What did they come to us wanting?
As one of the largest haylage producers in the UK, Baillie Haylage quite rightfully wanted to stake its claim in the marketplace UK-wide as the go-to for delivering consistent and well-packaged haylage that horses – as well as their owners - love. Albeit for very different reasons…
Family-run, established, passionate, incredibly knowledgeable and with a team in place to back all of those ballsey claims up, Baillie Haylage approached us with ideas to work on their social media outputs and improve the existing website.
What did that actually translate to?
Looking at the goals Bailley Haylage wanted to achieve, we discovered that to make sure the boxes were ticked, we needed to address the unstructured way of dealing with customer communication that had become business as usual.
Enquiries were coming in from all over the shop – the telephone, various social media platforms and direct messages – which made it really tricky to keep track of everything.
Team that with a website that didn’t fulfil Bailie Haylage’s sales potential and there was definitely work to be done to ensure that this established business reached the dizzy heights that we knew it could.
What did we actually do to achieve this?
To start with, that meant investing time in developing a paid advertising campaign. It gave us the valuable time we needed to not only increase sales but, vitally, to get to know the ins and the outs of the business as well as the team.
This increase in sales however further highlighted the need to streamline how enquiries were dealt with. The answer? A contemporary brand refresh and swish new website.
Well-known in the industry, the brand identity was solid, it just needed a lighter touch to bring it up-to-date and wake it up a little. Contemporary but recognisable, the new look was the result of collaborative work between both our and Baillie Haylage’s team.
Next, the website. As an established business, customer loyalty and lack of information were never the issue for Baillie Haylage. It was additional lead generation and customer communication where work needed to be done in this digital development project. That, of horse – sorry, we couldn’t resist – meant that we needed to design a website with the functionality to support increased sales, however, many people were driven there, and a tried and tested communications process.
Working to move away from the website purely being an extensive source of information, and one that the sales team were quite detached from in all honesty, we focused on the customer journey, making sure the website worked as a direct sales tool - a key instrument in measuring interaction and subsequent transactions.
Safe to say the team were as happy as Larry with the proposal - no more horsing around with a product that they had outgrown, finally they would have a website that could deliver on the business’s full potential while alleviating pressures on offline resources and further reducing costs.
One-click wonder buttons such as ‘Ask Us A Question’ and ‘Get A Quote’ as well as the ‘Stockists Finder’ were built into the designs to give each target audience quick access to the information and support they actually needed.
What results were generated by this strategy/product development?
With no previous way to track leads previously, through developing the paid advertising campaign sales increased significantly. As much as we’d love to attribute this growth to us being sat in the PPC saddle, the campaign was expertly facilitated by the quality of the products offered and the experience and dedication of Baillie Haylage’s employees when it came to following up on leads and converting them into sales.
Following the launch of the new website, it quickly became clear that we had made the right call. There was absolutely an appetite for the type of direct communication we had built in.
Over a 5-month period:
- The PPC marketing (Facebook and Google) we implemented when the new website launched was responsible for 31% of website traffic, with a conversion rate of 8.46%.
- The average website conversion rate is 6.72% (significantly higher than the e-commerce site average).
- 262 quotes were generated on a site that did not have this functionality originally.
One of the most impressive details about the new website is how SEO improvements have upped their game. Their site is now optimised for key phrases to see them appear in the top search results, everytime.
- Haylage - 11th to 1st.
- Haylage for Sale - 15th to 7th.
- Haylage for Horses - 34th to 4th.
- Haylage vs Hay - 22nd to 1st.
- High Fibre Haylage - 10th to 1st.
Stats aside - for the Baillie Haylage team this shift in processes means all customer interactions are now gathered together rather than being peppered across multiple channels and platforms. They are organised and can be actioned professionally and efficiently once the product or quote details have been considered.
Customer enquiry communications are now streamlined and consistent, with the ‘Get a Quote’ form completions tracking with a 4.55% conversion rate. With various forms in place across the site, interactions are now regularly monitored and analysed, allowing key messaging to be updated or altered depending on visitor activity.