The Client

The Client is the Singapore office of a South Korea-based Internet platform developer that specializes in e-commerce, online-to-offline (O2O) solutions, and digital marketing. The company is a fully-owned subsidiary of a Fortune Global 500 firm with 2,300 employees and offices in eight countries.

The Challenge

Headquartered in South Korea, The Client established its Singapore office in 2012, providing a suite of integrated marketplace platforms tailored for the local online and mobile commerce segments. This included its flagship social discovery app launched in 2013 that allowed users to share and recommend places of interest in Singapore.

One of the app’s key selling points was that it featured an extensive network of merchant partners that actively engaged users with exclusive offers and promos. The app gave participating merchants an added channel for having real-time conversations with customers, improving brand visibility through user-generated content and micro-influencers, as well as gaining valuable customer insights and contextual marketing information.

Several months after releasing the app, the Client wanted to accelerate the growth of its merchant partner network in response to very positive user adoption numbers. This led the company to consider implementing targeted marketing tactics alongside its inbound marketing efforts.

But with little experience in direct marketing and much of its marketing resources already tied up in existing programs, the Client realized the best way forward was to work with a third-party provider that specialized in targeted outreach.

The Callbox Solution

The Client chose Callbox after reviewing a shortlist of marketing agencies, pointing to Callbox’s long-term experience deploying successful campaigns in Singapore as the deciding factor.

Callbox and the Client then developed a campaign plan that combined emails and phone calls delivered as a sequence of multiple touches. The main campaign objectives included:

• Engaging decision makers to gauge fit and interest
• Booking face-to-face meetings with qualified prospects
• Collecting information needed in the Client’s sales process

Appointment Setting

1. The target prospects included business owners, restaurant managers, marketing managers, and general managers from retailers in Singapore.
2. Callbox prepared all campaign materials including the call script and campaign list, which were reviewed and approved by the Client.
3. The Callbox team maximized decision maker reach rates by leveraging SMART Calling, Callbox’s proprietary call management system.

Email Marketing

1. The campaign’s first touch point was an intro email that primed prospects up for the sequence of one-on-one calls. Follow-up emails and targeted send-outs (for distributing additional marketing materials) were also used at later stages in the campaign.
2. The Callbox team created and tested all email materials including templates, copies, and landing pages. The team also handled replies and prospect requests.
3. The Client monitored the entire campaign (including both email marketing and phone-based appointment setting) through Pipeline CRM, Callbox’s lead management and marketing automation tool.

Results

Callbox completed the campaign in six months (or 132 days at 22 days per month), and handed off a total of 129 qualified appointments and 302 verified leads to the Client.

Since the campaign followed a multi-touch cadence that started with email activities designed to initiate contact, the Callbox team only began generating appointments near the end of the first month. Once the nurtured contacts began converting, the campaign was able to consistently deliver between 18 to 25 qualified appointments each month.

The Callbox team also achieved a relatively high decision maker reach rate of around 24% and, by the end of the campaign, the team connected with a total of 3,045 decision makers.

The Client projected that 80% of the appointments generated in the campaign would convert into qualified sales opportunities, with 60% turning into signups. That translates to 62 potential new merchant partners for the Client’s social discovery app.