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Case StudyWhat an Actual MarketingTransformation Really Looks LikeTIBCO’s 3-year intent-driven journey to excellenceBy Mervyn Alamgir and John Steinert

TechTarget is a major provider of realpurchase intent data for enterprise tech.In Q3 2018, TechTarget was rated a Leaderin the Forrester Wave report for B2BMarketing Data.The actual Forrester Wave graphiccompares providers along two dimensions:“strategy” (X-axis) and “current offering”(Y-axis).In the “current offering” dimension,TechTarget scored full marks in in four keycriteria: data coverage, data acquisitionand processing, and data security andprivacy. In the second criteria, dataacquisition and processing, TechTargetwas the only provider to score full marks.TechTarget scored full marks in go-tomarket—which was given a 75% weightingin the “strategy” dimension by Forrester.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like2

TechTarget is like a giant radar that detectsdemand in tech markets.Our network of decision-support content—created by 200 editors and more than a1,000 writers—attracts opt-in researchersinterested in understanding solutions to helpthem change and improve their companies.We can see their research behaviors, and allof that behavioral data flows into our SaaSbased platform—Priority Engine—in theform of real purchase intent data, which isavailable to TechTarget clients.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like3

With TechTarget data, you get access topermissioned contacts in your marketplace.You get timeliness, seeing who is actually ina buyer’s journey.You get relevance around their interests inthat buyer’s journey.And you get that integrated into yourmarketing automation platform and yourCRM.This insight allows more engagement withyour target audience, resulting in betterconversion rates and more meetings,resulting in more real pipeline from demandthat you couldn’t otherwise access.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like4

These days, technology purchases involvemultiple decision makers in a buying team.Along the buyer’s journey, different buyersand influencers will join the account’sresearch process, consuming multiplecontent assets to help form an opinion andcreate a shortlist.Priority Engine is a gateway into thesebuyer’s journeys and provides directaccess to the actual people involved in thepurchase.While you have the ability to influencethese buyers through your own sales andmarketing outreach, TechTarget’s mostsuccessful customers also leverage our ownengagement services to help you furtherinfluence the buying team throughout theirpurchase process.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like5

Customers who take advantage ofTechTarget advertising, lead generation andqualification services see upwards of a 25%increase in shortlist consideration, a 3xincrease in lead response rates and a 19xincrease in meetings set.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like6

TIBCO—a TechTarget client since 2014—has taken advantage of TechTarget datawith great success. TIBCO was named aleader in two recent Forrester Wave reports:Data Preparation Solutions (Q4 2018) andStrategic iPaaS And Hybrid IntegrationPlatforms (Q1 2019).What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like7

TIBCO is a global integration, analytics andevent-processing software provider withcustomers across many verticals.TIBCO stands for “The Information BusCompany”. Bus is short for omnibus,meaning “bringing everything together,”which is precisely what TIBCO does—bringing data together and making senseof it. That’s why their platform is calledConnected Intelligence.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like8

These days, you hear a lot about businesstransformation or digital transformation,but you don’t often hear about marketingtransformation.In fact, there is a lot of investment inmartech. CMOs own big chunks of the techbudget and the responsibility of drivingrevenue is increasingly moving over tomarketing.When Mervyn Alamgir joined TIBCO in2015, the CMO wanted to change the waymarketing was run in order to support neworganizational objectives. So TIBCO set outto achieve true marketing transformation.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like9

In 2015, TIBCO’s customer was the ITdepartment. In 2019, the customershifted from purely IT to other areas of thebusiness, including business users, appdevelopers, and data scientists. To be infront of those customers, marketing had topivot. But at the same time, the businessmodel was changing because TIBCO wasmoving from a maintenance business modelto a subscription business model.Marketing transformation was driven byorganizational needs.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like10

In 2015, Amazon’s influence in B2C wasgrowing.That “Bezos effect” translated directly toB2B. After all, a B2B buyer is also a B2Cbuyer. He or she goes home after work,searches the web, and looks at products onAmazon.These consumer behaviors translated to adigital-first B2B buyer’s journey.In 2015, marketing was being measureddifferently. The demand waterfall andmarketing contribution to bookings werebecoming more widely used.While the market was moving one way,TIBCO was stationary.Its website was an afterthought in terms ofdemand gen. It wasn’t architected to reportwhat was happening or how much influenceit had on the lead funnel.TIBCO had to drive a change withinmarketing.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like11

TIBCO’s tech stack comprised eightversions of Salesforce and eight versions ofMarketo, all through multiple acquisitions—in addition to multiple vendors sitting on topof the stack.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like12

TIBCO had to clear up its go-to-marketstrategy from a technology standpoint first,use that as a foundation, and then buildupon it.So TIBCO set an objective to get itsmessage in front of the right person at theright time, and drive leads.There’s nothing revolutionary about thatobjective. In fact, looking back you couldargue it’s even a bit dated, because B2Bmarketing has moved beyond leads.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like13

In 2019, TIBCO is looking at building ademand gen engine that has many parts—not just marketing ops or the demand genteam but also the field marketing, salesenablement, and sales teams.The purpose of the engine is to driveauthentic conversations with prospectsor customers and deliver a measurableimpact on revenue.The objective of the demand gen engine hasevolved over the last three or four years andwill continue to evolve.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like14

Marketing transformation goes beyondthe tech stack; people and processes areinvolved in marketing. And then you builda plan, execute the plan and then you goback and learn and iterate in orderto evolve.Ultimately, this will never work withouta really strong change managementprocess.You can have the best tech stack in theworld but if you don’t have sales andmarketing alignment to take advantageof all those leads, then you’re not going tosee ROI.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like15

Change management has to be a core partof your transformation.If you are the person telling your CMO oryour marketing leadership team they needto shift budget from one area to another,then—as the face of change—you need tobe prepared to face resistance and pushback.You will also need to identify the changeagents within marketing that will join you inthat journey—people with a growth mindsetwho are willing to try new approaches,learn and adapt. They are the ones thatwill spread the message to the wholeorganization.You must be willing to change and be agilewith processes: You may change the wayyou do lead scoring. You may change theway you interact with customers or whenyou send an email to somebody.That level of agility is critical for marketingtransformation to succeed.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like16

It is critical to use real data to get buy-infor your ongoing efforts. This is an earlyexample of a proof point that TIBCO put infront of its CMO during the initial six monthsof marketing transformation.Having put in place some instrumentationon the website—including Bizible to provideattribution to media channels TIBCO werespending budget on—TIBCO was able toshow the CMO at a granular level of detailthat it was successful in the amount ofbudget that it was allocating to spending onbrand terms or very specific keywords andunsuccessful in other areas of budget.TIBCO then did a basic first shift inspending and immediately saw an overallimprovement in the volume in leads as wellas a strong decline in the cost per lead.This evidence of success due to agilityhelped make transformation tangible forthe CMO.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like17

Marketing transformation is a multi-yearproject that requires a foundation.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like18

Building the foundation of marketing transformation means creating a strategy basedon solving real business problems.2016In the first year of its marketing transformation, TIBCO divested from vendors whoseproducts it had purchased but wasnot using, and invested in a core stack oftechnology that allowed it to get moreinformation about what was happening inits marketing programs.2017TIBCO started an optimization program tounderstand which were the high-value pages contributing most to lead generation andrevenue. TIBCO focused its optimizationprograms on those pages.TIBCO also looked beyond its website andstarted investigating other channels to drivemore leads—TechTarget being one of them.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like19

2018In order to break down silos and get asingle view of the customer, TIBCO builta data warehouse to consolidate all theincoming data.In that same year, they experimented withAI and machine learning. Currently, over50% of leads created within TIBCO’sdemand gen program are either influencedby machine learning algorithms or touchedby an AI agent.2019TIBCO actually built its own internal solutionto provide a 360-view of the customer forthe sales team.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like20

TIBCO’s stack caters to both customersand sales.While it’s important to have a strong customer experience (educate customers, andbring them down the funnel), TIBCO alsostrives for a good sales experience, whichpromotes sales and marketing alignment.TIBCO leverages Salesforce and educatessales on how to leverage TechTarget’s realpurchase intent insights—how to prioritizethe most active prospects based on theirvendor and topic interests.By taking the guess work out techmarketing and sales, the right insightsallow marketers and salespeople tomake better decisions and accomplishobjectives more easily.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like21

Here is an example of applying insights to areal-world problem—in this case, a decliningtrend in trial-starts.Over the last two and a half quarters, thenumber of trials started per week wasdeclining significantly. This was a red flagbecause trial starts are the biggestcontributor to TIBCO’s revenue, so it wascritical for TIBCO to reverse the trend.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like22

TIBCO looked at the trend through thelens of marketing channels contributingto trial-starts—including organic, paid andreferrals.Organic traffic—in the green boxes—was thebiggest contributor to the decline in trials.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like23

Looking only at organic traffic, the source ofthe 600 decline of trial-starts in Q1 of 2019is much more apparent.What an Actual Marketing Transformation Really Looks Like24