EVENT PROMOTION
Client – IIM Lucknow

Objective – Portray and project IIM Lucknow’s annual management festival – MANFEST as one of the biggest B-school Festivals of India.

Grey Cell’s Initiatives - It was the first time ever an IIM had hired a PR agency when IIML took Grey Cell on board to advice them on making MANFEST a great success.

To give a unique flavor to the festival we roped in ‘Mumbai Dabbawallahs’ to speak on leadership and organizational skills – themes most relevant to business school students.

We also organized for media teams, both print and electronic, from Delhi to visit and cover the event. Result was a nationwide coverage for the festival in print as well as on electronic channels.

Special stories based on the fact that how over time the B-school Festivals have taken the shape of very serious events were also carried as features and articles.

Grey Cell has been successfully handling the IIML festival continuously for the last four years now.
 

ADVOCAY / ISSUES MANAGEMENT
Client – Food for Hungry Foundation

Objectives:
- To create an environment for Zero Hunger Act and set the stage for its proposal and enactment in India.

- To launch a people’s movement espousing the cause of the Zero Hunger Act.

Grey Cell’s PR strategy - Grey Cell strategists devised a multi-dimensional, two-phased, multi-location strategy to achieve the twin objectives for the client.

For creating a conducive environment for the proposed act, it was essential for the cause to be visible through meaningful programs and to be heard through appropriate platforms.

First and foremost, the advisory organized a successful launch for the Food for Hungry Campaign. A reasonably good media coverage ensured generation of initial awareness for the campaign.

Grey Cell fostered significant partnerships for the Zero Hunger cause with Social Development Foundation for community adoption and with Dil Se campaign for feeding programs.

We also facilitated appropriate celebrity mapping with the program for maximum visibility and mileage. Celebrities like the noted film actor and social activist, Shabana Azmi and the then reigning Jharkhand Chief Minister, Madhu Koda not only graced the launch ceremony of the ‘Ek Mutthi Anaaj’ scheme but also offered their whole-hearted support for the program. Widespread media coverage of the launch further strengthened awareness about the incumbent cause.

To further the cause and meaningful alliances, Grey Cell made presentations to more than 100 representatives of various NGOs at UP Land Alliance meeting.

Momentum for the people’s movement in support of the proposed act was sustained through various activities in the second phase.

Key multi-location interactive presentations, consultative workshops with various NGOs, public marches at key locations, written representations to key stakeholders like parliamentarians, bureaucrats, policy makers and academicians were some of the numerous PR initiatives which Grey Cell team organized and undertook with successful results.

In addition we also delivered all the written communication for all the Foundation collaterals including preparation of the second draft of the Zero Hunger Act without any outside legal support.
 

MEDIA COVERAGE
Client – BRITISH TELECOM

Objective – Favorable media coverage for BT, when the company was in the process of acquiring i2i Technologies.

Grey Cell’s media strategy - Grey Cell team strategized and ensured that media coverage for BT at such a crucial time of an acquisition though favorable should not be perceived as an overt publicity effort.

Our media team did a meticulous media mapping for the client as the issue on hand transcended its regular telecom industry and sector and had corporate, financial and HR overtones as well.

Key opportunities and meetings between the head honchos of both companies was utilized to facilitate pan-India coverage in mainlines, financial and sectoral publications.
 

INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATION
Client – Kanpur Leather House (KLH)

Objective - Communicate and establish KLH as India’s premier luggage and leather accessories brand and reinforce KLH’s lineage as one of India’s oldest store.

Grey Cell initiatives - Grey Cell applied integrated communication comprising same message through three distinct levels. At the brand level, its identity and positioning was brought in line with the intended communication, which was then disseminated in a premeditated fashion to the customers and the end users.

To enhance the premier image of KLH and firmly establish its vintage lineage, we also brought to fore the company’s ethics and values and its wide-ranging contributions to society.

Our integrated communication initiatives paid off handsomely and today KLH has franchisee branches in all major cities in Eastern India and also has branches in Mumbai and Delhi.
 

PRODUCT / SERVICE LAUNCH
Client – www.relationshipforever.com

Objective – Successfully launch Relationshipforever.com, India’s first exclusive website designed to discuss and resolve personal problems online.

Grey Cell’s launch tactics - Anticipating a widespread apprehension in people’s minds about mushrooming websites, Grey Cell devised an Experiential Media Launch for the client as opposed to an event oriented one.

Our media team organized for the media persons to personally go online with real or contrived issues and experience the website and its services. Since the website’s USP is advice anytime - anywhere, we encouraged the journalists to log in at odd hours to gauge a reality check of the site’s service and quality.

This Experiential Launch accomplished feature write-ups in almost all leading publications across the nation which in turn generated a traffic of more than three lakh visitors to the site in a time period of …XXX… months only.

As a follow-up push, Grey Cell also facilitated the psychologists from the website to regularly feature in the society trend stories in the media. We devised and helped with blog creations on the website to induce people into giving a feedback and thereby ensuring repeat website visits.
 

CRISIS MANAGEMENT

Issue at hand: Protect and handle the image of the promoter of a large industrial house amidst media glare due a family feud over property issues.

PR strategy – Since the family crisis in this case was already in the center of media attention, Grey Cell devised a media-centric crisis control strategy.

We set up a centralized crisis management cell to coordinate and disseminate relevant, true and consistent facts and picture to the relevant targets.

As media was already buzzing with rumors, both true and false, unearthing information about the impending stories and responding to each media vehicle accordingly with speed was of essence in this whole exercise.

Preempting a much wider media interest, we organized a direct media interaction for the promoter with key business journalists to acquaint them with latest and true facts.

Effective messaging, quick response and centralized information dissemination resulted in informed media stories both at the time of crisis and also with follow – up stories once the warring factions of the family settled their dispute.

Issue at hand: Protecting a leading eye hospital’s reputation when it was slapped with a false case by a patient.

PR Strategy: A pre-defined crisis management policy already in place, helped catch the crisis in the budding stage itself. We countered the single one-sided story in one media vehicle with an extremely fast-track response by providing relevant facts and patient’s medical history to all the health journalists. We also facilitated a direct interaction of the hospital chairman with the health media to put forward the institution’s side of the story and answer all brewing questions.

As a result the lone media vehicle, which had earlier published the false claims retracted its previous story by publishing the true facts and the hospital’s viewpoint as well.

The fast-paced exercise helped nip in the bud all other false stories from being published.
 

REPUTATION MANAGEMENT / BRAND & TRADEMARK PROTECTION
Client – Royal Cruiser

Kolkata based Royal Cruiser, eastern India’s leading and largest Volvo service operator, faced a reputation crisis. Some spurious fleet operators started encashing on and soliciting business in Royal Cruiser’s name and trademark with extremely shoddy services. As a result an irate section of duped passengers, not knowing the reality, started a negative campaign against the genuine Royal Cruisers.

Objective
 Protect the client’s reputation from taking any further beating and restore it to its original level.
 Put a stop to the trademark infringement and ensure no repeats.

Grey Cell’s reputation management strategy – We deployed a two-pronged approach to achieve both the objectives simultaneously.

To counter the negative campaign, we took the mass media route. We organized a press conference and set up select one-to-one media interactions to make public the true picture of the state of affairs. We also took the media for a terminus visit for a first hand view of the spurious products and services being run by fake operators which resulted in mediapersons taking a serious note of the ensuing racket.

Simultaneously, Grey Cell also undertook a factual and accurate representation to West Bengal State Government’s Transport Ministry. Our intensive lobbying with the ministry paid off when the transport licenses of the fake operators were scrapped by the state government.