The challenge
At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and the shift to remote work, a cloud technology giant saw the efficacy of its sales outreach efforts to small and medium-sized businesses in EMEA markets decline. Fewer and fewer prospects were responding to sales calls and outreach efforts were increasingly shifting to email. However, competitors were also pivoting to email. The company needed to rethink its approach. It needed an innovative partner with the sales acumen and resources to come up with an effective way for the company to stand out and reach prospects.
Our solution
As a long-time partner, TTEC had been successfully handling sales and acquisition management for the company’s other products in several regions worldwide. We handled inbound demand sales development and leads qualification in a dozen languages. Noting our sustained success in inbound sales, the client turned to us for help solving this sales challenge.
A TTEC team of technology-oriented sellers tackled the issue. They focused on developing an email that would stand out in the prospect’s inbox and proposed embedded videos. Each of our sellers created video introductions of themselves so that if prospects looked them up online, such as on LinkedIn, they knew it was the same person. The emails and videos were personalised by event or type of outreach (e.g., a prospect attended a webinar versus cold outreach) and segments (SMB versus enterprise firms). Each video also included a link to the seller’s calendar, allowing prospects to easily schedule an appointment to learn more about the product.
The results
The embedded videos immediately caught the attention of email recipients and led to a 4% increase in response rates compared to emails without a video. Additionally, the videos gave prospects a better understanding of the client’s other products, which helped raise conversion rates to 24% in its main line of business.
Through our partnership, the client gained a new take on outbound messaging using video as the outreach component, as well as visibility into solution selling and pipeline progression drivers, including CRM metrics such open rate, reply rate/conversion rate.
The client also gained expertise in international sales via TTEC and the ability to develop new business lead sources. The team’s success stemmed from TTEC’s close integration and partnership with the client’s internal structure from learning and development to marketing, sales, and customer support.
As a result, we were able to ensure that our outbound messaging was seamlessly aligned with the client’s brand style and tone. We continue to work closely with the client and are in the process of expanding our product and segment support in addition to expanding our scope from pre-sales to the full sales cycle.