SEATTLE, Wash. — Zonar, the leader in smart fleet technology, announced on Jan. 24 that it received gold recognition in the 4th Annual 2019 One Planet Awards, for the Communications or PR Campaign of the Year/Heightening Awareness.
Zonar’s winning campaign helped freight trucking fleets, bus fleets and school bus fleets that cross state lines throughout the U.S. understand and work towards ensuring compliance with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s Electronic Logging Device (ELD) mandate.
The mandate or ELD Final Rule for operators of commercial motor vehicles that are covered by the law, requires replacing paper hours of service logs and an earlier type of recorder called an Automatic On-Board Recording Device (AOBRD), with automated ELD technology.
Led by the compliance and safety team at Zonar, including Fred Fakkema, Ron Cordova, and Jill Snyder, and communications lead, Ben Hohmann, the team worked closely on the issue. They implemented a sustained communication and PR campaign to educate the industry prior to and throughout the lead up to the deadline for fleets to comply with the ELD mandate.
This strategic awareness campaign helped educate and convince businesses to tackle the change management requirements of the complex legislation and corresponding technologies, to transition their devices and processes ahead of time.
Understanding that many fleets considered the transition a daunting endeavor, the team focused on providing an easy pathway towards compliance, to help inspire early change within fleets. They hosted webinars, attended industry conferences, authored helpful guides and bylines, and secured thought leadership coverage in targeted media to reach their audiences directly.
Campaign content has also included blog posts, infographics, and easy-to-follow, printable calendars and timelines that outlined easy steps for fleets to follow, in order to meet the deadline. Also provided were with best practices on choosing the right solutions and vendors for their needs.
Thanks to the safety and compliance, and communications teams, Zonar customers and the industry as a whole was better prepared to comply with the ELD mandate on time.
“This campaign was something everyone across Zonar was passionate about because keeping our customers, partners and everyone behind the wheel compliant and on the road keeps their businesses thriving,” says Fred Fakkema, vice president of compliance at Zonar. “The esteemed One Planet Award highlights the work of my team, the communications team, but also the entire company.” He added that they are “honored and humbled for being recognized for our results.”
The One Planet Awards program recognizes the best in business and professional excellence in every industry worldwide. Organizations from all over are eligible to submit nominations, including public and private, for-profit and nonprofit, largest to smallest and new start-ups. More than 50 judges worldwide representing a wide spectrum of industry experts participated in the judging process.
For information about Zonar’s safety and compliance efforts, visit: www.zonarsystems.com/safety-compliance
About Zonar
Founded in 2001, Zonar has pioneered smart fleet management solutions throughout the vocational, pupil, mass transit and commercial trucking industries. Zonar’s mission is to enhance the safety, performance, and success of our customers, by transforming the delivery of innovative insights for commercial fleets worldwide. Zonar achieves this by helping fleets of all sizes maximize the use of their assets, with solutions that are dedicated to improving compliance, efficiency, maintenance, ridership visibility, safety and tracking.
Cloud-based services with open APIs drive Zonar’s smart fleet solutions by making it easy for fleet owners and managers to stay connected to their fleets, and drivers and operators to dispatch. Headquartered in Seattle and majority-owned by technology company Continental, Zonar also has a Technology Development Center in downtown Seattle, a regional office in Cincinnati, and a distribution center outside of Atlanta. www.zonarsystems.com
About the One Planet Awards
One Planet Awards recognizes companies for their business and professional excellence. The One Planet Awards honor outstanding individuals, executives, teams, new products and services, PR, marketing, and corporate communications, plus organizations worldwide. www.oneplanetawards.com
