The world is full of unsung heroes, and here at monday.com, perhaps the bravest of all is our incredible marketing team. We’ve seen insane growth over the last few years, and while we can certainly thank our great product and great customers for that success, we couldn’t have done any of it without our marketing team.
When we tell other traders how we got to where we are, they are often surprised by certain aspects of our strategy. We thought it would be great to introduce you to the team and tell you more about how our strong marketing team is driving our growth.
Quick Stats:
Budget: $1.7 million per month
Channels: Adwords, Facebook, Instagram, Capterra, Outbrain, Bing AdWords
Team Leader:
Rotem Shay
Known For: His alter-ego and nickname “karnaf” (rhino)
Facebook and Instagram Team Leader: Seffy Kotz
Known For: His passionate obsession with music
SEM Campaign Manager: Jessica Tacher
Known For: His Venezuelan accent and excellent proofreading skills
SEM Campaign Manager: Michal Gonen
Known For: Being an avid rock climber
SEM Campaign Manager: Liron Katzav
Known for: Her excellent selection of shoes
Rotem: I started working at monday.com in January 2015 when we only had a few hundred paying businesses. From the beginning, we believe in performance marketing. Advertising has changed a lot since the days of traditional advertising like you saw on Mad Men; today with digital marketing you can target precisely, get fast results, analyze data and grow fast.
You measure every penny that goes in and out. We started our performance marketing campaigns on Facebook and Instagram and saw the first growth there. This is great because most software companies haven’t had much success with B2B marketing tools on Facebook or Instagram. We started with a budget of roughly $30,000 per month, and when we said we wanted to eventually reach close to $1 million per month, our account managers were skeptical.
That’s because they think we’re going to take a traditional B2B approach and try to target traditional decision makers like CEOs and senior executives. This is very difficult on Facebook and Instagram. But as we explained in the post 4 ways we managed without a sales team, we did something different and created a direct response advertising funnel. We appeal to people’s emotions and design our prices so that the purchase becomes a human decision.
This makes everyone who has a computer and works with a team our target. Some may say we hacked B2B to become B2C, but I say our marketing approach has always been H2H – human to human. We are people who use a great product to solve real problems that other people face every day. Facebook is a large network of people and it is a unique platform for us to reach a large audience.
Seffy:
Back in July 2016, we had a budget of $300K, and it has since more than doubled to $750K. On Facebook and Instagram, our success is due to hyper-targeting our audience. But most of this Facebook won’t tell us.
So we created “lookalike” groups on Facebook where we sent a pixel of a successful customer acquisition we did in the past and told Facebook, “We want more people like that.” Facebook then analyzed these profiles and targeted a group of potential customers with matching profiles. This was critical to our success.
But no matter how effective our goals are, it doesn’t matter if the flag is ineffective. Creating a good banner is very difficult: you need an image and text that is attractive and attractive, but at the same time clearly explains what our product is and what people can expect when they click on it.
Liron:
My background is in Adwords and I’ve always been used to the traditional use of the word “target” – for example, if someone searches for “project management software”, it’s reasonable to assume that they have a very high target to buy it. That’s why I was drawn to monday.com’s intent model.
Through machine learning and BigBrain data analysis, we get a quality score on every signup, regardless of where they come from, and predict with a high degree of accuracy whether they will become a paying customer.
Jessica:
The biggest challenge we face is continuing to meet all of our KPIs while increasing our marketing spend. To give you an idea of our scale, our Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) grew by 350% in 2016 and our customer base doubled every 5 months. Our goal is to end 2017 with an ARR of $20 million, and every dollar we make goes back into our marketing costs.
Even a small drop in conversion rate has a huge impact on every aspect of our business and affects key growth KPIs. That’s why we work hard to optimize campaigns and constantly test new banners and landing pages to make sure we stay on track. But it doesn’t stop there – we’re now working to create a consistent and cohesive experience for customers throughout the journey.
Michal:
In Adwords, we have begun targeting distinctive industries and verticals. When we first launched in early 2014, we expected to see the most success from other startups, and instead, we were surprised at how quickly we expanded into many different industries.
70% of our users come from non-tech companies: construction, marketing, beer, wedding planners, and owners of churches to name a few. We first tried vertical targeting on Facebook over a year ago but didn’t have much success. With Adwords, it’s much easier with keyword-related searches and we currently have better luck with teams focusing on inventory management, event management planning, CRM, and more.