When Rae-ann Brygman and Nicole Fidler from Hyland took the stage at 6sense Breakthrough, they brought more than workflow diagrams. They brought cake. Not literally, but their presentation compared marketing campaigns to baking: “The perfect cake is the same as a successful and memorable campaign,” Brygman explained. “The channels are aligned, the timing is strategic, and your tools and teams work together in sync.”
Their three workflow “recipes” show exactly how Hyland automated complex, multi-channel campaigns while achieving email open rates up to 38% and expanding successfully into new buying groups.
The challenge
Too often, B2B marketing campaigns operate in silos across disconnected channels. Email runs in your MAP, ads launch from separate platforms, and sales outreach lives in yet another tool. This creates choppy buyer experiences, wastes time on manual coordination, and leaves marketing and sales accidentally competing instead of coordinating. You’re blasting generic invites to your entire database, but response rates are flat and you’re not reaching the right decision-makers at the right time.
The results tend to look a lot like the cake on the right. Sugar? Check. Flour? Check. Actual results? Blech.
You need a way to orchestrate campaigns that identifies the right accounts, delivers personalized engagement across multiple channels, and creates urgency around your initiatives.
The goal
Hyland, a B2B technology company serving six distinct verticals, needed to orchestrate omnichannel campaigns at scale without losing personalization. Their marketing team wanted to move beyond siloed tactics toward a cohesive, data-driven approach that could:
- Respond to real-time intent signals
- Expand into buying groups, and
- Bridge the gap between marketing and sales with coordinated, timely outreach.
Using 6sense Intelligent Workflows and AI Email Agents, Hyland created three repeatable “recipes” that automated complex, multi-channel campaigns while maintaining the human touch that drives meetings.
Tools they used
- 6sense Intelligent Workflows
- 6sense AI Email Agents
- 6sense Segments
- CRM (Salesforce)
- Marketing Automation Platform (Marketo)
- Sales Engagement Platform (Salesloft)
- 6sense Display Advertising
- LinkedIn Ads
- Google Ads
- Sendoso (for gifting)
- 6sense Audience Acquisition
How it works
Intelligent Workflows acts as your campaign orchestration engine, routing accounts through automated journeys based on their characteristics, intent signals, and engagement behavior. The workflow canvas lets you build sophisticated if/then logic across multiple channels from one unified view, while AI Email Agents handle personalized 1:1 outreach at scale to drive meeting bookings.
For Hyland, this meant creating three distinct workflows that each solved a specific challenge. The workflows automatically segment accounts, trigger the right tactics at the right time, and hand off qualified prospects to sales when they’re ready to talk.
Recipe 1: Persona-based acceleration
What Hyland built: A workflow that expands reach into buying groups by targeting both technical buyers and business buyers with persona-specific messaging.
The challenge they solved: After analyzing their database, Hyland realized they had limited business buyer contacts. They needed to build out buying groups while delivering relevant content to each persona type.
How the workflow operates:
1. Start with your ICP segment
Hyland began by creating a 6sense segment of their ideal customer profile accounts. This provided the foundation for identifying which accounts should enter the workflow.
2. Identify target personas
The workflow branches based on persona type, separating IT decision-makers from business buyers to enable different messaging tracks.
3. Layer on audience acquisition
For accounts missing business buyer contacts, Hyland used 6sense audience acquisition to identify and add the right people to their database automatically.
4. Deliver persona-specific AI emails
Each persona receives tailored messaging through AI Email Agents. Technical buyers get content focused on implementation and security, while business buyers receive ROI-focused messaging about business outcomes.
5. Monitor engagement
The workflow tracks email opens, clicks, and replies to identify accounts showing interest.
6. Route to sales
When prospects engage, they’re automatically pushed to a Salesloft cadence with context for the sales team.
Results
- Email open rates increased 25% compared to traditional nurture emails
- Cross-functional interest led to booked meetings with multiple stakeholders
- Acquired business buyer contacts performed better than existing technical buyer contacts, validating the strategy
Recipe 2: Intent-driven engagement
What Hyland built: A workflow that detects intent surges and responds with timely, relevant outreach.
The challenge they solved: Hyland’s marketing framework consists of four distinct plays, each with associated keyword groups. They needed a way to automatically engage accounts showing intent for specific topics with matching messaging.
How the workflow operates:
1. Create keyword-based segments
Hyland built four separate segments, one for each of their marketing plays. Each segment captures accounts that reach a certain intent threshold for that keyword group.
2. Trigger on intent signals
When an account surges on keywords related to a specific play, they automatically enter the corresponding workflow.
3. Match messaging to intent
The workflow initiates AI Email Agent campaigns with messaging that directly addresses the topics the account is researching. If they’re surging on compliance-related keywords, they receive compliance-focused outreach.
4. Personalize at scale
AI Email Agents pull in Salesforce fields to personalize each message while maintaining the 1:1 feel that drives response.
5. Track response
The workflow monitors email engagement to identify accounts ready for sales conversations.
6. Hand off to BDRs
Engaged prospects are routed to the appropriate sales cadence with full context about what sparked their interest.
Results
- 38% open rates on intent-triggered emails
- Instant access to in-market accounts enabled faster segmentation and conversion
- The segments provide ongoing insights for planning 2026 nurture strategies and content development
Recipe 3: Closed-lost re-engagement (omnichannel orchestration)
What Hyland built: Hyland’s first multi-tactic, full-funnel workflow that re-engages closed-lost opportunities after the six-month mark.
The challenge they solved: Hyland’s BDR team already had strong closed-lost outreach for the first six months after an opportunity closes. Marketing needed to complement that effort by creating an always-on nurture that kicks in after that six-month window.
How the workflow operates:
1. Define the audience segment
The workflow starts with a segment of closed-lost prospects in Hyland’s ICP where the opportunity closed more than 180 days ago and account status is still “prospect.”
2. Add a time-based gate
Accounts closed-lost within the last 180 days hit a “do nothing” node, preventing overlap with active BDR outreach. Once the six-month threshold passes, they automatically continue through the workflow.
3. Launch display advertising
All qualifying accounts are pushed to 6sense Display campaigns to spark re-engagement through brand awareness.
4. Branch by deal size
After a 14-day wait, the workflow branches based on opportunity value. Deals over $30,000 get pushed to a Marketo static list for gifting offers.
5. Send gifting or standard emails
High-value accounts receive emails offering a Sendoso gift (Hyland used an AirTag with “Did we lose you?” messaging). Lower-value accounts get thematic emails without gifts.
6. Engage with AI Email Agents
When prospects click on either Marketo email, they’re automatically routed to AI Email Agents for personalized follow-up.
7. Hand off to sales
After AI Email Agent engagement, prospects are pushed to a Salesloft cadence where the BDR team can take over conversations.
8. Remove from advertising
After 45 days, accounts are removed from display campaigns to control ad spend.
Results
- First omnichannel workflow successfully launched and running
- Always-on orchestration targeting high-value audience
- Visual workflow canvas made reporting to leadership straightforward
- Strong user adoption across the department sparked excitement for additional use cases
- Next planned workflow: Stage 2 to Stage 3 pipeline progression
Key learnings from Hyland
Use strategic sender names for AI Email Agents
Hyland initially named AI Email Agents after real BDR team members, but when those employees changed roles, all campaigns had to pause while new Microsoft inboxes were set up. They now use functional names that don’t depend on specific people.
Plan for send volume capacity
Hyland started with two AI Email Agents and quickly hit sending limits. They expanded to five agents (increasing monthly send capacity) to match their campaign needs.
Avoid CSV uploads for audience building
While you can upload CSV lists to AI Email campaigns, Hyland learned this creates limitations. The Salesforce integration doesn’t give you audience size previews, and permission issues can accidentally sync your entire database. Their recommendation: build audiences through Intelligent Workflows instead.
Get creative with segment limitations
Hyland’s closed-lost workflow required a rolling six-month timeline that wasn’t available as a standard segment filter. They solved this by using workflow logic with time-based decision nodes instead.
Coordinate with sales before launching
For the closed-lost workflow, Hyland met with their BDR team to understand existing outreach. This prevented oversaturation and identified the gap where marketing could add the most value.
Start simple and iterate
Hyland’s progression from standalone AI Email campaigns to intent-based workflows to full omnichannel orchestration shows the value of starting with simple use cases and building complexity as you learn.
About Hyland
Hyland is a B2B technology company headquartered outside Cleveland, Ohio. Founded in 1991, Hyland provides AI-powered content, process, and application intelligence solutions. Hyland has been a 6sense customer since 2019, initially leveraging the platform for account-based advertising before expanding into broader account-based orchestration.
Ready to see 6sense in action?
Intelligent Workflows provides a flexible canvas for orchestrating campaigns that match your unique go-to-market strategy. There’s no single “right way” to build a workflow. The drag-and-drop interface makes it easy to configure automation that fits how your teams actually work.
New to 6sense? Book a demo to see how Intelligent Workflows and AI Email Agents can transform your campaign execution.
Already a 6sense customer? Work with your Customer Success Manager to start building or improving workflows.
