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Transveral |
Issues based campaign |
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2007 was a pivotal year for the Internet and customer service. The emergence and pre-eminence of Web 2.0 technologies increased consumer expectations of how an organisation should interact with customers online, particularly with regard to personalisation, user-generated content and building communities. All of this was happening against a background of rising demands from customers, all wanting faster, more accurate answers to their questions across all sales channels.
Rainier PR client Transversal is Europe’s leading provider of multi-channel eService solutions for customer-facing websites and contact centres, enabling organisations to achieve high-impact wins on improved service, reduced costs and increased sales. Transversal's flagship Web Self-Service technology also uses customer service interactions as an opportunity to promote products and services based on what customers ask about.
As a significant player within the online customer service industry, Transversal needed to position itself as the market leader and innovator by maintaining a high level of brand exposure amongst new media, IT, business and vertical press.
Campaign
To show the all round leadership of Transversal Rainier PR developed a campaign-based programme that utilised customer case studies, industry trends and research-led news to deliver regular quality coverage to Transversal’s key audiences.
A central lynchpin of the programme to establish Transversal as the industry authority within the market has been the company’s annual research into multi-channel customer service. 2007 represented the third year of the study, making it possible for Rainier PR to highlight how different vertical industries, including utilities, travel and insurance, have progressed or declined when it comes to providing information across the web, email and telephone channels. This provided high level and broad coverage across the national, business, online and IT media.
Rather than simply blanket releasing customer news Rainier PR worked closely with Transversal to identify which customer deals had the strongest intrinsic news value, and then further enhanced this value by tying each customer announcement into a topical theme on the media agenda. For example, the announcement that Sony Computer Entertainment UK were using Transversal’s software was linked to coincide with the launch of the PlayStation 3. Similarly, electrical retailer Hughes Direct’s roll out was positioned to show how the company would meet increased demand at Christmas.
To consolidate its position as a leading authority, Transversal’s PR programme was geared to drive, and be aligned with, the media agenda. In 2007 there was no bigger issue in the online market than the emergence of Web 2.0, with many companies struggling to understand how they could incorporate Web 2.0 into their customer service strategy. After a comprehensive review of the Web 2.0 tools available to businesses Transversal made a series of recommendations of how they could be most effectively utilised. Interestingly, Transversal argued that Web 2.0 tools are not appropriate for all businesses, a stance not previously adopted within the market.
Results
More than 270 articles were written about Transversal in 2007 across the national, new media, IT and customer service media. This included regular high profile coverage in Computer Weekly, Computing, Silicon, New Media Age, IT Week and The Daily Telegraph.
The strength of Transversal’s position as an industry authority was underlined by competitor campaigns which essentially tried to copy its research campaigns. However such was the strong media mindshare that Transversal has developed through delivering regular quality content the press actually turned to Transversal and its research and included these in articles supposedly on its competitors.
Finally, the customer element of the PR programme which ran throughout the year, was directly responsible for generating several key sales leads in the retail and travel markets.
"I have worked with Rainier PR for three years now, and each programme they have developed and executed has consistently delivered excellent results that support our key business goals. We’re a relatively small company, but Rainier PR has been able to tap into our market knowledge and help position the company as an industry authority. The 2007 PR programme was a tremendous success that enabled us to build mindshare amongst key influencers at an important time."
Dee Roche, Head of Marketing and Strategy at Transversal.
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