progresss by LEWIS

Case Study

Hijacking Breaking News to Build a Corporate Profile

John Bates, CTO of Progress Software became a go-to resource for broadcast outlets around the Flash Crash.

Background and Goals Client: Progress Software Corporation Date: May 2010 to February 2011

“I’ve heard about John Bates. He’s supposed to be the man when it comes to consolidated audit trails.” - Reporter from the Financial Times

ver the past 30 years, Progress Software Corporation (NASDAQ:PRGS) has grown into one of the largest technology companies in Massachusetts with yearly revenues of more than $500 million. Historically, the company was known for selling “middleware,” the software that ties different technology products together, selling as many as 15 software products that are used by nearly 140,000 organizations in more than 180 countries, including 70 percent of the Fortune 100. Until recently the company had more name recognition for its individual software products than it did as a corporate entity. In early 2010, Rick Reidy, CEO of Progress Software shared his business and marketing goals with LEWIS. In order to compete with IBM, Microsoft and Oracle, the company would need to do more than provide excellent software solutions for businesses. Reidy wanted to take the company to the next level by providing enterprise software that would allow customers to identify and respond quickly to business opportunities and threats. LEWIS was charged with rolling out communications around Progress Software’s rebranding effort “RPM” or Response Process Management, which combined most of the company’s products and brands into one suite. The objective was to build out a corporate profile and personality for the company and launch RPM.

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Strategy

s part of the media strategy, the team monitored breaking news 24/7 in Progress’ vertical sectors, looking for opportunities to provide expert commentary. As the May 6, 2010 “Flash Crash” of the Dow Jones Industrial Average unfolded, the LEWIS team identified it as a promising opportunity to leverage. They quickly implemented a strategy for building Progress Software’s new corporate identity. They would use the breaking news story as a platform to speak about Progress’s RPM branding, establish the company’s credibility as an expert resource and gain ongoing, high-level media coverage about the company. LEWIS knew the market crash could have been caused by a trader’s “fat-fingered trade” or a roguetrading algorithm; Progress Software’s Apama platform is a market surveillance system that can prevent the potential for human errors made in trading. Progress Software was the perfect resource for commentary. Armed with that knowledge, the LEWIS team set about capitalizing upon the crash coverage by leveraging the expertise of Progress CTO, John Bates, to comment on it, as well as preventive measures. Bates was the perfect spokesperson for the issue since he developed Apama and is a member of the Technology Advisory Committee (TAC) run by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). This appointment gave Bates the additional credibility and third-party validation that journalists look for. Bates could deliver key messages about Progress’ RPM rebranding as it related to the Flash Crash and his expert commentary would pave the way to global name recognition for Progress. Ultimately, the team seized a relevant topic receiving moderate media coverage, and transformed it into a much bigger story through proactive outreach. By doing this, Progress led the conversation across media channels on the Flash Crash.

Flash Crash coverage appeared in tier-one media boosting thought leadership for Progress Software.

John Bates, CTO of Progress Software became an industry commentator.

Tactics 1. Telling the story to key media LEWIS began outreach to local and national media outlets, positioning CTO John Bates as an expert resource. Using the Flash Crash as a pitch point to segue into a discussion about what Progress Software does, the team secured coverage over the summer with stories in The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. In order to establish Bates’ credibility even further the team pitched him as an expert to business and financial publications. By early Fall the story had snowballed and LEWIS secured a profile in Investors’ Business Daily and The Boston Business Journal. In October, the team ran a media tour in NYC, where John Bates met with key financial reporters at Fortune, Time, CNN, The Economist and The Wall Street Journal. Not only did the team secure a high volume of valuable press meetings, but also the relationships established between the Progress executives and the journalists helped to generate further coverage in the final months of 2010.

Case Study

2. Creating compelling content

3. Engaging with core audience online

Bates wrote a paper for CFTC-TAC titled “Algorithmic trading and high frequency trading: experiences from the market and thoughts on regulatory requirements.” The LEWIS team sent a summary of the paper to financial reporters along with Bates’ corporate bio to secure another round of media coverage. The LEWIS team also developed key messages to aid Bates in weaving information about Progress’ RPM into his media interviews.

Another key asset in the campaign, were the timely blog posts by Bates that LEWIS helped to write. These covered the Flash Crash and were posted on TABB Forum, a highly visible website for the capital market industry. Journalists often check this forum for regulatory commentary and several reporters read the posts by Bates, and then wrote stories quoting him. Additionally, the LEWIS team used Twitter to track the Flash Crash story, as well as the journalists covering the financial event. Using the functionality of the Progress Software Twitter handle [@ProgressSW] the team followed relevant reporters and re-Tweeted news stories that both included Progress Software or were simply related to the topic.

John Bates provided commentry for tier-one media outlets.

Used Twitter to share news and engage with followers. Further, the team regularly highlighted John Bates’ involvement on the CFTC / SEC Technology Advisory Council both via Twitter and through direct media outreach. By re-Tweeting Bates regularly, his critical voice on various financial topics was emphasized. Through both this external and internal validation of Bates’ voice, inbound requests for his expertise increased.

Case Study

Results

he Flash Crash campaign achieved its objective: It served as a winning platform for launching Progress’ rebranding effort with the media. The successful campaign transformed external communications from pitching product news to spokespeople talking about crucial issues at the national level. The LEWIS team earned the trust of C-level executives at Progress from the high level of discourse and the top tier media coverage results. Company CTO, John Bates, has become a wellknown spokesperson. CEO, Rick Reidy was recently featured in a Wall Street Journal article after meeting the reporter during the NYC media tour. The story continues to have traction with media with Progress Software now a popular expert resource for national capital markets reporters.

• Secured specific news coverage on RPM in detail: - IT Business Edge “What is RPM” - A video on CRN • CNBC picked up on a blog post from Bates posted on Tabb Forum – this resulted in a CNBC story online, as well as an on-air mention • Increased exposure with local media - Profile in the Boston Business Journal - Boston Globe article - Feature in Xconomy

Metrics

172%

exceeded goal of 50 original news stories for the May-February time frame and generated 86 total pieces of corporate coverage – resulting in a 172% increase over the initial goal

different journalists covered the company

new business journalists, covered the story (journalists who had never before covered Progress Software)

interviews were conducted

190m

total media impressions

Proactive media outreach led to Progress leading the Flash Crash discussion in top tier media outlets.

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