Challenge

Hitachi had invested in marketing automation at a global level but wasn’t sure where to start rolling this technology out across Asia. It needed guidance on which industries to target and the markets it should prioritise for a pilot campaign.

Our Approach

Mahlab identified the industries with the greatest growth or growth potential, matching this with Hitachi’s product offering to establish the focus of the marketing automation pilot.

Market analysis and selection:

• The first step was to map out market opportunities. We started by reviewing a range of market intelligence reports from agencies like Mordor Intelligence and Gartner.
• These report insights were compared with Hitachi’s sales data and validated through interviews with local sales leaders, who provided on-the-ground perspectives on market challenges and opportunities.
• For the pilot to be successful, each local business unit needed to be able to support the campaign rollout. We took into account the resources and capabilities of Hitachi’s in-market teams as part of our pilot market selection.
  

Industry analysis and selection:

• With Hong Kong and Thailand selected as pilot markets, we then looked at which industries in these markets would provide the biggest growth potential. 
• By again looking at market intelligence reports, we highlighted the industries and sectors that had been growing at the fastest rates year-on-year and those that were predicted to maintain or exceed this growth. 
• We aligned these growth sectors with Hitachi’s product offering to select the industries that we would focus on for the pilot.

Gathering deep industry insights:

• We then needed to identify the purchasing decision-makers and understand what would make them want to select Hitachi products. 
• Internal interviews with Hitachi sales leaders gave us insights into the purchasing decision-makers. We also approached leading industry associations to gather industry insights. 
• The next step was carrying out a series of 1:1 interviews with our target audience in Hong Kong and Thailand to deep-dive into their broader interests, concerns, pain points, current perceptions about Hitachi as a brand and where they sourced information.
• These interviews were managed by a research team based in the market and were conducted in the local language. 
• To scale these findings, we supplemented qualitative insights with a quantitative survey and additional desk research on the events and key channels that these leaders were engaging with.

Establishing and activating the strategy:

• Armed with deep audience insights, we established the pilot campaign strategy. This included:
  • Mapping the customer journey
  • Crafting messaging that would resonate with our target personas in Hong Kong and Thailand
  • Building the campaign assets in Thai and Cantonese
  • Setting up the campaign across paid and owned channels
• With the strategy in place, we then activated the pilot across both markets.