Case Study for Defense.Net

12<

After start of client-agency relationship, months until Defense.Net was acquired by F5

30+

Top-tier media features

4

Industry awards

Background

 

When the agency began working with Defense.Net, the company was in stealth mode and had no customers or name recognition.  A core focus in Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) mitigation services brought it into a crowded market with three dominant players—Verisign, Akamai and Prolexic.  As a result, differentiation, as well as creative and aggressive PR, would be critical to success.  The objectives of our partnership were to establish market visibility, thought leadership and to drive sales via IT, networking and security decision makers at large enterprises. Defense.Net originally approached the agency based on Jay Adelson’s recommendation. Adelson is a four-time former client of the Karbo team–he was a founder of Digg, Revision3 and Equinix and was the CEO of SimpleGeo.

Approach

 

The agency began the relationship with a strategic positioning process that helped articulate the company’s core differentiation from the existing players in the market.  The positioning focused on how the team of DDoS experts was assembled, as well as how new technologies developed by Defense.Net were best positioned to mitigate the new generation of sophisticated DDoS attacks that were regularly disrupting the operations of the largest banks and enterprises.

The agency also developed a launch plan that focused on positioning the company in the context of the top trends and issues in the DDoS market.  The goal was to secure widespread coverage in enterprise-focused media and gain the support of the top market analysts.  The team embarked on a two-tiered strategy beginning with the launch of the company, followed by the introduction of the company’s first product a month later.  Ongoing coverage was secured by inserting Defense.Net into conversations around regular attacks, and via contributed articles, social media, industry awards and top tier security conferences.

The Karbo team began aggressively pitching the enterprise, technology, financial and security trade press, scheduling interviews with top journalists and bloggers.  Coverage in top tier press was extensive and Defense.Net met with the top analysts in enterprise security.  The team also secured a position as a Top Ten Finalist at RSA in the Innovation Sandbox.  This exposure created awareness, generated leads and most importantly, gave Defense.Net the credibility and stature needed to sell their services to banks and large enterprises that are typically skeptical of unproven technology startups.

Results

 

Below is a partial list of publications the team secured coverage in as well as awards and industry recognition.  After close to a year of working together and a high level of success, Defense.Net was acquired by F5.

A sampling of media placements for Defense.Net:

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