Strategic Creative (Know your audience)

The audience for this Forcepoint program is people in charge of protecting mid-size to large companies. Practitioners hold titles like Solutions or Network Architect, and they work with decision-makers with positions like CISO and CIO. They are highly educated, busy people with a sincere sense of duty – to protect their company from risk.

Forcepoint wanted to consolidate their presence in market under one creative platform. Under one idea that would be able to encompass multiple products and add context to Forcepoint’s brand philosophy (stop the bad and free the good) all across the buyer’s journey. An idea that would also tap into the audience’s unifying sense of guardianship.

The concept was called “clarity”, and featured bisected portraits meant to communicate the “before and after” of cybersecurity – moving from what is unclear and uncertain to what can be seen and protected. It invites the audience to take control of their future in cybersecurity.

Content Strategy (Create value & relevance)

Powering the campaign was a deep content marketing engine, with assets tailored to support the entire buyer's journey. eBooks provided general information about a given solution, while buyer's guides allowed for more specific competitive comparison. For pre-sale conversations we produced and promoted webcasts, whitepapers and remote consultations. Assets were developed in North America then adapted to EMEA, APAC and LATAM.

Media (Connect at the right time and place)

To get this message out in front of the audience, our goal was to take a full-funnel approach – generating awareness while pulling potential customers through the funnel to ultimately drive them to lead status. As a result, the campaign focused on wide reaching outlets such as Facebook, LinkedIn, programmatic display, Reddit, and Quora. The campaign also focused on reaching decision makers in the publications they trust most. The strategy included custom content targeting the C-Suite with thought leadership pieces from Forbes, IDG & CSO Magazine and Threatpost. Media was also employed to deliver longer form messages where the breadth of Forcepoint expertise could be displayed with high impact display, enewsletter advertorials and dedicated emails with CBSi, ISMG, Threatpost, and Forbes in North America. TechTarget and CSO Magazine were partners leveraged globally to achieve our overall goals.

As a result of the well-rounded media strategy, the Clarity campaign took hold in almost all forms of digital media – banners, social posts, syndicated content, digital takeovers, email and landing pages. Though developed in North America, this campaign was translated and adapted to markets around the world, including EMEA, APAC and LATAM.

COMPETITIVE DISPLACEMENT SUB-CAMPAIGN

A primary Forcepoint competitor was making strategic missteps and angering their customer base. We looked to capitalize on some of the pain points that audience was feeling by adapting the Clarity campaign to address issues like price transparency and a long-term strategic vision. An account-targeted list was used, and respondents were placed into a nurture series and given access to lower-funnel content and sales consultations.

ABM APPROACH

A key account selection list was generated with the Forcepoint sales team, and we created an arm of the Clarity campaign designed to get more specific to customer pain points. This list was comprised of prospects from strategic and named accounts, with sales opportunities exceeding $250K+. Our goal was to stay top of mind with these high-value targeted accounts and position Forcepoint as a leading source of expertise on cybersecurity.