s — don’t respond well to traditional marketing. Based on these two factors, I worked with the client on creating a complete marketing strategy, which included traditional tools as well as lower cost, technology-driven social networking marketing tools, which would reach their target audience in ways their customers feel most comfortable with.

The Client’s Needs

After consultation, we determined the client’s top six goals for social networking:

1. Generate new leads
2. Generate more website visitors
3. Increase ecommerce revenue
4. Fill up sales pipeline
5. Increase awareness in the target industries
6. Develop reputation as a thought leader

My approach

1. Corporate blog. In the past, all corporate communication had been one-way: from the client to their customers. They needed to engage in conversation, not just communication, so I developed a customer-focused blog. The client’s target audience consists of highly evolved, technology-driven people, and they are very passionate and outspoken about their professions. Without an outlet to communicate their viewpoints to a company, they will find their own outlets, many times in a negative manner. The blog gave them the forum they needed, and the response was extremely favorable.

Blogging gave customers an open door to the company, as well as to the CEO. With his weekly "Pulse of the CEO" entry, he was able to create a forum for open, honest dialogue. The reaction was extremely positive. Customers were thrilled to have this type of availability to senior management, and went out of their way to praise the company for its transparency. Most comments were positive, but even the negative comments were put within the constructive context of highlighting issues and determining ways to solve problems. In addition, the blog provided an effective way to inform customers of patches, bugs, updates, and new product releases. Used in conjunction with RSS feeds, customers were assured to receive this information instantaneously.

2. Webinars. Our client has many industry experts with decades of experience, and they were looking for a way to capitalize on this internal knowledge. I recommended the creation of biweekly webinars on subjects that interest and engage their customers. Some webinars were geared towards general industry topics and recent trends, while others were specifically focused on product-related topics.

Webinars offer many useful benefits. Not only are they a great way to educate a company’s audience (both current customers and prospects) on industryrelated topics, but they can also be used to demonstrate how a company’s products can fulfill specific needs. Because they are viral in nature, webinars can be used as a lead generation tool by attendees that pass along the invitation to friends and colleagues. In addition, they provide an interactive multimedia experience, and can even double as a one-on-one forum for customers and prospects that want to interact with company experts.

3. Tweet tweet - create a Twitter account. One of the fastest-growing social networking sites is Twitter, a "micro blogging" tool that enables real-time communication. Because responses are limited to 140 characters, it’s seen as a more intimate and informal way to connect. It’s not for everybody, but it’s perfect for my client’s target audience. User can access their account via the Twitter website, various Twitter third-party tools, and mobile devices. Our client discovered that it’s a great way to announce upcoming webinars and product updates, as well as share interesting conversations taking place on the blog. They have over 1,400 Twitter connections ("followers"), and it continues to grow.

4. LinkedIn.com. I recommended that all senior managers create their own LinkedIn account. LinkedIn is a professional networking site that’s a great way to build, maintain, track, and communicate with ongoing contacts. As profiles grew, so did pertinent professional information like email addresses and phone numbers, and utilizing the "kinship" that most LinkedIn members feel made connecting even easier. In addition, I encouraged my client to create a company-specific group within LinkedIn to supplement the blog and Twitter accounts. This group enabled the client to invite fellow LinkedIn members who fit within their target audience for in-depth, ongoing conversations. In essence, this group became a highly motivated and interactive focus group and advisory council, providing a forum to discuss upcoming product promotions, product-related issues, and "incubator" ideas for future releases. Because of this emphasis, most LinkedIn group members were already loyal customers, and those that weren’t soon became customers.

5. New philosophy on press releases. In the past, press releases were written, distributed, and forgotten. There was no measurement, no tracking of activity, and no understanding of their effectiveness. I shifted the client’s emphasis away from traditional press releases to Social Media Releases (SMR), which are shorter, more focused, and more interactive. They are specifically designed for social networking sites, which in turn are specially designed for distribution and penetration. SMRs contain audio, video, images, and other attachments that are impossible to include in traditional releases. They can also include internal contacts to encourage interviews, product requests, and demos. Essentially, each SMR is a branding opportunity; you don’t merely read an SMR, you experience it. Instead of distributing press releases through PR Newswire, the client started distributing SMRs via PitchEngine and ended up saving thousands of dollars while dramatically increasing the number of people that read and linked to their information.

6. Email signatures. The signatures at the end of emails had always been thought of as extraneous salutations, when in effect they can be used as a powerful branding tool. I developed a series of email signatures that promoted all the new forms of social networking: company blog, upcoming webinars, Twitter accounts, and the LinkedIn personal & group accounts.

Results

After just four months, the results were startling:

• 2,845 blog members, all of whom are new
• 39% increase in website visits
• 61% increase in organic search visitors (those who "Google" standard industry phrases and the client’s name)
• 81% decrease in website abandonment, indicating that visitors wanted to come to the website, and wanted to stay
• 39% increase in ecommerce-related revenue
• 21% increase in total revenue
• 1,344 webinar leads, all of whom are new, and 71% of whom are in the pipeline or have already purchased
• 24% increase in brand awareness from six months earlier
• 68% increase in customer confidence regarding company’s products, services, and reputation
• 77% increase in customer perception regarding company’s understanding of the latest technologies, like social media
• Total cost of all programs: $5,218
• Total ROI after 4 months: over 350:1

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