VC Inc. Marketing
VC Inc. Marketing offers a full range of PR, sales support, and business strategy services to B2B and B2C companies. The company, a 2017Bulldog Award Gold Winner, is active in a dozen industries, and it distinguishes itself from its competitors by offering solutions that more specialized agencies might never consider. Meltwater's media monitoring and contact database are key to the firm's success.
Meltwater Enables VC Inc. Marketing to
Identify exactly who is covering the topics the agency wants to learn more about
Perform essential tasks that return real results without ever having to leave the platform
Establish immediate contact with people in a position to advance a client's message
Challenge
Focusing More on What Clients' Customers Need to Hear
VC Inc. Marketing has served many large and well-known corporations through the years— including Kodak, CNN, and Novo Nordisk— along with startups and up-and-coming organizations that are anxious to make an impact in the marketplace. It's these growing organizations that cause co-owner Rafe Gomez to refrain from referring to his company as a PR agency. He explains, "I don't really use the word PR because many of the executives and business owners who I connect with think of PR as an indulgence that delivers zero ROI and only celebrities use, and they aren't aware of how it can benefit their organizations."
Instead, Gomez emphasizes the strategic value and bottom-line advantages that he can bring to his clients' customers, especially the opportunity to increase media coverage and sales. Not only does his agency strive to learn about their needs, goals, and challenges, it also pays close attention to the media outlets that they follow. It's a marketplace-driven approach that's guided not by what his clients want to say, but more by what their customers need to hear in order for them to become qualified sales prospects for his clients' products and services.
Given these requirements, Rafe Gomez needed a media communications platform that could identify and enable relationships with industry influencers, shorten the time required to secure contact and coverage, and help generate revenue for his clients with the earned coverage. His firm also wanted to engage with real experts whenever they had questions.
"Meltwater is allowing me to work much more efficiently and much faster than I did previously. Given the time that's saved in research, I can focus on finding really creative ways to deliver solutions that will build the sales of my clients."
Rafe Gomez, Co-Owner, VC Inc. Marketing
Solution
Research and Reach Out from Right Within the Too
It wasn?t long after switching from Cision to Meltwater that Rafe Gomez noticed a difference. In addition to Meltwater?s platform being more cost-effective, it also provided his firm with a whole new set of tools that were previously unavailable to him. His research became more substantive and allowed him to identify exactly who was writing about the specific topics that he was researching. And because he could do this from right within the tool, the savings in time and money were substantial.
PR is a people business, and Gomez soon began using Meltwater's influencer contact database to track down influential media professionals who could advance his clients' messages. When he wanted to tie a film school to a hit show at a Los Angeles TV station, he opened the influencer contact database and within minutes had all the data he needed to form relationships with key decision makers at the station. Two hours later, the station got back to him and he began setting up the TV segment.
"My sales support approach and methodology are instantly understandable to clients who previously weren't familiar with or interested in PR, and they can immediately see the benefits that this strategy delivers. It all comes together so beautifully with Meltwater."
Rafe Gomez, Co-Owner, VC Inc. Marketing
Summary
Meltwater Helps VC Inc. Marketing
Save time by researching content directly within the platform
"I was using Cision and found that Meltwater is much more affordable. There are also aspects to Meltwater that Cision lacks. Within any particular media outlet, I can see the content I'm interested in learning about from right inside the tool. This is huge because it means that I don't need to jump around nearly as much as I did before."
Receive personal instruction in a format that's available on demand
"The thing that blew me away was Meltwater's live chat aspect. I type in a question and a service rep quickly sends me a GIF that shows me how to achieve my goal. That's amazing! I save all of these GIFs in the event that I need to refer to them later. I can?t tell you how happy and relieved that makes me."
Earn ROI that can be measured in hours rather than weeks or months
"I used Meltwater to track down who's who at 'Good Day L.A.', which is the number one rated morning show in America's number two media market, and immediately I was able to find the entertainment reporter, the producer, and the assignment editor. I sent them a very short segment pitch right from the tool via email. Within two hours, the entertainment reporter replied 'I?m in, let's do this!' "
— Rafe Gomez, Co-Owner, VC Inc. Marketing
