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B2B TELECOMS · LEAD GENERATION · UK NATIONWIDE

Launching two product areas while deepening the ones already running

Onecom is the UK’s largest independent business telecoms provider. The work runs on two tracks at once: standing up paid acquisition for two product areas from nothing, and taking the longer-running campaigns that came across with the Gradwell merger past the easy demand into genuine pipeline. This is B2B marketing where the lead is the product, and where every route a buyer can take has to be measured.

SERVICES WE RUN

PPC

CRO

MARKETING SOLUTIONS

Lead Generation

B2B Marketing

Performance Marketing

Brand Awareness

Email Marketing

◆ AT A GLANCE ◆

The short version

Four figures that describe the work without describing the business. Every number on this page is a share, a rate or a movement.

From zero

Two product areas launched

No campaigns, no landing pages and no conversion history on either.

¼ the cost

Leads from Performance Max vs search

Per lead, across the same products in the same period.

~4x

Click-through on the content offer

Against the rest of the account, by design.

96%

Engagement rate, paid search sessions

Against a bounce rate under four per cent.

At the client’s request, every figure on this page is a share, a rate or a relative movement. We have not published lead volumes, ad spend, cost per lead or pipeline value in absolute terms, and no two figures here can be combined to derive any of them. If you want the absolute numbers, the client is happy for us to walk through them on a call under NDA.

◆ THE STARTING POINT ◆

Where the work started

Two very different jobs running in parallel, in a category where every competitor is bidding on the same handful of terms.

Business telecoms is a considered purchase. Nobody switches provider on impulse, the buyer is rarely the person who uses the product, and the decision usually involves contracts, numbers and a migration. That makes it a proper B2B marketing problem rather than a volume one: the job is not to generate enquiries, it is to generate enquiries a sales team can actually do something with.

Partway through, the picture changed again. Gradwell joined the group, bringing its own established campaigns, its own product lines and its own history of conversion data. Those campaigns had to be folded into one marketing mix rather than left running alongside as a second account with a second set of targets.

Two product areas had no paid presence at all. They needed campaigns, landing pages, tracking and a conversion path building from nothing, in auctions already contested by national competitors with years of history in them.

At the same time, the longer-running campaigns had a different problem. They were already capturing the people actively looking to switch — the low-hanging fruit — and that pool is finite. Growing beyond it meant reaching buyers before they were in market at all, which is a different kind of campaign with a different definition of success.

WHAT WE INHERITED

Two product areas with no campaigns, no landing pages and no conversion data to bid against

Established campaigns already working the in-market demand, with limited room left to grow inside it

Leads arriving by four different routes — form, phone, live chat and email — each needing to be captured and attributed

A category where the available search impressions are contested by every major provider in the country

◆ THE DIAGNOSIS ◆

What the work had to get right

Four things decided whether this produced leads a sales team would thank you for, or just enquiries.

Capture the existing demand before trying to create any

The first job on both new product areas was the bottom of the funnel: the people already searching for what Onecom sells. It is the cheapest demand in the market and the fastest to prove, and it funds everything above it. Performance Max did the heavy lifting here, producing leads at roughly a quarter of the cost of search for the same products.

The landing page decides whether the click becomes a lead

Buying clicks into a generic product page wastes most of them. Landing pages were rebuilt around the specific question each campaign’s traffic was asking, with the objection that actually stops a telecoms buyer answered on the page. Paid search sessions now run at a 96% engagement rate with a bounce rate under four per cent.

The low-hanging fruit runs out, so build above it

On the established product areas, in-market demand was already being captured. Growing further meant going higher up the funnel with a content offer aimed at buyers who are not shopping yet. That campaign runs at close to four times the click-through rate of the rest of the account and is measured on pipeline built rather than on leads this week.

A lead is a lead however it arrives

Buyers in this category call, fill in forms, start live chats and send emails, often across several sessions. All four routes are tracked and attributed, because a campaign judged only on form fills in a category where people phone will be switched off for the wrong reason.

◆ THE WORK ◆

How it was built, in order

Two tracks running at once: launch on one side, depth on the other.

TRACK A · PHASE 01

Launch

Two product areas, live from nothing

Campaigns, conversion tracking and landing pages built from zero for both. Performance Max carried the opening volume while search was held tight to the highest-intent terms, so the account learned on good data rather than broad data. First qualified leads landed inside the opening fortnight.

PPC

TRACK A · PHASE 02

Conversion

Rebuild the page, not just the bid

Landing pages rebuilt per campaign rather than shared, each answering the question its own traffic arrives with. This is where the cost per lead on a considered B2B purchase is actually won — the auction sets what you pay for the click, the page decides how many of those clicks are worth anything.

CRO

PPC

TRACK B · PHASE 01

Efficiency

Separate brand from acquisition

On the longer-running campaigns, brand search was separated out and run on its own terms. It produces leads at a fraction of the blended cost and protects the brand term against competitors bidding on it — but counted inside an acquisition campaign it flatters the numbers and hides what new demand really costs. Brand awareness work is only honest when it is measured separately.

PPC

TRACK B · PHASE 02

Pipeline

A content offer above the in-market demand

A high-value content offer built for buyers who are not yet shopping, promoted to the audiences the bottom-funnel campaigns cannot reach. It converts into the list rather than into the sales team, and the email marketing nurture behind it carries those contacts until they are ready. Judged on pipeline created, not on leads this month.

PPC

THE MERGER

Integration

Two account histories, one marketing mix

When Gradwell came into the group its campaigns were brought into the same operating model rather than run in parallel. Product lines that overlapped were consolidated so they stopped competing with each other in the same auctions, the established conversion history was kept working rather than reset, and brand terms were handled as one estate. Two sets of campaigns reporting into one investment and return view.

PPC

BOTH TRACKS

Measurement

Four lead routes, one view

Form submissions, phone calls, live chat and email enquiries all captured and attributed back to campaign. Performance marketing only works when the measurement reflects how the category actually buys, and in telecoms a large share of buyers still pick up the phone.

PPC

CRO

◆ HOW IT IS RUN ◆

How the account is run

The operating model matters as much as the work. This is what the client deals with week to week.

One principal operator

The person who builds the campaigns is the person who runs them and the person on the call. No account manager relaying instructions, and no junior learning on the budget.

Weekly, not monthly

Search terms, placements, landing page performance and lead quality reviewed every week. On a launch, a month is far too long to find out something is not working.

Lead quality, not lead count

Leads are reviewed on what the sales team can do with them, not on how many arrived. A campaign producing more enquiries at a worse qualification rate is a campaign getting worse.

Scheduled to the buying day

Campaigns run when the buyers and the sales team are both working. Spending into a Sunday afternoon in B2B telecoms buys enquiries nobody can act on.

Reallocation is built in

Effort moves to whichever part is the constraint. Across this period that meant landing pages first, then the top-of-funnel offer.

Everything is theirs

Campaigns, landing pages, tracking and lists sit in the client’s name and have from day one, on thirty days’ notice.

◆ WHAT MOVED ◆

What the period looked like

Shares, rates and ratios only. No absolute lead volumes, spend or cost per lead.

Cost per lead, Performance Max vs search

~¼

Same products, same period

Cost per lead, brand search vs blended average

~⅛

Why it is measured separately

Conversion rate, highest-intent campaign vs account average

~7x

Intent is worth more than volume

Click-through rate, content offer vs rest of account

~4x

Built for buyers who are not shopping yet

Engagement rate, paid search sessions

96%

On the rebuilt landing pages

Bounce rate, paid search sessions

Under 4%

Against a site-wide average several times higher

Lead routes captured and attributed

Form, phone, live chat and email

Share of available search impressions captured

~1 in 6

The headroom still in front of the account

Ratios compare campaigns within the same account over the same period. Engagement and bounce figures are site measured. We have not published lead volumes, ad spend, cost per lead or pipeline value in absolute terms, and no figure here can be combined with another to derive one.

“In a considered B2B purchase the auction decides what you pay for the click. The landing page decides whether you bought anything.”

Principal operator, TGMA

◆ WHAT IS NEXT ◆

What we are working on now

A case study is a snapshot of an account that is still running. These are the current priorities.

Rebuilding the search landing page on the newer of the two product areas, which is currently the weakest point in the funnel and the biggest single opportunity in the account

Taking search impression share up from roughly one in six, where the majority of available auctions still go to competitors

Building out the nurture behind the content offer so the pipeline it creates converts on its own timeline rather than needing a sales chase

Extending the four-route lead measurement into closed-won reporting, so campaigns can be judged on revenue rather than on leads

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