NEW YORK – Forefront Communications, the industry’s leading boutique marketing and PR firm focused on institutional fintech and capital markets firms, today announced that 2018 was a record year across all client service and growth metrics the firm tracks, including client satisfaction, client wins, headcount, and billings, which were up 40%.
Highlights from the year include:[perfectpullquote align=”right” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]”While we were fortunate enough to win multiple high-profile engagements and continue building out our team in 2018, we are extremely proud that we managed to achieve this growth without compromising on the service level that our clients have come to expect.” – Mark Dowd & Eric Soderberg[/perfectpullquote]
- Forefront added numerous industry-leading firms to its client roster in 2018 including the Security Traders Association (STA), Bank of New York Mellon, OpenFin, Imperative Execution, HPR (Hyannis Port Research), Tourmaline Partners, Templum Markets, Fusion Foundation, Causality Link and Merus Global Investments, bringing the total count to more than 20.
- Forefront more than doubled the size of its team, adding veteran communications professionals Monica VanHorn and Alexandra Saville as account managers, Sam Belden and Amanda Perrucci as digital marketing associates, John Riley in a senior content role and Kathy Connors as Head of Operations.
- Forefront strengthened the breadth of its offering with the launch of a dedicated social media practice and the augmentation of its content creation capabilities to supplement the firm’s existing marketing, media relations and corporate communications practice areas. This autumn, Forefront ran on-site social media for two of the highest profile capital markets events of the year – STA’s annual Market Structure Conference in October and WBR’s Equities Leaders Summit in December – helping both organizations shatter records for social media impressions and audience engagement.
- Forefront expanded its strategic alliance network, extending its global marketing and communications coverage through partnerships with leading European agencies The Realization Group and Streets Consulting as well as Contiuum Partners in Asia-Pacific. Forefront also enhanced its high-end design and web development capabilities through partnerships with two award-winning design groups.
- Forefront further developed its distribution capabilities, doubling the subscriber base of its daily “Forefront Fintech Digest,” a curated news aggregation newsletter that summarizes the day’s top institutional fintech and capital markets stories. The widely-read note is sent to nearly 3,000 decision makers each day; readership is heaviest among the buy side (about 50% of the readership, mostly hedge funds), with sell sides (20%), exchanges (10%), technology/data vendors (10%), and media/regulators/academics (10%) comprising the remainder.
- Forefront secured office space on Park Avenue South and plans to further expand its physical footprint in early 2019.
Commenting on the record year, co-Managing Partners Mark Dowd and Eric Soderberg said: “We’ve seen steady progress each year since launching the firm in 2016, but 2018 marked a real inflection point for us. While we were fortunate enough to win multiple high-profile engagements and continue building out our team, we are extremely proud that we managed to achieve this growth without compromising on the service level that our clients have come to expect. We’re excited to enter 2019 with a clear market tailwind behind our model and look forward to building our business by helping clients tell their stories in the most impactful way possible.”
According to Bryan Harkins, Co-Head of Cboe’s Markets Division and Chair of Wall Street Rides FAR, a charity bike event whose communications Forefront has led on a pro-bono basis for the past two years, Forefront’s ability to supplement media relations with engaging social content is a big point of differentiation for the firm.
“This past year we shattered our records for ridership, sponsor participation and total proceeds raised, and there’s no chance we would have done so without Forefront’s efforts. They had us everywhere – it was very hard to go onto LinkedIn in the six weeks before our ride and not see some mention of it. With Forefront’s help, we have raised nearly $1M for the Autism Science Foundation to date.”
About Forefront
Forefront Communications Group is a boutique marketing and PR firm that moves fintech and capital markets firms to the forefront. Deeply specialized, vastly experienced and highly connected, the rapidly-growing firm works with over 20 of the industry’s most influential companies to help them differentiate their brands, create meaningful content and then amplify it through expertly executed campaigns. For more information, visit us at www.forefrontcomms.com.
