A Global PR Launch of 140 Control4 Showrooms in One Day

Campaign Highlights:

On launch day, 16 unique stories were published, with top stories posted. In a matter of a week, that number grew to more than 400 mentions and over 1M social impressions.

Top-tier stories, interviews, video tours, photo opps, and broadcast coverage included Bravo TV, Good Housekeeping, Good Morning Washington, HGTV, GearBrain, Digital Trends, Boston Globe, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, CE Pro, The Ambient, and HiddenWires UK, along with many more mainstream, industry, freelance, and technology writers and analysts.

The Certified Showroom program continues to grow with more showrooms added weekly, allowing Caster to continue to find new pitch angles and opportunities leading to a continuous cadence of coverage.

The Challenge:

The Control4 Certified Showroom program was designed to direct homeowners, architects, and designers in the market for smart home solutions to a localized, physical, premiere Control4 dealer location where they can actually experience Control4 in an ideal showroom environment.

When Control4 decided they were going to launch 140 Certified Showrooms worldwide, followed by C4Yourself Day—an event in which all 140 Showrooms were to debut their locations and run an open house event on the same day—they knew they needed a unified PR and launch strategy in order to orchestrate a successful and impactful launch. They were looking to cut through the noise, shake up the industry, and generate global buzz with the mainstream technology media. Having been a Caster client for over a decade, Control4 knew exactly who to turn to.

The Results

Caster’s strategic plan and creative pitching efforts have led to a steady cadence of coverage that continues to roll out as more and more Control4 Certified Showroom locations are opened worldwide. On launch day, 16 unique stories were published, with top stories posted. In a matter of a week, that number grew to more than 400 mentions and over 1M social impressions.

For C4Yourself Day, Caster garnered 44 individual, top-tier media RSVPs from 22 locations across the U.S., UK, and Australia, consisting of consumer, trade, builder, and local press. This, combined with the distribution of an announcement outlining the success of the program, resulted in Control4 receiving an additional 41 unique stories, over 400 supplementary mentions, and 1.4M social impressions throughout the week following C4Yourself Day.

Within a month, total audience reach surpassed 320 million, an advertising equivalent value of nearly 3 million dollars—all with minimal investment.

Control4 dealers have shared how happy they were with the turnout at their C4Yourself events, both in the number and quality of press that attended, as well as new and existing customer traffic. “It’s really hard for some people to imagine the possibilities [of home control], and, being a certified showroom, we can show them all different kinds of home automation that [are] as simple as touching one button to make it work. We can show them ways with Control4 how to integrate to make [home automation] simpler to use,” said Vaughn Petraglia, VP of operations for Audio Video Experience in New Hampshire. Many dealers even shared how they want to move forward with their own events, PR, and social media programs, noting that the efforts paid off.

Ultimately, Caster’s efforts allowed Control4 to achieve their initial objective of making a big splash around the globe and staking their claim as both a serious player in the home automation space and a supportive business partner to their dealers. As a result, more designers, architects, builders, and end-users are aware of the possibilities of the Control4 smart home and now have the opportunity to experience the system firsthand in their own backyard.

Download PDF