Juniper is a challenger brand and had a big challenge. They were going head to head with market leader Cisco, and they wanted to win.

We knew they could not out-Cisco Cisco. But we also knew that Juniper’s products offered clear – if not widely understood – benefits to their target audience, and these benefits were already enjoyed by a small, but loyal user base. This made us realise that the most powerful communications tool we had were the users themselves.

Our strategy therefore used strong user advocacy as a base for a new business and awareness programme, and embarked on an integrated campaign that increased the size of the active user community by over 400%.

To do this, we knew network architects and programmers didn’t want marketers to tell them which products to use – they are marketing-averse. So instead we looked to provide them with a place where technical professionals can share their enthusiasm for a product and where they can go to learn and develop their skills.

A website, christened “J-Central” was built within six weeks. It delivered live (and archived) videocasts complete with presentations, application sharing and interactive Q&A each month with JUNOS experts. We also built a library of scripts that people could download and run on their infrastructure to minimize human error in deployments. We even built a remote lab providing targeted accounts with exclusive access to Juniper technology, so that the target audience could try and test before buying. And of course, user interaction and feedback was encouraged throughout, adding user-generated content to the information already provided. Very soon, J-Central was buzzing with activity, reinforcing the customer’s brand experience of Juniper, and providing a powerful indicator to Cisco users that they might just be missing something.

Our first email, inviting JUNOS users to register on J-Central, generated 600 responses. Thanks to the viral effect of the activity, J-Central soon had over 10,000 active users, including many who predominantly use Cisco equipment!