Cincom used a content and marketing automation campaign to identify its enewsletter subscribers in the buying process leading to increased sales leads
Cincom Systems is a privately owned company that serves thousands of clients on six continents. For over 45 years, Cincom has supported clients worldwide by solving complex business problems with its software and services and offering solutions for a wide range of industries, applications and business sectors.
The challenge
From the beginning, Cincom’s Expert Access magazine has operated independently from any Cincom product groups. This has enabled the e-zine – a bi-weekly newsletter that consists of articles written by industry experts – to steer clear of any ‘product’ message and attract excellent contributors without a perceived endorsement.
Through basic analytics and public reaction, Cincom felt that Expert Access was getting some engagement, but the company still couldn’t identify subscribers in its sales process or tie those potential prospects to a sale.
Content and automation
Cincom decided the most logical way to meet this challenge was to allow prospects to identify themselves by using its existing marketing automation system, Eloqua. In February 2013, using Eloqua, Cincom launched its behaviour-based content campaign, which was made up of the following five phases:
1. Creating blind form submits.
2. Leveraging existing content by tagging it.
3. Conducting monthly content audits.
4. Implementing progressive profiling.
5. Following up with leads.
First, a series of blind form submissions were created. When an Expert Access subscriber clicked through an article in the e-zine, the click is the same as completing a form with their name and email address. The process was seamless for the visitor, but a cookie was dropped onto their computer, and they become a known user in Eloqua. Cincom could then begin to understand the digital body language of that contact.
Next Cincom tagged each Expert Access article by subject matter to the vertical markets that its solutions target. For example, it was determined that content about ‘sales enablement’ and ‘performance’ is relevant to Cincom’s sales and product-configuration solution. When a subscriber engaged with two or more content pieces with these tags, they were automatically filtered into a lead generation campaign for that particular solution.
In addition to Cincom’s 1000 plus Expert Access articles at its disposal, each solution group had a website, blog, ebooks and a variety of other types of content. There was even a radio show, Expert Access Radio, on iHeartRadio with transcripts
and podcasts available. By conducting monthly content audits for each of these product groups, Cincom could select the content that was most likely to resonate with its readers.
A mix of top-performing Expert Access articles were included in the ongoing campaign along with vertical-specific content that provided a transition for the reader from the general Expert Access topic to the more vertical-focused campaign, increasing readership acceptance.
Then through the earlier blind form submissions, Cincom was able to capture the email addresses of those readers. However, in order to qualify the new contacts as a potential prospect, Cincom needed to learn more about them. The answer was progressive profiling. With the implementation of progressive profiling, Cincom could capture additional valuable data. With each new offer a contact engaged with, a new form field was presented. For example, on subsequent visits, Cincom might ask for their company name or size. Once they have that information, more specific information might be requested. The end result is a much more complete picture of the contact.
Finally, based on the total level of engagement with the resulting lead-generation campaigns, Cincom follows up on that lead.
The results
According to Cincom Systems marketing manager, Ed Mack: “Based on the level of engagement with the resulting lead-generation campaigns, a lead can be successfully followed up on by our sales organisation. Lead follow-up is centered on content that is engaged by the specific individual. The engagement with our audience in this behaviour-based content campaign has been outstanding.”
Here are the results after just two months into the campaign:
• A 256 per cent improvement in the campaign open rate.
• A 1941 per cent increase in the click-to-open rate.
• 1513 potential opportunities identified.
• An average of 18 new sales leads every week.
Over time, Cincom has successfully delivered relevant content, engaged at the pace of the reader and courted the individual for additional content and information. As prospects continue to let Cincom know who they are and what their interests are – both voluntarily and automatically – existing content can continue to be leveraged while Cincom seeks to learn what content has value and who values it.
