1. Lou McErlean
5809 Brushy Creek Trail
Dallas, Texas 75252
972-571-0448
lou.mcerlean@gmail.com
SUCCESS STORY: Packaging and Positioning Offerings for Maximum Revenue per Engagement
SITUATION: At New Media Gateway, I was selling to Destination Marketing Organizations (DMOs) which
were responsible for bringing business (meetings, conventions, and exhibitions) and leisure travel (tourists,
vacationers, and the like) to their destinations. The primary offering was a CRM tool specific to the industry.
SOLUTION: I researched and studied DMOs and discovered that they had needs far beyond the auspices
of customer relationship management, which “holds the information”. DMOs need robust marketing and
sales endeavors to market their destinations to various constituencies (meeting planners, tour operators,
consumers, and area stakeholders). So in addition to the CRM, they needed tools to promote their
destinations, to “leverage the information”.
ACTION: I developed and executed a BizDev plan which:
1. Packaged an array of offerings which included SaaS products like the CRM, CMS, MAP, and Workflow
Management Tool, as well as services like Website and mobile design, SEO/SEM, apps, and the like,
and positioned it as a holistic, industry-specific solution termed “The Destination Business System”.
2. Developed a positioning campaign and sales pitch which focused on the DMO’s:
a. Pain/Business Issues caused by having disparate solutions and providers.
b. Benefits/Vision of working with a single provider in an integrated offering environment.
RESULTS:
• Increased average $ revenue per customer by 766%.
• Increased annually recurring revenues from $400,000 to $5,000,000.
• This solution set became the DMO industry standard still being used today.
The below are screen shots from the video/presentation we used to position our Destination Business System
offering. The “silo” objects in screens 1-3 depict the current, disparate tools/applications/systems DMO staff use to
communicate, market, and sell their destinations. Screen 4 depicts the integrated structure of the DBS.
1) Tools/Systems don’t talk to each other 2) DMO staff have to explain mission to many providers
3) Current situation costs $$$ in lost productivity 4) Our solution integrates departments & systems