Cision Innovation Lab will provide the science to complement communicators’ art

Cision Innovation Lab will provide the science to complement communicators’ art

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The Cision Innovation Lab is developing technology to fuel the future of PR and comms, Cision’s, David Barker, president of data solutions and innovation, and Kaila Garrison, VP of marketing strategy and operations, revealed in a special session at CommsCon.

Cision’s Innovation Lab, located in both Berlin and New York, will look to incorporate the best comms technology into the company’s offering, whether by integrating it into the Cision Communications Cloud® or through its Cision Insights offering.

The pair discussed the types of technology the lab seeks to develop, how it is building the most advanced earned media technology through development, partnerships and acquisitions, and how its operations align with the principles of Earned Media Management and its four tenets.

Deciding what to develop

The lab will act as Cision’s research centre, serving as a testing ground for integration of acquired technology into the Cision Communications Cloud™, as well as the integration of the Comms Cloud™ with industry-leading marketing and advertising technology.

When deciding which technology to develop, acquire or partner with, Barker is able to identify the areas where comms professionals are lacking suitable tools to do their work.

“We look at the comms professional and we look at the gaps he or she may have in their workflow,” he said. “We think about ways to solve the problems PRs have in the same manner that paid media and other marketing disciplines did a long time ago.”

The Innovation Lab will use the power of technology to build on the principles of Earned Media Management, which sees earned media adopt the standardised processes and use of technology and measurement used in paid and owned sectors.

“We are on a journey to bring Earned Media Management to the fore,” Garrison added. “We’ve carved out a portion of the Cision organisation to focus on research, education and development of technology and tools to recognise those tenets of Earned Media Management.”

How the Innovation Lab innovates

Barker and Garrison used the session to unveil some of the existing technology which has been perfected in the lab and the areas in which the lab will look to innovate.

They highlighted a number of new innovations in the Innovation Lab pipeline, including new advances in tracking earned media audience data and developing an Influencer Graph which reverses the traditional media relations model by mapping audiences to influencers.

One new development which is already being rolled out is the use of image recognition technology. Both Garrison and Barker discussed the reasons behind the acquisition of ShareIQ and its integration into the Comms Cloud™ as Cision ImageIQ.

Cision ImageIQ allows communicators to monitor images in the same way they monitor text, meaning that they no longer need to depend on alt tags or hashtags when tracking how their images have been used across Instagram, for example.

The pair noted that they expect this technology to change the way comms professionals strategically use images as a part of their campaigns, a key component of all technology being developed in the lab.

The four centres of testing

The technology developed in the Innovation Lab will fall under one of the four primary testing centres which make up the department. This is split under Quants, Artificial Intelligence, Graph and Media.

The Graph stream is dedicated to working on the Influencer Graph, as well as technology which allows communicators to visualise and act on the interconnectivity of key influencers, content and target audiences.

Quants covers a range of innovations which will enable comms professionals to access data, metrics and measurement to validate the importance of earned media as a business driver.

Artificial Intelligence (and machine learning) looks to develop technology which brings efficiency, increased scale and deep insights to both day-to-day comms functions and overarching comms strategies.

Finally, the Innovation Lab’s Media wing will research how Cision’s products can integrate with platforms in the broader martech environment to extend and connect earned media to paid and owned channels. This is where many of the partnership aspects of the lab will take place.

Over the coming months, each of these four sectors will look to produce new innovations which add to the Cision Comms Cloud™ and Cision Insights. Garrison summed up how each of the areas will work to produce these innovations:

“We’re working 12-18 months ahead of what comms professionals think they want. David’s job is to come up with things communicators don’t even know what they want yet, but they’re going to need them and going to want them.”

CommsCon What journalists want

Daily Mirror’s Nada Farhoud: The relationship is the most important thing

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Taking the time to build and maintain relationships is the key ingredient to successful PR-journalist relations. That was one of the key takeaways from the What journalists want discussion at Cision’s CommsCon.

In a panel discussion moderated by Richard Griffiths, director, strategic communications at Ketchum, journalists from national and specialist publications agreed that there have never been as many opportunities for PRs to get messages out there thanks to the rise of digital and social publishing, but too many are failing to consider the demands on a modern-day journalist, leading to a disconnect.

The Daily Mirror’s consumer features and environment editor, Nada Farhoud, noted: “A bugbear is irrelevant emails. Today, I looked at my inbox and I’ve got 92,000 unread emails. If I read all the emails, I wouldn’t be able to do my day job.”

Farhoud was joined by Paul Hodkinson, comment editor and assistant director at Financial News, Ellen Stewart, head of content at Pink News, and Glamour‘s celebrity and entertainment editor Josh Newis-Smith. The group discussed what PRs are getting right and wrong, why understanding what they do is crucial, and the key to a successful pitch.

Staying on the right side of journalists

The panel agreed that there is a lot of good work being done by PRs and that they rely on strong relationships cultivated over a number of years to get stories out. However, they all noted that with time often of the essence, fielding irrelevant emails, follow-up calls or dealing with someone who hasn’t got the answers to the simplest questions, is guaranteed to cause annoyance.

“The thing that drives me up the wall is when you get an email and then a call – ‘I just sent you an email’,” said Hodkinson. “That combination, that order – an email then a call – makes no sense to me. I would have thought it is much more useful to call first and say ‘there’s a story you might be interested in’ then send the email, rather than the other way around.”

Newis-Smith agreed, adding: “It’s about making sure your emails are very personable and that you show a bit of respect for what we do.”

Know your audience

It might seem an obvious point, but keeping the reader of a publication in mind goes a long way to helping a pitch. Misconception about a title can sometimes lead to missed opportunities for getting a client’s story out to a wider audience.

Ellen Stewart elaborated on this point: “People think that because we are a specialist publication, we focus on just LGBT+ issues, that we’re not interested in what’s going on in the mainstream. But on the website, the majority of our audience is actually not part of the LGBT+ community.”

Newis-Smith added: “There’s thousands of celebrities out there, but not all of them are for my audience. It’s about making sure that celebrity works for our audience and thinking cleverly about the celebrity so that it’s relevant.”

How to be pitch perfect

As newsrooms across the industry feel the squeeze of budget cuts and fewer journalists, PRs will be going a long way to making life easier for reporters if they put in the hard yards to understand the demands faced and to be open about what they are looking for.

Hodkinson laid out what works for him: “I like people to be really honest and say, ‘Look, we’ve got this client, what would work for you?’ Do your research. Most journalists are interested in building relationships. That’s what gets you results.”

Fahoud concurred: “Meeting, whether it’s coffee, a breakfast, a glass of wine at the end of the day – whatever it is – that’s the most important thing. That gives PRs a better idea of what works for the Daily Mirror.”

  • By Ronan George
  • Panel (l-r): Josh Newis-Smith, Ellen Stewart, Richard Griffiths, Paul Hodkinson and Nada Farhoud 
KFC’s Jenny Packwood: Fill the crisis communications vacuum with positive news

KFC’s Jenny Packwood: Fill the vacuum with positive news

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No one seeks a crisis, but being ready for one is imperative when disaster strikes, a packed audience was informed during the Crisis killers: a reputation management masterclass session at Cision’s CommsCon.

In a panel discussion and presentation led by Tom Ritchie, Cision’s VP GTM EMIA, crisis communications experts considered the dangers of letting the media define a crisis, learned why planning is the be all, and why a clever sorry goes a long way.

Fergus Campbell, head of communications at Gumtree, warned that “reputational damage can be achieved by a thousand paper cuts” when a company has “left a vacuum of communications”, leading, in some cases, to reputational collapse.

He was joined on stage by KFC’s head of brand engagement, Jenny Packwood and Ed O’Brien, managing director of crisis communications at Teneo Blue Rubicon. The group analysed the ‘death by a thousand cuts crisis’, ‘managing the unthinkable crisis’ and faced up to the ‘demons of the crisis’.

Be true to your brand voice

In early 2018, Jenny Packwood was forced to deal with the unthinkable when 750 KFC restaurants failed to open across the UK because of major failings in a new distribution procedure. Jenny and her team took 321 media requests a day – about half its average number of yearly requests in a week – and faced over one thousand pieces of coverage globally across print, online and broadcast as approximately 19,000 team members were affected.

The team decided that only the boldest response would suffice for a crisis that had no quick fix or end in sight. Enter the FCK bucket; KFC’s creative mea culpa to their customers and staff. A print-only campaign – because “print is still the land of the statement” – allowed the company to wrestle back control in an honest and human way.

“So often when a crisis hits it is easy, and the most comfortable thing, to retract to that safe place. We actively decided not to do that. We know about our brand, and we know what our tone is,” she said.

“(The campaign) gave us a way of saying sorry in a way that felt true to our brand. And that gave us huge credibility and goodwill among the media and our customers. It worked for us because it is true to our brand and it is true to our tone of voice.”

The importance of getting on the front foot

In his presentation, Campbell revealed that Gumtree, an 18-year old brand and business, is the largest classified platform in the UK, with one in three adult users. But a failure to support customers through all stages of their transaction on the platform, means the company is seen as great clickbait for the media, as evidenced in the sex for rent controversy.

“Historically we haven’t engaged in issues,” Campbell said. “What are the things that we have control over? What are the things that we don’t? With engagement – writing letters, meeting MPs – we’ve done a lot of things which we feel allows us to cancel out the death by a thousand cuts.”

Get to know your demon

For Ed O’Brien, a company can only tackle a crisis if it has built up muscle memory in “peacetime”, meaning that when trouble strikes the organisation is ready for whatever may come.

Part of this process involves understanding personality traits when pressure rises and adrenaline is high. These demons, as O’Brien describes the internal whispers, drive the worst failing in a crisis – bad decision making.

The three types of demon the audience were advised to avoid include: The tyrant – the demon who believes only they and their team know what to do or can be trusted. “This tends to be the demon that causes people to filter their comms response through one person. What that does is slow you down. For an international firm, it also means that you lose local perspective,” said O’Brien.

The fear-monger demon plays down how bad a crisis is, for fear of getting into trouble. “This drives corporate introspection which allows the outside world to set the agenda.” Meanwhile, the lunatic demon ignores all the planning that you have done, believing that ‘it doesn’t apply to me’. “The reason this is bad is that you are relying on people coming up with a plan and formulating it right at the height of the stress,” he added.

Whilst recognising the demon in others is important, it is also crucial for individuals to face their own demons. O’Brien advises to do you work in peacetime; planning and stress-testing things in advance of a crisis to ensure panic does not take over:

“Be really honest with yourself about what your personal demon is, and what affects you in a crisis. Think about that so you know exactly what that demon is when it comes and you know how to deal with it.”

  • By Ronan George
  • Panel (l-r): Tom Ritchie, Ed O’Brien, Jenny Packwood and Fergus Campbell
Storytellers reveal how to develop great campaigns at CommsCon

Storytellers reveal how to develop great campaigns at CommsCon

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Creative storytelling was the order of the day at CommsCon, as a quartet of fabulous female storytellers shared their thoughts on how to develop engaging narratives in the day’s opening panel discussion.

Chaired by PRWeek editor-in-chief Danny Rogers, the panel featuring Virgin’s head of media relations Tamara Bennett, Adobe’s group manager, EMEA communications, Kelly Bergl, WINGS Creative Leadership Lab founder Gabriela Lungu and HSBC head of campaigns Natasha Plowman explored how the convergence of marketing disciplines is changing the way marketers tell stories.

The panellists started the session by presenting their favourite pieces of storytelling from the past year, before going onto explore the best techniques to create great integrated stories.

Creativity is about solving problems

Lungu, who has a background which encompasses both paid and owned media, nominated the Bihor not Dior activation has her favourite story. The campaign was designed to raise awareness of how big fashion houses often use local cultures as design inspiration, but that these cultures receive nothing in return.

She made the point that the campaign demonstrated how creativity and original thinking can both solve problems and raise awareness of issues in an engaging way.

“Creativity is about solving existing problems in a new way, and we need to be obsessive about originality,” she noted.

However, Lungu also emphasised the importance of aligning data to creativity: “Our job is bringing together the right bits of data and insights, and mixing them together to create beautiful stories. And then improving those stories based on the data coming in.”

Bring emotion to your campaign

Plowman used the #HSBCNavigator campaign to demonstrate that great storytelling isn’t restricted to those working in consumer PR. She described how the campaign’s message is designed to “empower internal audiences to have better conversations with customers.”

She argued that rather than coming up with a great tale, storytellers should base what they create on what they want their target audience to do after seeing the campaign.

“Good storytelling means starting with a clear measurable outcome that you want from the target audience – otherwise you’re just floating things out in the sky,” she said.

With regards to making a story engaging, Plowman added that all good stories bring an emotional element to their audience: “There is no good story without a good plot, a bit of drama. Don’t make your story too vanilla.”

Don’t try to go viral

Bennett highlighted Virgin Holidays’ LGBTQ+ campaign, which imagined what it would be like if  a straight couple received the same type of treatment on holiday as gay couples sometimes do.

She said that when Virgin looked to tell stories, it focused on business outcomes and changing perceptions, rather than creating “PR for PR’s sake”.

Similarly, Bennett noted that storytelling should be focused on exactly that; telling the story, rather than looking to gain maximum exposure by going viral. “It’s always about the story and not the channel,” she said.

She also praised charities for the way they tell stories to earn donations, stating that some of the best and most innovative storytelling comes from the sector.

Authenticity is vital

Finally, Bergl showcased one of Adobe’s most successful B2C campaigns; a digital recreation of the artist Edvard Munch’s 100-year-old brushes, which were made into perfect digital replicas for Adobe Photoshop CC.

She highlighted that one of the reasons why the campaign was so successful was because of its authenticity. “We truly embraced the power of storytelling by unlocking an age-old mystery for the sake of innovation. We tapped into Adobe’s creative heritage and unlocked tools for our creative community, all the while surrounding the story with Adobe’s innovation and magic. This is authentic to who we are as a brand.”

Bergl also added that she thinks herself lucky to be able to partner with PR, marketing and branding agencies who are loyal customers of the Adobe Creative Cloud and that she “gets a kick out of ” working closely with natural brand advocates.

#CommsCon interview highlights

Our key takeaways from CommsCon

Our key takeaways from CommsCon

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We promised that CommsCon would be a day of discussion, insight and debate, and judging by the response we’ve had from our delegates, we are delighted to have lived-up to the billing and are thankful so many of you joined the comms revolution!

We’re glad that every session provided some great insights and tips for how you can hone your comms output. Here are some of our key highlights and takeaways from the day.

Define your values or someone else will

In his keynote address, Sir Craig Oliver highlighted the importance of businesses telling their own stories. “Silence comes at a price. If you don’t define yourself, others will do it for you,” he warned.

Using anecdotes and insights gleaned from his time as former prime minister David Cameron’s director of politics and communications, Oliver said that while the comms function has been demoted in importance in a number businesses, it is actually more valuable than ever.

Earned Media Management will increase investment

CommsCon’s opening address saw Cision’s CEO Kevin Akeroyd and CMO Chris Lynch detail their vision for the future of earned media. Akeroyd discussed startling figures from analyst Burton Taylor which show that earned media receives just 0.5% of media investment by enterprises.

The solution to this underfunding of the sector? Earned Media Management.

Lynch demonstrated the value of businesses adopting Earned Media Management’s four tenets (Influencer Graph, Smart Engagement, True Measurement and Comms Transformation) and how incorporating standardised processes and technology into earned media workflow would illustrate its value to the company, thereby increasing investment.

When KFC ran out of chicken

Delegates listened with fascination as KFC’s head of brand engagement, Jenny Packwood, revealed how the company’s comms team looked to deal with its “chicken crisis”.

She explained: “So often when crisis hits, the easy and most comfortable thing is to retract into that safe corporate space where you do a terribly formal statement and everything sounds like it is written by a lawyer.

“We actively decided not to do that. We know who we are as a brand and what our tone is and we stuck to it, which is light-hearted, honest, authentic and a little bit irreverent.”

The session also saw Gumtree’s head of communications, Fergus Campbell, explain how the company has looked to be more proactive in managing its reputation to avoid “death by 1,000 paper cuts”, while Ed O’Brien, MD crisis management at Teneo Blue Rubicon, warned of the various demons which threaten every crisis comms response.

The launch of the Cision Innovation Lab

At the conclusion of his opening keynote, Kevin Akeroyd made the announcement that Cision was launching its Innovation Lab, based in New York and Berlin.

Following on from this announcement, Cision’s David Barker, president of data solutions and innovation, Kaila Garrision, VP marketing strategy and operations, expanded on the developments in Cision’s Innovation Lab during a session later in the day.

The pair detailed the new technology available now to help communicators, such as Cision ImageIQ’s image monitoring software, while also revealing the areas of earned media in which the company is looking to innovate.

How to tell great stories

Four fabulous female panellists; Virgin’s Tamara Bennett, HSBC’s Natasha Plowman, Adobe’s Kelly Bergl and Wings Creative Leadership Lab’s Gabriela Lungu all shared their tips on how to engage audiences with great stories.

The quartet each presented their favourite of example of storytelling from the last year – ranging from Virgin’s LGBTQ+ campaign to the Bihor not Dior activation.

Plowman made the important point that storytellers need to think more about how they want the audience to react when coming up with stories, rather than what they want to say.

She said: “Often we start with ‘this is what we want to say to our customers’. You have to consider what you want your customers to do with the content you’re giving them, how do you want them to feel or react?”

Journalists tell PRs what they want

In one of the day’s closing sessions, a panel of senior journalists detailed just what it is they want from PRs.

The Daily Mirror’s Nada Farhoud, Glamour’s Josh Newis-Smith, Pink News’s Ellen Stewart and Financial News’s Paul Hodkinson covered everything from how their roles are changing to their tips on how PRs can pitch stories to them.

There were gasps from audience members when Farhoud revealed that she had 92,000 unread emails in her inbox. The panel all agreed that PRs needed to look to build relationships with journalists to make to help make their pitches stand out.

How to create great social content

Peter Heneghan, LADbible’s head of communications, provided his recipe for campaigns which use social publishers and platforms to promote social good.

Using the example of the social publisher’s Trash Isles campaign, Heneghan noted that the younger demographic who consume content created by social publishers really care about issues which affect them and want brands to care too.

He added that when coming up with campaigns, communicators should consider whether it is something that would be interesting enough to talk about with friends at the pub. If not, customers would be unlikely to engage with it, he warned

How PR can break free from its “whiteness”

A diverse panel of industry luminaries discussed one consistent issue which rears its head in PR; how to make the sector more inclusive for people from a variety of backgrounds?

Dr Lee Edwards, associate professor at LSE’s department of media and communications, presented research which demonstrated that “whiteness” goes beyond the colour of people’s skin. Then, Vodafone Group’s Isobel Bradshaw, Hawthorn Advisors’ Kuldeep Mehmi, Hays’ Yvonne Smyth and Burson Rx’s Avril Lee shared their reaction to the findings and their own experiences of diversity in the industry.

Mehmi noted that industry needs: …a cultural change to drive inclusivity, more than just initiatives people sign up to. It’s about changing behaviour.”

Fantastic award winners

CommsCon saw the presentation of the inaugural Cision Comms Revolutionist Awards, presented to those campaigns which achieved measurable outcomes which enabled organisations to take action based on the results.

While every nominated campaign deserved to win, our panel of expert judges had the difficult task in finding the winners for each of the four categories.

So huge congratulations go to Kellogg’s, IKEA, Four Communications with the Home Office, and CNBC for becoming Cision’s first Comms Revolutionist Awards winners.

Great communication includes internal comms

On a day focused on external communication, it is important to remember that internal communications is just as important for all organisations. SocialChorus’s Brian McDowell revealed his three tips to achieve great internal communications: reach every employee, get executives engaged and personalise the experience.

Summing up the themes of the day

To help reflect on CommsCon’s key findings, Brandwatch founder and CEO Giles Palmer joined Kevin Akeroyd and Cision’s president, EMIA, Abe Smith on stage. The trio expounded upon the need to use data-driven tools to help predict and assess the best times and places to put out your messages.

Smith then delivered a rallying cry to all of CommsCon’s attendees, declaring that the earned media revolution was well underway.

And finally, thank you!

An event is only as good as its audience, so it would be wrong not to acknowledge the fantastic part our delegates played in making CommsCon such a special day. We’d like to thank all of our attendees for helping to create the buzz around the event and for packing out the venue.

Sir Craig Oliver

Sir Craig Oliver: “Tell your own story, or it will be told for you”

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Sir Craig Oliver, David Cameron’s former director of politics and communications, gave the keynote speech to an enthralled and packed Hawker House at CommsCon on Tuesday.

He provided a fascinating insight into his time in Number 10, his thoughts on what went right and wrong in the Brexit campaign, and the lessons he’s taken from his time in politics to take to his new role as senior managing director of Teneo Blue Rubicon.

Storytelling was a key theme of the day’s sessions, and Sir Craig was no exception as he urged businesses to “tell your own story, or it will be told for you”. Oliver spoke of his experiences in being instrumental in  moving Number 10 into the digital sphere, and the importance of fully embracing the digital media world to take control of your own destiny.

He told the PR and comms professionals in the room of his surprise at just how many businesses weren’t prepared to fully embrace digital media – that they would happily market digitally, but not communicate digitally. In the case of crises, then, these businesses were relying on others to tell their story for them.

Later in the day, we saw examples of businesses who successfully managed crises by owning their own narrative, just as Oliver urged – most notably from KFC’s ‘no chicken crisis’ and the company’s much-lauded ‘FCK bucket’ response. Similarly, Virgin Management talked about how they have stopped relying on press releases, and instead would point journalists towards their own content.

Oliver posed four fundamental questions that all businesses must ask themselves, which centre around creating a strong and authentic story:

  1. What is our story?
  2. What are our values – and do we share them frequently with our customers or clients?
  3. Are we telling our own story well?
  4. Or are we just trying to defend ourselves to glory?

In a turbulent and incoherent world, Oliver said, it is increasingly important for businesses to “realise that there is a price to silence”. With the world changing at an alarming rate, many who are uncomfortable and concerned about this put the blame at the door of business. Therefore, businesses must change strategy – rather than sit contentedly on the sidelines, businesses must be willing to take risks to create an authentic and true story about their values, their culture and what they stand for.

PR and comms has often been in a defensive, “crouching position”, said Oliver, but as the world moves towards populism and digitalisation, PR needs to promote itself and be willing to stand up and fight for its position. “Be a champion for comms in your business, because it’s never been more vital”.

Cision launches unmissable comms event - CommsCon

One day to go until CommsCon

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The time has come. A night of fireworks will be followed by a day of revolution at CommsCon tomorrow.

Hundreds of comms revolutionists will march on Hawker House to hear how the earned media landscape is changing, the opportunities this evolving landscape presents and ideas they can implement in their 2019 comms strategies.

As well as hearing from Sir Craig Oliver, David Cameron’s former director of politics and communications, delegates will discover what journalists want from comms professionals, how the integration of marketing disciplines affects the way they tell stories and a whole lot more.

For all those confirmed to attend, your name badge is ready for you to collect from our registration marquee from 9am. Once you arrive at the venue, just take your place in the queue on the left hand side.

The easiest way to reach Hawker House is to travel to Canada Water station (Jubilee, Overground) and take the business park exit. If you lose your bearings, don’t worry, we’ll have helpful signs and team members along the route to show you the way. You can also travel to Surrey Quays, while there are a number of buses which serve the area.

And remember, the first 50 registered delegates to collect their name badges from our registration team will receive a free goody bag!

We’re looking forward to seeing all of our comms revolutionists tomorrow for a day of discussion, insight and debate!

You can find the full day’s agenda for CommsCon here. 

PR News in Brief

PR news round-up (22 October – 2 November)

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Here’s a bumper round-up of the last two weeks’ PR news, featuring the countdown to CommsCon, W’s acquisition of LOTUS and account wins for The Academy and Headland.

CommsCon

We’re looking forward to seeing our fellow comms revolutionists who have confirmed their place at CommsCon next Tuesday. Find out how to get a goody bag and all the details you need to get to the venue.

See who is speaking

View the full day’s agenda

Opinion

Steph Bailey, FleishmanHillard Fishburn MD, corporate, details what the agency uncovered in its recent Dying days of spin report into issues consumers expect companies to take a stand on.

Alex Clough, creative strategy director at Splendid Communications, discusses the findings of the agency’s Brands’ permission to speak report into social purpose campaigns.

Interviews

60 Seconds with Platform Communications' Gay Bell

Gay Bell, founder and CEO of Platform Communications, talks about why she founded the agency, changes in the tech sector and how she commits to ensure staff are happy and motivated.

Victoria Ruffy, founder of Little Red Rooster, reveals why she set up the agency, how she attracts prestigious clients and how she replaced her Triumph Spitfire Mark IV.

Account wins

 

(L-R): Julie Adenuga, Mo Gilligan, Melanie C

Homeless charity Shelter has chosen The Academy to create and deliver its Christmas fundraising campaign.

Airbnb has appointed Headland to handle its corporate communications and public affairs briefs.

Barratt London has appointed Building Relations PR to manage consumer PR for its landmark developments across the capital, including Landmark Place in the City, Upton Gardens at West Ham’s former Boleyn Ground and Hendon Waterside.

OMRON Healthcare Europe, a provider of medical equipment for health monitoring and therapy, has appointed Hotwire to handle a brief to increase brand awareness in key audiences across the UK, Germany, France, Spain and Italy.

Baby health technology brand Owlet has appointed Milk & Honey PR to help launch the brand in the UK.

The International Wine Challenge has appointed Phipps to help the competition drive entries and promote the value of an IWC medal to wine makers.

Consulting, technology services and digital transformation firm Capgemini has appointed WE Communications to handle its PR internationally, following the agency’s work on its UK account.

Stand Agency has secured two new account wins. It will deliver integrated campaign activity for SSAFA, the armed forces charity, while it will also develop a comms strategy for Waltham Forest Council.

AI and cognitive tech firm IPsoft has appointed Brands2Life to a media relations and brand reputation brief.

US beer brand Scofflaw has hired Media House International as its UK PR agency.

Enterprise blockchain platform Gospel Technology has appointed Red Lorry Yellow Lorry as its retained comms agency in the UK.

The Lebanese Bakery has appointed Plus 1 Communications to help drive awareness for its recently launched Covent Garden restaurant.

Navigate Travel has selected Rooster PR as its first UK PR agency to raise awareness and boost bookings for its MedSailors, Yacht Getaways and Wild Kiwi brands.

Swedish oat drink Oatly has appointed Alfred to support the launch of its new product range and the brand’s “It’s like milk but made for humans” campaign.

“Lean luxury” hotel brand Ruby Hotels has appointed Grifco PR to handle its UK PR, ahead of the launch of its first UK hotel next summer.

Sleep brand Sid has appointed NakedPRGirl Claire Etchell to oversee its PR strategy and handle influencer relations.

Non-alcoholic gin brand CEDER’S has appointed instinct to handle its UK launch through both traditional PR and influencer marketing campaigns.

Private equity firm Horizon Capital has appointed Brackendale Consulting to handle a media relations brief.

Domaine Clarence Dillon, the luxury French wine brand, has selected Clementine Communications to help build its brand profile.

Legal firm Gillespie Macandrew has appointed Pagoda as its retained PR agency.

Vigilant Software, an information security and compliance business, has appointed Context Public Relations to deliver a comprehensive PR campaign to raise awareness of its products and services.

Awards news

Cision named best social listening tool at Social Media Marketing Awards

Cision’s Lorna Mattis and Tom Ritchie

Cision is thrilled to announce that the Cision Communications Cloud® has won the Social listening tool of the year prize at Social Day’s 2018 Social Media Marketing Awards.

People news

Kayleigh Watson

Video game publisher 2K has appointed Kayleigh Watson as senior PR manager. She will work across all of 2K’s titles, with a particular focus on its core games.

Good Broadcast, Good Relations‘ specialist broadcast consultancy, has hired Josh Wheeler as northern consultant to develop business outside London.

Sarah Stimson has left her position as Taylor Bennett Foundation CEO to launch Ladder Talent, a consultancy which aims to help businesses in the creative industries develop talent and improve diversity.

Cicero Group has hired Aideen Ginnell as its Ireland director to lead the group’s Dublin office.

Aideen Ginnell

Jam_ has hired Claire Robinson as account director and Dan Muir as senior creative as part of its move towards creating a fully integrated business.

Wild Card PR has made additions to its senior team. It has appointed Aaron Huckett and Jasmin Hannington as head of digital and head of news respectively, while it has promoted Sophie Langridge to brand divisional director and Victoria Prior to food and drink divisional director.

Tech PR agency Whiteoaks International has made a number of promotions to its senior team. It has promoted associate directors Tom Webb and John Broy to client services directors, with the pair joining the agency’s board. It has also elevated Simon Moss to the role of associate director and head of business development.

Havas PR has appointed three new account executives. Alex Minion and Kitty Barraclough join the agency’s Manchester team, while Lynne Webster will work in its Edinburgh office.

Cicero Group executive chairman Iain Anderson has been awarded the title of of Freeman of the City of London.

Agency news

W has acquired a majority stake in specialist travel consultancy LOTUS. The deal enables W to broaden and deepen its travel expertise, while LOTUS will access enhanced creativity and lifestyle connectivity.

Porta Communications has integrated its Redleaf Communications subsidiary into global strategic comms agency Newgate Communications.

PA Consulting has acquired Boston-based firm Essential Design to grow its US presence and extend its front-end design capabilities.

Innovation and investment specialist FieldHouse Associates has launched a new office in Cambridge, led by former BBC journalist Debbie Mayhew.

Jago has opened a new office in Dublin to strengthen its offering for clients in the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland and the EU.

PRCA news

The PRCA is set to create a number of books providing practical advise to comms professionals. The PRCA Practice Guides will cover topics ranging from agency management, crisis communications and digital PR.

Following the Association of Professional Political Consultants (APPC) merger into the PRCA, the body has created the Public Affairs Board, formed of members of the APPC and the PRCA Public Affairs and Lobbying Group.

Opinion: Alex Clough Brand purpose is everywhere

Opinion: Brand purpose is everywhere

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Alex Clough, creative strategy director at Splendid Communications, discusses the findings of the agency’s Brands’ permission to speak report into social purpose campaigns. 

Shaving brands are turning their backs on the stereotypical ‘real man’ to redefine what it means to be masculine. Mental health awareness is being championed by everyone from car manufacturers to broadcasters.

Fashion brands are putting increasingly diverse models on their runways and their photoshoots. Pride in London was backed by almost 50 official partners and a list of over 60 supporters, from Heathrow to Costa and our client, The AA.

But, as more brands jump on the cultural marketing and social purpose bandwagon, the impact on culture isn’t necessarily being measured. In fact, a study by Dentsu Aegis suggests 60% of brands that launch brand purpose initiatives are failing to measure the impact of their campaigns on society.

With no way to gauge the success of these social purpose campaigns, Splendid Communications wanted to find out if the public even really wants brands to share a point of view on culture and society. When, where and about what do they have the right to communication?

What do consumers think about brand purpose?

In partnership with Opinium and Pulsar, Splendid examined the role culture plays in modern marketing, the growing expectation that brands should have something to say about the world beyond their own products or services, and which topics these brands have permission to discuss.

Some 1,008 active social media users were polled, aged 18-55+, and, while there was a disparity between the opinions of older and younger audiences, the public at large either doesn’t think that (30%), or hasn’t yet decided if (34%), brands should project a voice about cultural issues.

That leaves just 36% who think brands should have a point of view on cultural issues. Clearly the jury is still out amongst the population at large. So, how did the 30th anniversary advertising campaign for Nike featuring Colin Kaepernick achieve such cultural and commercial success, given it was a blatant picking of sides in the debate around patriotism, racism and police brutality?

It was a huge risk, but a calculated one. Nike knows how polarised our world is, and they were happy to lose half their audience if the remaining half were to care, spend and talk more about the brand.

Our research suggests that younger audiences expect brands to adopt a cultural or societal stance, with 51% of respondents aged 18-34 believing that brands should have a point of view on cultural issues beyond their industry or product, and 56% of all respondents (18-55+) agreeing that brands have a responsibility to discuss social issues that are relevant to their consumers.

Finding the right issues

This means brands are tasked with answering a difficult question: if I have permission to speak, what social issues are relevant to my respective audience?

The public already seems to have agreed on some accepted cultural topics. Three in ten regular social media users would like brands to speak out on mental health issues and in north-east England, Northern Ireland and the West Midlands, people want brands to speak out on racism, too. But perhaps this is because they are already the topics on which they are used to hearing brands communicate.

Either way, brands need to tread very lightly. Asked what would make them unfollow a brand on social media, more than half (51%) said that they would unfollow if the ethics of the brand were not aligned with their own, or if the brand shared something they disagreed with.

While the industry is rushing to have ‘purpose’, many campaigns are struggling to prove any meaningful impact on society, making a lot of communications feel cynical. While some brands (like Nike) are getting it right, some are still struggling.

Brands need to find their voice and uncover when, where and about what they have permission to speak in relation to culture and society.

Cision launches unmissable comms event - CommsCon

First 50 CommsCon attendees to receive fabulous goody bags

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The comms revolution is nearly upon us! With one week to go until CommsCon, we’re offering delegates the chance to get the day of discussion, insight and debate off to a flying start.

As always with a revolution, it takes a small group of people to ignite the spark. So, to reward our most enthusiastic revolutionists, we’re giving away fabulous CommsCon goody bags to the first 50 registered attendees to collect their badges on the day.

All delegates need to do to obtain their goody bag is simply collect their name badge from our registration team, who will be located at desks under the marquee. The queue for the marquee will be located inside the barriers on the left hand side when entering the venue.

Once inside, delegates will join some of the biggest names in the business to discuss the evolving earned media landscape and pick up tips and advice to help inform their 2019 comms strategy.

Attendees will hear Downing Street veteran Sir Craig Oliver detail his experience of the compressed news cycle and social media echo chambers, a panel of senior journalists will detail what they want from PRs, and PRWeek’s Danny Rogers will chair a session where leading PR, marketing and advertising professionals discuss how the convergence of disciplines affects storytelling.

There will also be a chance to view the latest advanced earned media tech, learn how to stay in control of a crisis situation and discover how to tailor your social strategy to give your content the best chance to go viral.

So, remember remember the 6th November and ensure you arrive at Hawker House early to claim your goody bag if you’ve registered or confirmed your place at CommsCon.

 

You can see the full day’s agenda here.