Listen to this articleBelow is our recent interview with Adam Aloi, Managing Partner at Alliance Interactive:
Q: Adam, can you tell us something more about Alliance Interactive and its history?
A: I started Alliance Interactive in 2004 to help businesses attract more customers through data-driven B2B Marketing Services. Today we are a full service digital agency that assists a wide range of B2B, nonprofit, and startup clients with inbound marketing, website design, and development. We are focused on developing high-performing websites that convert visitors into leads and drive growth that matters.
Q: What challenges did you and/or the company identify at the start and have things worked out as planned?
A: For years I worked in finance and while I had a great job I was continuously frustrated by how difficult and expensive marketing solutions were in the early 2000s. I soon realized that everyone else was having the same challenges. Instead of focusing on marketing results, they were getting bogged down on website administration. Our company focused on open source tools to power website development and make website maintenance a breeze.
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Q: As a B2B Marketing Services company, how does Alliance work with businesses to reach potential customers online?
A: Generating leads is always something that requires effort, and even if you have something phenomenal that everyone wants, you still need to educate the market. The challenge we see with startups or midsize companies is that many tend to under value the impact that their digital platforms have on lead generation. Our marketing agency specializes in helping B2B organizations reach their target audience and improve their sales pipelines. We help businesses transform themselves through web design and a comprehensive suite of marketing services that influence how customers react to sales funnels and marketing campaigns. By building a modern marketing foundation, our clients can better serve the needs of sales prospects and drive growth that matters.
Q: You’ve recently been recognized as a top drupal development company by Clutch; could you tell us something more?
A: Clutch is a B2B ratings and reviews-based website also located in Washington, D.C. Their reviews are based on client feedback and data. Being recognized by Clutch’s in-depth and independent research is important for us, as we pride ourselves in our ability to bring solutions to meet the individual needs of each of our clients. Businesses must be able to optimize their websites and digital experiences to advance their goals and be competitive. Our mission is to promote open source tools that can help nonprofits, NGOs, and B2Bs build enterprise Drupal website projects that help them easily manage their websites as they continue to grow and scale their offerings.
Q: Can you give us insights into your website maintenance services?
A: At Alliance Interactive we focus on companies’ long-term design and website development needs. These are often substantial projects for our clients — in terms of both time and financial investment — so the applications need to run smoothly. Our website maintenance services help not only with development related issues, like Drupal or WordPress development and updates, but also extend to design needs such as building landing pages, publishing presentations, reports, and whitepapers, and interactive graphics that require a quick turnaround. Our website maintenance philosophy is to promote continuous development, which enables you to enhance and update your website and reduce costs over time. Following a continuous development cycle also means that your on-site user experience will continue to improve. Our team consists of Drupal, WordPress, Design, and Digital Strategists that work as a cohesive team to deliver projects with the right mix of budget and quality. When you have a website maintenance team that can deliver quickly, it frees up clients to focus on the real drivers of growth for their company.
Q: There are already a number of digital agencies in Washington, D.C. , why do you think yours is superior?
A: My finance background inspired me to start Alliance Interactive to help B2Bs and nonprofits take advantage of data. Almost everything we touch today from restaurants and buildings to cars and scooters has leveraged data to better understand their maximum capabilities. Since 2004 we’ve helped organizations maximize their budgets by reducing expenses and using those savings to drive digital marketing strategies that drive sales and donations, inspire visitors, and help marketing teams be more efficient with every marketing dollar.
Oftentimes we’re brought on for website projects that have come from another Washington, D.C. website company and we’re asked to fix or rebuild it. That’s usually the starting point where we’re able to impress on our clients the value of data intelligence to their future growth. Our market isn’t that large, so our reputation is also measured by how we treat each customer with the same level of respect, creativity and urgency. And unlike some agencies that run commercials in order to maintain their customer pipeline, our clients are mostly referrals based on our track record and reputation.
Q: Why is a strong online presence a critical component for the success of any B2B business?
A: A research report from Accenture showed that 94% of business buyers research online first before buying anything and 84.3% of them check a business website. The challenge is that many organizations haven’t had the proper exposure to B2B marketing services that can actually help them generate positive sales results online. Organizations that usually rely on an RFP process or long sales cycle are a great example. They don’t see immediate benefits from updating their B2B websites. For some clients a single lead can be worth tens to hundreds of thousands dollars, but they are still relying on a DIY website or marketing collateral. It’s not until we show them how their competitors are benefiting directly from their limited online engagement that we get their attention. It’s our job as a B2B digital agency to find interesting ways to attract and engage the audiences that come to their websites and encourage them to convert their visit into some kind of action, such as completing a form or following the brand on social media. And it’s important to test and make sure that the solutions we provide are working. We do this by incorporating analytics and A/B testing to make sure that our creative and design is showing the right trends. A strong online presence can mean the difference between nurturing a qualified sales lead and inadvertently helping your competition.
Q: What are some ways organizations can improve their B2B Websites?
A: My recommendation for B2Bs to improve their online strategies:
– Make sure you have a unified dashboard that can provide you with all the critical current data. Make sure you know what sales opportunities you have and which ones you may be missing.
– Optimize your site for mobile. Google’s search engine is focusing on websites that are built mobile first and penalizing websites that provide visitors anything other than an optimized experience.
– Grow your opportunity pipeline. The first step is setting up goals for what you want the site to deliver. For many B2B websites, that means understanding in real time what is happening on their website with sales, general website traffic and paid campaign traffic.
– Understand what the conversion rates are for your marketing efforts and the cost per lead.
– Be open minded to testing new approaches to your marketing efforts, whether that’s your B2B’s website design or implementing a B2B social media marketing campaign. The amount of data-driven insights that can be generated from these types of campaigns is incredible.
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Q: Can you give us any hints as to what else we might expect to see from Alliance Interactive this year? What are your long term plans?
A: We’re really excited about the feedback we’ve gotten from clients taking advantage of our website maintenance and support services. We’re always looking for ways we can support clients across the digital marketing lifecycle and make it a more productive and positive experience. I tend to look at a two to four-year horizon. We want to keep growing our digital services organically. And we want to do that through value-added services and solution sets that our new and existing customers are excited to use. At the end of the day, you have to prove yourself to your customers and continue to deliver meaningful results that get noticed.
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