Microsoft
Microsoft has been recognised as an ABA100® Winner for Marketing Excellence in The Australian Business Awards 2016. The Australian Business Award for Marketing Excellence recognises organisations that have achieved outstanding results through initiatives that demonstrate innovative marketing strategies and execution.
“We’re extremely proud to be recognised by the Australian Business Awards 2016 for our work in the Marketing Excellence category. Our customers have evolved. They are now empowered more than ever before with the ways they can engage with companies and buy products. As organisations and ultimately as the marketers inside organisations, we must understand and embrace this change. Microsoft Australia recognised that we needed to remain relevant to small and medium businesses. How we engage customers today is not how we engaged them yesterday and won’t be the best way to engage them tomorrow. Our ability to test, measure, learn and optimise marketing communications ensures we can learn and grow together with our customers.”
“We are very proud of achieving such strong results with the SMB Digital Marketing execution, however we know that digital transformation is a journey. We have big plans for this coming financial year to once again step up the level of service and engagement that we offer our customers.”
Established in 1985, Microsoft Australia is the Australian subsidiary of Microsoft Corp., a worldwide leader in software, services, devices and solutions that help people and businesses realise their full potential. Acknowledging that the way consumers interact with brands is changing, and realising that they could be more effective, Microsoft Australia undertook a comprehensive review of a legacy marketing program, focusing on small business. Following an audit into all marketing activities, Microsoft Australia identified a number of key improvements.
Where small business marketing had previously executed along corporate guidelines, the audit results prompted a shift in marketing to an inbound, content-led and customer centric approach. The central focus of the new strategy was to establish a digital marketing execution based on helping small businesses with pain points at the time they needed it. Actioning the strategy required educating internal stakeholders on small business pain points and convincing each product group to align behind a customer centric approach. Once this cohesive internal position was established, all interruptive marketing stopped, including call centres, database marketing and events. Instead, Microsoft established the small business website as the main channel for all communications with a year-round content plan to help solve customer problems.