How Sereno Achieved 12+ High-Quality Meetings with CXOs in 21 Days by Positioning Their Value Beyond “IT Support”

BEFORE: Deep Expertise, But Generic Perception in the Market

• 💼Perceived as “Just Another MSP”: Despite offering advanced Microsoft 365 security and hybrid workplace enablement, many prospects lumped them in with generic IT support vendors.
• 🚪Struggled to Break into the Right Rooms: Sereno needed to get in front of CIOs, CTOs, and Heads of Ops — not just junior IT staff — but didn’t have a clear path.
• 📩Low Engagement from Outbound: Their previous outbound efforts were bland and undifferentiated, resulting in poor open rates and near-zero replies.
• 🔄Relying Too Heavily on Referrals: While they had loyal clients, word-of-mouth alone wasn’t fueling consistent growth — especially for their modern workplace and cybersecurity offerings.

THE TURNING POINT: Messaging and Motion That Matched the Modern Buyer

We collaborated with Sereno to move their positioning from “support provider” to strategic enabler of secure, hybrid IT environments — and built an outbound system that reflected that shift.

🔍 Ideal Customer Deep Dive

• UK-based SMEs in finance, legal, and professional services
• Firms with 50–250 employees, managing a hybrid or remote workforce
• Companies using Microsoft 365 but lacking layered security or compliance controls
• Excluded startups with no infrastructure or those entrenched with larger MSPs

🧠 Reframed Messaging: From Reactive Support to Strategic Partnership

• Problem Hooks: “Worried about Microsoft 365 data exposure?” / “Still relying on VPNs and hoping it’s enough?”
• Solution Framing: “We harden Microsoft environments to CIS benchmarks and reduce IT incidents by 40% — without needing to rip anything out.”
• Tone: Calm, credible, and confident — built to resonate with busy operational leaders, not just IT managers.

⚙️ Smart Outreach Execution Using Clay + Smartlead

• Scraped and enriched contact data from Clutch, UK directories, and LinkedIn filters using Clay
• Targeted CTOs, CIOs, and Ops Heads in regulated industries with exposed attack surfaces
• Used Smartlead.io to run multi-touch cold email flows with custom first lines, based on LinkedIn activity and tech stack
• Every message felt one-to-one — not spammy or mass-blasted

📊 Tracking and Iteration

• Email opens, click-throughs, replies
• Best-performing messaging variants
• Decision-makers who engaged but didn’t convert (for retargeting later)

AFTER: Strategic Conversations with the Right People, Fast

• 📞12+ qualified meetings with C-level and senior IT decision-makers
• 📬35%+ reply rate, significantly higher than industry average
• 🔒Inbound interest generated through outbound, as execs forwarded emails internally
• 💼3 deals entered proposal stage, one with a multi-office UK finance firm

WHAT’S NEXT FOR SERENO?

• Focus on cybersecurity bundles for hybrid environments
• Expand into public sector tenders and regulated verticals
• Pair outbound with thought leadership content on Microsoft ecosystem best practices

Sereno isn’t just growing leads — they’re building strategic trust at the executive level, where real IT change begins.