
G. PIROZZI CONSULTING
Strategic Marketing Modern Media Brand Development Tactical Support
G. Pirozzi Consulting's RFP Response
to Garden City Group
1. NAME OF FIRM:
G. Pirozzi Consulting
2. ADDRESS:
51 Hallock Avenue
Smithtown, NY 11787
3-5. CONTACT PERSON & INFO:
Gina Pirozzi
212/228-1249
6. WEBSITE
7. BRIEFLY DESCRIBE YOUR FIRM’S BACKGROUND, STRUCTURE, SIZE AND CLIENT BASE:
G. Pirozzi Consulting was founded by Gina Pirozzi in 1992. In its formative years, the company limited its services to public relations and general marketing for law firms. GPC prospered immediately and Ms. Pirozzi earned a reputation as one of the most effective, successful and best known legal marketers in New York.
Within a few years, GPC added not-for-profit organizations and several trade associations to its roster of law firm clients.
From those origins, the company’s second decade saw it grow into a full service marketing provider serving a diverse client base including law firms, sports and entertainment properties, corporations, not-for-profits, retailers, media companies, political action groups, real estate companies, special events, and filmmakers.
Today, Ms. Pirozzi still handles the law firm clients (and a few trade associations) while partner David Goldberg handles the non-legal accounts. Combining the partners’ core strengths with access to an unmatched talent bank, today’s GPC is a “nouveau mom-and-pop-shop” offering a full range of strategic marketing services while maintaining its “hands on deck” attitude.
As importantly, the GPC mandate is to become accountable to the client’s vision and larger goals. It is never enough to meet marketing/media metrics if there is an opportunity to directly impact the bottom line.
The original mission – to provide innovative marketing to law firms – remains unchanged; even if it has expanded to include new industries (and, in the case of GCG, to target law firms with that innovative marketing). The GPC vision is reflected in its internal motto: “It’s our job to make our clients too big to need us.”
8. PROVIDE A SUMMARY OF YOUR FIRM’S EXPERIENCE PROVIDING SERVICES SIMILAR IN SIZE AND NATURE TO THE SCOPE OF WORK DESCRIBED IN THIS RFP. CASE STUDY SUMMARIES OF PREVIOUS WORK IN WHICH YOU GENERATED NEW CONTENT AND A MEDIA PRESENCE FOR A CLIENT DEVELOPMENT OR INITIATIVE, PARTICULARLY IN LEGAL INDUSTRY PUBLICATIONS, IS PREFERRED. PLEASE OUTLINE THE NUMBER OF HOURS REQUIRED TO COMPLETE THAT PROJECT, AS WELL AS THE OVERALL COST.
Traditional case studies are difficult to provide, particularly in regard to cost, results and measurement, due to confidentiality issues. Work samples, however, are fair game and plentiful. Note, however, that we have not included reams of news stories, bylined articles, photographs, conference and panel appearances generated from two decades of representing major law firms in their efforts to attract legal industry press. Rather, we are assuming that capability is a “given”. Instead, we chose to highlight some work that may better illustrate our ability to think creatively and execute strategically on the modern public relations and marketing landscapes.
Please follow the bold/underlined hyperlinks within this text for a more fulsome look at GPC.
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The Safe Center LI is a nationally prominent nonprofit dedicated to issues around child abuse, domestic abuse and sexual violence. They target the general public, legislators and the legal community (in conjunction with major pro-bono activity). In a six-month project term, that was later renewed, GPC staged a major press event to announce their “re-branding” as The Safe Center LI that successfully targeted local print and broadcast outlets as well as a special target of the group’s – college newspapers, websites and radio stations. GPC also launched the organization’s social media strategy with a Facebook page, blog and viral video campaign. Content was further shared via traditional media resources like this example of Verizon’s “A Minute Smarter” program with the organization’s Executive Director Cynthia Scott . In a more integrated example, GPC leveraged the public’s interest in the NFL’s domestic violence issues to help The Safe Center develop and publicize a related program we referred to internally as "Ray Rice Training" and shared it via an in-depth piece on WABC-TV.
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Catastrophic medical malpractice firm Pegalis & Erickson is a small firm with a big reputation; in part due to a decade-long collaboration with G. Pirozzi Consulting. Partner Steven Pegalis is one of the few legal newsmakers to hold the distinction of appearing on the Big Three national morning news shows (GMA, Today, CBS Morning News) on the same day when GPC booked him in connection with a groundbreaking case in which a lab error resulted in an unnecessary double mastectomy for a Pegalis & Erickson client. For good measure, the story also made the cover of Newsday and was widely covered in the legal press. GPC was instrumental in placing many New York Law Journal features for Mr. Pegalis and his associates, as well as his induction into the National Law Journal Hall of Fame.
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On behalf of iconic retailer Esther Fortunoff and her Fortunoff Fine Jewelry brand, GPC launched a “zero-budget” viral video campaign that tapped into the nostalgic love of the brand among key Long Island demographics. The program called Fortunoff Memories attracted the participation of many key Long Island business leaders and generated far more notoriety than any of the previous, and more traditional, publicity efforts as hundreds of Long Islanders shared the videos in their own networks and relayed similar stories of their own. GPC also responded to Fortunoff’s desire to develop a relationship with Long Island’s burgeoning Indian community with a lengthy placement on ITV Gold and its social extensions.
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Cal Ripken, Jr. is a world-renowned athlete whose current business, Ripken Baseball, operates in the world of youth baseball tournaments, training, et al, in addition to the responsibilities associated with "being Cal Ripken”. GPC was brought in to lead a transition from the “Cal Ripken brand” to the “Ripken Baseball brand” and helped develop and stage a national television and digital content property called The Player with Cal Ripken, Jr. This sizzle reel produced by another GPC client, Eight Squared Entertainment, illustrates the sum result of GPC’s efforts for the project that is currently in development. On behalf of the same client, GPC developed a digital-only daily journal featuring CBS broadcaster Lou Tilley to augment the national television coverage of The Cal Ripken World Series. Finally, GPC worked with Northern Safety Inc., a distributor of industrial safety products, to create digital videos to better activate Cal’s endorsement of their brands.
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Earlier this year we "conquered Hollywood" optioning a major studio film deal for our client, the motivational speaker Kevin Laue , who did 70 domestic speeches and a 35 day Asian tour in 2015. We also ghost-authored his autobiography for the Chinese language market.
Other content solutions have come from enhanced social media applications, old fashioned press releases ranging from the mundane to the traditional to the highly unusual (earlier this year, a “honeybee pin” worn by a National Science Medal winner was credited by President Obama with spurring a conversation that led to major environmental legislation. Since that pin was purchased at Fortunoff, a GPC media alert resulted in major social and traditional media buzz – if you’ll pardon the pun.) Always looking to intelligently push the envelope GPC is currently working with another client to develop a highly targeted Branded Radio solution.
9. PROVIDE A SUMMARY OF YOUR FIRM’S WORK FOR OTHER PROFESSIONAL SERVICE FIRMS AND LEGAL ADMINISTRATION FIRMS. PLEASE IDENTIFY WHERE POSSIBLE ALL SUCH CLIENTS BY NAME.
G. Pirozzi Consulting was born in the legal industry and, over two decades, has accumulated a long list of law firms for which it has done or is doing business. Among dozens of firms for which we have provided services ranging from one-off projects to full service marketing are: Mound Cotton Wollan & Greengrass; Pegalis & Erickson; Boundas Skarzynski Walsh & Black (now Skarzynksi & Black); Healy & Baillie (now part of Blank Rome); Hoffmann & Baron; Bruno, Gerbino & Soriano; Kreindler & Kreindler; Simon Lesser; Brandow Law; and Rakower Lupkin to name a few.
Though less frequently, we’ve also provided services to many entities marketing their brand or services to law firms including E-Title, The BAA Marketing Law Conference, The Negotiation Institute, AIRROC and The WIN Summit.
10. DESCRIBE YOUR FIRM’S COPYWRITING CAPABILITIES:
Copywriting – and writing of all kinds - is one of the core strengths at GPC. Partner David Goldberg has ghost-authored two novels and two nonfiction books. Partner Gina Pirozzi is the author of “The Paralegal’s Guide to New York Law Firms”. Among the partners, there is also significant experience writing advertising copy, scripts, web copy, press releases, business letters, speeches, consumer articles and trade articles.
Beyond internal capabilities, GPC will, on occasion, identify an external subject matter specialist for certain writing assignments. By way of example, we recently provided a client with the services of a former New York Law Journal reporter to work on a complex legal article and have provided Spanish-language and Chinese-language journalists to certain client projects.
11. PROVIDE ANY OTHER INFORMATION THAT YOU BELIEVE WOULD MAKE YOUR FIRM'S WORK FOR GCG SUPERIOR TO THAT OF OTHER PR FIRMS.
In all candor we are not a PR firm. We are certainly PR experts, but there is not a public relations agency or consultant working today that has not expanded their practice beyond traditional “pitch and place” story work. They’ve done so because that 2oth Century model is all but dead and also because their clients – who live in a world dominated by social media, digital media and communication that moves at the speed of light - have demanded the change.
As a result, it has become very difficult for prospective clients to separate those with genuine passion, knowledge and expertise from those simply looking to survive.
G. Pirozzi Consulting takes pride in its ability to provide tactical support in traditional and non-traditional communications projects. At our core, we are a partnership of balance.
Gina Pirozzi has spent her entire career in the highly ordered, risk-averse world of law firms pitching stories to law journals, arranging conference participation and speaking engagements, and – more recently – embracing social media at a “lawyer’s pace”.
David Goldberg has spent his professional life on the cutting edge of communication as a marketing chief at two public companies. His corporate pedigree is matched by an entrepreneurial bent that is always in search of what’s next.
This yin and yang serves to benefit any G. Pirozzi Consulting client and to separate us from many of our peers.
As it pertains, more specifically, to GCG:
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We know lawyers – for better or worse. We know law firms. We know the legal press. We also know that marketing to lawyers has stark differences from traditional B2B marketing given the unique structure of law firm partnerships and a reticence to abandon “the way things have always been done”.
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We believe in content! More specifically, we believe in mutli-platform, layered content that expands as it moves from website, to Twitter, to LinkedIN, to Blogs, to traditional press, to trade press and back to website.
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We are nimble and flexible enough to excel at project work and we have huge external bench strength should a project require outside expertise.
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We do not have a pitch team. Your project will always be in the hands of a partner.
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We believe in excellence. It is all we do.
FEES:
At GPC, we try to keep on open mind on how fees are structured. We do NOT and will NOT work on an hourly fee basis, but are willing to consider most other models.
Our preferred model is a monthly retainer (calculated based on scope and deliverables) in a fixed term with mutual options to renew. By way of example, many of our clients will retain us for a 6-9 month period to execute a variety of tasks; often with a major deliverable at the end. In those cases, the fee is a monthly retainer even though the 6-9 month plan is usually comprised of multiple projects. That being said, we are also comfortable working on an ad hoc project-to-project basis with fees negotiated accordingly.
There is no rate card for our services. As a general philosophy, we work with a very low overhead and – when it is necessary to bring in a project partner like a videographer, graphic designer, translator, etc – we do not pass on a “mark up” for that work. In our Long Island/NYC marketplace, we are widely considered to provide an excellent value for our services.