Bridge Global Strategies is a boutique public relations firm that specializes in helping foreign companies build and maintain strong reputations in the U.S. market, leveraging its extensive experience and a global network. The firm focuses on customized PR strategies to enhance corporate visibility, manage crises, and promote client products effectively. With a proven track record of working with a diverse clientele, Bridge emphasizes the importance of thought leadership and cross-cultural communication to achieve success for its clients.

1. Public Relations Capabilities of
for
Foreign Companies in the U.S.
October 11, 2012
© Bridge Global Strategies 2012

2. The Value of a Good Reputation
• A good reputation:
o It’s like money in the bank - it takes a long time to earn, but it can
disappear very quickly
o It sticks to a company or a product for a while after it is no longer
deserved (so does a bad reputation)
o It enhances profitability by attracting investors, employees and
customers
• Bridge Global Strategies’ prime focus is helping companies build and
maintain good reputations, both at the corporate and product levels

3. Who We Are
• A boutique PR firm with particular expertise working with
start-ups and companies from overseas, especially those
entering the U.S. market
• Based in New York City, but working with clients from all
over the U.S. and the world
• We help raise corporate and product visibility, awareness
& sales
• We develop PR strategies that are appropriate, realistic,
effective and affordable for a market newcomer
• We are entrepreneurs; a lot of our work is for other
entrepreneurs

4. Our Clients
• Our clients have included:
– Tech startups CoreMatrix, ecobee and Worktopia
– International biopharma association New York Pharma
Forum
– Healthcare organizations such as the LV Presad Eye
Institute
– Online retailers Mabel’s Labels and Admiral Road
– Luxury hotel chains Nikko Hotels International, Okura
Hotels & Resorts and urban resort Hotel Chinzanso Tokyo
– Bio-venture companies Transparent, Inc. and AnGes MG
– Secret Fire Games, creator of The Secret Fire
– Top Asian Business Schools (CEIBS, Indian School of
Business, Nanyang Univ. Business School, Hong Kong Secret Fire Games
Univ. of Science & Technology Business School)
– Professional service firms RMi (healthcare marketing) and
Verde Group (research & management consulting firm)

5. What We Do: Our Key Services
• Communications to launch or re-position companies,
their services and products
• Programs to build and manage corporate reputations
• Strategies and programs to build brand visibility and/or
increase sales of products/services
• A full arsenal of communications tools to carry out
these strategies and programs
– From media relations to events to marketing materials

6. What Differentiates Us
• Big agency know-how and experience; small agency
service, creativity and results
– Don’t have to sacrifice resources for quarterly results
– Employees and clients are our most important consideration,
not shareholders

7. What Differentiates Us
• Senior professionals actually work on your account –
not just show up for meetings
• Amazing client retention demonstrates the quality of
our service
22 years! 15 years 19 years

8. Small and Hands-on, But
With a North American & Global Network
• Best of large and small agencies: senior level service, with
a North American-wide and a global network (something
usually found only with big multinational agencies)
– Bridge was a founder of Public Relations Boutiques
International (PRBI); Lucy Siegel, CEO of Bridge, was
founding president
– This network provides Bridge with “arms and legs” on
the ground where we need them to help us help you,
from Minneapolis to Moscow, San Francisco to São Paulo
– For more information on PRBI, visit
www.prboutiques.com

9. Boston
New York (2 firms)
Roseland, N.J.
Philadelphia, Penn.
Washington, D.C.
Kansas City, Kan.
Pittsburgh Grabs, Switzerland
Chicago Brighton, England
Minneapolis Moira, Northern Ireland
Houston Munich, Germany
Phoenix (2 firms) Moscow, Russia
Aspen, Colo. Sao Paulo, Brazil
Los Angeles Buenos Aires, Argentina
San Francisco Dubai, U.A.E.
Portland, Ore. Johannesburg, South Africa
Seattle Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Toronto Seoul, Republic of Korea
Vancouver

10. Industry Experience
• Academic Institutions • Industrial/Manufacturing
• Appliances and Housewares • Non-Profit Organizations
• Broadcast Media • Office Equipment
• Consumer Electronics • Consumer Packaged Goods
• Financial Services • Consumer Services
• Food • Professional Services Firms
• Games • Scientific Instruments
• Governmental Organizations • Software
• Healthcare/medical • Telecommunications
• Information Services • Trade & Professional
• Insurance Associations
• Internet retailers • Travel and Hospitality
• Internet technology solutions • Travel technology

11. What We Do for Foreign Companies
• We have worked with clients from all over the world: China,
Japan, India, Russia, Canada, France, Germany, UK, South
Korea, and more
• Our staff is very savvy about cross-cultural communications.
We understand what our foreign clients don’t understand,
and we help them bridge that gap
• We believe in the benefits of cultural diversity in both
American society and the business world.
– but the key to success is understanding “la
différence!”

12. What We Do for Foreign Companies (cont’d)
• We help build your company’s reputation and visibility with
your key constituents in the United States
– We help develop communications strategies & the tactics to
implement them
– We help you shape the story you need to tell and then we help you
tell it
– We also focus on visibility with “gatekeepers” who can introduce you
to end customers
– We can arrange industry analyst meetings for your senior executives
with firms that follow and develop reports about companies in your
industry
– When you’re ready, we will introduce “big” business media (Wall
Street Journal, CNBC, Inc., etc.) to tell your business story
• We help position your company as a “challenger brand”
• We help you become – or get credit for being – a thought
leader

13. Challenger Brands
• They have something truly different to offer
• They aren’t using a template, they develop new ways of seeing,
thinking and living
• Their employees are excited about the future
• Their leaders are risk-takers, but realistic
• They have a great story to tell
• They may be small, but the big guys are watching them

14. Thought Leadership
• Entrepreneurs need a leadership “voice” to develop a
challenger brand
• Any company can have one, not just the industry leaders
• The CEO is important in moving towards thought
leadership, but can’t make the company a visionary one
alone; as the company grows, others in management must
support the effort
• Entrepreneurial companies need a strategy to move
towards this goal

15. Case Studies

16. ecobee: Green $$$ Made Easy?
• Canadian green tech company ecobee hired
Bridge in September, 2008 to help make its
corporate and product debut
• We worked with ecobee on a PR strategy for the
company and its ecobee Smart Thermostat.
We divided the PR campaign into phases:
– Announcement phase with pre-orders
– “Product available” announcement
– Trade shows to get to know trade media
– Consumer media/reviewers
– Business media and analysts last
• Set goals for measuring success
Helped launch ecobee’s third
• Produced press materials product, new Smart Si Thermostat in
• In consumer PR phase, arranged product 2012
reviews with traditional consumer media
• Launched second product in early 2010
• Launched third product in early 2012

17. ecobee: Early Media Results (First 6 Months)
• U.S. articles written on/in:
• 107 North American blogs
• 12 Overseas blogs
• 18 newspapers & magazines
• 3 TV shows
• Audience impressions: over 140,000,000
• U.S. coverage included:
• Engadget • Technorati
• Gizmodo • Ubergizmo CEO Stuart Lombard with ecobee’s original
• CNet • Josh Spear Smart Thermostat
• Treehugger • NBC TV Chicago
• Good Clean Tech • Business Week TV
(PC Magazine blog) • New York Post
• Crunchgear • London Times
• CPM = 28 cents
• At least 3 X this number of media impressions achieved after 18 months!

18. Top Asian B-Schools Earn A+ in the U.S.
• Goal: raise visibility for four of Asia’s (and the world’s) top business
schools (China Europe International Business School, Shanghai; HKUST
Business School, Hong Kong; Nanyang Business School, Singapore;
Indian School of Business, Hyderabad) to increase North American
applications
• Bridge developed the strategy, plans and positioning for a “Top Asian
B-School” PR campaign. We focused most of our media outreach
attention on top media outlets that wield a huge amount of influence
• We arranged media interviews for business media with deans, faculty,
students and alumni
• Results:
– Long and positive articles in Bloomberg BusinessWeek,
Wall Street Journal (twice) and Canada’s National Post
– Increased interest from potential North American
students

19. Launched New Mutual Fund at Start of
“The Great Recession”
• Startup investment firm Structured Investment Management’s
innovative mutual fund was approved by SEC just as Lehman Bros. fell
• With market in chaos, journalists ignored news of new mutual funds
• We paused PR to conserve budget, waiting for media to return to
routine coverage; but crisis worsened and spread worldwide
• Worked with company to start building thought leadership; used time
to achieve greater visibility for company and fund
• Arranged several opportunities for CEO to comment on the financial
crisis on Fox Business News and CNBC. He was able talk about the new
fund on air
• As the media slowly returned to covering routine news, we were able to
arrange interviews with trade media, BusinessWeek TV, Smart Money,
Kiplinger’s, Louis Rukeyser’s Mutual Fund Report and Money Magazine

20. Launch PR for Japanese CRO
• Created and implemented launch communications strategy for
Japanese clinical research organization SNBL in Baltimore:
– Developed corporate brochure in two languages
– Developed press kit materials
– Conducted successful media relations campaign
– Worked with local university (site of the CRO) to develop big opening event
• Baltimore mayor, Maryland governor and U.S. Congressman attended; TV crews,
local papers covered event
• Created effective visual strategy that put SNBL on TV and in all print coverage
– Followed up with post-launch communications

21. Admiral Road’s Cause Marketing Program
• Bridge helped Admiral Road, a Canadian manufacturer
of children’s fleece products, to enter the U.S. market
• We suggested a cause marketing program as a way to
inject news value into announcement of some new
products (personalized fleece blankets for babies and
kids decorated with monkeys, zebras and giraffes)
• Positioned the products as the “Baby Safari” line
• Arranged a cause marketing sponsorship for Admiral
Road with the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF)
• Announced the “Baby Safari” line to the media; stressed
donation of a percent of sales to AWF
• Admiral Road was included on the AWF web site as a
sponsor (a million unique visitors/month), with a link to
the AR site
• This strategy provided a news hook for media coverage
and attracted new animal-loving customers
• Cause marketing relationship lasted for over five years

22. Crisis Management Experience
Our staff has helped to save companies large and small from crises
ranging from boycotts to bankruptcies:
• Korean economic crisis
– Provided issues management and media relations counseling to bolster a top Korean
conglomerate’s financial viability and U.S. image during collapsed economy in Korea
• Consumer product contamination
– Counseled American company on overseas PR when regulatory officials in another
country found banned chemicals in one of the company’s cosmetic products
• False rumors
– Developed communications strategies to stop rumors of foreign company’s U.S. market
withdrawal and sale; media trained executives; conducted aggressive media outreach
• Greenmailing
– Counseled corporate management on media relations involving a greenmailer who tried
to use the media to manipulate the company’s board of directors; conducted aggressive
media outreach to discredit the greenmailer
• HIV-Contaminated Plasma
– When a drug company’s HIV-tainted blood products caused a massive crisis, we developed a
crisis management and communications strategy, provided counsel to the CEO, and set the
direction for media relations and internal communications.

23. Lucy Siegel
President & CEO
Lucy’s experience spans almost every area of PR: communications positioning, issues and
crises, corporate media relations, executive speeches, internal communications, merger
communications and a wide range of other matters related to corporate reputation. She
is also proficient as a marketing public relations counselor, helping clients position and
sell their products and services, both in consumer and B2B industries.
She started her career in journalism and then moved to PR at Equitable Life, where she
directed communications for the group health and pension asset management businesses
She then moved to Tokyo where she worked for Cosmo Public Relations, which appointed
her its first non-Japanese board member.
After returning to New York, she launched and headed a subsidiary for Cosmo before
opening her own firm, which she ran for seven years until it was acquired. It is now part
of Publicis in New York.
Prior to founding Bridge Global Strategies LLC, Lucy spent seven years at Publicis, where
she co-directed public relations in the agency’s New York headquarters, managing the PR
staff and overseeing all PR clients.
Lucy has served in many industry leadership roles, including as an officer of the Public
Relations Society of America’s New York Chapter, Women Executives in Communications
and the organization she helped found, PR Boutiques International. She is a graduate of
Connecticut College in New London, Ct., with a major in government.

24. Thank you for taking time to
learn about us!
Lucy Siegel
President & CEO
lsiegel@bridgeny.com
Bridge Global Strategies LLC
16 West 36th Street, 10th Fl.
New York, NY 10018
212-583-1043
www.bridgeny.com
Blog: http://bridgebuzz.bridgeny.com