The Challenge:

The company was growing tired of working for general contractors, where the work was not only getting more and more competitive, but where they found themselves stuck in the competitive bid and RFP “rat race”, often a race to the bottom awarded straight to the lowest bidder.

In the meantime, the jobs they were securing more routinely were historically clients that only placed orders for one-time special projects.

Instead, the company wanted to target more lucrative long-term contracts working direct for business owners and franchisors that had hundreds of locations in need of casework; they wanted to focus almost exclusively on national accounts. The kind of major corporate clients that would name them as the exclusive vendor responsible for providing all casework for their new and remodel locations.

The idea was that by locking down contracts that provide repeat business for years to come it could allow the Cohen’s to streamline their operations and lower overhead. Fewer clients, but much larger volume. Much less chaos, much more efficiency.

The only problem was the traditional ways of selling weren't generating results. Their sales team just wasn't getting the traction needed to forge relationships with buyers and key decision makers that they needed.

Realizing that the old ways wouldn't work, the Cohen management team turned to LinkedSelling to show them how to get their foot in the door with these larger accounts and generate better opportunities.

The Solution:

To kick off their campaign, we built and quickly grew an industry LinkedIn group that catered to their ideal prospects in the construction division of large companies and franchises titled - Commercial Construction Professionals. The key was to not create simply a group about woodworking, but an industry-focused asset that their prospects would actually enjoy and care about enough to join and stay members for a long time. Since the launch, the group has grown to over 9,000 members, but more importantly has positioned the company differently than there long-list of competitors.

It’s been an entry-point to many relationships that we’ve helped them build both on LinkedIn and email.

The LinkedIn group allows us to keep the Cohen Architectural Woodworking name in front of thousands of prospects over and over again. It’s also a positioning tool as they see Ben Cohen (VP of Sales) and the company as leaders in the space. The top-of-mind awareness it builds is massive.

And when we leverage this leadership status to reach out and talk business, it lowers defenses and allows for a more open conversation with their prospects.

Outside of their LinkedIn group, we made a targeted expansion of their sales team’s LinkedIn database of personal connections.

These connections we were then able to work through a series of LinkedIn and email campaigns to generate sales opportunities.

On top of the outbound messaging campaigns, daily content sharing and updates helped create a stronger awareness between the sales force and their prospects making their outreach all the more effective.

The end result has been a steady stream of sales opportunities for the company.

Some of which have resulted in quick business, some are more introductory, but the value of getting their team in the door with this many qualified prospects has had a substantial effect on the company helping lead them to being named one of Inc. Magazine’s 500 fastest-growing private companies in the country.

Partnering with the LinkedSelling team to manage the entire campaign from launch to booking consistent appointments each month has allowed their sales team to focus on closing their leads and building better relationships rather than searching around for new opportunities to even begin with.

The Results:

LinkedSelling Has Generated Consistent Sales Appointments with Targeted Accounts Leading to Over $30 Million in New Sales 

Since that first year, they have closed multiple deals from their outbound campaigns with LinkedSelling including high-profile healthcare and retail clients resulting in over $30 million worth of new business to date.

In fact, they became so busy that they initially had to pause our services because they couldn’t handle any new leads or opportunities.

They went from being caught up in the rat race, to becoming the sole vendor for millions in commercial projects. It has allowed them to more than double the size of their facility, hit record high levels of revenue, and their highest profits ever. Since that first year, they’ve built and delivered cabinetry for hospitals, airports, and large companies all over the country.

Recent campaigns have led to appointments with some of their top named accounts including: 

• SVP Construction and Property Services at Novant Health
• Director of Real Estate and Construction at Centura Health
• Director of Construction at Sonic Drive-In
• Vice President Restaurantant Development, Design, Construction and Real Estate at McDonald's
• Director, Architecture & Construction Project Management at Hilton Worldwide
• Director Design and Construction at Nationwide Children's Hospital
• National Manager of Construction at Domino's
• Construction Coordinator at Mayo Clinic
• Gigafactory Project Architect at Tesla

“We started getting leads that you're not going to find doing Google searches or calling secretaries. They're not going to let you in the door. And as a result [of our work with LinkedSelling] it has brought us some of our largest deals to date.”  - Noah Cohen, VP at Cohen Architectural Woodworking

Other results from the campaign include:

- Positioning the Cohen Architectural Woodworking brand as a leader in their industry.
- Maintaining a top-of-mind campaign that keeps them in front of thousands of their ideal prospects.
- Generating a steady stream of calls with highly targeted prospects for their sales team.