Public Relations Capabilities of

October 11, 2012 © Bridge Global Strategies 2012

Foreign Companies in the U.S. for

• A good reputation:

o It’s like money in the bank - it takes a long time to earn, but it can disappear very quickly

o It sticks to a company or a product for a while after it is no longer deserved (so does a bad reputation)

o It enhances profitability by attracting investors, employees and customers

• Bridge Global Strategies’ prime focus is helping companies build and maintain good reputations, both at the corporate and product levels

The Value of a Good Reputation

Who We Are

• A boutique PR firm with particular expertise working with start-ups and companies from overseas, especially those entering the U.S. market

• Based in New York City, but working with clients from all over the U.S. and the world

• We help raise corporate and product visibility, awareness & sales

• We develop PR strategies that are appropriate, realistic, effective and affordable for a market newcomer

• We are entrepreneurs; a lot of our work is for other entrepreneurs

Our Clients • Our clients have included:

– Tech startups CoreMatrix, ecobee and Worktopia – International biopharma association New York Pharma

Forum – Healthcare organizations such as the LV Presad Eye

Institute – Online retailers Mabel’s Labels and Admiral Road – Luxury hotel chains Nikko Hotels International, Okura

Hotels & Resorts and urban resort Hotel Chinzanso Tokyo – Bio-venture companies Transparent, Inc. and AnGes MG – Secret Fire Games, creator of The Secret Fire – Top Asian Business Schools (CEIBS, Indian School of

Business, Nanyang Univ. Business School, Hong Kong Univ. of Science & Technology Business School)

– Professional service firms RMi (healthcare marketing) and Verde Group (research & management consulting firm)

Secret Fire Games

What We Do: Our Key Services

• Communications to launch or re-position companies, their services and products

• Programs to build and manage corporate reputations • Strategies and programs to build brand visibility and/or

increase sales of products/services • A full arsenal of communications tools to carry out

these strategies and programs – From media relations to events to marketing materials

What Differentiates Us

• Big agency know-how and experience; small agency service, creativity and results – Don’t have to sacrifice resources for quarterly results – Employees and clients are our most important consideration,

not shareholders

What Differentiates Us

• Senior professionals actually work on your account – not just show up for meetings

• Amazing client retention demonstrates the quality of our service

22 years! 15 years 19 years

Small and Hands-on, But With a North American & Global Network

• Best of large and small agencies: senior level service, with a North American-wide and a global network (something usually found only with big multinational agencies) – Bridge was a founder of Public Relations Boutiques

International (PRBI); Lucy Siegel, CEO of Bridge, was founding president

– This network provides Bridge with “arms and legs” on the ground where we need them to help us help you, from Minneapolis to Moscow, San Francisco to São Paulo

– For more information on PRBI, visit www.prboutiques.com

Grabs, Switzerland Brighton, England Moira, Northern Ireland Munich, Germany Moscow, Russia Sao Paulo, Brazil Buenos Aires, Argentina Dubai, U.A.E. Johannesburg, South Africa Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Seoul, Republic of Korea

Boston New York (2 firms) Roseland, N.J. Philadelphia, Penn. Washington, D.C. Kansas City, Kan. Pittsburgh Chicago Minneapolis Houston Phoenix (2 firms) Aspen, Colo. Los Angeles San Francisco Portland, Ore. Seattle Toronto Vancouver

Industry Experience

• Academic Institutions • Appliances and Housewares • Broadcast Media • Consumer Electronics • Financial Services • Food • Games • Governmental Organizations • Healthcare/medical • Information Services • Insurance • Internet retailers • Internet technology solutions

• Industrial/Manufacturing • Non-Profit Organizations • Office Equipment • Consumer Packaged Goods • Consumer Services • Professional Services Firms • Scientific Instruments • Software • Telecommunications • Trade & Professional

Associations • Travel and Hospitality • Travel technology

What We Do for Foreign Companies

• We have worked with clients from all over the world: China, Japan, India, Russia, Canada, France, Germany, UK, South Korea, and more

• Our staff is very savvy about cross-cultural communications. We understand what our foreign clients don’t understand, and we help them bridge that gap

• We believe in the benefits of cultural diversity in both American society and the business world.

– but the key to success is understanding “la différence!”

What We Do for Foreign Companies (cont’d)

• We help build your company’s reputation and visibility with your key constituents in the United States – We help develop communications strategies & the tactics to

implement them – We help you shape the story you need to tell and then we help you

tell it – We also focus on visibility with “gatekeepers” who can introduce you

to end customers – We can arrange industry analyst meetings for your senior executives

with firms that follow and develop reports about companies in your industry

– When you’re ready, we will introduce “big” business media (Wall Street Journal, CNBC, Inc., etc.) to tell your business story

• We help position your company as a “challenger brand” • We help you become – or get credit for being – a thought

leader

Challenger Brands

• They have something truly different to offer • They aren’t using a template, they develop new ways of seeing,

thinking and living • Their employees are excited about the future • Their leaders are risk-takers, but realistic • They have a great story to tell • They may be small, but the big guys are watching them

Thought Leadership

• Entrepreneurs need a leadership “voice” to develop a challenger brand

• Any company can have one, not just the industry leaders • The CEO is important in moving towards thought

leadership, but can’t make the company a visionary one alone; as the company grows, others in management must support the effort

• Entrepreneurial companies need a strategy to move towards this goal

Case Studies

ecobee: Green $$$ Made Easy? • Canadian green tech company ecobee hired

Bridge in September, 2008 to help make its corporate and product debut

• We worked with ecobee on a PR strategy for the company and its ecobee Smart Thermostat. We divided the PR campaign into phases: – Announcement phase with pre-orders – “Product available” announcement – Trade shows to get to know trade media – Consumer media/reviewers – Business media and analysts last

• Set goals for measuring success • Produced press materials • In consumer PR phase, arranged product

reviews with traditional consumer media • Launched second product in early 2010 • Launched third product in early 2012

Helped launch ecobee’s third product, new Smart Si Thermostat in 2012

ecobee: Early Media Results (First 6 Months)

• U.S. articles written on/in: • 107 North American blogs • 12 Overseas blogs • 18 newspapers & magazines • 3 TV shows

• Audience impressions: over 140,000,000

• U.S. coverage included: • Engadget • Gizmodo • CNet • Treehugger • Good Clean Tech (PC Magazine blog) • Crunchgear

• CPM = 28 cents

• At least 3 X this number of media impressions achieved after 18 months!

CEO Stuart Lombard with ecobee’s original Smart Thermostat

• Technorati • Ubergizmo • Josh Spear • NBC TV Chicago • Business Week TV • New York Post • London Times

Top Asian B-Schools Earn A+ in the U.S.

• Goal: raise visibility for four of Asia’s (and the world’s) top business schools (China Europe International Business School, Shanghai; HKUST Business School, Hong Kong; Nanyang Business School, Singapore; Indian School of Business, Hyderabad) to increase North American applications

• Bridge developed the strategy, plans and positioning for a “Top Asian B-School” PR campaign. We focused most of our media outreach attention on top media outlets that wield a huge amount of influence

• We arranged media interviews for business media with deans, faculty, students and alumni

• Results: – Long and positive articles in Bloomberg BusinessWeek,

Wall Street Journal (twice) and Canada’s National Post – Increased interest from potential North American

students

Launched New Mutual Fund at Start of “The Great Recession”

• Startup investment firm Structured Investment Management’s innovative mutual fund was approved by SEC just as Lehman Bros. fell

• With market in chaos, journalists ignored news of new mutual funds

• We paused PR to conserve budget, waiting for media to return to routine coverage; but crisis worsened and spread worldwide

• Worked with company to start building thought leadership; used time to achieve greater visibility for company and fund

• Arranged several opportunities for CEO to comment on the financial crisis on Fox Business News and CNBC. He was able talk about the new fund on air

• As the media slowly returned to covering routine news, we were able to arrange interviews with trade media, BusinessWeek TV, Smart Money, Kiplinger’s, Louis Rukeyser’s Mutual Fund Report and Money Magazine

Launch PR for Japanese CRO • Created and implemented launch communications strategy for

Japanese clinical research organization SNBL in Baltimore: – Developed corporate brochure in two languages

– Developed press kit materials

– Conducted successful media relations campaign

– Worked with local university (site of the CRO) to develop big opening event • Baltimore mayor, Maryland governor and U.S. Congressman attended; TV crews,

local papers covered event

• Created effective visual strategy that put SNBL on TV and in all print coverage

– Followed up with post-launch communications

Admiral Road’s Cause Marketing Program

• Bridge helped Admiral Road, a Canadian manufacturer of children’s fleece products, to enter the U.S. market

• We suggested a cause marketing program as a way to inject news value into announcement of some new products (personalized fleece blankets for babies and kids decorated with monkeys, zebras and giraffes)

• Positioned the products as the “Baby Safari” line

• Arranged a cause marketing sponsorship for Admiral Road with the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF)

• Announced the “Baby Safari” line to the media; stressed donation of a percent of sales to AWF

• Admiral Road was included on the AWF web site as a sponsor (a million unique visitors/month), with a link to the AR site

• This strategy provided a news hook for media coverage and attracted new animal-loving customers

• Cause marketing relationship lasted for over five years

Crisis Management Experience Our staff has helped to save companies large and small from crises ranging from boycotts to bankruptcies: • Korean economic crisis

– Provided issues management and media relations counseling to bolster a top Korean conglomerate’s financial viability and U.S. image during collapsed economy in Korea

• Consumer product contamination – Counseled American company on overseas PR when regulatory officials in another

country found banned chemicals in one of the company’s cosmetic products

• False rumors – Developed communications strategies to stop rumors of foreign company’s U.S. market

withdrawal and sale; media trained executives; conducted aggressive media outreach

• Greenmailing – Counseled corporate management on media relations involving a greenmailer who tried

to use the media to manipulate the company’s board of directors; conducted aggressive media outreach to discredit the greenmailer

• HIV-Contaminated Plasma – When a drug company’s HIV-tainted blood products caused a massive crisis, we developed a

crisis management and communications strategy, provided counsel to the CEO, and set the direction for media relations and internal communications.

Lucy Siegel President & CEO

Lucy’s experience spans almost every area of PR: communications positioning, issues and crises, corporate media relations, executive speeches, internal communications, merger communications and a wide range of other matters related to corporate reputation. She is also proficient as a marketing public relations counselor, helping clients position and sell their products and services, both in consumer and B2B industries.

She started her career in journalism and then moved to PR at Equitable Life, where she directed communications for the group health and pension asset management businesses

She then moved to Tokyo where she worked for Cosmo Public Relations, which appointed her its first non-Japanese board member.

After returning to New York, she launched and headed a subsidiary for Cosmo before opening her own firm, which she ran for seven years until it was acquired. It is now part of Publicis in New York.

Prior to founding Bridge Global Strategies LLC, Lucy spent seven years at Publicis, where she co-directed public relations in the agency’s New York headquarters, managing the PR staff and overseeing all PR clients.

Lucy has served in many industry leadership roles, including as an officer of the Public Relations Society of America’s New York Chapter, Women Executives in Communications and the organization she helped found, PR Boutiques International. She is a graduate of Connecticut College in New London, Ct., with a major in government.

Thank you for taking time to learn about us!

www.bridgeny.com Blog: http://bridgebuzz.bridgeny.com

Lucy Siegel President & CEO

lsiegel@bridgeny.com Bridge Global Strategies LLC 16 West 36th Street, 10th Fl.

New York, NY 10018 212-583-1043