Founded in 2012, Exodata provides its customers with a complete IT management solution that covers everything from infrastructure to 24/7 support. However, its marketing strategy wasn’t quite as comprehensive. It was still using old-school methods, such as newspaper ads, to attract leads and clients.
When Laurent Fontaine joined as the company’s marketing and communications director, he knew that something had to change. He wanted Exodata, which is an overseas department of France to be one of the first companies in the region to implement an inbound marketing strategy.
“I wanted Exodata to embrace the inbound methodology because I knew just how powerful it could be for us. I started out trying to do inbound manually, with tools like MailChimp, Hootsuite and Buffer, but they didn’t work well together. The data wasn’t centralised, and we weren’t getting the leads or the insights we needed. We needed to find a better way.
Laurent had been introduced to the inbound methodology through the HubSpot blog, and he had been impressed by the breadth and depth of the information that is provided. He began investigating the HubSpot Marketing Platform as a possible solution for Exodata.
“The software itself had everything we needed under the one roof, and I knew that it would allow us to implement the disruptive strategy that I had in mind. The free HubSpot CRM was a big plus for us, as the CRM that we were using at the time wasn’t effective; we couldn’t track the sales funnel and pipeline.”
However, Laurent says that HubSpot’s commitment to its customers was what sealed the deal. “We loved the way that HubSpot looks after its customers, helps them to develop their strategy and gives them everything they need to succeed. We were convinced that together we could be effective, and we signed on the dotted line in February 2016.”
Creating Content That Convinces and ConvertsLaurent got started by creating personas for Exodata’s different types of clients and then began targeting them with content that they would be interested in reading. He set up ebooks and whitepapers on Landing Pages, adding Calls-to-Action and Forms to drive user engagement. He used the Social Inbox to increase Exodata’s profile across the social networks and to encourage followers to visit the company’s Blog.
“Our HubSpot customer success manager was so helpful as we took the next steps – setting up Workflows and building Campaigns. She made sure that we were doing the right things at the right times, and that helped us get up and running quickly. We also use the Marketing Analytics Dashboard a lot, because it allows us to see which of our actions are the most effective and then adjust our strategy accordingly.”
Within weeks, Laurent noticed an increase in both the quantity and quality of the leads that Exodata was getting.
“We have quite a long sales process, so we want our leads to look upon us as thought leaders in the field. Before, we were cold calling and trying to explain what we do and then get them into a meeting. It wasn’t efficient. Now, the leads have already been nurtured with relevant, useful content – they know what we can do and how we can help them.”
The migration to the HubSpot CRM has also been revelatory, says Laurent.
“Our salespeople now have a view of the entire customer journey – they can see what kind of topics they were interested in and what their pain points are. When they call them up, they know what they want to talk about.”
A Direct Line to More Leads and Customers