When Chris Fell left his corporate job in 2007, he decided to set up a consultancy business to improve the sales and marketing performance of Australian businesses. He believed that digital marketing and marketing automation could be hugely beneficial, especially in the area of lead generation. After researching ways to market his own fledgling consultancy business, he discovered HubSpot in 2009.
Soon after experiencing the impact of using HubSpot’s software for his own business, Chris realised it could also greatly benefit his clients. He began exploring the possibility of becoming a HubSpot partner and quickly saw an opportunity to establish a better kind of agency, one that provided an all-in-one lead generation solution and one that would really help marketers prove their value to the organisation. A conversation with Paul Roetzer of US-based HubSpot partner PR 20/20, alleviated any fears for Chris and provided his ‘penny drop moment’. He says Paul highlighted that the business model followed by traditional agencies is broken, explaining, “they charge by the hour and clients pay by the hour. There is no incentive to be effective, no mutual benefit.”
In his earlier corporate career as a CEO, Chris was always frustrated with marketers who came 'cap in hand' asking for funds without any understanding that they needed to demonstrate ROI. Helping marketers prove their value to the organisation was a problem that had always been of interest to Chris. Now with HubSpot’s software this problem can be solved. Chris decided to seize the opportunity and expand his consultancy into an inbound marketing agency. He says, “we use HubSpot’s software and do the opposite of traditional agencies. We focus on generating business results and our clients don’t worry about the time it will take us."
Partnering with HubSpotg2m Solutions was founded in 2010 and focus their efforts on helping start up's and small to mid-market clients in Australia. Typically, their clients are from technology, software and professional services industries as Chris believes they’re particularly suited to inbound marketing. Chris explains, “inbound marketing is more appealing to these clients because they are a little bit more advanced and open to experimenting with new ways of doing things.”
As inbound marketing is still quite a nascent concept in Australia, the team have used focused on building awareness and educating prospects about its’ value. Their marketing activities are targeted at two distinct buyer persona’s : CEO Charles and Marketing Mary. Chris explains, “CEO’s are looking for financial evidence of success, growth in sales and efficient cost of acquisition while marketing managers want help to run their campaigns more effectively and efficiently. We tailor our campaigns to fit those distinct needs.”
Over time, Chris has refined his client acquisition strategy to ensure they only take on clients where a mutual benefit can be delivered. He recalls, “when we first started, I would take anyone on as I was just desperate to get the business off the ground. But as we’ve got bigger, we’ve become wiser about what a good client is like. We interview the client to ensure we can help them.”
This means establishing some basic qualifying criteria. For example, all clients must have a sales team of at least 2 people as it means they have ‘hungry mouths to feed with leads’ and need their lead generation machine working effectively. They also require that all clients purchase, at minimum, the ‘Professional’ HubSpot software package which includes HubSpot’s Marketing Automation app. Chris explains, “you cannot do lead nurturing with the HubSpot Basic package so you can’t really set up a funnel. Without a funnel, they’re just leads, not qualified leads.”
Generating well qualified, quality leads has become a cornerstone of the g2m proposition. Previously, many of their clients found it extremely expensive at a cost per lead level. Through the adoption of an inbound marketing strategy, executed via HubSpot’s software, the cost per lead has become much more affordable.
Marketing's Salvation