Clare Morris Agency Wins Award for Legislative Awareness Campaign
November 14, 2007
COLUMBIA, SC November 14, 2007 – Last evening, the S.C. Chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) presented the Clare Morris Agency with an Award of Excellence for its 2007 legislative outreach campaign on behalf of the S.C. Centers of Economic Excellence (CoEE).
According to the chapter’s president, Michael Sponhour, the Clare Morris Agency was the only nominee to receive a perfect score on its judging criteria. He added that the judges from Arkansas, Georgia and Texas chapters commented that the comprehensive campaign “was the best of the best. On a small budget, very aspect was achieved and done well. This illustrates the power of strategic minds, creative writing, and PR at its finest…”
The campaign implemented during the 2007 legislative session included a number of communication tools to update the members of the General Assembly on the progress of the state’s endowed chair program and its positive economic impact in generating more research dollars coming into South Carolina. Since the program was established in 2003, 35 centers and 62 chairs have been approved among the state’s three research universities – Clemson University, the Medical University of South Carolina and the University of South Carolina.
“We are thrilled to be recognized by our IABC peers for our work,” said Clare Morris, president of the Columbia-based marketing and communications firm. “This was a great team effort and I especially want to thank Jessica Daly for masterminding this strategy and Trisha Ostrowski for overseeing the implementation of this multi-layered campaign. Amy Murray and Karen Owens also contributed their considerable brainpower which led to the success of this campaign.”
“More importantly, we accomplished our goal of keeping the legislators informed about the CoEE program. Thanks to their ongoing support, this program can continue to build South Carolina’s knowledge economy,” Morris added.
The campaign included a replica of the Wall Street Journal titled The Main Street Journal. The newspaper included stories highlighting the program and the professors. It was hand delivered to General Assembly members by a paperboy, and photos of the legislators were distributed with press releases on the program to each one’s hometown newspaper.
Other tools included one-page briefings; a Research Stars brochure, which was underwritten by New Carolina, South Carolina’s Council on Competitiveness; an interview on This Week in the House; a legislative breakfast; and an opinion-editorial co-authored by all three research university presidents.
Formed in 2006, the Clare Morris Agency is a woman-owned marketing and public relations firm that specializes in helping companies and organizations that work to make South Carolina more competitive in the knowledge economy. The CMA team unites the talents of professionals with diverse backgrounds and a combined 45 years of experience spanning the private, non-profit and government arenas. Visit www.claremorrisagency.com for more information.
