Forefront Communications, the industry’s leading boutique marketing and PR agency focused on institutional fintech and capital markets firms, today announced that 2019 was a record year, reaching new heights in client wins, headcount and billings, which were up nearly 50%.
Highlights from the year include:
Industry Recognition
- In December, Forefront was one of just six agencies named to Observer’s prestigious Financial PR Honor Roll, spotlighting the most influential firms serving the financial services industry. The New York-based publication noted that “the agency punches way above its weight,” helping it build an impressive roster of clients in just three years.
New Office
- Forefront opened a new office in July 2019. The approximately 2,000-square-foot office, located at 381 Park Avenue South, accommodates the firm’s 12-person team and provides room for further expansion.
New Clients
- Forefront added numerous industry-leading firms to its client roster in 2019, including Analyst Hub, Blockworks Group, MayStreet, PanXchange, n-Tier and Old Mission Capital, bringing its client count to nearly 30.
Top-Tier Media Coverage
- Forefront continued to build out its PR and content capabilities, adding veteran journalists Monica VanHorn and Alice Uribe as senior vice president and vice president, respectively, and Alexandra Hamer as a digital marketing associate. Top media coverage secured for clients by the PR team included profiles of HPR (Hyannis Port Research) in the Wall Street Journal, OpenFin in Waters Technology and PanXchange in the Financial Times.
Prolific Thought Leadership & Social Media
- On the content side, Forefront in 2019 led the thought leadership writing efforts for a range of leading capital markets firms, including OpenFin, Tourmaline, HPR, LiquidityBook, Luminex and Confluence. In addition, the firm ran on-site media relations and social media for several of the highest profile industry events of the year – The Security Traders Association’s annual market structure conference in October, WBR’s Equities Leaders Summit in December and BlockWorks’ global Digital Asset Summit conference series – helping all three organizations break records for social media impressions and audience engagement.
Numerous Websites and Re-Brands
- Forefront also strengthened its marketing and branding offering with the addition of Thomas Rafael as Head of Design and Ian Keldoulis as Creative Director. The firm launched several client websites in 2019 – including Dash Financial, CausalityLink and Imperative Execution – executing the brand development, graphic design, content creation and web development. Forefront also completed messaging and positioning exercises for several leading capital markets firms, ranging from startups to a $5B+ data and analytics provider.
Expanded Distribution
- Forefront further developed its distribution capabilities, expanding 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 and is sent to more than 3,000 decision makers each day. In 2019, Forefront began producing a new monthly feature, “Reporters on the Record,” interviewing top journalists who cover financial services and the capital markets.
Philanthropy
- Forefront became a Silver Sponsor of Wall Street Rides FAR, a charity cycling event whose communications the firm has led on a pro-bono basis for the past three years. With Forefront’s help, the event raised a record $418,000 for the Autism Science Foundation in 2019 and has raised well over $1 million to date.
Commenting on the pivotal year, co-Managing Partners Mark Dowd and Eric Soderberg said: “With a new office and industry recognition of our successes, 2019 represented a turning point for our organization. Most importantly, we’ve been able to continue to provide an unprecedented level of service to our clients, helping them with the full spectrum of their communications needs – messaging, content creation, web design, media relations and more. We’re particularly proud of our dedicated team of professionals – all great writers and many former journalists – who know the industry and how to make our clients’ voices heard. We’re excited to continue the journey and set an even higher standard in 2020.”
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 nearly 30 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.
