‘More Than a Platform’: How Juniper Networks Uses Zoom to Enhance Customer Experience and Build a Community

Founded in 1996, Juniper Networks provides the physical infrastructure as well as the software services that help make the internet run. The networking company’s mission is to “power connections, empower change” — helping customers leverage the internet to access key resources, drive innovation, and more.

Striving to create connections and a meaningful experience with customers, the organization needed a platform that would keep pace and support this mission. 

Challenge

Juniper Networks struggled to manage multiple collaboration solutions across both external and internal communications. For the Juniper sales organization, employees needed to connect with customers on a platform that makes sense for them, especially with the COVID-19 pandemic forcing teams to rapidly shift toward remote environments.

About two weeks after stay-at-home orders went into effect, Hang Black, VP of Global Revenue Enablement, knew the team needed to immediately streamline communications, posing the question, “Who can service the sales team at volume and scale quickly?”

Solution 

For Black and team, Zoom’s ease of use was precisely what they needed to deliver an effective and intuitive experience for her stakeholders. 

“It was the ease of use and familiarity — Zoom is pervasive. It’s a common tool used across all enterprises and verticals because there’s a lower barrier of entry for access to everyone,” Black said.

Tony Holzhey, Juniper Networks’ Senior IT Director, knew Zoom was a necessity for the team’s agility. He said, “Zoom is widely known in the marketplace — [sales] really needed to be out in front of the client base with something they knew, could use, and adapt quickly with.” By adopting licenses for almost a third of the company, Holzhey wanted to equip any customer-facing job function — marketing, sales, customer service, and support — with the right solutions to serve customers. Zoom even helped both external and internal support departments connect with users to easily remediate issues in real-time. 

For Black, it was critical to create an experience for the sales team itself, as she quickly moved to digitize enablement programs in the face of social distancing.

“How do I keep the sales teams engaged in a fully virtual environment?” she wondered. With Zoom, Black was able to create an engaging and grounded enablement experience, using features like polls, filters, and Breakout Rooms to foster interaction within the teams.

The Zoom platform has even enabled Juniper Networks to expand its reach in terms of customer engagement. 

“We record all of our customer conversations and all of our virtual events on Zoom right now. It’s enabling us to reach a global audience,” said Sarah Lesway-Ball, Senior Director of Global Experience Marketing. Lesway-Ball added that the adoption of Zoom has already proved its worth. “We got a lot of value out of it because it enabled us to be agile.” 

By using Zoom Meetings, Zoom Team Chat, and Zoom Webinars for customer-facing communications, Juniper Networks can deliver on their promise of experience-first networking.

Results

“Virtual engagement for sales has been exponentially better because of Zoom and the functions that it has provided us for collaboration,” Black said. Zoom helped Juniper Networks open new doors to opportunities, empowering the team to easily connect with potential candidates, colleagues, and customers. 

When thinking about the future of events and other customer engagement opportunities, Lesway-Ball said, “Moving forward, we anticipate having a hybrid engagement strategy. Our customers want a variety of ways to engage with us, so we will meet them where they are.” 

Ultimately, there’s been “virtual community building that’s been spurred by Zoom,” Lesway-Ball noted. The platform’s accessibility has brought people together in a way that transcends the technology itself. “It’s more than a platform,” Lesway-Ball added.