May I have your attention please?

July 2nd, 2008 by Katie Theriault

Recently, we received an award for the most “attention-getting” ad in a Readex Research ad perception study of the publication Homeland Security Today. The ad was for Harris RF Communications: our Talk as One, Work as One campaign. For those of you not familiar with Harris, they are an international communications and information technology company that provides tactical communications (basically, radios) to the Department of Defense and other international agencies. We teamed up with them to help launch a new product to a new market.

Some quick background: think about how our federal, state, and local agencies work together. Agencies like the DEA, FEMA, National Guard, Coast Guard—plus your neighborhood police and fire departments. They all obviously carry some form of radio for communication, but what you may not know is that they have to carry multiple radios with different frequency bands so they can communicate with each other.

What Harris RF Communications offers is one radio that covers multiple frequencies (as well as many other benefits). The idea of different organizations being able to universally communicate is referred to as interoperability. The need for interoperability has gained more and more attention because of events like Hurricane Katrina and 9/11, when agencies trying to assist those already in the trenches couldn’t communicate. Obviously, that’s a problem that someone needed to solve.

This campaign was a ton of work, but a lot of fun. And a great partnership. I think both teams would agree this was one awesome project to help create. The award was a great win for our egos, but, more importantly, a great win for our client. And, hopefully, for the people using the product.

Even though the timelines were incredibly challenging, this campaign should really be a model for any marketing manager looking to get the most from his or her agency partner.

This was a true collaboration. “Collabo,” as one MFer calls it.

RF Communications did their homework—and then some. They gave a full-on presentation of the new market they were breaking into: the public safety market. AND they covered all the benefits of what they were offering from the customer perspective— including helping us to identify the USP (unique selling point).

They also included management from the get-go. We were able to develop a campaign that included the input and strategic thinking from all of the key stakeholders. With this early management buy-in, approvals were easier and faster. It’s amazing how much this step helped us stay on track with our timeline, and the budget.

The other amazing thing RF Communications did was explain the problem—not just the solution. So we were able to put on our strategic thinking caps to come back with some great solutions they hadn’t thought of before. All of this led to a great outcome.

A strong, compelling, in-your-face (no pun intended) ad campaign that got noticed. And met its communication objectives. It delivered. We delivered. That’s the way it should be.

This entry was posted by Katie Theriault on Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008 and is filed under Ad business, Advertising, Blogging, Brand Strategy, Clients, Creative, Design, Flash, Google, Marketing, Media, Online Advertising, Political Marketing, Public Relations, SEO, Success, Technology, Video. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.