Winning Strategies

Company: Winning Strategies, Newark, NJ
Company Description: Winning Strategies set new industry standards for performance in one of the most crowded and competitive markets on the planet. Winning Strategies gained a reputation for taking on difficult challenges in the most stringent and unforgiving market conditions. Our specialties include corporate communications, issues management, grassroots mobilization, healthcare PR, and niche messaging.
Nomination Category: Corporate Communications, Investor Relations, & Public Relations Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Communications or PR Campaign of the Year - Social Media Focused

Nomination Title: Sing To Win: Taylor Swift Karaoke Contest for Verizon FiOS

1. Tell the story about this nominated campaign since January 1 2009 (up to 500 words). Focus on specific accomplishments, and relate these accomplishments to past performance or industry norms. Be sure to mention obstacles overcome, innovations or discoveries made, and outcomes:

The Sing To Win campaign branded Verizon FiOS as the most popular purveyor of popular entertainment: up-to-the-minute, with its finger on the pulse of youth culture. Interactivity on line and through social networking sites gave participants a sense of close communication with their favorite entertainer, tapping into the cultural zeitgeist of interactivity. The campaign’s results achieved its ultimate child-parent objective: measurably reaching the teen demographic.

Verizon FiOS had just launched its FiOS One television channel in New Jersey and was preparing to launch its services in the Philadelphia and Pittsburgh markets. Simultaneously, a 19-year-old, country music superstar, Taylor Swift, was in the midst of a record-breaking concert tour. These coinciding events prompted Verizon to leverage their sponsorship with Swift to reach audiences in target markets throughout New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware. Verizon’s intention: tap the eagerness of Swift’s huge and emerging fan base by appealing to teens’ enthusiasm for social networking, viral videos and karaoke. Offering prizes of tickets to Swift concerts, Winning Strategies created a “synergy media” platform, blending events, contests, public relations, online and social media elements. A Web-based contest asked participants to create videos of themselves singing karaoke versions of Taylor Swift songs, post the videos online, and get friends and family to vote for their favorites. http://demo.noplacelikefios.wsits.com/

The success of the campaign was evaluated by the high number of participants and voters who registered on the Web site, giving Verizon their data and permission to be contacted again to facilitate sales of FiOS products in the region. Verizon then converted fans of Taylor Swift into fans of FiOS.

Taylor Swift boasts a massive and feverishly loyal fan base among young teen and “tween” females. This demographic has also played a significant part in the rapid growth of social networking, fan sites and online activity. They are technologically sophisticated, likely to post personal information online such as photos or videos, and possess a high comfort level with online interaction.

Winning Strategies sought to stimulate the interest and loyalty of this audience using Facebook and Twitter as interactive vehicles with the goal of reaching the parents and guardians who have buying power. All participants under age 18 were required to provide contact information for a parent or guardian to give consent for participation. The ‘tweens’ were a conduit to the actual target group, adult consumers.

Campaign results included:
• Approximately 426 videos posted on line
• Over 153,000 votes cast by 12,000 registrants.
• More than 61,000 visits and about 585,000 page views generated
• Establishing Verizon’s role as a leader in entertainment content and increased the brand’s recognition amongst the next generation of consumers.
• Established thousands of potential sales leads for Verizon in previously untapped market, resulting in 10% increase in sales in targeted regions.

Earned media impressions from print, online and broadcast totaled over 13 million. Paid media impressions from online ads, Google AdWords and search engine optimization totaled over 33 million impressions.

2. List hyperlinks to any online work samples, news stories, press releases, or other documents that support the claims made in the section above. IMPORTANT: Begin each link with http://, and enclose each link in square brackets; for example, [http://www.youraddress.com]:

http://demo.noplacelikefios.wsits.com

http://thestevies.com/ABA10Attachments/WinningStrategies/

3. Provide a brief (up to 100 words) biography about the leader(s) of the team that carried out this campaign:

At Winning Strategies Penny Paul has provided strategic counsel for such varied
accounts as ExxonMobil, Newark Beth Israel Medical Center, and the MCJ/ Amelior
Foundation. For Verizon she has acted as team leader on a series of award-
winning integrated marketing campaigns utilizing a seamless meld of Web, events,
street teams, celebrities, social networking and earned media to brand Verizon
as the most desirable and reliable provider of the best in technology and
entertainment Ms. Paul is a graduate of Yale University and a non practicing
attorney admitted to the Bars in New York, Connecticut and the District of
Columbia.