THE GOAL
Eliminate inefficient ad spend to focus on lead quality, not just quantity
THE CLIENT
An email analytics and deliverability platform that helps maximize email marketing performance for some of the world’s largest companies.
THE CHALLENGE
A volume-based approach to lead generation was no longer working for this company. Digital tactics were running across multiple channels on four continents, but increased lead volume didn’t necessarily create more customers or increased good leads. With digital ad spend becoming limited and optimization decisions difficult, this company turned to Statwax to uncover the real areas of customer acquisition opportunity and make better channel, spend, and optimization choices.
THE STRATEGY
Statwax knew the best way to move from lead volume to customer volume was to put the company’s sales data to work. With a robust Salesforce pipeline already tracking all post-lead activity, the Statwax and client teams sat down to determine the common criteria that indicated the difference good and bad leads and what prospects would become customers. New personas were built that included key data signals that could then be targeted on digital platforms. Analysis of prior marketing touchpoints that produced customers allowed Statwax to build predictive models showing where more digital focus could reliably produce more customers, for what cost, and at what level.
Armed with this predictive model for lead success and with clearly defined customer journey milestones in the CRM, Statwax linked Salesforce and Google Ads together to bring deeper-level insights into the ads platform. By using new customer persona information and behavioral signals, Statwax was able to build out ad campaigns designed to reach the right users at the right times, rather than casting a wide net and creating inefficient spend. Additionally, the model helped to increase the number of good leads generated by ad efforts over time. Non-search platforms like LinkedIn, Quora, and Capterra were leveraged to engage specific purchase influencers based on data signals previously gleaned, building, and nurturing interest over time. Paid search was re-built to optimize toward downstream outcomes logged in Salesforce, such as qualified leads and closed customers. This new level of insight opened the team up to perform better analysis on every keyword, search term, ad variation, and audience segment. Items that drove lead volume gained the ability to be paused if those leads fizzled out. Other lead criteria were found to be responsible for a far better lead-to-customer conversion than originally thought.
Sales teams at the company were able to use data Statwax generated to have more valuable conversations with good leads and spend less time on bad leads. The company’s pipeline filled with more qualified individuals based on refined awareness-building, while bottom-of-funnel paid search more efficiently converted leads who were most likely to become a customer and filtered out the potential bad leads.
THE TAKEAWAY
You can’t bog down your sales team with unqualified leads; a pure volume play will eventually become inefficient. Turning your internal customer journey insights into actionable digital ad insights can transform how your marketing spend performs. It gives your sales team better leads to work more efficiently and helps close more customers without having to spend more to get there.
Sometimes all it takes is a new perspective. If you’re interested in hearing ours, let’s start a conversation.
