Moss Adams is one of the largest independent accounting and financial services firms in the United States, with over 200 partners, more than 1,700 professional staff, and twenty one locations. Along with affiliated firms and alliance members, they provide professional services in assurance, tax, consulting, wealth management, and capital transactions on a worldwide basis. Organized to provide services within an industry and service line matrix, Moss Adams has customers across a wide spectrum of sizes and needs – from individuals to multi-nationals within public, private, and not-for-profit entities – all customers for whom our client has specialized financial and advisory expertise. Passionate about their people, their communities, and their professions, Moss Adams is regularly recognized as one of America’s best places to work.
Business Situation
Perhaps no industry has experienced such a rapid evolution in how marketing is conducted as the professional services industry. Just a few years ago, the name of the firm, the logo, and the reputation and relationships of the senior partners were the cornerstones of an effective marketing strategy. As junior staff rose, they would contribute to an article or two, usually published under the name of a senior partner. Occasionally, a rising star would co-author a book with a senior partner. There were speaking engagements, trade shows, and client entertainment. Typically, client trust was earned in the core service offering and add-on sales easily followed. Those days are gone.
Three factors contributed to the rapid evolution of how professional services are marketed. First, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act was passed in 2002. This act prohibited accounting firms from performing many non-audit services for their audit clients. Many longstanding consulting relationships, some lasting several decades, instantaneously ended and were open anew to competition. Second, the explosion of new business software gave rise to thousands of start-up technology consulting firms. As the surviving firms matured, they began to offer strategic and advisory services that had been the sole domain of more established firms. And finally, the proliferation of content available on the internet has altered the way clients and potential clients obtain information about professional services, industry trends, technology, and business improvement initiatives. Put simply, some of the best business thinkers in the world publish their thoughts for free, or at a nominal cost. The marketing of professional services has had to evolve rapidly in this new landscape.
Against this background, marketers of established firms have not been without their advantages. Reputation and relationships still matter. A history of success on important and complex projects still matters. The ability to provide a broad range of expertise with geographic reach still matters. And, established firms have been creating content for years. They are very good at it. It’s in their DNA. They just had to figure out the right way to provide their content while extending their brand.
And, this was exactly the business situation our client was in.
Solution
The single greatest risk when designing a marketing communication platform is that it risks being out of date on the day that it launches. Our paramount consideration was to design and build a site to meet both the current and the future needs of our client. The solution would have to be both flexible and house massive content libraries. It would have to allow easy modifications and enable fresh marketing strategies. With many competing and ambitious objectives, a careful evaluation was conducted.
This evaluation included:
- Defining requirements and objectives with each of the fifteen industry groups;
- An inventory of web site links, event publishing tools, email platforms, and data capture forms the site would utilize;
- Review of current and potential social media platform extensions;
- Project planning with the content production teams; and
- A complex audience segmentation process, including key customer interviews, to map users' behaviors our client's objectives for the site.
Creating a platform that worked across all divisions of a matrix organization required collaborative but structured project management. After a formal card sort exercise and detailed wireframe review process, we locked down web site navigation options and built prototype user flows for user acceptance testing and final refinement. This valuable step revealed several use cases where specific navigation, content presentation, and publishing tools required custom features and related development.
As we built the site, we extended a print rebranding that had been completed by the client to every design element. Remember that risk of being out of date when you launch? That goes double for design. The electronic design needed to compliment the brand, draw attention to the content, simplify the sightlines, and match color and shape to action. Spending time and resources on great design will pay dividends with every click-through over the lifespan of the site.
Combining careful evaluation, project management, and great design, the site went live with three unique online properties tied to a central content management system. Key features include secure data capture, outbound communications, event registrations, and centralized response management tools. Customer data is readily accessible for analysis, and the whole platform was developed to support integration with social media.
RESULTS
With over 600 unique pages of content presented within an interesting and intuitive design at launch, web traffic has increased, content publishing has been streamlined and the organized content is more easily discoverable within a customized set of search criteria. On top of the operational efficiencies and intuitive user experience, the website has been recognized as best in class and picked as a finalist for numerous national and global marketing awards. Moss Adams is efficiently building and launching integrated marketing campaigns that deliver organized, actionable, and measurable results. By integrating traditional and digital media at the hub of their communications and tracking leads through connected relationship management tools, our client can manage cross channel comparisons, budget to actuals, and true conversion tracking.
Exceeding our client’s objectives, the fully built collection of sites enables:
- Efficient content management;
- Intuitive and logical navigation;
- Increased traffic and audience engagement;
- Valuable connections through full-cycle CRM; and
- Award winning design.
Technology
Technologies and platforms utilized in the development of this website include:
- Kentico 5.5
- SQL Server 2008 R2
- Windows Server
- IIS 7.0
- C#.NET 4.0
- JavaScript
- ASP
- HTML 4.0
- CSS 2.0
- FTP
- YouTube
- RSS Feeds
ABOUT CATALYSIS
For nearly 20 years, Catalysis has specialized in the digital integration of award-winning marketing campaigns that drive connected, measurable results. Our clients include Microsoft, Moss Adams, Banner Mattress, Thunder Valley Casino, BabyLegs, and WineBid.
For more information, contact info@catalysis.com or visit our website at www.catalysis.com.