• by Ray Schultz , Columnist, August 22, 2024

Box, a software company that helps Fortune 500 employees collaborate on content, determined that it needed more data on the prospects visiting its site.  

This was no easy challenge, given that 97% of website visitors never log in or fill out a lead form on any site.  

The company turned to Bombora, a firm that helps B2B brands build first-party data and divine intent. Utilizing Bombora’s Visitor Insights, Box has been able to learn who is visiting its site, then personalize its marketing in real-time. The arrangement went live a few months ago.   

“We’re getting a lot of insights into knowns, unknowns, industry, company size,” says Tess Mercer, head of marketing operations at Box. “We know when they are closer to sales, closer to closing the funnel.” 

In addition, Box is now “kicking off account and lead scoring based on visits to high-priority pages on the website — the volume of visits, number of visits, and consumption of content and assets,” Mercer says.  

All of this is done without any sharing of personally identifiable information. In cases where it already has contact information, Box can use Bombora to append variables like the job role and conduct data hygiene, and presumably conduct targeted email campaigns. 

But the real breakthrough is the ability to determine intent.

Perhaps predictably, Box’s pricing page is especially popular with potential clients. Once it sees that level of intent, Box can direct visitors toward webinars, or “any kind of event that can give them a lot of context,” Mercer says 

Based on testing of recent segments, Box is “taking a generic message for a specific Box product and tailoring it to key segments to optimize conversions and message resonance, then incorporating this into modeling to distinguish…..when is a site interaction meaningful and what can it tall you if other businesses start to behave the same way,” says Jen Steffan, senior director, product marketing at Bombora. 

Marketers have gotten a reprieve on third-party cookie deprecation. But they should invest in first-party data and integrate some third-party data, says Putney Cloos, chief marketing officer of Bombora.

Box is pleased with the results thus far. For instance, it measured the impact of personalizing key pages on its site for its Life Sciences audience members.  

This resulted in a 20% increase in page views, a 315% increase to contact requests, a 30% increase in quote requests and a 75% increase to response rates. 

Any advice for B2B brands? “My advice is don’t boil the ocean, and don’t reach for the stars,” Steffan says. “Look for wins that are easy to get — don’t go deep, go wide.”