ILMA Compoundings May 2018 - 8

INSIDE ILMA

Company Callout
How Digital Marketing Succeeded for Sea-Land

C

ompoundings: What was it
that made you and Sea-Land
Chemical turn your attention
and focus to digital marketing?
Matthew Mapus: Historically, SeaLand has done most of its advertising
through traditional channels, such
as print advertising in conjunction
with the promotion of the brands we
represent at industry trade shows, and
through our team of sales professionals,
this continues to be a core part of
our marketing program. Nothing can
replace cultivating individual face-toface relationships, but we also realized
we needed to find other ways to reach
customers and provide them with valuable information on our products and
the challenges facing the industry. It
just made sense to meet the customers
where they already were - online.
Compoundings: Roughly how long
ago did Sea-Land decide to implement
step one? Did you dip your toes in the
water at first, or did you go all in right
away and start posting on your own
with whatever resources you had?
Mapus: About two years ago, we
developed a plan to ramp up our
digital marketing program by partnering with a marketing firm, bringing
on some additional people with
marketing experience and investing
in an inbound marketing tool to
track customer engagement. We have
progressively implemented different digital tools into our platform,
starting with basic improvements
and techniques to effectively share
information. The support and tools we
invested in have allowed us to shorten
the learning time and move forward

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MAY 2018

| COMPOUNDINGS | ILMA.ORG

quickly - including some recent
enhancements to our website product
search capabilities, bi-monthly email
campaigns highlighting our unique
product offerings and increased digital
communications through our industry
association partners like ILMA. For
example, we recently utilized an electronic banner on ILMA's website to
highlight some new product offerings,
and the response has been well-received over an extended period.
Compoundings: Now that it's been
a couple of years since you've undertaken a more focused effort to market
Sea-Land in the digital arena, have you
learned anything that you were not
expecting?
Mapus: We've been surprised by how
it has improved our reach and our
ability to get information out to our
customers at a much quicker pace.
With traditional means like print
advertising or direct mailings, the
customer may not ever see it, or the
information may not be timely. We've
all done it - we get a magazine or
a mailer, and it goes in a pile on our
desk to read "when we have time." By
providing information through digital
platforms, we can share information
much faster with the ability to observe
interest in the topic being shared. Traditional advertising remains a valuable
part of our integrated marketing plan,
but reaching out to customers through
digital means will continue to be a
tool we use to raise awareness about
our products and services.
Compoundings: How have you
measured the success of your digital
marketing efforts?

Mapus: The resources we have invested
in allow us to measure several different
engagement metrics. Metrics such as
click through rates and open rates play
a role in our decisions about future
campaigns that we create and those
we don't use in the future. That is one
of the many benefits of using digital;
you can gauge interest and make
adjustments. Many of our campaigns
have resulted in greater interest in
our products and services, and this is
reflected in our increased web traffic,
technical information requests and new
opportunities.
Compoundings: Businesses use digital
marketing to share different types of
content, whether it be news about a
new hiring or facility update, but I've
seen a few blog posts from Sea-Land
Chemical have showcased your lighthearted, humanistic side. What is
Sea-Land's thinking behind that?
Mapus: At Sea-Land, we believe that
our purpose is simple: to create a great
experience for our customers, suppliers
and employees. So, for us, sharing our
stories and appreciation to our business
partners and friends is important. We
try very hard to not only bring pertinent and usable information to our
customers to help them solve some of
their toughest challenges, but also show
that we are grateful for the opportunity
to work with and for so many great
people and companies in this industry.
We realize our business partners have
a choice in the companies they work
with, and we appreciate the opportunity to support them in any way that
we can.
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ILMA Compoundings May 2018

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