Wolf Tracking

Earlier this year, Seagate turned to Cohn & Wolfe to help with the unveiling of an entirely new family of products and services under the Maxtor Fusion brand. They were launched and co-marketed with software partner, Fabrik, Inc. The main objective of the campaign was to generate online buzz and awareness for the new offerings and create a demand prior to the formal launch.To drive consumer anticipation and to maximize the volume and quality of media coverage and online buzz in advance of the “Project Fusion” launch, we developed an elaborate series of strategies and tactics that leveraged social media tools and properties to seed campaign messaging and product information in advance of the formal announcement.

Coverage appeared in top-tier consumer, business and online media outlets, including Associated Press, Tom Foremski’s SiliconValleyWatcher blog, Gizmodo, CNET News.com, Business 2.0, BusinessWeek.com, Washington Post, San Jose Mercury News, Newsday, MSN Money, ABC News, Red Herring.com, PC Magazine, Laptop, Network World and Small Business Computing. Ultimately, the campaign won a 2006 Award of Excellence from the Society for New Communications Research.

In June of this year, Cohn & Wolfe teamed with SunTrust Bank to introduce a new solution to protect consumers from the growing problem of identity theft. SunTrust became the first bank to offer its customers free identity theft protection, which included enhanced account monitoring to stop thefts before they happen. By fielding awareness surveys, hosting events at local branches and partnering with an FBI spokesperson, SunTrust received high praise from business, consumer and industry trade publications for its brand leadership and customer commitment.

The results; more than 70 print and online placements, including The Associated Press, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Atlanta Business Chronicle, South Florida Sun-Sentinel, and Orlando Sentinel. C&W secured more than 40 TV placements, including 3 stories on CNN and local coverage in SunTrust’s key markets and 29 radio placements and three coveted segments on the “Clark Howard Show,’” the Georgia Public Broadcasting Network and USA Radio (which distributes news stories to 1,100+ stations around the world and the Armed Forces Radio Network).

2006 will be remembered as a tough year for competitors of Panasonic Toughbook. Cohn & Wolfe’s East and West coast teams helped create a swell of positive brand and product momentum throughout the year. From feature placements in The Wall Street Journal to extensive coverage to glowing reviews in Laptop Magazine, The Financial Times, CNET, PC World and PC Magazine, Panasonic Toughbooks finally received high praise for their reliability and durability and the Panasonic brand was heralded for its innovation and commitment to quality. Media results were generated across each of Panasonic’s top industry verticals, including government, healthcare, field service, public safety and horizontal wireless coverage for partnerships with all major cellular carriers.

We also helped build brand and product credibility by organizing multiple media and industry tours to Panasonic’s facilities in Japan and hosted special events to win the hearts and minds of key customers. From product placements that landed Panasonic Toughbooks on the top of the world as a sponsor of the Everest Peace Project, to celebrating the value of public safety customers at a national appreciation event, it was a great year for mobile computing story telling.

Yahoo! tapped Cohn & Wolfe to launch Yahoo! Answers, an online community where people can ask and answers questions on any topic. Our goal was to generate awareness of Yahoo! Answers as a community-based resource for information, interaction and inspiration. The campaign created excitement, stimulated word-of-mouth buzz and consumer trial and distinguished Yahoo! Answers from competing search engines and portals.

The launch secured more than 110 million consumer impressions, including coverage on FOX’s “Good Day New York” and in a variety of print outlets including Metro New York, Quick & Simple, Newsday, The Washington Post and The San Francisco Chronicle. Social media played an important role in building buzz for Yahoo! Answers with coverage in the top blogs including John Batelle’s Search Blog and TechCrunch. Yahoo! Answers quickly built a large community of users and grew from 10 million users pre-launch to 60 million users post-launch.

The newest Yahoo! offering was such a success that its main competitor Google conceded defeat. In The New York Times reporter Miguel Heft’s November 30, 2006 article, “Google Plans to Cancel Paid Service for Answers,” Tomi Poutanen, product director of Yahoo! Social Search commented that, “It has been one of our more successful launches.”