Challenge
Avaya, a 20-year-old global communications company, was looking to tell new stories, broaden its audience reach and establish a market-reshaping narrative around its cloud and SaaS offerings. The Avaya brand was well-known as a communications hardware provider, but the industry and market needed to understand the shift in the company’s business model and its updated value proposition. It was imperative that Avaya become synonymous with cloud and software in order to make a significant move in the market.
Solution
In the initial months of the partnership, Hotwire worked closely with Avaya to tell the “new Avaya” story to new audiences – helping change the company’s public image from a legacy hardware and phone provider to a recognized “cloud giant.” Hotwire helped Avaya show up differently in influential business press, broadcast outlets and trade and channel publications. The agency also secured features with CNBC Mad Money, Business Insider and CRN on a variety of key topics, including Avaya’s shift to new partnerships with Google, its move to AI in the contact center, new product offerings, “the experience economy” and what industry analyst firm Gartner calls multi-experience. COVID-19 accelerated digital transformation and digital projects for Avaya – helping Fortune 500 organizations support remote work and work-from-home is a core Avaya business. Hotwire worked to land major Avaya profile opportunities, shifting the story to the remote work narrative and landing broadcast media opportunities for Avaya’s CEO with CNBC’s Mad Money, CNN, Fox Business and TD Ameritrade. Via these opportunities, the CEO reached investors, shareholders, brokers, customers and partners, giving them the confidence that Avaya had the right offering. Hotwire and Avaya also worked together to shape and update the narrative around how the “reimagined Avaya” was the go-to partner to help companies shift their communications and collaboration efforts to a remote model – using the “Avaya does the hard work of remote work” tagline.
Results
Eight months after partnering with Hotwire, Avaya’s CEO Jim Chirico landed six total Tier-1 broadcast opportunities and more than 15 top-tier media placements, effectively connecting Avaya’s communications narrative to its business narrative. By continually refining the narrative, retooling the messages and focusing on the right channels, the company has been able to broaden the audience reach, tell its story more confidently, and communicate the business value to the industry more effectively. This has inspired confidence among customers, prospects, partners & employees that Avaya is the right partner for the current climate. 6 Tier-1 broadcast opportunities 15+ top-tier media placements 32% Increase in shareholder value YoY 65+ articles on Avaya’s COVID-19 response
Want fresh marketing stories in your inbox?
Get the weekly email that makes you a marketing genius.
Stay informed and inspired, for free.