A funnel that looked functional — until you looked closer.

Compt provides a personalized employee stipend platform. Their primary digital conversion goal: get qualified HR buyers to submit a "Request a Demo" form. The funnel data told a clear story — but the gap between Page Visits and Visible On Screen was the headline nobody had written yet.

The 20% visibility gap — 52 people who landed and never saw the form — pointed immediately to a device behavior problem, not a messaging problem.

Recover lost form visibility, increase RFD submissions, and identify the highest-leverage CRO bets for a six-month horizon.

The broader objective was a strategic document that prioritized which funnel problems to solve first — and why — so the team could execute in sequence rather than in scattered parallel.

HR buyers arriving via desktop and mobile — with very different experiences.

Traffic was 63.9% desktop, 35.5% mobile, 0.6% tablet. The RFD form was immediately above the fold on desktop. On mobile, it required scrolling ~30% before appearing — a friction point that explained the visibility gap with near-perfect precision.

Demand generation and demand capture are two separate problems — and they require different solutions.

I structured the audit into two distinct buckets: Demand Generation (creating new demand) and Demand Capture (converting existing intent). This framing prevented the classic mistake of pouring budget into acquisition when the real leak is in the conversion experience.

Demand Generation issues found: Video content was either gated or too small to engage with meaningfully. The comparison worksheet was gated while a similar savings calculator sat ungated — an inconsistency that undermined trust.

Demand Capture issues found: "Schedule a Demo" blended into the nav. CTA contrast issues throughout. Chat response times (~6 minutes) left intent-forward prospects waiting. Homepage messaging failed to define the ICP above the fold.

Sequenced, time-boxed experiments across a 6-month horizon.

Days 1–30: Make the RFD form visible on mobile. High-contrast demo CTA. Audit chat response times, implement a routing chatbot.

Days 30–60: A/B test mobile form fix vs. control. Ungate the comparison worksheet with an interactive embedded form.

Days 60–90: Increase video accessibility, remove webinar/thought-leadership gates. Validate messaging with sales.

Days 90–180: Roll improvements to all demo-request landing pages. Build mid-funnel retargeting audiences around ungated content. Test partner lead-sharing structures.

Conservative estimates based on existing conversion rates.

Directional and conservative — assumes all other rates hold constant. Combined lift across CTA hierarchy and chat optimization could be materially higher.

Funnel problems almost never announce themselves.

The gap between "Visible on Screen" and "Page Visits" is a metric most teams don't even look at — but it told the whole story here. Device behavior drives experience; experience drives conversion. The data pointed to the answer; the job was asking the right question first.

Ungating content isn't a revenue risk, it's a trust investment. Gating a comparison worksheet while leaving a similar calculator open signals inconsistency — and prospects notice even when they can't name it.

If this were live, the next phase would go deeper into post-submit.

The audit stops at the RFD submission. The next layer: speed-to-contact after form submit, show rate on demos booked, disqualification rate (targeting problem or messaging problem?). A closed-loop view from first click to closed-won would unlock the next tier of optimization.

Leads were coming in. Nobody was following up in any systematic way.

The brand had steady inbound from content, paid, and organic — but no nurture infrastructure. Leads entered the CRM and sat there until a rep manually reached out, often days later. No scoring, no segmentation, no way to distinguish high-intent prospects from casual browsers.

Build a system that moves the right leads through the funnel at the right pace — automatically.

North star metric: increase the percentage of MQLs converting to sales-accepted leads (SALs) within 30 days of first touch. Secondary: reduce sales time spent on unqualified outreach.

Four segments built on behavioral and firmographic data.

Segment A — High intent, right fit: Visited pricing + demo page, correct company size and title. Routed to sales within 10 minutes via task + Slack notification.

Segment B — Medium intent, right fit: Downloaded resource or watched video, right profile. Enrolled in 5-touch educational sequence over 21 days.

Segment C — High intent, unclear fit: Strong engagement signals but unclear ICP match. Enrolled in BDR qualification sequence.

Segment D — Low intent / early stage: Newsletter signups, cold list. Monthly value email only; suppressed from sales view.

Built in HubSpot across eight weeks — workflows, sequences, and scoring in parallel.

Weeks 1–2: Audited and cleaned database. Built property structure. Defined scoring matrix with sales input.

Weeks 3–4: Built lead scoring, lifecycle progression rules, internal Slack/task alert workflows.

Weeks 5–6: Wrote and designed email sequences for Segments A–C. Subject line A/B tests on touches 1, 3, and 5. Branching logic based on email engagement.

Weeks 7–8: QA across all workflows. Launched to live traffic. Set up reporting dashboard tracking MQL volume, SAL conversion rate, sequence engagement rates, and unsubscribe tracking.

Sample Segment B sequence: T+0: Welcome + relevant resource. T+3: "The real cost of [problem]" — educational. T+7: Social proof — customer story with similar profile. T+12: Mid-funnel comparison content (ungated). T+21: "Is now a good time to connect?" with calendar link.

First 60 days post-launch.

The scoring model was right. The timing was wrong — and that's a useful finding.

Initial cadence was too aggressive for Segment B. Pulling touch 3 from Day 5 to Day 7 increased reply rates. The lesson: automation isn't an excuse to be impatient on behalf of the prospect.

Sales adoption required active change management — not just a workflow. A 30-minute training + Loom walkthrough raised adoption from ~40% to ~85% within two weeks.

Introduce intent data and dynamic content personalization.

The current system treats "right fit, medium intent" as a monolith. The next version would incorporate third-party intent signals (Bombora, G2) to surface in-market prospects earlier within Segment B, and suppress outreach to contacts whose intent score has dropped below threshold.

Expansion campaigns fail when they treat new markets as copies of the original.

The brand was expanding from one established market into three new locations simultaneously. The instinct: replicate what worked in market one. The brief I brought back challenged that — each market has distinct competitive dynamics, buyer personas, and community contexts that should shape the campaign.

A shared brand spine with localized activation layers.

Core campaign concept: "This is your kind of work." — built around the idea that the space you work in should reflect who you are and how you work best. The concept allowed visual and copy localization without fragmenting the brand.

Three phases: Awareness (establish presence, top-of-funnel reach) → Consideration (landing page visits, event signups, tour requests) → Conversion (capture leads, convert to tours and memberships).

Each channel had a defined role in the funnel.

Meta (FB/IG) — Awareness & Retargeting: Broad geo + interest targeting. 7-day retargeting to website visitors. Creative: 15s video + static with local visual anchors.

LinkedIn — B2B Consideration: Target: company decision-makers, HR/Ops titles, team size 10–100. Sponsored content promoting flex office for distributed teams. In-platform lead gen forms for tour requests.

Email: Segmented sends to existing CRM contacts by geo-proximity. 3-touch announcement sequence for contacts within 25 miles of each new location.

Local SEO: Google Business Profile optimization for each location. Location-specific landing pages with distinct copy and photography.

One dashboard, three markets, clear accountability.

Built a GA4 + HubSpot reporting framework tracking: CPL by market and channel, landing page conversion rates by variant, tour request volume by source, and cost-per-tour. Weekly cadence with sales ops to review and reallocate budget in real time.

Local photography outperformed stock by a significant margin.

In A/B tests, ads using real neighborhood imagery had 30%+ higher CTR than brand-standard creative with generic workspace shots. The investment in local shoots paid back in performance within two weeks. Communities recognize themselves — and they respond to it.

Events were happening. Pipeline wasn't coming from them.

The brand was hosting monthly virtual events with solid attendance (80–150 per event) but minimal downstream conversion. No consistent follow-up, no segmentation between attendees and no-shows, no connection between event participation and CRM activity. Events felt like brand awareness spend with no attribution.

Three distinct tracks: registrants who attended, no-shows, and high-engagers.

Track 1 — Attended: Highest intent. 3-touch sequence ending in a direct calendar link to book a tour or consultation. Personalized with event topic.

Track 2 — No-shows: Registered = interest. Missing = time constraint, not lack of intent. Received recording + warm re-engagement sequence on the content they missed.

Track 3 — High engagers (poll responses, Q&A, chat): Highest-intent sub-segment. Fast-tracked to sales — same-day BDR task creation.

Built on HubSpot workflows with Zoom integration for attendance data.

Pre-event: Confirmation immediate → T-7 day reminder → T-1 day with agenda + calendar block → T-1 hour day-of reminder.

Post-event (Attendee): T+2h: "Thanks for joining" + replay + takeaway resource. T+24h: Value-add follow-on content. T+72h: Soft CTA — tour or consult booking with calendar link.

Post-event (No-show): T+4h: "Sorry we missed you" + full recording. T+3d: Key insights summary. T+7d: Invitation to next event in the series.

The no-show track was the biggest surprise — and the biggest win.

No-shows converted to booked consultations at nearly the same rate as attendees. Registering for an event is a meaningful intent signal even when attendance doesn't happen. The no-show track was almost an afterthought — it became a core part of the system by month two.

Moving the CTA email from T+48h to T+72h increased click rates ~18%. The prospect needed a day to digest before committing to a next step.

Two separate problems sharing one root cause: response lag.

New inbound leads sat uncontacted for 4–6 hours after form submission. Research shows lead-to-contact rates drop by more than 10× when response time exceeds 5 minutes. Simultaneously, a significant portion of the database — leads with prior intent signals — had gone cold with no re-engagement strategy in place.

Alert + assign + automate — so no lead waits more than 5 minutes.

Trigger: Form submission, high-intent page visit (pricing + demo in same session), or chat initiation.

T+0: Personalized confirmation email with one-click calendar link. Contact owner assigned. Slack alert sent.

T+2 min: HubSpot task created for rep with lead summary (source, page history, company size if enriched).

T+5 min fallback: If no rep action, escalation ping to team lead.

T+10 min: If no rep response, automated "checking in" email with value-focused copy and calendar link.

Three segments, three different reactivation strategies.

Warm Dormant (31–90 days): Had engaged but gone quiet. "We have something new" sequence with content update relevant to original interest area. 4-touch, 14-day sequence.

Cold Dormant (91–180 days, prior MQL): Strong historic signals, no recent activity. "Has anything changed?" re-intro with light offer. 3-touch, 21 days. Non-engagers moved to suppression.

Churned/Stalled Opportunities: Quarterly re-engagement timed to business seasonality. Email from assigned rep (HubSpot sequences for personalization). Referenced original conversation and led with something new since last interaction.

The most valuable leads were often the ones already in the database.

Reactivating warm dormant produced qualified opportunities at a fraction of new acquisition cost. It's easy to keep chasing net-new. It's more efficient to re-earn attention from someone who already raised their hand.

The T+5 escalation ping was initially met with resistance from sales ("it makes us look reactive"). After two weeks of data showing significantly higher qualification rates on fast-response leads, the resistance disappeared.

What the brand sounds like — and why that matters at scale.

Voice archetype: The Trusted Local Expert. Knowledgeable without being academic. Direct without being transactional. Community-rooted without being parochial.

Tone spectrum: Campaigns lean warmer and more aspirational. Product content stays informative but conversational. Sales-assist content is credible and evidence-first.

Word choices matter: We say "workspace" not "office space." We say "your team" not "your workforce." We say "community" not "network." Every word signals whether you understand the people you're selling to.

Rooted in audience insight, written to stop the scroll.

Before vs. After — same brand, different energy.

Before:

After:

The rewrite trades passive language for a perspective. "Work feels different here" invites the prospect to find out if it's true. That's more compelling than a welcome mat.