The Star’s digital content editor joins HR Media

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Simon Waller, former digital content editor at Sheffield newspaper The Star, has joined HR Media to enhance the South Yorkshire PR agency’s digital offer.

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Simon Waller

Waller is experienced in video, media and design, starting his working life at a Sheffield-based design agency before joining The Star in 2001.

In his new role at HR Media, Waller will manage all aspects of its design and video production.

Richard Fidler, account director at HR Media, said: “Simon joins HRM at the perfect time and his appointment is a real demonstration of our commitment to offer a full range of services to our clients.

“Video and design has never been more important in getting a message across, so to have someone of Simon’s talent and knowledge as part of our team is fantastic news for everyone associated with HR Media.”

Waller added: “I’m really excited to be joining the HR Media team. I have been given a fantastic opportunity to strengthen the company’s digital services, growing this side of the business as it becomes an increasingly vital part of our PR services.

“I’m looking forward to getting started on some exciting projects, both for the business and its clients.”

Gorkana meets… PC Advisor

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Jim Martin, the editor of tech magazine PC Advisor talks about the the title’s unique relationship with digital and ecommerce, and gives an insight into its most popular content and the ways in which it is consumed. 

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Jim Martin

Who reads PC Advisor, and what do they get from the title that they cannot find elsewhere?
The ‘average’ PC Advisor reader ranges from the geek for whom the tech they use makes a lifestyle statement, to the everyday person who needs to know the best laptop or smartphone for them. We provide independent and in-depth tech-buying advice they can trust, when they need it most, in language they understand.

Tech titles can be notoriously short-lived yet PC Advisor is more than 20-years-old. What is the key to its longevity?
We’re obsessed with understanding our audience, their needs, and the medium via which they access information. We transitioned to online more than a decade ago, and we scan the horizon for changing consumer trends. Just because something worked yesterday, doesn’t mean it is the right thing to do tomorrow.

PC Advisor is still in print as a monthly. What do readers get from the print title that they cannot get from an online only title?
The print- and digital magazines are curated books of the best evergreen long-read we produced that month. It’s a linear, leisure reading experience for hobbyists, rather than information found at the point of need.

How much crossover is there between the on and offline content you publish? What is the publishing strategy?
We produce content for online, and select a tiny fraction for multiple magazine titles including PCA, Android Advisor, and iPhone & iPad User. We love magazines, and will make them as long as it is viable, but pcadvisor.co.uk has a global audience of 30m users (10m in the UK), and our magazines have a readership of 30,000. We are a digital publisher at our core, with a sideline in other platforms.

What is PC Advisor’s most popular content, and why?
The information you look up on your phone when you are in a store, considering a purchase: reviews, group tests and buying guides.

E-commerce is a major revenue stream for the brand – when do readers become buyers, and how do you facilitate this?
We consider our audience to be buyers at various points in the buying cycle. So if a user lands on a PC Advisor tutorial, they are both a post-purchase consumer and in the early stages of consideration.

We provide a point-of-sale at every stage of the buying process; from tips and tutorials, and new product information, through reviews and group tests and on to deals pages.

What can PRs do to help? What content, in terms of topic or format, would you like to see more of?
Products, product information and access to product launches. We need products to review, and information about upcoming products. We will never break an NDA!

What do you recommend people should buy the PC Advisor reader in their family for Christmas?
The Amazon Echo Dot. It’s ridiculously good value at £49.99 and still does a lot even if they’re not an Amazon Prime subscriber.

  • Jim Martin is editor of PC Advisor, call him on 020 7756 2875, or email [email protected]

Two wins for Mercieca

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Mercieca has won two new PR briefs from food-to-go business Adelie Foods and the Licensed Trade Charity (LTC), which provides debt advice, free support and care for the licensed trade industry.

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URBAN

Adelie Foods has briefed Mercieca to handle PR activity for the company and its URBAN eat brand, following a competitive pitch.

John Want, marketing director at Adelie Foods, said: “Mercieca’s experience and knowledge of food, coupled with their uncomplicated strategic approach and creative ideas really impressed us. We need an agency that can help us integrate and step-change our PR to both external and internal audiences and Mercieca fits the bill perfectly.”

Mercieca PR director Gemma Oakes added: “We’re delighted to be working with Adelie Foods and the URBAN eat brand across its wide-reaching PR remit. Our passion for food and our ability to tailor PR campaigns for different trade, foodservice, corporate, consumer and internal audiences makes for a brilliant partnership with Adelie Foods. We’re very excited about getting started and helping to get their messages out far and wide.”

The LTC has briefed Mercieca to handle a new integrated campaign designed to improve awareness of its charity services.

Liz Gaffer, director of marketing and charity services at the LTC, said: “Mercieca impressed us at every stage of the pitch process, particularly with their relevant experience within the charity sector.

“Awareness and engagement are two key challenges for the Licensed Trade Charity, and it was therefore important for us to work with an agency that thinks strategically as well as delivering disruptive creative.”

Oakes added: “Delivering award-winning integrated work for two leading charities, Hospitality Action and Grocery Aid, put us at an advantage going into the pitch. Combined with our understanding of the licensed trade sector, we were equipped to deliver a winning strategy and approach for LTC. It’s a really important time for the charity and we’re excited to help make it top of mind for the many thousands of people who work in the industry.”

PR Agency One pledges to subsidise EU membership for employees

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James Crawford, the managing director of Manchester-based PR Agency One, pledges to offer employees up to £1,000 per annum if they wish to opt into the ‘associate EU citizenship’ currently being considered by the European Parliament.

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James Crawford

Crawford said: “I support this idea and want my current and future employees to know that they will be able to take up this opportunity if the plan goes ahead, even if there are costs associated.”

The policy is currently being considered by the European Parliament, and has been fast-tracked to the negotiating table by Guy Verhofstadt, the EU parliament’s chief negotiator. UK nationals could have the option to pay a fee in order to keep rights such as freedom of movement in the EU.

Crawford added: “As a small business, with clients in seven European countries, it would also make it easier for our company to do business in the future, knowing my team is able to move freely between countries.

“For many of my team, EU membership is also a great employee benefit because a European passport makes travelling and holiday-making around Europe so much easier. There could be other rights linked to this proposal if it is taken further, such as healthcare.”

Gong Communications hires senior account managers

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Gong Communications has hired two corporate communications specialists, Libby Wyman and James Deacon, as senior account managers.

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James Deacon

Wyman joins form Forster Communications, she will deliver global corporate and sustainability communications for international clients, and will develop Gong’s social purpose work.

She said: “I’m delighted to be part of such a strong and motivated team at Gong; an agency that clearly punches above its weight to deliver award-winning communications for clients as diverse as challenger brands and multinationals.”

Deacon joins from FleishmanHillard Fishburn, and, in his new role, will focus on the Lloyd’s of London account. He’ll also work with Gong associate director, Nikki Francis-Jones, on UK-focused marketing for the agency.

He added: “I’m thrilled to be joining such an inspiring team here at Gong. Delivering a strategy session with a solar energy social enterprise in Madagascar in my third week here is certainly confirmation that I’m in the right place.”

Gong MD, Narda Shirley, added: “Libby and James bring a great range of experience combined with boundless enthusiasm and passion. During 2016 we did a lot of thinking about who we are as an agency and that has helped us attract two standout people who are drawn to the idea of working on clients with a strong purpose.”

W promotes Sophie Raine to deputy MD

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Sophie Raine has been promoted to deputy managing director, a new role at W Communications.

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Sophie Raine

Raine, who joined W in early 2014, previously served as a director at the agency, and has over ten years of consumer and brand experience. As deputy MD, Raine will work alongside CEO Warren Johnson and managing director Richard Tompkins to meet W’s growth targets moving forward.

Raine leads on the Lidl and Unilever accounts at W, and manages its influencer division and live events arm, which ran the comms for V Festival this year. In her new role, she will share responsibility for W’s entire UK P&L, lead on talent development and oversee client work and output.

Raine said: “It has been another stellar year for W with continued impressive growth, exciting acquisitions and expansions both in the UK and abroad. It’s an honour to step into the role of deputy managing director at such a dynamic and fast-moving business, and I look forward to being a part of the next phase of W’s success into 2017 and beyond.”

In September 2016, W announced that it was opening an office in Amsterdam.

The key to pitching more visual stories

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Visual communication is leading the way in the media and journalists are urging PRs to send strong still images, video or infographics. Gorkana asks four agencies what’s key to pitching a successful visual story.

Visual stories are now more likely than ever to engage audiences. Video, rich imagery and VR are topping the list as the core materials that make an impression when PRs make a pitch.

Few Gorkana media briefings go by without editors of the biggest publications stating that good quality images and video make for a better story. Whether its national like The Telegraph or a new business title like Quartz, publishers want more image-based, video-led, or chart-based articles whether are either created in-house or out.

Four agencies discuss how to gain pitch success with publishers across the board:

Work backwords

Rachael Sanders, image specialist and digital account executive at Dynamo: “I would work backwards from this – if your client or brand wants to incorporate photo stories more often, then PRs need to be working with the client from the beginning on how they can tell their stories in a visually engaging way.

“Understanding how imagery will add value to your campaign is important, so establishing this purpose from the offset will help come up with a successful idea. It can be easy to forget this method of storytelling, but if a picture can tell a 1,000 words, then it’s worth implementing an image PR strategy with clients.”

Tim Sinclair, chairman at Wolfstar adds: “Push back to your clients. Explain to them the benefits of good imagery and video. A journalist may take your story and run with it solely based on the fact that they think your video will draw in clicks even if the press release is not necessarily one for them.”

Make it newsworthy

Sinclair explains that a video or image with an obvious sales message wouldn’t make it far with the press. Visual stories must be engaging, memorable and relevant to the audience.

“Your story is also still reliant on its newsworthiness, the headline and the opening. It is very rare that we would issue a press release without good quality imagery accompanying it. Imagery helps paint the picture and having a video in particular to accompany your news story strengthens its chances of being covered as it can be easily shared online and on social media,” he adds.

Kieran Kent, MD at Propeller adds: “Make sure it’s not boring. Just because it’s a video does not mean it is automatically more engaging so you need to ensure there is an interesting story which accompanies the visual.”

Pay attention to detail

Lucie Kaye, head of consumer at Eulogy says: “As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words. So for a picture to land in the media it has to do just that. When your image hits a picture editor’s inbox, it needs to make sense immediately. A pithy caption which shows how your client is essential to the story means you’ll land the coverage, including the all-important client credit.”

Sanders adds: “It’s also important to know how picture desks like to be pitched. Captions are key, each image needs to say who, what, when, where and why, just like news story would in the opening line. They also need to be high-res but compressed for emailing. There are challenges with pitching visual stories, as most photo-desks receive at least 20,000 images per day, so there’s a lot of competition.”

M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment names new entertainment lead

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M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment has promoted Jodie Fullagar to head of entertainment, 10 years after she first joined the agency’s entertainment division as its first full-time member.

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Jodie Fullagar

Since joining M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment in 2006, Fullagar has helped to grow the agency’s entertainment offer to a 20-strong team, and has been responsible for the development of a portfolio of Pernod Ricard brands, including Ballantine’s, Jameson, Martell, G.H. Mumm and Havana Club.

Other clients in the entertainment division include NatWest, Samsung and SAB Miller.

Before joining M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment, Fullagar started her PR career at Exposure, where she led strategy and activations for brands involved in film sponsorship properties.

In her new role, Fullagar will join the agency’s five-strong board and support CEO Steve Martin and MD Jamie Wynne Morgan in developing long term future facing strategies for the agency.

Martin said: “I am delighted Jodie has taken on the role to drive our entertainment business forward. She is very strong across all marketing disciplines but has such in depth knowledge of the film and music industries which allows her to advise our clients how to navigate within those circles with real impact.

“Her loyalty and passion for the company is unsurpassed and we are excited about the future growth of our Entertainment offering.”

Fullagar added: “I’m delighted to join the board of what I believe is the most dynamic, creative and forward thinking sponsorship agency out there.

“I’m especially proud of the 50:50 split of male / female representation on the board and the shared passion and expertise that unites us. As the agency’s first entertainment employee, it’s incredibly rewarding and exciting to be given the privilege of leading our entertainment division which is full of brilliant people doing brilliant work. I look forward to working with the team to help our clients thrive.”

60 Seconds with Peter Sutton, PMW

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Peter Sutton, MD at PMW, talks to Gorkana about his decision to launch an agency, the current comms climate, his passion for mountain-climbing and his work with the Dame Vera Lynne Children’s Charity.

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Peter Sutton

Describe the current state of the comms industry.
Nowadays it is all about finding ways to communicate with the person you want to speak to, be it clients, consumers or other businesses, without wastage. By that I mean that businesses need to use all of this wonderful new technology we are constantly presented with to target their core customers in a clever way.

You’ve been running the show at PMW for more than 23 years now. What’s your favourite part of your job?
I find the science behind marketing interesting, but ultimately it’s the creativity that gets me out of bed in the morning. PMW’s core belief is that a totally bespoke marketing campaign that is appropriate to that client is what makes campaigns work.

Before that, you worked in radio. What made you jump ship to PR?
I dealt with a lot of advertising agencies over the years. As I had accumulated a lot of fantastic contacts in my career, I wanted to create an agency that, frankly, I felt could offer a better all-round service. I didn’t want the restraint of working in one media field and wanted to be involved in it all – so I started PMW 23 years ago, and I am still loving it.

What was your very first job?
My first ever job was working in a very old-fashioned hardware store when I was 18 years old. I still remember the smell of paraffin and coal.

PMW is based in the rural setting of Billingshurt in West Sussex. What are the advantages of being based outside of a more traditional, urban location?
Cost is an advantage of course. We don’t pay city rates and therefore don’t need to pass these costs onto our clients. Our converted barn in the middle of the Sussex countryside is a beautiful place to work and offers us a creative place to think. Our clients love visiting, especially when they are shown the office and see how the team works.

Which brand do you most admire?
I admire a lot of brands, of course. But the one that I think is consistently on-brand and has its true message running throughout is Virgin. It knows who it is and the brand’s creative ‘thread’ or DNA is obviously across the board.

What do you wish you had more time for?
I have a real passion for walking up mountains, and it would be great to have more time to conquer some of the big ones. I recently completed a 100 kilometre Thames Path walk and the Three Peaks in Wales, which includes Ben Nevis, Scafell Pike and Snowdon, all for charity. The next mountain on my list has to be Mount Kilimanjaro – I’m working towards this steadily!

You’ve also been chairman of the Dame Vera Lynn Children’s Charity since 2009. How did that come about?
I was chairman for five years having met Dame Vera through a millennium project we did with Guildford Borough Council, creating the world’s largest time vault. Dame Vera was voted as the spirit of the 20th Century as part of the celebrations and helped to seal the vault, which will be reopened in the year 3,000.

We still work with the charity in an advisory and voluntary role, and we are currently working on a very exciting project as Dame Vera will celebrate her 100th birthday next year. I can’t say much more for now, but it will be a significant event to mark her centenary – watch this space!

Reflections on moving to the infamous ‘dark side’

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By  Mike Berry, Head of Content, Fleet Street Communications

For many, moving from journalism to public relations is akin to – as the well-worn phrase goes – joining the Dark Side. However, that’s never been my view. Over my 18 years or so in business-to-business journalism it’s clear to me that the two professions share many of the same skills and attributes – and that the disciplines are rapidly converging.

In theory, today’s journalists should make excellent PR professionals – they write well, have the skills to work across multiple platforms, should have a decent black book of contacts and (generally) are dedicated and passionate people.

But for some the switch is a struggle. Perhaps it’s because PR can be far more diverse and multi-faceted than journalism. From my initial observations, communications pros are spinning multiple plates: writing press releases, feature comments and by-lined articles, planning events, managing projects, handling journalists’ enquiries, drafting client campaigns, pulling together reports – often across several accounts. The list goes on.

That’s just the day-to-day, operational stuff. Then you have the ongoing challenge of managing clients’ reputation, creating demand for their product or service, and striving to help them achieve their business goals.

I’m not saying journalists aren’t busy (believe me, they are), but mostly their job is about getting the best story they can for publication.

Where journalists can make an impact is by offering a different take on content. Digging out the story, making sense of those survey results, spotting coverage potential in company initiatives. Just knowing what journos want from PRs, and how to get that across is a good start.

Before I made the leap, my role was predominantly focused on content generation, be that in print, digital or for face-to-face events. Often that meant liaising closely with advertisers and clients on ‘branded’ content initiatives and projects which were part of a new, more collaborative, approach designed to produce something engaging that serves both the readers’ and clients’ needs.

It’s those skills and experience I hope to bring to bear in my new role as Head of Content at FSC. The best agencies in my view are those that have teams comprising a mix of both long-standing, established comms professionals and experienced journalists. That’s what attracted me to FSC, along with its expertise and knowledge in the sectors that I’m fascinated by (and have been most recently immersed in as a journalist).

Maybe there will be bumps further down the road for me, but for now – a couple of months in – my transition from hack to flack has been a stimulating experience.

Follow me on Twitter @mrmikeberry @FleetStreetComm