Tag: Campaign Analysis

RevSure Pipeline Readiness

Demand Generation Effectiveness displays the most effective channels by various metrics

RevSure, which describes itself as a Pipeline Readiness solution, announced enhancements that “provide marketing teams with increased insights into data and around lead-to-revenue projections.”  The new capabilities help marketers increase their spend efficiency and focus expenditures on campaigns and actions with the highest ROI.

RevSure helps go-to-market teams “share a single source of truth” concerning the health of their pipeline.  It also automates reporting tasks and offers recommendations for converting leads into qualified sales opportunities.

“With a united full-funnel view, you can effortlessly pull all of this data into one place, so you can easily analyze the impact of each campaign and lead source at a glance.  Did your latest low-cost webinar lead to a high amount of pipeline and bookings?  You may want to consider scaling your efforts or investing in more webinars.  On the other hand, did that conference you attended 8 months ago and spent tens of thousands of dollars on not lead to the pipeline and bookings you were hoping for?  Might be worth crossing that conference off your list for the next year, so you can ensure you are focusing on the campaigns and channels that are bringing you the greatest ROI,” blogged RevSure.

New features offer insights into demand generation effectiveness and efficiency, helping prioritize leads and opportunities.  AI recommendations call out which leads to prioritize and how to optimize campaigns.  Users can drill down into campaigns or filter by title, industry, segment, or channel.  The Demand Generation Effectiveness is a color-coded tree map of “what is working and where is it working,” explained RevSure Head of Marketing Kacyn Goranson to GZ Consulting.  “It will show you generated lead volume, gross cost per lead, or booking value, so you can quickly slice and dice your marketing efforts” and determine “what is actually effective” across the funnel.

RevSure also provides stage conversion analytics, cohort analysis for campaign efficacy, and marketing campaign / KPI analytics.

Cohort analysis with Lead Insights

Lead prioritization is based on firmographics (e.g., location, size, industry), persona, engagement data from MAPs, intent, channel, campaign data, and lead source.  Data is sourced from Apollo and customer-licensed intent datasets.

To improve demand generation effectiveness, RevSure now ingests Salesforce campaigns and lead sources, along with Google AdWords and LinkedIn Campaigns.  These additional data sources are available for campaign budget analysis.  Users can “easily calculate and determine” conversion velocity, pipeline, and booking value.

“Today’s marketers have a gap in their data toolsets and are currently lacking AI-based models, and many CMOs are tasked with adopting and driving what will be effective, and winning, data strategies,” argued RevSure CEO Deepinder Singh Dhingra.  “Using RevSure helps provide marketing teams with intelligence and insights into their sales pipeline, and data that empowers them to strategically defend marketing budgets and pivot campaigns based on sales performance – both of which can be critical to sales success in the current economic climate.”

RevSure provides sales and marketing teams lists of their top 25, 50, and 100 most promising leads and opportunities.  It also displays “step-by-step recommendations” concerning when and how to follow up with them, “turning qualified leads into legitimate sales opportunities.”

Lead Prioritization provides a summary of the Top 25, 50, and 100 opportunities along with the working lead list and projected pipeline value.

RevSure already supports Salesforce, HubSpot, Marketo, and Pardot.  The HubSpot App Marketplace partnership was launched earlier this month.

RevSure focuses on the top and middle of the funnel with recommendations and prioritization tools instead of the bottom, which looks more at forecasting.  “We are in the lead-to-opportunity journey,” explained Singh to GZ Consulting.  “We don’t go into the forecast.”

RevSure is less than a year old and officially launched at SaaStr in September 2022.  According to Singh, the firm is ahead of its customer acquisition and revenue targets.

Demand Generation Effectiveness Drilldown.

Spiceworks Ziff Davis Acquires Aberdeen

Spiceworks Ziff Davis (SWZD) acquired intent and technology intelligence vendor Aberdeen.  The acquisition brings together intent data from Spiceworks and The Big Willow, Aberdeen and SWZD market research, Aberdeen’s technology profiles (the old HHMI / Access CI datasets), and Ziff Davis B2B media sites.  

SWZD describes itself as “the trusted global marketplace for connecting technology buyers and sellers across all marketing channels and the leader in demand generation and integrated intelligence-driven marketing, connecting technology buyers and sellers across IT, marketing, HR, and finance.  SWZD has a massive reach into the entire buyer’s collective with a monthly audience of 71.5M across powerhouse IT brands.”

Aberdeen will be managed as a wholly-owned subsidiary of SWZD, but initially operate independently.  Along with third-party intent, Aberdeen adds a library of industry intelligence, technographic and firmographic data, and a demand generation call center.  

The union positions SWZD as a credible competitor to Zoominfo and TechTarget in the B2B technology intent space, helping customers identify “businesses that are truly in-market for their product.”  Unlike the two larger technology sales intelligence vendors, SWZD does not offer a sales intelligence platform.

“We give our clients actionable visibility into the businesses that are truly in-market for their products and unparalleled access to quality, scale, and diversity of B2B tech intent data to make meaningful connections with those buyers.  With the union of businesses, we immediately married our data and boosted our intelligence, resulting in a 15% increase in businesses, 70% increase in segment scale, 30% richer intent data, and expansion into fifteen new verticals.”

Richard Jalichandra, EVP and Global GM of SWZD

Continued Jalichandra, “We’re just starting to explore opportunities to further enhance our business-level data and invest in our combined product roadmap.”  

Jalichandra also identified “synergies around research,” a core function at both firms.  Aberdeen offers a “rich library of data-backed reports,” while SWZD offers custom market research.

The combined resources deliver account-level insights across 14 million companies and 24 million contacts.  Over 11 billion intent signals are collected monthly from over 10,000 B2B websites.  Intent data is available for over fifty technology segments.

The merger improves the depth of B2B intent data, expands the scope of account and contact intelligence, and grows their market research capabilities.

“We’re excited about the opportunity to expand the reach and identity of Aberdeen as a subsidiary of SWZD to put customers in even closer contact with the very buyers and influencers they’re targeting,” said Aberdeen CTO Mark DePalma.  “Through the power of our combined data sets, vertically integrated demand generation capabilities, and continued innovation in our technology and services, we help customers with unparalleled targeting and marketing outcomes.”

SWZD’s Intelligent ABM delivers “actionable intent signals,” target account list prioritization, data appends, look-a-like expansion, built-in campaign activation, purchase intent scores, campaign analytics, and “seamless integration with marketing automation platforms.”

“With the combination of SWZD’s first-party intent data and Aberdeen’s third-party intent data, you get greater visibility into the entire buying collective. Not just that, our intent signals captured on the basis of the actions our audience takes; whether it is troubleshooting tech issues, comparing product reviews, connecting with an expert or accessing strategic content, provides an incredible quality and diversity of data right from the boardroom to the server room.”

Spiceworks Ziff Davis Website

SWZD offers a set of technology marketing services, including

  • Direct and programmatic advertising
  • Email marketing and newsletter sponsorships
  • Content marketing (e.g., whitepapers, e-books, infographics, case studies, interactive content, custom video, and market research)
  • Lead generation (e.g., content syndication, BANT qualified leads, intent-based leads)
  • Market research (e.g., online surveys, focus groups, in-depth interviews)
  • Virtual events (e.g., webinars, video meetups, panel discussions)

Financial details were not disclosed.

Flash: Cognism Acquires Mailtastic

Hybrid Engagement vendor Cognism acquired email signature marketing firm Mailtastic in a seven-figure cash and stock deal.  The acquisition provides Cognism with an additional marketing channel – professional email signatures that reflect the latest corporate messaging and branding.  Mailtastic centralizes corporate signature blocks, with adjustments by market, outbound language, and job function.  Employees can select between multiple signature options based upon the recipient.

Mailtastic supports G Suite, Office 365, Outlook, Exchange, Apple Mail, and Gmail, with signatures optimized by the device.  Mailtastic is GDPR compliant with European server locations.  Mailtastic features include centralized campaign management, campaign analytics, event planning, and click notifications.

“The acquisition will enable Cognism to empower go-to-market teams with a whole new channel for their outreach and lead generation efforts,” posted Mailtastic Marketing Manager Verena Vogt.  “For Mailtastic, the acquisition represents an exciting opportunity to offer accelerated internationalisation, extensive product expansion, and the creation of joint products and services that will define the next era of B2B revenue growth solutions.”

The full Mailtastic team of ten is joining Cognism, including its founders Tao Bauer, Peer Wierzbitzki, and Andreas Schröder.

Mailtastic was founded in 2015 and grew its customer base to 350 enterprises, mostly in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland (DACH).  The acquisition provides an additional go-to-market channel, an EU office in Mainz, and a set of Central European enterprise clients into which Cognism services may be cross-sold.  Cognism will open a second UK office in Manchester that will focus on Mailtastic sales, with plans to open a second North American office towards the end of the year, possibly in Canada.

Mailtastic is profitable and has a 67% annual growth rate.  The firm has no sales team, with selling conducted by one of its founders; thus, applying Cognism’s successful go-to-market approach should support rapid revenue expansion.  Cognism’s sales approach is to hire recent University grads as SDRs and then train them in Cognism’s sales tools for prospecting, ICP/TAM analysis, and outbound sales engagement.  Reps also leverage global company and contact profiles that include over 20 million direct dial and mobile numbers.

Mailtastic has a negative churn rate.  CEO James Isilay indicated that the DACH market is slower to purchase technology, but also less likely to switch vendors than the UK or US markets.  Once licensed to the enterprise, seat growth takes place organically as firms look to control email block branding and messaging.  Furthermore, the DACH market provides a stable base for cross-selling Cognism services.  Beyond GDPR, Mailtastic signature management is a compliance requirement in regulated UK and German industries.

Cognism has been a Mailtastic client for the past year, enjoying a 10% rise in click-through rates and a 25% increase in webinar conversions.

The initial post-acquisition focus will be on cross-training the companies and deploying a Mailtastic sales team trained in Cognism sales tools and processes.  In Q3, Mailtastic will be integrated with several MAPs and SEPs.

“These are uncertain times and we want to ensure our clients have every tool at their disposal to develop new ways to prospect when budgets are being cut and certain channels, like outdoor advertising and live events, just aren’t an option.  Email signature marketing is massively underused and it will play a key role as more people work from home and engage others through their screens.

Cognism is focused on expanding in Europe and bolstering our position as a global go-to-market champion.  To achieve this, our fantastic team has worked tirelessly to help clients build strong, repeatable lead generation strategies that can benefit from both inbound and outbound methodologies and, by integrating Mailtastic, we’re strengthening this offering further.  Cognism provides clients with the data they need to send emails, the tools required to automate and action them, and now it will be providing a way for customers to expand their reach with every email their employees send.  By continuing to expand the Cognism offering, customers are able to build powerful go-to-market strategies that will enable their go-to-market teams to find and deliver new revenue, faster.”

Cognism CEO James Isilay

Cognism combines B2B DaaS services, sales intelligence, ICP / TAM tools, prospecting, email templates, and outbound cadences.  Mailtastic provides them with additional email customization tools.

The Mailtastic acquisition is similar to the Terminus purchase of Sigstr late last year.  Both firms offer a strong feature – management of email signatures – that would likely be difficult to justify as a standalone MarTech license in the current economic environment.  However, both add significant value alongside the ABM capabilities of their new parents.

Isilay indicated that the firm successfully transitioned to WFH.  Sales and renewals in the exhibition and recruitment markets declined, but the firm used its ICP tools to adjust its targeting and its new business generation is back to pre-pandemic levels.  COVID-related churn has died down, and revenue is growing strongly again, with $8.5 million in projected ARR by the end of May.

LinkedIn Product Announcements

LinkedIn Marketing Campaign Analytics assist with bid decisions.
LinkedIn Marketing Campaign Analytics assist with bid decisions.

LinkedIn recently began supporting video uploads which begin playing silently when they appear in members’ feeds.  Videos may run up to ten minutes, though LinkedIn recommends lengths of fewer than five minutes.  As with LinkedIn posts, members will also receive analytics on views, likes, shares, and top viewing markets.  The new feature provides B2B marketers with a business focused platform on which they can post corporate announcements, executive thought leadership pieces, and corporate event videos.

Business Insider found that LinkedIn is considered the most trustworthy of the social media platforms with people deeming it best at protecting privacy (55%), least likely to display deceptive content (55%), and safest network for posts and participation (43%).

LinkedIn will also be passing along viewer details such as employer and title for the top viewers.

“Analytics about where video viewers work and what they do present substantial opportunities for networking, recruiting, generating sales leads, and so on. For example, executives can announce a new product or service and then dive into their audience analytics to build up a list of prospects; opinion leaders discussing a pressing trend will have more tools for growing their followers; job-seekers can post videos with an eye on courting recruiters or a company’s attention, or vice versa. All these scenarios pave the way for LinkedIn to upgrade free members onto premium tiers, where more advanced customer relationship management (CRM) tools are available.”

  • Robert Elder, Business Insider, “LinkedIn Video Sharing Could Be a Revelation”

Video should help address user engagement issues.  As of Q3 2016 (their last public quarter), only 23% of users engaged with the platform each month, resulting in an average daily engagement of only two minutes.  Consumer platforms have much higher daily engagement rates with Snapchat at thirty minutes and Facebook at fifty.

In other news, LinkedIn released a Windows 10 live alerts app which displays new messages, trending stories, profile views, and other LinkedIn-related alerts.  The service supports 22 languages.

LinkedIn also released a set of enhancements to its Advertising platform including expanded demographic data, campaign recommendations, and additional metrics.  The Campaign Manager now displays LinkedIn accounts which responded to campaigns.  Website Demographics tracks website visitors via a lightweight JavaScript tag.  Brands can segment website visitors and create campaigns via job title, industry, job seniority, job function, company, company size, location, and country.

Thus, firms can identify unexpected visitor segments.  “With these insights, you can craft new marketing content designed to better resonate with that audience,” LinkedIn stated.

Campaign insights are also displayed as new hover cards which provide budget and performance data for other advertisers and recommends how to boost performance.

New metrics include Sponsored Content shared by members, details on social actions, and better file export and data options.

“The three new advertiser data tools optimize your use of LinkedIn ads, making sure you have maximized social ROI,” observed Francis Rey in SocialBarrel.   “Sponsored Content continues to drive most of the company’s ad revenue. With more than 500 million professional members on the platform, LinkedIn already filters a unique audience for your business. You only need to tap into it and take advantage.”

Rey also noted that “While Facebook is still beyond reach in social ads, the social network caters to all audiences. Meanwhile, LinkedIn focuses on professionals, with an entirely different purpose.”