Marketing Wins

Marketing led accomplishments

New Market Penetration

When asked by Ricoh Board of Directors to establish the company in 360-degree spherical imaging I led the strategic launch team with strategy, tactics, market segmentation, product positioning, communication and sales channel requirements. Architected to achieve category objectives the executed plan generated the needed attention and consumer demand to exceed launch forecast quantities by 200%. The launch team worked closely withFacebook and YouTube to develop and activate their 360-degree video sharing platforms leading to significant gains in consumer adoption of the technology. The successful launch of Ricoh Theta doubled sales, displaced competitors, demonstrated industry prominence, and s ecured #1 market position, stimulating national media buzz with programs on Bloomberg, USA Today, and others

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The Future Potential for 360 Degree Cameras

Why 360 video is the next big thing in tech

360 interview - Jim Malcolm, President, Ricoh Americas - CES 2016

Theta 360 - Brand Site

Brand Positioning

Lack of investment in PENTAX prohibited growth and distressed the brand globally. Determined to restore both the company reputation and brand promise, I led the development and execution of a 3-year strategy combined with an investment commitment to nurture communication, product development, and channel growth. These activities rebuilt credibility and stabilized the business, recovering viable market share and restoring customer confidence.

I have included a few of the most notable benchmarks here:

Year One: Brand integration, achieving all KPIs and growing brand recognition 15% (unaided brand recall) and 22% (aided recall).

Year Two: Stabilized core market segments. Launched 11 new products and phased out-of-date legacy SKUs. Commenced brand marketing/communication and social media efforts including 40 one-on-one press interviews. Received significant PR media stories (27MM Impressions) within 48 hours of launch. Grew unit sales 3.5% while industry average sales eroded 28% year-over-year.

Year Three: Penetrated new segments and achieved #1 market share, which drove 400% industry growth.

Year Four: Released phase II of innovative technology at strategic price points.

These efforts transformed the public image and viability of the Pentax brand and displaced competitors through renewed customer confidence. As a result, this strategy was duplicated globally. The extensive press followed as DP Review, Tech Times, The Verge, CNet, and PC Magazine carried stories about the brand.

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Worth the wait? A look inside the Pentax K-1

Pentax 645Z Product Review

Strategy Session with Jim Malcolm

Product Launch

Selected to rollout Sony Reader, an innovative, disruptive product designed to transition consumers from buying physical printed media to downloading digital books. Utilizing new product launch tools on a national scope, demonstrating product features, leveraging media relations (PR), channel development, experiential marketing, advertising, and social engagement.

Instigated 2MM hands-on trials during the Reader Revolution campaign, which placed 1,000 product demonstrators into retail locations over a six-week program. Achieved targeted presale quantities and exceeded first-year sales projections by 11%. The resulting program established a sustainable media and product launch platform for future Sony products.

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Sony Reader Revolution Campaign

300k Sony Readers Sold

SONY Starts a Reading Revolution

Customer Engagement

Inherited a team accustomed to a lack of transparency, which led to poor customer service standards, unacceptable service times, and a legacy service provider who routinely failed KPIs. Despite repeated warnings, site visits and internal analysis of performance gaps a significant change in strategy and vendors became necessary.

Co-developed and led the service and operations teams to evolve the service model for both PENTAX and RICOH branded products in The United States and Canada to ensure customer excellence. Post-execution service measures, including c ustomer service, revealed new and continuing gaps in customer satisfaction resulting from an internal parts flow bottleneck in delivery from global inventories.

Initiated and committed to continuous process improvement models, empowered Ricoh's Director of Operations to lead the ongoing process improvement resulting in the launch of the Ricoh Service Portal. Satisfaction levels hit all-time high (+85%) as service times reduced 80%, local market parts inventories decreased 73%, and ROI measures exceeded projection by 7%.

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Ricoh Imaging Community Page

Global Integration

Hired by the Chairman of Ricoh Company, Ltd. to lead the post-acquisition integration of Pentax into the larger Ricoh and better position the company in a highly competitive eroding marketplace.

After completing a global assessment of marketing and communication capabilities, the investigation revealed disparate and competing management and systemic operational flaws. Mapped Pentax against Ricoh's global infrastructure throughout Europe, The Americas, Asia-Pacific and Global Headquarters in Tokyo, Japan. My insights defined the future state of the organization including re-allocation of group resources, elimination of redundant costs, internal and external communication improvements, brand strategy, Voice of Customer (VOC) requirements and enhancements to product development processes. My transformation methodology was the catalyst, on a global basis, to initiate change management and compliance with defined merger strategies. Provided expertise, executive leadership and execution standards to Ricoh Corporation’s CEO, CFO, COO, and GSMO team.

Restructured and consolidated to harmonize product offerings while establishing marketing and communications. This reduced costs, time-to-market, improved quality and delivered an operationally lean North American business unit.

Strategic Planning

Entrusted with multiple Sony brands and spanning a variety of consumer products; I had the privilege and opportunity to push the creative envelope for both existing and newly entered market segments within the consumer electronics space.

Rooted in market analysis and customer segmentation; advertising such as the launch of the Cybershot T-1 with Steven Tyler and the establishment of "Rush Mylo" broke new ground for Sony Electronics within the Corporate Marketing division.

Having the opportunity to team with bright minds in creative agencies I was able to develop, approve, produce and deploy unique creative foils that built brand equity for Sony. Stagnant product categories such as noise canceling headphones and exciting new market segments like digital cameras offered me the opportunity to showcase my creative instinct and business acumen to deliver results.

As a result of our work, the company took a commanding #1 market share position in nearly every category I represented. This included large established subbrand such as Walkman and new product categories like the Sony Reader.

Leading a global standardization initiative to unify marketing and communications strategies; I scoped and built the Marketing Resource Management (MRM) tool needed to manage complex libraries of marketing assets, developed campaigns, deployed media and measured results across multiple brands including Sony, Walkman, Reader, Handycam, Vaio, Xplod, Mavica, and Cybershot.

The action resulted in improved brand measures, expanded market share and defined a legacy MRM platform.

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