Bandwagon - PR Agency of the Year in Canada and the U.S.A.

Company: Bandwagon, New Orleans, LA
Company Description: Bandwagon is a full-service destination marketing and PR firm with corporate offices in New Orleans, LA. The firm firm represents travel destinations from across the U.S. to help them boost visitation.
Nomination Category: Corporate Communications, Investor Relations, & Public Relations Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Public Relations Agency of the Year in Canada and the U.S.A.

Nomination Title: Bandwagon

Bandwagon is a full-service destination marketing and PR firm with specialized teams focused on tourism research, destination branding, and destination PR. Our purpose for opening Bandwagon was to offer high quality destination marketing and PR services for new, emerging, and/or rural destinations. We differentiate ourselves by our style of customer service, flat fee pricing, and strategic approach.

Bandwagon opened in May 2019 when two of the firm’s partners found out the agency they were managing was phasing out operations. Cory Cart, APR, and Boone Clemmons joined forces with Steve and Daphne Barry to open Bandwagon just eight months before the global pandemic crippled the travel and tourism industry. Not knowing what the future held, Bandwagon responded by tapping into our crisis communication background to help clients outlast the pandemic.

Bandwagon operates with corporate offices in New Orleans, LA, and satellite offices in Lafayette, LA; Santa Fe, NM; and Clearwater, FL. We have quickly grown to a team of eight with numerous associates working part-time or as sub-contractors.

Firm Growth

Hard work and research were needed to develop innovative campaigns for our clients or risk our business not weathering the global public health crisis. As a team, we fast-tracked our business plan focusing on growth of the firm. We weathered the pandemic and remained open, and we also hired new team members, signed new clients, won awards, expanded budgets of existing clients, and elevated our work quality. Bandwagon’s 2020 billables doubled over 2019, and 2021 will surpass 2020.

Accolades and Awards

This past year, Bandwagon and our work were honored with the following accolades and awards:

-Bandwagon website honored by Flywheel including us on their list of Top 40 Marketing Firm Websites. Our website in-house despite not having a web development department.
-Bandwagon received 2021 Platinum Hermes Creative Award for Team Achievement
-List of client awards at: https://yourbandwagon.com/awards/
-Boone Clemmons will finish national accreditation in PR (APR) in 2021 taking the number of accreditation practitioners at Bandwagon to three - more than other firms in our comparative set

Thought Leadership

Bandwagon’s expertise was tapped for the following further cement our status as thought leaders in the destination marketing industry:

-Boone Clemmons - appointed Travel & Tourism Research Association’s marketing committee
-Cory Cart, APR - named faculty for Southeast Tourism Society’s Tourism Marketing College to teach advanced PR courses including crisis communication
-Alice Phillips - selected VP of Awards for Public Relations Association of Louisiana
-Cory Cart, APR - appointed SportsEvent’s National Sales and Marketing Committee

Growth and Expansion

As our firm’s sole focus is the tourism industry, the pandemic was a massive threat to our future. Many of our peers in the industry were forced to close their businesses or cut staff. Due to our focus on the impact of the pandemic to our industry, we grew the firm by doubling our annual billables, winning new clients via RFP processes, expanded our team, and launched a new research division.

ROI for PR clients

PR for the travel and tourism industry all but stopped during the pandemic. Editors flipped the narrative and only talked about COVID-19 and the impact it was having on the industry. We leveraged our press relationships like never before and still secured destination coverage despite the challenges. The ROI we earned for our clients indicates the level of destination coverage our clients received during a time when no one was getting this type of coverage. These results are a direct reflection of the creativeness that our team tapped into during the pandemic. Since July 2020, Bandwagon has earned an average ROI per client of 2,983.15% based on media placements valued at $2.4 million.

Global Agency Network

Our success with launching our business and how we weathered the pandemic have allowed us to begin the process of joining IPREX, a global platform of partner PR agencies. From this network we will be able to further our growth and development in a collegial environment.

-Bandwagon website: www.yourbandwagon.com
-As part of the accreditation process, Boone Clemmons was required to build a portfolio focused on a recent case study of his work. View Boone Clemmons APR Portfolio here: https://bandwagon.egnyte.com/dl/nBLsb5VmsC
-Much of our work won awards in 2019 and 2020. Here is a sample case study from the destination brand Bandwagon created for Sunland Park, NM: https://bandwagon.egnyte.com/dl/P6cPdaQec1
-Professional development & education - Bandwagon believes strongly in the ongoing need for professional development and education. As such, in 2021 Alice Phillips will begin the process to earn her APR, Boone Clemmons will complete his doctorate at the University of New Orleans, Cory Cart has started on a masters degree at Harvard University Extension School, and more. Both Boone and Alice will also begin the three-year process of earning their Tourism Marketing Professional designation by starting Tourism Marketing College. Learn more about this program here: https://www.southeasttourism.org/marketing-college