Overview
The right context turns outreach into a reason to respond.
Elastic Path had already tried re-engaging closed-lost accounts with human-written outreach. That campaign produced no pipeline. When the team ran a closed-lost campaign through Swan, it produced pipeline and closed-won business, according to VP Marketing Brianne Thomas.
For Brianne, the difference is the context behind the message. Swan can draw on the account’s history, previous conversations, product information, and fresh signals to find a relevant reason to reach out. Sales receives the prepared draft in Slack, ready to review and send.
That shared GTM brain now serves customer success too. When a customer shows interest in a paid product feature, Swan combines the signal with HubSpot context and prepares outreach for the CSM. Marketing builds the plays, sales uses them, and CS can act from the same foundation.
The engine at a glance
- Engine A shared GTM brain for intent-informed outbound and product-triggered CS outreach.
- Outcome Closed-lost re-engagement now produces pipeline and wins; CS can act on product interest with context.
- Team Marketing and an embedded agency partner build the plays. Sales and CS review and send in Slack.
I like to think of Swan as my go-to-market brain. It's the center that controls and does different things, while the source of truth is still HubSpot.
Brianne Thomas
VP Marketing, Elastic Path
The challenge
Seven tools and 14 steps before a rep could send.
Preparing one outreach meant moving through seven tools and 14 manual steps, taking more than 30 minutes. Reps had to piece together account history, signals, and a relevant message before they could start the conversation.
The effort did not guarantee a result. An earlier closed-lost campaign produced $0 pipeline. Reopening a deal required understanding the previous conversation, what had changed, and why the account should engage again.
Customer success had to wait for the customer to make the next move. When someone explored a paid add-on, the product prompted them to contact their CSM. The team needed a way to act on that interest with the account history already reflected in the outreach.
The solution
Give every play the account context it needs.
Swan is the context and orchestration platform behind Elastic Path’s plays. HubSpot holds the customer history; PostHog and other signal sources show what is happening now. The shared GTM brain brings that context together with product knowledge and reusable outreach skills.
Brianne builds and adjusts plays through natural language, alongside an agency partner she treats as an embedded growth marketer. Swan researches the account and prepares the message; sellers and CSMs review it in Slack and decide what to send. Improvements to the shared skills become available to the people using those plays.
Systems, agents, and humans working together
- Systems HubSpot supplies account history. PostHog captures product interest; other sources add buyer intent. Slack brings the next action to the team.
- Agents Swan combines those signals with shared context and skills to research accounts and draft relevant outreach.
- Humans Brianne and her agency partner shape the plays. Sellers and CSMs review, adapt, and send the messages.
Who uses the GTM brain
Marketing, the agency, and sales build together.
Fourteen people across Elastic Path and its agency have used Swan. Marketing builds the plays with an embedded agency partner; sales leadership, reps, and customer success put them to work using the same account context, messaging, and skills.
Marketing & the agency
Brianne builds and adjusts plays using natural language. Her agency partner works as an embedded growth marketer, helping improve Swan workflows and test new signals.
Sales leadership
The SVP of Sales and Customer Success contributes a vertical playbook and uses a champion campaign in her own voice. Sales helps shape how the engine works.
Account executives
Reps receive account research and prepared outreach together in Slack. Brianne says they champion Swan and helped bring customer success into the workspace.
Customer success & marketing ops
CS receives product-interest alerts with outreach grounded in the customer’s history. Marketing operations maintains tracking and the background workflows that keep the engine running.
One GTM brain, useful on both sides of the sale.
The same account history and product knowledge support a seller reopening a lost deal and a CSM introducing an add-on. Each play draws on the shared context, while the person closest to the account decides what to send.
From any marketer who's tried to get a sales team to adopt a tool, you know it's not easy. Swan was.
Brianne Thomas
VP Marketing, Elastic Path
The use cases
How the engine works.
USE CASE 01
Stack the signals behind a personal first message
14 manual steps
reduced to review & send
Website visits, ad engagement, and Bombora intent give the team reasons to prioritize an account. Swan combines those signals with account research and shared messaging skills to draft outreach in the seller’s tone.
The draft arrives in Slack with the preparation already done. Brianne says the team now runs all outbound through Swan and sees higher email response rates than it did with its previous process. Reps keep the final review and send.
In their first full quarter using Swan, Elastic Path increased pipeline generation by 20%, attributed to their intent-informed outbound campaigns.
- Account signals
- Research & context
- Draft in rep’s tone
- Review in Slack
The number one thing people were impressed with was that you can give Swan all the context it needs to draft outreach that's actually effective.
Brianne Thomas
VP Marketing, Elastic Path
USE CASE 02
Reopen lost deals with a relevant reason to reconnect
Elastic Path revisited its closed-lost history with messages grounded in the previous conversation, what had changed, and recent company news. Swan gives each follow-up a specific reason to reconnect.
Brianne’s earlier campaign used human-written content and produced $0 pipeline. She reports that the Swan campaign produced both pipeline and closed-won business. Her explanation is straightforward: the automated campaign has the context it needs to make the message relevant.
- Closed-lost account
- History & fresh context
- Reason to reconnect
- Seller reviews & sends
USE CASE 03
Build once, then improve the way the team works
Brianne and her embedded agency partner build the plays alongside sales. Product context, messaging, and reusable skills give each person a starting point without requiring every rep to maintain the underlying workflow.
The same workspace supports daily LinkedIn spend alerts and bounced-email checks that research job changes, find updated contact details, and reassess account fit. These background plays help keep the team’s work current.
USE CASE 04
Act on product interest while the customer is exploring
Elastic Path offers paid add-on modules, including search. When a customer clicks on a relevant feature in the product, a PostHog signal now alerts the CSM and prompts Swan to draft a personal email. The team can follow up while the interest is fresh.
The GTM brain supplies the context that makes the message useful. Swan draws on recent conversations and HubSpot account information, including the customer’s current search provider, so the draft can connect the add-on to that customer’s situation.
The CSM receives the alert and prepared outreach in Slack, where they can review, approve, and send. A product click becomes a timely expansion conversation, with the account history already reflected in the message.
- Product interest in PostHog
- Customer context in HubSpot
- Personal outreach drafted
- CSM reviews in Slack
Now, if somebody clicks on something in our product that signals interest in a paid add-on, Swan alerts our customer success manager and drafts the outreach. Because it has the context of everything in HubSpot, it's a very personal email. We're an active player in the upsell instead of waiting for the customer to reach out
Brianne Thomas
VP Marketing, Elastic Path
The impact
An engine that wins business and a team that champions it.
The closed-lost result gives Brianne a concrete business outcome: a motion that had previously produced no pipeline now produces pipeline and closed-won business with Swan. She also reports higher email response rates, while the original workflow figures show 90% of outbound automated and 14 manual steps reduced to review and send.
Sales adoption helped the engine spread. Brianne says sellers champion Swan and told customer success how much they liked it, making it easier to introduce the new CS motion. Both teams can act on relevant signals using shared account context and prepared outreach.
For customer success, the immediate change is the ability to act on product interest proactively. At the time of the interview, the play was running, but no upsell had closed from it yet.
Before Swan
- Previous closed-lost campaign produced $0 pipeline
- Fourteen manual steps to prepare outreach
- Customers prompted to contact CS about add-ons
With Swan
- Swan campaign produced pipeline and closed-won business
- Researched drafts ready to review and send
- Product interest alerts CS with contextual outreach
