IkeGPS is a provider of data acquisition technology and structural analysis software for electric utilities, communication companies, and their engineering service providers. IKE’s software enabled its customers to increase speed, quality, and safety of their fiber and engineering construction projects as well as the maintenance of other assets.
"If we were going to start doing more sophisticated selling, we needed to start outbound marketing and tracking.”
As a software company selling to engineers, it’s no surprise that IKE employed the best of the best developers and product designers. Unfortunately, however strong a product is, it will not market or sell itself. Nomad’s POC, Chris DeJohn, IKE’s VP of Sales, says he realized that “if we were going to start doing more sophisticated selling, we needed to start outbound marketing and tracking”. The IKE team understood that getting to this level of selling started with making sure the right infrastructure and a strong operations backbone was in place. The company started evaluating marketing automation platforms, eventually deciding to implement Marketo and Bizible. They knew they needed an implementation partner to help out, and asked their sales contacts at Adobe for a referral.
That’s when Nomad came in. Adobe referred Nomad to IKE as a preferred implementation partner, and the team got started architecting the project. Nomad quickly dove in to understand the company’s business model, goals and other systems to begin the implementation of Marketo and Bizible.
“We would have had to hire three to four people externally if we didn’t leverage Nomad. They are our swiss army knife in terms of the sales operations expertise we needed”
As the implementation progressed, Chris realized that Nomad could be much more than just an implementation partner. Throughout the implementation, Chris would ask his assigned Nomad team questions that were technically out of scope of the marketing automation implementation, including questions about new technologies, reporting & analytics architecture, and sales operations. Each time, the team was able to answer his questions and eagerly jumped in to help out.
The Nomad team is able to lend expertise across many different platforms and processes, as well as across departments. Chris said, “we would have had to hire three to four people externally if we didn’t leverage Nomad. They are our swiss army knife in terms of the sales operations expertise we needed”. Now, Nomad works with the company for ongoing MOPs and SOPs services to help execute, grow and optimize those functions on an ongoing basis.
Nomad works hand in hand with IKE’s internal sales team as well as the company’s external content marketing agency to create a sophisticated sales & marketing function. Nomad’s responsibilities include marketing campaign execution, lead qualification and routing management, and administration of IKE’s growing tech stack. Chris likes working with Nomad for the team’s technical expertise, but also for the way they work. Chris says he likes that “I can communicate with Nomad directly on Slack, and that Nomad works directly with our content agency without my oversight, meaning I don’t get bogged down in meetings”.
All of Nomad’s efforts came to fruition with the execution of IKE’s first webinar. Historically, IKE's marketing efforts were heavily brand-focused, but strategic lead generation initiatives were always on the roadmap for 2023. Nomad worked with both IKE’s internal team and content marketing agency to make the company’s first webinar campaign a great success.
Nomad worked with key stakeholders to determine a target audience, utilize the company’s existing database and enrich it, market the webinar, integrate a webinar platform, and communicate with attendees after the event. Nomad also worked hand in hand with the company’s content marketing agency to align on key deliverables and make sure the event went off without a hitch. All of Nomad’s efforts, from initial implementation of the necessary platforms to strategic marketing ops consulting to execution, helped put on a successful webinar which drove leads for the company and resulted in absolute buy-in from the Sales org to participate in future marketing initiatives.
"Nomad’s understanding of the big picture and ability and willingness to get into the weeds if needed is a nice combination”
Nomad fills multiple needs for IKE. Of course, Nomad implemented key marketing platforms and acts as the company’s outsourced marketing and sales operations execution team, but Nomad also acts as a key thought partner. Chris works with Lu to set priorities concerning the sales & marketing tech stack, “bouncing ideas off of her” to set the company’s agenda, including new platforms and optimization. He says that “Nomad’s understanding of the big picture and ability and willingness to get into the weeds if needed is a nice combination”.
Nomad is Chris’ partner for all things sales & marketing technology and process. To anyone considering working with Nomad, Chris has this to say: “there seems to be a niche that is in real demand and Nomad fills that very well with good people and personalities. Nomad doesn’t just have process expertise and technology background, but also good people, and those three things together make the real difference”.
"Nomad doesn’t just have process expertise and technology background, but also good people, and those three things together make the real difference"
