Long Case Studies | LITMUS

Case Studies

The LITMUS team structures customised frameworks delivering campaigns at the national, regional and global levels. What that means is we are the team that.

US-based Cloud Communications Provider Reaches Asia-wide Audience with LITMUS

A Silicon Valley-based cloud communications platform-as-a-service (CPaaS) company was entering Southeast Asia with an aim to grow its international operations. New to the region, it was of course an unknown company, faced with the task of building its business while creating brand awareness and educating a new market.

LITMUS was appointed as the regional communications consulting team by their then Executive Chairman, with whom the agency had worked when he was CEO at another firm.

LITMUS worked closely with the corporate team to establish the company, as well as build a market understanding of its services and offerings in SEA, using strategic media (print and online) and industry analyst (including IDC, Gartner, Frost & Sullivan) engagement.

The Silicon-Valley firm was acquired a couple of years later by a New York Stock Exchange listed provider of business cloud communications, for several hundred million dollars. Through this acquisition, the New York firm planned for international expansion, especially Asia.

LITMUS has been supporting the new entity’s Asia Pacific (APAC) expansion, including their openings in China and Japan. LITMUS also supported them for a variety of partnership announcements in Japan and the Philippines, along with customer wins, customer success stories and industry awards.

Of the long relationship, the client commented “The LITMUS team has been instrumental in helping us break into the SEA market, helping to build our regional market presence through their deep understanding of the local market. LITMUS provided invaluable counsel on how to make global strategies regionally effective, as well as serving as my on-ground ears and eyes, an absolute dependable communications partner in Southeast Asia. I strongly recommend LITMUS to any business in need of an efficient and trusted communications partner in Southeast Asia.”

New Zealand-based Cyber Insurance Innovator Launches in Singapore with LITMUS

LITMUS was approached by a New Zealand-based innovation-driven insurtech as they planned their Singapore launch. New to the market, they faced challenges typical of any new company: how to build their brand, how to become known and trusted by their stakeholders – partners, customers, potential customers – and how to grow and succeed in a competitive market place.

LITMUS strategized the launch of Singapore’s first cyber, technology and financial lines insurtech in Singapore, serving as the communications agency for Asia. Media content was created, demonstrating the unique offerings of the company and its proven expertise in critical areas of business continuity, risk management and cybersecurity.

In addition to the content, media outreach took place prior to the launch for select priority interviews, and a media briefing with key journalists was held on the day of the official launch.

The launch campaign was highly successful, with 74 news articles generated across Singapore, Southeast Asia and in global trade publications.

Importantly, beyond the excellent news results, was the direct business impact: many calls from partners, customers, and 3000+ website visitors within a few days of the launch.

Following the company launch, we have managed several other projects, including a technology platform launch, product diversification partnership announcement and Advisory Board announcement.

News story results on the activities total close to 300.

LITMUS Launches Cyber Security Start-up in Singapore; Delivers Investors, Customers, Partners

LITMUS has considerable experience in the important cyber security space. LITMUS recently managed the public launch of a Singapore-based firm that offers a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform for companies to monitor, measure and mitigate human-induced cybersecurity risks.

The founding CEO was kind enough to offer his take on objectives, audiences and business impact. These are his words:
“As with any start-up, we have multiple objectives: build our brand, educate the market about our product and services, differentiate from competitors, acquire customers, acquire partners, and speak to the investor community.

We decided to work with LITMUS based on their 10 years of innovation experience in Singapore and the region, backed by their strong understanding of technology and their expertise in translating business insights into content, and getting a brand in front of the right audiences.

The media results were excellent, 83 media reports across regional and global publications: 33 news reports and 50 social media news reports, with an audience reach of more than 2.8 million. Those audiences were the ones we wanted to reach business, finance, investors, innovation, technology, and security.

And the broader business impact has been invaluable”

⇒ Investors: several Series A investors contacted us keen to learn more about what we do.  This is great, allowing us to maintain contact over the longer-term now that the ice has been broken organically.

⇒ New customers: including a well-known ASEAN FinTech who reached out to us and with whom we are already working on a POC. We are also in conversations with other firms.

⇒ New partners: cybersecurity companies that offer complementary cyber solutions.

⇒ Social channels: our biggest social channel uptick on LinkedIn

⇒ Website traffic: ~2x surge in website traffic over 30 days

So, if you have objectives and audiences like ours, work with LITMUS.”

Founding CEO

LITMUS Builds Thai-based Payment Leader’s Brand Across Southeast Asia

A Thai-based B2B fintech firm had the lofty objective of becoming the leading payment solutions provider in SEA with a focus on innovation, disruptive technologies, value, and safety.

It had many critical stakeholders, including employees, regulators across SEA, financial service institutions at the national and regional levels, ecommerce firms, transport companies, companies in several business sectors and consumers. It also needed to talk to the regional and global investor communities, because, as a start-up, investor confidence in its brand and its operations was critical.

LITMUS worked with the firm for several years, developing and executing corporate, B2C and B2B positioning and product promotion strategies to build the firm’s brand, partnerships, and presence across SEA and internationally.

The multi-year communications campaign delivered more than 1,000 news stories across influential media – CNBC, WSJ, Forbes, FT, TechCrunch – reaching, informing and influencing key stakeholders.

With several rounds of investment, the firm has now raised around USD70 million.

LITMUS Leads 7-Country Communications Campaign for Singapore-based Consumer Finance Platform

LITMUS worked with a Singapore-based consumer finance platform as it planned an aggressive business push across its seven markets: Singapore, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, and Malaysia.

Its business objectives included acquiring consumers and partners, while demonstrating its leading position and plans to the financial sector.

Its communication objectives were to be positioned and perceived as an established fintech company with strong products, partners, and technologies to compete and win in a highly competitive space.

LITMUS, working with the headquarters team, was responsible for the campaign across all seven markets, from conceptualisation, messaging, and content development to media strategy, targeting and engagement.

LITMUS developed internal campaign briefing books, counselled local country heads on the campaign, its focus and in-market approach, and media interaction guidelines. LITMUS identified and coordinated several key media interviews in several markets, including Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, Hong Kong.

Critical to the campaign success was the strategic approach of developing a regional news release with a consistent message, along with customised content supporting each of the seven markets to increase relevance and impact at the regional and local levels, and most effectively reach business and consumer audiences.

From a story-line perspective, in addition to emphasising the company’s track record of success, it was important to describe the future, in particular how funding will be invested to drive growth through product and technology enhancement, management and technical talent acquisition, and partner network expansion.

One of its key differentiating elements was its focus on driving greater financial inclusion and security for the promising customer segments in Southeast Asia and Hong Kong. These solutions help to improve the financial health of consumers by helping them made informed choices on varied financial products in a simple way.

The multi-market PR and communication campaign generated nearly 250 news reports, including 20 interviews, while reaching over 200 million people across broadcast, dailies, business, technology, start-up, fintech, banking/finance, and payments publications. Some key media included CNBC, Asian Venture Capital Journal, Tech in Asia, e27, Deal Street Asia, Hong Kong Economic Journal and The Philippines Post.

LITMUS Helps Malaysia Fintech Start-up Build Brand with Investors, Banks, Insurers, Talent

LITMUS worked with Malaysia-based fintech that provides banks and insurance companies with a full stack technology solution that manages every stage of the customer acquisition journey.

LITMUS tasked with building their leadership position across multiple markets, driving B2B customer acquisition and attracting investors through thought leadership articles, C-level opportunities at regional events, and brand building across key technology and trade sites.

LITMUS supported the company with all media strategy, content development and media engagement, serving as the firm’s only regional and global PR agency.

Over several years the communications campaign generated 450 news articles, and 20+ interviews in Tier 1 media, including Bloomberg TV, TechCrunch, Mergermarket, Nikkei Asian Review, and Asian Venture Capital Journal.

News coverage was across 15 markets:

China, Japan, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Israel, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Thailand, the UK, Europe, and the US. Coverage spanned dailies, business, technology, finance, and banking media verticals (across print, online, and broadcast)

The founding CEO was kind enough to share his challenges, objectives, and impact around the communications campaign. These are his words:

“We started out as an online financial aggregator (OFA) in Malaysia and Indonesia. Seeing how competitive the landscape was for OFAs across the region, with four or five players vying for funding and consumer web traffic, our goal was to leverage a unique technology advantage to win in Southeast Asia. We developed our technology to offer a proprietary full stack solution for financial institutions and a unique value proposition for digital consumers.

We engaged LITMUS to define and differentiate our offerings from competitors, build our brand as the leading full-stack fintech company in the region, support customer acquisition of banks and insurance companies, as well as attract investors and top talent to the company. The communications campaign included content, media management, awards, and business intelligence.

Serving as our only regional and global agency, LITMUS developed a communications strategy that focused on telling a story of growth and innovation.

Over several years the communications campaign generated over 300 business, technology, and investment media reports across Asia, Europe, and North America, with an audience reach of 130+ million.

The media coverage sparked interest among existing clients who reached out to us after reading about our new technologies. We also strengthened our brand among prospective clients based on company developments, including funding, regulatory approval, and other initiatives. Our talent search and outreach efforts also improved significantly, due to greater awareness about our company story.”

Founding CEO

European Robotics Innovator Targets SEA Industrial Sector with LITMUS

A European-based global leader in industrial automation and robotics had Southeast Asian business objectives of differentiating its brand, promoting its innovation-leading products, dominating market share, and educating customers and potential customers of the value and benefits of robotic automation.

Its products are cutting edge, and applicable to a wide variety of industry sectors, including automotive, agriculture, medical, metal working, hospitality, manufacturing, and FMCG.

Working with the Singapore-based team, LITMUS developed a strategic regional communications plan to deliver partners, customers, and revenue.

That plan, involving content development, partnerships, customer success stories in written and video format, marketing collateral infographics was reviewed, endorsed and executed for six Asian markets – Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, Vietnam, and seven languages.

Within those markets, we needed to reach corporations, enterprises, SMEs with a message of innovation, technology adoption and competitiveness in an Industry 4.0 world.

The plan’s execution saw thought leadership, media engagement (broadcast, print and online) targeted interviews, press conferences, journalist briefings, and press releases researched and distributed, delivering exceptional brand exposure, with over 1,000 news stories, driving customer acquisition and partner engagement.

LITMUS Delivers SEA, ANZ, India Communications Campaign for European Robotics Solutions Start-up

A Denmark-based leader in innovative robotic solutions for the manufacturing sector was new to Asia. The firm chose LITMUS to build its brand and position it as a leading provider of collaborative applications in Southeast Asia, Australia, and India.

It brought best-in-class technology, a hyper-active product roadmap, and partners and customers across Asia. But it had aggressive market-development plans to become the leading company in its space. It was a challenger, bringing innovation to market faster that competitors, but challenged by their longer presence and larger size.

LITMUS worked with the firm to announce its entrance into the region with the opening of its regional headquarters. LITMUS leveraged strategic regional and in-market media engagements (broadcast, print and online) including by-lines, interviews, media briefings and press releases to reach key target audiences across the region, including managing trade media attendance in Japan, for the region’s largest trade show.

LITMUS has delivered over 300 news stories across Southeast Asia, India, and Australia, driving customer acquisition and partner engagement for the company.