About the client
Mentra bridges the gap between neurodivergent professionals and employers, helping corporations develop better ways of hiring people. Its employee offering allows corporations to have access to a pool of neurodivergent professionals for different departments such as software, AI, machine learning, cybersecurity, user experience, sales, and marketing. Mentra also works alongside enterprises on neuroinclusive hiring, talent pathways and workforce programs.
As Mentra looked to expand its presence among larger organizations, the challenge was not to secure more prospects. The team needed to get in front of the people who could actually influence hiring and talent decisions: senior HR leaders, Talent Acquisition teams, People leaders and Executives responsible for workplace inclusion.
IncX worked with Mentra to build and test an outbound GTM system across several channels. This included LinkedIn outreach, podcast invitations, newsletter acquisition and high-touch account-based outreach.
The approach was deliberately test-led. Rather than assuming that one message or one channel would work across the entire enterprise market, we tested different audiences, offers and signals to see where Mentra could get the strongest engagement.
The Problem Statement
Reaching Enterprise HR and Talent leaders through conventional outbound is notoriously difficult. IncX had to devise a strategic workaround to cut through the noise.Senior executives face a constant stream of generic pitches.
To ensure Mentra didn’t get lost in the noise, our outreach had to achieve two things simultaneously: target the exact right stakeholders and give them a compelling, undeniable reason to respond.
To build a highly optimized Go-To-Market (GTM) playbook, we designed our campaign to answer five critical questions:
Persona Fit: What are the most relevant HR & Talent personas that will resonate with Mentra’s value proposition?
Industry Need: In what industries do we see the most urgency around neurodiversity?
Intent Trigger: Can the fact that a company has recently been hiring act as a strong conversion intent trigger?
Friction Reduction: Do C-level individuals prefer high-friction sales calls or value-based low-friction introduction opportunities?
Account Penetration: Is there an opportunity to use an initial call to get introductions to decision makers?
Answering these core questions formed the foundation of our successful GTM program.
We built the program around four complementary motions: LinkedIn testing, podcast-led outreach, newsletter acquisition and targeted ABM. Each channel served a different purpose.
LinkedIn allowed us to experiment with audiences and messaging on a large scale.
Podcast outreach offered an easier way to begin engaging with top-level executives. Newsletter acquisition gave interested prospects a way to stay connected without immediately entering a sales process.
For priority accounts, ABM allowed us to slow down and work the account more carefully.
Step 1: Testing Personas and Verticals
We began by testing senior HR audiences across different industries rather than treating HR as one broad segment. The early campaigns gave us a clear difference in engagement.
The Cyber & Risk campaign achieved a 24.1% acceptance rate, while Creative Media / MarTech reached 30.0%.
These results helped us narrow the audience down and continue to test around specific industries and seniority levels.
The objective at this stage was not to find one winning campaign and stop the exercise altogether. It was to understand which combinations of persona, industry and message gave Mentra the best starting point for an enterprise conversation.
Step 2: Testing Hiring Activity as an Intent Signal
We also tested recent hiring activity as a potential signal for prioritising accounts.
The thinking was rather straightforward: Companies that were actively hiring could have a more immediate need around talent acquisition and therefore be more likely to engage with Mentra and its talent pool.
The campaign went on to achieve a 7.1% acceptance rate, which was significantly lower than the stronger persona and vertical campaigns.
The results gave us a clearer picture of hiring activity by itself and helped us realise that it was not a strong enough reason to contact someone. It could help identify an account, but the outreach still needed to be relevant to the person and the company's specific context.
Step 3: Using Podcast Outreach to Start Senior-Level Conversations
The podcast became one of the strongest parts of the program.
Rather than asking senior HR leaders to take a sales call, we invited relevant executives and influential professionals to participate in a conversation.
This gave prospects a different reason to engage with Mentra. The first interaction was not a product pitch. It was an invitation to discuss work, hiring and the changing workplace.
The Influential Personas campaign generated a 15.0% message reply rate and 9 interested leads.
A separate HR Executive campaign reached a 12.3% reply rate at an early stage.
This approach also created opportunities that went beyond the initial campaign response. If the senior executive became involved in the discussion, there would be a chance for the relationship to continue further, either to record an interview or even meet someone else within the organization.
Step 4: Building a Newsletter Audience
Not every relevant prospect was ready for a sales conversation.
Instead of treating that as a dead end, we used newsletter outreach to give interested prospects another way to stay connected with Mentra.
Approximately 20 subscribers were directly attributed to outbound, contributing to an active newsletter base of 48 subscribers.
This created another layer in the GTM system. Prospects who were not ready to engage directly could still enter Mentra's audience and continue hearing from the company over time.
Step 5: Testing a Direct TA Demo Approach
We also tested a more conventional sales motion with the TA Demo Track.
The campaign achieved a 28.9% connection acceptance rate, showing that the audience was willing to connect. The message reply rate was only 5.1%, giving us an effective comparison with podcast campaigns.
The direct sales approach was effective at generating connections, but the relationship-led podcast approach generated stronger engagement once the connection had been made.
That distinction proved to be important in determining how to prioritize our efforts.
Step 6: Moving to High-Touch ABM for Priority Accounts
For strategic enterprise accounts, we deviated from standard campaign outreach to focus on a highly targeted approach.
The team drafted 184 tailored enterprise emails, which included 71 emails across 21 priority ICP accounts and 113 emails to warm, highly relevant prospects.
Follow-up was handled based on the account and the response. This included referrals, calls, scheduling and introductions to other stakeholders.
Our goal wasn't just to generate another outbound reply; for a large enterprise, securing an internal introduction to the right team is often far more valuable than a single positive response.
This approach gave us room to work accounts individually and follow where the conversation actually led.
Results
Across the different outreach motions, the program produced:
1,807 Connection requests (Across 7 LinkedIn snapshots)
360 Connections accepted (19.9% weighted acceptance)
33 Message replies (9.5% weighted response rate)
19 Interested leads (Across HeyReach snapshots)
184 High-touch emails (Manual enterprise outreach)
11 Confirmed positive outcomes (Positive responses / podcast agreements)
29 Documented response records (Including referrals & warm outcomes)
~20 Newsletter subscribers (Directly attributed to outbound)
What Worked Best
Creative Media / MarTech HR: 30.00% acceptance rate; 11.10% reply rate; strongest early persona + vertical validation.
Influential Personas Podcast: 18.40% acceptance rate; 15.00% reply rate; highest reply rate among larger campaigns; relationship-led access.
HR Exec. Podcast: 19.20% acceptance rate; 12.30% reply rate; senior-enterprise engagement through a low-friction offer.
TA Demo Track: 28.90% acceptance rate; 5.10% reply rate; strong connection rate, with fewer message responses.
Newsletter Invite: 19.00% acceptance rate; 3.00% reply rate; audience acquisition / nurture rather than immediate conversation.
The outreach also created conversations and introductions across a number of large organizations.
Enterprise Outcomes
Uber: interest in the podcast.
Google: interest followed by an internal handoff to the central People Operations function.
Disney: podcast agreements.
Wayfair: calendar shared and recording scheduled.
Accenture: podcast recordings and agreements across multiple contacts.
JPMorgan: internal assistance offered.
PNC, Nuro, University of Connecticut and Bender Consulting Group: podcast agreements.
Aira: preparation call completed.
SEON and Zühlke Group: referrals to relevant People and Talent leadership.
Affinity Global: direct contact information and availability provided.
The important shift: The cold outbound approach was a tool for establishing business connections and gaining inside access rather than just a means of obtaining maximum responses.
A response might result in a podcast, a podcast might result in another stakeholder, a discussion with one person might result in an internal introduction and this was precisely how things played out in a number of these cases!
What We Found
When targeting senior HR and Talent leadership, seniority alone didn't move the needle. A VP of Talent Acquisition at a scaling tech firm faces entirely different bottlenecks than one at a traditional enterprise.
Success ultimately hinged on a precise intersection of industry nuances, specific role functions, and narrative alignment. The top-performing campaigns were never the broadest ones; they were the campaigns where the core message directly mapped to a specific priority on that leader's immediate radar.
Intent Signals Require a Narrative Context: On paper, using recent hiring activity to prioritize accounts seemed like the most rational decision to make. However, a 7.1% acceptance rate quickly proved that data signals are useless without context. A hiring trigger can tell you which company is growing, but it cannot write the pitch. The outreach still had to answer the most critical, human question: Why should this specific executive care about Mentra right now?
Low-Friction Conversations Unlocked More Enterprise Doors : The data highlighted a stark contrast between a direct pitch and a collaborative invitation. While our TA Demo Track secured a strong 28.9% connection rate, it stalled out with a minor 5.1% reply rate. Meanwhile, the Influential Personas and HR Executive podcast campaigns sparked 15.0% and 12.3% reply rates, respectively. For time-starved enterprise executives, lowering the friction of the first step created the necessary breathing room to build trust and develop a genuine relationship meant to last.
Enterprise Sales Demand "Land & Expand" Patience: In large enterprise accounts, success is rarely linear. Our Account-Based Marketing (ABM) framework proved that a single contact is just the entry point. The real value emerged post-connection through internal referrals, handoffs to adjacent stakeholders, and multi-threaded follow-ups. We had to redefine what "success" looked like—recognizing that a campaign's value isn't just about whether the first contact books a demo, but how effectively it opens up the broader organization.
Building an Interconnected GTM Ecosystem: Ultimately, the program demonstrated that sustainable enterprise growth relies on a multi-channel engine where different assets play distinct roles:
LinkedIn served as our rapid testing ground for persona validation and top-of-funnel connections.
Podcast Outreach provided a high-status, value-first hook for senior leaders.
The Newsletter acted as a long-term nurture loop, keeping warm prospects engaged in Mentra's orbit.
Strategic ABM gave our team the tactical flexibility required to navigate complex enterprise accounts over time.
Instead of hunting for a silver-bullet campaign, combining these channels created a comprehensive, resilient enterprise GTM process.
IncX helped Mentra build and test a multi-channel enterprise GTM system that simultaneously catered to senior HR, People and Talent audiences.
The program generated 1,807 connection requests, 360 accepted connections, 33 message replies and 19 interested leads, alongside approximately 20 newsletter subscribers directly attributed to outbound. The team also carried out 184 high-touch enterprise emails across priority accounts and warm prospects.
More importantly, the work created opportunities across companies including Google, Uber, Disney, Accenture, JPMorgan, Wayfair and Nuro, with several conversations progressing through referrals, internal handoffs, podcast agreements and additional stakeholders.
The biggest outcome was a clearer picture of how Mentra should approach the enterprise market.
A direct Talent Acquisition message could generate connections.
A podcast invitation could create a stronger conversation with senior executives.
A newsletter could keep interested prospects engaged when they were not ready for a sales conversation.
For priority accounts, a more manual ABM approach created room to build relationships beyond the first contact.
The result wasn’t one outbound campaign that worked better than everything else. It was a GTM system that gave Mentra different ways to reach the right people, start conversations and stay connected as those relationships developed.
