Building customer loyalty
An early entrant into the solar PV capital equipment market in China, GT Solar (GT Advanced Technologies) quickly established a leading market position for its silicon casting furnaces. Beginning in 2009, increasing competition from low-cost Chinese equipment makers began threatening GT's marketshare with low-cost, knock-off equipment.
To combat this competitive threat, JNP Marketing Group launched a customer loyalty program to build deeper relationships with the company's installed base of customers. We recommended shifting marketing dollars away from traditional trade shows to fund a series of customer symposia events coupled with a series of media tours throughout Asia - China, Taiwan and Korea, to highlight GT's technological advantages over low-cost suppliers.
The customer symposia events were well received by customers and prospects as it gave them the opportunity to talk directly with GT's management team and technology experts about future product roadmaps and helped develop greater trust and a deeper relationship between GT and its customers.
These private events are a great way of maintaining control of the agenda and message compared to other forms of traditional event marketing.
We launched an aggressive media campaign reaching out to editors in China, Taiwan and Korea to generate earned coverage for GT in the leading solar PV trade and business publications. Over a two-year period, the company's earned media placements increased by 300 percent.