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BT Infonet Global Communications

Ruder Finn, Inc., has been working with BT Infonet since its acquisition of Infonet Services Corporation (Infonet) in early 2004. Ruder Finn began work with Infonet in 2000, shortly after the company's December 1999 initial public offering, the highest, one-day offering for a telecommunications company for that year.

With the financial markets primed, Infonet tapped Ruder Finn to build an integrated global public relations campaign to consistently communicate its offerings worldwide while finding the right level of localization of the key messages for each respective market. Infonet had dual challenges: further expand into existing markets, and communicate ‘differentiation' in a highly price-competitive market segment – multi-nationals with ‘do-it-yourself' systems – to win them as new customers.

 

 

OBJECTIVES

• Support revenue growth in North America, Asia Pacific and EMEA
• Unify brand value proposition and ensure consistent messaging across geographies
• Unlock Infonet's well-kept secret of leading customer service and technology deployment

PROGRAM

• With Ruder Finn on board, Infonet set records for its industry marketing awards and unparalleled reputation for customer service. With active press announcements on new contract wins, Infonet PR consistently measured better quality of coverage over that of main competitor Equant, and became known as the service provider to some of the top names in the world – like Nestle, VW and Bayer.
• Ruder Finn helped Infonet's swift entrée into new technologies – like IP VPN, MPLS, IP Video VPN, Security and MobileXpress, using solid PR, media and industry analyst programs as a baseline for well-orchestrated, global service launches.
• Ruder Finn supported publicity for Infonet's charismatic CEO, Jose Collazo, and positioned its leaders on the business issues and ‘hot topics' of each year – such as convergence, security and application defined networking.
• Ruder Finn helped Infonet build and manage its first-ever industry analyst program which today boasts nearly 200 registered individuals on its exclusive Analyst Corner website
• Ruder Fin helped create and manage a centralized global customer reference program that maintains 160 global customers willing to speak on Infonet's behalf.
• On a daily basis, Infonet executives would depend on their Daily Media Monitor report compiled by Ruder Finn to deliver company and international market news.
• At its most proactive period, Ruder Finn supported Infonet in North America, Canada, Mexico, Brazil and Columbia; had full-time teams in London and Amsterdam to manage the EMEA-wide PR marketing program that supported major selling countries such as the UK, France, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, Norway, Sweden and Holland; and, in Asia, Ruder Finn supported both the Infonet and BT brands in Singapore, Australia, and Hong Kong, and played a special consultant to Infonet regarding its business presence in China.

RESULTS

• A measureable impact on sales, with consolidated contract values of more than $250,000.00.
• 13 consecutive “Best in Class Overall” awards by Telemark Consulting, Ltd., Voice of the Customer survey (issued quarterly).
• CEO and executive features in Forbes, Financial Times, Bloomberg, Dow Jones, SmartBusiness, WSJ, TelecomAsia and BusinessWeek.
• Corporate and local "story houses" to maintain message control in all regions.
• An international survey with the Economist Intelligence Unit designed to capture the media trends in outsourcing.
• A Top Ten media program, designed to concentrate resources on the most influential trade journals in Europe, Asia Pacific and the Americas.
• Support for Infonet's corporate sponsorship of Team Alinghi, winners of the America's Cup, the world's largest sailing event.
• Keynote addresses at leading trade and analyst events, the Financial Times World Telecommunications Forum and BusinessWeek Asia events.
• Three World Communications Awards (multiple nominations each year).
• Annual search engine optimization programs to place high in search portal sites like Yahoo and Google. The team also placed white papers on key industry portals and tracked downloads for sales lead generation.
• Consistent, favorable placement in Gartner Magic Quadrant.
• Various marketing and product awards with Frost & Sullivan, SABRE, PRWeek, MIT Sloane eBusiness Awards, Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award (J. Collazo), Platinum PR Awards, Network+TeleCom Award, Telemark Gold/Telemark “Best in Class”, IP survey rankings.