This three-generation family business, originally run by Alan Eccles, followed by his son Roger Eccles, and now grandson Adam Eccles, developed an envious reputation in the drainage industry for its quality engineering of ductile iron and composite access covers, gully grates and surface boxes.

Having competed so successfully over the decades using traditional promotional methods, the company were now keen to embrace today’s fast-paced digital landscape, and to modernise their brand and corporate image.

In the initial meetings it was clear that Eccles were ambitious to embrace a new digital arena. The consultation process formalised many areas that the company could enhance and modernise, including refreshing its corporate identity, developing a new suite of promotional literature, implementing a new website design, and competing better across social media and other digital platforms.

This resulted in the creation of a fully costed Strategic Marketing Plan with actionable intelligence and agreed timelines.

Since the company’s logo was long-established and respected in the industry, after review we decided to refresh rather than redesign it. To modernise the brand our graphic designers tweaked its look and feel, introducing rounder edges, a cleaner font and the additions of TM and R marks. We also created a new strapline to succinctly state the company’s proposition: a movement away from selling ‘products’ towards offering ‘solutions’.

To complement the brand refresh, 35 product logos were also created in this similar style so that each product could have its own identity tied into the parent brand.

With a new corporate logo and product branding suite complete, a full brand audit was then undertaken across all digital and physical channels so that the old logos could be replaced by the new versions.

To help create a stronger online presence and to drive leads into the business, the next strategic objective was to design and implement a new website. The company wanted a shop window to showcase the many products that they sell, but also to position themselves as an industry leader and authority within the world of drainage.

To achieve this we created a stunning new design that incorporated slick rolling graphics, video, aspirational imagery and a progressive storyboard to capture prospects’ interest in the company and push them further down the sales funnel.

We created clear delineations between the company’s products, services and divisions, as well as focusing heavily on the About section, packing it full of history, heritage and testimonial; drawing off the company’s unique longevity in the industry ahead of its competitors.

We also created a Technical Hub, full of industry-leading content so that the website would become a destination site as well as capturing rich SEO from well-searched terms.

An important part of the strategic marketing plan was to create new literature for the sales teams to utilise in order to better capture customers’ attention and convert opportunities.

Our graphic designers created a new suite of modern literature to complement the new brand, including: a corporate brochure, product directory, product pocket guide, ESG policy, business cards and more.

These were printed on high quality stock with a spot uv finish.

Previously, the company were not active on any social media channels. After review we decided to create online profiles on LinkedIn and YouTube, the channels where we knew our target audience frequented.

We focused on creating and deploying organic content to build a new audience naturally – using case studies, testimonials, customer photos, videos – and within three years we saw a 1805% increase in the number of followers to the company’s profile page on LinkedIn.

The use of video is so important across today’s digital landscape; to promote a company, to tell its brand story, or to highlight specific product features and benefits.

We knew this was an important medium for Eccles to utilise, so we created a library of new videos for the company, including first-person customer case studies as well as animated ‘explainer’ videos using the latest 3D rendering software packages.

We worked alongside several high profile clients, including Tower Bridge, where we filmed a custom-designed batch of manhole covers being installed on London’s world famous bridge landmark.

We surveyed a large sample of Eccles’ customer base to determine what gifts or goodies they would most prefer. For office use respondents wanted pens and note blocks. For on-site work they wanted tape measures.

Sourcing the highest quality, most cost-effective solutions, we produced a gift box of branded goodies that were sent to key customers as part of a wider retention strategy.

This activity acted as a great ice-breaker for the sales teams to phone, visit and reconnect with customers and to cement a new pipeline of opportunity.

A key activity to support the Eccles’ sales team was to attend various industry events, including roadshows, breakfast meetings and trade exhibitions.

We created a series of pop-up banners and event spaces, designed to be portable and reusable from one event to another. This enabled the sales team to become self-sufficient in attending events and getting in front of key decision makers.

To generate extra leads for the company we created a monthly Email Marketing Plan, sending carefully-crafted digital content to a segmented database of target customers.

This included notifying customers about the latest special offers, discounts and incentives, as well as informing about the company’s upcoming plans and new product developments.

We found this to be a very successful way of getting the Eccles brand in front of customers, keeping the company at the heart of conversations, and ensuring that customers received a stellar experience interacting with the brand.

Typical metrics for this activity averaged at 30% Open Rate and 18% Click-Through Rate.

Measurement is a crucial element of modern marketing to understand which communications, channels, messages and activities have worked, and which have not.

We collated the data and feedback from across all our marketing activities to create a bespoke dashboard which was reported to the Board of Directors for discussion each month.

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I’ve been using Starlight for years now. They have elevated our marketing to an exceptional standard!

Jim is very down-to-earth and easy to work with.

Adam Eccles, Managing Director
ECCLES UK FOUNDRIES LTD