Opinion: How to prepare for the social media apocalypse

Opinion: How to prepare for the social media apocalypse

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Alex Warren, senior account manager at Wildfire PR, asks whether the recent negative headlines around social is a sign to prepare for the social media apocalypse.

Alex Warren

Is social media doomed to fail?

That’s the question that I’ve been thinking about recently. From the Cambridge Analytica scandal to the #DeleteFacebook movement, Snapchat’s celebrity exodus to the YouTube Adpocalypse, it feels like social media  – and Web 2.0 as a whole –  is on the brink of catastrophe.

Now, if there’s anyone who should be well-placed to manage a crisis, it should be PRs. Unfortunately, when it comes to social, PR professionals haven’t always been the quickest off the mark in times of change.

When Web 2.0 technologies hit the scene in the early 2000s, PRs were perfectly placed to take ownership of the trend. Our job was to facilitate two-way communication, to manage influencers, manage crises and generally relate with the public.

Despite this, PR somehow managed to miss the boat. Businesses didn’t trust their comms teams to manage social media, regularly choosing to outsource to more targeted digital agencies and social firms.

Then, as brands began to realise that social media was often just one more communication channel, they brought it in-house and reassigned it to the marketing department. The result was PR professionals being left out of the loop.

While I’d love to put this down to poorly timed circumstances, the reality is that communicators were woefully unprepared for the rise of social media. Digital agencies were already running award-winning campaigns while PR pros were still trying to work out whether or not to add hashtags to their press releases.

Responding to new social media trends

Faced with this slow-moving history, the idea that social media could be on the decline (at least, social media as we know it) has left many PRs keen to find out what’s next and how the PR industry can start to define the shift  –  rather than waiting around to be told which direction to start marching in.

It’s for this reason that the Post-Social Media Apocalypse project was launched. Developed by the Wildfire labs team – which conducts radical, yet retro, research into the PR industry – it offers insights into the key changes facing social media and provides a compact survival guide for PR people looking to adapt.

Click the video below now to discover a few of the key lessons PR people can take away from the project and use to prepare themselves for the social media end-times.

How PR measurement saves lives

How PR measurement saves lives

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In 2017, the government made an announcement that could have been disastrous for stroke survivors throughout the UK.

It had decided not to replace the National Stroke Strategy for England when it expired at the end of the year.

The Stroke Association argued that stroke is a unique condition requiring its own plan to drive improvements. It’s the UK’s fourth biggest killer and leading cause of disability, and the charity said existing strategies did not adequately address the key issues to driving continual improvement in stroke care.

The charity knew something had to be done – and with potentially thousands of lives on the line, failure was not an option.

If it couldn’t sway public opinion to put pressure on the government, the standard of stroke care could decline and people could lose their lives. So the Stroke Association commissioned Cision to help monitor and track its campaign progress.

“We were determined to develop a campaign that highlighted the seriousness of this devastating health condition to mobilise public support,” says Anil Ranchod, the Stroke Association’s deputy director PR and comms. “We needed a powerful way to inform the public and the right tools to ensure we were on track.”

He adds: “Our campaign, A New Era for Stroke, needed to engage the public and garner widespread media attention to spur the government to re-evaluate its decision.”

PR would be essential to sway public opinion

The Stroke Association puts PR and comms at the heart of its media strategy, and this campaign was no different.

To force the government to act, it decided to drive people to an online petition calling for change. If it could gather enough signatures, it knew NHS England and the Department of Health would be forced to listen.

“The strategy for the campaign involved establishing a research and measurement programme to reach targeted audiences and analyse campaign progress,” Ranchod explains. “Developing audience profiles for personalised outreach with a call to action was important to identify target audiences.”

To achieve this, Cision surveyed 10,000 UK residents to measure the public’s awareness of the issue. Then, our team identified and tracked key influencers and outlets for the charity’s target audiences.

As the campaign progressed, we mapped The Stroke Association’s mainstream and social media coverage against its web traffic, calls to the helpline and petition signatures.

Ranchod says: “Updated measurement was factored throughout the entire campaign, starting with the audience identification survey, which pinpointed specific audiences and their media consumption habits.”

The insight that averted disaster

By the end of stroke awareness month (Make May Purple for stroke), the petition had gathered more than 5,000 signatures. But there was a problem.

Cision’s reports showed that the charity’s PR and social output correlated with a huge spike in signatures. But that spike wasn’t big enough. If the charity was to achieve its goal of securing time with a government health minister, something had to be done.

We showed that although the campaign had reached 48% of UK adults, just 14% had been exposed to coverage featuring a link to the petition. Following this feedback, the Stroke Association changed its approach – greatly increasing the campaign’s impact.

“Having this information from the beginning was vital as it encouraged campaign efforts to revolve around data-based decisions,” continues Ranchod. “Monitoring social media engagement (which started low) led to the charity upping the ante on our social media offering.

“Utilising our video content earlier along with the comprehensive online dashboards available through Cision Intelligence provided much-needed ongoing analysis, ensuring progress could be tracked against KPIs.”

He adds: “By the end of the campaign, Cision reported respondents’ awareness of our key messages grew by 35%, showcasing how PR efforts helped the organisation achieve its underlying objectives.”

Spurred on by the introduction of social media case studies, the #NewEra hashtag made 7 million impressions. The petition link was shared almost 4,000 times, achieving a potential reach of 3.7 million people.

As a result, the petition generated over 55,000 signatures and helped secure two meetings with a government health minister.

The future of comms at The Stroke Association

Technology played a key role in the success of The Stroke Association’s #NewEra campaign. By incorporating measurement into the campaign from the start, it was able to define exactly what success looked like and show that its PR activities were a cost-effective way to achieve its goals.

“Measuring the success of a campaign is not just about coverage or reach and frequency,” says Ranchod. “It’s about demonstrating engagement and impact of the coverage, such as actions taken or increased awareness.”

Going forwards, Ranchod says the charity will continue to use this approach to demonstrate the contributions PR and comms make to its strategic objectives.

“It has and continues to be a journey, not a destination,” he says. “But thanks to technology we’re now in a position to effectively track and measure the impact and outcomes of our work.”

He adds. “Working with Cision, we now have a better understanding of what metrics to measure – and it’s about measuring your performance and being able to attribute outcomes across all areas of your work.”

Why it’s time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms

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Meet the Journalist: Woman & Home's Kath Brown

Meet the Journalist: Woman & Home’s Kath Brown

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Kath Brown, editor at Woman & Home, tells us why the brand has initiated its 50 over 50 Awards and why now is the best time in history to be a woman over 50.

Since becoming editor last September, what changes have you made to the magazine?

My main aim since taking over Woman & Home has been to make it more modern and youthful because that’s exactly what this audience now is. Our goal is to be the voice of the modern grown up woman, the go to destination for women over 40 and commercial partners who want to talk to her.

This demographic has been evolving for the last few years and is now at a seminal moment. Today, midlife women are very different to the generations before them and age is meaningless. Kate Moss is 43. Davina is 50. Dawn French is 60. Over the hill? Invisible? Not anymore.

Women are feeling their power and flexing their economic muscle – they have way more disposable income than any other demographic – and I wanted us to be at the heart of that. Our covers and art direction have been given a modern refresh and there are more inspiring lifestyle pages particularly in fashion, beauty and homes.

We understand that a magazine like ours is a luxury item at £4.50 and we make sure it is jammed packed with original, relevant content that our audience will love.

What are the Amazing Women 50 over 50 Awards? Why have you launched them?

When I first took over as editor and started working with the team, we talked a lot about how to position ourselves. No one wants to be pigeonholed and the barriers of age are totally blurred. But on the flip side of that, we didn’t want to hide the fact that we are unashamedly aimed at midlife women.

The language to define this market has been difficult in the past – middle aged, menopausal, mature… not the sexiest of descriptions. So, we are all about owning it. We’re 50 and we’re proud. We’re not anti ageing, we’re pro ageing and that’s why we launched the Amazing Women Awards 50 over 50 – to celebrate the sheer brilliance of this generation.

There are truly inspiring grown up women everywhere these days – in politics, fashion, the police force, on TV. And while compiling Woman & Home we discover awesome ladies working in their local communities, setting up successful businesses and generally holding up the world. We think they all deserve awards actually.

Can you give a brief overview of your team, including who does what?

The Woman & Home team is small but brilliant. My deputy is the amazing Miranda McMinn who oversees features and looks after commercial. We call her the ideas guru and she is a master at tone of voice.

Also on features is Charlotte Williamson – the best features editor in the business. Our celebrity director is Nathalie Whittle, queen of the last minute cover shoot and associate editor (health and wellbeing) is Jane Druker.

Dave Dowding is creative director and he creates beautiful layouts with Katherine Stock, senior art editor, and Katie Harris, senior designer. Chief sub is Emma Badger and her deputy is Carly Rigley. In pictures we have Emma Smith and Louise Connolly and last, but most certainly not least, there’s the lifestyle team:

  • Fashion: Julia Morgan, Charlie Moore, Samantha Rnic and Lydia Taylor
  • Beauty: Rosie Green and Fiona McKim
  • Food: Jane Curran.
  • Interiors: Jennifer Morgan

What are important things to consider when you produce content for the title’s audience of women over 50?

They’ve read it all before, so tell them something new and inspiring. In recent research we found our readers love our inspiring, positive, intelligent tone of voice – they expect nothing less than brilliant journalism so we have signed up some fantastic names like Allison Pearson and Anna Murphy.

Our women have cash to spend, but they want advice on spending it wisely. So, edited choice in fashion, beauty, travel, homes etc is hugely important. They have no problem shopping in Aldi for the award winning champagne (well why wouldn’t you?) but they’re also quite happy to splash out on an amazing holiday in Vietnam if we say it’s brilliant.

Are there any specific content areas which are very popular with your readers?

Yes. Fashion and beauty are both hugely popular because this woman wants to look modern and glamorous. She is also mad about travel (with family and girlfriends) and loves to read features about inspiring women who are achieving great things.

Health is a big area because she’s the gatekeeper to her whole family’s wellbeing (millennial kids, small kids, husband, older parents… she’s in charge of it all). Food and interiors are also important. She loves to entertain and show off her stylish home and great cooking skills. I mustn’t forget books – this woman reads up to 40 a year!

How does content vary between the magazine and your digital platforms?

The same rules apply really. All our content is very targeted to this demographic. Anyone who tells you the 50+ market isn’t digitally savvy needs to wise up. The Woman & Home audience is as highly engaged with their smartphone as everyone else and they love our content.

We have just updated our website, which receives 500,000 monthly uniques and 2.7 million UK page impressions. We have a 49% open rate on our daily newsletter (it’s so compelling I usually end up opening it myself) and we have 1.2 million Facebook followers.

We are also doing more and more experiential – our readers love to get together with like-minded people, especially when there’s Prosecco and a goody bag involved.

What is your relationship like with PRs?

PRs love Woman & Home because they know a mention either in print or online will shift product. We are a highly trusted brand and we don’t take that trust for granted. If one of our editors says something is good then it really will be.

As an example of this, we recently mentioned a personal stylist in a fashion feature. It was buried deep in the copy with no image but the stylist got several new clients as a result of it. It’s the power of Woman & Home.

Finally, when was the best time in history to be a 50+ woman?

It’s now of course! Only a few years ago women complained about becoming invisible when they hit a certain age. Well we’re not having that anymore. We are the pioneers of modern ageing and at Woman & Home we are proud to lead the charge.

WE hires new UK general manager

Ruth Allchurch joins WE as UK general manager

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WE Communications has appointed Ruth Allchurch as general manager of its London office.

She will replace current UK general manager Marcus Sorour, who is set to become vice president, international, client services at the agency. Both Sorour and Allchurch will be based in London and report to Alan VanderMolen, WE’s president, international.

A consumer and FMCG comms specialist, Allchurch was previously managing director at Burson Cohn & Wolfe, where she led the agency’s UK consumer brand practice.

Allchurch says brands must work to win consumer trust

This appointment comes during a period of dramatic change in how brands are perceived in the consumer landscape. Allchurch stressed that brands today must understand the high expectations consumers have of them and tailor their communications accordingly.

“We are now seeing brands having to work harder and harder to win consumer trust in this era of transparency,” she said. “Our job in 2018 is to ensure brands stay true to the role they can play in consumers’ lives and not behave like something they aren’t.

“Fundamentally, brands in 2018 need to be clear on their purpose and increase integration across the entire media ecosystem (paid, earned, owned, experiential and search).”

She added: “It is about creating meaningful content which provides useful product and service information or is entertaining or serves some sort of higher purpose.

“Content delivered by a brand should be targeted to the customer’s needs and be in real-time. SEO targeting and retargeting are critical and brands need to anticipate these micro-moments to provide the right information at the right time to build stronger customer relationships.”

3 reputational risks facing the FMCG industry

To help FMCG communicators navigate this changing consumer landscape, Cision Insights has analysed millions of press clippings to reveal the three biggest reputational threats facing brands in the sector today.

With more than 25% of a company’s value linked directly to its reputation, protecting firms against these risks is a key responsibility for communicators in the industry – and 3 reputational risks facing the FMCG industry will help you do exactly that.

Inside, you’ll discover the impact changing consumer preferences, new political pressures and resistance to healthier product ranges are having on earned media coverage in the sector. Enter your details into the form below now to claim your copy.

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A better way to measure the value of earned media

A better way to measure the value of earned media

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Earned media is perfectly positioned to solve the critical problems senior marketers face.

It generates qualified prospects, identifies potential customers and engages them at the right place and time.

By rights, comms should play a far more prominent role in the marketing mix. The reason it doesn’t can be summed up in just three words: lack of measurement.

At Cision, we recognise that you need to know where earned media works best in order to achieve the best results. Marketing executives want to know their investments are achieving tangible business goals. But old metrics like reach or Advertising Value Equivalent (AVE) simply aren’t up to the job.

As this brand new white paper reveals, technology today is helping communicators measure the performance of their campaigns with a far greater degree of accuracy.

Why communicators need a new way to measure earned media

You’d be hard-pressed to find a marketing director who considers AVE a meaningful metric. So, perhaps it’s not surprising that some major PR organisations are calling for it to be abandoned altogether.

AVE ascribes the same value to both positive and negative media coverage. It doesn’t account for when coverage reaches the wrong audience for your brand. And it does a bad job of measuring the impact of coverage received through social media.

“AVE is a lazy way of persuading marketers schooled in old ad ways that PR counts,” says Robert Phillips, Edelman’s former CEO. “The model of the future must be able to analyse the depth, resonance, importance and influence of the conversation.”

Other common measures like Opportunities to See (OTS) and reach also fall short of this standard. But new innovations are helping communicators assess the impact their campaigns are having on tangible metrics like conversions, lead generation and ROI.

Armed with these insights, not only will you be able to demonstrate the success of your campaigns to senior stakeholders. You’ll also have the tools to optimise them for maximum impact.

Better tools mean better measurement – and better results

We know that marketing executives understand the value of earned media. But it still remains a largely unrealised opportunity for businesses that lack the tools to effectively measure their campaigns.

Press releases, speaking opportunities, case studies, testimonials and social media can all drive lead generation and build customer trust. But different strategies are suitable for different businesses. So communicators need a way to see what works best.

To take full advantage of this opportunity, you need the tools to overcome this challenge. You need something you can use to accurately measure the value of the coverage your campaigns generate.

Ad agencies don’t boast about the number of billboards or TV ad slots they get their clients’ content featured on. So, your comms team shouldn’t hold up the volume of coverage it secures as a measure of its success.

“Getting into a top tier outlet is great. But what does that mean for the business?” asks Chris Lynch, Cision’s CMO. “That’s a question that’s getting asked more and more.”

As you’ll see in our brand new paper, Why it’s time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms, the latest technology can help you answer that question using recognised business metrics. Enter your details into the form below now to claim your copy.

Why it’s time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms

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Opinion: 5 new PR tech tools explained

Opinion: 5 new PR tech tools explained

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Chris Blackwood, partner at Third City, examines five new pieces of PR tech you can use to simplify your life in communications.

Remember the days where you would handwrite a press release, read it to the client over the telephone/Morse code/smoke signals to get sign-off and then hand deliver it the next day on Fleet Street? Those were the days, hey?

Today the PR world is awash with new technology and if you’re not using it, you may as well be carving your press releases into stone tablets.

But don’t worry. Here’s a quick run-down of five modern tools of the PR trade and the inside track on how they work, without all the technical guff.

Telegram

No, we’ve not gone back to Victorian times. Telegram is a mobile and desktop messaging app, like a beefed up WhatsApp. And just like WhatsApp you can create groups, but with much higher capacity.

This is great for handling an integrated campaign. Plonk all agency teams into a group with key client-side people and it means everyone stays in touch and up to speed, without generating thousands of unnecessary emails.

Even better, as Telegram groups can have thousands of users, it can be utilised instead of email address collection as a way to recruit and inform ‘super fans’ of your brand activity. But if you take this second route, don’t scrimp on the admins.

Slack

If you hate having to wade through millions of emails, Slack is the project management app for you. It’s designed to facilitate team collaboration, enabling everyone to talk to each other, develop ideas and share documents in a format that looks and feels more like Facebook than Outlook.

Crucially, you can create separate channels where only specific people are invited to participate in conversations. This can work well for planning different campaigns, or serving different areas of your client’s business.

Filestage

How many iterations of a document have you gotten up to? I think there’s a release draft V34 somewhere on our servers.

Filestage won’t help deal with indecisive or over-eager clients, but it does take some of the pain out of the process. It works in a similar way to Google Docs, in that many users can comment on a document and an editor can amend. But unlike Google Docs, creating a new, clean version with comments taken on board creates a fresh copy without losing the past ‘layers’ of changes.

Long story short, this prevents the pain of a document growing into a mass of messy comment chains and eye-popping luminous track changes, bringing zen to the process of document development.

SEM Rush

Most PR agencies do wonderful SEO work without even realising. Those backlinks to client sites on the likes of BBC, the Guardian and MailOnline help push them up Google rankings and make AdWord bids more competitive.

SEM Rush lets you quantify the value of organic links and traffic, without needing a coding degree to use the thing. PR has always had an issue with evaluation, but there’s no excuses with tools like this available.

A cryptocurrency wallet

Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon, and for the rest of your life. I’m talking about your clients asking to pay in cryptocurrency. It really shouldn’t be a barrier.

The UK has one of the best-regulated crypto exchanges in the world, London Block Exchange. Here you can open an account and with your personalised wallet number, can accept crypto payments with ease. Almost like a… bank account.

You can then instantly convert this to pound sterling or leave it unconverted and ride the crypto rollercoaster.

Another piece of technology simplifying the lives of communicators is the Cision Communications Cloud®. Find out more about the world’s most advanced communications technology here.

PR news in brief

The case for investing in earned media

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Consumer attitudes have changed radically in recent years. People aren’t just becoming more sceptical of traditional push marketing tactics. They’re increasingly taking steps to avoid them altogether.

Ad blocker penetration has surged 20% since 2016 to 615 million users worldwide. Meanwhile, new research from YouGov suggests that three quarters of Brits don’t want marketers targeting them on social media.

“There are various degrees of suspicion and rejection towards the premise of targeted advertising,” notes Marketing Week columnist Mark Ritson. “The only reason we have not heard more from this large, dominant slice of the British population is that they had no idea what was going on.”

At the same time, consumers are changing the way they interact with the media. It’s becoming increasingly clear that earned media plays a vital role in driving lead generation and building consumer trust.

The case for investing in earned media

Consumers are shunning traditional marketing channels

Thanks to comparison sites, online reviews, news articles and more, consumers today are far better informed than they were even 10 years ago.

Historically, if you were buying a car you would have had to rely on the messages in TV ads, printed in brochures or delivered by forecourt salesmen. But now, you can find everything you need freely online.

As a result, paid and owned media channels have less control over a brand’s message. So communicators need to find new ways to reach their audiences, using mediums consumers know and trust. It’s more important than ever for brands to be part of the conversation early. Those that don’t leverage the press, social media and influencers risk seeing their brand value erode over time.

Company decision makers are also hungry for earned media content, according to research from publishing company Raconteur.

Its survey of 500 European C-suites found that half of executives are likely to read content from a recognised expert – while 47% look for content that’s recommended by an influential figure in their industry.

“Your ability to cut through comes down to credibility,” says Raconteur CEO Freddie Ossberg. “Partnerships, respected influencers and exclusive research offer great ways to demonstrate your expertise.

“When done right, these types of partnership result in credible content which creates a halo effect for your entire brand.”

Earned media coverage and pull marketing generate trust

Research from leading advisory firm Outsell confirms that senior marketers and CMOs prefer “pull marketing” methods. These methods let people opt in when they are ready to engage with a product or service. A survey of over 1,500 industry professionals showed that B2B and B2C marketers now believe pull tactics, such as earned media and PR, are more effective than print, TV and native advertising.

The same study showed that consumers find “push marketing” tactics like email intrusive. People want to seek out information when they’re interested in products or services. They don’t want to hear about them if they’re not.

The most trusted methods also tend to be the most effective. Users prefer experiences they can opt into – such as hearing expert speakers, reading news articles and viewing testimonials.

All this ties into the idea that modern consumers are actively seeking out information from trusted sources to inform their buying decisions.

The case for investing in earned media

Marketing execs are embracing earned media

As consumer attitudes towards the media change, communicators are seeing their share of the marketing budget increase.

Three quarters of companies plan to increase their PR spend in the coming years, according to the latest research from the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) and the USC Centre for Public Relations.

“Public relations as a discipline is clearly evolving and becoming more important to marketers,” says ANA group executive VP Bill Duggan. “Digital has put PR front and centre, as it allows immediate outbound communication and inbound feedback.”

This reflects the changes in consumer behaviour highlighted above. Customers are seeking information from trusted sources like news articles, experts and influencers, while marketers are keen to create the content their customers want to consume.

That means your comms team is now in a unique position to influence consumer behaviour. But –  as Cision’s latest white paper reveals – technology must play a key role in your campaigns if they are to realise their full potential.

Download Why it’s time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms today to discover how the latest technology is helping brands across the globe make the case for greater investment in PR and comms.

Why it’s time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms

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PR News in Brief

PR news round-up (21 May – 1 June)

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Our latest round-up of essential PR news, featuring five influencer marketing tips from Golin, account wins for Frank and how technology is revolutionising the comms industry.

Why it’s time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms

 

Consumers trust earned media more than any other kind of marketing. It can generate the greatest returns. And yet most companies are still under investing in it.

The reason for this is simple. Company execs want to be confident their investments are generating returns. But for years, comms professionals have struggled to measure the business impact of their campaigns with the same accuracy as their colleagues in paid and owned media.

That is, until now.

Our latest white paper reveals how technology is revolutionising the comms industry. It looks at the scale of this opportunity for your business. And it outlines why it’s time for CMOs to finally embrace PR and comms.

Thought leadership

Will Cooke, executive director, strategy and innovation at Golin, presents his five top tips to hone your influencer marketing strategy.

PR case study

Discover how Brands2Life helped Moonpig’s Valentine’s Day cards to stand out by forming a partnership with NHS Blood and Transplant to send organ donor cards to loved ones.

Account wins

The Apprentice winner Ricky Martin, founder of Hyper Recruitment Solutions, has appointed Manc Frank to handle PR for both himself and his company.

Ricky Martin

Tech PR agency CCgroup has celebrated three new recent account wins. It is the new global PR agency of record for Travelex Currency Solutions, helping the brand to establish itself as a fintech giant. Public service network provider MLL Telecom and Swedish fibre-to-the-home company VXFIBER have also appointed CCgroup as their UK PR agencies.

MediaCityUK communications agency Rule 5 has been selected to deliver social media training for 15 Nando’s employees working at restaurants across Scotland, Ireland and the North of England.

Mural and wallpaper firm Rock Roll has appointed Little Red Rooster to manage its press office, handle hero product launches and oversee influencer outreach in the UK and Ireland.

Health drinks brand For Goodness Shakes has made Impero its lead creative agency to relaunch the brand and deliver its first full scale social campaign, Feel the Good.

Yogi Footwear has hired Claire Etchell as a consultant for its relaunched premium brand. Etchell will handle the brand’s PR strategy, including brand partnerships, press and influencer relations.

Propeller PR has a won brief to promote the ad:tech, Technology for Marketing and eCommerce Expo conferences for online retail association IMRG and exhibition business CloserStill Media.

Aduro Communications will provide PR support for a brand collaboration between Mr Men, Little Miss and vitamin brand Haliborange.

Manchester leisure destination The Printworks has appointed Jam to drive awareness of the venue both across the North West and nationally.

French private equity firm Omnes has appointed Brackendale Consulting to manage its UK comms brief.

Alpha Kilo will implement and manage a global comms and media relations strategy for the association of art and antiques dealers LAPADA, Linteloo and Clippings.com. Freya Simms, LAPADA’S CEO, said: “We are delighted to be working with Alpha Kilo to promote the association and the wonderful pieces our members have to offer, whether online or at our flagship fair in Berkeley Square.”

Photobox has appointed Frank as its agency of record following its work developing the company’s The Crown From The Crowd campaign last month.

French bar and bistro TraTra has appointed Palm PR to deliver a print and digital PR campaign as well as manage its press office, to drive bookings at the venue.

Hencote Vineyard Estate has appointed travel and property specialist P1 Communications to implement a PR and marketing campaign promoting the estate’s accommodation, wine tasting tours and event space.

Enterprise St Helena has selected The Brighter Group to handle its PR and marketing activities.

Skin Aesthetics Clinic London has appointed Kay Flawless PR to manage its publicity, including PR activity.

Specialist financial and investment consultancy Communications and Content will handle media relations briefs for Osmosis Investment Management and Welplan Pensions.

Electronics company Casio has appointed Inkling to create a content-led campaign for its calculator division designed to encourage young people into STEM subjects, with particular focus on A-level maths.

GPS smartwatch startup Pin iT has appointed integrated comms agency One to provide PR and social media services to raise the company’s profile.

Laser processing company Opsydia has appointed The Nisse Consultancy to support the launch of its new laser marking technology aimed at tackling tampering and counterfeiting in the diamond sector.

Opsydia’s laser marking system

 

 

EMERGE will handle UK press and publicity for content monetisation platform rewardStyle and consumer content platform LIKEtoKNOW.it.

The Astrid Lindgren Company has appointed Riot Communications to develop a campaign celebrating the author to mark the 75th anniversary of the publication her Pippi Longstocking books in 2020.

Independent opticians and eyewear boutique Aston & Woods has appointed The PHA Group to manage the comms strategy around its launch.

Financial services membership organisation TISA has appointed Atlas Partners to support its public affairs and media strategy.

Drayton Controls has appointed HROC to manage consumer PR and other marketing services for its Wiser app-controlled smart heating system.

International creative agency Toaster has selected Tuesday Media as its PR partner to raise its profile in global markets including the UK.

Colossus Bets has appointed Influence Digital to manage its B2C social strategy. The agency will use social-first content to educate existing and new customers on “crowd betting”.

People news

Global banking firm MUFG has appointed Susan Tether as its first head of corporate communications for EMEA. She will be responsible for internal communications, CSR, press office activity, public affairs and activating marketing initiatives including thought leadership and sponsorship.

Video advertising specialist Unruly has appointed Mark St Andrew, Cannes Lions’ former head of communications, as global communications director. He will lead Unruly’s PR and brand comms strategies, working with regional teams in Europe, the US and APAC.

Brand activation agency tbk Group has brought in Rachelle Headland to run its London operation. Headland previously worked as managing partner at Oliver and managing director of Saatchi & Saatchi X.

Atlas Partners has hired Nina Doehmel-Macdonald as senior consultant. She joins from Bupa’s UK press office and will manage a range of clients, including GambleAware.

Legal and litigation PR agency Byfield Consultancy has appointed Jeff Segvich as associate director and head of transatlantic relationships. The consultancy has also hired Asad Moghal as digital and content manager.

Carnsight Communications has appointed Steph Palmer as account manager. Palmer initially joined the team as an intern in February.

Agency news

Ketchum has restructured to shift its resources towards 14 industry sectors in a sweeping initiative that comes less than six months into CEO Barri Rafferty’s tenure. The move dispenses with the practice area offering that is common among PR firms and includes a new agency ‘look and feel’.

MLPR owner Marie Louise Pumfrey has launched specialist Instagram marketing consultancy Social Paradise Global with Fiona Austen.

Rachel Green, Jacqui Doughty and Lindsey Hoyle have combined their expertise to form specialist food marketing consultancy The Gourmet Collective. The consultancy will offer a range of PR services to clients, including media relations activity.

PRCA news

The PRCA has launched its Communicating the Gender Pay Gap report and disclosed its own pay gap figures. The report is designed to help organisations voluntarily address their gender pay gaps. The PRCA’s median and mean gender pay gap figures skew 12.14% and 39.71% respectively in favour of men.

Opinion: 5 ways to hone your influencer marketing strategy

Opinion: 5 ways to hone your influencer marketing strategy

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Will Cooke, executive director, strategy and innovation at Golin, presents his five top tips to hone your influencer marketing strategy. 

Work backwards, and start with why

Successful marketing comes from real understanding of business priorities, brand ambition and audience needs. It seems simple, but start with why are we doing this?

Be clear on the business objective or customer pain point you want to influence, it enables you to be more inventive with your campaigns, build more valuable relationships and ultimately demonstrate greater value.

Influencer marketing can drive multiple stages of the customer journey, but there is not one approach that can solve all your problems. Once you have your ‘why’, make sure everyone knows what you need to achieve to be successful, while steering clear of meaningless metrics.

Who do you want to influence?

Consumers engage with people who represent their interests, so brands must find influencers who have the most credible connection to those interests, not just those with the biggest followers.

People know when influencer marketing is not genuine and when it’s transactional, so invest time in defining what relevance means to the brand, business and audience then find the influencers who share your purpose.

Golin sees influencer marketing as an art and science, which involves balancing qualitative analysis (brand fit, aesthetic) with quantitative tools to look beyond follower numbers and identify relevant influencers – improving ROI in the process.

Creativity is your greatest weapon

Audiences may have accepted #ad in the newsfeed but it doesn’t mean they are happy about it. A brief of ‘work with influencers’ will lead to brand blandness and newsfeed blindness. Audience attention is earned (and ROI improved) with genuine collaboration and remarkable creativity.

Find the shared insight, brand truth or emotional connection and explore it in ways that benefit everyone. We should aspire to create culture, rather than simply campaign collateral, so think about which other channels content can work in now, next week and even next year.

Relationships. It’s not so complicated

Influencer marketing may feel like it has exploded out of nowhere, but hasn’t it always been about making friends and influencing people? This power of influence on social platforms has moved away from the tyranny and waste of always-on social, while #authenticity has become a devalued commodity to be bought and sold.

Now we need to embrace ‘always in’ culture. Brands need to think long term and create genuine equity by embedding themselves in culture, developing mutually beneficial relationships and growing advocates by celebrating their community.

Measurement is not a retrospective activity

Instil measurement throughout the campaign by setting defined goals. Start with clear objectives that link back to your original business objective, for example build brand love or drive product purchase.

You must then take a wider view of measurement across the customer journey. Don’t be a slave to reach, set a range of more relevant and richer KPIs that will allow you to understand the outputs, behavioural change outcomes and ultimately business value impact.

Remember, don’t see influencer marketing in isolation, the approach may lead to a website visit, consideration in-store or word of mouth recommendation – all of which can be measured.

Cooke’s tips are derived from Golin’s Influencer Consumer Attitudes Report 2018, which can be found here.

Why it's time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms

Why it’s time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms

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What you’re about to read might sound like bad news.

But for businesses that arm themselves with the right tools, it actually represents a huge opportunity just waiting to be realised.

You see, consumer trust is falling across the board. Global research firm Nielsen reports that consumers now trust print, TV and radio ads less than they did five years ago. At the same time, Edelman’s 2017 Trust Barometer shows that trust in public institutions plummeted last year.

In fact, it’s earned media that people see as the most trusted ingredient in the marketing mix. Recommendations from friends and family top Nielsen’s consumer trust index, with 83% of respondents saying they trust them.

Yet, despite yielding the best results, earned media’s power has failed to translate into increased marketing investment. Even though consumer trust in advertising is plummeting, it’s actually paid media budgets that have seen exponential growth in recent years.

Ask any CMO and they’ll tell you why. They feel confident investing in paid media because it’s easy to measure, easy to manage and easy to see when it’s generating ROI.

Ensuring company execs feel the same way about earned media is the key to unlocking its true potential – and helping communications claim its rightful place in the marketing mix. But historically, communicators have lacked the tools to do this.

This is now changing. New technology is helping huge brands around the world maximise the impact of their campaigns and measure the true contribution earned media makes to their businesses. Thanks to the latest PR and comms tools:

  • The Museum of London substantially boosted its 2017 visitor numbers with a targeted campaign that increased its social media engagement 60% year-on-year.
  • The Stroke Association doubled the number of signatures its #NewEra petition was generating last year, collecting 55,000 names and securing two meetings with a government health minister.
  • And Slimming World increased its brand’s reach 25% in just six weeks with its Dream Weight campaign – generating more than 11,000 web sessions in the process.

As you’ll see in Cision’s latest white paper, Why it’s time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms, that’s just a taste of what’s possible with with the latest media monitoring, outreach and analytics technology.

With these tools at your disposal, your comms team will finally have everything it needs to compete on a level playing field with their marketing and advertising colleagues.

So, download this brand new white paper today to discover the true scale of this opportunity for your business – and see why it’s finally time for CMOs to embrace PR and comms.

Enter your details below now to claim your copy

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