Case Studies

CIMCON is a smart city technologies company seeking to stand out in a crowded market. Our charge was to present the adoption of their technologies as something every town and city should consider.

We implemented a public relations, sales, and marketing plan with CIMCON for their smart city technologies and services. One very successful element was a strategic content development and lead generation program based on the company’s successful relationship with the city of Syracuse, New York. 

We developed multiple pieces of content (press releases, case studies, videos, a white paper, and bylines) all housed on a reg-wall/landing page. Through a concurrent media campaign, we generated multiple articles in various publications, including Smarter Streetlights Are Just the Beginning in Syracuse, N.Y. We also supported speaking sessions at multiple industry events and conferences. 

The program was a huge success for lead generation, content development, municipal and influencer engagement - and served as a template for future city-specific, integrated campaigns across the country.

Cortex is an AI for social media marketing company. The goal was to prep the founders with go-to-market messaging and launch the company directly to potential prospects. 

Adam led all communications efforts as the company planned to come out of a two-year stealth period. A key decision was picking a time and place to launch the company - one with prospects and potential customers. Adam accomplished this by working with the events team at Digiday to launch at their Agency Summit in New Orleans. 

Adam arranged meetings with close to 20 agency executives to present the concept and demo of Cortex, leading to multiple RFPs and sales follow up. Adam drove local and trade media outreach. Coverage including The Boston Globe and BostInno helped with recruitment and funding.

Fall Risk / Ariel is an executive training company based in Lexington, Mass. The CEO, Sean Kavanagh, was planning a keynote at a major industry event. He wanted to connect a major personal narrative (he survived a near-fatal bike crash) with the story for his keynote - the importance of being prepared for change.

Together, we developed the idea of an eBook, which looked at his accident and recovery and provided lessons for facing and adapting to change. SharpOrange worked hand-in-hand on every element of the eBook from initial abstract, to outline, structure, content, tone of voice, interviews, editing, to layout and virtual binding. 

The finished eBook, “Fall Risk” (a substantial 60+ pages) served as the core story for his keynote. The book and presentation were a huge success. You can learn more in a blog post we helped draft. We also helped Sean launch his FALL RISKer consultancy.

Sonos was once considered an expensive, niche product in a crowded market segment. The company faced competition for media visibility and staffing for its Cambridge office since Bose was the dominant local player. 

Adam consulted on multiple initiatives with Sonos as their East Coast PR consultant, including the launch of the Play: 3 device; supporting recruitment efforts for the Cambridge office and arranging executive media tours. Sonos challenged Adam to connect with an influential personal technology journalist at The Boston Globe. The reporter previously thought the product line was “niche” and too expensive and never covered the company. Adam used the impending launch of Spotify in the US as a draw in his pitch. He invited the reporter to visit the Sonos lab in Cambridge to speak with an executive audio engineer and listen to some music on a product that would be released the following week. At the end of a lengthy visit, the reporter demanded that he be able to take the product home with him - under embargo. With a couple of frantic calls to the Santa Barbara HQ, we were able to “loan” out two of the speakers.

The reporter published a glowing article and did two broadcast reviews. The Play: 3 became a huge hit, and the media messaging around it being the best device to stream internet radio and Spotify was a winner. A year later, Sonos was being distributed nationwide and even doing a Super Bowl ad.

A Canadian sales software company, VanillaSoft wanted to raise its visibility from an industry-perception perspective. VanillaSoft is fortunate to have a very brash, very outspoken, and very atypical Canadian chief revenue officer.

SharpOrange worked closely with VanillaSoft to secure media, byline, and influencer engagement opportunities. This involved reviewing topics of interest to VanillaSoft customers, the company, and the industry at large. 

We were able to secure not only a steady flow of media coverage but also a series of appearances on sales-focused podcasts. In addition, we worked with VanillaSoft to create a new podcast under the aegis of Selling Power, an important sales industry media outlet. 

XenoPsi is a New York-based ad agency. The company represents several spirits brands and wanted to enter an adjacent market and settled on beer. However, the company had no direct experience in that market. Our goal was to reach beer marketers with a message that would lead them to XenoPsi. 

Given XenoPsi’s expertise in digital marketing, we decided to conduct a survey to understand how mobile devices impacted consumer behavior when they were standing in front of the cooler making their selection. One thousand people were surveyed and the results showed that people using mobile to learn about beer bought more beer, more frequently, and more different brands than non-mobile shoppers. These were good findings and likely to be of interest to beer brand managers.

We used an exclusive approach to place the story and stats in Beer Business Daily, an industry email newsletter read by our target audience. This story included a link to the study landing page with a registration that collected basic contact information for access to the report. 

Coverage also appeared in advertising and beverage industry publications, with the initial Beer Business Daily article resulting in nearly 80 qualified leads.

ZoomInfo is a sales data and process company. Their aim in working with SharpOrange was to rise above a group of “commodity” contact information providers. 

SharpOrange took a deeper look at company positioning. We tied a reintroduction to trends in sales, and especially AI. We developed thought leadership platforms for ZoomInfo executives, and shared those perspectives through major media outlets to elevate the brand story. We developed higher-level narratives - beyond a commodity contact database, ramped up the byline program, increased participation in industry events, podcasts and analyst reports. 

Over the course of one three-month campaign, we developed and placed eight bylines, supported executive appearances at keynotes, increased podcast interviews, and industry news mentions. Our collaboration ended when the company was acquired by a rival.

We’re proud of our work and would be happy to connect you with references and client contacts.