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Domain Expertise
Engage PR
specializes in promoting category-making and category-breaking technologies
that have had a profound impact on the enterprise and carrier markets. With
this issue of InsidEPR, we are
starting a series of articles that highlight the depth of our experience in
some of today's key technologies.
Winning
Strategy Helps Clients Gain Industry Honors
At year-end,
publications choose the top technologies, products, services, and companies
of the past 12 months. For a startup company, awards can demonstrate technology
and industry leadership. Private companies may find it easier to get more
funding. An honor can elevate a company above a competitive market or
influence a purchase decision.
Because public relations can influence award givers, Engage PR starts working
with its clients months in advance to help ensure
they are top of mind. As part of the on-going PR program, account teams
maintain a matrix of awards and influencers, and regularly promote clients
while arranging for key client executives to interview and meet influencers
in person. Engage PR helps clients write carefully crafted, jargon-free
award submissions that clearly describe the company, its technology, its
product or service, and the benefits of using the product or service. The
agency also works to secure third-party references and may ask clients'
venture capitalists to approve and submit the applications.
The hard work paid off this year; a record number of Engage PR clients won
industry awards and honors at the end of 2005.
InfiniRoute
Light Reading's Leading Lights
Award for Best New Service, Private Company
Service Provider Weekly's Top 50 Vendors in
2005
NetDevices
IT Week's Top 50 Technology
Innovators of 2005
Service Provider Weekly's Top 50 Vendors in 2005
Network Chemistry
IT Week's Top 50 Technology
Innovators of 2005
EE Times' "Company to Watch" in the "Creators'
List"
Network World's Signature Series Finalist for Best Wireless Product
Reviewed in 2005
Nevis Networks
EE Times' "Company to
Watch" in the "Creators' List"
IT Week's Top 50 Technology Innovators of 2005
Red Herring's 10 Private Security Companies to Watch.
NexTone
IT Week's Top 50 Technology
Innovators of 2005
Service Provider Weekly's Top 50 Vendors in 2005
Reconnex
IT Week's Top 50 Technology
Innovators of 2005
A MoneyTreeTM FutureCentricSM
Company
Info Security's Hot Company Award 2006
SC Magazine's Awards Finalist for "Best Security Solution for
Governments"
InfoWorld's Excellent Rating in product review
InfoWorld 100 - Maimonides Medical Center's Deployment of Reconnex's ERM Technology
Strix
IT Week's Top 50 Technology
Innovators of 2005
Internet Telephony's Product of the Year 2005
Network
Chemistry's Year Ends With a Bang
Network
Chemistry is the industry standard for the security of wireless networks,
data, and users. Engage PR began working with Network Chemistry in June
2005.
The Approach
Since Network Chemistry's inception in 2002, the company had been primarily
OEM-focused. Based on developments in the wireless security market and
customer demand, however, the company decided to expand its sales
strategies to include the enterprise and vertical markets. Network
Chemistry enlisted Engage PR to further establish itself as the leading expert
in wireless-security.
In November 2005, Engage PR worked with the company to promote the launch
of its RFprotect™
Endpoint, the first automated wireless threat protection solution for
enterprise mobile laptops. Network Chemistry also asked the agency to
publicize its leadership role in the new Wireless Vulnerabilities and
Exploits (WVE) industry initiative. WVE is the first industry-wide database
to identify and catalog emerging wireless threats. Network Chemistry's and
Engage PR's goal was to end the year on a high
note by securing eight to ten standalone articles and to build awareness
and momentum heading into 2006. An aggressive outreach program to key media
and analysts netted over 35 briefings for Network Chemistry executives.
The Result
Engage PR far exceeded expectations by securing standalone coverage in 40
trade publications and mentions in seven others. Positive coverage of the
company, its product, and the industry initiative appeared in top-tier
trade publications, including Network World, CIO, Computerworld, EE
Times, and eWeek. The WVE initiative
generated such buzz that Engage PR was able to place expert members of the
WVE editorial board as contributors to an ongoing column in a premier
weekly networking publication.
The Takeaway
By the end of the year, Network Chemistry was recognized as an industry
thought leader and acknowledged for its unmatched expertise in the wireless
security space. Due to the overwhelming success of the launch, the WVE
industry initiative, and numerous awards, Network Chemistry and Engage PR
generated 30 percent more press in the second half of 2005 than the
company's largest competitor. Network Chemistry was also named a
"Company to Watch" in EE Times' 2006 "The
Creators" list. In addition, the company's free BlueScanner™ tool, which provides Bluetooth vulnerability assessment, was a
finalist for best wireless product in the Network World Signature
Series.
Engage
PR Helps Strix Mesh Better Than The Rest
Strix Systems is the leader in high-performance wireless
mesh networking systems. Engage PR began working with Strix
in April 2005.
The Approach
Strix's Access/One Outdoor Wireless System (OWS)
is widely used, and its network in Tempe, Arizona, is the largest deployed citywide network in
the U.S.
But in November, Strix confirmed its largest
customer deployment to date with the news that the Republic of Macedonia
had selected the company to create the world's first countrywide wireless
mesh network. The 1,000-plus-square-mile deployment will be the single
largest broadband wireless network in the world, providing high-speed data,
voice, and video capabilities to the entire population of more than two
million people. Already, the Strix network
provides wireless broadband to the nearly one million inhabitants of the
capital, Skopje.
Engage PR realized that the unprecedented scope of the Macedonia deployment called for a PR
strategy that included trade and business press in the U.S. and
abroad. The announcement provided a perfect opportunity to elevate Strix in the eyes of the press and of potential
customers, and to help the company gain market momentum. While the PR
message highlighted the sheer scale of the deployment, it also emphasized
the superiority of Strix's multi-radio
technology, which beat out multiple competitive single- and dual-radio
solutions during trials in the country's mountainous terrain. Engage
arranged a series of interviews with top-tier publications before the
announcement was sent over the wire to ensure that editors understood the
significance of the news and had exclusive material for their articles.
The Result
More than 20 publications covered the Macedonia deployment, including
Business Week, Red Herring, The Economist, InformationWeek, Unstrung,
and more. Engage PR also placed Strix on the BBC
radio program "The World," which also runs on NPR.
The Takeaway
Engage PR positioned Strix as the technology
leader in the mesh networking market and forcefully promoted the company's
win of the largest mesh deployment in the world to establish Strix as the most aggressive competitor in the wireless
mesh market.
Good
Strategy Wins Great Publicity For Big Deal
Maryland-based
NexTone Communications, a global leader in
session management solutions, closed $35 million
in Series D funding in November—one of the largest
telecom funding deals of 2005. Engage PR crafted an aggressive PR strategy
emphasizing how the funding will help expand strategic initiatives and
advance NexTone's market leadership. Ten
interviews with NexTone and its leading VC resulted
in articles in 15 key publications, including the Baltimore
Sun, Washington
Post, Red Herring, and Dow Jones VentureWire.
The strategy yielded some of the best funding coverage that NexTone's new CEO had ever seen.
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