Broadsoft: Positioning and Messaging to Become a Category Leader

Situation: Broadsoft was winning customers competitively but not being positioned correctly in the media and in analyst reports such as the Gartner Magic Quadrant

Marketing Goal: To be declared the “market leader” in its market within VoIP (now called Unified Communications)

Strategies & Tactics:

• Assessed all existing external communications
• Conducted primary research by speaking with media and analysts and garnering industry perceptions of BroadSoft and its competitors
• Developed a comprehensive Analyst Strategy focused on reaching the top 10 analyst firms
• Conducted an audit of the top 10 analysts to determine how each one evaluated VoIP market leaders – and which company they perceived as the market leader
• Created a criteria matrix, identifying how each analyst firm defined leadership (e.g. number of lines shipped, quality/quantity of customers, strategic partnerships, product innovation, etc.)
• Calysto worked with BroadSoft to clearly define the company’s new Strategic Position, key messaging and proof points based on each of these leadership metrics
• Developed an individual six-month plan-of-attack for each Analyst and Media target, which included regular updates on company milestones and a Newsjacking Strategy where Calysto would contact analysts when BroadSoft competitors made announcements to provide BroadSoft’s take on the news
• Introduced BroadSoft’s Strategic Position as a new category to the press and analysts. Differentiated BroadSoft from competitors by consistently communicating unique value propositions to each of 5 audiences
• Conducted a press and analyst tour along with repeated in-person tradeshow interviews and phone interviews (repeatedly)
• Conducted (at least) quarterly analyst interviews to repeat Strategic Position and encourage category development as well as hammer home the proof points
• Conducted monthly communications with all reporters to repeat Strategic Position and category
• Conducted a weekly “Did You Know” campaign
• Distributed bi-monthly press releases with customer announcements supporting the Key Messages with proof points
• Customized each interview based on what the journalist or analyst “counted” to measure Market Leadership
• Encouraged reporters to quote “Champion” analysts who declared BroadSoft the Market Leader

Results: Due to Calysto’s efforts, top-tier industry analysts quickly began to publicly refer to BroadSoft as the VoIP Market Leader in Application Servers in their reports and briefings:

• BroadSoft was named a “market leader” by the research firm Current Analysis
• Analyst firm Gartner developed a new “magic quadrant” in the VoIP application server space, featuring BroadSoft as the market leader
• BroadSoft was honored by Frost & Sullivan as having the VoIP Technology of the Year
• Other firms followed suit by naming Broadsoft The Market Leader in its category
• Increased press coverage including naming the application server space as its own category. Reported as Market Leaders
• Positioned CMO Scott Wharton as an industry Thought Leader
• Scott became a “source” of inbound” inquiries
• Ultimately acquired by Cisco for $1.9B in February 2018

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