Case Study: Palo Alto Networks

From Twistlock to Palo Alto Networks: How TNS Helps Startups

The New Stack was a key piece of Twistlock’s marketing and growth strategy as a startup in the cloud native security space, leading up to its $410 million acquisition by Palo Alto Networks in 2019. Once it became part of PAN, the team immediately signed back on as a Platform Sponsor to help build the Prisma brand among The New Stack’s cloud native audience.

“The New Stack is a ‘go-to pub’ for our target audience of developers, DevOps, and engineers who are building and managing new stacks around the world that are built on open source technologies and distributed infrastructures.”

— Jeannie Christensen, Palo Alto Networks

Twistlock leveraged TNS as its partner to attract an organic audience beyond its own database and install base. Over two years of sponsorship, TNS sent almost 14,000 clicks to the Twistlock website. In the first half of 2019 alone, Twistlock contributed 15 articles to TNS that generated more than 61,000 pageviews. “The traffic that TNS drove, as well as the backlink strategy helped make us the most visited site in our competitor category, as well as driving authority to key pages so that we ranked in the top three on all the priority keywords related to our product,” said Jeannie Christensen, former marketing strategy director at Twistlock and current content and web strategy lead for Prisma Cloud at PAN.

They leveraged the Platform Sponsorship for multiple marketing efforts including contributed posts, podcasts, research, and “greenroom” interviews that were live streamed from the KubeCon North America and KubeCon Europe 2019 events and published on TNS.

Utilizing The New Stack’s proprietary analytics and analysis meant Twistlock could contribute content that was “topical and informative, but high level enough to get authentic interest and readership,” said Christensen. “We were able to tap into a built-in and highly engaged audience that The New Stack already has” while linking to key product details on the startup’s website.

Meghan Marks, senior director of Prisma marketing at Palo Alto Networks said, “Prior to the acquisition, we were able to learn more about Twistlock’s technology and thinking in The New Stack — and we saw industry interest in their product and approach. We’re thrilled to carry forward the TNS partnership, as it continues to help us reach our core audiences.”

Christensen added, “The New Stack just feels more authentic and a part of the larger cloud native, open source, and devops community and ecosystem. A lot of pubs are less focused on this collaborative spirit.”

After the acquisition, Twistlock introduced a series of Virtual Summits featuring cloud and DevOps evangelists sourced by both PAN marketers and the TNS team. Christensen said, “TNS expanded our ability to find diverse speakers and writers beyond our influencer network. We support their diversity and inclusion efforts 100 percent.”

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