
intelsat
telecom
Intelsat operates the world’s first Globalized Network, delivering high-quality, cost-effective video and broadband services anywhere in the world.

the challenge
Intelsat was struggling to shift their sales conversations away from having ‘feed and speeds’ discussions to those that really spoke to their customers’ specific business issues and concerns. Their biggest challenges revolved around gaining buy-in on the messaging direction from participants during internal workshops, creating related commercial insights for Intelsat audiences, then leveraging and promoting the adoption of that new messaging to their sales teams.
Intelsat, which sells megahertz bandwidth, is in a market that was gaining a lot of new entrants, and with this came a commoditization problem. “Everyone was starting to sound the same, with little differentiation,” said Lynette Simmons, director of marketing at Intelsat.
As soon as Intelsat launched a new product to the market, their competitors were quick to follow. This made it urgent, Simmons said, to shift the way the company marketed and sold its solutions. “We can’t assume with these audiences that we come in with this leadership position,” she said. “Instead, we have to start at the beginning of even answering the question of ‘why satellite?’”
In other words, to stand out and drive marketing-generated leads into the funnel, the company needed to transition to a more insights-driven, provocative messaging approach—and fast.
the solution
A two-day messaging workshop was used to build compelling messaging that created the buying vision and lead to a documented POV, conversation roadmap, and solution whiteboard. Create Value Skills training was then deployed to equip sales teams with the skills needed to keep customers focused on Intelsat differentiators and value—not price. After these activities, Intelsat engaged CVI’s Content Services to produce materials that reinforced the new messaging, including a sales playbook and customer-facing eBook.
Intelsat leveraged Corporate Visions’ Create Value Messages to change the way it developed and delivered their go-to market messages. A big part of that meant infusing an insights-driven approach and a distinct point of view into their messaging DNA. The positive impact of the investment in a common, repeatable approach to message and content development was felt first in the company’s demand generation programs, according to Simmons.
“Everything is trackable, and as we looked at the programs we’ve put in place, from open rates, to clickthrough rates, to actually filling leads into the funnel, it’s made a huge impact,” she said.
The insights-driven approach to message differentiation, as well as the company’s key positions and market messages, was something Simmons wanted all marketing team members at Intelsat to be fluent in. By getting her team steeped in their key differentiators, as determined by the cross-functional approach, this was something they achieved much faster than anticipated. In addition, Intelsat teams—and not just marketing—were required to attend Corporate Visions workshops that were critical to message development and delivery. Since then, increasing numbers of Intelsat executives are using the point of view (POV)—plus CVI brain science-based techniques—to have more engaging customer conversations.
“By partnering with Corporate Visions we were quickly able to train an entire marketing organization on the methodology and get to the finish line quickly,” Simmons said. In less than one year the entire team was following the methodology and executing 100 percent on their own.”
Simmons added: “[Corporate Visions] was awesome. Our facilitator helped us achieve cross-functional agreement on our messaging direction and made sure the team could support it with relevant business insights. And the related content CVI produced was beautiful and delivered as promised. We’re confident that we have the foundational skills to refresh [Corporate Visions] messaging so that it continues to resonate with customers. At the same time, we know we can look to CVI as an ongoing resource for messaging and content development.”
- Implemented a common, repeatable approach to messaging and content to drive pipeline, while training and certifying its entire marketing team on key differentiated market messages.
- Generated 40% outbound customer email opens and a 68% click-through rate with new message campaign.
- Created a complete marketing message and story in only two days that generated high internal adoption.
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