“The Halston B2B team have been essential to the creation, implementation and execution of our growth strategy as a tech start-up. We owe much of our success to their knowledge of unique target industries, skilled team of content creators and incredible PR network.”
From Tech Start-up to Global Acquisition
Hark came to us with an innovative, bleeding-edge SaaS product in the emerging market of Industrial IoT.
Our experience and expertise in tech startup marketing ensured the delivery of Hark’s initial market penetration strategy.
Throughout our years-long relationship our strategies for the brand developed to ensure our messaging and content were always fit for purpose and razor sharp in targeting as new and exciting markets revealed themselves to the company.
In 2023 Hark was acquired by NADAQ-listed SolarEdge, enabling the growth of the latter’s extensive commercial and industrial energy management portfolio and allowing them to further their additional services to our C&I customers.
Go to Market Strategy
The initial strategy for such a nascent type of technology is usually education-based, especially when considering the marketing for IoT.
We first looked at the target markets and developed our messaging through a rigorous understanding of buying persona pain-points and opportunities.
When a target market is bereft of the basic knowledge needed to comprehend the true extent of the benefits of your tech, easy-to-understand videos and animations, speaking slots at conferences and digestible onsite content are key-stones of your market penetration strategies.
Progressive PR
Once we gained a foothold in the market, we changed tact slightly to ensure brand recognition and thought-leadership.
Our PR coverage for Hark has been a showcase of our speciality, an example of our expertise in order to create technical pieces, placed in niche publications directly in front of their target audience. This allowed them to grow engagement and generate leads with the upper echelons of their desired clients
One of our esteemed PR placements came as Hark were recently featured in Raconteurs prestigious report, IoT for Business. The report demonstrates how IoT-enabled smart cities are changing the way we live.
Forging Partnerships
We’re continuing to place Hark at the heart of their target industries, encouraging observation of the disruptive power of the Hark technology.
Through our collaborative approach we’ve:
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Created a video series on smart buildings with Bruntwood Group
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Brokered an ongoing string of events with Dell
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Events and collaborative campaigns with Microsoft
Award Winning
Our targeted campaigns and monthly content garnered interest for Hark’s social media channels while increasing site traffic and SEO positions.
Niche PR placements helped to bring thousands of additional page views and attract industry demand. Our PR strategy also covers industry awards, conference and speaking opportunity strategies as well as alternative coverage for example industry podcasts. With our support Hark have achieved many accolades including:
- IoT project of the Year at the Digital City Festival awards for their connected buildings project
- Reached the semi-finals of KPMG’s ‘Best British Tech Pioneer 2020’
- Placed 2nd on the SmarTech Innovators list
- Transformation through Technology Award from the UK Tech Business Awards
Progression
Hark came to us as a fledgling tech start-up and we developed their strategy and identified a benchmark to aim for.
Since conception, we have hit milestone after milestone and reached a stage where Hark are securing contracts with multi-national clients such as energy giants and retail chains.
We helped them achieve this by constantly refining their target audience and adapting our strategies to fit their aggressive growth trajectory. This meant supporting the start-up to scale and find a genuine and valuable voice, every step of the way.
We transitioned Hark through a full rebrand, as they shifted their business model and target audience. This included reinvigorating their website using specific engaging content which defined their new brand offering.
We helped them grow their team through incoming business from contact made with individuals in their chosen sector.
The carefully planned thought-leadership and brand positioning from day one allowed Hark to gain interest from their acquirer and saw the company go from start-up, to scale-up to acquisition in six short years.