case

Nordic PR campaign for security leader

Palo Alto Networks is one of the largest and most influential security companies in the world, protecting over 80,000 clients from cyber and ransomware attacks. As the pan-Nordic PR agency for Palo Alto Networks, we were tasked with managing its PR strategy in these regions, including supporting the organization’s country managers and local sales objectives

Goal

Generate increased awareness to support sales objectives in the Nordics

Strategy

Enhanced visibility through tailored, strategic communication.

Outcome

Massively improved brand awareness in the Nordic region

Goal

Generate increased awareness to support sales objectives in the Nordics

While Palo Alto Networks is one of the largest cyber security brands in the world, their media presence in the Nordics was minimal prior to the company’s collaboration with digitalPR. Our goal was therefore to generate strong brand awareness in all four Nordic countries, in order to support the company’s local sales teams and generate increased traction.

In order to achieve this objective, we created a wide-ranging earned communications strategy, including content creation, brand placement in relevant Nordic media, localized news releases, and thought leadership pieces.

Strategy

Thanks to digitalPR’s team of PR professionals, which includes former technology journalists, we have a vast network of media contacts across all sectors of the Nordic media landscape. Using this unique expertise, we created a map of the key publications and journalists who were crucial to achieving our goal.

This included trade media in the relevant verticals, IT and technology publications, and business and finance media in all four countries. With boots on the ground in each market, digitalPR was able to work directly with the local country managers for Palo Alto Networks, ensuring that each press activity was tailored to the specific needs of that business.

With this key groundwork in place, we were able to craft thought leadership pieces for each country and pitch them to the publications that were strategically important to achieving the local sales objectives. This included making effective use of Palo Alto Networks’ Unit 42 Cyber Security reports, which are compiled by world-renowned threat researchers and an elite team of security consultants.

Wherever possible, we utilized regional spokespeople from Palo Alto Networks in order to convey the enormous wealth of experience and expertise that the company possesses in the area of cyber security.

Outcome

Massively improved brand awareness in the Nordic region

Within the first six months of digitalPR’s collaboration with Palo Alto Networks, we generated over 120 articles and brand mentions in key publications throughout the Nordic region.

More than thirty of these successes were interviews or opinion pieces featuring experts from Palo Alto Networks. However, in addition to securing important coverage in the trade media, we also achieved successes in IT and finance media, including Børsen (DK), Computerworld (NO), Kauppallethi (FI) and Computersweden (SE). Combined, this helped to propel the awareness of Palo Alto Networks to a level never before seen in the Nordic countries.

Finally, we succeeded in positioning the Unit 42 Cyber Security research group within Palo Alto Networks as key opinion leaders in the Nordics, generating more than fifty media mentions of these reports during the campaign period.