Passageways - Software & Apps Marketing Campaign of the Year

Company: Passageways, Lafayette , IN
Company Description: At OnBoard, we believe board meetings should be informed, effective, and uncomplicated. That's why we give boards and leadership teams an elegant solution that simplifies governance. Launched in 2011, today, OnBoard serves as the board intelligence platform for more than 2,000 organizations and their 12,000 boards and committees in 32 countries worldwide.
Nomination Category: Marketing Campaign Categories - Industry
Nomination Sub Category: Marketing Campaign of the Year - Software & Apps

Nomination Title: Empowering Organizations to Survive the Pandemic

Specify the date on which this campaign or program was launched: April 2020

As the world went into lockdown, OnBoard’s customers braced for a new reality, struggling with how to navigate this new environment. How to just logistically get their board of directors together in a virtual environment. And, lacking sophisticated tech backgrounds, many had never experienced virtual meetings.

Making matters worse, this was a time when leadership and boards were put to test and needed to be nimble, to act quickly, and figure out how to align their business and operations with a global pandemic.

The pandemic enabled us to share experience and expertise in virtual meetings, working with industries that were considered most vulnerable. To help organizations overcome this challenge, we launched a global campaign to offer frontline teams unlimited access to OnBoard, our board management platform.

Our offer was simple: To help everyone navigate remote meetings, we’d offer five months of access to our platform with no commitments or questions asked.

We also wanted to share our expertise from the nearly 20 years of experience we’ve accumulated on how virtual meetings are effectively executed. Our objective was to help educate and inform organizations how to make the transition from in-person meetings safely and effectively.

Development
From Day One, it was critical that this would be a global campaign to allow organizations across the world to leverage the offer. The marketing team had to act quickly to do a GTM on this promotion.

Messaging
Overnight, our market was educated and adopted remote meeting technology. There no longer a question about whether our platform was essential. We had to pivot our messaging, demonstrating our expertise on virtual meeting management. That messaging was reflected everywhere, from the website, to partners, to every asset and collateral we use.

Thought Leadership Assets
We quickly designed an editorial calendar and rolled out a plan to publish thought leadership and educational articles around compliance for virtual board meetings and best practices for virtual meetings.

Engaging Partners
We connected with our 10+ partners to roll out the promotion. Our partners were not fully supportive but thrilled to bring value added services to their own membership base. We recruited help from our national partners such as ICBA, AGB, Techsoup, ASAE etc. Personalized landing pages were designed to help with the promotion. To spread the word globally and across all industries, a multichannel marketing campaign was developed.

Starting with a press release in all primary regions, the offer was central lead the OnBoard response in all channels including but not limited to - Email, Event, SEM, and Partner Communications. The team successfully solicited participation of our 10+ partners in getting the out to their respective memberships.

Results
We made access to our platform 100% unrestricted and unlimited. That meant no disabled features, no questions, no credit card, and no commitment. Our objective was to empower these organizations with the tools and focus they needed to help the people they serve.
As we worked in those early months to rapidly deploy our solution, we accelerated our product roadmap, bringing a custom Zoom Integration to our customers before the end of April.
That innovation helped make meetings feel more natural when nothing else did. Its launch lowered the barrier to entry, increased engagement, and drove adoption. We also purchased zoom business licenses for every organization who participated — again, no questions asked.
Every organization was assigned a dedicated account executive to help guide their teams, offer training to their users, and help them get onboarded quickly so they could focus on making strategic decisions for their organizations.
Total Organizations Helped - 650+
Total Product Value Given over 5 months - $ 1,596,282 ~ 1.6M (Equivalent value of paid customers for the same period)
This program also greatly influenced overall 2020 marketing success, including:
All of this activity results in over 1000+ requests form fills
We generated $3.8m in pipeline
$700k direct revenue generated
Over $2m revenue influenced.
Total Requests - 1000+
Total new customers added - 100+
Total Direct Revenue Generated - $711,202 - 700k
Overall Pipeline Generated in 2020 - $ 3,831,076 - 3.8M

G2 Grid for Board Management Software https://www.g2.com/categories/board-management#grid
G2 User Reviews for OnBoard https://www.g2.com/products/onboard-board-management-software/reviews
Capterra User Reviews for OnBoard https://www.capterra.com/p/179015/OnBoard-Board-Portal/#reviews

Free Educational Resources for Boards in 2020
Virtual Meeting Toolkit: the definitive guide that provides executive leaders and board members – especially those new to working virtually – with best practices and insights on running effective and productive virtual board meetings. https://www.passageways.com/resources/virtual-meeting-toolkit
Guide to Virtual Meetings Using OnBoard: Best practices, tips, and guidance for using OnBoard to lead a virtual board meeting, make decisions, provide strategic guidance, and keep communication channels open. https://www.passageways.com/board-portal/virtual-board-and-leadership-meetings-guide
Remote & Virtual Meeting Legal Database: An exclusive, interactive database for all corporations and nonprofits looking at virtual meeting laws across every state. https://www.passageways.com/board-portal/virtual-board-meetings-law
COVID-19 & Virtual Board Meetings – Is That Even Legal? A step-by-step guide for boards to examine and amend their bylaws and articles of incorporation to legally hold virtual board meetings. https://www.passageways.com/blog/covid-19-has-moved-you-to-virtual-board-meetings-is-that-even-legal
Blog: Staying Connected While Working Remotely https://www.passageways.com/blog/staying-connected-while-working-remotely
Blog: Key Considerations for Boards During the COVID-19 Crisis https://www.passageways.com/blog/how-your-board-needs-to-address-the-covid-19-crisis

Media Links
Passageways & AGB Announce Free Access to AGB OnBoard Virtual Meeting Management Platform For Higher Education Institutions https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/passageways--agb-announce-free-access-to-agb-onboard-virtual-meeting-management-platform-for-higher-education-institutions-301045120.html
Indiana Business Journal: Local firm gets ‘overwhelming’ response to coronavirus-inspired software giveaway https://www.ibj.com/articles/local-firm-gets-overwhelming-response-to-coronavirus-inspired-software-giveaway
TechPoint: Passageways integrates with Zoom, offers free access to nonprofits and governments https://techpoint.org/2020/04/passageways-integrates-with-zoom-offers-free-access-to-nonprofits-and-governments/
Press Release announcing free OnBoard https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/passageways-announces-free-access-to-its-onboard-virtual-meeting-management-platform-for-nonprofits-and-select-government-bodies-301036324.html
TrustRadius Tech Care Awards https://www.trustradius.com/vendor-blog/2020-tech-cares-award#passage