San Francisco-Based Pierry Rebrands as Wunderman Thompson
Move bolsters Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce Center of Excellence to deliver enhanced, connected experiences for clients.

March 3, 2020 – NEW YORK, NY – San Francisco-based marketing services agency Pierry Inc. has rebranded to parent company Wunderman Thompson, a WPP creative, data and technology agency built to inspire growth for its clients. Pierry’s rebrand solidifies Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce Center of Excellence and enhances their marketing technology offering under one brand. The new identity leverages Pierry’s existing skills and combines them with Wunderman Thompson’s marketing technology expertise to meet clients’ growing demand for the Salesforce Customer 360 Platform, and Pierry and Wunderman Thompson’s shared clients will now have simpler access to the expertise of both agencies.

Founded in 2008, Pierry was acquired by Wunderman in September of 2017 and became a significant part of Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce Center of Excellence after Wunderman and J. Walter Thompson came together in 2019 to become Wunderman Thompson.

Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce COE encompasses Pierry, Mirum, ENext, EMark, The Cocktail, and Gorilla Group to deliver expanded marketing automation, CRM and CDP solutions for clients worldwide.

Wunderman Thompson’s Salesforce offering reduces complexity for clients by providing a one-stop solution to create customer experiences that deliver what consumers need, when they need it, at speed. By simplifying marketing technology, clients can focus on creating the kind of experiences that inspire customers and consumers to action, with technology that transforms customer journeys.

Wunderman Thompson’s marketing technology offering is comprised of three key elements: customer acquisition technology, experience technology and commerce, integrated with Wunderman Thompson’s data and mobile experts to deliver customized digital interactions and build deeper ties with customers.

“With Pierry’s rebranding, Wunderman Thompson positions itself as one of Salesforce’s largest agency partners globally for building data-driven marketing and advertising technology solutions for personalized customer engagement,” said Stephane Viallet, VP of Alliances, Salesforce.

“I’m excited to officially move Pierry under the Wunderman Thompson banner,” said Neil Stewart, Global CEO of Wunderman Thompson Commerce. “Data-driven thinking leads to consumer experiences that get results for clients, and Pierry’s expertise strengthens our Salesforce Center of Excellence to inspire growth for our clients.”

Salesforce and others are among the trademarks of salesforce.com, inc.

About Wunderman Thompson
Wunderman Thompson is a creative, data and technology agency built to inspire growth for its clients and people. Our experts deliver end-to-end solutions at a global scale with an entrepreneurial spirit that infuses creativity with emerging technology to deliver revolutionary work. Headquartered in New York, we are a worldwide agency bringing together over 20,000 people in 90 markets across the globe.

About Pierry Inc., A Wunderman Thompson Company
Pierry, Inc was founded in 2008 with one goal in mind – help its clients make the most of their digital presence. Today, this remains our goal, but we have since grown from a small staff servicing local businesses into a full-service digital marketing agency, providing world-class service to some of the most recognizable brands in the world. Our services include creative, strategy, campaign management and implementation of cloud-base technology. We are a proud Salesforce Partner.

In 2017, Pierry became a part of WPP and the Wunderman Group companies.

The marketing landscape is littered with acronyms—DSP, DMP, ESP, SSP, SEO, PPC, CPM—the list goes on and on. Recently, DMP (Data Management Platform) has grown into one of the hottest acronyms in the digital marketing space.

While the technology behind Data Management Platforms is complicated, the basic high-level functions of a DMP are rather simple: It consolidates disparate data points then leverages those consolidated data points to create targeted user audiences.

And once all data has been consolidated and unified, the resulting audiences can be pushed to various activation platforms.

How a DMP Works

Having the ability to aggregate data from multiple marketing channels is like hitting a hyper-targeted audience gold mine.

A DMP layers first-party data like site-side user activity, mobile app activity, or paid media engagement on top of second-party data from a data sharing relationship and combines it with third-party data from vendors to create a full view of your ideal audience and what they’re doing.

By collecting and storing data from first-, second-, and third-party data sources, DMPs allow brands to deliver the right message at the right time to the right audience.

What’s Next?

With all of that data flowed into the DMP and connections made to enable a single view of a brand’s customer, what happens next? Unlocking audiences and advertising to them directly through media spend optimization through suppression and onsite personalization.

Media Spend Optimization Through Suppression

You’ve seen it before. The display ad you can’t seem to get away from, no matter what webpage you’re on. These brands are guilty of not optimizing their media spend.

With a DMP, brands can drive acquisition through display ads by suppressing the audience who have already seen an ad or are existing customers. The quickest path to ROI from a DMP is to put recency (pace at which the user is shown the creative) and frequency (the number of times creative can be shown to a given user) caps in place.

For example, a retail brand launches a display ad campaign to promote their upcoming fall line. They could then create an audience of people who have already seen their ads and instruct their DSP (the software used to execute programmatic ad buys) to not show additional ads to this audience group. Additionally, this retail brand could create an audience of existing customers to ensure that their ad spend on their new line is not wasted on customers who have already purchased.

Combining these techniques creates a better user experience for their audience and, more importantly, optimizes their ad spend.

Onsite Personalization

Consumer expectations for more personalized experiences are at an all-time high. As these expectations have grown, brands have struggled to keep up and make sure they are providing relevant and personalized content on their websites.

By leveraging a DMP, brands can create an audience based on multiple data sets from past website browsing behavior to CRM data—all enriched with third-party data—to create a truly detailed audience profile which can be leveraged to improve their user experience.

So, what does this look like in practice? For our retail brand with a new fall line, their data consolidation efforts have created an audience that is female, college educated, and early 30s. It also shows that, of this audience, current customers are purchasing in high numbers from their Texas location and frequently buy gift cards.

Armed with this information, the retailer could serve up a personalized website creative for this specific audience that highlights exclusive deals at the Texas location that also includes a promotion for gift cards that drives engagement, loyalty, and (most importantly) sales.

There are a myriad of ways to use a DMP and even more benefits for brands. Stay tuned for our upcoming post that further explores the many ways DMPs can bring more value to data.

By: David Koroghlian, Directory of Strategy & Business Architecture

Redwood City, CA – June 5th, 2018 – Pierry Inc., A Wunderman Company and Salesforce partner, announces the launch of its exclusive data solution, Omni-Cloud 4.0 – a Salesforce Fullforce Solution that drastically improves the way retailers connect with their customers.

The brand-new solution leverages third party data from disparate systems into a central repository, making it compatible with many Salesforce products, including Marketing Cloud, Commerce Cloud and Service Cloud. With this cross-cloud compatibility, retailers will have a holistic view of their customer, allowing them to deliver precise, customized campaigns.

“With Omni-Cloud 4.0, we see unlimited potential for the retail market to deliver targeted, personalized marketing, and deliver the ability to connect with their consumer base like never before,” said Josh Pierry, CEO of Pierry Inc., A Wunderman Company

The Omni-Cloud 4.0 leverages the Salesforce Platform, bringing together data from various sources to drive awareness, engagement, and customer loyalty. This solution enables Salesforce customers to become more efficient and effective in their marketing efforts while engaging consumers on a whole new, one-to-one level.

“We are thrilled that Pierry Inc. has been recognized as a Salesforce Fullforce Solution partner and is helping companies in the retail and marketing industry connect with their customers in entirely new ways,” said Don Lynch, SVP, worldwide alliances, Salesforce. “We work closely with Salesforce Fullforce Solution partners to help ensure our customers can benefit from Pierry Inc.’s proven industry expertise with the Salesforce Intelligent Customer Success Platform.”

The solution is currently available on the AppExchange. For more information go to www.pierryinc.com/omni-cloud4-0 or reach out to salesforce@pierryinc.com

Salesforce Fullforce Solutions

Salesforce Fullforce Solutions are partner offerings recognized for their specialization in priority Salesforce industries and other key solution areas. Fullforce Solution partners have demonstrated proven expertise and customer success, and receive Salesforce go-to-market support, executive sponsorship and guidance as part of the Salesforce Partner Program. Learn more about Salesforce Fullforce Solutions.

Salesforce, Fullforce and others are trademarks of salesforce.com, inc.

About Pierry Inc., A Wunderman Company

Pierry, Inc was founded in 2008 with one goal in mind – help its clients make the most of their digital presence. Today, this remains our goal, but we have since grown from a small staff servicing local businesses into a full service digital marketing agency, providing world-class service to some of the most recognizable brands in the world. Our services include: creative, strategy, campaign management and implementation of cloud-base technology. We are a proud Salesforce Partner.

In 2017, we became a part of WPP and the Wunderman Group of companies.

It really is true, you don’t often get a second chance to make a first impression.  While this saying is typically the domain of person to person meetings, it also holds true for brands and their initial interactions with consumers.

Regardless of industry or size, most companies will at some point send a welcome email to a new customer or subscriber.  No matter what type of interaction triggered the welcome email, what happens next is a critical step. At the most basic level an email welcome series is meant to introduce, inform and set a foundation for a long standing, positive relationship.  In fact, according to a recent Returnpath survey – welcome series recipients read 69% of subsequent brand messages, compared to just 18% of subscribers who did not receive a welcome series. That is quite a big difference in engagement between the two groups.  While there is little debate that an email welcome series is a must have, there are three key elements that the series should incorporate in order to provide the recipient with a positive first brand interaction.

1. Impeccable timing is an admired and often success indicating trait.  With an email welcome series, this philosophy also holds true – whether it’s ensuring that the initial communication is sent soon after the trigger event or ensuring completion of the welcome series in a timely fashion.  The entry points to a welcome series can be many and varied, however what is constant is the need to trigger the welcome series while the action is still fresh. In addition to the initial welcome email, timing also comes into play throughout the welcome series.  Even send spacing, so as not to fatigue the reader, balanced with the need to stay top of mind should be considered for the email flow. We’ve all experienced a series of emails from a brand that like dating, were too much too soon or so spaced out that all momentum and possibly interest were lost.  The final timing consideration is to ensure once the welcome series is complete, a seamless transition for the customer to another form of regular communication takes place.

2. Content, content, content – Within the welcome series, content should focus on a few key elements – 1) value reinforcement content that demonstrates the consumer made a good decision to transact or sign up. From the first email and throughout the welcome series, brands should aim to provide content that proves your emails and relationship are worth continuing – lest find your emails in the spam or unsubscribe category, 2) a gentle reminder of how they engaged with your brand resulting in this email arriving in their inbox. As consumers receive more and more email, it is important to provide them with details on how your relationship came to be, and 3) focused content – where possible strive for a singular focus for each email in the series with one or two clear calls to action. This content should not overwhelm with too much information at one time. And finally – personalize where possible. Even a personalized subject line can result in higher unique open rates.

3. Set Expectations – A welcome series is the perfect opportunity to set the tone of the future relationship and educate on key steps or information needed. Often times this can take the form of an interactive tutorial that explains what to expect moving forward or provides instructions on how to use a product or newly purchased service.

It is fair to say that an email welcome series is an integral part of any robust email strategy. Hopefully you are already leveraging a welcome series as part of your email program. However, if that is not the case, hopefully some of the elements discussed here can provide a good foundation and framework to start. After all, it’s never too late to make a first impression.

About the Author
David Koroghlian is the Director of Strategy and Business Architecture at Pierry Inc., a Wunderman Company and Salesforce Gold Partner, where he leads the organization’s strategy practice. In this role, David advises clients on their digital marketing strategy across a wide array of digital marketing channels. Prior to Pierry, David spent five years as a digital marketing consultant at Adobe where he helped clients develop, plan and execute their digital initiatives. In addition to his time spent as a marketing technology and strategy consultant, David previously was a brand side marketer where he oversaw digital, mobile and social efforts for a number of companies.

Redwood City, September 20, 2017—Pierry Inc. is pleased to announce today that Wunderman, a WPP company and globally leading, digital agency, has taken a majority stake in our company.

“Pierry is one of the very best companies at helping clients use Salesforce Marketing Cloud to manage their customer relationships,” said Mark Read, Global CEO of Wunderman. “I’m delighted that Josh Pierry and his team will be joining Wunderman, deepening our technology consulting expertise and giving our clients access to a world-class team for working with Salesforce, one of the world’s fastest growing software companies.”

Mark Read, Global CEO of Wunderman. Photo courtesy of AdWeek.

Pierry—which began as a team of two back in 2008—has rapidly grown to employee nearly one hundred strategy, creative, technology and digital specialists, with offices in Redwood City, CA, Boulder, CO, New York City, NY, Ruston, LA and Kyoto, Japan. Through our proprietary MaaS™(Marketing as a Service) approach—a unique blend of technological expertise partnered with creative excellence—our mission has always been to aid companies in optimizing their digital marketing initiatives, improve efficiency, impact and increase ROI. Pierry’s revenues were $14.5 million USD for the 2016 year-end.

“It’s not every day [that] you get the chance to become a part of one of the largest and most respected digital agencies in the world. Having Wunderman as our partner allows us to continue to scale rapidly and increase our service capabilities for our clients,” said our Founder and CEO, Josh Pierry. Today, Pierry serves a vast range of clients across a variety of sectors including, LifeLock, Louisiana Tech University, Major League Soccer team San Jose Earthquakes and Yeti Coolers.

Pierry Founder and CEO, Josh Pierry.  Photo courtesy of Media Bizj.

The investment is a part of WPP’s operational streamline—progressing its strategy to focus on three key verticals that differentiate the Group’s client services: technology, data and digital content. As a Platinum Salesforce Marketing Partner, Pierry will join the ranks among WPP’s other investments in innovative technology service companies, including AppNexus, mySupermarket and Within Unlimited (VR/AR). WPP’s digital asset portfolio includes companies like Cognified, Deeplocal (an innovation studio and spin-off from Carnegie Mellon University, Marketplace Ignition (Amazon-focused e-commerce), Medialets, Salmon and The Cocktail (a digital consultancy).

The Group has also invested in several digital content companies, including Russell Simmons’ All Def Digital, Gimlet, Imagina (a content rights and media company based in Spain), Mic, Refinery29 and VICE. Their roster of wholly-owned digital agencies also includes Essence, AKQA, F.biz, POSSIBLE, VML, Mirum and Wunderman.

WPP’s digital revenues came in at over $7.5 billion USD in 2016—representing 39% of the Group’s total revenues of $19.4 billion. The Group has set a projected target of 40-45% of revenue to be derived from digital in the next four to five years (digital represented 41% of WPP’s revenues as of June 30, 2017). WPP companies collectively employee 29,000 people and generate revenues of $7.5 billion in North America.

“Joining forces with Wunderman is a tremendous opportunity,” said Josh Pierry, and we look forward to the contingency it brings to continue to advance, grow and deliver our clients the best service in the industry.

Ah, the 4^th of July, Independence Day, the federal holiday we observe as a nation—commemorating the thirteen American colonies asserting their independence from Great Mother Britain—to stand as the unified and independent nation we know today as the great country on earth.

What better way to pay patronage to such an important occasion than reminding consumers what this independence yields them? The freedom to buy whatever they want, of course!

As marketers, and those providing these services to companies, it is our job to grab consumer or client attention, convince them in the span of a few seconds, or minute, that they need our product or service and—if we do it right— even make them smile or laugh.

These are 6 companies that used the 4^th of July holiday as an opportunity to do just that. Here’s what they did right and what we can learn from them:

Let FREE-dom Ring

What are you offering your consumers? A coupon or discount code? Information about a sale? A holiday greeting? A study done by Experian in 2013 observed 174 brands—that sent email campaigns within two weeks of the 4^th of July—noted that those mailings offering incentives to readers during the holiday—such as free shipping, a coupon or simply giving notification of a sale—saw open rates increase as much as 25%, transaction rates increase threefold and transaction-to-click rates increase as much as 51%.

What can we learn: If you are incentivizing your customer, draw attention to that initially by putting that in the subject line of the email.

Nail the Tagline, Subject Line or Caption

It’s a safe assumption that the majority of consumers will be receiving some sort of 4^th of July related email or advertisement—so do both parties a solid and write something memorable. Be clever, be concise and be associative.

What comes to your mind when you think of Independence Day? Fireworks? Red, white and blue? Grilling with friends and family? Include words that relate to the holiday and integrate them into the beginning of email subject lines, ad taglines or in the first sentence of a social media post.

California Avocados

What they did right: Grilling is a huge part of Independence Day festivities, California Avocados used this as an opportunity to integrate their product into an image that is quickly associated with celebrating American summers and holidays. They also had a clever play on the traditional “red, white and blue” slogan by integrating the color of their product in the tagline. Catchy and memorable.

Rover

What they did right: This dog sitting service company kept their message simple, clean and concise. With the hot dog image, Rover cleverly alluded to what their services cater to in a manner that was insightful—many dogs are afraid of fireworks during the holiday or need to be watched when families travel for long weekends—while also playing a double role as a visual commonly associated with the holiday. Rover wrapped it up with a clear CTA encourages customers to reserve their services during for the hoilday.

Lulu’s

What they did right: Lulu’s tagline integrates associative holiday words, “exercising your right,” into playful copy. Clear CTAs (Call to Actions) that tie in the holiday and highlight the seasonal relevancy of the product. Lulu’s also provided examples of their products to use for related and subset events— “Pool Party”, “Backyard BBQ”, enabling customers to visualize how they can use and wear the product in a variety of settings.

Credit.com

What they did right: Again, we see a play on “slogans” from the holiday— a smart tagline/title that integrates associative words with the holiday in a manner that also highlights the services Credit.com offers in an easily-understood, intelligent and humorous manner.

Jack Daniel’s

What they did right: Appealing to those with proud patronage, Jack Daniel’s alludes to its product actually being produced in the U.S.—something that has become increasingly rare with outsourcing and is thus an added-value aspect for customers. The ad also incorporates the standard color palette associated with the holiday and iconography with the eagle that is both on brand and holiday relevant from a design standpoint.

Lowe’s

Happy 4th of July! #Vine #loop https://t.co/1UllbqpjVk

— Lowe’s (@Lowes) July 3, 2013

What they did right: Lowe’s integrated its products in a subliminal sell format—reminding customers of their products without a hard sell. A fun and visually pleasing way to engage viewers and wish customers a happy holiday.

How are you celebrating and reaching out to your customers for Independence Day? Comment below and let us know!

Right now, before even getting into the true meat of this article— the cream de la crème— your eyes have already darted thousands of times towards the images, unconsciously running a full once-over. Why? Because the brain processes visuals faster than any other type of content—identifying images in just 13 milliseconds. In fact, 90% of the information sent to the brain, is visual; and by 2018, it is predicted that as much as 84% of marketing communication will be visual—talk about needing to nail the first impression! Perhaps, we need to reevaluate the old strategy, “content is king” and swap it to “visuals are king.”

What does this mean for your business and marketing strategy? Picture it. As the saying goes, a photo is worth a thousand words, so save yourself some verbiage and add a little visual—in your emails, on your website, even on your social media handles. Here’s why:

First Impressions are Everything.

A study done by the Stanford Persuasive Technology lab noted that 46.1% of visitors discerned a company’s credibility straight from its website design. If you’re not greeting potential clients dressed up with visuals and looking the part, you could be potentially losing half of your business and never get the chance to wine and dine them—if you know what we mean.

We are a Generation of A.D.D.-ers.

A recent study showed that human attention span has dropped down to a mere eight seconds… (yes, likely less than the time it took you to read this), that’s shorter than that of a goldfish. If that’s not bad enough, our brains are (over) stimulated— receiving five times as much information on a daily basis than we did 30 years ago. What does this mean for marketing and communication? We need to capture audience attention and do it fast. Content with visuals gets 94% more views than that without, so do yourself—and your audience— a favor and break up that encyclopedic-like block of text with some eye candy.

Increased Engagement.

Social media is another outlet that has completely changed the way that companies interact in a direct-to-consumer capacity—so don’t miss the opportunity to increase engagement by integrating visuals for the eyes to easily digest. Tweets get retweeted 150% more with photos than without and a recent study by Adobe discovered that Facebook posts with images see a whopping 650% higher interaction than those without.

Try a (Visual) Call to Action.  

Try serving up some imagery dishes to give your audience a brain boost. People are able to follow illustrated directions 323% better than direction without visuals. They also recall 80% of what they see and do, compared to a mere 20% of what they read. Trying to integrate a CTA (Call-to-Action) or inform your audience about a sale or important up-and-coming event? Mix in a photo or illustration the next time.

The Future is Visual.

As technology and social media have continued to evolve, video has emerged as a key player in the future of communications. In 2015, on a daily basis, users were averaging almost 11% more time spent with digital video than on social networks. Video will likely play the most prominent and substantial role in direct-to-consumer visual communication. Today, four times as many consumers prefer watching a product video to reading about it; but perhaps, this should come as no surprise as we can gather the sense of a visual scene in less than 1/10 of a second. Lazy or time-saving? You decide.

Where can you include visuals in your communications with consumers?

• Email marketing/email campaigns
• Websites
• Company blog posts
• Social media
• Fliers and brochures

Some examples of visual content are:

• Images
• Videos
• GIFS, memes
• Infographics

Still not convinced? Here’s one last tidbit for you—if this article had not included any visuals, you’d be likely to remember only 10% of the information three days later. Not to worry, since we integrated some beautiful aides, you’re likely to retain at least 65% of this. Guess it goes to combat the old saying— sometimes looks are everything!

We know— you’re welcome. Now get to work!

Sources:

BRAIN RULE RUNDOWN Rule #10: Vision trumps all other senses. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.brainrules.net/vision

Cooper, B. B. (2013, November 13). How Twitter’s Expanded Images Increase Clicks, Retweets and Favorites [New Data]. Retrieved from https://blog.bufferapp.com/the-power-of-twitters-new-expanded-images-and-how-to-make-the-most-of-it

Effects of text illustrations: A review of research. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF02765184

M., O’Neill. (2015, May 7). The 2015 Video Marketing Cheat Sheet [Infographic]. Retrieved from https://animoto.com/blog/business/video-marketing-cheat-sheet-infographic/

N. (n.d.). 13 Reasons Why Your Brain Craves Infographics. Retrieved from http://neomam.com/interactive/13reasons/

Pinantoan, A. (2015, May 20). How To Massively Boost Your Blog Traffic With These 5 Awesome Image Stats. Retrieved from http://buzzsumo.com/blog/how-to-massively-boost-your-blog-traffic-with-these-5-awesome-image-stats/

Shrivastava, S. (n.d.). The Power Of Visual Content In Your Content Marketing Strategy. Retrieved from https://blog.rankwatch.com/the-power-of-visual-content-in-your-content-marketing-strategy/

Watson, L. (2015, May 15). Humans have shorter attention span than goldfish, thanks to smartphones. Retrieved from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/03/12/humans-have-shorter-attention-span-than-goldfish-thanks-to-smart/

Trafton, A. (2014, January 16). In the blink of an eye. Retrieved from http://news.mit.edu/2014/in-the-blink-of-an-eye-0116

Award Honors Lee’s Vision & Leadership at the Organization’s Annual Conference in San Diego

We are pleased to announce today that Ben Lee, our Chief Marketing Officer, has received the “Outstanding Marketer” award from the Academy of Marketing Science (AMS).

The award was presented last Friday, May 26^th by the non-profit organization which is dedicated to promoting excellence in marketing practices and knowledge.

“Ben and Pierry Inc. epitomize the spirit of the award in advancing the role of marketing through innovative and ethical practice,” said Adilson Borges, AMS President. “In particular, Ben’s belief that marketing must be leading strategic efforts of companies today because it is marketing’s responsibility to build and maintain an intimate relationship with customers. In this way, we can create truly valuable experiences for customers.”

More than 400 marketing professionals gathered at the Academy’s annual conference in San Diego, where Lee was recognized for shepherding Pierry’s rapid growth and innovative client solutions.

“I am extremely honored to be here this evening to accept this award on behalf of my Pierry colleagues – and our clients – who are embracing the opportunity of digital marketing in some really unique ways,” Lee noted at the conference’s closing ceremony. “Digital marketing presents a huge opportunity for companies to create deeper relationships with their customers, but the ability to fully understand and leverage it requires a whole new set of skills that many companies simply don’t have, nor can they afford to bring in house. Pierry continues to add manpower and functional expertise that enable us to partner with marquee brands across a variety of sectors, and deliver the best possible results for our clients.”

For over 40 years, AMS has annually recognized an individual who epitomizes the spirit and character of the Academy and its ideals. Previous winners have included CMOS, CEOs and entrepreneurs to the likes of Walt Disney, Jeff Campbell (Burger King), Robbie Brozin (Nando’s Peri Peri) and Mathew Berry (ESPN). (For a complete list please visit: https://ams.site-ym.com/page/OutstandingMarketer).

About Pierry

• Named the 538^th fastest growing company in the country by Inc. Magazine in their 2016 “Inc. 5000” list
• #6 Fastest Growing Company in the San Francisco Bay Area by the San Francisco Business Times
• Pierry – which began as a team of 2 people in the emerging digital marketing space in 2008 – now has employees in offices throughout the United States and in Japan, and serves a wide range of clients, from start-ups to multi-billion dollar global brands.
• Pierry coined the term MaaS (Marketing as a Service) to describe the unique way it helps its clients design, develop and execute marketing solutions that dramatically improve efficiency and impact, and increase ROI.
• Founded in 2008 by Josh Pierry, the company has grown into a global preferred digital marketing partner for companies in all sectors, with offices in Redwood City, CA, Boulder, CO, Ruston, LA, Albany, NY and Kyoto, Japan.

We’ve all been there. You meet someone and feel that special twinge in your heart–the “spark” some call it. You realize this person is interested in you as well. Did they feel that same feeling? There’s only one way to find out: communicate with them. Find out if they’re what you’re looking for and if you’re what they’re looking for.

Just like dating, lead nurturing is a delicate dance between two people who share some initial common ideal. Perhaps you meet at your favorite coffee shop when you order the same obscure fresh ground cold brew. Or they ventured to your Contact Us page through a well-targeted Google Ad. Either way, the only way to find out if this is going somewhere is to give them more information about you and hope it’s enough to get them to stick around.

Dating and lead nurturing follow many of the same rules and cadence. Here are some general guidelines for cultivating a great (lead) relationship.

Don’t put everything on the table all at once. Most likely your lead came to you because they have an interest that aligns with your products or services. Great! You have something in common. This would be like someone saying “I like cats”. The appropriate response would be “I also like cats”, not showing them your entire phone’s worth of the 20 cats you have living in your home.

The same should be said for a brand new lead. If they find value in something you offer, affirm that as part of your core beliefs, but don’t overwhelm them with every little detail about your product. For example, if they found your brand after clicking on an ad that focused on the eco-friendly nature of your goods, reply with information that goes deeper into that aspect–don’t just send them your entire catalogue and hope they’ll call back.

Ghosting is just as bad as hounding. Building a good relationship means maintaining regular communication. You want them to know they’re on your mind and you’re thinking of them. Yet, you don’t want them to think you’re stalking them, nor do you want them wondering if you remember their name. Regular, valuable communication with your leads is just as important. Find the right balance for your audience and make sure every touch point is not only valuable, but works to move them through the sales cycle.

Know when to introduce your friends and family. After you’ve invested enough initial time to see if this is going somewhere, it’s time to bring them further into your world. You would probably introduce them to your friends first, to gauge the response, and then move on to your family. But you wouldn’t throw them into a room with both at once. The same rule applies to how you introduce your product or service. Start slow with your introduction. Find the friends (products/services) that are most welcoming and relatable to your new beau. Once you know it’s a sure thing, bring in Aunt Betty (less compatible product/service), who might not be the most relatable, but something that’s still important enough for them to know.

Sometimes, it doesn’t work out. Sometimes, the spark fizzles. You realize that the one thing you both had in common was the only thing you had in common (i.e. Deep Blue Something’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s). The best thing you can do in this type of relationship is to end it quickly and civilly. There’s nothing wrong with walking away when you realize it’s just not going to work. If the customer you’re speaking to would not be the right fit for your product/service, that’s ok. Make sure they appreciate the time you spent together, and make sure they also understand why you’re breaking things off.

No one likes to get dumped, either. You may not be the one to realize the relationship isn’t working. It is going to sting when you find out the feelings aren’t mutual, but the best option for everyone involved is to walk away with your head held high. Trying to force a bond that doesn’t exist will only make you come off as desperate or clueless as to what your customer really values as a person. Be able to recognize when a lead is dead. Otherwise you’ll just end up looking like a spammer.

But sometimes, it’s love at first sight. Everyone has a friend of a friend who has that fairytale love story. They locked eyes with that person and just knew they were destined to be with each other. They had an instant connection that brought two halves of a whole together. Even in lead nurturing, this happens. When it does, don’t over-think it. Accept your excited new customer with your warmest embrace. In other words, think about how you can create a loyal customer and brand advocate–not just make another sale. When a consumer has an instant connection with a brand, more likely than not they’ll share that connection with others. And we all know that word-of-mouth endorsements carry more weight than any other marketing initiatives.

Remember, despite what eHarmony and Match.com will tell you, dating is not an exact science. The same holds true for lead nurturing–it’s more of a dance in which you try to anticipate your partner’s moves and follow their rhythm without stepping on their feet. When you’re both in sync, it’s a delightful and harmonious salsa. If you’re trying to force something that isn’t working, it’s a clumsy, off-beat electric slide that results in a few bruised toes and frustration from everyone involved.