Gene Carozza
Senior Vice President, Technology & Head of Operations | Boston, MA
CloudBees: Longtime Client Continues to Push the Envelope with Creative Integrated Campaigns
Introduction
From a Startup to a Category Leader
For more than eight years PAN has partnered with CloudBees on a full-service, data-driven integrated marketing program that’s positioned CloudBees as a leader in the fast-growing, fast-changing DevOps space. PAN has generated consistently strong media results, spearheaded creative social campaigns, helped establish CloudBees’ DevOps Radio podcast as a respected, highly popular thought-leadership vehicle, and supported the development of the company’s users conference from a one-room, half-day session into the industry’s top DevOps event, with 2,000 attendees over four days in San Francisco’s Moscone Center.
CloudBees is that rare breed of client that’s always focused on ‘What’s next?’ and is willing to try new things to connect with its audiences. They’ve empowered us to challenge them every step of the way. Year after year our partnership grows stronger – and together we’re focused on new and creative ways to take CloudBees to the next level.
The Challenge
To outmaneuver rivals in the software delivery market, CloudBees needed to raise its level of engagement with technical audiences and strengthen its awareness among enterprise buyers. Software delivery was changing, becoming more of a strategic value driver for businesses’ operations, and CloudBees needed to position itself as a primary voice in the emerging field of DevOps.
The Approach
PAN went to work on a long-term plan to establish CloudBees as an industry leader. Tapping the media skills that won PAN national agency-of-the-year awards with PR News and PRovoke, the firm launched successful campaigns to drive awareness for CloudBees’ pivot to a new market – continuous delivery – and its evolution to a full-service supplier of solutions serving the much broader DevOps market.
PAN integrated with CloudBees’ PR team, positioning co-founder and CEO Sacha Labourey for top-tier media opps and creating a thought-leadership program that delivered a stream of bylines, social media campaigns and digital assets, whitepapers and blogs.
During the firms’ engagement, PAN has partnered with CloudBees’ marketing team to create high-impact, creative social programs that broadened CloudBees’ engagement with their core audience. These included themed creative campaigns and online content depicting the Jenkins technology community’s well-known “Butler” mascot posing as iconic characters from “Breaking Bad,” “Game of Thrones” and “West World.” These depictions resonated with CloudBees’ developer audience and won multiple industry awards.
PAN was a driving force in the development of CloudBees’ podcast series, “DevOps Radio,” evolving it into a premier thought leadership vehicle. With PAN providing technical and logistical expertise, the series has aired more than 60 episodes featuring industry pillars such as Gene Kim and customers such as Fidelity, Accenture and CapitalOne.
PAN’s media and marketing team also helped drive the awareness that built the Jenkins World annual user session into the industry’s best-attended DevOps event – the annual Jenkins World | DevOps World in San Francisco. PAN seeded interest in the 2019 conference, contributing more than a dozen thought leadership bylines ahead of the event. We also lined up more than 20 on-site interviews with journalists for CloudBees executives, recorded 10 DevOps Radio podcasts and facilitated widespread media coverage relating to the event.
The Impact
Establishing CloudBees as a DevOps leader.
Through its partnership with PAN, CloudBees has generated record levels of media coverage, raised its social media profile and drove significant interest in DevOps Radio and Jenkins World | DevOps World. The DevOps Radio’s downloads jumped by 37% in 2019, crossing the 225,000 mark early in 2020. The podcast series regularly generates nearly 2,000 website sessions back to the DevOps Radio landing page. The company’s “West World”-themed social campaign in 2018 generated 580,000 clicks to the DevOps World landing page. The conference itself netted 63 articles focused on CloudBees news and thought leadership topics.
CloudBees wanted to establish itself as a recognized force in DevOps – and in 2020 both Forrester and Gartner validated its position, naming it a Leader in the DevOps category. The company has grown its business and positioned itself in the forefront of industry conversations about software’s evolution – the value it can generate and the security challenges enterprises face. Now, in 2020, CloudBees is leading the conversation about the creation of a new holistic concept known as Software Delivery Management (SDM).
CloudBees has always considered PAN a trusted member of our team. Every move we make, we know PAN will wow us with ideas – and exceed our expectations when it comes to execution. PAN has been a critical part of our success.
Heidi Gilmore | Area Vice President, Marketing Communications, CloudBees