Be Known: Rebranding Your Agency

6/12/2017 Anonymous 0 Comments


Ahmet Reisli, a Digital Strategist and Designer at the PR firm RooneyPartners and a 2016 graduate of BIC, was asked to rework his agency's website -- but the project turned out to be much more than that: a rebranding of the agency, including a new tagline. When he began the process, Ahmet applied his best BIC thinking and put himself in a client's shoes. He asked himself, "What kind of a PR agency would I hire? What would make me feel CONNECTED with the firm?"  He also did a competitive analysis, reviewing the taglines of other agencies. He came across lots of language such as this: “Data-driven PR.. Visual driven... X driven.. Y driven… agency," which sounded too "hard sell" and not something that would make a client feel energized and connected to the agency. 

What Ahmet envisioned for potential and existing clients was more like “RooneyPartners is here for you and will tell your story  -- you, the client, are going to become whatever you wanted to be so that ultimately YOU are going to BE KNOWN. It’s not about the agency. It's about the client." 


Here's are some of the applications of his "Be Known" tagline that also has sub-branding lines for different uses. 


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Party. Party. Party.

6/07/2017 Anonymous 0 Comments

Caps thrown. Families hugged. A wild ride ends in S104 with a graduation party...

Good luck, Class of 2017. Soar -- but stay grounded. Please stay in touch -- nt

More pix in GALLERY.

BICsters Rising

6/06/2017 Anonymous 0 Comments


Sahil Shah BIC ’16 is now  as an Experiential Marketing Specialist at Admerasia an award-winning multicultural full service advertising agency based in New York City. He’ll be joining a diverse marketing team to lead the day-to-day experiential activities with clients in categories such as telecom, automotive and finance.

Marika Bailey BIC ’16 has just been named Web and Digital Media Manager for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, America's premier legal organization fighting for racial justice. Marika will be applying her BIC skills to help the NAACP reimagine their visual brand and create a compelling narrative for a new generation of civil rights leaders. 

Rolando Leal BIC ’16 has landed a job at McGarryBowen as a Sr. Account Executive managing JCPenney. He’ll be the Hispanic market expert helping with strategy, production and growth initiatives. 

Dalyn Francis BIC '16 has secured a position as Project Manager at Saatchi & Saatchi Wellness where she'll lead the production of cross-media projects working with multi-functional teams to deliver strategic on-time on-budget programs that power client satisfaction. 

Megan Fullagar BIC ’16 is now a Marketing Manager for Strata, a media buying technology, at NBC Universal/Comcast. She’ll have the opportunity to build campaigns, oversee its re-branding, and completely overhaul all its of marketing efforts from digital to social media. 

Alexandra Suazo BIC '15 has left the New York area for her dream job as the Manager of Digital Marketing for American Girl/Mattel in Middleton, Wisconsin.   

Vera Golikova Keiter BIC ’15 was just promoted to copywriter working for all BBDO clients, specializing in digital activations. 

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Ladies & Gentlemen: The BIC Class of 2017

6/03/2017 Anonymous 0 Comments


Congratulations to the BIC Class of 2017 --  our third graduating class.  This amazing group of students entered two years ago and hail all the way from India to Taiwan. From Greece to China. From Spain to Scandinavia -- Denmark and Norway. Bangladesh, Russia and Sri Lanka.  From Virginia all the way to New York City.  

In two short years, these industrious BICsters have gone after and brought home:

Out of 19 awarded nationwide, three LAGRANT Foundation Scholarships were awarded to BICsters: Dalis Galvez, Priscilla Parra, and Melissa Julien.

Melissa also earned a MAIP internship at DigitasLBi. 

Rocio Rivera Iglesias and Saif Ishtiaque were accepted into the Griffin Farley Beautiful Minds Planning Boot Camp over the summer.

Last year, BICsters earned First, Second and Third place (a clean sweep!) at the CCNY Grad Symposium for Naushi Perera, Karina Ramos Salce, Marta Mugica Telleria, Liana Pantzari, and Hank Lin.

BICsters shined remarkably bright at The One Club for Creative Excellence:

Ben Miftari, Enmanuel Vargas Tiburcio, Naushi, Karina, Marta, and Liana were all selected to be a part of an exclusive club: The One Show Client Pitch.   In the last two years, BIC has won two GOLD Pencils. This was the result of campaigns submitted by six BICsters from the Class of 2017: Karina, Marta, Liana last year and Hank, Enmanuel, and Yulia Lesnichaya this year. Yulia was also part of the winning team at The ONE Club's Creative Boot Camp.

Naushi’s poster was honored at the CUNY Human Rights Competition. And Hank was part of a team that was awarded $5,000 at the Zahn Innovation Competition – plus selected as the Audience Choice Award for an extra $1,000.

As part of their graduation requirements, BICsters went to conferences all over NYC: Internet Week, Creative Week, Advertising Week, Social Media Week, Mobile Week – actually, it’s amazing to think that there were weeks when BICsters were in the classroom!  In fact, some even PRESENTED at conferences: Marta and Rocio presented original papers at the Second International Conference on the Historical Links Between Spain and North America.

BICsters have already worked their tails off at places such as: Y&R, MBooth, QuinnPR, Digitas, SociedAD, and Campbell Ewald. They even helped rebrand CCNY for its 170th Anniversary and were feted by the President of City College at a gala in The Great Hall.

As capstoners, these grads tackled serious issues: they helped fight teen depression on behalf of the UJA. And changed the conversation about drinking OR driving for Heineken.

They "PiP-ed It" in the Spring and showed their portfolios-in-progress in speed dating style to recruiters from top notch agencies.

Just before donning their caps and gowns, they defended their BIC portfolios to a panel of professional judges -- and they all survived!!

After months of spending days and nights with each other, by the end of this first week in June, they will be flung far and wide. Doing the most amazing things. As Andrew Carnegie said: “Do your duty and a little more and the future will take care of itself.”  That’s what these students came to BIC to do: a little more.
  
The future is in good hands. Congratulations to the BIC Class of 2017!!

BIC Portfolios Worth Defending

6/02/2017 Anonymous 0 Comments


BICster don't just create portfolios, they must defend them to a jury of professionals in order to earn their MPS degree. This year, our industry judges came from powerhouse companies such as HunterPR, Ogilvy, Ketchum, Deutsch, VaynerMedia, and PepsiCo with titles such as Director of Strategy and Insights Integration, CEO, Creative Director, and Marketing Manager.

Morning and afternoon sessions saw students in Management/Planning, Public Relations, and Creative present in 25 minute slots that included 5 minutes of Q&A.  With portfolios that include both product and process, BICsters distilled their two years in the program with tightly packaged presentations of key projects elevated through the lens of their expertise and passion.

A big BIC thanks to our amazing panels of judges who came on campus and dedicated their day to assessing BIC portfolios and giving students terrific feedback and advice.

Management / Planning Judges
Michael Doody, Founder and Chief Strategy, The ________ Project
Will Parker, Director of Strategy & Insights Integration, Horizon Media
Michelle Rowley, SVP, Group Planning Director, Deutsch
Jasmine Richards, Associate Marketing Manager, PepsiCo

Public Relations Judges
Peter Harris, CEO, Grayling US
Grace Leong, CEO/Managing Partner, Hunter PR
Matt Hantz, Director Digital Design, MBooth
Mitchell Markson, Creator and Ground Control, Markson IdeaCraft
Lauren Mundell, SVP, Director New York Food & Wellness, Ketchum
Enmanuel Tchividjian, Principal & Owner, The Markus Gabriel Group

Creative Judges
Christopher Blunt, Freelance
John Colquhoun, Freelance
Jorge Moya, CCO, SociedAD
Ricard Valero, Creative Director, Ogilvy




Portfolio Defense: Over and Out...

Heineken's Drink OR Drive Initiative a BIC Success

6/02/2017 Anonymous 0 Comments


On the hottest day of the coldest May in memory, three BIC teams presented their CSR campaigns to Heineken USA at the BIC capstone Client Pitch. HUSA brand manager Katharine Preville, Manager of Alcohol Policy & Government Affairs Donna Hawes Saunders, APCO Creative Director Howard Pulchin, and APCO Director Tina Kaiser were joined remotely by SVP Chief Corporate Relations Officer Tara Rush to judge the event. Heineken is the world's most international brewer. Among its many corporate social responsibility efforts, HUSA seeks to create communities of Responsible Citizens by encouraging and rewarding them to make better decisions by focusing on moderate consumption of its brands and knowing how to choose between drinking or driving.


--> Earlier in the semester, HUSA challenged the students to "change the conversation" and uncouple the words "drinking" and "driving" in order to decreased the impact of alcohol related car accidents. Then the BIC team competition kicked into high gear.

Team Mosaic pitched their strategic campaign "Drink or Drive... and Open Your Night" which built off of HUSA's current tagline "Open Your World. " Their strategy asked consumers to unburden their night from decision-making by taking a moment earlier in the day to commit to a "micro-choice." The reward would be a night of spontaneity -- more fun and responsibility-free. Anchored in an "invitation only" event, the campaign began with key influencers who helped consumers make the decision.


Team Polaris focused on three key cities where DUI incidents are below the national average. Their "Welcome to a Post-DUI World" celebrated the innovation and choices already being made by city dwellers and then leveraged those smart choices to keep the momentum going in the right direction. The campaign included a competition among the mayors of New York, Houston, and Atlanta as they competed for even lower DUI numbers and increased innovation.



Team Prizm noted that while DUIs had fallen since the 1950's, the numbers had plateaued. Their research led them to believe that the established language of drinking responsibly had become wallpaper and needed new clarity in order to be effective. Their campaign "Zero=Zero" made sure there was no ambiguity when people were making the decision to drink or drive -- if you choose to drive, you cannot have ANY drinks. Using traditional media with existing language, the campaign included breakthrough ways of replacing ambiguity with clarity, always ending with "Zero=Zero. Drink or drive. Never both."

After a rigorous Q&A session, client judges deliberated for more than an hour and a half in 90 degree heat before deciding that their choice for winning campaign was...all three!

The BIC Corporate Capstone is overseen by Professor and Program Director Nancy Tag. Building off of expertise cultivated in the Fall Non-Profit Capstone, three BIC teams work on a corporate client brief to solve communications challenges. Previous corporate partners have been Universal Music Group and Univision.