Industry Focus

Composite Advantage (CA) is the leading manufacturer of large Fiber Reinforced Polymer (FRP) products for the civil and waterfront infrastructure markets. Its products include vehicle bridge decks, pedestrian bridge decks, cantilever sidewalks, heated deck panels,  fender protection systems and large separators for berthing Navy vessels at piers.  CA combines innovative design, efficient resin infusion technology and flexible production cells to develop breakthrough approaches to large FRP structures. Composite Advantage is a nationally recognized expert in the design and manufacturing of FRP products for the infrastructure market.

Business Challenge

CA wanted to maintain their competitive advantage by reaching and educating potential customers about FRP technology. Their existing website, built by local university students in a capstone project in 2007, lacked the ability to deliver content and drive conversions. CA needed a way to reach design engineers and decision makers in the larger infrastructure market with educational and proof-of-concept information.

They were also spending large amounts of time managing their marketing and sales efforts and fulfilling information requests by hand. Going mostly by what “felt right” and without metrics for their marketing, efforts were not generating enough well-qualified prospects. What’s more, traditional methods of lead generation, such as referrals from partners and existing clients, networking, conference attendance, and site visits, although an important and necessary strategy, were too time-intensive and not scalable to truly grow the business in the desired time frame.

How Acadia Helped Composite Advantage

In 2015, Acadia began working with CA to create a robust inbound marketing program, complete with automated information request fulfillment, comprehensive web activity metrics, and sales tracking through tools like Hubspot.

With Acadia’s help, CA has saved time on tedious manual marketing tasks and has more time for continuous nurturing of prospects and educational content creation ensuring that CA is top of mind when a need arises. They’ve even found that more of the inquiries received are about product fit for specific projects and pricing instead of questions about the strength and durability of FRP itself. This is in large part because of the educational content provided on the website and outreach through social media.

To expand and scale CA’s new marketing efforts and reach a larger audience, Acadia helped CA partner with Thomas in 2018 for large-scale marketing. Because they were familiar with Thomas as an industrial directory but not with its marketing services, CA took gradual steps to incorporate services like SEO, MQL generation, and asset design and development. Acadia continues to serve as the overall Hubspot program manager and campaign and content coordinator ensuring that CA’s message stays consistent, focused, and timely.

ROI of 53:1

Based on their work with Acadia and Thomas, CA has been able to realize a 53:1 return on investment for their inbound marketing dollars.

CA has already recommended Acadia to others for developing an inbound program and for serving as a knowledgeable and local point of contact with Thomas. It’s been helpful to move gradually, starting with automated information requests and other inbound work with Acadia, then expanding to complex strategies that included SEO, MQL generation and A/B growth driven design with Thomas. Acadia understands that refraining from diving into a large-scale marketing program early on was a smart choice economically. Taking the walk, then run approach proved to be the right strategy.

Although CA had been ahead of the market for several years, the competition was beginning to catch up with their marketing efforts. With help from the Acadia and Thomas for Industry teams, CA has again pulled away from the competition.

Why I Recommend Acadia

“Acadia and Thomas have allowed me to reach customers I didn’t realize were out there and who did not know CA had valuable solutions for them. I appreciate having a partner in Acadia who took me step by step into the inbound process and gave me more time for consistent nurturing of prospects. It’s clear from talking with potential clients that they’re more informed about CA’s technology and are ready to have a deeper conversation earlier in the sales cycle. That’s where inbound has been so helpful for us.”

                       

Scott Reeve

President, Composite Advantage