A company had new wireless remote-access software that it wanted to sell to large companies in the financial-services sector with more than 5,000 employees. It set a target of closing 51 key customers by the end of the fiscal year.
T1 Media was brought in to generate qualified sales leads. After conducting a multi-disciplinary strategic analysis, the findings did not support the corporate strategy of concentrating on the financial-services sector.
Strategic Media Research
Instead, the analysis found that the two largest sectors that would have the highest interest in this product was centered on multi-national firms in manufacturing and services, followed by retail, public administration, financial, insurance and real estate.
On top of that, it became apparent that technology-based solutions were horizontal in nature, not siloed to a specific industry sector. Large global companies had been heavily investing in their technology infrastructure for the past 10 years so they had the operational platform to deploy this technology seamlessly.
Strategic Media Recommendation
Companies having many mobile employees and staff with a need for up-to-date customer-service information are more likely to respond based upon need versus sector specialty.
T1 Media recommended that no specific sector be targeted at this stage of product introduction, but rather target by company size and job function. Then, apply a horizontal target strategy among key technology decision makers across all sectors until the customer base is firmly established.
The Research Was Spot On
The software company’s sales and telemarketing teams incorporated manufacturing and service industries into the lead-generation profile. After three weeks, all leads had come from the two identified sectors. There were zero leads from the financial-services category. The company shifted its business plan to focus on multiple sectors and key technology leadership.