Deploying the Marketing Machine to Generate New Business

When Marc Bracken stepped in as CEO of Mobiltex after XPV Water Partners acquired the business in 2019, he discovered a company delivering best-in-class IoT-based corrosion-protection monitoring solution for pipelines and storage assets — without state-of-the-art marketing to match.

“Our existing customers were raving fans, but our brand didn’t reflect our leadership position.  Our brochures and case studies didn’t communicate our story and Google searches returned almost nothing about the company,” says Bracken. 

Bracken’s strategic priorities for Mobiltex involved launching new products, acquiring new customers, and entering new markets. Business development up to that point had relied on a small direct-sales team; however, simply adding new sales staff was unlikely to achieve his objectives for more than a year, as it takes time to build a territory and customer base. 

“We needed to get the word out about our great technology and touch more ideal prospects before adding new sales staff,” says Bracken. “We needed a powerful marketing program capable of generating sales leads immediately, and we needed it operating within months – not years.”

Ramping up quickly

Bracken turned to the XPV Water Partners FLOW Growth Accelerator program to help boost and scale his company’s marketing capabilities. Part of the system and available to all XPV portfolio partners, the XPV Marketing Program offers partner companies an array of field-proven methodologies and best practices for rapidly developing marketing capability and expertise needed to build and execute programs that generate an ROI.

Tapping XPV’s marketing capabilities and a broad network “bench” of proven industry specialists provided Mobiltex with a ready-made marketing team, enabling Bracken to ramp up quickly.

“Half the battle is cutting through the clutter to identify marketing vendors who can actually deliver what they promise,” Bracken says. “It can be time-consuming, and potentially costly if you select the wrong vendor. In contrast, XPV ‘bench’ specialists and vendors understand the industry and apply best practices that greatly improve effectiveness and results.”

Working with Bracken, XPV helped to create an annual marketing plan closely aligned with the company’s strategy, refined product and service value propositions, and a compelling and repeatable company story that clearly differentiated Mobiltex from competitors. A team of proven water industry experts then delivered a new search-engine-optimized company website promoting a modern brand image that reflects the company’s leadership position, along with new brochures, feature articles, customer case studies, product animations, sales tools, and more.

Doubling-down on results

With core marketing and sales materials in place, it was time to “flip on the switch” and launch proactive, digital-based marketing campaign. The results were impressive.

“Our team was excited about the quantity of high-quality sales leads produced by the digital program, especially as the old website didn’t produce these types of leads at all,” says Bracken. “In the first year of the program, we generated hundreds of qualified leads that increased sales by 10%, and effectively sped up the commercialization process for new product offerings.”

Initiatives targeting new markets are especially promising with 11 new sales accounts gained from expanded solution offerings into adjacent market verticals.

The overall speed of program deployment, and the rapid buildout of new company processes and capabilities, is extraordinary, according to Bracken. New product launches are now planned, integrated, and synchronized for achieving better results. Internal processes for managing leads and tracking ROI and advanced digital marketing programs return immediate results involving sizable new-sales opportunities. Engineering, sales, customer service, and marketing are all aligned with press releases, product training, website updates, price sheets, external marketing programs, and client outreach.

Says Bracken: “The Mobiltex marketing efforts are now firing on all cylinders and powering to the next level.”

Powering to the next level

The XPV Marketing Program helped transform Mobiltex to a marketing powerhouse within a single year. Continued success, however, has required institutionalizing the new marketing programs and processes within the company, along with transitioning from the short-term XPV direct support to hiring capable in-house staff dedicated to managing and scaling programs to meet the company’s marketing needs.

Using XPV’s Talent Platform, Mobiltex developed the ideal-candidate profile, targeting the key qualifications and traits needed to lead the company’s marketing program to the next level. XPV’s hiring scorecard and process helped Bracken sift through dozens of applicants before identifying and hiring the right person with the right qualification for the job.

“I’m still amazed at how transformative this program was for our company,” says Bracken. “Today, our marketing program is powered by advanced dashboards that precisely track the ROI of each campaign, we apply innovative best practices to reach new clients, and we have expanded our sales team to further accelerate the growth of our company.”