Kronos is the market leader in workforce management solutions. As part of their global marketing strategy, they aim to maintain a dialogue with prospects at all levels within large companies with large workforces, in order to communicate the significant cost and productivity benefits that Kronos can deliver. Fairly straightforward so far.

But the B2B buying process is a complex one and there is a need for touchpoints throughout the buying cycle, and to all levels. These are a few of the ways Base One has addressed these differing requirements.

The Yes Test.

Kronos prospects already receive a regular stream of high-quality content, including research into latest developments in workforce management. This piece was designed to help those prospects to move onto the next stage – ie to assess how well they managed their workforce compared to others. The Yes Test simply asked a series of questions – the challenge being to answer 'yes' to as many as possible. Boldly designed, the Yes Test was a combination of infographic styling with the usefulness of a self-assessment tool. 

The Meeting Kit

As every marketer knows, the majority of downloads come from influencers rather than decision makers. Senior managers and budget holders are harder to reach, so we wondered what we could do to help get the issue of workforce management to permeate upwards within the target organisations. Our idea was to help prospects to have an internal meeting about workforce management; in this way, we could leverage the enthusiasm amongst some managers by making it easier for them to put it on their bosses' agendas.

The meeting kit comprised a Powerpoint presentation (or a huge poster-sized print-out) along with preparation questions. In short, everything someone would need to manage a productive meeting if they wanted to get people talking about workforce management. There was a digital version and an off-line version, which sales teams could offer to their nottest prospects.

C-Level portrait

Decisions are frequently made lower down in an organisation, and approved from on high. This is a simplification, but an important point if we wanted Kronos to be accepted and approved by the C-level. To gain awareness, along with a high-level understanding of what Kronos does, we sent out framed portraits (gathered from publicly available images) composed of tiny pictures of other people photos. The accompanying line was "It's your people who make you look good" – reflecting how Kronos helps businesses to turn a workforce from a cost into a competitive advantage. 

Summary

This goes to prove that content marketing and communications is about more than sending out whitepapers or product offers. By thinking about the specific marketing goal (whether to gain credibility with C-level or to put certain issues on the corporate agenda), we have found some innovative and effective ways of solving the problem.