Strategic Marketing Consultants

The Situation Airgas was founded in 1982 with the acquisition of a distributor, Connecticut Oxygen. Over the next 35+ years, the company has grown organically and through more than 500 acquisitions to become one of the largest U.S. distribution networks in the packaged gas industry. Airgas was acquired by Air Liquide in 2016. Together, the combined company became a world leader in gas and services for Industry and Health. Airgas is dedicated to improving the performance of its more than 1 million customers, Airgas safely and reliably provides products, services and expertise to the following industries through its more than 18,500 associates, over 1,400 locations, robust e- Business platform, and Airgas Total Access® telesales channel: Construction Energy and chemicals Food and beverage Government, defense and aerospace Life sciences and healthcare Manufacturing and metal fabrication Power utilities and materials Retail services The Airgas SEO Solution Leading the Airgas strategic marketing team, Shea Ellison proposed a comprehensive digital marketing effort to: 1. Add hosted gated landing pages to each business unit’s sites combined with branded and targeted lead magnets. 2. Implement a hosted marketing automation platform that integrates with in-house CRM systems. 3. Engage professional sales writers to create a series of opt-in, nurturing and closing email messages to pull prospects into and through their sales funnel. The Airgas SEO Results After implementation of the SEO solution, opt-ins increased by 66%, engagement with nurturing and sales emails increased by 89% and sales increased by 61% over the course of three years. Revenue also climbed 33%. Management in both marketing and sales lauded our efforts as nothing short of “amazing.” The system is continually tweaked and improved through multi-variate testing on an ongoing basis. As a result of this process, numbers have continue to increase year over year. Safety extends beyond Airgas plants and branches. With more than 8,200 vehicles in its fleet, the company remains steadfastly focused on maintaining a safe driving record. Through rigorous training and commitment to safety by our drivers, the company continually achieves one of the lowest accident rates in the industry. Airgas operates the largest U.S. hazmat organization specifically trained to handle compressed gases, the Airgas Emergency Response Organization (AERO). Specially trained AERO teams located throughout the country respond quickly to emergencies that arise Read More

The Situation The background in this Linde Gas case study, we learned that in the 2004 financial year, The Linde Group generated revenue of EUR 14.127B.  It makes it the largest gases and engineering company in the world.  The Linde Group has approximately 65,000 employees working in more than 100 countries worldwide.  The Group comprises three Divisions: Industrial Gases & Healthcare, Engineering, and Gist The largest division, Linde Gas, has three reportable segments – EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa), Asia/Pacific and the Americas.  The new Marketing VP of Linde Gas of the Americas engaged the services of Strategic Marketing Consultants.  The goal was to design, develop and implement an innovative new strategic marketing plan to better engage their customer base, increase their prospect lists and grow revenue across all business units. The Solution Leading the strategic innovation team, Shea Ellison proposed a comprehensive digital marketing effort to 1. Add hosted gated landing pages to each business unit’s sites combined with branded and targeted lead magnets.  2. Implement a hosted marketing automation platform that integrates with in-house CRM systems.  3. Engage professional sales writers to create a series of opt-in,  nurturing and closing email messages to pull prospects into and through our sales funnel. The Results After implementation of the solution, opt-ins increased by 61%, engagement with nurturing and sales emails increased by 87% and sales increased by 58% over the course of three years.  Revenue also climbed 33%.  Management in both marketing and sales lauded our efforts as nothing short of “amazing.”  The system is continually tweaked and improved through multi-variate testing on an ongoing basis.  As a result of this process, numbers have continue to increase year over year. In 2007, the program was replicated in EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) and Asia/Pacific with similar results.  Of course copy was adapted for the cultural differences throughout each segment and region. Read More