Seismic, a sales enablement organization that develops software solutions for managing, automating and distributing sales and marketing content, serves customers around the world. Over the past several years the company has expanded into new international markets, specifically the Asia Pacific (APAC) region with a strong focus on Japan.
Along with the typical challenges of expanding a business and learning different cultural norms, the team at Seismic needed to create a new marketing strategy specific to the APAC region. Initially, Seismic focused on face-to-face interactions, in-person experiences and events in the region.
But then, in 2020, Seismic shifted its APAC marketing strategy to be digital-first, with a focus on crafting amazing virtual experiences. The results were promising. Because of its shift, Seismic saw:
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- A 20 % increase in booking success rate
- A 67% increase in conversion from MQL to sales meetings
- A shorter overall sale cycle leading to a higher conversion rate
Here’s how Seismic’s APAC team made its shift to digital experiences.
How Seismic Tweaked Webinars for APAC Success
Colleagues at Seismic’s corporate headquarters in the U.S. were already using ON24’s virtual event platform. As a consequence, some members of the APAC team were already familiar with the platform, making it an easy choice to deploy to the APAC region.
To ensure the successful deployment of the ON24 platform, however, Seismic’s team would need to adjust a few things to make webinar programs work for the APAC region:
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- Live webinars in APAC time zones – Current webinars aired live in U.S. time zones, meaning APAC audiences would only have on-demand or simulive viewing options. This wasn’t the experience the team wanted for their new region, so they decided to produce their own live webinars in APAC-friendly time zones.
- APAC-specific content that was relevant and interesting to the audience – Trends, topics and issues that are important and relevant in the U.S. do not always resonate the same way in other parts of the world. With cultural and economic differences unique to this region, the team needed to produce content that was relevant to their audience and would draw them to participate in the event.
- Local and regional experts who can connect with the audience – Webinar speakers are chosen for various reasons, but many times it’s because they’re an expert in their field or they’re well-known by members of the audience. The APAC team wanted to ensure audiences could connect with speakers, so they featured local and regional experts.In addition to having a better understanding of local and regional trends and topics, these experts also speak local languages allowing them to provide a deeper level of immersion and engagement with the audience that doesn’t always happen when content is translated through closed captions.
Seismic’s APAC-Specific Webinar Program
With members of the APAC team already familiar with ON24, the team hit the ground running and developed a webinar program featuring two 60-minute webinars per month for the APAC market.
Webinar topics are usually related to B2B marketing or sales, but occasionally feature different subjects. The main objective of the webinars are pipeline acceleration and customer acquisition, but the team also uses them for thought leadership and education on marketing and sales enablement, an early-stage concept for the region.
To help make it easier for APAC customers and prospects to participate in webinars, the team created a dedicated landing page for APAC webinars on the Seismic website. This page allows users to easily register for live events or review on-demand content without having to sift through irrelevant global information.
The company recently ran its first simulive event featuring a pre-recorded fireside chat. At the conclusion of the video, the event switched over to a live Q&A session with attendees.
In addition to simulive capabilities, the team at Seismic takes advantage of the audience interaction and engagement tools like surveys, polls and resource lists and webinar console branding to create captivating and immersive experiences for participants.
How Seismic Used Data to Build Pipeline
The work doesn’t end when the event is finished. So, Seismic developed a plan to follow up with participants and nurture leads. Using ON24 Intelligence to analyze data, the team works with sales colleagues to prioritize leads and build pipeline.
Attendees are classified into tiered categories based on engagement scores and their digital activity during the event such as participating in polls and surveys, asking questions during the Q&A, downloading content from the resource list and requests to book a meeting.
The sales team then uses this information to create personalized follow-up emails. Seismic even employs its own technology to track a lead’s engagement with the email content.
The webinar program and diligent follow-up process has resulted in a 20% increase in Seismic’s success rate at booking sales meetings. The company has also seen MQLs convert to sales meetings 67% faster than before the webinar program. Overall, the webinar program combined with Seismic’s analytics led to a shorter sales cycle and higher conversion rates.