Fixing Attribution and Rebuilding the GTM Architecture

The Client

Xlera Solutions is an FPGA and embedded systems consultancy serving aerospace, defense, and industrial markets. Their team carries deep expertise in Xilinx and Intel FPGA platforms, real-time signal processing, and ITAR-controlled programs of record. They win on technical depth — the kind of consultancy that gets called when a tier-1 defense prime needs a hard problem solved, not when a client wants a commodity engineering team.

Their revenue model depends on two streams: NRE (non-recurring engineering) contracts from direct defense relationships, and design-win-based commercial engagements with systems integrators and OEMs. Both require serious domain credibility and a pipeline of qualified conversations. Neither of which a generic marketing firm can build for a consultancy operating inside ITAR-controlled domains.

The Challenge

When Xlera came to Influential B2B, they had three compounding problems.

Invisible spend. A $10,500+ Google Ads account was running with zero tracked conversions. There was no way to connect a dollar of ad spend to a qualified conversation, much less a won program. The marketing budget was invisible to the business.

Positioning that undersold the capability. Their go-to-market message was “We do FPGA projects.” Technically accurate. Commercially catastrophic. It positioned Xlera as an outsourced execution team — a cost centre competing on rate — rather than what they actually are: a commercialization partner for firms taking an FPGA-based product from prototype to program of record. The difference in pricing power and relationship dynamic between those two positions is significant.

No pipeline infrastructure. There was no system for building, tracking, or converting a pipeline of qualified FPGA buyers. Business development relied on referrals and existing relationships — high-quality inputs, but not scalable, and with no visibility into what was working or why.

The Approach

Foundation: Fix Measurement Before Touching Spend

The first move was not to add more marketing activity. It was to audit what existed and stop the damage. We suspended the Google Ads account, rebuilt conversion tracking from scratch, and applied source tagging to every pipeline entry going forward. No qualified engagement can be properly evaluated without clean attribution. This is non-negotiable before any new budget moves.

In parallel, we rebuilt the positioning. The shift from “We do FPGA projects” to “We commercialize FPGA products” is more than wordsmithing. It changes the entry point of every sales conversation. Commercialization partners sit alongside the product roadmap. Engineering subcontractors sit in the procurement queue. One of those relationships commands three to five times the fee of the other — and attracts a fundamentally different buyer.

Architecture: Target the Right Accounts, Not More Accounts

With attribution fixed and positioning clarified, we designed the account targeting infrastructure. The right segments for Xlera are not broad-spectrum technology buyers. They are defense primes and systems integrators with active FPGA programs who need a partner capable of navigating ITAR requirements, managing program-of-record timelines, and delivering design wins that survive the transition from prototype to production.

We also opened a government channel via SOCOM relationships that had previously been untapped — a high-probability, high-value segment that Xlera’s technical depth makes them uniquely qualified to serve, and one that referral-dependent business development had not systematically reached.

Build: Assets Written for FPGA Practitioners

A repositioned capability overview, a targeted outreach sequence, and a lead magnet — all written in the language of FPGA practitioners, not generic technology marketing. The assets needed to pass a technical credibility test from an engineering lead at a defense prime before they could move a conversation forward.

The lead magnet was an eBook positioned at the commercialization stage of the buying journey: the moment an FPGA consultancy’s client has a validated design and needs to think about production, scale, and program sustainability. That is exactly the conversation Xlera is built to have — and the asset reached the right people at the right moment. 48 opt-ins from a single cohort at this level of audience specificity is a strong signal.

We also executed a book launch for Jesse that placed him on the Amazon Best Sellers list. For a technical founder in a trust-driven, relationship-first market, being a published author in your domain does something no ad campaign can replicate — it makes every subsequent conversation start from a position of established authority. Buyers who might take six months to warm up to a cold outreach will read a chapter first.

Release: Clean Pipeline, Clear Signal

We pruned 91 stale opportunities from the CRM. Not a comfortable exercise, but a necessary one. A pipeline carrying dead deals from 18 months ago is a noise machine — leadership cannot make resourcing decisions, prioritisation calls, or accurate revenue forecasts from it. The pruned, source-tagged pipeline gave Xlera’s leadership a clean working view for the first time.

Every new conversation entering the pipeline from that point carried its origin with it.

The Results

• 287 qualified, opted-in contacts built across target account segments — from zero
• $0 wasted ad spend after full attribution rebuild on a $10,500+ account
• 91 stale opportunities pruned — clean, source-tagged pipeline established
• 48 eBook opt-ins from a single cohort in the FPGA commercialization segment
• Government channel opened via SOCOM relationships, adding a new high-probability vertical to active pipeline
• Amazon Best Sellers list — Jesse’s book launch, executed as part of the engagement, placed him as a published authority in the FPGA commercialization space

What Made It Work

Two decisions drove the outcome.

Measurement first, spend never. Every instinct in marketing pushes toward “do more” — more ads, more content, more outreach. We pushed the opposite direction. You cannot make good decisions about where to put resources if you don’t know where revenue is coming from. Three weeks of attribution work before any new spend moved was the highest-leverage investment in the engagement.

The positioning shift did more commercial work than any campaign could. “We commercialize FPGA products” changes who you attract, what they’re willing to pay, and how the relationship starts. Xlera didn’t need a bigger audience. They needed a more precisely positioned message in front of the right audience. That is a strategy problem, not a spend problem. Solving it unlocked everything else.

“What we built wasn’t just a pipeline — it was the infrastructure to understand where that pipeline comes from. That’s what we didn’t have before.”

— Jesse Beeson, CEO, Xlera Solutions