Background
Invensis is a Bengaluru-based BPO services provider. I was hired in 2011 to help them digitize their marketing and business development efforts, while targeting clients in the US, Europe and Australia.
Building the Digital Presence
I started with a website revamp, going beyond design and UX enhancements to a complete content overhaul for all services being offered by the company. I had to rewrite the content for over 200 website pages myself, to make them more informative while balancing SEO elements.
After the website was relaunched, I led a team of SEO specialists to rank Invensis on relevant search terms using popular off-page optimization techniques at that time. We even started a company blog and built a team of in-house content writers to keep that going.
I also created social media pages for the company and ran our first CSR campaign, where we built awareness about world hunger and the company even made a contribution to the United Nations’ World Food Programme.
Transforming the DNA of Invensis
Traditionally, Invensis relied on offline relationships, trade shows and sometimes even agents and middle-men to get new clients. With a strategic SEO plan, we were able to get new leads from the website contact form. I got QR codes added to brochures for trade shows, which was seen as a novel idea at that time.
Next, I started using platforms like Quora and LinkedIn Answers (it was alive back then) to connect with potential clients by answering their queries. During this activity, I found myself crippled with limited domain expertise in financial and logistics services, which was a key offering. I realized that if department heads and key members of the senior management could directly participate in such forums, it would really help the company.
This led me to undertake a major change in the DNA of the company. I started helping these domain experts to create LinkedIn profiles and start sharing their knowledge on social media forums. I even conducted training sessions for these people and helped Invensis build thought leadership on the internet. This improved the reputation of the company and we started seeing a surge in organic leads through digital media. Invensis had truly been digitized.
Final Outcome
Within 6 months, we recorded an 8x increase in qualified leads coming from digital sources. This brought significant cost savings for the company by eliminating agent commissions, along with enhancing the brand image in the global market.
The Outgrowth of Digital Transformation
As part of the digital transformation of the company, I also led the creation of an intranet tool for better communication and collaboration within the 1200 member strong organization. We named this tool vCollab and it helped Invensis reduce its paper dependence and other legacy issues that were slowing down decision-making.
Another noteworthy benefit came to the photo retouching services offered by Invensis to real-estate photographers. Surfing on the digital transformation wave, we decided to build a product that allowed clients to upload raw images and track progress using an online interface. This digitization helped us expand to a B2C audience on a per-image pricing model. Popular requests included enhancements (this was before Instagram or easy-to-use photo filters), photo restorations and even addition or removal of people in group photographs!
