321% more leads and a 9:1 return for a cybersecurity consultancy

The challenge

ISI Defense serves one of the most defined and difficult-to-reach B2B audiences in existence: security officers and IT leaders at defense contractors navigating CMMC certification, NIST 800-171 compliance, and FSO requirements under real regulatory deadlines. The audience knows what it needs, distrusts generic marketing, and doesn't respond to high-pressure sales motions.

The competitive landscape compounds the difficulty. Well-funded players like Drata ($118k/month in search spend) and A-lign ($57k/month) dominate paid search auctions. ISI needed a program that could generate qualified pipeline without matching those budgets, which required getting both the content and the channels right simultaneously. Neither alone would be enough.

The approach

Big Sea and Cordelia Labs operate as an integrated team on ISI's engagement: Big Sea leads marketing strategy, content production, and campaign architecture; Cordelia leads media strategy, channel selection, and paid execution. That integration is what makes the program work. Every paid campaign is built around content purpose-made for the audience, and every content decision is informed by what the media data shows about buyer behavior and intent.

Big Sea developed a content program around ISI's two service lines — Managed Security Provider (MSP) and Managed Security Services (MSS) — producing gated assets mapped to compliance buyer stages: CMMC strategy guides, budget frameworks, NIST readiness assessments, and CUI playbooks. Landing pages were continuously tested and refined based on conversion data. Key findings shaped the entire program: PDF content at earlier buyer journey stages outperformed "schedule a consultation" CTAs; cleaner above-the-fold layouts converted better; MSP messaging outperformed CMMC-branded messaging for bottom-funnel calls to action.

Cordelia built paid media campaigns across Google, Bing, and LinkedIn structured around ISI's compliance frameworks — CMMC, NIST, FSO, CUI — with continuous keyword refinement and negative expansion on search, and precision role and company-size targeting on LinkedIn. After pausing LinkedIn mid-year to regroup on creative and audience strategy, Cordelia relaunched in December 2025 with competitive lookalike audiences and multiple creative variations. LinkedIn immediately became the highest-efficiency paid channel in the program, generating the majority of paid MQLs at a fraction of the cost of search.

The results

In 2025, the program delivered 965 MQLs — a 321% increase over 2024 and 69% above the annual goal. Overall site traffic grew 81% year-over-year to 137,957 sessions, with organic share of voice more than doubling as paid and organic reinforced each other across the same keyword territories. Big Sea and Cordelia's combined efforts influenced $1,989,257 in closed-won deal value from 61 deals, at a 9:1 return on total media investment.

In Q1 2026, monthly MQL volume accelerated well past the 2025 baseline. February delivered 287 MQLs, March hit 445, and April produced 415, each month running more than 600% above the monthly goal of 57. LinkedIn had by then become the dominant first-touch source for new MQLs, generating 82% of all paid MQLs in April using just 16% of the paid media budget. Lead quality improved alongside volume: MSS qualified MQL rate nearly doubled from Q1 to Q2 2026 as the content and targeting strategy matured.

In a market defined by regulatory complexity and buyer skepticism, what ISI built with Big Sea and Cordelia is a compounding demand engine. Each month of content, optimization, and audience refinement makes the next month more efficient.