Joining forces with two driven individuals with track records of delivering high returns, meant delivery on multiple fronts, in timeframes so short that nobody in their right mind would ever agree to them.
Of course, I said yes 😜
EDGY, Inc was a demand-generating machine for mid-market businesses, whose founders / CEOs either needed to jump to the next level of revenue, or were working towards a profitable exit.
As I joined this driven crew, EDGY needed to increase its own awareness and prominence at the same time as it drove demand for existing clients.
The company was packed with talent. Marketing, messaging, sales, technology, strategy and execution were all covered. However, with few people to do the doing — create and execute the plans, write copy, craft and critique design, individuals weren't always lined up with the tasks they were best equipped for. Everybody was expected to be able to do everything, at top speed. So, it was a hive of activity, while not always as productive as it could have been.
New customers were coming in almost faster than we could keep up, and they needed results. So, we got focused on mastering:
This meant processes, and training everyone to execute those processes.
We documented everything, so it was repeatable. And, so that it worked for us as well as for our clients.
Our discovery call process proved to be incredibly effective at extracting information from our prospective clients — giving them new perspectives and helping them to get clear on what they do, and why they do it. When they became clients, we used that same discovery process for their prospects.
Discovery isn't just about the task at hand, especially when it concerns the company CEO. It digs into motivations, weight of responsibility, potential business / staffing repercussions for targets hit or missed. Done well, it uncovers the essential emotional factors as well as commercial ones.
This is the ultimate in repeatable processes — while some specifics vary, the approach and questions themselves are deliberately open-ended, designed to get to the information that matters.
We got really good in four specific areas, to support outbound strategy.
Underpinning each of these was a significant deep dive into each client's product, target market, current positioning, competitors, challenges and barriers to growth. This allowed us to tailor our approach to focus on what would have the most profound impact on them.
While discovery reveals assumptions and conclusions about why a business is in its current situation, our insistence on checking and challenging assumptions frequently opened up opportunities that would otherwise have been missed. Conversely, it occasionally uncovered problems that needed to be addressed before jumping into demand generation.
Our do all things necessary approach meant the exact application of these strategic pillars varied from client to client. For some, it was a complete rebrand — including a new name, new website, and new user interface for a mobile app, before targeting could get underway.
For others, campaign landing pages were ideal, allowing business as usual to continue while we worked to generate demand.
For every client, and for EDGY itself, messaging was the linchpin.
Words matter. They can convince, or confuse. Intrigue, or bore. Irritate, or amuse. Act as accelerator, or brake.
Within the technology industry, there's a tendency towards describing how something works, too early in the buying process. The nuts and bolts are essential, but describing how they fit together technically doesn't make a sale. Instead, prospective buyers come away understanding exactly how a product works, but with no compelling reason to buy it.
We tipped that paradigm on its head.
Our messaging was carefully crafted to allow the reader to picture the outcome. Saved time. Increased productivity. Improved record keeping. Happier employees, with improved critical thinking skills.
We wrote website copy to persuade users to read, and identify themselves as leads.
We wrote outbound emails that attracted compliments, as well as secured meetings.
We helped our clients conduct discovery calls, and turn those meetings into opportunities.
EDGY's client base expanded through referrals, as clients saw their own revenues increase. Client businesses were acquired in impressive timeframes, using streamlined processes to expedite diligence. Others broke into brand new markets, for which they needed a very different approach than they were used to.
We worked for, and alongside, each client to let them understand what we were doing and why, so they could then execute their individual approach.
We showed them what awesome looked like, and the effort and skill that goes into producing it.
Lastly, we moved into managing a key EDGY client called Panzura, which is an award-winning business turnaround story all of its own.