Summary

In this B2B hardware manufacturer lead nurturing case study you will learn how an industry leading diagnostic tools manufacturer used lead nurturing to stay top of mind with new and existing buyers.

Company Background

The Energy Conservatory (TEC) manufactures MINNEAPOLIS brand precision diagnostic equipment and develops processes used to solve comfort, energy use, durability and air quality problems in buildings. TEC’s knowledge of building physics, reputation for innovative design, and excellent technical support have made them the leading manufacturer of performance testing tools for the building science industry.

Founded in 1980 at the Minnesota Energy Agency, their blower door was a pioneer in the energy conservation sector. Today, their blower door continues to set the standard in the industry. Since then, the company has launched multiple diagnostic tools for the industry.

Situation

TEC is the industry leader with the most established brand. 95% of the company’s sales were coming from distributors, but they were getting ready to launch an internal store to offer products directly.

Buying their solution was not an “if” but “when” decision due to state and federal regulations. Inbound leads were not an issue for the company because of the longevity of the brand, their presence at tradeshows, in trade publications and their distribution partners. When a purchase decision was ready to be made TEC was almost always in the running.

Company had built a database of 20K past and existing customers (only 35% had full contact info including email addresses) that was used very sporadically for one off announcements and occasional newsletters.

TEC had a great deal already accomplished including:

• A well established brand
• A required product
• An existing customer base

The Challenge

TEC’s remaining founder was in the process of exiting the company and empowering a new leadership team and new owners. In addition, TEC’s long time head of sales and marketing was preparing to retire. There was also new competitor moving into the market with a focus on digital marketing, and as result TEC’s external sales partners and distributors were asking for additional digital education support.

TEC was interested in Digital Demand Center to ensure:

• TEC remained top of mind with their existing and past customers
• Make it easier for new buyers to understand what product was the best fit to meet their needs
• Ongoing education to remain thought leaders in the market to support their partners and distributors
• The leadership transition did not reduce confidence in the organization/brand

The Solution

Month 1

During the first month, Digital Demand Center’s parent company Gabriel Sales crafted a digital first buyer education strategy that included an awareness campaign to remind the market why it was such a great solution, a lead nurturing campaign, an automated sales education campaign and framed an ongoing newsletter strategy.

Month 2

Gabriel Sales ran a three-day onsite video content production workshop at the company’s headquarters to create the initial content required for the campaigns. Digital Demand Center’s full tech stack was launched and integrated with multiple Salesforce seats. A video channel was launched, and all tech integrations were completed. Data appends and validation was run on their 20,000 records.

Month 3-4

A six-part awareness campaign was kicked off to 12,500 newly cleaned and validated targets. Content production was completed. Ongoing monthly newsletter was launched during month 4.

Month 5

Digital Demand Center™ kicked off lead nurturing and sales automation campaigns then entered steady state with ongoing managed services.

Results

Over time TEC’s mailable database of customers and potential buyers grew from 12K to 20K leads, almost doubling the buyers they can target with digital first education.

Digital Demand Center™ continues ongoing top of mind awareness, customer education, and pre-sales automation communication across TEC’s existing customer base and inbound lead nurturing database.

TEC is able to stay top of mind and drive ongoing engagement with over 75%, of their entire database quarterly basis, with most customers engaging with multiple pieces of digital first education on a consistent basis.​

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Additional Strategic Benefits

The new ownership and leadership team was able to take over the business and focus on higher priority activities including launching an eCommerce platform, deepening relationships with existing channels and growing their distribution partner network.

TEC built an in-house content production team to focus on digital education for buyers, including video and multi-media production. In addition, TEC built a large on-demand library of case studies, use cases and testimonials to provide social proof to potential buyers.

This wraps up this B2B hardware manufacturer lead nurturing case study. Please visit additional customer success stories or contact us for your a free gap audit to learn more.