The economic reality: Why change is essential
The numbers tell a stark story. Marketing budgets have hovered around 7.7% between 2024 and 2025, with leaders under increasing pressure to justify every pound spent. Economic deceleration continues through 2025 and is expected to continue through 2026.
This isn’t just about tightening belts – it’s about fundamental transformation. The organisations that thrive aren’t those that simply cut costs, but those that systematically re-engineer their foundations for long-term success.
Three proven approaches to unlocking marketing potential
To demonstrate what this re-engineering looks like in practice, we’ve picked three examples from our work with leading B2B organisations to show how to turn marketing potential into profit. These range from fine tuning initiatives to full transformations, let’s dive in.
1. Equifax: From blockers to breakthroughs
The challenge: Despite investing in enterprise technology, Equifax faced declining web conversions and lengthy lead response times that were sabotaging growth acceleration.
Our approach: We systematically identified and eliminated conversion blockers:
- Web optimisation: Streamlined complex forms to reduce friction
- Process re-engineering: Eliminated delays in lead qualification
- Technology maximisation: Implemented nurturing automation with appropriate routing
Potential made Profit:
- 100% increase in pipeline growth to £3.6m within 6 months
- 50% increase in form conversions
- Lead response time reduced from 7 days to 1 day
By addressing fundamental process issues and maximising existing technology, we transformed Equifax’s marketing potential into measurable profit growth.
2. CloudPay: From broad netfishing to spearfishing
The challenge: CloudPay CMO, Nick Webb, faced pressure to deliver 30% year-on-year growth, but their high-volume ‘netfishing’ approach was becoming inefficient. Without reliable data, there was no confidence in pipeline forecasting.
Our approach: We implemented a complete go-to-market transformation:
- Data analysis: Conducted intricate ‘fishbone’ analysis across three years of customer touchpoints to build a journey that’s relevant
- ICP redefinition: Established clear ideal customer profiles that were 3x more likely to convert
- Account-based strategy: Shifted from individual leads to account-wide ‘signals’
- Technology integration: Unified insights across Demandbase, HubSpot, and paid media
Potential made Profit:
- 75% increase in total pipeline
- 29% increase in net new pipeline
- 80% of leads now fit ICP criteria (up from 50%)
- Landed biggest ever deal – a global airline worth 600% more than typical average order value
3. Expel: Data-driven efficiency at scale
The challenge: With high growth targets and watchful investors, Expel needed to scale performance across demand channels while maximising returns from their media budget.
Our approach: We used diagnostic frameworks to identify optimisation opportunities:
- Spend analysis: Identified value hotspots and wastage across channels
- Customer-first strategy: Realigned approach to prevent channel duplication
- Advanced targeting: Extended maturity to enable cost-efficient strategies
Potential made Profit:
- 2x increase in sales qualified account (SQA) conversions
- 32% reduction in media budgets, releasing multi-million budget back to business
- 68% decrease in cost-per-opportunity (SAO) through higher quality leads
- 281% increase in return on ad spend (RoAS)
Potential made Profit
The transformation starts with understanding where you are today and where you need to be tomorrow. Whether you need a comprehensive diagnostic of your current performance or a strategic transformation of your go-to-market approach, Modern has the proven methodology to deliver results.
Contact us today to discover how we can help you unlock the potential within your marketing function and turn it into measurable, sustainable profit.
