Driving software adoption through full funnel marketing strategy and execution
At Autodesk, as part of the Education team, I was tasked to drive global awareness and adoption of a priority software Fusion 360 among post-secondary faculty.
Responsibilities
Strategic Leadership: Led the end-to-end global demand generation strategy, aligning sales, campaigns, analytics, and operations teams.
Channel Management: Ensured all channels were working in tandem: geofencing, paid social, display ads, telemarketing, email, and direct mail
Content Production: Directed the creation of high-value assets, including video customer stories and targeted landing pages, answering critical user questions to remove barriers to adoption.
Cross-Functional Alignment: Partnered with Sales to refine lead follow-up protocols and worked with Operations and Analytics to ensure accurate global lead routing and tracking.
Reporting Framework: Developed forecast and regional KPIs, monitoring and reporting on progress throughout the campaign.
Key Pillars
Audience-Specific Segmentation: Messaging differentiation within ideal client profile - four-year university faculty versus two-year vocational institution faculty addressed unique educational needs.
Story-Led Messaging: Conducted tests validating performance of standard feature-focused copy to customer-centric storytelling.
Multi-Channel Activation: Alignment of a diverse mix of tactics including geofencing, paid social, display, telemarketing, and direct mail to reach faculty at multiple touchpoints.
Results
Achieved 216% of global lead generation target achieved
Increased engagement by 3.6x at target accounts
Exceeded forecast for new faculty pipeline and increased engagement among existing contacts
Recognized with a Communicator Award from the Academy of Interactive & Visual Arts.
Learnings and Insights
Authenticity Outperforms Features: A/B testing I conducted proved that peer-led customer stories resonated significantly more with global faculty than technical feature lists. This validated that emotional proof points drive higher engagement than functional specs.
Cross-functional alignment drives performance: The campaign's success relied heavily on the "invisible" work of operations ensuring leads were not just generated, but correctly routed and tracked. My tight alignment with Sales and Ops was the force multiplier that turned high engagement into tangible pipeline, also ensuring a positive customer experience.
Segmentation Requires Nuance: With my understanding of the ICP differences and personalizing the strategy and messaging, I was able to create assets that spoke directly to the specific curriculum goals of each persona, drastically increasing relevance.
