Swiftpage: Fueling Small and Midsized Business Growth

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Swiftpage

H. John Oechsle, President, and CEO, SwiftpageH. John Oechsle, President, and CEO
Swiftpage delivers modern and innovative software and services that are purpose-built to fuel small and midsized business growth. The company's customer relationship management and marketing automation solutions help drive customer acquisition and retention for their clients. In an interview with CIO Applications, Swiftpage President and CEO H. John Oechsle talks about the factors that led to the company's inception, its customer relationship management (CRM) and marketing automation software offering and their plans for the future.

What are the factors that led to the company’s inception?

Swiftpage was established as a small email marketing company in 2001. Initially, I played a limited role within the company as an investor, but in 2006, I was brought on as an advisor to help implement an OEM white-labeling strategy designed to improve growth prospects. Despite such efforts, Swiftpage had begun to stagnate, and that is where I took over as the CEO in July 2012. With our sights set on establishing Swiftpage as a leader in the customer conversion and retention space, we went ahead and acquired the rights to a CRM application called Act!.

As Act! was released in 1987, it had global brand recognition along with a loyal paying customer base. And while the software was functionally rich for SMBs, it lacked in certain aspects. Consequently, we decided to perform a complete overhaul of the application to meet modern standards. In March of 2013, we embarked on a two-year journey, which we called the “transformation era.” Over this period, we had to transform Act! from a license and maintenance model to cloud-based subscription model. After the successful completion of the “transformation era,” we started our operations in the North American market with a whole new portfolio of cloud-based sales and marketing platform rebranded as Act! and designed to fuel business growth for SMBs.

Then we entered the “conversion era,” where at the time 60,000 customers with 200,000 users had to be moved to the new Act! platform. The transition was accomplished in a frictionless manner, and by 2017 we had entered the “growth era.” To aid in this venture, we partnered with SFW Capital Partners, a private equity company, in May 2018. This helped us leverage SFW’s expertise and resources to accelerate the Act! product roadmap and, in the process, enable growth. Finally, we acquired a company called Kuvana, which developed a marketing automation tool for CRM called InboxGuru. The Act! platform was bundled together with the rebranded InboxGuru, thus giving rise to the Act! Growth Suite, which helps SMBs effectively manage their front-office processes such as customer acquisition, management and retention.

Can you provide a brief overview of Swiftpage’s product offering?

With our flagship offering, the Act! platform, we provide the ultimate toolset to build relationships, maximize engagement and drive business growth. Users can keep customer details, emails, document, notes, history, activities and more in one easy to find place.

With our flagship offering, the Act! platform, we provide the ultimate toolset to build relationships, maximize engagement and drive business growth

Customer information, like insurance policies, service contracts or projects can also be seamlessly moved from existing CRM solutions to the Act! platform. The Act! platform optimizes the way you engage prospects and customers with response-driven nurture marketing campaigns—all sent to targeted lists automatically using criteria and triggers that can be defined accordingly.

SMBs can manage opportunities using a simple, out-of-the-box sales process or a customized setup that fits their needs. They can view a complete visual representation of their sales pipeline to project revenue, adjust their strategy and quickly focus their efforts. In-context KPIs help a business to understand the health of their sales pipeline at-a-glance. Further, the platform provides dynamic visual snapshots of real-time metrics with interactive, graphical dashboards covering individual, team and business performance. These dashboards help monitor sales, marketing and business health KPIs for smarter decision-making.

Moreover, Swiftpage’s Act! platform can be tailored to SMBs according to their size and needs. At the lower end, we offer a plan for one to five-person companies that include the basic CRM and marketing automation features. Moving up to the next tier, there are different plans with more advanced features and for SMBs employing more than 100 employees. The different plans are structured in a manner that allows SMBs to leverage more sophisticated features as they experience business growth. No matter where you are in the journey as a business, we have an on-ramp for you, and once you get on that ramp, you can ride the Act! highway to grow as much as you need.

What are the steps involved while onboarding a new client?

We have a whole department focused on onboarding clients and helping them achieve success through the use of our Act! platform. Each client is offered a free 14 day trial period, where they experience the problem-solving capabilities of our platform on a first-hand basis. During this trial period, we answer any concerns that clients might have and guide them on how to utilize Act! to the fullest. Once a client decides to adopt the Act! platform, we help them with the integration process and also provide webinars along with 24/7 technical support. While clients are subscribed to our platform, we regularly conduct checks to ensure they are not facing any issues as well as offer additional assistance to enhance their experience.

What according to you, is the unique value proposition of the company?

Despite a large number of CRM and marketing solutions in the market, Swiftpage sets itself apart because we are dedicated to the SMB sector and provide a truly customizable all-in-one CRM solution at a price point previously unavailable to businesses of this size. Our Act! platform is purpose-built to enable SMBs and help them achieve business growth. Most of the CRM providers have started out in the enterprise space and have tried to tailor their solution towards SMBs. However, we are different; our entire portfolio is designed to cater to SMBs, providing them with unparalleled flexibility, and exceptional value that enables a perfect fit for every customer. Further, the Act! Growth Suite acts as an all-in-one sales and marketing platform, which helps reduce unnecessary complexity and saves time.

Act! is highly-rated by customers, and there are numerous cases of satisfied clients. One such client was a Philadelphia based business that was having trouble attracting new members, and at the same time, they were unable to retain existing customers. Their membership had decreased by 20 percent over the past three years, and the company was struggling. The problem stemmed from an email marketing platform that had limited functionality. Once the client realized they could manage all of their business processes through a single comprehensive platform, they adopted Act!. And within a year they were able to increase their membership by 40 percent.

What is the company’s plan for the future?

We are continuing to drive through what we refer to as the “growth era.” Coupled with geographic expansion, we are looking into enhancing the Act! platform with sales automation and service management capabilities. Customers looking for a comprehensive sales management and marketing platform to grow their business can rely on Swiftpage to gain a competitive advantage over the competition.

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