When Michelle Levy, Associate Vice President of Marketing Programs for ECI Telecom, was tasked with marketing an innovative, powerful solution to a varied, broad audience who knew nothing of its value, she responded by developing a comprehensive content-marketing initiative. Her goal: to make efficient and effective use of time, money and resources. She was impressed by the outcomes - a 79 percent e-mail open rate - and surprised by how the initiative positively impacted the organization’s entire marketing effort.

1. Case Study: Executing content marketing
to drive leads‐to‐sales conversion
Michelle Mogelson Levy
Associate Vice President, Marketing Programs
ECI Telecom
March 16, 2011

2. Michelle Mogelson Levy
Associate Vice President, Marketing Programs
ECI Telecom
Michelle is responsible for demand generation
and global marketing programs, and is focused
on aligning marketing campaigns to the buyer’s
journey.
Areas of expertise include lead generation,
management, nurturing and scoring, and
marketing automation. She is passionate about
reporting, measurement and best practices.
@mogelsonlevy
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3. Case Study Background
The
ECI Telecom
company
The B2B telecom market,
marketplace 12‐18 month complex sales cycle
Network infrastructure solutions
The product
for telecom providers
Automated email marketing lead
The channel
nurturing campaigns
The
To increase amount of Marketing Qualified
campaign
objective Leads being pushed to sales
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4. Case Study Background
Centralized core marketing team managing all outbound campaigns
Small team tasked with multiple, simultaneous lead nurturing
campaigns covering several segments
Running segmented email campaigns based on behavior without
aligning content to buyers journey
Segmented marketing database of over 30K prospects
Hundreds of unmapped/unknown/orphan marketing assets
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5. The Tale of Two Campaigns
Campaign #1 – The Easy Win
Focused, targeted campaign to defined
audience for segmented industry
Utility Market Segment
Utilized ECI generated content for
5 step nurturing campaign
Results: 33% open rate
11% conversion
Sherpa Benchmark: 24% open rate 12%
conversion
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6. The Tale of Two Campaigns
Campaign #2 – The True Challenge
Broad‐based technology
campaign spanning numerous
applications and solutions
Wireless Backhaul
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7. Challenge & Goal
Replicate successful conversion rates on
The Easy Win campaign…how can we
ensure success for The True Challenge?
Challenge
Create personalized, highly segmented
lead‐nurturing campaign by offering
compelling content matched to the
early/educational stage of the buying cycle
Goal
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8. Strategy
What do I What do I
need? have?
How do I fill
the gap?
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9. Strategy to Tactics – What Do I Need?
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Tactic #1
Define which assets are needed to fuel campaign
Result: Set of third‐party content aligned with
educational stage of buying cycle
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10. Strategy to Tactics – What Do I Need?
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Tactic #2
Audit and allocate existing content to stages
of buying cycle
Align/educate global matrix organization of
content creators and owners to buyers’
journey
Results of asset audit
695 assets
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11. Transfer the Knowledge to Buyer at Right Time
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Education Solution Vendor Selection
Loosening of the Committing to Exploring Possible Committing to a Justifying the Making the
Status Quo Change Solutions Solution Decision Selection
We understand the Your solution will We are confident
We might have a Your solution
problem and how it have the greatest The business case is
problem, or we are applies to our and ready to move
connects to our impact on our justified internally.
conceiving a vision. need. forward.
business. business.
Thought Solution Solution Financial
Value Story On Boarding
Leadership Knowledge Validation Justification
Published Articles Events/ Welcome Kit
Proof Of Concept ROI tools
Social Media Webinars Business Oriented Training
Competitive Tools Client References
White papers Web site/SEO Case Studies Customer
Blogs Executive Briefings Product Specs
Analyst Reports Newsletter
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12. Education
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Education Solution Vendor Selection
Loosening of the Committing to Exploring Possible Committing to a Justifying the Making the
Status Quo Change Solutions Solution Decision Selection
Content at this stage focuses on
introducing a problem, and then
connecting that problem to critical Problem ACTION
business issues. It should create a sense
of urgency for a target to take action,
action that should eventually lead them
Business Business
to consider a solution that you offer. issues issues
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13. Solution
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Education Solution Vendor Selection
Loosening of the Committing to Exploring Possible Committing to a Justifying the Making the
Status Quo Change Solutions Solution Decision Selection
Once targets commit to solving a problem, Solving the
content should be built to help them pinpoint problem
their needs in relation to the problem. Next
comes the process of matching needs against a Needs
range of solution options in order to find the
type of solution that is the best fit, which has
unique content requirements of its own. Best fit
solution
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14. Vendor Selection
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Education Solution Vendor Selection
Loosening of the Committing to Exploring Possible Committing to a Justifying the Making the
Status Quo Change Solutions Solution Decision Selection
Content at this stage should focus on helping buyers
vendor
differentiate vendors that offer the ideal solution,
vendor
and arming them with the information they will need vendor
to address the questions and concerns of other vendor
influencers. Clearly communicating features and Vendor
functionality, demonstrating return on investment
and total cost of ownership, and sharing details ROI Service
TCO
around service.
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15. Alignment: Established Content Committee
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Product Managers
Product Marketing
Solution Marketing
Programs Marketing
AR/PR
Web and Media
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16. Content Audit and Mapping Process
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Quality Value
Does the content asset meet the same How thoroughly does it address a
quality standards you set for your customer pain point? What content
products and services? pieces should be made freely available
to Web site visitors and which should
be gated?
Relevance Influence
Does the content meet the information Does the content asset influence buyer
needs of the buyers journey? Is it perceptions? Does it best emphasize
relevant for the designated persona? specific issues, risks, inefficiencies or
opportunities that an offering is tied
to?
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17. Strategy to Tactics – What Do I Need?
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Tactic #2
Breakdown by buying cycle:
Raw data 400
Vendor Selection: 174
Solution: 120
Educational: 1
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18. Strategy to Tactics – How Do I Fill the Gap?
What do I need? What do I have? How do I fill the gap?
Tactic #3
Acquire third‐party assets
Define sources of valuable content
Third‐party validation sources; analysts,
research firms
Sponsored (writing) articles by
independent thought leaders
Purchase licensed content for
distribution
Execute campaign
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19. Results
Quantitative
The Easy Win: Average of 33% open rate and 11%
post‐click conversion rate
The Real Challenge: Average of 78% open rate and
23% post‐click conversion rate
Industry benchmarks: 24% open rate and 12% click
through rate (Sherpa 2011 Benchmark Guide)
Qualitative
Content audit serves as basis for web
mapping and supports all future campaigns
Organizational alignment to buying cycle
Open rate: emails opened divided by emails delivered,
Post‐click conversion rate: completed a registration form
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20. Summary and Key Takeaways
What do I What do I
need? have?
How do I fill
the gap?
Increased conversion rates by 136%. Its all about your buyers’ journey…
Aligning your content to their journey will enable you to deliver the right
content to the right audience at the right time.
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21. Credits
Aligning Content to Buyers Journey
2011 Email Marketing Benchmark
Report
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22. Thank You
Michelle Mogelson Levy
AVP Marketing Programs
ECI Telecom
Mail: Michelle.Levy@ecitele.com
Linkedin: MichelleMogelsonLevy
Twitter: @mogelsonlevy
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