Client Profile
Sunrise Manufacturing, located in Rancho Cordova, CA, provides load securement and transit protection products for businesses in North America. Products include void fillers, airbags, and corrugated packaging.
Business Situation
Sunrise Manufacturing purchased a rotary die cutter to diversify and complement its transit protection line of business. Some of its customers had a growing need for corrugated boxes and trays as they faced supply and capacity issues with their existing vendors. However, while the equipment opened new opportunities, the company’s management recognized that they had limited knowledge of the corrugated box market. They needed a partner with proven corrugated sales expertise, specifically new business development, to fully capitalize on their investment.
Sunrise reached out to Tyoga Container for a referral. Tyoga, an industry peer, had achieved significant success generating new opportunities for their corrugated packaging business by partnering with Athena SWC. Athena’s expertise in corrugated packaging and proven ability to drive business growth made them an appealing choice for Sunrise, particularly given the challenges of navigating a new market.
Trusting Tyoga’s recommendation and impressed with Athena’s track record, Sunrise engaged with Athena to help them market their new rotary die-cutting capability and further expand its transit protection line. The decision to partner with Athena was clear, without the need to explore other options.
Taking a Holistic Approach
Sunrise chose Athena’s inbound and outbound solution with sales coordination. The inbound marketing component included revamping the website and developing an SEO strategy to drive quality prospects to the website—the outbound component involved outreach to prospective targets and introducing Sunrise and its solution.
Building the Website Foundation
The website rebuild started as a launch pad (8 initial pages and additional added monthly) to kick off the program as quickly as possible. The current website needed to be optimized; there was no tracking or analytics. In the first year, the website was built up to 30 pages, and the team produced two monthly, keyword-rich, relevant blogs. The work focuses on optimizing content for search engines to increase organic traffic, and it is paying off.
“Our site was not optimized before. We had a Contact Us page, and that was about it. We didn’t have any way to track any information,” explained Matt Allen, Director of Sales Sunrise Manufacturing. “Now it’s 100 times better. We’ve got a lot of traffic, and with website visitor tracking, we can see what manufacturers have been on the site and decide if we should add them to the funnel and start doing outreach.”
Applying Corrugated Sales Expertise to Outbound Sales and Lead Generation
The outbound portion of the program involves generating lists of highly targeted companies, finding the decision makers in those companies, and reaching out via phone calls, personalized email, and monthly eblasts and enewsletters.
“They’re doing a pretty good job. They call prospects to generate interest, and as soon as they get some traction, they kick it to me to have one of our salespeople engage the prospect. We have had considerable wins, but most have been in our traditional business,” explained Matt.
Athena’s team acted as an extension of Sunrise’s sales force, coordinating meetings, managing CRM inputs, and following up with potential clients. The consistent cadence of outbound activity allowed Sunrise to maintain a steady pipeline of new opportunities—something their internal sales team often found challenging due to the demands of managing existing accounts.
Matt Allen shared, “Our internal sales team is fairly senior and has well-established territories. Their focus has traditionally been on maintaining existing accounts, often meaning they are not spending time doing prospecting activities. Athena’s involvement allowed us to maintain a steady cadence in outbound activity. Their entire job is to go out and find new activity, and then it’s up to us to bring it home once they’ve qualified and have the right opportunity.”
Sales Coordination and Ongoing Support
Sales coordination involves following up with leads where a quote was provided, but there has yet to be a response. Mikayla, the account manager at Athena, and her team will try to get a resolution, and if it is a lost opportunity, attempt to find out why.
“One of the greatest values is sales coordination. Mikayla and her team are very good at the follow-up and engaging with our reps to make sure activities are being done, and if they’re not being done, ask what the roadblocks are. They’re more than willing to take stuff back and rework it.”
The Results
Matt reflected on the partnership’s development over the last year, understanding the importance of patience. The revamped website resulted in increased web traffic, enhanced search engine rankings, and improved visibility—all key metrics that were previously lacking.
“We knew year one was to build out some infrastructure and revamp the website, and we realized we weren’t going to see a lot of revenue generation in the first 12 months. We have a good cadence now that most of the infrastructure is built. We are starting to see some nominal success. The engagement has been positive for the business; we’re getting the word out, and our website is optimized now. The next 6 to 8 months is going to be critical,” said Matt.