Marketing and Business Intelligence Advertising
TOP PHOENIX ADVERTISING AGENCY’S MARKETING AND BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE SIZES UP THE COMPETITION
Situation
A client specializing in business process outsourcing (BPO) for the healthcare industry hired the agency for integrated marketing and advertising services as well as its marketing and business intelligence capability to prepare a go-to-market strategic plan.
With approximately 500 employees and almost $400 million in enterprise sales, the client was “spinning off” a technology offering from the primary company as a separate division with the objective of becoming a pure-breed play in the commercial healthcare technology outsourcing space. After incredible growth in the military and government lab technology outsourcing spaces, the client wanted to create a new company and separate value proposition that would stand out as a darling startup amidst larger Fortune 500 competitors moving into the commercial healthcare space, and for good reason.
Recently, a major competitor, Xerox (with more than 140,000 employees), had announced that it was splitting into two, independent companies, one of which would be called Xerox Business Outsourcing. When asked why, Xerox CEO Ursula Burns stated that ‘markets, specifically healthcare, are looking to transform themselves and their businesses.’ The solution, she said, was BPO.
(See how an integrated marketing agency’s approach to business and marketing intelligence, augmented by a comprehensive strategic marketing and business plan, scooped the industry 30 days before the largest force in the industry announced its new focus.)
With the ilk of companies such as Xerox and IBM now strategically positioning to target BPO services in the healthcare market, FabCom’s client needed the best possible marketing and business intelligence (BI) to shape its own value proposition to position the new company between the smaller local competitors and the national players vying for a piece of the healthcare industry’s growth. By applying business intelligence ingenuity and exceptional due diligence, FabCom, one of the top integrated marketing and advertising agencies in the Southwest, delivered a truly unique solution.
Goals
- Help develop a compelling and right-sized competitive value proposition for the new brand.
- Thoroughly assess and understand the competitive sales environments and most likely competitors of the new entity.
- Leverage competitive business and marketing intelligence to create resonating market position and brand claims.
- Assess exactly what kind of tools and sales processes the client will compete against in order to right size sales and marketing recommendations and subsequent sales and marketing investments.
Objectives
- Conduct primary and secondary research to quantitatively find similar competitive companies nationwide within the business process outsourcing space based on company information, history, size, credit, location, types of services, filings, etc.
- Deeply fingerprint and review more than 100 business process outsourcing, managed services, professional services, telehealth, and healthcare IT outsourcing companies to help qualify the best array of competing suppliers to benchmark.
- Review market competitors and assess their brand, positioning, and sales propositions.
- Qualify over 50 top local and national competitors’ strengths and weaknesses, then review and assess from this first-hand business intelligence the top 10 most likely competitors to the new brand.
Strategy
FabCom provides a unique method of mystery shopping to gather internal business and marketing intelligence from its clients’ competitors. Ordinary mystery shopping typically involves anonymously “shopping” by phone or in person, to understand value propositions, pricing, products, sales methodology, and services. The top integrated advertising and marketing agencies now embed competitive business and marketing intelligence within their strategic methodology. A marketing team’s business intelligence experience assures what is routinely gathered as part of normal secondary research is analyzed at the next level of fidelity required for accurate executive team recommendations. This means quantitative data sets need to be considered contextually and relevantly with environmental market data and competitive trends. An informed comprehensive strategic marketing plan is then developed that positions the client for optimal advantage in the competitive landscape.
The “mystery shopping” approach was first focused to screen all of the possible competitors and then tiered to hone in on the most likely competitors in order to benchmark the competition’s complete new business approach to assure the client’s marketing and advertising recommendations were most informed to make the biggest sales impact possible.
The agency created a model community healthcare facility that was “coming out of the ground” in order to seek the same services that their client’s organization provided. The idea was for this model healthcare company to solicit proposals from the client’s competitors, paving the way for a deep look into what it would take to design a better sales and marketing plan for the client. The business intelligence gathered from this research could then be used to compare the client’s own strengths and weaknesses with others in the marketplace.
The mystery shop was part of the more comprehensive marketing strategy development process where the integrated marketing and advertising agency routinely invests up to 2,000 hours developing a name, brand, positioning, identity and integrated marketing, advertising, and sales tactics.
The entity the agency created was a model “family practice clinic” in its development stage and in search of complete business process outsourcing services for all critical technology and communications systems including EMR/EHR and patient portal communications.
The model clinic was positioned as partnering with the strategic advertising and marketing agency to help the new breed care facility come out of the ground. The agency was working as a consultant to create the brand, positioning, and operational startup budgets. In the Request for Proposal sent to the client’s competitors, the clinic stated they were investigating the ability to implement a new care delivery model that was 100% outsourced technology and “turnkey” tech support. Ultimately, the clinic was seeking a long term IT partner. They were looking for recommended technology, positions, and investment budgets for the new 100-plus provider, full-service family practice clinic which will include obstetrics, gynecology, pediatrics, full cardiac care, and rehab units.
The following were created for the model community healthcare facility that was mystery shopped:
- Development and launch of website
- Model company identity design
- Non-traceable phone number through Google Voice
- Complete persona for the Front Desk Administrator
- Background information and bidding scenario to discover the front-end sales, marketing, and proposal tactics
After careful review to discover the most similar competition, more than 50 top national competitors were sent a Request for Proposal from the model community healthcare facility. The competitors, ranging from business process outsourcing to managed services, were asked to provide the following deliverables in the proposal:
- Inclination and experience in enterprise level healthcare institutions, hospitals, and clinics (including any relevant case studies, white papers, client referrals, examples of value-added best practice services, etc.).
- Ability of the vendor to satisfy requirements specified in the scope of work including, but not limited to, firm’s qualifications/ experience in the delivery of hospital or large community clinic environments.
-
Planning specification (hourly rate or estimated total cost) including a
detailed project plan and assessment capability. - Vendor’s plan for accomplishment of the task to include the quality of personnel assigned to the project; understanding of the scope of work; collection philosophy including recent collection experience; technology and equipment.
-
Remote support/help desk capability, approach and rate (i.e., per desktop,
per call, per doctor). -
Pricing/fees/approach with installation of hardware (hourly rate or
estimated total cost). -
Pricing/fees/approach of installation of software (hourly rate or estimated
total cost).
When the primary research was completed and all of the proposals were received, the marketing business intelligence teams began an extensive analysis to compare the information obtained from the study. In the process, FabCom also conducted 10 phone discussions to review the RFP final candidates in further detail to explain the scope of the project and the above deliverables.
Products, services, materials, selling propositions, positioning, sales messaging, and responsiveness of proposals were noted, along with how well their messages were communicated. From this BI work, the integrated marketing and advertising teams would then identify their client’s strengths, weaknesses, differences in method, and optimal competitive positioning for the new strategic marketing and advertising plan.
The following criteria were evaluated to determine an overall score for each of the competitor respondents. Most of all, the end goal was to qualify the competitive need and provide quantitative strategic direction for the agency’s recommended advertising and marketing tactics.
A total of 11 criteria were developed to analyze all facets of the proposal. The business intelligence team’s thorough analysis evaluated the credibility, overall ability to problem solve, innovation in addressing evolving needs, and their degree of passion for what they do.
Topics assessed were:
- Products
- Services
- Proposal materials
- Responsiveness/follow-up
- Presentation/messaging
- Market positioning
- Sales methodology
- Value-added offers
- Operational methodology
- Relevant experience
- Fit to attributes required
Results
Based on a scale of 1 to 10 (1 being the most room for improvement, 10 being the best) the companies were rated to create a final mystery shop evaluation and outcome synopsis. The top three competitors, based on average rating of the above criteria, were analyzed in more detail to provide the agency’s client the exact sales methodology of competitors and rationale on how these top competitors actually compete in the healthcare BPO market.
FabCom assessed the competitors’ services, claims/promises to their customers, and positioning and sales methodology. With competitive detailed pricing models, sales proposals, case studies, whitepapers, client referrals and recorded phone discussions with the competition, the agency, on behalf of the client, was able to develop a deeper understanding of the market. The client was empowered with the embedded capability of a fully-integrated marketing and advertising firm driven by a seasoned business intelligence team.
Once the information was analyzed, the findings were documented and discussed in detail with the client. The team then built out a comprehensive strategic advertising and marketing plan—one that was informed by the additional due diligence of the unique and very thorough mystery shopping approach.
As a result of the business and marketing intelligence methodology, the client was able to define the most effective business process outsourcing value proposition with a new degree of accuracy that would differentiate its positioning in the healthcare marketplace.
The business and marketing intelligence processes built into the agency’s strategy solutions enable the client to better compete with even the largest corporations, as a true alternative. Through an innovative market research approach, FabCom enabled their client to focus less on the mysteries of the competition, and more on mastering new profitable growth opportunities in the dynamic healthcare market.
About Fabcom
Nearly three decades of strategic focus on 360-degree, deep-dive market research and insights drives FabCom’s Neuromarketology™ method.
This experience is why FabCom was chosen as the first integrated marketing agency in the Southwest to become an IBM Cognos and IBM Watson marketing intelligence platform solutions certified partner. A growing capability of a top artificial intelligence brain in the space is now embedded as part of the integrated marketing agency’s solutions.
Identifying and responding to ad fraud as-it-happens is one of the many attributes that makes FabCom an industry leader in the digital age of advertising. With trends drastically shifting from traditional advertising to emerging and guerrilla methods that shift by the moment, having a partner that not only can react to these shifts but also safeguard your investments in that direction is invaluable.
FabCom, founded in 1992, is an integrated, strategic marketing and advertising agency with clients across the United States. In addition to marketing business intelligence, FabCom is known for its specialties in dynamic one-to-one marketing, integrated, cross-platform, multi-channel, database, and trigger marketing. Its strategic, research-oriented, personalized approach to marketing communications has helped conceive and implement numerous highly successful national and regional campaigns.
For more information on FabCom and how it prepares its clients to seize marketing and advertising opportunities online and offline, visit fabcomlive.com or fabcomlive.com/brainfood.
