The sponsors and DOER asked PixelMEDIA to consolidate the 6 separate websites into one site and to create a single branded user experience: Mass Save.

Success Factors

Mass Save’s strategic objective was straightforward: to encourage residents and businesses to be energy efficient through increased awareness and through direct energy-saving incentives offered by the Mass Save sponsors. PixelMEDIA identified three key project initiatives to achieve this goal:

Define audience segments and needs-based categories

Working with a team that included each sponsoring company, PixelMEDIA helps to define the target audiences and segment them into Residential, Business, and Professional (contractors, architects, etc.) categories.

With the categories in place, the team defined the needs and goals of each segment, as well as the business rules that would determine eligibility, availability, and call to action for each.  At the same time, PixelMEDIA looked at the six original websites to determine each one’s value proposition; the unique content; and the engagement model and call to action.

The resulting organization model was based on a progressive sequence that matched incentives with the needs of users at several levels: Lighting and Appliances, Heating and Cooling, and Building a House or Addition. Customers could take small, low-cost steps—such as installing compact fluorescent bulbs (CFLs) or replacing a refrigerator—or learn about “whole house” solutions that offered incentives on heat and hot water systems, air conditioning, or home insulation. In addition, customers could easily browse across categories to learn about other energy-saving opportunities and make plans for improvements throughout their homes and businesses.

Since the initial launch, two more categories have been added to accommodate the long-term goals of deeper energy savings and enhanced awareness about energy efficiency: Home Energy Assessments and the Learning Center.

Develop a tool to deliver localized incentives

Because incentives were specific to certain sponsors, PixelMEDIA needed to develop a mechanism that prevented customers from seeing incentives that were not offered in their service areas. A ZIP-code based incentive finder was designed to let customers identify their location, fuel type, and building type.

Once a customer entered a ZIP code, the incentive finder matched it against a database of the sponsors’ service areas. The fuel type and building type data refined the search to return gas or electric incentives and incentives designed for single or multi-family homes. In addition, the incentive finder filtered out out-of-state customers and customers of municipal power companies. The system was intelligent enough, however, to return results to municipal electric customers who heated their homes with gas.

Deploy an enterprise-level content management system

The consolidation of the 6 websites provided an opportunity to reduce production and administrative costs. PixelMEDIA implemented an enterprise-grade content management system (CMS) for Mass Save that streamlines the process of creating, approving, and publishing new content to the website by multiple sponsors and vendors. PixelMEDIA also provides support services for major revisions and user training. In addition to reducing production cost and complexity, the CMS enables a structured approach based on the branded look and feel of the website.

Results

The consolidation of six websites into one resulted in a unified, branded user experience and a single destination to support a range of statewide and regional energy efficiency campaigns. The masssave.com URL provides a simple, easy-to-remember call to action in television, radio, outdoor, and print advertising and provides a recognizable, trusted presence at events across the state.

In the time since the 2010 launch, the website has seen an increase of more than 500% in visitors, and more than 5 million page views—an increase of 570%.

In May, 2011, PixelMEDIA implemented a customized analytics framework that will coordinate site activity—including conversions and downloads—with the growing spectrum of marketing efforts. The tracking tools have enabled the Mass Save team to accurately track the steady increase in active participation on the site.

In the fall of 2011, the residential section was redesigned to add the Home Energy Assessments and Learning Center categories and relaunched in conjunction with a range of marketing efforts.

In October, 2011, Massachusetts was ranked as the country’s leading state in terms of energy efficiency investment and initiatives by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE). The State Energy Efficiency Scorecard ranks the states based on best practices and leadership in energy efficiency policy and program implementation. Prior to the launch of the Mass Save program, marketing campaigns, and website, Massachusetts had been ranked third.

The new Mass Save brand continues to grow as a focal point for sponsors, state agencies, contractors, and energy customers, with an increasing emphasis on no-cost home energy assessments, financing, and contractor participation.

Success Factors

Banner advertising on websites that included AARP and WBUR (Boston) would drive traffic to landing pages that featured a series of video interviews with people who had been affected by cancer. The landing pages were designed according to best practices for generating interest and conversions:

A/B testing of banner ads

The Jackson Laboratory wanted to gather data for future campaigns, so PixelMEDIA suggested a round of A/B testing of the banner ads. A/B testing means creating different versions of an ad or landing page and running both during the same time period. For example, out of 20 users, 10 would see ad A and 10 would see ad B. The click-through rate would be tracked to see which ad generated more interest,

Continuity of relevant terms and images

An important goal of the testing was to determine which combination of words and pictures best established and maintained the continuity—or “scent of information”—between the banner ad and the landing page. Maintaining this continuity is critical to helping readers remain focused and confident that they are moving along the right path toward their goals.

A prominent primary call to action

Each landing page included a large call-to-action that included a brief description of the offer, which included an online subscription to The Jackson Laboratory’s magazine, The Search. The strategy was to focus on a single call-to-action (subscribe to the newsletter) but offer several options for doing so: directly from the landing page, from a subscription page, or from the GYH website. The options allowed people gather more information if they wanted to before subscribing.

Solution

One set of banner ads featured pictures of the people behind the personal stories. The other was a set of bold graphic treatments of the headline, without people. The ads would be competing with other ads on the busy websites, so quick message comprehension was important. The Jackson Laboratory team wanted to learn which direction would be more effective for future campaigns, so multiple design and copy treatments were rotated in ad placements and results tracked.

Results

Despite the presence of competing photographic imagery on the target websites, the ads with images of people attracted significantly more click-throughs and generated higher conversion rates. The people ads and the graphic ads used the same copy, but the association between headline and person proved to be the stronger approach. For subsequent phases of the campaign, the graphic-only ads were suspended in favor of the people-based ads.

Success Factors

Early in the project, it became clear that busy, high-profile target audiences would need to grasp the substance and benefits of PKC’s product offering quickly before making the commitment to learn more about PKC. To differentiate the company from competitors that offered less reliable content, PKC wanted to convey the image of a company staffed by experts and driven by domain expertise. PKC and PixelMEDIA determined that a multi-part visual approach would provide a more engaging experience for time-strapped audiences and offer immediate differentiation from the competition.

Product Iconography

The first task was to create a set of icons representing the three core components of the PKC solution: Profiler, Advisor, and Explorer. Each product offered a progressively more detailed presentation of medical data, so the PixelMEDIA design team developed a set of icons related by color and shape. These icons would be used as signposts on the web pages, and as the primary actors in a set of animations that described the business value of the PKC products.

Business Value Animations

As the icons were developed, PixelMEDIA content strategists and designers developed the scripts, storyboards, and final files for a series of animations that would illustrate key product concepts on the home page and high-level product pages. For the home page, the focus was on the basic value proposition. On the product pages, a more detailed visual explanation provided an overview of the component and its place in the solution set.

Location Photography

To link the technology to the expertise behind it, PixelMEDIA recommended a design approach that layered the animations over scenes from the PKC offices. Working with PKC’s own photographer, PixelMEDIA provided written and visual direction for the photography, which features employees from every level of the company on nearly every web page.

Solution

In addition to creating and directing the icons and animations, PixelMEDIA drafted a new message architecture and website copy; developed a new site architecture and page wireframes; coded the website and animations; and managed the project from start to finish. The ability to complete all phases of design and production in one location helped to meet an aggressive timeframe, and simplified the challenge of working remotely with a client in Vermont. In fact, the entire project and all reviews and meetings were conducted by phone or web.

Results

PCK can now go to market with its new product set, confident that the website will support its long-term marketing effort. Its sales team can now use the website as a virtual presentation, walking clients through the product set and using the graphics in their own materials and presentations. The website also serves as an internal communications and recruiting tool: its visual explanations and concise messaging helped the company communicate its new direction to current and future employees.

Success Factors

Empirix had a solid internal working group in place to drive the messaging and content of the new website, including the re-alignment of its extensive product offerings with its new solutions framework. In addition, Empirix was developing a new logo and brand identity elements that would be incorporated into the new website. PixelMEDIA identified 3 key elements needed for a successful outcome:

Message Architecture

PixelMEDIA experience designers worked with the Empirix team to focus the company’s value proposition and to articulate a set of proof points for audience segments that needed to design, test, and deploy large call centers and customer service operations. The message architecture stressed a broader solution-based approach built on a proven portfolio of products, and was used by the Empirix team as a guideline for copywriting for both online and traditional media.

Information Architecture

The experience designers at PixelMEDIA created a full inventory of the Empirix website and worked with Empirix to determine which content best supported the new positioning and where content would need to be edited or created. Using the inventory, PixelMEDIA created a new site architecture that put solutions at the forefront while providing a clear and logical organization of the Empirix product portfolio.

Content Design

The goal of the architecture was to present products in the context of a customer challenge and Empirix solution, and to help customers focus on the content that was relevant to their situations. A set of detailed wireframes was created for each level of the website to visualize how the content would be organized and presented on screen. PixelMEDIA also produced a set of Microsoft® Word® content templates and a style guide to help the Empirix team draft and edit page copy within recommended word and character counts.

Solution

Using the wireframes and the new Empirix design elements, PixelMEDIA designers created the Adobe® Photoshop® layouts that would be used to build the final HTML templates. A clean, 3-column grid provided put the new content front and center, while providing clear navigation and focus areas for related topics and calls-to-action. With the final designs and approved content from Empirix, PixelMEDIA’s development team coded and QA’d the new website and spent a full day with the Empirix developers to ensure they had the information needed for a successful launch.

Results

The new Empirix website went live in November, 2011. The redesigned website gives Empirix a powerful new focal point for its outbound marketing programs and news releases. In addition, the website now supports a sales process that is centered around solutions, and helps Empirix to deliver a higher-level value proposition to higher-value customers at the enterprise and solution-provider levels.

Success Factors

The sponsors and DOER asked PixelMEDIA to consolidate the 6 separate websites into single Mass Save website and to create a unique brand identity. The new brand would serve as a recognizable focal point for a wide range of online and traditional marketing activities, and having a single brand would reduce the cost and complexity of maintaining multiple marks and identity systems. PixelMEDIA identified 3 key elements needed for a successful outcome:

Stakeholder Input

PixelMEDIA conducted a one-day workshop with the sponsors to map Mass Save brand attributes against the emotional and rational drivers for the three main audience segments: residential customers, businesses, and industry professionals.

Message Architecture

Using the resulting brand attributes map, PixelMEDIA worked with the sponsors to developed a value proposition and a set of key messaged based on “Savings through energy efficiency,” “Ease of access,” “Trust and expertise,” and “Investing in the future.” The resulting message architecture continues to serve as the framework for writing the Mass Save website.

Mood Boards

The PixelMEDIA Creative Services team presented a set of “mood boards” to sponsors and stakeholders. A mood board is a set of colors, images, typefaces, and other design elements grouped to convey a feeling or mood—futuristic, earthy, businesslike, etc.—and to elicit a “gut” reaction. The Mass Save “neighborhood” that appears at the top of each page reflects the positive reactions to a warm, “traditional” approach that would speak to a diverse audience that included residential customers, businesses, and trade professionals.

Solution

Based on the approved mood boards and message architecture, PixelMEDIA produced a complete visual identity for Mass Save: logo, typography, colors, and supporting imagery. The approved logo continues the “building” theme with houses and multi-story buildings against a sunburst. The logo and brand elements provided the foundation for the design of the website and were distributed to the agencies that were creating campaigns and content for Mass Save. PixelMEDIA also produced a design and editorial style guide to ensure that the brand elements are properly applied in order to remain legally protected.

The resulting visual design and editorial tone reflect the spirit and mission of Mass Save as well as the needs of its audiences: easy access to incentives and information; clean, simple controls; and a commitment to helping customers understand the many energy-saving opportunities available through Mass Save.

Results

The consolidation of six websites into one resulted in a unified, branded user experience and a single destination to support a range of statewide and regional energy-efficiency campaigns. The Mass Save brand offers a simple, easy-to-remember identity in television, radio, outdoor, and print advertising and provides a recognizable, trusted presence at events across the state.

The new Mass Save brand continues to grow as a focal point for sponsors, state agencies, contractors, and energy customers, with an increasing emphasis on no-cost home energy assessments, financing, and contractor participation.

GOAL

Bus-Tech provides virtual tape backup systems to IT managers looking to control costs and improve performance over physical tape backup systems. To nurture existing leads, Bus-Tech was running an email campaign that invited visitors to download a series of whitepapers. The leads had already converted (filled out a form) on the site previously; the email campaign was intended to engage these visitors further, and give them more reason to view Bus-Tech as a potential vendor.

Great idea – but the delivery schedule was inconsistent, and the whitepaper deliverables were too old to be compelling. Creating new content on a monthly basis quickly became an onerous task – let alone keeping the themes fresh, on-topic , and attention-grabbing.

SOLUTION

PixelMEDIA suggested that they could help by creating and fulfilling a six-month email/ whitepaper calendar.

In addition to reducing last-minute stress and less-than-optimal themes, this would allow Bus-Tech to develop a more strategic communications strategy. PixelMEDIA’s conceived of a series of whitepapers that would address some of the hot topics of the virtual tape backup in mainframe environments industry. The client, relieved to have this burden removed from his to-do list, was pleased when he saw how many more conversions were captured.

“PixelMEDIA came up with a schedule that kept our name in front of prospects, whitepaper topics that they were really curious about, and the tracking and metrics to help us measure success.” Jim O’Connor, Bus-Tech director of product marketing

RESULTS

Comparing Conversion Performance

• BEFORE PixelMEDIA took over: 15 downloads, 481 visitors
• AFTER PixelMEDIA took over: 71 downloads, 787 visitors

As a result of the PixelMEDIA lead nurturing program, Bus-Tech experienced:

• 373.3% increase in downloads
• 63.62% increase in site traffic
• More time to focus on other strategic tasks

Thanks to a consistent schedule of emails promoting a new lineup of whitepapers on topics of interest to IT managers, Bus-Tech experienced a 63.62% increase in site traffic directly attributable to the emails, and a 373.3% increase in downloaded whitepapers. That’s an important leap in brand reach. What’s more, by offloading this task to PixelMEDIA, Bus-Tech director of product marketing Jim O’Connor was able to focus less on getting leads, and more on turning those leads into sales. According to O’Connor, “PixelMEDIA came up with a schedule that kept our name in front of prospects, whitepaper topics that they really wanted to know about, and the tracking and metrics to help us measure success.”

WHAT YOU CAN DO

If you’re thinking of starting an email campaign to nurture leads, do yourself a favor and think it through beforehand. List your audience’s primary concerns, your competitive advantages, and strategic goals. Then, look for messaging opportunities: how can you present your strengths in ways that speak to audience’s needs? Create a content calendar looking forward 6 to12 months that presents valuable information in a series of whitepapers, webinars or events. Use email to promote the campaign. Then measure the results for continual improvement.

• Integrate easily with their global web presence
• Establish and maintain brand consistency
• Ensure each site’s compliance with corporate Web standards
• Eliminate publishing and timing barriers across global and localized sites
• Provide better accountability and auditing tools
• Improve the efficiency of deploying Web content

The Solution
PixelMEDIA designed, built, and developed a custom CMS to control updating and creating all pages across the 29 Logica country websites. This solution marks success with a number of features:

• An intuitive and easy-to-use system for local administrators to manage the pages and content on their respective site
• A Microsoft® Word-like content editing screen
• A preview page for the user to review changes before publishing
• Predefined workflow to review and approve changes before publishing
• Controls for IT administrators to manage local users’ access and editing privileges
• Flexibility to meet the needs of local administrators without compromising existing corporate standards

The Impact
Now editors update the country sites more frequently and IT administrators can enforce consistency worldwide. The country CMS has helped in several ways:

• Significantly reduced the cost of managing 29 sites
• Enforced the brand consistency,
• Facilitated site maintenance,
• Maintained consistent content presentation and navigation
• Controlled the design templates.

I truly appreciate everything PixelMEDIA has done in such a short time. You should be really proud of what has been accomplished. –  Chris Messina, Project Manager Internet / Intranet, Logica

For this initiative, PixelMEDIA provided:

• User interface design
• Web design and development
• Custom programming and development
• Dedicated hosting for 29 countries in 19 languages

The sticks stayed in the office through the fall, as the PixelMEDIA team worked to bring them online. Bauer Hockey hired PixelMEDIA to tackle the MY BAUER project, a rich Flash application where players can purchase and personalize Bauer’s top-of-the-line sticks. From choosing a pattern, grip, and color to printing a player’s name right on the stick, MY BAUER walks users through their choices and gives a three-dimensional preview of their purchase.

PixelMEDIA was tasked with updating the site’s look and overhauling the platform that supported it. For Bauer, administering the site would be easier than ever, from managing attributes to handing out discount codes. And the modular, flexible Flash client delivered faster performance and paved the way to new sticks.

For PixelMEDIA, working on MY BAUER meant creating a rich retail experience. The stick models had to look good and load quickly. Customers demanded a full-featured shopping experience, where they could tweak their stick for hours, store it in an online “stick rack” and then share it with a teammate, or say, a parent with a credit card. And the bilingual site made players feel at home whether they logged on from Madison, Wisconsin or Saint-Jérôme, Quebec.

Since MY BAUER launched, PixelMEDIA has had the pleasure of working closely with the Bauer team to maintain and enhance the site, and to launch new product lines – like the Vapor X:60 goalie stick, available as of December.

The upgrades in the technology of MY BAUER allows us to easily update the wide variety of choices we are able to provide the consumer as well as enhance the overall user experience. —Evan Baker, Product Line Manager, Sticks, Bauer Hockey.

The Impact

• Deliver a new look and rebrand for Bauer’s premium retail experience
• Design a bi-lingual site with fully configurable product options
• Support transactions in multiple currencies
• Move MY BAUER to a new e-commerce platform, for simpler maintenance and greater reliability
• Replace the existing stick configurator with a modular, easy-to-update Flash client

PixelMEDIA Solution
PixelMEDIA came to the project with years of experience supporting the MainStreet e-commerce platform. Pixel had already built customized administration interfaces for ViaLuxe’s in-house CRM system and business users – from sales representatives, or “concierges,” to administrators and third-party retailers – and the development team extended those interfaces to support ViaLuxe’s new business model.

On the front-end, the PixelMEDIA web development team applied the new design to an established cart and checkout process, quickly bringing the new venturere and its distinctive branding to the web.

Since it rang up its first sale in September, PixelMEDIA has had the pleasure of collaborating with ViaLuxe to roll out new features and reach new customers as the business expands.

Our customers expect a top-notch experience from us, with the best merchandise and the best service. We can count on PixelMEDIA to help us meet those expectations. – Bill Rowley, VP, Business Development, ViaLuxe Inc.

The Impact

• ViaLuxe added a new retail channel to its suite of properties
• With PixelMEDIA by their side, ViaLuxe can continue to enhance and expand the experience and respond to customer requests

For this initiative, PixelMEDIA provided the following Application Development services:

• Integration support between the Main Street commerce platform, the client’s existing catalog and CRM services and a custom-build cart and checkout process
• Web development support to turn the client’s designs into standards-compliant templates that help the brand shine on all browsers
• Ongoing support and rapid turnarounds for new features and design enhancements

Engaged in a pay-per-click (PPC) campaign, the company was not seeing sufficient results. The lack of optimized landing pages was hindering the performance of the campaign by costing QUMAS valuable conversions.

QUMAS wanted to increase the visitor conversion rate, so the company turned to PixelMEDIA to develop and create landing pages that would further this objective.

PixelMEDIA Solution
After speaking with QUMAS, PixelMEDIA understood the conversion goals of the campaign to be whitepaper and webinar downloads. The new landing pages would require visitors to fill out a form in order to download the specific resource. User information would be collected, but visitors would still be allowed to learn about QUMAS without having to contact the company directly.

PixelMEDIA’s next step was to create a landing page via wireframes. An Information Architect created a page that greatly improved the user experience. The title of the
whitepaper/webinar was moved below the header to stand out. The description and image were clearly defined on the page and easy to see. Additionally, six fields of the form were removed to encourage more visitors to fill it out. Finally, the conversion goal clearly stood out and told the user what to do. The result was a landing page design in which most of the page was above the fold, making it easy for the user to fill out the form in order to download the requested resource.

The PPC campaign ads were updated with the new conversion goals and destination URLs. The redesigned, user-focused landing pages were created for multiple whitepaper/webinar downloads, resulting in an increase of registrations over the next four months.

We are very pleased with the landing pages developed by PixelMEDIA. The increased traffic to our site and acquisition of new prospect information has strengthened our integrated marketing campaigns and we have seen a number of these prospects convert to active sales opportunities.   —Caoimhe Kiely, Global Head of Marketing, QUMAS

The Impact

• Over a period of four months,
• Form submissions increased 153%
• Conversion rate increased 44.8%
• Average time spent on site increased 74%

For this initiative, PixelMEDIA provided the following search marketing services:

• PPC campaign management
• Form creation
• Landing page optimization
• Content strategy