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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