Positioning a Research Company to
Enter the Commercial Product Arena
 The
Challenge: Vista Research, a Mountain View-based research company,
was moving into the commercial market after years of specializing
in government contracts and environmental research. One of its first
commercial products was an innovative underground pipeline leak
detection product with applications in airport safety. Although
Vista is well-known in research circles, it foresaw difficulties
in marketing its new products to an audience not familiar with the
company.
The Solution: We prepared a comprehensive
media kit that led off with news that Vista's product had been installed
in two airports in Montreal. The release proceeded to explain how
the technology works, how it differs from alternative methods and
what it can be used for. The rest of the media kit included biographies
of the company's principals, facts about Vista Research, areas of
its research, past technologies created (such as a method to make
it easier to see hockey pucks on television broadcasts of National
Hockey League games), and photos and marketing sheets on the product.
We also posted additional photos on the Web in a high-resolution,
downloadable format to save Vista the costs of photo duplication,
and set up a website dedicated to the leak detection system.
We followed up with more than 200 calls to
all the press in the Bay Area, United States and Canada that received
the full press kits, sent more information to those news organizations
who requested it, and arranged interviews with Vista officials.
Results: More than 20 publications
in the United States and Canada ran stories, new product reviews
or briefs on Vista Research and its pipeline leak detection system.
The effort resulted in recognition for Vista Research as a credible
commercial vendor, ensuring that future products will be recognized
and received favorably by an industry now familiar with it.
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