Talend, a global leader in modern data management, is taking the work out of working with data.. Founded in France in 2005 and headquartered in San Mateo, California, more than 7,250 customers around the world rely on Talend for modern data management that drives real business value.
Talend implemented 6sense at the beginning of 2022 with a small group of SDRs and strategic AEs.
In order to leverage the full potential of the solution, the pilot in EMEA North focused on applying a data-driven approach to account selection which led to a realization of how 6sense aligned with Talend’s outbound goals, Rob Norman, Head of EMEA Marketing at Talend, says. From that point forward, Talend’s EMEA North team experienced groundbreaking results with 6sense, including:
- 6sense in-market accounts are 7.17x more likely to become open opportunities
- SDRs saw a 97% improvement in prospect response rate
- SDR call connect rates increased to 5.8%
Here’s how Talend uses 6sense to better understand their customers and optimize outbound efforts.
The Challenge: Converting ICP Insights into Pipeline
Talend had already built their Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) before implementing 6sense. While this gave the revenue team a clearer picture of their target buyer, not knowing when to reach out to prospects meant their ICP insights still weren’t converting into outbound success.
Talend knew their sales and marketing teams could take a more unified approach to driving pipeline by applying data rigor to both the selection of target accounts and the timing of engagement.
Both teams wanted to engage the same accounts, but the path to achieving operational alignment still wasn’t clear. This changed when sales and marketing teams realized how Talend could use 6sense alongside their ICP data to determine when to go after accounts.
The Solution: Aligning Sales & Marketing on the Buyer Journey
These days, Talend’s revenue team prioritizes their outbound efforts on in-market accounts by leveraging 6sense intent data in tandem with their ICP data. This aligns the sales and marketing teams at every stage of the journey.
“6sense creates a connection between sales and marketing. The unifying effect it’s had on our sales and marketing lexicon is an understated but hugely valuable benefit,” Rob says.
This alignment creates a clear framework for Talend’s outbound efforts:
- Engage early-stage target accounts and progress them to in-market
- Convert in-market target accounts into open pipeline
- Support the progression of open opps to closed-won revenue
“Sales now focuses their time on accounts at the decision and purchase stages,” Rob says, “while marketing is responsible for progressing accounts down the buying journey –– this is the North Star guiding our revenue team.”
Greater Efficiency with Keyword Intelligence
Using 6sense, the operational efficiency of the team improved significantly. The team contacted fewer than half the number of prospects but engaged almost the same number of prospects.
Nathalie van Alst, Talend’s EMEA North SDR leader, attributes the improvement directly to 6sense. “The team focused on accounts in decision and purchase stages and used keyword intelligence to understand the message they should be going out with to shape outreach sequences,” she says.
For Talend’s SDRs, relevance and timing led to extraordinary results:
- Accounts in the purchase and decision stage were 7.17x more likely to become an open opportunity within 90 days than other accounts
- A 97% improvement in response rate to SDR outreach in Q4 (14.4%) compared to Q3 (7.3%)
- Call connect rates increased to 5.8% in Q4 from 3.4% in Q3
Marketing is Winning, Too
Meanwhile, visibility into prospect behavior and buying stage is also creating marketing wins. For example, by analyzing audience keyword research, the marketing team ran a hugely successful executive roundtable on data governance.
“6sense’s platform determined the topic and the account list to invite — we had record attendance with the right profile of attendee, in decision and purchase,” Rob shares. The roundtable is now run on a quarterly basis, alongside digital plays, more events, and sales outreach.
“Rather than one-to-one ABM where you’re putting all your eggs in one basket, 6sense lets us go after multiple accounts that have a high intent to convert — it’s ABM at scale,” Rob explains.
Next up: From EMEA Pilot to Adoption Across the Revenue Team
Following Talend’s success in EMEA North, they’re rolling out 6sense across the global revenue team. AEs across the entire company are being enabled based on the success of the pilot in EMEA North.
“We started off using 6sense focusing on sales support, and we’ve now expanded that to take a holistic approach to how we are driving our marketing alongside our sales. It’s helping shape how we drive our sales and marketing,” Rob concludes.
