MOMENTUM
After a difficult 2009, Porter-Novelli took the opportunity to reinvigorate its operation in 2010, unveiling a new brand positioning that attempts to return the firm to its roots in planning and behavioural change. Altogether, the year was a happier one, with plenty of new business, including significant wins from Hitachi GST, Heinz, Welch’s, Bayer, Wikimedia Foundation, Piedmont Healthcare and McDonald’s. There was also expanded business rom existing clients such as Microsoft, P&G’s Always brand and HP, and new digital AOR duties for The Laughing Cow and Soyjoy. In addition, Porter-Novelli acquired Voce Communications, a San Francisco tech and digital specialist with which it has collaborated on numerous accounts.
REGIONAL REACH
Porter Novelli’s flagship New York office, led by Lisa Rosenberg, is a longtime leader in both consumer and healthcare communications. The Washington office—where Porter Novelli was founded—is home to a substantial social marketing and public sector capability, a growing public affairs practice and a major hub for the firm’s creative work. The Chicago office has grown in stature in recent years, and the firm maintains a comprehensive presence in California, with offices in Irvine, Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco, offering technology, life sciences and public affairs expertise. There are smaller offices in Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Ft. Lauderdale, and Seattle, and north of the border in Montreal and Toronto. PN also has an extensive Latin American network.
INTERNATIONAL REACH
In Europe, a respectable turnaround following a miserable 2009 has taken particular shape under UK CEO Sally Ward, who presides over around 100 people. Other wholly-owned offices Brussels, where a team of 30 has historically focused on Belgian business but has developing EU and public affairs capabilities; the Netherlands; and Spain. Of the network offices, the most impressive include Farner Porter Novelli, the market leader in Switzerland. Through a mix of wholly-owned operations, strategic alliances and affiliates, Porter Novelli offers reasonable coverage of the Asia-Pacific region. India is arguably the strongest part of the Porter Novelli network in the region, with the PRactice Porter Novelli focused primarily on technology business. In China, Porter Novelli’s partnership with local marketing communications giant Shunya International is now in its third year, and the firm has operations in Taiwan and Hong Kong. In Japan, Focused Porter Novelli has 20 staff; in Korea, Korcom Porter Novelli has 20. In the southern Asia operation, there’s a team of 14 in Singapore, mostly focused on serving regional business, 55 people split between three offices in Australia, and another 25 in New Zealand.
EXPERTISE
Porter-Novelli’s three core areas of strength are healthcare, technology and brand marketing. Of these, it is the latter two that appeared to perform strongest in 2010, judging by the firm’s new business record, with the brand marketing practice offering specific depth in food and nutrition and fashion beauty. In particular, Porter-Novelli was named agency-of-record for McDonald’s nutrition work, and also clinched Hitachi Data Systems global PR account in 2010. Both of these wins were spurred by the firm’s insights and analytics capabilities; it can credibly be regarded as a pioneer in this space, and is now attempting to leverage this heritage to help it capitalise on the shift towards data- and digital-centric communication. Porter’s public affairs practice, led by Kiki McLean in Washington DC, also performed strongly over the past 12 months, thanks in part to its expertise in healthcare regulatory issues. Porter also offers one of the top two or three social marketing practices in the country, serving an impressive portfolio of public sector clients. Digital and social media expertise is now integrated into campaigns across all practice areas, featuring an impressive roster of talent.
TALENT
The firm is led by CEO Gary Stockman, supported by global president and CFO Anthony Viceroy, and global president, clients, Julie Winskie. Personnel news was probably dominated by the loss of 20-year agency veteran Lisa Rosenberg from her role as New York MD, for a senior role at Euro RSCG PR. Susan Hayes came onboard as global director of healthcare, replacing Barbara DeBuono who departed for Orbis, while the firm also added healthcare veteran Cheryl Nigro as an EVP in its New York office. Darlan Monterisi was hired to lead the firm’s global HP business; and ex-journalist and content consultant Nick Charles joined the firm at the start of 2011 to give the firm a stronger global content edge. Other key hires included Ilene Smith EVP and director of food and nutrition; Debra Cabral as EVP in Washington DC; and Loretta Markevics as SVP of engagement planning and research. The digital practice added Mary Matyas and Mike Scheiner to executive digital roles, but lost senior talent in the shape of global digital and social media head Stephanie Agresta, and strategic planning chief Joel Johnson.
CULTURE
The firm’s Porter Novelli University program remains one of the strongest professional development platforms in the PR industry. The agency also collaborates with parent company Omnicom’s training program at private business school Babson. Globally, the firm continues to train its people in its proprietary Compass planning methodology, which has been rebuilt and renamed as Engagement Planning.
INTELLECTUAL LEADERSHIP
Porter-Novelli’s insight-generation process PNPoint forms a key part of its engagement planning platform, by attempting to “marry immersion with the rigour of data.” Indeed, the firm’s analytics operation, led by Israel Mirsky, must count as one of the industry’s strongest, and includes a partnership with Prime Research. And the acquisition of Voce gives it access to a range of tools and services in the digital realm.
PROGRAMS
Porter-Novelli picked up a SABRE Award in the marketing to men category on behalf of its work launching the Gillette Fusion ProGlide. The campaign, called ‘Turning Skeptics into Believers’ helped Gillette overcome lethargy in the shaving category by developing a social-media centred effort based on a robust a research platform. The product eventually became the number one razor in its category, beating awareness targets comfortably. Another eye-catching campaign was Porter’s creation of the HP Mobile Park and digital event SXSW in Austin, Texas.
BRAND
After the negative buzz of 2009, it was a smart idea to relaunch the Porter-Novelli brand in 2010, giving the agency an opportunity to redefine its vision and goals and perhaps jettison some of the baggage of recent years. The rebranding attempts to make the agency more client-centric and creative, and was accompanied by a major internal global conference, bringing together 176 Porter staffers from 36 countries. These changes bode well; Porter-Novelli remains one of the more low-profile firms, and any attempts to distinguish itself from its peers - and put to rest persistent speculation regarding a possible merger with an Omnicom stablemate - can only make sense.
THE FUTURE
Stockman says that Porter-Novelli’s midsize status makes it more nimble than its peers. Others might say that it is stuck in the classic midsize quandary: too big to innovate, and too small to see the benefits of scale. Given the profound ways in which technology is affecting business models, though, this argument may yet prove moot. What cannot be disputed is that Porter-Novelli is the smallest of Omnicom’s global networks and also appears to be growing at a slower rate. The firm has demonstrated that it can capably compete for both national and global assignments; continued new business strength will help convince the doubters of its long-term viability. —AS