Background
Rivet B2B supplies industrial components to manufacturers across North America. Their digital marketing program had grown organically over years—multiple agencies, overlapping campaigns, and reporting that stopped at form fills instead of revenue.
The challenge
Rivet was generating traffic but not enough qualified pipeline. Campaigns were structured by product line rather than buyer intent, and bidding ignored downstream CRM data. Sales complained about lead quality while marketing pointed to rising click volume. The disconnect was structural, not tactical.
Specific pain points included:
- High spend on informational queries that never converted
- Duplicate keywords across brand and non-brand campaigns
- No visibility from click to closed-won in Salesforce
- Ad copy focused on specs, not buyer outcomes
Our approach
NexisBlue began with a full account audit and sales alignment workshop. We mapped keyword themes to buying stages—problem-aware research, vendor comparison, and ready-to-quote intent—and rebuilt campaign architecture accordingly.
Implementation unfolded in three phases over two quarters:
- Phase 1 — Foundation: Conversion tracking linked to Salesforce opportunities, negative keyword consolidation, and search term analysis by intent tier
- Phase 2 — Restructure: New campaign groups by intent, refreshed ad copy with use-case messaging, landing page alignment for top themes
- Phase 3 — Optimization: Value-based bidding for segments with sufficient conversion volume, weekly search term reviews, and sales feedback loops on lead quality
Technical integration
We connected Google Ads offline conversion imports so bids optimized toward qualified opportunities—not just MQLs. Sales stage updates fed back into platform learning. Dashboards gave marketing and sales shared vocabulary on pipeline contribution.
The results
- 47% increase in qualified pipeline within two quarters
- 33% reduction in cost per lead while lead quality scores improved
- Clear visibility from click to closed-won deal
- Reallocation of 22% of budget from low-intent themes to high-intent winners
Key learnings
B2B search success depends on CRM-integrated bidding and sales alignment—not keyword volume alone. Rivet now runs a search program aligned to revenue, with quarterly reviews that treat search as a pipeline channel, not a traffic channel.
What's next
Rivet is expanding the model to Microsoft Ads and testing account-based search overlays for named enterprise targets.
