Live blogging at LeadsCon:
Crossing the Chasm: The uprecedented Partnership between a lead gen company and one of the worlds premier brands.
During the “American Idol” finale on May 20, T-Mobile ran a campaign unlike any other they have before. Not only did the company bring back Catherine Zeta-Jones, but as part of their “mobile makeover,” they suggested viewers visit an independent third party site. It was the first time the carrier has recommended a third-party website in their campaigns, let alone one that is completely independent, i.e., the Redwood City based online lead generation startup, BillShrink.
So how did one of the most recognized consumer brands end up deciding to promote BillShrink, giving the performance-based, online customer acquisition company millions of dollars in media exposure? And what does this mean for the worlds of brand advertising and performance-based marketing? To understand this unique partnership, we have brought together T-Mobile’s Vice President of Marketing, Jeff Hopper and BillShrink’s CEO, Peter Pham to talk about how two companies from seemingly opposite ends of the spectrum have worked together to put the user first and in the end have everyone succeed. They will be joined by Jordan Rohan, formerly Managing director of RBC Capital Markets, who will engage them in a fire-side chat.
Moderated: Jordan Rohan
Panelists: Jeff Hopper – VP of Marketing T-Mobile
Panelists: Peter Pham – CEO BillShrink
How did the relationship come about? – T-Mobile actually came across BillShrink and reached out to them. Thinking about it now, I can’t imagine T-Mobile being open to this partnership if it wasn’t their idea in the first place.
Jeff -it was very important to build a campaign that added there message of “best value”.
BillShrink and T-mobile teamed up first by hitting the streets (Shopping Centers) They engaged people and walking them through the BillShrink process.
Market research – set up a booth at the mall
BillShrink Results:
7-10 results will end with T-Mobile
60-70% register and perform a complete analysis on BillShrink.
BillShrink: They survey and engage not only conversions, but also “considerations”.
Jeff – Consideration is the KEY in wireless. 1-5 consider T-Mobile
Jeff – 18% going into BillShrink considered T-Mobile, exiting BillShrink 60% considered T-Mobile
The key message for this campaign is transparency – the sales team had to adapt to the process of comparing other sources. This was a scary proposition for them to take on.
Audience Q’s
Did BillShrinks platform encourage T-Mobile to change pricing?
They did use it to find insights to their competition, but no significant price changes were made.
It was very important for BillShrink to stay independent of T-Mobile. While T-Mobile wanted to promote BillShrink they also had to find the right amount of exposure they were going to give. It was important to promote BillShrink without giving the impression that it was a T-Mobile microsite.
(BillShrink) What level of information do you share with the providers?
They build consumer profiles, etc, and they are willing to sell that data.
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