Lynn Eastep of Fleishman-Hillard

With more than thirteen years of digital communications experience, Lynn Eastep has delivered award-winning and sophisticated marketing solutions for Fortune 500 corporations, nonprofit organizations, and household-name consumer brands. She has created word of mouth, digital and social media campaigns for clients such as Nestle®, Bayer, AT&T and Visa.

As a senior vice president and Partner in the Global Digital practice, Lynn also leads the Cleveland, OH Digital practice and leads a team responsible for Web strategy; social media marketing; integrated marketing communications; and non-traditional marketing in both traditional and emerging channels.

Ms. Eastep joined Fleishman-Hillard from Marcus Thomas LLC, where she established the Interactive Marketing practice. While at Marcus Thomas, she guided a cross-functional team of strategists, designers and producers to deliver award-winning online promotional campaigns for clients such as Nestle® (including NESQUIK®, Hot Pockets® and Juicy Juice® brands), Goodyear, Alcoa, and Pfaltzgraff. Ms. Eastep worked closely with clients and account teams, offering strategic counsel to help clients navigate the rapidly evolving world of consumer-generated social media (including blogs, RSS, podcasts, word of mouth marketing and other evolving formats), and establishing partnerships with such online properties as MySpace, MTV.com and YouTube.

As the Corporate Internet Manager for ICI Paints, Ms. Eastep directed all interactive initiatives for the corporation, including developing Web sites for such brands as Glidden and Ralph Lauren. Through her role, Ms. Eastep developed an award-winning interactive CD-ROM that sold more than 2 million copies worldwide. During her tenure, she also established affiliate partnerships with Home & Garden Television (HGTV), Better Homes & Gardens (BHG.com), Do-It-Yourself Network and Homestore.com. While at this post, she established an international e-business team to establish global Web development standards for the company.
Prior to ICI Paints, Ms. Eastep was the Marketing Webmaster for Progressive Insurance Corporation, where she managed Web content, e-mail marketing, online advertising and direct marketing efforts.

Ms. Eastep has received national, regional and local awards for interactive excellence. Recent honors include the Shop.org Innovation award, Horizon Interactive Award, “Best Consumer Goods Web site” from the Web Marketing Association, Judges’ Choice and Silver Anvil from the Public Relations Society of America, and an IABC Vision Award of Merit. She has served as a judge for a number of national interactive marketing competitions, including acting as an Internet Advertising Competition Judge for the Web Marketing Association. She has been an invited speaker for the American Marketing Association, Association of Internet Professionals and the Public Relations Society of America.

Ms. Eastep received her Bachelor of Arts degree in business administration from Hiram College, her Bachelor of Arts degree in Rhetoric and Communications from Kent State University and an Executive Management certificate from the Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University.

Jen Gulvik of Houlihan’s Restaurants, Inc.Back to Speakers Ted Wright of Fizz

WOMM-U: Day Two Case Study: Houlihan’s Restaurant

The final session of the conference featured a case study on Houlihan’s Restaurants, presented by Jen Gulvik, VP Marketing, Houlihan’s Restaurants, Inc.

In the past few years Houlihan’s has undergone a tremendous transformation. Spreading the word about this has been an interesting challenge. They’re not a national advertiser. While they are in some major markets, they don’t have the budget that many of their competitors do.

The task was to see if they could turn their customers into a marketing force. In the past many of their restaurants had established e-mail lists, it was one-way only. However they do receive a large amount of customer feedback, and this is increasing. She thinks this matches the trend of customers taking control of their brand experiences.

At a WOMMA event a year ago, Jen realized that they’re in an industry (food & beverage) that is heavily talked about. Why not take advantage of that?

First step was to determine who their brand lovers were. They created and sent out a survey. Some quick metrics: 114,949 sent, 18,695 received. From there they began to build out a program, an advisory group. This group would advise them on menu choices and other brand assets. They also developed a program for the HouliFAN’s.

The primary communication channel with the advisory group is the HQ, a password protected site that allows Houlihan’s to provide information to the fans. It also allows them to participate in coversations and get feedback.

One of the first things they did was ask the advisory group, what would you do? Early on they saw an issue related to the removal of fajitas from the menu, or as Jen said, a fajita-freakout.

Once the site was established with the advisory group, it expanded to the entire fan-base, the HouliFANs.

Soon afterwards they rolled out a new menu and used their fans and the site to spread the word. They found that 35% of the fans had spread WOM about the menu.

The program is still new and growing but they’ve been thrilled with the response and feedback they’ve received.

Lynn Eastep of Fleishman-Hillard

On the agenda

WOMM-U: Day Two Case Study: Houlihan’s Restaurant

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