A PUBLIC RELATIONS PROPOSAL

Prepared By:

Ashley N. Peterson West Virginia University

IMC 618 July 20, 2015

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Executive Summary 3

Company Background 6

Situation Analysis 30

Core Problem Statement 33

Campaign Key Publics 34

Primary Messages

Secondary Messages

Campaign Goal & Objectives 44

Campaign Strategies & Tactics 50

Calendar of PR Activities & Budget 62

Evaluation Plan 76

References 86

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

“Synchrony Financial is Recognized as a Top Employer Amongst College

Students, Survey Reveals”… While this may not be a headline that Synchrony

Financial, the former GE Capital Retail Finance, is expecting to see right away, it

is one that the company will want to see within the next 5-7 years as they

successfully become a standalone company and develop the Business

Leadership Program (BLP) brand amongst students, undergraduate and

graduate, around the world. Built on GE heritage, Synchrony Financial followed

in the footsteps of current parent General Electric to create a rotation-based

leadership development program as a way to create a pipeline for strong talent to

become future leaders of the company. The first obstacle the company must face

relative to universities, outside of increasing knowledge about the company and

its brand as a whole, is for students to become aware of the existence of the

program in the sea of opportunities presented to them from other companies.

Without the widely known General Electric logo attached to the name of the

company or its leadership program, it is important for Synchrony Financial to

build and leverage key relationships with new and existing stakeholders to drive

the company to reach the following goal: Establish Synchrony Financial as a

top employer choice amongst undergraduate and graduate students.

To establish itself as a top employer amongst college job seekers, Synchrony

Financial must first look to its employees as its #1 team of brand ambassadors.

Because they are living the Synchrony experience every day, the company must

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ensure that their employees are happy and satisfied with their role within the

company and its journey, understand the upcoming changes, and are aware of

the many job opportunities that have become available as part of the new

company, including BLP.

Moving forward from developing brand ambassadors internally comes leveraging

university-level connections to develop new partnerships with campus faculty

and their students eligible for the program. While volunteer recruiters will be

important to identifying and developing the faculty-level relationships, current and

past rotational program members will be key to driving student interaction both

in-person and virtually as today’s students become increasingly connected in

both personal and professional interactions. By engaging faculty and students

before, during, and after recruiting seasons through on-campus and virtual

information sessions, career fair attendance, leadership symposiums, and social

media dedicated to sharing the BLP story, Synchrony Financial can expand the

amount of campuses that willingly interact with the company to introduce

recruiters to top talent, assist in hosting special events, and ensuring that

students keep the company top of mind throughout the year.

Relative to the increasingly connected student is the ways in which they find out

about career opportunities, making online searches a key channel for which

students learn about companies and potential jobs. While influence from friends,

faculty, and family is still important to today’s student, making sure you are

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accessible at their fingertips has become a priority if a company wants to be

seen. To ensure that Synchrony is showing up in online searches, this plan

proposes leveraging media relationships, existing and new, to share

information and news about the Business Leadership Program leveraging BLP-

and company-created press releases, stories, videos, as well as other media to

gain attention of publications that cover career-specific topics to drive awareness

around potential employers.

By adopting the proposed plan of action, Synchrony Financial can continue to

reach for the goal of becoming a top employer choice amongst college students

leveraging a budget of $643,000 across the year 2016 to increase employee

retention, develop new faculty-level campus partnerships, impart the brand on

more students, create additional news for the media to cover, and, ultimately,

hire incremental amounts of Business Leadership Program members who

understand and internalize the value of the opportunity in comparison to others.

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COMPANY BACKGROUND

As General Electric began to strategically become less dependent on its

financing arm, GE Capital, the company made the decision that it was going to

spin off a major segment of this division. With this strategy to shed assets outside

of the core industrial and healthcare segments of the greater GE Company,

Synchrony Financial was born. As the largest provider of store-branded credit

cards, the former GE Capital Retail Finance embarked on its separation from GE,

most notably with the largest initial public offering of the year to date of $2.9

billion on July 31, 2014 (De La Merced, 2014).

Source: Synchrony Financial Q1'15 Financial Results

The External Environment

As a financial services company, Synchrony Financial is undoubtedly at

the mercy of any changes in the economy and how it affects current and future

habits of the American consumer. To maximize success from year to year, the

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company must be aware of how shifts in the economy will affect the success of

their partners within retail and healthcare, as consumer confidence in the state of

the union will serve as a deciding factor in what purchases they decide to make,

or hold off on, and whether a credit product as offered by Synchrony Financial

provides actual value to them.

State of the Economy

In a review of the country’s economic standing over the past few years, it

is clear that recovery is accelerating as of the beginning of this year. The budget

deficit was at its smallest since 2007, with spending and revenue not being

extraordinarily high, gas prices were going down, and the unemployment rate

was steadily decreasing. Unfortunately, while jobs are being added, they are not

high-wage jobs, resulting in lowering household income, a factor that would affect

consumers looking to acquire credit (Zumbrun & Nasaw, 2015).

Looking into the first half of the year, the Bureau of Labor Statistics has

shown that key labor statistics continue to recover through 2015. Beginning at

5.7%, the unemployment rate is now at 5.3%. The change in number of jobs

went from 201,000 in January to 223,000 in June. The average hourly earning

has also increased from $24.76 to $24.95. The Consumer Price Index,the

change in the prices paid by urban consumers for a representative basket of

goods and services, went from declining by -0.7 at the beginning of the year to

increasing by 0.3 by the end of June (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2015). All in all,

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these statistics show that the economy is relatively improving and consumers are

beginning to spend a bit more, but not much more.

Consumer Spending Habits

In 2015, economists have noticed that Americans have become a saving

population, spending less and less as the year goes on. Even though gas prices

are lower and jobs are being added, the first part of the year saw very little

change in the economy given that people were saving more than they were

spending. Moving into the spring, economists hoped to see an increase in

spending but, because consumers still were not confident about the future of the

economy, they were holding on to their disposable income that had increased

due to these new jobs and lower gas prices (CNN Money, 2015).

This cost-cutting behavior that arose during The Great Recession is

continuing as observed in the following consumer saving habits as shared by

Lesonsky (2015) from the 2014 McKinsey US Consumer Sentiment Survey:

• Shopping based on price

• Using coupons or discount codes

• Comparison-shopping for good deals

• Buying products in bulk

• Shopping online more often

• Trading down to less expensive brands or private label products

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These behaviors are driven by nearly four in ten consumer being fearful of losing

their jobs and the same amount living paycheck to paycheck. With decreasing

household income, 40% of families bringing in less than $75,000 are cutting

spending or delaying major purchases to get by in comparison to just 22%

bringing in over $150,000. But, no matter the level of income, positivity about the

future is very low, with only 23% feeling optimistic, compared to 29% in 2009.

Overall, nearly 40% of consumers say that they will never return to their pre-

recession spending and those who want to return are waiting until they can pay

down debt, save money, or return to their past income levels (Lesonsky, 2015).

With this outlook on the economy and consumer spending, companies like

Synchrony Financial and their retail partners must be aware of how to best

communicate and deliver on the value of the credit product as a way for

consumers to make purchases of goods that they want and need while still being

able stretch disposable income across monthly payments. If this value is truly

understood by consumers, Synchrony and its partners can work to drive them

into their many locations no matter their level of confidence for the future.

The Industry

Synchrony Financial operates in the financial services sector, specifically

the credit services industry. The largest area of growth in this industry is the

creation of multichannel customer experiences, which include physical branches,

digital branch activity, and call center support. Companies operating in this space

must be prepared to act quickly as consumers change their behaviors when

interacting with banks. As found by Nielsen, the channel in which consumers

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interact with their bank is highly dependent on the specific banking activity, as

illustrated below (Heggestuen, 2014).

Source: Business Insider

Coming out of 2014 where the focus of the banking industry was “to better

acclimate to regulatory pressure by investing in compliance infrastructure and

enhancing risk governance”, 2015 brings a new set of opportunities and

challenges for financial institutions (Deloitte, 2015). In the past year, financial

services industries have been focused around regulatory controls to ensure

compliance with regulators including the Federal Reserve Board, the Office of the

Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation

(FDIC), and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), where applicable.

As the industry is looking forward to now focus on boosting profitability in the

coming year, Deloitte (2015) has identified seven focus areas for these

institutions:

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1. Balance sheet efficiency – Customer relationship programs, cross-selling,

and new product line investments with strong portfolio management

2. Mergers & Acquisitions – Seeking M&A targets based on growth & scale

factors such as efficiencies, growth prospects, funding profile, technology,

and compliance

3. Growth – Using customer analytics, digital technologies, sensible

underwriting strategies, and cross-industry best practices to drive

innovation and competitive edge

4. Payments transformation – Greater focus on how to remain “top of wallet”

in a growing contactless banking atmosphere

5. Compliance and risk management – Exceeding regulatory expectations by

integrating risk management, compliance, and ethics into company culture

6. Data management – Leverage data analytics to take a proactive stance in

everyday banking operations

7. Cybersecurity - Adoption of new and improved methods to enhance

security, vigilance, and resilience of current cybersecurity models

The Client

Synchrony Financial, formerly known as GE Capital Retail Finance, has

roots in consumer financing back to 1932, and is currently the largest provider of

private label credit cards in the nation based on purchase volume and

receivables. With three core platforms – Retail Card, Payment Solutions, and

CareCredit, to be explained in coming sections – Synchrony operates based on

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the definition of its name, “a state in which things happen or move at the same

time,” through its philosophy of Engagement (“Synchrony Financial Q1'15

Financial Results”, 2015). This philosophy creates a culture beyond just building

partnerships, but “sharing [their] partners’ visions, treating their goals as [its] own

and investing in their success” (“Synchrony Financial Q1'15 Financial Results”,

2015).

Synchrony Financial has established itself as the “diverse community” of

over 11,000 employees across its multiple client-facing and operational functions.

About 1,000 of these employees are partner dedicated, with most of this subset

being co-located with retail partners, bringing Synchrony’s expertise to their front

door to effectively function side-by-side. Synchrony is a true believer that every

single employee has an impact on business and leverages training programs,

diversity networks, and volunteer programs to provide employees with

opportunities to thrive and excel within the company and their communities

(“Synchrony Financial Q1'15 Financial Results”, 2015).

Synchrony Financial bases their everyday activities with partners and

customers on their partner- and customer-centric value proposition as shown

below.

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Source: Synchrony Financial Q1'15 Financial Results

In the midst of its journey, Synchrony Financial has been recognized

within the industry with awards including re-certification as a 2015 Customer

Service Center of Excellence by BenchmarkPortal and a 2015 CIO 100 Award

Winner by CIO Magazine (“Newsroom”, 2015). Coming up on a year since its

IPO, Synchrony Financial has overall trended upward in stock price from its start

at $23, as illustrated below.

Source: Google Finance

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Moving forward, Synchrony Financial (2015) has identified the following goals

for “Building Tomorrow’s Opportunities”:

• Grow Core Business Across Our Platforms

• Grow Synchrony Bank

• Complete the Standalone Transformation

• Maintain a Strong Balance Sheet and Financial Profile

• Invest is Talent and Strengthen Our Culture

With continued focus on driving these key goals, Synchrony Financial has the

potential to successfully continue this upward journey as they move to become a

standalone company.

The Product, Service or Issue

As a provider of consumer credit across a wide variety of partners,

Synchrony Financial operates under three core platforms: Retail Card, Payment

Solutions, and CareCredit. The Retail Card platform is a leading provider of

private label credit cards, Dual Cards, and business credit products for small- to

medium-sized organizations. One or more of these products are offered through

19 national and regional retailers including Amazon, Gap, Lowe’s, Sam’s Club,

and Wal-Mart. Each retailer enjoys a customized credit and loyalty program that

allows their customers to remain engaged with them in-store, online, or via

mobile (“Synchrony Financial Q1'15 Financial Results”, 2015).

The Payment Solutions platform offers promotional financing for

consumers to make major purchases through private label credit cards and

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installment loans. With approximately 63,000 partner locations across a variety of

industries including automotive, furniture, jewelry, and consumer electronics, this

platform brings big-ticket financing solutions to national and regional retailers,

manufacturers, buying groups, and industry associations (“Synchrony Financial

Q1'15 Financial Results”, 2015).

The CareCredit platform provides promotional financing for healthcare

procedures and services including dental, veterinary, cosmetic, vision, and

audiology. The CareCredit private label credit card gives cardholders access to

approximately 186,000 healthcare partner locations, including mostly individual

and small groups of providers, as well as national and regional providers. Below

is an overview of the amount of partner locations, active accounts, and loan

receivables for each of the three platforms, providing insight into the reach that

Synchrony has through its partners (“Synchrony Financial Q1'15 Financial

Results”, 2015).

Source: Synchrony Financial Q1'15 Financial Results

In addition to these platforms, Synchrony Bank, Synchrony Financial’s

subsidiary, has recently launched Optimizer+plus, a consumer deposits product,

which is supported with a single physical branch and online and mobile

capabilities. Consumers have the ability to use Synchrony Bank for CDs, Money

Market Accounts, Savings Accounts, and IRAs, with a loyalty rewards program

called Perks (Synchrony Bank, 2015).

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Promotions

Following it’s initial public offering in July 2014, Synchrony Financial

launched a nationwide brand campaign. At the center of the campaign was the

company’s tagline “Engage with us”, confirming the company’s view that “every

interaction with its partners and customers represents an opportunity for

Synchrony Financial to engage with partners and help grow their business”

(Marketwatch, 2014). With the help of Interbrand to develop the new branding

and Ogilvy & Mather to create the campaign, Synchrony launched cross-channel

advertising including print ads in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and

trade publications; TV commercials, such as the screenshot of one shown below

symbolizing partnership and “synchrony”; airport advertising; and digital ads

(MarketWatch, 2014).

Source: www.ispot.tv

With the Synchrony Financial IPO being such a major one in 2015, also

supported by a breakout advertising campaign, the company has developed

great relationships with the media to gain coverage moving forward since its big

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IPO day in July 2014. As early as October, Bloomberg and Yahoo were covering

the story of the company’s CEO Margaret Keane, The New Yorker featured the

company’s thoughts on Millennial consumers, and PYMTS.com shared how the

company’s CIO Carol Juel and her peers in the industry were leveraging new

developments. In addition to these early stories, Fortune, Forbes, Wall Street

Journal, as well as local media partners have covered their new partnerships,

culture, innovation, and volunteerism of Synchrony Financial, putting the

company in the news multiple times each month (“Newsroom”, 2015).

From a social media perspective, Synchrony Financial is currently limited

in their online presence. The public is able to connect with the company on

Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube. On Twitter, @SYFNews in an extension of the

website’s newsroom, providing up to date information on the company while

@AskSynchrony serves as a customer service handle to deliver relevant

information for cardholders and account support. On LinkedIn, the company

focuses primarily on providing a job board for interested applicants. On YouTube,

the company provides quick videos about its products, career-focused videos

featuring current employees, and testimonial videos featuring current

cardholders.

The Synchrony Financial Newsroom and Investor Relations pages serve

as the center of owned media for the company. The Newsroom, in addition to

compiling news coverage as explained above, shares the many press releases

and videos created by the company. The investor relations page provides

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investors as well as the general public with details around upcoming events and

recordings of past presentations.

To support the growth of their partners’ credit programs, Synchrony

Financial uses its sales teams and extensive marketing experience in the

financial services space to drive increased usage of credit programs among

partners and increased purchases among cardholders. Dedicated marketing

centers of excellence and on-site teams work directly with partners to develop

marketing strategies to best fit their goals and objectives through direct and

digital marketing through such channels as Synchrony websites, retailer

websites, and mobile (“Synchrony Financial Q1'15 Financial Results”, 2015).

Market Share

While there is not a clear outlook into the exact market share of Synchrony

Financial in comparison to its competitors and industry according to its annual

report, it can be assumed that, as the largest private label credit card provider by

purchase volume and receivables, it has a large percentage of the credit services

industry.

Competition

Competing in the ever-growing financial services industry, Synchrony

Financial’s primary competitors are other major financial institutions including

Alliance Data, American Express, Capital One, Chase, Citibank, TD Bank, and

Wells Fargo, as well as its partners’ in-house financing programs. Synchrony

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Financial’s key to success operating alongside these competitors is their ability to

attract new and retain existing partners and cardholders. Many of these

institutions are substantially larger with a greater amount of resources and offer a

broader range of products and services, forcing Synchrony to compete amid the

following factors:

• Financial Terms

• Underwriting standards

• Marketing expertise

• Service levels

• Product/service offerings

• Technological capabilities and integration

• Brand and reputation

Each of these factors play a big part in Synchrony Financial’s partnerships with

retailers and healthcare providers, and their ability to acquire and retain loyal

cardholders. Continuously striving to be best in class in as many of these areas

as possible will give Synchrony the competitive edge needed to maintain its spot

as a leading private label credit card provider.

In looking at three of its top competitors, Alliance Data, Citi, and Wells

Fargo, it is important for Synchrony Financial to understand what these

companies may be bringing to their key publics of employees, cardholders, and

partners.

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Alliance Data

Alliance Data Retail Services, which has been in business for over 25

years, describes itself as the “leading provider of tailored marketing and loyalty

solutions, building relationships through branded credit programs” with private

label, co-brand, and commercial credit products (“Who We Are”, 2015). With over

40 million active cardmembers, Alliance Data Retail Services operates under

three lines of business - Card Services, Epsilon, and LoyaltyOne - with retail

clients including J.Crew, HSN, and Pier 1 Imports for which they manage the

customer lifecycle to drive sales and serve as a strategic marketing partner

(“Who We Are”, 2015).

Alliance Data Retail Services operates on a culture driven by the following

values: Work together. Build trust. Communicate openly. Innovate and create.

Teach and learn. Give back. Have fun! The company’s social responsibility

efforts focus around supporting the well-being of children, improving education,

and increasing access to healthy food for the hungry. From a career perspective,

Alliance Data opens its doors to undergraduates and recent graduates through

internships and the Initial Career Experience (ICE) 6-month rotational program as

well as a wide array of functional roles for experienced job seekers (“Who We

Are”, 2015).

Alliance Data mostly leverages online media to share its story with its

website, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, and blog in addition

to press releases. Each of the online channels seems to focus around Alliance

Data’s company culture and outcomes of various research studies that the

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company conducts. Earned coverage of the company shows that they have

been recognized in industry publications for being a top employer and received

industry awards for customer service (“Home”, 2015).

Citi

Citi Retail Services describes itself as “a full-service collaborator focused

on growing retailers’ sales and building customer loyalty” by “empowering [their]

partners with the latest and most effective retail and payment strategies” (“Our

company”, 2014). As a part of Citigroup, Retail Services brings 200+ years of

financial experience, including 30 years as an industry leader, to support retail

partnerships that last an average of 15 years with 90 million open cardmember

accounts and 600+ million transactions each year. Some of its retail partners

include The Home Depot, Macy’s Best Buy, Brooks Brothers, Office Depot, and

Goodyear (“Our company”, 2014).

As a part of the larger Citigroup, Citi Retail Services operates with the

mission of serving as a “trusted partner to our clients by responsibly providing

financial services that enable growth and economic progress” (Citigroup, Inc.,

2015). Outside of functional opportunities for experienced job seekers,

undergraduate- and graduate-level job seekers can look to start a career with the

company through summer associate and analyst roles and development

programs (“Our opportunities”, 2015).

Similar to Alliance Data, Citi shares its story through Citigroup’s online

media channels including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, Google+ and

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Instagram and press releases specific to Retail Services. Each of these channels

generally focus on the company culture and careers around the world, news

stories, and research outcomes. Earned coverage of the company comes from

features in industry publications about their leadership team and awards

recognizing their excellence in various areas.

Wells Fargo

Wells Fargo Retail Services has a focus to “satisfy all of [their] customers'

financial needs and help them succeed financially” by providing strength and

stability, signature service, and innovative solutions (Wells Fargo Retail Services,

2015). Retail Services manages the financing programs for a host of national

chains such as Dillard’s as well as many small businesses (Wells Fargo Retail

Services, 2015).

Wells Fargo operates under the values of People as a competitive

advantage, Ethics, What’s right for customers, Diversity and inclusion, and

Leadership. With a culture based on the “One Wells Fargo” philosophy, setting

the standard that the company should always imagine themselves as their

customers, Wells Fargo team members believe that their success is dependent

on how much they care for each other, their customers, their communities, and

stockholders (“The Vision & Values”, 2015). In addition to the various functional

employment opportunities for experienced job seekers, Wells Fargo also offers

development programs for undergraduates and MBAs, including both internships

and full-time opportunities (“MBAs and Undergraduates”, 2015).

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While Retail Services does not have its own social media presence, news

about this division is shared through its parent’s, Wells Fargo Financial National

Bank, accounts on Facebook, Google+, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube,

Twitter, and corporate-owned blog. These channels focus on a variety of topics

relevant to Wells Fargo’s various stakeholders by including information about

corporate culture, banking product Q&As, contests, and posts about current

events. Unique to the competitors covered, Wells Fargo’s Pinterest page

currently shares photos specific to its brand such as stagecoaches and ponies,

contests, inspirational quotes, community service initiatives, links to industry

articles, and a focus on college care package ideas, a dedication to a subset of

its accountholder base. Overall, the Wells Fargo presence online with the help of

their press releases seems to provide a relatively comprehensive view of the

business to solidify the brand, even though the Retail Services information is

included in the broader company news.

Resources

With approximately 11,0000 employees across the nation and overseas,

Synchrony Financial is headquartered out of Stamford, Connecticut and

Synchrony Bank out of Draper, UT. The employees are spread across 11

customer service centers, 10 support centers, and one retail bank branch.

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SWOT Analysis

STRENGTHS WEAKNESSES

• 80+ years in industry

• Strong partnerships

• Wholly-owned subsidiary bank

• Partner & Customer-focused Value Proposition

• Strong company culture

• Strong brand introduction/campaign

• New brand in the market

• Majority-owned by GE

• Currently establishing framework to become a standalone

• Current low online presence beyond website

OPPORTUNITIES THREATS

• Technological Innovation

• New Partner Acquisition

• New Products and Services

• Talent Acquisition

• Stronger social media presence

• Competitors with established brands

• Competitors with lower pricing for partners

• Market risk

• Regulatory Risks

Even though Synchrony Financial is a brand new name in the financial

services industry, their deeply rooted experience and strong partnerships with

retailers and healthcare providers have set them apart from being just any new

company in the industry. By owning its subsidiary bank, Synchrony Bank, the

company ensures that all key business operations are handled internally by its

thousands of employees across the nation and in international markets.

With strong company culture, defined by the values of honesty, passion,

drive, caring, responsibility and boldness, Synchrony has created a strong

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internal brand to ensure partners and cardholders of their dedication to delivering

a value proposition focused on them, their success and their well being.

Operating in a fickle economy, Synchrony Financial must be aware of economic

and regulatory outlooks to drive internal practices that mitigate risks to their best

ability.

Because Synchrony is a new name in its space, with just a year under its

belt, it must still work its way to being a top of wallet name for cardholders and

number one partner choice for retailers and other partners compared to its long-

established competitors who may bring stronger offerings to the table. To combat

the competition, Synchrony is dedicated to continue to attract and retain their

partners, acquiring and developing their talent, and leveraging a collaborative

mindset to utilize technology and innovation to drive new products and services

for their partners and cardholders in the future.

By re-launching an existing company under a new name, it was very

important for Synchrony Financial to ensure that the public was aware of who the

company was on the day of its IPO. By introducing this brand to the market with

a strong branding campaign as explained earlier, Synchrony was able to put their

name at the forefront in conjunction with opening their company up to public

trading. In comparison to its main competitors that do not advertise on a national

scale, this campaign had the potential to put the company top of mind for the

general public and, most importantly, potential partners as a reminder that this

financing partner option was in the market. While this campaign is not meant to

be constantly running, it will be of great importance for Synchrony to focus on

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their social media presence next given that its competitors have a solid presence

on the main channels and are utilizing these channels to provide a unique look at

their companies.

Public Profiles

As a company that has, within the past year, gone through immense

changes as they make their way to become a standalone from General Electric

Company, Synchrony Financial has a handful of publics to keep in mind that are

truly invested in the success of the journey.

Retail & Healthcare Locations

As mentioned earlier, each of the three Synchrony Financial platforms

support a wide range of retail and healthcare partners including national chains

like Wal-Mart down to local small businesses and healthcare providers. While

Synchrony Financial is the leading provider of private label credit cards, they still

have the opportunity to gain additional cardholders, allowing this public to

increase their profitability through credit and financing programs.

Current Relationship: Current partners depend on their relationship Synchrony

Financial to give their customers greater buying power and to drive repeat sales

and loyalty using private label credit cards. Potential partners may be shopping

around for price, or need to better understand the value that Synchrony Financial

brings to the table to give them their business, which could possibly cause them

to move their business from one of Synchrony’s competitors.

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Influentials: Key decision makers, peers, customers, competitors

Self-interests: Profitability, Value for Cost, Seamless partnership

Cardholders

Synchrony Financial cardholders utilize their cards to purchase things that

they want or need without having to tap their checking accounts or other credit

cards. These cardholders look to Synchrony for optimal customer service

throughout their relationship. This group consists of current cardholders who

actively use their cards as well as those that have gone inactive after opening

their account or have yet to open an account.

Current Relationship: Current cardholders have applied for and been approved

for a private label credit card or Dual Card through one of Synchrony Financial’s

retail or healthcare partner locations. Active cardholders have a running balance

that they are paying off based on their card’s specific terms and conditions, while

inactive cardholders have an open credit line that can be used at their respective

retailer or healthcare partner’s locations. Potential cardholders have been

exposed to the opportunity to apply in various interactions with retailers and

healthcare providers but have not yet moved forward to do so.

Influentials: Retailers, Family, and Employer

Self-interests: Manageable debt, Exceptional customer service

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Employees

Majority of employees of Synchrony Financial were first hired by General

Electric under the GE Capital Retail Finance business and have since been on

the journey to standalone with the company. For continued talent growth, it is

important for Synchrony to leverage employees as brand ambassadors to attract

new talent and maintain a best-in-class work environment to retain and promote

current talent.

Current Relationship: Employees of Synchrony Financial work across the

multiple Synchrony or retail partner locations to support the everyday activity of

the company across its many functions.

Influentials: Peers, Family, and Management

Self-interests: Workplace happiness, Positive career outlook, Work/Life

Balance, Making a living, Supporting self/families

Shareholders

Beginning with the July 31, 2014 initial public offering, stock in Synchrony

Financial became available to the general public. Shareholders who have

invested their money into this company are looking to see continued growth and

success moving forward.

Current Relationship: Shareholders have purchased Synchrony Financial stock

options, which are traded on the New York Stock Exchange.

Influentials: Synchrony Board of Directors/Management, Peers/Other

Shareholders

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Self-interests: Continued company success, Dividend income

Community Partners

Across its footprint, Synchrony Financial partners with local communities

to execute on various volunteer programs including Habitat for Humanity, Junior

Achievement, and Every Woman Works among others to foster economic self-

sufficiency, deliver financial education, and support the communities through

charitable giving and health and improvement programs.

Current Relationship: Local communities and volunteer organizations have

developed partnerships with Synchrony Financial, providing employees of the

company the ability to volunteer in support of various causes.

Influentials: Community peers, Volunteers, Local businesses

Self-interests: Achieving goals, Establishing long-standing corporate

partnerships

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SITUATION ANALYSIS

Since the initial communication of GE Capital Retail Finance’s new name

in June 2014, Synchrony Financial has had a lot of work to do on the branding

front. Even though it is a company that has been in business for close to a

century with key successful partnerships and historic ties to General Electric, the

name Synchrony does not instantly ring a bell in the ears of the general public as

the consumer finance company that they may have known for years. This new

name has caused the company to start “fresh”, despite standing strong in the

industry with a solid partner and customer base. The following goal and

objectives, driven by an analysis of Synchrony Financial’s current situation and

identified core problem, will help to ensure that the proposed public relations

campaign will assist the company in achieving their overall business goals

moving into the future as a standalone company.

Throughout over 80 years of being in business, the company now known

as Synchrony Financial has undergone constant changes, mostly by expanding

their reach with new partnerships and offering new products and services to

partners and their customers. The infographic below shows a timeline of where

this consumer finance company has been since its early start as the business

segment that allowed General Electric customers to finance their appliance

purchases. Throughout this timeline, one thing has stayed the same until 2014:

The company’s name began with “General Electric”, or the sixth best global

brand as identified by Interbrand (2014).

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Source: Synchrony Financial Newsroom

With the connection to General Electric came a strong brand identity

instantly recognized by current and potential stakeholders. Most important in this

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group were potential clients, customers, and employees who want to do business

with or work for a company that is established in its industry. Now operating

under a new name, Synchrony Financial has the unique opportunity to leverage

its history, as can be seen in current marketing campaigns, while also focusing

on creating their own separate value proposition and culture to attract and retain

new partners and employees as they work to maintain existing ones.

At the center of the day-to-day success of Synchrony Financial, aside from

the success of its retail and healthcare partners, are its employees. Margaret

Keane, President and CEO of Synchrony Financial, was asked the question of

how Synchrony Financial will make up for the leadership gap as Baby Boomers

within companies begin to retire. In response, Keane stated, “One thing that gets

me excited about launching a new company is that we can attract young talent

who want to help build it up from the ground floor. Young people today are

motivated by an entrepreneurial drive, to be part of something bigger than

themselves, and to be a part of their communities” (Schawbel, 2015). While the

focus on bringing in young talent is a vision of Synchrony Financial, the company

must ensure that this young talent is fully aware of the attractive opportunities

being developed at the company. To make sure this group becomes aware of the

opportunities, Synchrony Financial needs to ensure that they become a employer

worth seeking, which starts with increasing their brand awareness amongst the

general public, and more importantly, the job-seeking population.

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CORE PROBLEM STATEMENT

“No matter how successful you are, you will not stay that way if you do not

have the best employees…” (Vereker, 2013). To achieve each of its business

goals, Synchrony Financial must ensure that they are not only retaining and

developing their employees, but also bringing in top talent to support their growth

as a standalone. As mentioned earlier, without the General Electric preceding its

name, the company must now heavily depend on the story of its 80 years as an

organization to prove its place in its industry.

While current partners and employees and industry experts are well aware

of the change and understand the journey that the company is on, Synchrony is a

new brand name amongst competitors American Express, Citibank, and Wells

Fargo, for example, which are established household names. These well-known

names can easily overshadow Synchrony’s in the eyes of job seekers who are

not in tune with the IPO and story behind who Synchrony is and has been in the

industry. For that reason, Synchrony Financial is struck with the following

problem: While Synchrony Financial as a business has been around for

over 80 years, its new name, now stripped of the General Electric brand, is

no longer immediately perceived as a top employer amongst job seekers.

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CAMPAIGN KEY PUBLICS

Key Public #1: Current Employees

Demographic & Psychographic Profile:

This diverse group of over 11,000 employees works across various

locations in the United States, India, and the Philippines in functions including

Finance, IT, Risk, HR, Sales, Marketing as well as in customer service and

collections call centers. Each function and call center team can either be

dedicated to a specific retail client or work internally to support the various

functions in their everyday interactions with the clients (“Careers”, 2015). As a

Synchrony Financial employee, each individual commits to the company’s

dedication to the following purpose of engagement: “We pioneer the future of

financing, improving the success of every business we serve and the quality of

each life we touch”, which is supported by the company’s values of Honesty,

Responsible, Passion, Caring, Driven, and Bold (“Annual Report 2014”, 2015).

While the employee base is highly diverse, sharing commitment to this singular

purpose in conjunction with the campaign to be detailed in the following sections,

it is important that this public be treated as one to help drive the overarching

employer brand.

Synchrony Financial employees currently have an average tenure of 7

years, higher than the US average of 4.6 years, and the company is maintaining

a 90% retention rate. While majority of the employees were hired into the

company prior to the IPO, over 1,000 employees have joined the company since

(“Annual Report 2014”, 2015). With the attraction of new talent paired with high

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retention and tenure, it can be expected that the overall workplace satisfaction of

employees is positive. In an environment of high employee satisfaction, 98% of

employees identify more strongly with company culture when they are happy with

the job and are 186% more likely to promote their company and reach out during

networking opportunities (Gravitate Design, n.d.). Consequently, employees can

serve as brand ambassadors for Synchrony Financial, either in official or

unofficial recruiting opportunities where they can share their first-hand

experiences with the company, assisting to achieve the goal of the campaign to

be defined in the next section. This public may or not may be aware of the

Business Leadership Program and other entry-level jobs based on their

experiences with the company, but can be educated on these positions to assist

in their role as potential brand ambassadors.

Self-Interests: Workplace happiness, Job security, Positive career outlook,

Work/Life Balance, Making a living, Supporting self/families

Current Relationship: Overall, the current employees have a positive

relationship with Synchrony Financial and are aware of and confident about the

constant changes going on with the company as it moves closer to becoming a

standalone.

Influentials: Peers, Family, and Leadership

Contribution to objectives:

This public will help to achieve the following general campaign objectives:

• Increasing overall brand awareness

• Developing college/university relationships

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• Increasing employee retention

Primary Message: As employees, you are our greatest assets.

Secondary Messages:

• As an employee of Synchrony Financial, you are in the unique position to

sit in the driver’s seat as the company takes its journey to standalone with

an increased focus on engagement, innovation, as well as diversity of

thought, perspective and life experience.

• With a dedicated focus on providing foundations for personal and

professional development including diversity networks and community

service opportunities, you have the great ability to grow and build your

network within the company to drive your career further.

• The Synchrony intranet creates a one-stop shop for all internal resources

including Margaret Keane’s video blog, site-level information, human

resources and benefits tools, company brand, culture and news, learning

modules, and a host of other resources relevant to those within the

organization.

• Site-level calendars and communications provide insight into opportunities

to get involved with company initiatives and upcoming events to attend.

Key Public #2: Student-Facing Personnel at Colleges & Universities

Demographic & Psychographic Profile:

This public encompasses the various members of the campus community

who are in direct contact with and help to influence and advise students. This

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group also includes those who serve to develop and maintain relationships with

potential employers for their students. This public includes Career Services,

Deans, Advisors, and Professors who are speaking with students on a daily basis

in different capacities (i.e. office hours, career development activities, advising

sessions, etc.), understand the interests and goals of students, and can help

direct students to potential employers that they are aware of that may be a good

fit.

For the purpose of this campaign, Synchrony Financial will focus on

colleges and universities in the United States. By leveraging the connections of

the current employee public, the company can gain an understanding of other

campuses not on their radar currently, with which they can establish additional

relationships.

Self-Interests: Student success, monetary support, corporate world knowledge

for educated conversations with students

Current Relationship: This key public may or may not be aware of who

Synchrony Financial is as a company. Similar to the general public, their

relationship with the company may be through knowledge of General Electric,

which is also a major recruiter, or as a cardholder through one of Synchrony’s

retail clients. Outside of these possible transactional relationships, this public

may not be fully aware of the employment options that they could recommend to

their students.

Influentials: College/University Leadership, Peers, Students

Contribution to objectives:

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This public will help to achieve the following general campaign objectives:

• Developing college/university relationships

• Increasing brand awareness amongst students

• Hiring new talent

Primary Message: By partnering with Synchrony Financial, you can help make

your students aware of fresh, unique employment opportunities with one of the

premier consumer financial services companies in the United States.

Secondary Messages:

• Developing a new partnership provides you with a greater opportunity to

get your students placed in internships and full-time jobs.

• Students see you as a trusted advisor. When asked who was the

strongest influence on job search and career decisions, students named

faculty as third only behind parents and significant others. In addition to

being key influencers, faculty, advisors, and department staff was

identified as one of the top three sources of career opportunity information

(Suzuno, 2014).

Key Public #3: Corporate-Focused Media

Demographic & Psychographic Profile:

This public consists of any local, national, or international newspaper,

radio, television, or magazine, both online and offline, and blogs that can help

contribute to the sharing of the Synchrony Financial story. While inbound

requests to cover the company's story can be generated via its media relations

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team, this public is also an avenue for Synchrony to reach out and request

coverage of special events or news to help increase awareness of the efforts of

the company. Ideally, this public includes media outlets that are dedicated to

sharing the stories about larger corporations given that they would understand

how to properly cover and publicize stories of this nature to reach the desired

audiences.

On a local level, media outlets can include newspapers, radio, and

television in Synchrony Financial’s key footprints, which include Stamford, CT

where the company is headquartered, Dayton, OH, St. Paul, MN, Costa Mesa,

CA, as well as the many client sites in which employees may sit. On a national

and international level, media outlets include CNN, Forbes, Fortune, Bloomberg,

and Business Insider, to name a few. Lastly, this public also includes corporate-

or college-focused publications and blogs that may or may not funnel into the

other outlets. Due to its many retail clients across the nation, this public may also

include any outlets that its partners may utilize.

Self-Interests: Maintaining a Positive Reputation, Creating appealing stories for

audience

Current Relationship: More than likely, this public is aware of Synchrony

Financial as a corporation but may or may not know of the potential employment

opportunities across the business. This public also may or may not have had the

chance to cover this company in some capacity since the IPO.

Influentials: Media peers, Leadership, Corporations (Corporate partners)

Contribution to objectives:

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This public will help to achieve the following general campaign objectives:

• Increasing overall brand awareness

• Increasing brand awareness amongst students

Primary Message: As a company just a year post-IPO, Synchrony Financial

provides constant unique opportunities that will generate interest among your

audience concerning general awareness of the company and employment

opportunities at a “new yet established” company.

Secondary Messages:

• As Synchrony Financial focuses on investing in new talent and

strengthening corporate culture in 2015 and beyond, the company can be

looked to as a case study for businesses looking to revamp their culture to

drive new and maintain current employees.

• Synchrony Financial engages to make a difference in the communities in

which its employees live and work, providing new stories with every

service activity, which, in 2014, included the help of 3,000 employees

across 17,000 hours (“Annual Report 2014”, 2015).

Key Public #4: Undergraduate & Graduate Students

Demographic & Psychographic Profile:

This public consists of students in U.S. undergraduate and graduate level

programs that are eligible for internships and full-time positions in the Business

Leadership Program. Based on the available tracks in the program, these

students must show interest and have the applicable background for a position in

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Sales, Marketing, HR, Risk, Finance, Information Technology, Operations, Data

Analytics, and Internal Audit. In general, most of the tracks require students to be

pursuing or graduating with a Bachelor’s degree in a related field with a 3.0 GPA.

As the exception, the Marketing and HR tracks require an MBA or Master’s

degree with the same 3.0 GPA (“Business Leadership Program”, 2015). These

basic qualifications for the program define the target students in this public.

Self-Interests: Graduation, Post-Graduation Job Placement, Career Path

Outlook, Development Opportunities

Current Relationship: Depending on their knowledge of General Electric

Company as a whole and its most recent business decisions or their credit card

status, students on the undergraduate or graduate level may or may not be

aware of who Synchrony Financial is. As a major brand and recruiter on many

campuses across the world, General Electric is one of the companies that may

have overshadowed Synchrony Financial in the eyes of students. In its first year,

Synchrony Financial chose select schools where it would attend career fairs and,

to help in brand awareness, any campuses where GE and Synchrony were

present, the respective recruiting teams banded together to ensure students

spoke to one or the other based on their interests and experience. On these

campuses, awareness may be a little higher given students ability to connect the

dots between the two companies.

Graduate students, most of whom have spent time working before or

during their program, possibly know the story from general awareness of

companies, while others may not. In general, any Synchrony Financial

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cardholders would be aware of the story of the change due to the various brand

awareness marketing strategies to cardholders and the general public.

Influentials: Peers/Friends, Parents, Significant others, Faculty/Teachers

Contribution to objectives:

This public will help to achieve the following general campaign objectives:

• Developing college/university relationships

• Increasing brand awareness amongst students

• Hiring new talent

Primary Message: By considering Synchrony Financial’s Business Leadership

Program, you are giving yourself the unique opportunity to embark on an

entrepreneurial career booster that will focus on your development as a leader in

the workplace and your community.

Secondary Messages:

• The Business Leadership Program provides you with a one-of-a-kind

rotational experience that embraces the values of professional

development, cross-functional knowledge, and community service.

• Many of the current or emerging leaders within the company launched

their careers as a member of similar leadership development programs.

• Current rotational program members an graduates are spread amongst

the various sites and serve as “buddies” to incoming program members.

• Rotational projects are developed based on identified business needs,

driving high levels of exposure to various functions and senior leaders.

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• Formal and on-the-job training provides members with skills needed to

execute on projects and excel in the company.

• Synchrony Financial and its employees are dedicated to “making things

happen”, whether with partners, customers, or in the community and we

want you to help with that as a new employee with new ideas to share.

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CAMPAIGN GOAL & OBJECTIVES

Following its IPO, Synchrony Financial outlined five key strategic goals to

drive future growth in 2015 and beyond. While four of the five focus on business-

related successes, the fifth - Invest in Talent and Strengthen Our Culture –

focuses on the people aspect of the company (“Annual Report 2014”, 2015). In

its 2014 Annual Report, Synchrony Financial (2015) recognizes that, “to meet the

evolving needs of our partners and customers, we must attract, retain and

develop the leadership potential of a great team. In growing our team, we strive

for diversity of thought, perspective and life experience, as we believe this

enhances our ability to reflect the marketplace, increases innovation and

improves group performance”.

To achieve this goal of investing in talent to drive performance-driven

goals, Synchrony Financial must ensure that, even without the General Electric

brand being attached to their company, job seekers see the company as a top

employer due to its legacy and GE heritage. Synchrony Financial, as explained

earlier in the description of its many publics, is creating local partnerships to drive

social responsibility efforts and brand awareness, which also drives connections

to the general job-seeking population. Within colleges and universities, on the

other hand, they still compete with the well-known General Electric rotational

programs, among other highly recognized employers. For the purpose of this

campaign, Synchrony Financial must focus on attracting new talent through their

Business Leadership Program. Consequently, the goal of this campaign is:

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Establish Synchrony Financial as a top employer choice amongst

undergraduate and graduate students.

Campaign Objectives

With a focus on establishing employer brand awareness amongst colleges

and universities, the proposed public relations campaign will focus on achieving

the following objectives:

Objective #1: Increase overall brand awareness amongst identified external key

publics by 25% by Q1 2016.

Rationale: Before focusing specifically on college job seekers, Synchrony must

continue to drive increased brand awareness amongst the general public and,

most importantly its key publics as identified in the previous section. With a goal

of enhancing the job seeking public’s perception of Synchrony as a top employer,

overall brand awareness will assist in driving the many influences that college

students have when selecting their post-degree employer.

Objective #2: Hire 70 qualified candidates into the Business Leadership

Program following Fall 2015 recruiting season.

Rationale: The Business Leadership Program (BLP) is a two-year rotational

program designed to provide recent graduates with real-world experience

working alongside experienced professionals in a fast-paced work environment.

The program includes formal study, sponsorship in a month-long community

service project, followed by the opportunity to embark on a career with

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Synchrony at the end of the two years. BLP, which also has a corresponding

summer internship program, currently focuses on hiring 60 candidates for its

class starting in 2015 across functional tracks including Sales, Marketing, HR,

Risk, Finance, Information Technology, Operations, Data Analytics, and Internal

Audit (“Business Leadership Program”, 2015). This program was built based on

the historical General Electric rotational programs, which helped drive GE to be

the #2 Best Company for Leaders, in which the consumer finance segment of

company has offered rotations in Sales, Marketing, Risk, and Finance (Donlon,

2013). This objective requires an increase in target hiring, which requires

increased interest among eligible talent to meet the target.

Objective #3: Develop working partnerships with an additional 15 colleges and

universities by Fall 2016.

Rationale: By developing relationships with various colleges and universities

across the nation, Synchrony Financial can work directly with administrators and

faculty to drive a strategy that works for their specific student body. While tactics

supporting other objectives can serve to drive awareness amongst the top two

sources of influence shown below, knowing how to best approach on-campus

strategies with the help of those that interact with students on a daily basis will

serve to ensure Synchrony is at the top of its game to ultimately drive the hiring

of new talent. After targeting 32 campuses during its first recruiting season in the

2014-2015 academic year, there is room for the company to increase this

coverage moving into the next recruiting season to not only be exposed to

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additional talent, but also get additional insight into how to make a name for

themselves on campus.

Source: Harvard Business Review

Objective #4: Increase awareness of Synchrony Financial as a top employer

amongst students in majors eligible for placement in the BLP tracks by 60% by

Fall 2016.

Rationale: Using survey results like the chart below, Synchrony can utilize pre-

campaign surveys to measure what students know about their brand currently

and leverage this campaign to drive awareness around what they offer as an

employer to allow them to stand tall against competitors.

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Source: Harvard Business Review

As brand awareness increases, especially around the journey that Synchrony

Financial has been on in the past 80 years, and the company overcomes the

obstacle of name recognition, they can move forward to expand on what makes

them a top choice as an employer.

Objective #5: Increase employee retention by 4% by the Q1 2016.

Rationale: Being recognized and perceived as a top employer requires a

positive perception amongst current employees. Synchrony Financial, in

conjunction with its university-focused tactics that will communicate what it is like

to work for the company, must also ensure that these values are also recognized

internally. By delivering on an increase in employee retention in the next year

through various tactics, Synchrony Financial can exemplify workplace

satisfaction amongst those who are already working there, spreading a positive

reputation for potential employees.

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The goal and objectives outlined above have the core focus of

strengthening Synchrony Financial’s employer brand given its “new yet old”

position in its industry. To do this, Synchrony must continue to differentiate itself

from competitors to attract the best talent, focus on increasing brand awareness

across the general public, make current employees into brand ambassadors, and

retain committed employees (Vereker, 2013). With these objectives in mind,

tactics will be created to ensure that Synchrony meets, and strives to exceed, the

expectations of job seekers and those who influence them.

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CAMPAIGN STRATEGIES & TACTICS

In keeping to the overall goal of establishing Synchrony Financial as a top

employer choice amongst undergraduate and graduate students, the company

must leverage its knowledge of the identified key publics in conjunction with the

defined objectives to develop a set of strategies and related tactics to achieve the

various objectives amongst each public. The following strategies and tactics as

proposed will provide ways in which Synchrony Financial can use existing and

new resources to effectively reach and communicate with current employees, on-

campus personnel, undergraduate- and graduate-level students, and the media

who will provide additional publicity around its many efforts.

Current Employees

Strategies & Tactics

Strategy #1: Express gratitude for employee dedication throughout the

ongoing journey to become a standalone company through internal

recognition events and communications.

Tactics:

• Recognize employees through bi-annual site-level “Thank You” lunches

featuring a senior leader as keynote speaker

• Hold quarterly “Walk With Us” webinars with Q&A led by senior leadership

to keep all employees abreast of current and upcoming changes

• Implement function-level “Employee of the Quarter” nomination system

through current Rewards & Recognition website

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Strategy #2: Reinforce the unique benefits that all employees are exposed

to by working at Synchrony Financial through internal events and

communications.

Tactics:

• Bi-monthly “Know Your SYF” virtual sessions focused on different

employee benefits (Compensation, Health, Diversity Networks, Education,

etc.) led by members of the respective team

• Monthly “Know Your SYF” newsletters focused on various benefits

containing quick facts and links to resources for more information

Strategy #3: Educate current employees on the Business Leadership

Program through internal communications and events.

Tactics:

• Use the Synchrony intranet to post monthly “Meet The BLPs” articles to

introduce program and program members by function

• BLP members, supported by site leadership, to organize “Meet The BLPs”

in-person networking events at their respective sites during their 8-month

rotations

Even though this public is unique because it is an audience that Synchrony

Financial is currently in constant contact with, there still lies a lot of opportunity to

ensure that employees are aware of everything that is going on within the

company beyond their day job. The first strategy outlined gives Synchrony

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leadership the chance to recognize the current employee group as a whole for

their continued work, as well as patience, as the company undergoes changes in

its journey to become a standalone company, and ensure that they are aware of

how they are an integral part of the journey as much as the next person. With the

name “Walk with us”, senior leaders can drive an inclusive environment for

sharing information utilizing a phrase similar to the recognized “Engage with us”

tagline of the company. In addition to this new call rhythm, traditional recognition

tactics such as the lunch and nomination for employee of the quarter help to

drive a continued culture of inclusiveness and appreciation.

During this journey, not only will the company itself change, but aspects of the

company that matter most to its employees will as well, such as benefits. In a

recent study it was found that 71% of employees that are most loyal to their

employer are those that are satisfied with their benefits (Scorza, 2011). As the

company moves from under the General Electric umbrella, benefits will change.

While they may stay the same or even change for the better, ensuring that

employees are fully aware of what changed and how it will affect them will help to

maintain and build increased loyalty amongst the company’s current employees.

By providing multiple touch points in which employees can be made aware of this

information, Synchrony Financial is providing flexible options for employees to

learn about, internalize, and ask questions about what matters most to them.

Lastly, because Synchrony Financial will want to utilize current employees as

brand ambassadors, it is important that they understand what the Business

Leadership Program is in the case that they are in a place to recommend it to an

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interested candidate. BLP, while modeled off of long-standing General Electric

rotational programs, has a very unique value proposition that is important to

today’s potential candidates. As shown below, BLP members have three 7-month

rotations with two one-month cross-functional opportunities and one one-month

community service opportunity built in to their two-year commitment (“Business

Leadership Program”, 2015).

Going to market with this structure has been an important differentiator for

Synchrony from its predecessor and other companies. If employees are speaking

on behalf of the company in hopes to introduce new talent to their employer, it is

important that they know how to explain the opportunity and, at the least, speak

to how the program is working in the company currently. By providing proactive

opportunities to read about and meet with current program members, current

employees can speak intelligently on the topic to pique the interest of potential

candidates. With the help of these three strategies, Synchrony Financial can

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focus on increasing employee retention while building internal awareness around

the new, unique Business Leadership Program.

Student-Facing Personnel at Colleges & Universities

Strategies & Tactics

Strategy #1: Leverage internal recruiting volunteers to develop

relationships with on-campus personnel through personal communications

and face-to-face interactions.

Tactics:

• College/university alumni within Synchrony Financial to send standard

email about company and BLP to personal contacts at alma mater to

gauge interest in relationship

• Local alumni or Synchrony employees to utilize drop-off collateral to

Career Services offices

• Identify and meet with key faculty members to develop working

partnerships with to conduct class visits and guest speaking events

• Identify opportunities to partner with on-campus student organizations and

meet with organization advisors and executive boards to brainstorm plans

of action

Strategy #2: Interact with on-campus personnel throughout the academic

year using collateral and personal contact.

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Tactics:

• Leverage “Meet The BLPs” and other BLP-related communications to

send to contacts throughout the year for continued awareness

• Resource senior leaders as well as current and past BLP members to visit

schools for face-to-face discussions with key personnel to develop

recruiting strategy

Similar to how the first set of strategies leverage current employees, reaching

out for new on-campus partnerships will be successful through the utilization of

current employees as well, especially those who have connections at their alma

mater or local campuses. In the first strategy, this plan is proposing that

employees who are familiar with colleges and universities and, more specifically,

key personnel, either through attending or being in the local area become key

contacts to assist in establishing recruiting relationships. One of the top four

reasons people open emails is because they are familiar with and/or trust the

sender (Winter, 2015). By having a Synchrony employee state that they are an

alumnus or are knowledgeable of the school, there is added familiarity between

them and the person or office that they are contacting to drive them to open the

email and potentially respond. Also, by providing collateral in-person that can

work one step further to initiate face-to-face interaction, Synchrony can allow its

employees to foster more meaningful discussions while on campus.

With the second strategy, Synchrony Financial can ensure that there is a

plan in place for volunteer recruiters to foster an ongoing relationship beyond

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recruiting season. Wright (2008) identified three lessons for companies who are

looking to get the most from university relationships: “(1) the relationships moved

beyond short-term vendor relationships and became lasting partnerships that

built new capabilities for the company; (2) senior management was highly

involved; and (3) the companies involved the university in their strategy and not

merely in a technical task or isolated problem in their business.” By providing

recruiters with standard media to share with their contacts and opening the

possibility for current and past members of the program and senior leaders to

speak directly with interested students, Synchrony can use this strategy as a part

of their broader recruiting strategy to build long-lasting relationships with

personnel that can help to drive top talent to the company.

Undergraduate & Graduate Students

Strategies & Tactics

Strategy #1: Educate the potential candidate population on the Business

Leadership Program through Synchrony-sponsored online and offline

communications and events.

Tactics:

• Create BLP-specific social media on Facebook (Synchrony BLP), Twitter

(@SYFCareersBLP), Instagram (@SYFCareersBLP), and Snapchat

(SYFBLP) for BLP-only news, updates, and conversations

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o Facebook & Twitter: Day-to-day updates on BLP including posts

about rotations/projects, community service, event announcements,

and Q&A

o Instagram: Share photos and videos from BLP training, community

service events, networking events, recruiting coverage, and general

company events (i.e. Diversity network, Town Halls, etc.) attended

by BLPs

o Snapchat: BLP member takeovers for “Day In The Life” look into

the program and major recruiting event coverage

• BLP members to host “Social Media Takeovers” across all channels

during recruiting season

• Diversity Networks to host the “Synchrony Financial Symposium for Future

Diverse Leaders” to be attended by recommended talent/potential hires

• Hold in-person information sessions for interested students

Strategy #2: Engage potential candidates throughout and beyond the

recruiting season via online channels to drive understanding around what

a career will be like with Synchrony Financial through the Business

Leadership Program.

Tactics:

• Create a “Business Leadership Program” playlist on the existing

Synchrony Financial YouTube channel to feature monthly “Day In The Life

of a BLP” videos

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• Develop the Synchrony Financial BLP Blog to feature posts from current

and past rotational interns and full-time employees throughout the year

• Host two online BLP Q&As, one for undergraduate-level and one for

graduate-level students, featuring a roundtable of current and past interns

and full-time employees prior to and following key recruiting season dates

The key purpose of the strategies listed above are reaching current students

where they are, whether on campus or online. To successfully execute on these

strategies and tactics, Synchrony Financial will require high levels of dedication

from their recruiting volunteers and digital teams to ensure that students are

effectively exposed to the opportunities of the Business Leadership Program

before, during, and after recruiting season. By establishing BLP-specific social

media pages and blog, Synchrony recruiters can direct interested candidates to

information that is relevant to their job search instead of them having to scour

other corporate pages or be limited to the University website. In addition to

regular posting activities, having current BLPs partake in page takeovers allows

for real-time interaction that is valuable to potential candidates as they have a

chance to directly interact with employees who are where they want to be in the

future. Social media takeovers work for brands because they drive engagement,

foster authenticity, and connect companies with their audience while expanding

their network (Pearson, 2013). This highly targeted and relevant interaction is

mirrored with the proposed information sessions and Q&As to be led by

recruiters and current or past members.

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In line with its values of Honesty, Responsible, Passion, Caring, Driven,

and Bold, Synchrony Financial’s Diversity Networks serve as a core piece of its

cultural puzzle. As shared by CEO Margaret Keane, “Our BLP new hires will be

linked to our affinity groups in their first week on the job, whether the Women’s

Network, Hispanic Forum, African American Forum or any of our other affinity

networks, to help make the important connections new team members need to

start building their own support networks” (Schawbel, 2015). By having these

networks host a symposium for top talent, the company is showing this

dedication to diversity before students apply to drive home an important part of

the Synchrony Financial culture, while also allowing them to improve their

leadership skills and build new peer and professional networks as they learn

more about the company as a potential employer.

Corporate-Focused Media

Strategies & Tactics

Strategy #1: Solicit media coverage of BLP news and events in local and

national in print and online channels using outbound requests.

Tactics:

• BLPs to engage in outreach to local media using approved press releases

communicating upcoming events and service projects

• Promote leadership support of program through posts and photo sharing

on externally-facing corporate social media pages

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• Create professional videos to be shared via email to local and national

media for coverage in future stories

• Establish foundation of brand influencer partnership with BuzzFeed to

initiate internally-created posts on major online channels

In the past, rotational program members within General Electric programs

have had the chance to impact how their program is viewed both internally and

externally through the creation of committees focusing on a wide variety of

special extracurricular projects. For example, while one committee focused on

developing an educational internal newsletter, another focused on revamping the

public-facing website to ensure it communicated the program as it stands today.

This media-focused strategy will provide BLP members with an added unique

opportunity to control the destiny of their program by working both internally and

externally to drive awareness and interest around the program. As all of the

tactics above require outbound communications to media outlets on local,

national, and potentially international levels, not only will the members of the

program develop through their day-to-day roles, but also through added projects

that allow them to “share the wealth” of their experience given that it is a new

program in the market.

Unique to this strategy is the tactic of working to establish a partnership

with BuzzFeed, well-known content-driven websites. BuzzFeed (2015) “provides

the most shareable breaking news, original reporting, entertainment, and video

across the social web to its global audience of more than 200M”. BuzzFeed has

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business-focused categories and content and allow for brands to partner with

them to create and distribute editorial content on their pages. With their reader

audience being similar to the population that Synchrony is targeting for the

program, this partnership would allow for Synchrony to gain visibility on content

created internally but also be given the ability to be shared broadly outside of the

company through the popular website.

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CAMPAIGN CALENDAR & BUDGET

In this portion of the plan, supported by the illustrated calendar and budget

for the aforementioned strategies and tactics, additional insight will be provided

into why and when the proposed tactics should be executed. As Synchrony

Financial moves forward, trial and error is necessary to find their niche, but they

will want to make sure that their test executions do not break the budget. By

2016 being just their second full year post-IPO, potential first full year post-

separation, and the first year of full-on recruiting for BLP with current members in

place, utilizing as many existing resources as possible to minimize costs will

remain a priority. Whether it is reaching internal audiences, campus audiences,

or the media, leveraging the help of corporate communications and BLP

members gives additional development opportunities for its employees while

working to reach the overall goal of this plan. On the following two pages are the

PR activities calendar and campaign budget, followed by further detail around

why the calendar and budget were developed as proposed.

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Detail Per Item Cost Quantity Total ProjectedKey Public Current EmployeesStrategy Gratitude/RecognitionTactics Bi-Annual Thank You Lunch Available to all employees at all sites $11.00 22000 $242,000.00

Quarterly "Walk With Us" Calls Led virtually by internal leaders $0.00 0 $0.00Employee of the Quarter Rewards 1 employee per 8 functions $250.00 32 $8,000.00

Strategy Subtotal $250,000.00

Strategy Benefits ReinforcementTactics Know Your SYF Webinars Led virtually by internal leaders $0.00 6 $0.00

Know Your SYF Newsletter Developed by current employees for electronic delivery $0.00 52 $0.00Strategy Subtotal $0.00

Strategy Internal BLP EducationTactics Meet The BLP Articles Developed by BLPs for electronic delivery $0.00 12 $0.00

Site/Happy Hour Events One per 8-month rotation per 12 sites (Off-site events for larger sites) $500.00 24 $12,000.00Strategy Subtotal $12,000.00

Public Subtotal $262,000.00

Key Public Campus PersonnelStrategy Relationship BuildingTactics Outbound Emails Developed by recruiters $0.00 $0.00

Collateral Dropoff Provided by corporate recruiting teamcollateral warehouse $0.00 $0.00Strategy Subtotal $0.00

Strategy Academic Year EngagementTactics Outbound Emails Developed by recruiters $0.00 $0.00

Recruiting Team Travel & Lodging Airfare, hotel, rental car for 15 teams of 5 people $5,000.00 15 $75,000.00Senior Leader Travel & Lodging Airfare, hotel, rental car for 10 leaders $1,000.00 10 $10,000.00

Strategy Subtotal $85,000.00Public Subtotal $85,000.00

Key Public StudentsStrategy BLP EducationTactics Social Media Channels Managed by SYF social media team $0.00 $0.00

Social Media Takeovers Managed by SYF BLPs & social media team $0.00 $0.00Leadership Symposium Invite 15 symposium attendees $2,000.00 15 $50,000.00Information Sessions Virtually led by BLPs and recruiters $0.00 $0.00

Strategy Subtotal $50,000.00

Strategy Academic Year EngagementTactics Professional Video Creation Leverage team that creates current YouTube videos $0.00 $0.00

SYF BLP Blog Managed by BLPs as part of University Website $0.00 $0.00Virtual Q&As Virtually led by BLPs and recruiters $0.00 $0.00

Strategy Subtotal $100,000.00Public Subtotal $150,000.00

Key Public MediaStrategy Media Coverage SolictationTactics Press Releases Created by BLPs, reviewed by internal teams $0.00 $0.00

Leadership Social Media Leverage current leaders' and SYF channels $0.00 $0.00Career Video Dissemintation Delivered electronically to media contacts $0.00 $0.00BuzzFeed Partnership Partnership including 4-5 articles $100,000.00 1 $100,000.00

Strategy Subtotal $100,000.00Public Subtotal $100,000.00

Sprout Social Team Subcscription Year-long subscription with one-month free trial $500.00 12 $6,000.00Public Opinion Polls Conduct two national surveys of about 800 respondents $20,000.00 2 $40,000.00

Measurment & Evaluation Total $46,000.00CAMPAIGN TOTAL $643,000.00

Measurement & Evaluation

Synchrony Financial 2016 Public Relations Campaign

BUDGET

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Key Public #1: Current Employees

Gratitude/Recognition:

• Thank You Lunch: By providing each employee a meal ticket for two

lunches per year in the spring and summer, SYF is being given a chance

to not only show gratitude for their employees’ contribution to the

company, but also offer the opportunity to mingle with other employees

and site leaders and hear a keynote from a select leadership team

member. With the average lunch costing about $11, this tactic does

become the most expensive out of all that are proposed, but recent

surveys show that unexpected non-monetary appreciation is something

that employees seek from their employers (Han, 2014). Glassdoor (2013)

found that, while appreciation from their manager and a paycheck are the

top two most common motivators of employees, unexpected treats and

rewards comes in third before public recognition, career opportunities, and

feeling involved in the decision-making process. Based on this

information, if SYF were to surprise employees with these lunches and,

potentially in years following switch up the times and frequency in which

they hold these lunches, it can continue to be a pleasant surprise as

desired.

• Quarterly “Walk With Us” Calls: At a time when the company is going

through many changes and constant internal communications flood emails

informing employees of what is coming up, it cannot be expected that

employees actually internalize what they are reading, if they read it at all,

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until it effects them personally. McKinsey (2012) shared that 28% of the

average workweek is spent reading and answering emails and 19%

searching and gathering information. It can be assumed that, depending

on individual employees’ roles, not everyone is taking heed to what is

being shared, so having dedicated webinars that employees can listen in

on live or at their leisure for the topics that are most important to them will

ensure that, even if they are not ignoring the emails, that they can spend

one hour truly internalizing what matters to them and saving the time to

backtrack or ask others later.

• Functional Employee of the Quarter: A recent Globoforce Workforce Mood

Tracker shared that job seekers’ number two reason for leaving their

previous employer is for lack of recognition (48.3%), specifically value-

based recognition. The report shares that 79% of employees say that

recognition tied to core values gave them a stronger sense of company

goals and objectives (Irvine, 2012). As SYF continues to embark on its

journey to separation with a new set of values, tying this specific tactic to

company values, along with routine recognition throughout the company,

gives leadership a chance to give employees the feeling of being a part of

the bigger picture, which is important for the company’s current situation.

Overall, given that 65% of employees that can name their values have a strong

grasp on company objectives and 88% that know the values are engaged, timely

recognition based on core values reduces turnover, increases productivity due to

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added understanding of an organization’s commitment to company objectives,

and added employee engagement (Irvine, 2012). With these important tactics

promoting recognition and understanding of the company, the timely execution of

each of these will, as the Globoforce study revealed, positively affect the

employee metrics that drive greater ROI.

Benefits Reinforcement: The “Know Your SYF” series will provide employees

key information about their benefits at no cost to Synchrony Financial aside from

the time needed to prepare and hold the virtual sessions and distribute the

corresponding monthly emails. Because the respective departments with the

knowledge of the information being shared organize the series, the sessions and

emails can be created and delivered in a way that is succinct but comprehensible

by all employees. Similar to the “Know Your SYF” calls, the virtual sessions will

give different departments a chance to provide a refresher of what may have

come through in the emails prior to. By scheduling two emails before each

webinar, the respective departments can share a one-hour call, delivering their

information for 30 minutes each, allowing employees to better manage their time

depending on what benefits are important to them. This series, once again,

contributes to employees being “in the know” and fully aware of what is available

to them, further adding to employee engagement and satisfaction.

Internal BLP Education: Currently, Synchrony Financial leverages its new

intranet to share various articles about what is going on in and around the

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company. For example, relevant to the Business Leadership Program, a recent

article covered the start of the first class of BLP interns in June. With “Meet The

BLPs” articles created by the BLPs themselves and segmented by function, there

are multiple benefits: (1) BLP awareness is increased internally (2) The BLPs get

an early chance to share their story and gain exposure throughout the company;

and (3) Current employees become acquainted with the new faces that they may

see around their area and, due to the functional breakdown, can ensure to

connect with them or be aware that they may hear from them while they are on

rotation trying to complete their projects. The networking events add to these

benefits but with BLP being a leadership-driven initiative, allows for networking

for the BLPs, other current employees, and overall exposure for all in attendance.

These networking opportunities give employees a scheduled chance to interact

with the BLPs while they are in their rotations for only 8 months to learn about

what they are doing, how it may help their day-to-day and offer a helping hand.

As stated earlier in this plan, current employees serve as brand ambassadors for

Synchrony Financial and its opportunities based on their first-hand experience.

While earlier tactics provide them with information that is pertinent to their role,

personal or professional development, or general understanding of the company,

these events serve to ensure that, as employees share with others, that they are

sharing correct information about the rotational program as a job opportunity.

Key Public #2: Campus Personnel

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Relationship Building: To ensure that universities are on-board for SYF to join

in recruiting activities during their Fall semester, the main interviewing and hiring

season, recruiters want to leverage the Spring semester as a way to focus on

gauging interest and beginning to build the relationship, especially as a new

name on campus. By using alumni or employees local to the area who are

knowledgeable about the school and/or specific contacts, there is already a

foundation set ready to be built upon with further contact and information sharing.

The stronger the relationship built earlier in the calendar year, it is recruiters’

hopes to have a more successful recruiting season by getting additional

opportunities to get in front of students and faculty as a way to identify the

university’s top talent. By dropping off collateral to contacts, this brand

awareness is increased and provides additional ability for students to be put in

front of the company and its opportunities before they attend their campuses’

next big career fair to start interviewing for their next summer internship or full-

time position. As a key example, while the Spring semester often brings

interactions with students who may have already committed to a summer

internship, exposing them to the BLP early allows them to compare their

upcoming experience with the potential experience at SYF as they “shop around”

for employers prior to graduation with the help of their trusted faculty.

Academic Year Engagement: As a follow-up to the relationship building piece

of this public’s strategy, it is important for the recruiting teams to keep contact

with their respective universities year-round, not only to drive awareness of the

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company, but mainly to ensure that they are dedicated to providing the best for

the university’s students. Hopefully, by the end of the Spring semester, recruiters

have identified engaged faculty members to assist in recruiting strategy

development prior to recruiting season that can help provide feedback on SYF’s

approach based on their specific student base. Also, the outbound emails

become more productive given the relationship that has now been created. By

attending both Spring and Fall career fairs, where applicable, followed by

leveraging student organizations or other avenues to hold Synchrony-branded

guest speaking events later in the semester, the brand is on campus enough

without over-saturating, giving faculty and, of course, students multiple times to

interact with Synchrony employees to better understand the company over time.

Key Public #3: Students

BLP Education:

• Social Media Channels & BLP Takeovers: With current social media

presence on Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube, and opportunity to expand to

additional channels to reach the key public of students, Synchrony

Financial can utilize its current social media team and BLPs to create

content to raise awareness about and generate interest in the rotational

program. To help share unique experiences within the program, BLPs and

recruiters can help the social media team share content year-round on the

Careers accounts to keep them active. To further the understanding of the

true day-to-day of the program, having BLPs share “Day in the Life”

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content through the established channels will provide followers with

valuable insights into the potential opportunity at no cost to Synchrony due

to sharing on existing channels.

• Leadership Symposium: By inviting identified top talent from across the

country to interact with the company during a collegiate leadership

symposium, Synchrony Financial has the chance to build relationships,

share the brand, identify potential hires, and create brand ambassadors.

While this is a costly tactic, directly exposing collegiate job seekers to the

company, its people, and its culture provides an instant potential pipeline

for the rotational program. By holding the symposium in April, this tactic

falls in line with the other relationship building tactics at the faculty level,

creating the foundation for hiring in the next recruiting season.

• Information Sessions: The in-person information sessions will be in

conjunction with the career fairs, providing recruiters with a place to direct

students while they are still on campus and able to interact one on one.

Because the recruiters are already on their respective campuses for the

career fair activities, there is no incremental cost to hold these in-person

sessions. As Cornell University (2015) shares with companies preparing to

come to campus, “Employer information sessions and presentations can

greatly enhance your on-campus recruitment effort. Sessions early in the

semester raise student awareness about your organization, thereby

increasing the number of resumes submitted for an interview”.

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Academic Year Engagement: The proposed ways in which Synchrony Financial

can keep in touch with prospective BLPs throughout the school year will leverage

existing resources to keep the relationship moving at no cost to the company in

hopes to generate additional interest to help with future hiring. BLPs can utilize

internal or contracted production teams to develop the monthly Day In The Life

videos for YouTube that, similar to the social media content and takeover days,

provide added insight into the daily life of a BLP across various functions and

segments within the business. Additionally, the BLP blog not only gives the BLPs

a chance to work together to organize their own blog from month to month to

share their experiences, it gives prospective BLPs the chance to read the unique

experiences in addition to reading the social media posts. With a host of BLPs

around the business, these alternatives diversify the ways in which BLPs can

share their story. The virtual Q&A sessions will be scheduled before and after the

career fairs in line with the social media takeovers, which then become a

promotion avenue for the Q&As, giving students the chance to learn more about

the program before meeting with recruiters, while also providing recruiters a

place to direct interested candidates for more information as they may be

evaluating their options once the recruiters leave campus, or for those who did

not have a Synchrony representative on their campus.

Key Public #4: Media

Media Coverage Solicitation:

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• Outbound Sharing: Similar to many of the tactics in this plan, Synchrony

Financial will want to leverage existing resources to grab the attention of

the corporate-focused media. By sharing the links to the new YouTube

videos released to different sets of media contacts each month, to

minimize oversaturation, and ensuring that some of the social media

content throughout the year focuses around leadership support of the

program (i.e. quotes, interviews, etc.), BLPs can gain new skills with the

help of corporate communications to share their experience beyond

internal audiences and college audiences. With each quarter, the BLPs

can identify a key theme that is relevant to their experience and, with the

help of corporate communications, identify which media outlets quarterly

press releases should be distributed to.

• BuzzFeed: Because BuzzFeed is a popular media outlet for the students

that Synchrony is targeting for BLP hiring, creating a partnership would

allow for them to pay for guaranteed placement that is sure to reach their

desired audience. The BuzzFeed “partner” designation is defined as those

posts or thumbnails that are brought from external advertising

partnerships. This partnership requires the advertising company to pay

about $100,000 in exchange for the ability to develop 4-5 posts on the site

(Sternberg, 2013). To test this partnership, Synchrony can develop this

partnership for one year and provide BLPs the chance to develop

additional content that is more relaxed and fun. Developing quarterly

posts, specially in advance of on-campus recruiting efforts, will allow the

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posts to build buzz around the company before recruiters make their way

to campus to execute on the student-facing tactics.

Measurement & Evaluation

Because a lot of the proposed evaluation methods to be explained in the

next section require the sponsoring team for internal events and Synchrony

representatives in off-campus settings to tabulate engagement levels in real-time

or utilize electronic communications to distribute surveys, for example, a small

amount of the budget for this campaign will go towards measuring the

effectiveness of the proposed tactics. By leveraging a survey agency to conduct

the national public opinion polls and ensuring the social media team has a

running Sprout Social subscription to manage and analyze the additional social

media efforts, the company can ensure that the major evaluation methods are

covered. Because the social media monitoring must be done on a continuous

basis, Synchrony must produce funding to keep the subscription ongoing while

the public opinion poll will occur twice – once in January before the campaign is

in full swing and once in December as the year-long campaign is closing out.

Specific to internal tactic execution, Synchrony will want to take an official

count of new hires when they join the company, and get their feedback via in-

depth interviews in August before their rotations go into full swing and

interviewers can get a “fresh” external view that is not too influenced yet by the

culture. Employee engagement in various events will want to be measured year-

round to see how different events may get employees more involved than others

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while post-event surveys will take a snapshot in time around specific employee-

focused events such as the recognition lunches, Know Your SYF webinars and

Walk With Us leadership calls. To measure and evaluate its employee-focused

tactics, the company can measure the 2015 retention rate at the start of 2016,

conduct employee focus groups about halfway through the campaign to see how

much the proposed tactics have been engaging and helpful so far and end the

year with the all-employee survey to get insight on how the overall campaign was

helpful to employees understanding the company and its journey more than the

current day.

From a university perspective, the company will want to count the number

of new partnerships developed at the time of career fairs, given that attending

and having a booth at a career fair serves as a stepping stone to creating a

working partnership with engaged faculty and students. On-campus engagement

will be measured hand-in-hand with student engagement levels and post-event

surveys as they will all be indicative of the support received by students and

faculty as well as provide an avenue for feedback moving into the next event or

next recruiting season. Overall, the timing for measuring and evaluating the

proposed tactics will be parallel to the timing of the events in which the proposed

method is tied to as a way to ensure that the company and its various teams

involved are getting real-time feedback to adjust for future planning and

execution.

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EVALUATION METHODS

Based on the earlier defined objectives, it is recommended that Synchrony

Financial use the following evaluation methods to determine the success of the

proposed strategies and tactics that will help them in achieving the individual

objectives and overall goal of this campaign. For the purpose of timing of the pre-

and post-campaign evaluation methods, the campaign will run through 2016,

allowing for the inclusion of an entire recruiting and hiring season.

Objective 1

Increase overall brand awareness amongst identified external key publics by

25% by Q1 2016.

Criteria

A 25% lift in overall brand awareness amongst university personnel,

undergraduate- and graduate-level students, and corporate-focused media by Q1

2016 is achieved.

Tools

Pre-Campaign Public Opinion Poll: To understand where its key publics

currently stand in relation to their awareness of Synchrony Financial, including

who the company is, what they do, their background, and career opportunities,

this public opinion poll will be distributed amongst samples in its key external

publics’ populations. Specifically, this sample will be the most effective by

including personnel and students from campuses that Synchrony currently has a

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relationship as well as those that it does not and representatives from print, TV,

radio, and online media. Some questions that this poll may include are:

• Do you know what Synchrony Financial is?

• Do you know how they came to be a company, through a buyout or

spinoff?

• Have you seen this company name on TV, newspaper, or online, or at

retailers that you visit?

• Are you aware of the opportunities available for college graduates at the

company?

Post-Campaign Public Opinion Poll: This post-campaign version of the above-

mentioned poll will give Synchrony Financial an idea of where the level of

awareness stands amongst its key external publics following the execution of the

proposed tactics.

Social Media Engagement: By leveraging Facebook, Twitter, Instagram,

YouTube, Snapchat, and a blog as a way to reach campuses and bring overall

awareness to the career opportunities at Synchrony Financial, the company will

want to keep track of metrics such as followers, views, shares, likes, and

retweets before, during, and after the campaign. This will allow Synchrony to see

not only how successful the channels have been in reaching the campaign’s key

publics, but also what content within those channels have achieved the best

traction for planning future content.

When looking at each individual social channel, the following metrics will

be measured with the support of Sprout Social for additional analytics. Sprout’s

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service provides a “collaborative platform [that] ensures smarter, faster and more

efficient social communications” (“Home”, 2015). By providing the ability to

identify opportunities to engage with followers, publish messages to multiple

social accounts, and measure performance and analyze social activity, Sprout

Social will allow Synchrony Financial’s social media/PR team to manage current

social media efforts while taking on the new BLP-focused accounts and posts to

measure effectiveness of the efforts. With a Sprout Social Team subscription,

three members on the team have the ability to manage these accounts

seamlessly as the content volume increases (“Home”, 2015).

• Facebook – Utilize Facebook Insights for business pages, which looks at

Page Likes, Post Reach, and Engagement (Clicks, Likes, Comments, &

Shares). Also, as events occur and hashtags are developed to generate

conversation, a look at the level of usage of those hashtags will provide

insight into engagement (“All of the Social Media”, 2015).

• Twitter – Utilize Twitter Analytics for metrics around tweets, tweet

impressions, profile visits, mentions, followers, and tweets linking to the

respective account. In addition to these metrics, Twitter allows users to

look into Engagement Rate (Clicks, Retweets, Favorites, and Replies by

impression), Link Clicks, Retweets, Favorites, and Replies for the past 28

days. Also, as events occur and hashtags are developed to generate

conversation, a look at the level of usage of those hashtags will provide

insight into engagement (“All of the Social Media”, 2015).

• Instagram – Followers, Tags, Hashtag usage

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• YouTube – Views, Comments, Likes/Dislikes, Favorites, Shares

• Snapchat – Private Snaps: Snaps Received, Chat messages sent,

Chat messages Received; Stories: Views, Average Views/Snap,

Estimated Time Viewed

• Blog – Views, Comments, Likes, Shares

Media Content Analysis: As Synchrony Financial gains additional media

attention through its overall company dealings and this campaign’s efforts, the

company will want to utilize media content analysis to understand who, what,

when, where, why, and how of news that is being shared in corporate-focused

media as well as how effective it is in increasing brand awareness across its

external publics. This media would include the proposed internally created and

proactively solicited coverage, inbound requests, and outputs of their potential

brand influencer partnerships.

Objective 2

Hire 70 qualified candidates into the Business Leadership Program following Fall

2015 recruiting season.

Criteria

Seventy Business Leadership Program employees are hired into Synchrony

Financial in the summer of 2016.

Tools

Count of New Hires for Class of 2018: New hires into the Business Leadership

Program will begin in July of every year. The number of program members hired

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to begin in their respective functional tracks in July of 2016, set to complete the

program by July of 2018, will determine the success of this objective.

Objective 3

Develop working partnerships with 15 additional colleges and universities by Fall

2016.

Criteria

Fifteen incremental university partnerships are developed leading into primary

recruiting season in Fall 2016.

Tools

Count of New Campus Partnerships: The simple count of new partnerships

that Synchrony recruiters have developed will evaluate the core success of this

objective.

On-Campus Engagement Levels: The proposed tactics require Synchrony

Financial recruiters to interact with personnel via email and face-to-face

interactions to help build campus relationships. To measure success of this

objective and its related tactics, the company will want to track how many

schools provided responses to recruiters in comparison to the total schools

contacted, the average number of contacts per campus, and how many face-to-

face meetings were held. Having a count of these interactions as a foundation

aside from a simple count of new partnerships developed, Synchrony will have

an idea of the effort needed moving forward to continue the increase.

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Objective 4

Increase awareness of Synchrony Financial as a top employer amongst students

by 60% by Fall 2016.

Criteria

Awareness of Synchrony Financial as a top employer amongst students has

increased by 60% leading into the Fall 2016 recruiting season.

Tools

Current BLP In-Depth Interviews: By interviewing current members of the

program, Synchrony Financial can get an idea of what drew them to apply, why

they accepted their offer, and get their thoughts on how to reach students given

their close proximity in age and experience. This can be done annually moving

forward to ensure that opportunities to develop and make adjustments to the

recruiting approach can be identified. Questions asked of current BLPs may

include:

• What made you apply for the Business Leadership Program?

• What types of interaction did you have with the company/representatives

before you applied?

• If you had more than one offer, what made you want to accept your offer

with Synchrony?

• What do you feel is the best way to reach students on campus today?

Student Event Engagement: Synchrony Financial will be interacting with

students using both in-person and virtual events to help spread the Synchrony

story and attract talent to the Business Leadership Program. The company will

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need recruiters to track the number of students that attend their respective

information sessions and Q&As. For both types of events, representatives will

want to document attendees’ name, classification, major, and email as a way to

interact further with students via post-event surveys (detailed below) and other

follow-ups throughout the recruiting relationship.

Post-Event E-mail Surveys for Undergraduate & Graduate Students on

Selected Campuses: From the first time out on campuses in Fall 2014,

Synchrony Financial is aware that overall awareness of the company was low. By

recruiting side-by-side with General Electric teams, recruiters were able to tie the

story together for students but still had to overcome the obstacle of being a

lesser-known company trying to establish its presence. Because the proposed

events will help to increase awareness, Synchrony will want to evaluate what

students think of the events that they attended and give them a chance to

provide feedback for an improved experience as job seekers. With recruiters

collecting emails for follow-ups, the initial follow-up communication to the

students can include a link to a survey opening up that feedback loop, giving

them a chance to provide insight into their experience with the event and

perception of the company. This survey will take a rating scale approach, asking

some of the following questions with an area for open-ended

comments/feedback:

• What is your level of understanding of Synchrony and its business model?

• What is your likelihood of applying for the BLP full-time program or

internship?

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• How helpful was this event as a part of your job search?

• Please rate the level of interaction with Synchrony representatives

• Please rate the helpfulness of Synchrony representatives.

• Please provide feedback around how we can improve this event in the

future.

Objective 5

Increase employee retention by 4% by the Q1 2016.

Criteria

A 94% employee retention rate is achieved by Q1 2016.

Tools

Employee Retention Rate for 2015 as compared to 2014: According to the

Society for Human Resource Management (2012), retention rate is “the

percentage of employees who were employed at the beginning of a period, and

remain with the company at the end of the period”, not including employees that

were hired and may have left during that period. The company must revisit the

exact definition used by human resources to develop the retention rate that is

displayed on their careers website to duplicate for evaluation of this objective.

Cross-Functional Employee Focus Groups: At each of the Synchrony

Financial sites, there is a wide range of functions represented, all with different

levels of insight into what is going on with the company depending on their

specific roles and responsibilities. By bringing representatives of all functions into

one room for a focus group, the company can gain feedback around where the

84

knowledge gaps lie, why there are gaps present, and what these employees

believe can be done specific to their function to close them, in addition to how

they believe these gaps may affect their perception of being an important asset

to the company. For this to be the most effective, conducting these at every site

would be the best approach to ensure that the various employee demographics

are covered. Some questions to be asked of these focus groups include:

• Were you aware of what an IPO was before our company’s? Do you know

now?

• Are you aware of the process that the company is going through to

become a standalone? If so, what aspects?

• If you are aware, what channels, internal or external, helped you stay in

the know?

• If you are not aware, what can be done to keep you aware?

• Do you feel like your role/function is a factor in what you are aware of?

• Do you research what is going on with the company on your own?

Employee Engagement Levels: Based on the proposed tactics, employees will

be engaged via various channels to ensure that they are aware of what is going

on with the company as a whole, what it means to be a Synchrony employee,

and why they are the company’s most important asset. Their knowledge of these

aspects of Synchrony will help drive retention based on their level of

engagement. The company will want to keep a count of how many employees

are participating in appreciation lunches, leadership calls, benefits calls, and

Business Leadership Program events.

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Post-Campaign All-Employee Survey: With part of the campaign being

dedicated to current employees’ knowledge of the broader company, this all-

employee survey will serve as a comprehensive checkpoint for leadership to

understand the knowledge and perception of their employees. This survey must

be designed in a way to give the company a way to measure outputs by asking

employees about what they have participated in, outtakes by asking about their

knowledge of company dealings, and outcomes by asking how their knowledge

and engagement drives their perception of the company and their satisfaction in

working for the company. Questions asked as a part of this survey may include:

• Have you participated in any Walk With Us events? If so, how many?

• Have you participated in any Know Your SYF events? If so, which ones?

• Are you a member of a diversity network? If so, which one(s)?

• Based on the events that you participated in, where do you rate your level

of knowledge of the company?

• Based on knowledge gained from these events, where do you rate your

likelihood to stay with the company for the next 3 years?

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