A Guide to Competitive Takeout Campaigns

Speaker A: They're looking at these other accounts, these other vendors. And why wouldn't you want to get ahead of that and be the first person? It's the same thing as when you qualify an account. You want to be the first person to reach out to that account before any other vendor. You don't want to give them the opportunity to even get in touch with this other vendor before you have the opportunity to go in and tell them what you do and why you do it better.

Speaker B: This is Revenue Makers, the podcast by Sixth Sense, investigating successful revenue strategies that pushed companies ahead of. So, do you have competitors? I'd imagine you do. Today's episode I'm really excited about because I had a conversation with Meg Noonan, who runs integrated campaigns over at Bug Crowd, and we talked about a, ah, competitive takeout campaign that her and her team put together and was very successful. And the show was really focused around, like, how do you go about building one of these things? Because it can be tricky, right? You want to go after those accounts that are going after your accounts, those competitors, but at the same time, you want to do it classy, and you want to do it in a way where you're highlighting what's good about you. You don't want to sling mud. It could get ugly. I'm sure we've all seen competitors get ugly, and that's certainly not what you want to do. So this episode dives into some of the best practices, how to think about it, how to enable your team. Some really great, actionable advice on these competitive takeouts. So let's dive in and see what we can learn. All right, Meg, thanks so much for jumping on. I've been looking forward to, uh, a little chat about competitive takeouts.

Speaker A: Thank you so much for having me.

Speaker B: Let's dive in. So a lot of people in the world, a lot of companies like to sling mud and go after their competitors, but there is obviously a much better way to do it. And certainly we are in a competitive space where any market is pretty much there's competitive, and you are certainly in a competitive space yourself. Talk a little bit about your role and kind of how it's led to kind of running these competitive. These integrated takeout campaigns that you. That you do.

Speaker A: Yes. So I'm the senior manager of global campaigns at bugcrowd. Um, so my repertoire includes everything from minor campaigns to major tier one campaigns, and that does include competitive takeout. We were running more use case campaigns that were use case based on pain points. We're still running those, obviously, but there really Just became a need for specific competitors that continued to come up in our deals, specific competitors that were coming up in intent data that our, uh, prospects and customers were researching. And so really became obvious that there was a need to address that. So that's how the competitive takeout kind of fell underneath my purview.

Speaker B: And you're in that. That space of you're cybersecurity, but you work with hackers and other things just to help organizations sort of go after and find the holes and the risks that they have and. And plug them, essentially.

Speaker A: Right, Yep, that's exactly it. So we partner with the ethical hacker community to find vulnerabilities before the next breach. And really we pride ourselves on matching our crowd with, uh, each of our customers to make sure that each of the specific needs of our customers is met through that crowd.

Speaker B: You've been in this role for, obviously, for a long time running these different campaigns. Was there a certain point where you're like, all right, this is getting a little wild. We need to start thinking about how to more directly go after our competitors. Was there a moment? Was there a certain. Or was it just sort of a. Kind of made. It just made sense?

Speaker A: No, there was definitely a moment. I think I mentioned that we were seeing our competitors, some of our tier one competitors in particular, pop up in our accounts, intent data again coming up in deals. So, you know, it came apparent that there was likely some competitive, um, takeout happening on the other side against us. And so obviously we had to make a decision if we were going to be aggressive and go after that competitor as well, which we, in the end, decided to do, obviously, otherwise we wouldn't be talking about it now. But as we saw those intent markers continue to show up at a higher frequency, and also the more it became apparent within each and every single one of our deals that we were going up against the same competitors time and time again, and that we were really in the need for specific messaging, takeout messaging, not just in our integrated campaigns. We're looking at, uh, obviously our demand gen function, our SDR function, but also on the enablement piece and the sales messaging and that takedown messaging and offers and things like that, and became very apparent that we needed to better differentiate and really be aggressive with our messaging there.

Speaker B: So you talked about intent was certainly an early sign, but again, it started probably getting redundant that your sales team was just seeing these same account, and it was like, okay, clearly we know where we're playing and who's playing or coming after us. So from a messaging Perspective because obviously this can get tricky. You want to go after your competitors, you want to talk about like why you're better and I'm sure, and there's some situations where you definitely are better in some features and maybe there's some places where maybe the competitor's better or maybe not. But how did you approach putting the messaging together? You didn't want to go negative early. I mean, I certainly have seen any number of competitor campaigns that have been negative and not so pretty. But how did you approach that without kind of put. Or maybe you did push the button a little bit and go too far, but maybe not too far, but negative.

Speaker A: Yeah. So we definitely want to keep in mind not being negative out of the gate. And also our philosophy is more focusing on the things that we can deliver on and that we can deliver on better and our product roadmap and things like that versus spending so much time talking about what the other company can or cannot do. So we really, really focused in on the buyer's pain point. So we did a very in depth analysis with current customers that have switched from that competitor, from things that we. From in depth research that we've done elsewhere and honed in on, um, exactly where our platform and product was better, the use cases and the problems or pain points that that solved for the buyer and focused on that versus going out and saying that we're better than xyz. And that definitely took that in the enablement piece. It's not as easy as going out and saying, well, we do this better than they do. It takes a lot of training and enablement, I think. And that's something we're still working on is figuring out that sweet spot we had to go with the pain points that we were solving, but back it up with solid numbers. Whereas a lot of times sometimes solving a buyer's pain point, you can be anecdotal about it. We had to be very direct with. These are ratings according to third party review sites. These are, uh, where our customers say that they've improved their programs after searching a bug crowd, things like that, and really focusing on the hard data in order to stay away from being negative about the competitor.

Speaker B: I've personally been involved in deals, whether it's here someplace else, where it's like, hey, I want to hear from somebody that switched from your competitor. It's like, okay, they've got videos, our competitors got videos of people saying, oh, I switched from, because they were terrible, or this or that. And then we've, we've got videos of them Saying that was there actually like direct quotes or testimonials from folks that had made the switch? Did you go that route?

Speaker A: We do have testimonials from folks that have made the switch. They're not always called out from m which competitor they came from. You can probably read through the lines and a lot of them, um, especially if we're talking about specific pain points that we're hearing customers that have left that competitor that come up recurrently. But we did not really go the route of calling them out directly in our content. It was more. We do have specific quotes that again, focus on, um, quotes and stories and testimonials that focus on those pain points that we know that we are better at solving.

Speaker B: So when it came to the enablement side of things, was it enabling your sales team on a campaign or was it enabling your sales team on how to go after the competitor or was it somewhere in between?

Speaker A: It was definitely somewhere in between. So this is a big campaign rollout that we've done. And when I say campaign rollout, it means also enabling the team on all the other things that we're doing aside from the messaging. So versus just giving them updated competitive battle cards, giving them updated messaging, we had to really enable them on what we were doing to serve them specific leads or go after specific accounts and qualify those accounts in order to hand them over to the sales team and the SEO teams. So again, it was a bit of both in that we had to do all the enablement and the learning and the uh, and the familiarizing with what the campaign structure was and exactly how things are getting handed off. But then once they are handed off, exactly how to attack that messaging and how to utilize what the accounts have already consumed from like a demand gen or an SDR perspective. Bring that into the opportunities and the conversations and make sure they really hammer home those points that we know are we're solving for.

Speaker B: Do you have competitive insights, somebody at the company or most people in the company that sort of handle that a hundred percent, or is this sort of a group effort across?

Speaker A: Yeah, we have a couple people that handle this a hundred percent. So it was a lot of partnership with them to make sure that we were communicating correctly through all of our demand gen messaging and all of that, we have that competitive intel team that's constantly doing all the research and surfacing more and more pain points that we're solving for better more and more things that come up within the deals. It also depends a lot though on our sales team being really clear and um, what their conversations have surfaced, because that's a lot of the places we're getting that one to one feedback on where our competitors are falling short and we are exceeding content.

Speaker B: Again, like tricky in the sense, like it's pretty clear probably what content you need. But when you thought about kind of how to map the content to the different to the buyer journey, first, how did you go about that? And then secondly, was there something that really stood out during the course of the campaign that was really driving a lot of engagement or really helping move things forward? Maybe sort of that one piece of content that was punching above its weight in terms of its ability to really move things along.

Speaker A: In setting up our content map, we tried to hit every single channel and every single content type. This was a full funnel campaign. So we're looking at accounts all the way from awareness through to decision and purchase. We wanted to make sure that we were doing the educational bit, the awareness bit at the top of the funnel, things like blogs around where we succeed in solving those pain points, all the way through to case studies, customer testimonials from accounts that have switched from our competitor to us, testimonials that speak to those strong points that we have to offer. And then also comparison guides. Those are more direct and specifically taking out this is where we excel and this is where our competitor doesn't. So that's where we did get a little bit more aggressive was in the comparison guides. I would say that in terms of how the content performs and I'm not super surprised about this, especially for the types of accounts that we've been going after. We've been finding a lot that are kind of in that middle bottom of funnel is really the customer testimonials and case studies because they're exactly who you want to hear from. Right. You don't want to hear from Buck Crowd as to why Buck Crowd is superior. You want to hear from customers that are using bugcrow every day, why this is the right choice to make and why switching from your competitor, having those testimonials at our disposal, that's really what the accounts want to hear about. They want that firsthand experience.

Speaker B: What was the most effective channels for that specific type of getting those testimonials out? Like what worked really well to get that in front of a target?

Speaker A: Uh, we've seen the most engagement with those through display advertising and paid social media. So we've seen, um, all the content that we're running on display that's getting much more engagement than the rest of the content within the campaign. We're also having a lot of success with those quotes and the testimonials being surfaced in early conversations. So when our SDRs are doing outreach and really focusing in on those customer quotes and how they solve the pain points, that's been really successful as well.

Speaker B: The competitor guys, you talked about where you were calling out the competitor by name at that point or.

Speaker A: Yep, we do have those comparison guys. We're calling competitors out by name. They're more internal. And once we've got conversations going. So that's where we kind of. We're trying to also find that balance between calling out our competitors directly versus talking to their pain points. So there does get to a point in the funnel where you have to be more direct, I think, about calling out exactly how you're going to win over your competitor, especially when you know that same thing's being done on the other side. So the comparison guides are, I think, essential especially for that bottom of funnel engagement and differentiation.

Speaker B: Any tricks or any challenges, would those things had to heavily be looked at by legal? Were those just curious if that. Because that's a process in and of itself, I would imagine.

Speaker A: Absolutely. Yep. That had to go through legal approval. We had to have all of our sources, uh, certified and all of that. So we know at least after going through all those hoops that what we're putting out is accurate and a true snapshot of what our business looks like in comparison to our competitor. But it did take a lot of, uh, back and forth between different departments internally to make sure that it was approved and we could defend our claims.

Speaker B: Now, you said display and paid social on the, on the testimonial side, but just overall, campaign wise, were the similar channels that were just performing well, or was it again, kind of the concert of everything coming together?

Speaker A: It's the concert of everything coming together because in the full funnel workflow, we're really looking at taking those accounts that uh, are showing some intent or in their awareness stage, moving them through the funnel. So it's. They're really starting at top of funnel with demand gen, paid social display moving through into our prospecting and our qualified account outbounding into true sales conversations. So it was really a big concert of all the different channels coming together, which I find in most of the integrated campaigns that we run, it's not one single channel because they each serve their own purpose. Some are generating qualified accounts, some are nurturing those accounts, et cetera.

Speaker B: So this is a little bit of a tangent, but I'm just curious, like you've got field things happening. You might have events happening. You just talk a little bit like how you're structured and how you kind of make all these things come together. Is it relatively large marketing team or.

Speaker A: We have a pretty small marketing team. As senior manager of global campaigns, I manage the global strategy and then I work with our field teams to get that into the field activities. We set up the integrated campaigns. We have a need for each of the different channels in each of the different areas. And then we really work together and collaborate on how we're going to get each part of the campaign into each of the different areas. So for example, I'll meet with our regional counterparts and going over how we're going to activate the campaigns within the field, whether that be through events, through webinars, through roundtables, things like that, and making sure that we're consistent with our messaging, whether it be this campaign or any other campaign. We're always tying each of our events back to a campaign or each of our field activities back to a campaign so that we're specific and direct with our messaging and consistent. Within my purview again is uh, global demand generation and campaigns. And then I work with, whether it be content on, um, the content needs with creative and then work with the field teams, the regional teams to make sure that we truly integrate the campaigns into each one of our marketing channels that we have available.

Speaker B: This particular campaign that we're talking about now, if you were to go and architect version 2.0, like where would you spend your time to uplevel, change it, fix some things, where would your head go?

Speaker A: I think one thing I would really. And we will do a 2.0 of this. So this is on the list for the next phase is more of an uh, interactive guide, more interactive assets. I think that's something that we haven't tackled yet. Things like more interactive, public facing, ROI calculators, things like that. We do have those things that we do on the back end. But it would be great not only as a lead generation tool, as an account qualification tool, but just a valuable asset to show again where we're where solving those pain points for the customers that are competitors, just not solving as well.

Speaker B: All right, so then here's a question I always like to ask too. Like there are many organizations I'm sure that have sort of flirted with the idea of like, okay, we really need to get aggressive and go after do these types of programs, but maybe they're hesitant or there's concerns internally legal, whatever it may be, like what Would be your advice for like, uh, maybe a marketing team that's kind of on the fence about how do we do this? We do it effectively, but also want to keep it classy. Yeah.

Speaker A: I think number one is qualifying the amount of business you could potentially be losing to the competitor through known conversations that are happening. So keeping a good record, journal, data sheet, whatever you want to call it, of, uh, each instance where the competitor's name is coming up, what that deal looks like, what the potential loss is, and not only what the potential loss is, but just the frequency of the amount of times that those competitors are being mentioned. That. Which is a bit more anecdotal because it depends again, on, um, reporting back from sales and having like, that great alignment and feedback loop. But also it's really hard to argue with intent data. So if you look at your top accounts in your strategic segment and you pull a segment report on them in six sense, and you see that the top keyword group being researched in that set of accounts is your competitors, that's really hard to argue with. So that just goes to show me that they're looking at these other accounts, these other vendors. And why wouldn't you want to get ahead of that and be the first person? It's the same thing as when you qualify an account. You want to be the first person to reach out to that account before any other vendor. You don't want to give them the opportunity to even get in touch with this other vendor before you have the opportunity to go in and tell them what you do and why you do it better.

Speaker B: Nice. Well, we have a question that we've asked. I say we, I guess I have been asking lately, where everyone or all of our guests, what is the most ridiculous thing you've ever been asked to do in your career? It could be good or bad. So good has been. We worked with NASA on a marketing campaign. Bad is the statute of limitations are just up on that. So we've. We've seen the spectrum.

Speaker A: Previous to my B2B years, I used to be in luxury retail, and that used to entail traveling to China. And I think one of the most ridiculous questions, at least to me that I was asked, was to eat chicken feet. That's a delicacy there. And that is totally out of my wheelhouse of something to do. So that was a pretty ridiculous question for me.

Speaker B: Did you eat the chicken feet?

Speaker A: I did. They actually weren't bad. They were fried.

Speaker B: I guess if you're gonna have any sort of delicacy like that as long as it's fried, it's gonna help you.

Speaker A: Yeah, I didn't want to offend anyone. It's a delicacy there. So it was a, uh, fine line to walk. But I did do it. I can add that to my list of accomplishments. And I survived.

Speaker B: And, uh, were there colleagues or other folks that were like, you got some street cred with it because you just had bought. You had just had the chicken feet.

Speaker A: Yes. Chicken feed.

Speaker B: Street cred. Nice. Very good. Well, Meg, this is great. I appreciate going through this. I think a lot of folks will get some great value out of it because, again, these campaigns can be really effective, but they're tricky. So you really helped us kind of navigate the ins and outs it. So I really appreciate it.

Speaker A: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. M. It was great chatting about it and fun.

Speaker B: Thank you. Thanks for listening to this episode of Revenue Makers. If you're looking for more info on how to stay on top of the latest marketing trends, check out our resources in the show notes and subscribe to the Secret Sauce monthly newsletter. You can do it at the bottom of every page@6sense.com it's packed with practical tips and insights that can help you level up your marketing strategy. See you next week.