Michelle Tegtman/PTC/Manager Corporate Communications As PTC expanded into collaborative product development software, the target expanded from the historical target of engineers, to senior level executives from director on up. The goal is to build awareness and credibility at this senior level. An overall increase in awareness of 10 points across this target group after the initial 12 months has been set. Awareness will be tracked from the start of the effort, October 2001, through September 2002. StarLink looked to the media that offered the most in added value as a way to get directly in front of the target. Print was selected as the primary element based on the number of opportunities available including conferences, seminars, email communication and subscriber lists. Print provided the ability to measure the effort against the communication goal. Added value in the form of awareness research was negotiated in order to track campaign performance.Core books selected were Business Week, (national and Industrial Management editions); Forbes; Fortune (national and Industrial Manufacturing Technology editions), Wall St. Journal (Technology Reports), and Industry Week.Books were selected given their cache as respected leaders in business print. By ingratiating themselves with these books, PTC was able to get itself quickly in front of the right audience, leverage the magazine’s credibility to position itself as a top tier company.

The Details:Business Week: PTC received sponsorship rights to Business Week’s Digital Economy Forum which included brand identification and panel participation. PTC secured several important follow up sales meetings, and positions themselves as a leader in product development software. PTC is using a subscriber list to conduct proprietary awareness research as it’s tracked against the communication goal. Access to this list has saved PTC thousands in research costs and weeks in turn-around time.ForbesCapitalizing on the Forbes brand, StarLink negotiated use of Malcolm Forbe’s Trichera Ranch. PTC will entertain 40 key prospects Forbes property. The purpose of using the Forbes ranch is to entice key prospects whom might otherwise not be open to hearing the PTC story.

As PTC, a designer of traditional CAD/CAM software, expanded their offerings into a new arena of enterprise-wide collaborative product development software, they found themselves needing to create awareness and build credibility with a new audience whom they had never spoken to previously. Historically PTC had targeted engineers, but the decision-making process for this new software would be moved up in the organization to senior level C-executives. This audience had no awareness of PTC and in general, is not influenced by advertising.By understanding PTC’s challenge, and recognizing that limited funds were available, StarLink put together a program which would capitalize on the integrity and cache of the leading business publications to create a halo effect for PTC which would provide both awareness and credibility and position them as a top tier technology company.In the end, for a relatively small investment, PTC is, and was, able to get directly in front of an audience that their salespeople alone could not get through to, The plan developed by StarLink not only generates awareness, but gets them face to face with their leading prospects. So far the media effort has produced 15,000 new leads into the system, all qualified with $100 million in the sales funnel. StarLink fully understood the challenges the PTC sales force faced in getting in front of the senior level executives. Rather than design a media plan that relied on traditional media measures such as reach and frequency, they used media as a portal to provide direct contact with these senior executives face to face. In understanding the importance of credibility with this target, StarLink designed partnerships with the leading business publications to create a halo for PTC and implied endorsement. Spending was concentrated in the most prestigious and credible leading business publications. As part of the schedule and often at no additional cost, StarLink negotiated co-sponsorships of key events held for senior executives by these publications. By piggy-backing on these events, PTC is able to get face to face with this audience and build relationships. Conversely, StarLink negotiated with these publications to co-sponsor PTC events as a way of building credibility and driving attendance. Additional components such as webcasts, custom publishing pieces, online components and access to subscriber lists were further negotiated as a way to build awareness and get in front of the right audience and receive the implied endorsement of these leading publications.This approach recognized that PTC had neither the funds nor the time it would take to build credibility and awareness on its own. Media was used simply as leverage to gain access to PTC prospects and to develop relationships with industry leaders. For example, their newly developed relationship with Jack Welch has yielded them meetings with every CIO across all GE business unit and they are now under consideration for standard across all units.

As PTC, a designer of traditional CAD/CAM software, expanded their offerings into a new arena of enterprise-wide collaborative product development software, they found themselves needing to create awareness and build credibility with a new audience whom they had never spoken to previously. Historically PTC had targeted engineers, but the decision-making process for this new software would be moved up in the organization to senior level C-executives. This audience had no awareness of PTC and in general, is not influenced by advertising.By understanding PTC’s challenge, and recognizing that limited funds were available, StarLink put together a program which would capitalize on the integrity and cache of the leading business publications to create a halo effect for PTC which would provide both awareness and credibility and position them as a top tier technology company.In the end, for a relatively small investment, PTC is, and was, able to get directly in front of an audience that their salespeople alone could not get through to, The plan developed by StarLink not only generates awareness, but gets them face to face with their leading prospects. So far the media effort has produced 15,000 new leads into the system, all qualified with $100 million in the sales funnel.