Working with the c-suite successfully

Working with the c-suite successfully

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This is a guest post from Martha Lane, PR trainee at Life Size Media.

Communicating with members of the C-suite is something most PR professionals will navigate at some point in their career. However, if contact with the C-suite is not something you have experience with, the prospect can seem daunting.

The following tips address common concerns surrounding communication with the Cs, whether within your own organisation or that of a client. Employing them will ensure the process is productive and enjoyable for both parties.

Having the confidence
The key to dealing with Cs is having the confidence, and this comes from knowing the value of your work. The work you are doing is vital to their company, so rather than viewing your meetings as a drain on their time, understand that they benefit both you and the company. No matter how junior you are, if you’re well-prepared you can form a productive relationship.

Ensuring successful meetings
Meetings with a C will usually be strategy-based. Make the most of their unique and experienced perspective.

Be switched on and ready to take notes at a super-fast pace. Ask if you can record the meeting if you think you may miss points or want to relisten to complex topics. Don’t be afraid to ask challenging questions to get the most valuable insight.

Your role will often involve interpreting the vision they put forward in these calls and translating it into action, for example, the creation of a content plan or PR calendar.

Since a common obstacle when contacting someone in an executive position is their lack of available time, it is important to be efficient with the time you do have together. Always go into a meeting prepared – do your research, be certain of what you are aiming to gain from the meeting beforehand and set out your agenda when you first invite them and at the beginning of the call.

Taking the time to do your research allows you to carry out your agenda in minimum time. This shows a respect for their time, which contributes to a productive working relationship for the long term.

Initiating communication
The form of communication you use is important. Though the preferred form of communication will vary between individuals and depend on what exactly you need, a call is always preferable for strategic questions, complex matters or when resolving issues. This may seem counter-intuitive as pinning down a C-level executive for a call can seem difficult given their busy schedule, but ultimately one in-depth call is much more efficient than days of back-and-forth emails.

Another advantage to calling over written communication is that you can gain a lot more information through a call – you can gauge the person you are speaking to better and identify misunderstandings before they develop.

What to do if your C is simply too busy to respond
One of the most common problems you may encounter is an unresponsive C. You may be able to anticipate times when the C-suite team is likely to be unavailable based on the state of business, so you can prepare for some disruption.

Stay ahead of the issue by constantly observing the company’s growth. The time may come when the C moves on in their role and, gaining other responsibilities, becomes less involved in day-to-day communication with you. If this happens, it is important to still keep your relationship alive. This is manageable – even if it means less regular calls and more to-the-point conversations, the quality of your communication can be maintained.

To maintain quality over quantity, plan ahead. Ask your C about their schedule well in advance, letting them know that you need to know this to ensure consistency in your comms work.

During periods when your C is not so readily available, there may be an alternative person in the company that can offer assistance when it comes to sharing information or providing approval. Minimising your C’s involvement like this allows you to utilise their limited time for points of business where their input is absolutely essential.

Finally, remember the key to communicating with the C-suite: being confident. It is at times like these, when your C is stretched thin, that it may be necessary to assert the importance of your role. Remind them that great communications are key to the success of their company and that their expertise and input is essential. Follow the advice laid out here and enjoy a productive relationship during even the most hectic times.

For managing relationships with your C-suite and stakeholders both internal and external to your organisation, check out Vuelio’s Stakeholder Management and Engagement solutions – book a demo here.

For more from Life Size Media, read this previous guest post from Martha Lane on Ensuring effective and successful communications across different cultures. 

Earth Day 2022 COP26 comms

Earth Day 2022 – did COP26 comms make a change?

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This year’s Earth Day has a lot to live up to. Coming after the highly-anticipated and high-pressure COP26, today brings opportunity for those who made big promises in October 2021 to hold themselves to account. Did the global event make real change to how organisations operate and communicate their purpose to the public?

One impact COP26 made in the minds of those paying attention to its message of climate change was the installation of a growing impatience; a need for accountability from those with the power and influence to drive action.

‘COP26 and many other political events within the last six months have highlighted the public’s growing lack of tolerance for hypocrisy,’ says Propel Technology’s lead communications consultant Claire Dumbreck.

‘For many, COP26 will be remembered for the rich elite jamming up Prestwick Airport with their private jets and then preaching to the masses about how they should give things up for the greater good.’

Perception of the global event – the success of which was predicted by Sir Vince Cable beforehand to be 60:40: ‘my heart is with the 60%; my head with the 40%’ – wasn’t 100% positive. While its failures ultimately fall on political promises that were short of expectations, the PR and comms sector had a part, too:

‘Some businesses and comms teams could have been more considered in their approaches – there were a lot of campaigns with fairly (very) loose connections to COP26!’ believes One Nine Nine managing director Barnaby Patchett.

‘The issue here was that the press was flooded with transparent attempts to ‘cash in’ on COP26 – with no real connection to the goals and aims of the conference. The best campaigns were underpinned with a clear, authentic link to COP26, from organisations making tangible, significant progress on sustainability.’

Consumers and stakeholders increasingly expect integrity from organisations, not greenwashing, and PR and comms teams are being tasked with the practicalities of that responsibility.

‘As an industry, comms was both part of the post-COP26 climate change discussion and has since had to respond to it,’ says senior PR consultant Katy Barney, who heads up Ambitious PR’s ESG & Sustainability PR services.

‘Agency-side, this has meant more clients coming to us and asking for advice on how to communicate around sustainability, meaning an imperative to upskill rapidly and get to grips with the issues.’

Accessibility of language around climate change is a must-have skill for PRs in the wake of COP26, but as an industry we’re not quite there yet, according to research conducted by the Hanover Group Strategy & Insights unit, which targeted the general public in the UK and Ireland, and business leaders across Europe:

‘Only 1 in 4 people (25%) were comfortable defining “net zero” and much less so with terms like “carbon trading” and “climate refugees”,’ says Hanover Group’s strategy & insights director Teodora Coste.

‘23% were uncomfortable defining any of the terms most often used at COP26.’

The obfuscating and grand-standing that reverberated around October’s summit isn’t necessary, or useful, for building climate considerations into campaign work. For Earth Day 2022, here are more practical steps:

‘Wind the sanctimoniousness right down!’ says Claire Dumbreck. ‘Address any perception of “us and them” before more scepticism takes hold. Demonstrate genuine short-term human benefits of acting with the environment in mind (beyond the luxury of just feeling good about it).’

‘Start at home and focus on reducing your own carbon emissions and environmental impacts,’ says Lexington’s director and head of responsible business Andrew Wilson. ‘Do you really need to fly to that client meeting? Second, be critical friends to clients, provide constructive challenge on their own operations. Do agencies have the in-house expertise to advise on Net Zero strategies and approaches to reduce environmental impacts? Third, work with brands to produce communications that help to change consumer attitudes and bring about a shift in behaviour.’

Ultimately, use your skill as a PR; if you’re part of the comms industry, you already have the tools to get the message out there:

‘Zero and environmental change are so much more than a single-issue topic – there are lots of opportunities for PR teams to get creative,’ says Katy Barney.

‘There will always be another story or angle if you’re committed to making change.’

For more on climate change and how the communications sector can help make a difference, check out this post on what PR and comms teams should know about sustainability, a reflection on the success of COP26 from the Vuelio political team, and this guest post from Sir Vince Cable featuring his predictions ahead of the summit. 

 

How to communicate in the metaverse

How to communicate in the metaverse… also, what is the metaverse?

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If you’re up on your PR and comms trends for 2022 and the years ahead, you will have read about the metaverse and just how important it is going to be for the industry. But… do you actually know what that word means? Do you understand how you and your team might use it for upcoming campaigns? How to talk about it to clients and other brands?

To help prevent you from any out-of-touch floundering in future stakeholder presentations and competitive pitches, here’s how the industry is already making great use of the metaverse and how you can join, too.

What is the metaverse?
To cut through all the jargon: it’s a virtual space for interacting. With other people, with places, with items.

‘The way I try to explain it to friends is, it’s like a hybrid of The Sims, Rollercoaster Tycoon & GTA (without the crime),’ said The Playbook’s senior sport and brand communications executive Rob Baney.

‘Creating your own The Sims-like dream world, building your entertainment offering Rollercoaster Tycoon-style, and then having you and your mates explore this world in the best clothes and with the coolest car, like your character in GTA.’

If you aren’t a gamer, the concept of a metaverse has long been established in science fiction and regularly features in film (Ready Player One and The Matrix, for some dystopian examples), and even portrayed quite poorly in 90s thrillers you may have seen, like The Lawnmower Man and Disclosure. In the latter, for example, it’s shown as already being a part of work tech. Michael Douglas needs to hack a computer – instead of sitting down to type, he dons a VR headset and gloves for his search and walks through a Virtual Reality Database.

You could say that’s a prediction of how the metaverse may shape up in the next few years – full integration into our lives, even office documents. You could also say ‘why did Michael bother when Ctrl + F is right there – who has the time for that’. But that would be overlooking the allure of realistic interactions with surroundings otherwise closed off, and plenty of us want that.

Why is the metaverse so popular right now?
While a metaverse is not a new concept – not even to the comms industry, who had the opportunity to explore it in ‘Second Life Marketing Safaris’ as far back as 2007 – it’s resonating strongly now, particularly in the wake of Facebook’s widely-publicised rebrand to Meta and new strategy to build ‘the’ metaverse, as we search for new ways to connect in our day-to-day.

When people wanted to be with those they couldn’t see in the flesh in the early days of the pandemic, downloads of applications like Zoom, Teams and Houseparty boomed. Games like Animal Crossing: New Horizons broke records, with advertising from Nintendo showing family members and friends using their Switch consoles to fly out for quality time on each other’s virtual islands.

Conversations while fishing for bass couldn’t happen in reality during lockdown, but it could online. Connection is the value of digital spaces – that’s the value a presence in the metaverse can provide to your audience.

How are brands and businesses already using the metaverse?
Using Animal Crossing: New Horizons as an example, businesses, charities and even US politicians quickly realised its potential for engaging with consumers and integrated their branding and messages into the pre-existing world of the game. But many brands and agencies have since gone further into the metaverse – this isn’t something to get ready for in the future, this is happening now.

Recreating reality: VCCP built virtual offices in gaming and social platform Roblox, using its London Victoria office as a base design, but building in extras impossible in real life, such as an enclosure for meerkats.

Connection in virtual spaces: A Roblox-based ceremony and gig was held as part of the Brit Awards this year, with a virtual version of PinkPantheress booked to perform. Artists including Lil Nas X have also teamed up with the platform for performances.

In-metaverse living: Nike invested in the possibility of virtual footwear with its December 2021 purchase of digital collectable creators RTFKT. ‘This acquisition is another step that accelerates Nike’s digital transformation […] and extend[s] Nike’s digital footprint and capabilities,’ said Nike president and chief executive John Donahoe.

Comms and campaigns: To publicise the new series of I’m A Celebrity… late last year, ITV launched a virtual version of the show’s castle with Fortnite Creative for viewers to explore. In fact, ITV has created a number of new ways for viewers to connect with its programming via the metaverse in this way, including an in-game Fortnite version of its entertainment show The Void.

So, should you care?
In summary – yes. At its most simple, the metaverse can be a recreation of what we know, but it can also be a fantastic version of what we want, or an overlay of extras to make life easier.

While data from We Are Social’s latest Think Forward report found that 90% of social users were ‘clueless’ about the metaverse, its quick adoption across the industry in real ways is meaningful. Current excitement about these virtual spaces may dim, but applications of them will embed into our culture and lives, long-term.

Virtual influencers are already here, and NLP (Natural Language Processing)/virtual avatars are an accepted part of online customer service. For those who need other ways to access events and experiences beyond getting on a train to a crowded gathering at a city centre, the metaverse opens up a whole world of possibility and connection. For business, it offers new ways to engage consumers continuously bombarded with images and messages in ways that will stick.

In a real world that has become increasingly unpredictable, filled with situations we can’t control, it’s unsurprising that the possibility to create others we can is appealing. And at the very least, what’s on the way should be a lot cooler than that scene in Disclosure. The metaverse can be whatever we want to make it.

If you’re ready to enter the metaverse, visit our visit to those brands setting up in Animal Crossing: New Horizons and check out our look at the influence of virtual influencers. 

Want more on ways to engage the minds of  your audience? Here’s a write-up of our webinar on Neuro PR with Harvey & Hugo PR’s managing director and Leader of the Pack Charlotte Nichols 

The Value of Chartership Report

Just how important is chartership in marketing and PR?

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A study from the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) and the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) – The Value of Chartership report – has found that while respect for chartership within the marketing and PR industries has improved over the last ten years, it is still significantly lower than in other professions.

Featuring the viewpoints and experiences of over 300 chartered members, the report finds that around two-fifths (39%) feel respect for chartership has increased, though? 72% believe it is higher in other sectors such as engineering or accountancy. However, respondents felt that the value that comes with being chartered in PR and marketing is worth it, regardless, giving them a competitive edge in their professional lives.

Other findings from the report:
• Over four in ten (43%) argue it is very important for careers to be chartered
• Three in ten (31%) believe being chartered provides them with an edge to win new business
• 15% have been able to achieve a higher salary or increase rates due to their chartership status

Just as important as chartership to the study respondents – Continuing Professional Development; 72% believe regular upskilling and knowledge refreshment is vital for progressing within the industries.

CIPR CEO Alastair McCapra said: ‘Compared to other sectors, our industries have the advantage of low barriers of entry into the profession but a disadvantage in the number of qualified and professionally accredited professionals. We know what we do delivers value and so do our clients, but research shows a continued lack of collective confidence.

‘This research highlights how chartered status overcomes this by providing pride, status and confidence to individual practitioners. When compared to other professionals, or as seen by other professionals, our status is low but improving. Chartered status is an essential tool in increasing this further and faster.’

CIM chief executive Chris Daly added: ‘The past few years have underlined the critical role marketing and PR professionals have had in supporting and guiding businesses through a turbulent time. Rising consumer expectations for organisations to act ethically and communicate effectively, coupled with ‘the great resignation’ has put a greater emphasis than ever on the development of skilled PR and marketing practitioners.

‘There has always been a concern that investing in the development of staff may just accelerate their departure, but this joint research shows that chartered practitioners can provide a real financial boost for businesses – something that is crucial as we look to recover from the pandemic.’

Read ‘The Value of Chartership’ in full here.

For more on getting access to support and opportunities for upskilled in PR, comms and marketing, check out our round-up of six industry bodies to link up with.

Channel 4

Media Response and Controversy Behind Channel 4’s Privatisation

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The Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries announced that the Government is privatising Channel 4 in response to increasing pressures from streaming giants like Netflix and Amazon. Dorries believes a change of ownership will grant Channel 4 the ‘freedom to flourish’ and allow it to ‘thrive as a public service broadcaster long into the future’ (via Twitter, 04.04.22).

In the week that followed the announcement on 4 April, we tracked broad, large-scale media coverage as well as a sample of articles from 280 journalists across 356 UK-based publications. 104 international publications also reported on the growing spectrum of controversy arising from this decision.

Mutual Consensus Across UK and international Media

UK and international media reaction

Opinions towards the sale were relatively mutual between the UK and international coverage, with an almost even split between negative and neutral sentiment. As Conservative MPs expressed their shared concerns, The Telegraph commented on the rarity of such widely-shared agreement across the media and political parties, describing it as ‘very odd’ (The Telegraph, 07.04.22). With multiple layers of controversy embedded in the decision, very few have attempted to outline a positive response.

Trending areas of controversy

Trending categories

Among the 4,186 headlines that emerged in the UK in the five days that followed, three focus areas gained significant attention in the media: representation, revenge and job loss.

In a sample taken from the top international, national and business news sources, over half referenced the concerns of ‘cultural vandalism’ that may occur from likely foreign ownership. Dorothy Byrne, former head of news and current affairs at Channel 4, has had a particularly strong voice in this area; 75 journalists across the UK quoted her extensive opinions on the matter.

Byrne exemplified her concerns in stating: ‘We would no longer, for example, hear “gay people in Glasgow” on the channel. Mass [global] audiences don’t want to hear the perspective of the nations and regions of Britain particularly’ (iNews, 05.04.22).

Similarly, Kirstie Allsopp has also held the spotlight for her opinions as an established Channel 4 presenter. Several UK news articles embedded her viral tweet, which concluded that ‘Profit will be king and the passion & inclusion of Channel 4 will be lost’ (BBC News, 06.04.22).

Many journalists have also opted to outline the chronological timeline of Channel 4, referencing Margaret Thatcher’s goals to serve the ‘underrepresented voices’ (The Guardian, 06.04.22). The topic is by far the most popular for reach among the public, with one trending article titled ‘Hands off Channel 4 – it helped me embrace my sexuality’ (The Independent, 06.04.22).

An act of revenge for Brexit bias?

With a strong adoption by US media, 27.5% of the sample focused on speculations that the sale is an act of ‘revenge’ due to Channel 4’s loaded commentary and ‘bias’ in coverage against both Brexit and Boris Johnson (Sky News, 05.04.22). Back in 2019, Channel 4 made the news for replacing Johnson with a melting block of ice during a debate he was unable to attend (referencing his lack of response to the climate emergency). This led to a “threat” from the Conservatives, who said they would review Channel 4’s broadcasting remit if they won the election (The Guardian, 28.11.19).

With this decision now confirmed, 770 publications quoted Conservative MP Julian Knight (also chair of the influential Commons Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee), who initiated the concerns that this could be an act of strategic retaliation. He said the Government’s decision to push ahead represents ‘a big risk” with uncertain benefits (Sky News, 05.04.22).

Impact of privatisation on Scottish production companies

Scottish production companies have also been highlighted as an area of emphasised loss by UK media, particularly in the job sector. Since 2007, Channel 4 has played an ‘important role’ in the ‘growing success of the screen sector in Scotland’, including £200 million for Scottish-based productions and support for 400 jobs (The National, 04.04.22).

Following Armando Iannucci’s opinion piece in The Guardian on April 6th, 557 media outlets across the country reported on his views. He is a prominent Scottish writer and producer with an established relationship to Channel 4. Iannucci tweeted ‘Why do they want to make the UK’s great TV industry worse? Why? It makes no business, economic or even patriotic sense’ (Sky News, 05.04.22).

The ‘Red Meat’ Agenda

In an interview with Times Radio, the aforementioned Dorothy Byrne also accused Boris Johnson of ‘throwing red meat to right-wing voters’ (The Independent, 05.04.22). Since the discussion, this has been a trending phrase in 127 media outlets across the UK and United States.

Huffington Post further added that this will please the PM’s ‘Brexiteer base’, who have expressed a growing displeasure for the ‘pro-Remain, left-of-centre’ news coverage by Channel 4 (Huffington Post, 05.04.22).

Over 300 news sources shared excerpts from Health Secretary Sajid Javid’s interview with LBC Radio, who expressed his joy for the sale. Javid was often quoted saying the sale will ‘set it free’ to ‘compete in what is a fast-changing landscape’ (The Independent, 06.04.22). Additionally, Dan Wootton, the GB News presenter known for his opposition to left-wing views, took to social media to share his optimism for the sale:

Dan Wootton tweet

Valuation and loss

Two days after the announcement, BBC News shared the estimation that Channel 4 is worth between £600m and £1.5bn—which has since been quoted 60 times across several UK sources (BBC News, 05.04.22).

Aside from the impact on Scottish employment, The Guardian reported that analysts believe the company would face 40% to 50% cuts to its £660 million programming budget – which, in turn, could lead to cuts to content (Metro.co.uk, 04.04.22).

Key facts of the study
• Over 4,186 articles were analysed from 3 – 8 April, with a focus on UK media and occasional focus on the international response.
• The analysis was a blend of Vuelio Media Monitoring and Analysis, enriched by the Vuelio Insights team.
• When discussing controversies embedded in the privatisation of Channel 4, a sample of coverage was studied in depth in order to provide reliable and trust-worthy insights from the top international, national and business news sources.

Want to understand more about this story and data, or find out how the Vuelio Insights team can support you? Get in touch.

Is the food and drink sector ready for HFSS restrictions

Is the food and drink sector ready for upcoming HFSS regulations?

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If asked to hum your favourite advertising jingles, how many of them would be for food and drink products that would likely fall foul of the Government’s upcoming restrictions on HFSS ads?

For those in comms in the food and drink sector, the rules on HFSS (foods High in Fat, Sugar and Salt) coming into place in October will change work drastically. The advertising landscape in the UK will be completely different. Those old mainstays of traditional TV advertising that are yoghurt, chocolate and spreadable cheese adverts featuring happy celebrities will be gone, and with them, the UK obesity crisis. At least, that’s the thinking laid out in the Government’s ‘Introducing a total online advertising restriction for products high in fat, sugar and salt (HFSS)’ consultation findings.

‘While the evidence is not conclusive, it’s possible that restricting HFSS advertising exposure could […] influence adult purchases and consumption […] Further restrictions on HFSS advertising could therefore help reduce overconsumption and generate significant additional health benefits,’ say the Government’s conclusions.

Whether or not this will work to help people (and the companies they buy from) make ‘healthier’ choices, or draw criticism equal to that received by recent mandates on calorie inclusion in menus across England, change is coming. What this means in practice – a 9pm watershed on television for HFSS adverts and a complete ban on digital HFSS advertising from 22 October 2022.

Considering the impact these restrictions will have – potentially ‘the most significant in-store changes seen in decades,’ according to Barclays analyst James Anstead – are food and drink comms practioners ready?

There’s a lot of opportunity here. That 9pm watershed and the restrictions on HFSS paid-for ads online doesn’t explicitly include earned media. That means for HFSS brands and clients, the comms function potentially becomes much more valuable. But with that opportunity comes responsibility to share the right message, with the right people.

‘Being part of the discussion is key to getting your voice heard,’ says Vhari Russell, managing director at The Food Marketing Experts.

‘We’ve been working hard to drive collaborations to increase the following for the brands we work with and increase the data they have to enable them to sell directly to consumers. It is about ensuring all the bases are covered in terms of driving traffic to store, both online and bricks and mortar, and then creating standout to establish a brand of choice positioning.

‘Grow your tribe, so that you have a key and engaged customer base that will champion products outside of advertising. Working with influencers is critical to a brand’s success, however, you need to ensure you comply with best practice.’

One organisation that moved ahead of the regulations was TfL, whose policy on junk food advertising has been estimated to have decreased weekly junk food purchases by 1,000 calories. But which other companies are already approaching the regulations in the right way?

‘Dr Wills – we loved their campaign to help drive sales in Tesco to keep their listings,’ says Vhari. ‘Pip & Nut, too – many of the team now subscribe to get their nut butter deliveries since the pandemic.

‘TfL has already reported a significant change, and I think it is a great opportunity for brands to get creative and return to grassroots tactics. The guidelines have been put in place to help the nation eat better and make healthier choices. For brands that are high in salt and sugar, it is key to communicate in an honest and engaging way. Very few brands state you should eat their product all day every day, so it’s about consciously conveying the occasions to consume.’

With the cost of living crisis in the UK impacting purchasing decisions, and food High in Fat, Sugar and Salt often a cheaper and more convenient choice, HFSS products will continue to have a place on shelves.

PR teams working in the food and drink sector have an opportunity to make a difference with their campaigns, just as brands do with their approach – comms can help consumers mix HFSS foods into as balanced a lifestyle as they can manage within their means.

‘Brands need to drive the occasions when their products fit into the customer’s life so that they remain in the basket week in week out,’ says Vhari. ‘When consumers’ budgets are being hit harder it is vital that brands share the purpose, values, and credentials to retain customer loyalty.

‘I think that disruptive marketing combined with engaging and mouth-watering content is here to stay.’

For more on food and drink, check out these 10 top UK food bloggers. To track how the media is covering HFSS restrictions, try Vuelio’s Media Monitoring services – book a demo here. 

How to build your following on LinkedIn

How PR agencies can unlock the ‘Holy Grail’ of LinkedIn

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This is a guest post from Vicky Stoakes, communications director at Red Setter.

‘Can you double our followers in a year?’

As a PR company, we’re used to focusing all our efforts on building our clients’ reputations and profiles. Putting time aside to build your own company profile feels akin to a builder deciding to build their own house first – it’s simply not a priority – but it should be because we know it works. A focus on social media – especially LinkedIn – can support new business, recruitment and most importantly, boost company morale.

So, last year we took our own advice and put a proactive social media plan in place. And yes, we did double our followers in a year. This is how we did it.

Strategise to win

It’s so obvious it almost goes without saying, but you need a plan. You wouldn’t skip the strategy stage for your clients, so why would you skip it for your company page?

We mapped out three clear goals – to attract new business; engage talent; and to grow followers from our target audiences (design and PR).

The right kind of posts

With clear goals and a target audience in mind, next steps are deciding what to post. As a PR agency, it’s easy to fall back on sharing client news and coverage, but it’s a limiting – and dull – approach to social media.

Instead, ask yourself, what do your audiences want to see? Often, you’ll find there are two answers. They want to see more of your team and company culture, and evidence of your company’s expertise. Feed these insights into your content plan.

Share the love

CEOs beware! Content creation shouldn’t fall exclusively on your shoulders – though we know from experience it often does for smaller organisations – but neither should responsibility rest solely with your social media, marketing, or comms lead. It’s important to create a culture where everyone, from top to bottom, has a voice and feel they have something to say.

But make it easy. As a PR agency, words are almost second nature to us, but busy people, no matter the industry, can need help. Alongside ideas gathering as a team, we have a guide to our content, with clarity on the purpose of each piece and where it’s likely to appear, and covering basics, like word count.

A culture of content

When we began our new LinkedIn approach only a handful of team members had proactively written any blog posts for us. By the end of the first year, with the new campaign firmly in place, over 80 per cent of the team had written posts (some of these appearing beyond the blog in media titles).

Of course, it’s a big deal to have team members write blogs outside of their normal day jobs, so we’ve dialled up the value of this internally. It’s now so embedded in our culture that people regularly come up with ideas and offer to contribute. The joy of this as a comms director is immense.

With a steady stream of content agreed and forthcoming across the team, we can post around once a week, sometimes more. And even better, 90% of our posts work across LinkedIn and Instagram.

Is the plan working?

The only way to know if your strategy is working is checking analytics – and bracing yourself to play the long game. Social success doesn’t happen overnight. It was a slow burn that really seemed to catch fire around the 10–12-month phase.

We regularly check our engagement, allowing us to know what resonates with our audiences and, just as importantly, what doesn’t (stopping anything that’s falling into the virtual void).

Using LinkedIn itself as a barometer is helpful: it suggests that 2% is good engagement and anything above is smashing it out of the park. With our average at 10%, we’ll take that.

Use the ‘secret sauce’

As the admin to a company page, you have access to a feature that allows you to invite your personal connections to follow your company page. Use it and do it wisely. Get your agency leaders involved.

By doing this, we noticed a snowball effect. We got our connections following us by asking. Then by posting content with relevant hashtags – never forget the hashtags! – we noticed a regular stream of new followers from our target audiences following us because they were interested in our content. Start with those you know, and others will find you.

Find the fun

Finally, have fun with it. Make people want to read your posts. Tell your company story, empower the team and enjoy the journey. Remember, there’s no shame in asking people to engage with your posts, so don’t forget to ask your own team and thank them when they do engage!

Interested in building your organisation’s social media profile? Check out how Tiny Tickers and The Wildlife Trusts amplified their campaigns and message using their social channels (in the absence of bit budgets) here. 

For more from Red Setter, read this guest post from Alex Blyth on how to tackle the PR recruitment crisis by growing your team from the ground up.

How to become a journalist's favourite PR person

How to be a journalist’s favourite PR person

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If you follow enough of your fellow PR people on social media, you’ve probably seen the occasional gripe about rude responses they’ve received from journalists. If you follow journalists, complaints about irrelevant emails they’ve received from PRs might have shown up on your feed a time or two.

Nobody wants to be on either side of those media vs comms clashes, so how can you make sure yours is a name any journalist will be happy to see in their inbox?

Signing up the ResponseSource Journalist Enquiry Service to receive media requests straight to your inbox is a good starting point, naturally, but for guidance on the next steps, we asked three more journalists regularly using the service what makes a good PR.

Rob Waugh, freelance journalist regularly writing for outlets including The Daily Telegraph, Metro and the Daily Mail
‘Ensure the name of your expert is kept very close to their comment if you’re sending text. Journalists using this service are often dealing with large amounts of text, and if the name isn’t right next to the comment, it’s easy to misattribute.

‘The best way to reply is in plain text NOT in a document headed with company logos. This just adds another stage to the work of a journalist who’s probably dealing with dozens, or even hundreds of comments and means that your comment is less likely to be used in any finished piece.’

Nick Booth, freelance writer currently covering mobile networking infrastructure for Mobile Europe
‘Keep your response short. The shorter your email, the easier it is to deal with! If it’s really short and sweet, the other person will act on it right away.

‘Try to make every technology-related contribution about one thing: how is this going to save anyone any time or money? After all, the only reason we use computers at work is to save time or money. So how does it do that?

‘Always use your own words when describing what your client does. Use short simple words. If you use jargon you don’t understand, it just sounds like you’re copying someone’s homework. Don’t assume the other person knows what all these acronyms mean!

‘And if you’re responding to Nick Booth, send him some sort of bribe…’

Martina Mercer, editor of Sunday Woman and The Consumer Voice, freelance journalist, PR and author
‘Always use the journalist’s name and make sure you get it right.

‘Another tip I have that is quite controversial (but is the way I run my business on the PR and marketing side of things, due to having insight from a journalist perspective) is DON’T copy and paste press releases, emails, etc. The journalist knows you’re doing this. They want someone to take the time to respond – to read the entire journalist alert and to construct a bespoke reply. Pasting may seem like a good idea, and a way to respond to many at a time, but for the bigger newspapers and magazines, it’ll just come across as a little insulting. I like to construct a bespoke pitch for every journalist I talk to. I know most of them now, and usually have conversations with them about life and events anyhow, so a copy paste affair would seem a little strange, too.

‘Always offer more, my one rule – go beyond the book. They’d like images, offer a sample, too.

‘Always be grateful. It astounds me how many PR companies will cut contact with the journalist once they have their client featured. Don’t have an attitude or think you have the power in this situation, as you don’t. The journalist holds all the cards and should be treated as such. They are the ones that will make sure you get paid and will make sure you get results. You don’t have to brown nose, but you do have to appreciate this fact. I once had a PR company who scolded me for writing just two lines about their product and for it being at the end of an article. I wasn’t even keen on the product but included it as she badgered. She saw the article then sent an email to say. “It’s not worth it, forget it, you just added it at the end.” I blocked her email, blocked the company and anyone she represented and made a point of never ever recommending them again.

‘I’d like to say try not to nag, but in all seriousness, I receive so many responses to journalist alerts, hundreds at a time, that sometimes I need a good nagging. The phone can ring while I’m reading a pitch and it’s lost forever, so do follow up with me; do ask.

‘If I can name names of great PRs, I’d like to say that those representing Ritter Sport (who sent me the most wonderful Christmas gift and didn’t expect anything in return), Haribo (who keep us stocked on their latest releases) and Lush do it right.’

Sign up for a demo of the ResponseSource Journalist Enquiry Service here.

For more on forming lasting connections with the UK media, here is more advice on responding to enquiries, reasons to give the ResponseSource Journalist Enquiry Service a try before delving into #JournoRequest on Twitter, and even more tips from journalists.

Rob Baney

PR Interview: Rob Baney, senior sport & brand communications executive for The Playbook

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One of Vuelio’s main objectives is to help comms professionals and teams streamline processes to allow them to focus their time and efforts on key priorities and projects. In a highly demanding industry, it’s not solely a case of time management that creates a successful environment but a line-up of multiple factors. We caught up with Rob Baney, senior sport & brand communications executive at The Playbook, a leading communications agency working with a range of global brands, to discuss life as an agency PR professional in 2022.

What have you been working on lately?

It’s been a busy start to 2022 at The Playbook… A couple of highlights: helping NFL UK fans celebrate Super Bowl the British way, including Greg James’ hilarious Superb Owl segment on Radio 1 with The NFL Show pundits Jason Bell and Osi Umenyiora – nothing beats British humour. And heading out to Abu Dhabi in January to support the DP World Tour on the ground with local comms for the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship, where Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny swapped Warner Bros. World for the first Rolex Series event of the year.

Has this project been typical of the last 6-12 months?

In the past 12 months, I wouldn’t say anything has been ‘typical’ – projects have changed, and continually change… I felt like I became an expert on UK covid testing and entry requirements ahead of a LaLigaTV press trip to Barcelona last autumn, but that’s all redundant now. Since the turn of the year and even in the past month I’d say it’s become more ‘normal’ and its exciting to be doing events again. One good example of this was our Sunday with LaLiga where we packed out the Sports Bar & Grill for an ElClasico watch party – it was great to see the passions of fans back in person.

How important is maintaining a good work/outside-work balance for employee wellbeing?

It’s vital. I recently managed to get away to the Cheltenham Festival for a couple of days and had a great time. I went to university in Cheltenham and I always enjoy going back there to catch up with old mates. There are few better places than Cheltenham in race week.

I’d say a good work/life balance is now more important than ever, with everything work-related being an app click away. When you enjoy your work, checking emails and Teams can actually get quite addictive, so it’s very important to force yourself to switch off. Although you might trick yourself otherwise, you do need the break.

How has the pandemic impacted your work?

It’s impacted us massively. In all aspects of our job. Obviously, there were times where in-person activations weren’t feasible and while virtual calls served a purpose, there are some opportunities that are far more effective face-to-face, so we’ve had to adapt throughout to service our clients. Having said that, it’s also streamlined a lot of processes and there are a lot of benefits to Zoom (aside from the Hawaiian beach backgrounds).

As we look ahead to the rest of 2022, what trends do you see coming up?

The world is already opening up, and physical activations will come back in full. But it’s virtually we’ll see the most innovation. We recently had a workshop with an expert on all things Crypto, NFTs and the Metaverse. And it’s the latter of these I see real potential for brands activating in this year… Lots have already jumped in to the ‘Metaverse’ and I expect more and more to do the same. I’m no way the expert but the way I try to explain it to friends is it’s like a hybrid of The Sims, Rollercoaster Tycoon & GTA (without the crime); creating your own The Sims-like dream world like, building your entertainment offering Rollercoaster Tycoon-style, and then having you and your mates explore this world in the best clothes and with the coolest car, like your character in GTA. Pardon the pun, but there’s literally a whole other world out there…

How do you plan to handle extra demand as business grows?

We’re an agile agency and we’ve got a wider group who can support immediate needs. We take pride in our very successful always-on internship programme where we give on-the-job training to anyone with a willingness to learn, no experience or degree needed. We often have exciting projects come in and have a whole roster of experienced and trusted freelancers to call upon. When we need someone senior in permanent role, we have a thorough recruitment process to choose through the talented applicants. We are always on the lookout for the best talent.

Within your specific role, what have been your major learnings over the last few years?

One of our core values at The Playbook is to ‘Never Settle’ and I think this is something I consider on a daily basis. There’s a lot of excellent projects we work on, but I’m always thinking: how could we make it better, could we have been more efficient, was the messaging strong enough, could we have had better imagery. There’s lots of different ways to tell a story, and our job is always to tell that in the most compelling way possible.

What are the greatest day-to-day challenges for agency PRs? 

Time – isn’t it for everyone? Managing your time is so important, we’re always working to tight deadlines, so you need to have a good handle on your time and your colleague’s time so we can achieve everything we want.

With such a large and varied client base, how do you manage multiple relationships and campaigns?

It sounds cheesy but communication is key. If we’ve got an event on for one client on a certain day and we’ve a clash with another client deadline, then being upfront and honest is the best approach. They trust us to do our job, and they know we have other clients to service.

PR is playing a more important role in the wider conversation around ESG and CSR – how will this impact your clients?

If there are compelling and interesting ESG or CSR stories to tell, then we’ll be the first to consult our clients and help tell them in the best way possible. I can’t stress enough the importance of doing something purposeful, without this it’s opening yourself up for criticism. Brands should want to help society, and without getting to deep, in a capitalist world where profits rule, there’s plenty of value for clients to put resources towards helping people.

How are client strategies changing with regards to the current climate?

Usually I’d say strategies are often based off performance, so if performances are strong the strategy will remain similar but ‘let’s do that bigger and better’. Having said that, I’ve noticed a lot more clients including influencer activation in their briefs. Previously, this was always a proactive suggestion from PRs, and some clients didn’t have the capacity to truly consider how content creators could fit in to their existing strategies and help them achieve their business objectives. It’s refreshing that influencers are central to business strategy, and it’s good to see the agile influencer tool we’ve developed over several years getting more and more use. As the influencer space continues to morph and change with creators becoming established outlets our tool anticipates this, so we can identify the best creators for different projects, and we continue to grow relationships in this space to help us forge the strongest content and achieve the client’s desired outcomes.

And finally… there have been some mixed England performances out in the West Indies over the last few weeks. What do you think is the most important change that needs to be made to ensure the team are capable of regaining The Ashes next year?

Fundamentally, we need a team that’s going to bat for time (the runs will come), which they have in the West Indies, albeit on flat pitches. We need to learn to grit it out when the going gets tough… too often has that batting order folded like a pack of cards. I never thought two of the world’s all-time best Test bowlers in Broad and Anderson were the issue, but that’s a debate for another day. If we’re to regain the Ashes, we need four or five established batters to support Root, and if a quality spinner were to emerge, that would be the icing on the cake.

Connect with Rob Baney via Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn. 

Omkar Khot sits in Vuelio’s new business team, specialising in PR & Public Affairs across enterprises. Connect here. 

For more on trends in PR and comms this year, check out our round-up of insight from industry thought leaders to help with your content and campaign planning. 

How business comms can help fight fake news

How business comms can help with the fight against fake news

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This is a guest post from Laura Morelli, UK Head of media at Semrush.

Trust is rapidly becoming a vanishing commodity. So says this year’s Edelman Trust Barometer, a long running gauge of belief in government, media and other prominent societal markers. The decline in media trust in particular is especially striking, dropping 13 percentage points over the last year to just over one in five people believing in the credibility of media brands.

The survey cites a widespread and growing concern about the dissemination of fake news and false information as reasons for this shift. Despite major media outlets investing significantly in fact checking functions and seeking to redress the inaccurate spread of information, it seems the public feels this isn’t enough to stem the tide. Of course, if media outlets cannot address these concerns, public trust in their output may never recover.

Businesses face the same challenge. While few would expect corporate entities to hold impartial views, consumer purchase power rests increasingly in their ability to demonstrate a matching set of values. The same study found that some 52% of people in the UK buy or advocate for brands which mirror their values, a metric rooted in belief that those values are being translated into positive action.

Communications professionals are then placed into a similar situation as the media – how to keep their narratives rooted in fact. This is particularly key when targeting younger demographics who have grown up under the shadow of fake news and risk essentially being trained to question all information from sources, both official and otherwise. We live in a time where we will continue to see a flood of opinion, false theories and fake news spread so easily online. According to new research from Semrush, UK online searches for ‘fake news’ regularly occur an average of over 12,000 times per month. We are also seeing the wider public become increasingly aware of what they are consuming. The term ‘How to spot a fake news story’ increased by 50% over the last 4 years. Searches for ‘fake news examples’ are up by 60% during the same period.

While fake news is insidious, one of the best tools to fight its spread is clear and irrefutable proof points and sources. Indicators of online misinformation or disinformation are often discovered in poor, single source references, or unsubstantiated platforms. Fake news counts on time poor readers being unwilling (potentially because the content plays into their own beliefs or opinions) or unable to sense check efficiently. This is also why reputable news organisations have invested so significantly in data journalism – a technique which comms providers should highly encourage.

Businesses may not recognise that they have access to a bigger data toolkit now than ever before to help substantiate their claims. While citations about business efficiencies and product efficacy must come from within R&D departments and internal data, there are well known external sources on offer for building consumer confidences. The internet is one of the most powerful research tools ever, and just a peek into search data can lend greater insights into consumer motivations, trends, and opinions. This can not only be used strategically to support business direction and decision making, but tactically to support content marketing initiatives too.

Fake news and misinformation online may be hard to stop – but it’s not impossible to keep fighting. And the tools you use to do so may just help improve consumer perceptions of your business and its purpose still further. Trust may seem at times to be a vanishing commodity, but savvy businesses can stop the slide, and potentially boost their brands in the process. It is increasingly essential that businesses deploy similar journalistic rigour to their branded storytelling. This is just as applicable to citing reputable sources and using data to shape narratives as much as it is for gaining those backlinks.

For more on the impact comms can have on the fight against fake news, check out this guest post from Sidekick PR’s Charlotte Dimond on how PR can stop the spread of misinformation. and well as our previous ResponseSource webinar with Polis, FactCheckNI and The Ferret, Facts, fakes and fast news. 

PRCA LGBTQ+ Network

PRCA relaunches its LGBTQ+ Network

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The Public Relations and Communications Association (PRCA) has relaunched its LGBTQ+ Network with a focus on supporting the PR and comms industry to ‘show up’ for the LGBTQ+ community.

Originally launched two and a half years ago in partnership with YouGov, the PRCA’s LGBTQ+ group has held events, conducted cross-industry research into how sexual identity can impact work and highlighted LGBTQ+ role models in PR and comms. The group’s relaunch as a network includes the introduction of volunteers to boost positive impact across the industry when it comes to inclusivity.

Plans for the network include the sharing of resources and learning materials for reference, accessible events, commentary and discussion of important LGBTQ+ matters and new Role Models blogs.

The LGBTQ+ Network is led by Hill+Knowlton Strategies senior associate director Emma Franklin-Wright and Good Vibes Only Talent founder Katie Traxton.

PRCA LGBTQ+ Network Co-Chair Emma Franklin-Wright said:

‘As communications professionals we can have so much influence on the public narratives around LGBTQ+ people. At a time when we are increasingly under attack from the media it is so important for us to give as many people in our industry as possible the tools to create positive representation in our work, and to give agency leaders the resources to create inclusive workplaces. Having a refreshed network to deliver on those goals is vital and having so many new volunteers coming together to deliver this important work is truly energising.’

PRCA LGBTQ+ Network Co-Chair Katie Traxton added:

‘Having the backing of the PRCA to relaunch the group means a lot. Over the last two and half years, we’ve learnt about the ongoing challenges of equality, opportunity and representation that the LGBTQ+ community still face both in workplaces and the work we do. Now it’s time for us to invest our energy in catalysing real change. We know that progress is likely to be gradual, but we have a great group of people working with us and we want PRCA members to get involved, share their thoughts, and ultimately join us on our mission. The more of us who work together, both members of the LGBTQ+ community and allies, the more impact we will make.’

Committee members for the PRCA LGBTQ+ Network are:

Gian Marco Candolo (Senior Account Executive, Cicero)
Nina Eadie (Head of Lifestyle PR, Keko London)
Stephanie Ensten (Partner Manager, Mercedes EQ Formula E Team)
Sinead McGeever (Account Director, FleishmanHillard)
Will Richardson (Associate Director, TEAM LEWIS)
Lex Rosenthal (Account Manager, TALA)
Michela Siuni (Marketing and Communications Manager, I.G. Advisors)
Myles Storey (Campaigns Manager – Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability, O2)
Jonathan Sullivan (Account Executive, Brazil)
James Treacy (Senior PR and Communications Manager, Abercrombie & Kent)
Josh Wheeler (Broadcast PR Specialist)

For more information on the network and how to get in touch, check out the PRCA website.

Check out our previous accessmatters sessions on inclusion in the media, PR and comms industries with Proud FT’s Cassius Naylor, the Social Mobility Foundation’s Sarah Atkinson and The Unmistakable’s Asad Dhunna. 

Are PR and marketing a comms power couple?

Do PR and marketing make a perfect comms couple?

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Public relations and marketing – two interlinked comms functions whose connection has been under debate for years. Since at least the 1970s, in fact, according to Stephen Waddington, who led our latest webinar on the subject, ‘PR & Marketing: The Ultimate Power Couple?’.

Sign up to watch the webinar. 

‘In researching our ‘Trends in the integration of marketing and public relations’ white paper, I found a piece from 1978 highlighting how the two functions should work together. That relationship in the headline is always going to be situational depending on size and scale, but there’s one thing that’s certain; this debate has been going on for 50 years and will keep going.’

Download the white paper ‘Trends in the integration of marketing and public relations’.

If this is a conversation that hasn’t yet started at your organisation, whether you’re working in-house or agency-side, take advice from Stephen, Mastercard‘s Suman Hughes and Hotwire Global‘s Tara O’Donnell shared during the webinar to consider the benefits of bringing your PR and marketing functions closer together.

Is this a debate for everyone?
As pointed out by Stephen, the CEOs, customers and celebrities that PR and marketing teams serve won’t really care so much about what is integrated and what isn’t – what matters is that the results are good. Who it is important for is those working towards the results, who have had to weave key messaging and strategy, such as ESG, into every aspect of their planning and actions over the last few years.

‘The pandemic has led to a reappraisal of organisations,’ believes Stephen. ‘Teams need to work together to understand their business’ place in the market and in wider society.’

‘An idea can start from anywhere’ – Mastercard’s Suman Hughes on the in-house perspective
On taking on her current role as Mastercard’s director of communications, UK, Suman Hughes joined a comms team already integrated. PR and marketing work closely together to communicate the brand’s message to its global audience and worldwide workforce and this connection aids every part of their strategy and execution.

‘Working as one team means offering a single unified voice. Whether it’s marketing, comms, public policy, HR, accounts, it all comes back to our employees and them as brand ambassadors – we talk as one, as Mastercard.

‘Integration means we can pool our resources and break down silos to make the most of what we have, making the biggest impact for our stakeholder groups and audiences.

‘It’s a global model that we run – not just across our international team, but across all our agency groups, too – we approach every piece of work this way, from paid, owned and earned. An idea can start from anywhere and become a campaign that’s holistic. It’s a level playing field and it makes it super-interesting for me to do my job.’

‘It’s all about business impact’ – Hotwire Global’s Tara O’Donnell on the agency perspective
‘In teams that have integrated marketing and PR, it’s all about business impact and how you measure it. When companies work in this way, it is more efficient, but depends on the organisation.

‘When companies had to go into ‘protect revenue’ mode in 2020, we realised that many were struggling because traditional marketing channels had shut down. Our comms clients, maybe for the first time, were tasked with having business impact – everyone in their organisations were tasked with improving business results. That’s what led us to look at what we do and evolve it to impact reputation along with revenue.

‘We’ve found it’s an incredible marriage; reputation to revenue resonates across the board. If you’re talking to a comms client about thought leadership – you’ve based it on insight about an audience they’re trying to reach; you should do that with your marketing anyway. You can use that insight all the way through the pipeline.

Is integrating PR and marketing for you?
‘It’s a really natural progression of using what you’re already creating to have different impact,’ says Tara.

‘The value to clients is really simple to show; our comms clients will understand it and our marketing teams do, too. It’s not necessary that they always work together, but we can show that there will be business impact when they do.

‘From a comms point-of-view, to be able to go to the business and show how you’ve impacted revenue… that ability to show value is incredible.’

‘Give it a go!’ says Suman. ‘If you’re really clear on your business objectives, you’ll all be pulling in the same direction’.

Watch the fullPR & Marketing: The Ultimate Power Couple? webinar here for more on integrating your comms functions.

The white paper, ‘Trends in the integration of marketing and public relations’ , can be downloaded here.

This is how journalists want you to reply to their requests

PRs: this is how journalists want you to help with their requests

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Answering requests from journalists for comment, launch details or products for review should be pretty easy, right?

A myriad of media professionals from across the UK media send requests straight through to the inboxes of relevant PRs with the Journalists Enquiry Service every day. That means plenty of opportunities to get it right, but taking even one chance on sending something irrelevant can result in a very annoyed journalist. Are you replying with what journos are actually asking for?

Find out more about the ResponseSource Journalist Enquiry Service and book a demo here.

To make sure your replies are relevant, here are dos and don’ts from three journalists writing for national, regional, consumer and trade titles regularly using the service:

Samantha Brick, freelance journalist for titles including the Daily Mail and The Sun…
Do: ‘Email is best for getting in touch, WhatsApp okay in an emergency/deadline.’

Don’t: ‘Phone out of the blue (I usually have interviews lined up in the day).’

Useful PRs? ‘Specialist PRs who work in the wellness/spiritual world are fantastic. They send case studies and information that I can – and do – use and that’s because they read what I write.’

One more thing: ‘Most PRs who get in touch with me have a good idea of what I do and offer only appropriate press releases, profiles of individuals – thanks!’

A freelance journalist and columnist for consumer magazines…
Do: ‘Read the request in full and answer the request itself rather than just sending something over. Be as specific as possible in your response. “I have a couple of experts; shall I send over” probably won’t receive a response if I have asked for experts in the request… just send the suggestions from the get-go with information about what you have sent is relevant to what I am working on. Sometimes journalist receive so many responses that there really isn’t time to respond to vague or irrelevant emails.’

Don’t: ‘Follow up super quickly… I understand why you do this, but usually it takes time to get back to people especially as journalists have to speak to editors, etc, and figure out which suggestions from the enquiry work best. Also, please do not send stuff that is irrelevant to the query unless there is a REALLY good reason for it.’

Useful PRs? ‘They explain who they are, who they are working for, why what they are sending is relevant and information on what a potential interviewee will speak about or even some quotes to use… or what they can provide. Very simple and easy.’

One more thing: ‘Even if you have a journalist’s number do not call them or text them without their permission. Not okay!’

An interiors journalist writing for the Metro…
Do: ‘Read the callout! Often there are specific requests and details that don’t work if not in the reply. A specific pic, detail, etc. Maybe 30% of replies I get aren’t relevant or fit at all. When there is 100 replies to go through, this can mean half hour wasted.

‘Make sure the person is available, too. It can be a bit chicken-and-egg but often I get replies from people where, say, I’m looking for someone who has bought a first home. After a week of back-and-forth they tell me actually that person doesn’t want to talk property…

‘Have everything ready, if poss. If I need a great pic to go with it, if this takes two weeks to source it might fall to the bottom of the pile!’

Don’t: ‘Send tenuously linked (or not linked at all) ideas. I’m looking for a sportsperson for interview so sending a press release on a new nutri bar doesn’t really help me.’

Useful PRs? ‘Anyone who doesn’t need to check with a dozen people to get a green light, then put five people to oversee a zoom call. I like it when PRs show confidence in their clients and work with me to get it all out the way as soon as poss. As a freelancer, you don’t get paid for endlessly chasing.’

One more thing… ‘RS is a great service and without it and all the PRs signed up I’m not sure how I would do my job tbh, so keep up the great work!’

Want to get the most out of the ResponseSource Journalist Enquiry Service? Here is more advice on how to respond to requests from journalists as well as reasons to try the service before searching #JournoRequest on Twitter.

The benefits of charity corporate partnerships

The benefits of charity corporate partnership for brands

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Red Nose Day is coming up this week, and while people across the country will be taking part in charitable endeavours for Friday 18 March (sometimes involving baked beans and bathtubs), big brands are taking part, too. It’s not just about handing over the giant cardboard cheques on the night; alongside the number one priority that is helping people in need, there are many other benefits to corporate partnerships with charities.

Sainsbury’s, Argos, Habitat, TK Maxx, British Airways, Walkers and the Premier League are just some of the big-name brands listed as partners this year on the Red Nose Day website – you may have already bought something from one of them that will result in a contribution to the charity. Want more warm and fuzzy feelings alongside bonus business boosts? Consider the added value for brands wanting to get involved in the charity sector.

As Kurt Geiger subsidiary Shoeholics’ head of brand marketing Angela Asiedua pointed out, regarding the brand’s charity partnership with Smart Works for its ‘Shoe Good’ charity arm, there’s no better time for businesses to do some good: ‘Shoe Good a key mission for us moving forward, especially after the challenges of covid. It seems more important than ever that we look after each other and help where we can’.

As part of the team-up between Shoeholics, Smart Works were able to give donated shoes and bags to the unemployed women they coach and support back into work. ‘With the support of partners, we can be ready to help any woman who needs our support with the tools she needs to succeed,’ said the charity’s CEO Kate Stephens.

Such team-ups can be light-hearted in tone, too. Prostate Cancer UK has a remit that requires sensitivity in its messaging – the charity has partnered with brands like Below the Belt Grooming for Men, which often use playful branding. Their partnership was a perfect fit – the brand pledged to raise £10,000 for the charity during 2018, with funds going to research into diagnosis and treatment, as well as support for those impacted by prostate cancer.

‘It is partners such as these that will help us make prostate cancer a disease that the next generation of men need not fear,’ said director of fundraising James Beeby.

Awareness-raising and starting conversations about frightening topics is a key element of these partnerships. Just as the reputation of a charity can help highlight the credence and kindness of a business, that brand can give the charities it works with the benefits of its own ‘personality’; sometimes humorous, blunt or straightforward.

As shared by Numan’s marketing manager Abbie Moujaes in her guest post on healthcare comms, a straightforward tone can be difficult to nail when your subject matter is so potentially serious and life-altering, but if you can nail it, it will pay off in awareness and engagement. A bold and no-nonsense tone in comms may not always come naturally for an established charity; it can for consumer brands who have it built into their brand DNA already.

If you’re part of a brand’s in-house team and want to work with charity initiatives like Red Nose Day beyond bathing in baked beans to raise money, there are plenty of possible partnerships that will fit your organisation’s existing values and add to its purpose. Brands like SalesForce have teamed up with Human Appeal and Hands On London’s UK Wrap Up event, which has had six years of success so far. In 2019 alone, the initiative helped get 5,219 warm coats to local charities.

Initiatives like The Charities Aid Foundation have resources for finding corporate partnerships.

As the past few years have shown us all, people expect more from the businesses they buy from. If you have found success with your brand’s comms plan, it is the perfect time to share the benefits of your skillset.

In need of PR and comms solutions for your charity? Take a look at how Vuelio’s services can help you manage vital relationships, reach influential figures and access the political landscape here.

For more on building a charity brand, catch up with our webinar on the subject with Scouts and Shape History.

Want info on helping a local charity with their PR strategy? Check out this previous guest post from Spike’s Andre Gwilliam.

And for charities doing great things with their digital content, check out these 10 Top UK Charity Blogs.

Email marketing trends

Email marketing: Top industry trends for 2022

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This is a guest post from April Mullen, director of brand and content marketing at SparkPost.

There are a lot of moving parts when it comes to marketing, especially in email. In order to keep ahead of fierce competition, it is vital that brands are on top of changes within the industry. Failing to adhere to new practices can damage brand trust and reputation and risk losing subscribers.

Generating more sophisticated email content can help increase customer engagement. This, in turn, leads to better deliverability, more conversions, and a stronger community for your brand.

With these challenges in mind, here are some key trends for this year, and how marketers can stay ahead of the curve.

1) Email design: the balance between engagement and accessibility
On the one hand, emails need to stand out with bold, engaging designs. But at the same time, they need to be easy to engage with. Are these two key email trends compatible? Sure! They just require marketers to be a little more thoughtful about how they construct their communications.

Dark mode: Over the past couple of years more and more marketers have been experimenting with dark mode in their emails. They are responding to consumers who like the option for a number of reasons.

Firstly, it’s easier on the eyes – especially in low light reading environments. Secondly, low brightness means more battery life can be preserved on mobile devices, and lastly some people just prefer it that way.

Dark mode should be treated like an email necessity, not an afterthought. If your designers are worried that it might limit their creativity, they needn’t be. In many ways it has the opposite effect. More thought goes into logos, brand colours, and layouts when considering dark mode.

Accessibility: It’s a golden rule of email marketing that messages should be able to be read by everyone no matter where they are, what device they are using or what their ability level is. But there is still some catching-up for marketers to do to achieve this. Not complying with accessibility can cause brand reputation challenges.

15% of the world’s population experience some form of disability. Why should they be prevented from interacting with your emails for the sake of a few lines of code and thoughtful design? Ensuring that minimum font sizes are used and that the text is properly aligned, among other tweaks, to meet accessibility requirements in 2022.

Emojis: Everyone loves a good emoji and for the most part, they work well in email – adding a sense of fun that is universally understood.
In 2021 more marketers began using emojis in email subject lines and headlines in a rather careless way. Some forgot that if emojis replace actual words, the overall message won’t make sense if images are blocked or won’t load.

The key, if you are going to use emojis in your subject line, header or in the main body of the text (which is good for mobile viewers as copy space is often limited), is to test and test again for effectiveness before you press send.

GIFs: A properly executed GIF in a marketing email can be a very powerful way of expressing brand values in a light-hearted way. But they must be used in the right way and within the right context.

Marketers need to ensure that GIFs used:
– Aren’t too flashy or overwhelming by having smooth transitions between each frame
– Include a static fallback just in case the GIF doesn’t load
– Always include ALT text for screen readers

2) Privacy changes continue to rock the boat
Privacy continues to be a hot topic for email senders, especially marketers. As the demand for relevant and personalised email increases in 2022, the barriers to collecting the actionable data necessary to meet that demand will increase as well. The loss of third-party cookies and new features, such as Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection, are likely only the beginnings of a paradigm shift that will continue to drive marketers to rethink data collection and usage practices.

Loss of third-party cookies: Third-party tracking involves data that’s not owned by the website you’re on – and it’s used after you leave. Let’s say you’re on Currys and look at a Camera, and then you go to John Lewis and see that same camera in an ad in your sidebar. That’s a third-party cookie tracking your internet habits. Firefox and Safari no longer support third-party tracking, and Google has announced they’ll follow suit with plans to sunset third-party cookies in 2022. The demise of third-party cookies puts a tailwind behind channels that leverage first-party data – email being the most pervasive channel using first-party data. We should all be gearing up for more investment in email and SMS because owned data is about to be more valuable than ever.

Apple Mail Privacy Protection (MPP): Back in June 2021, Apple announced MMP would be coming to their Mail app on all compatible Apple devices. According to Apple, “Mail Privacy Protection stops senders from using invisible pixels to collect information about the user. It prevents senders from knowing when they open an email and masks their IP address, so it can’t be linked to other online activity or used to determine their location.”

At a very high-level, since MPP will prefetch all images in an email, senders will need to be aware of the following:
– Open rates will be inflated
– Open times will be random and unreliable
– Device information will be unavailable
– User location will be approximated

As 2022 progresses, upwards of 50% of open data will become unreliable and no longer useful as a success metric. This means that marketers will need to take a more holistic approach to measuring the success of email programs. Below are some example alternative success metrics that senders can use:
– Clicks
– Conversion
– Engagement from other channels, such as your mobile apps

3) Generating personalised content with limited resources
Creating an engaging, interesting and personalised email can be a challenge especially if a marketer is limited in terms of time and resources. There are however a few shortcuts that they can employ to speed the process up.

Personalisation: Personalised content used to be the icing on the top of the cake in email marketing. In 2022 it is arguably the whole cake. With brands having to contend with privacy changes across the marketing spectrum there is more and more pressure to build personal relationships with customers and delivering bespoke emails is a highly effective way of achieving this.

Ultimately, brands that employ personalisation in a responsible way that truly drives value to customers and isn’t self-serving to the brand, will have happy customers.

Agile content: This is when marketers use feeds to pull in content such as product listings, job advertisements, properties, recent news directly from an organisation’s external source/website, etc.

Images, links, and copy can all be added in a few clicks without the marketer having to resort to additional technology to be able to do this.

4) Email production: the final step
Email production can involve a lot of different people within a company, often working remotely and invariably focusing on their own specific niche. Fortunately, there are tools that simplify the process while simultaneously unlocking the creativity of email teams.
Email Design Systems: The days of constantly creating an email from scratch will soon be gone forever. Email Design Systems are essentially modular templates that have been pre-coded. They enable marketers to deliver marketing emails quickly as automation means that there are fewer elements for them to be concerned about.

Email Design Systems enable:
– Seamless collaboration between everyone involved in email
– Fewer risks – e.g. less typos, more consistent branding, etc.
– Email campaigns that are quicker to produce and get to market
– More time to invest in better quality code, which means better quality email

BIMI: Brand Indicators for Message Identification (BIMI) is an initiative that was launched in 2019 that enables brands to send out emails with their logo appearing next to the email in the inbox.

BIMI is bound to be embraced by more and more companies this year for a number of reasons:
– Design: it helps emails stand out in an inbox
– Authentication: BIMI incentivises brands to adopt proper email authentication – DMARC in particular – when sending mass messages to consumers. Senders who put in the effort to implement DMARC are rewarded with the display of their logo
– Protection Implementing – BIMI protects brands against spoofing and phishing as customers can more easily recognise that the messages are legitimate

In our recent Benchmark survey, we asked which email innovations email marketers are considering adopting this year? BIMI was one of the main responses with 28% saying they are contemplating using it.

It’s never been more important to stay ahead of trends
Design, content and process are year-on-year major focuses for email marketers, but more so this year as privacy updates occur, changes to ways of working continue to take hold and brands fight to retain once loyal customers. If you haven’t got your design, content or process right, you can be sure that your email marketing will see an effect.

Ensure you’re targeting the right people for your campaigns with Vuelio’s Media Database and Monitoring.

Want more on email marketing and trends in PR and comms this year? Read this previous guest post from SparkPost company Taxi for Email on building strong foundations for a successful email campaign and this round-up of insight from industry thought leaders on what you need to plan for in 2022.

PR leaders celebrate International Women's Day

IWD 2022: PR and comms leaders support #BreakTheBias

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This is a guest post from the team at Hotwire Global. 

Imagine a gender equal world. A world free of bias, stereotypes and discrimination. A world that’s diverse, equitable, and inclusive. A world where difference is valued and celebrated. Together we can forge women’s equality. Collectively we can all #BreakTheBias.

That’s the theme for this year’s International Women’s Day 2022. We spoke to a number of PR and communications professionals in the industry to ask about their experiences and shed light on how we can all play our part to spark lasting change.

Rebecca Taylor-Cottle, Head of Communications, EMEA at Citrix
Rebecca Taylor-Cottle‘As communications professionals, we have a significant amount of influence within our businesses. With the right planning and dedication, we can use this influence to elevate women’s stories, sponsor women, and raise their profiles both internally and externally. In a former role, I did an audit of the people who represent our business in the media and found them to be just 3% women. I then looked for ways to improve things, running more media training for women, introducing new narrative arcs, and simply elevating women’s voices on social media. A year later, 30% of our media coverage had a female spokesperson. By acting as a sponsor for women, I created a much more representative view of our business from a media standpoint, and helped some of those women develop and grow in their roles. We may not be in charge of who is hired, but Communications teams can still have a huge impact on women’s careers.’

Melanie Coffee, PR and Media Relations Director at Crayon
Melanie Coffee‘I’ve been a storyteller for over 20 years and am always on the hunt for a good story to share. We often hear about the lack of women in the IT space, but there’s certainly not a lack of stories about us. It’s just a matter of taking a brief moment to look and listen for them.

‘When I find out about a cool project, I like to talk to individual team members, not just the person leading it. In doing so, you will often get different insights that strengthen your story, and it is more inclusive for the whole team.

‘When it comes to working to #BreaktheBias, early in my career I was fortunate enough to work with some incredibly powerful women who showed me the different ways in which they “owned their space” and they were unafraid to stand up for what they thought was right. I carry those lessons with me and try to pay it forward through supporting women and young people in their careers.

‘This can happen through providing feedback 1:1 on their recent presentation, taking a few minutes to push them to “own their space,” combating feelings of imposter syndrome, and my personal favorite: Stop telling yourself no.

‘Sometimes we talk ourselves out of an idea before we even propose it. That’s telling ourselves “no.” We need to stop doing that and instead push forward. And if we “fail” then make sure we “fail” forward.

‘It’s also being transparent in my own work and life. How I have failed forward, how I struggle to balance family and work. I am hopeful that by being open and honest with others I can help them learn along the way.’

Natasha Gay, senior account director and UK Hotwire Ignite Possibilities Programme (HIPP) lead, at Hotwire Global
Natasha Gay‘As an industry, we must do more to restore the diversity balance through actions, in order to shift the narrative. It all starts with people, and it can’t be done in a tokenistic way.

‘We can’t yet consign to history the idea PR is only for young, white women. According to the most recent PRCA census, 74% of those working in the industry identify as white British and the average is 38.

‘We should be actively looking for ways to increase the diversity of our workforce. This extends beyond recruitment – it starts at an education level. It’s about recognising and understanding why the industry has not diversified like other sectors. This is something that we at Hotwire feel very passionate about and, as a start, we are working with organisations like 10000 Black Interns to help address this.’

Vic Miller, VP PR & Communications at GWI:
Vic Miller‘The term ‘PR girl’ should be banished for eternity. Now in my 40s I rarely get ‘girl’ but the concept is still the same – the presumption that there is a woman who does PR and she’s at your service. This completely removes the understanding that PR and comms is a strategic role that often needs to set the strategy as well as deliver on it.’

For more on how the UK PR industry is marking IWD 2022, check out our blog here.

International Women's Day 2022 in PR and comms

UK PR and comms industry celebrates International Women’s Day 2022

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Is International Women’s Day still necessary to acknowledge in PR in 2022? While the workforce that makes up the PR and communications industry in the UK is mainly female, our sector is not fully equal across the board on gender quite yet…

Because while we’re on the subject of Boards – they’re still mostly led by men. Balancing home life and work – a necessary consideration for many women; not always for their male counterparts – has been even harder for many because of the pandemic and unconscious (and occasionally conscious) bias continues to impact career success. Where gender intersects with race, class and sexuality, the inequality built into our industry becomes even more difficult to overcome.

Yes – International Women’s Day is still important to recognise and celebrate, even in a sector that may seem to outsiders like it’s getting it right. So, happy IWD to all women; here are just come of the events and initiatives happening across PR and comms today to mark the occasion.

Recharging
M&F Health is giving its entire agency a day off in honour of International Women’s Day, encouraging staff to book a doctor’s appointment, take an exercise class or use the time to reflect and recharge.

‘74% of our agency are women and working in health and wellbeing as we do every day, makes us especially aware of the importance of taking care of our own health,’ says James Hollaway, M&F Health owner and managing director.

Inspiration for the move – the agency’s client Organon, which will also be giving its 10,000 employees a day off to prioritise their health, or the health of the women in their lives.

Educating
Over at performance marketing agency Journey Further, 160 members of staff across all three office locations will have access to a full-day event focusing on the three pillars of inspiration, education and celebration.

‘It’s important that the day is not only actionable, but also relevant to our staff,’ says PR director Beth Nunnington.

‘To ensure we are covering topics that will make the most impact, we spoke to a diverse group of women across the business, plus heads of departments, to gather feedback about which topics they would like us to put a spotlight on. Our day will include internal speakers, third party speakers, and existing content, such as Ted Talks and roundtable discussions. We’ll continue to drive this action all year round, not just on 8 March.’

Celebrating changemakers
With local London charities, the Charities Aid Foundation will be taking part in a Statue Walk with the Charities Aid Foundation, aiming to draw attention to how much work there is still to do to raise awareness about women’s equality and accelerate gender parity across the world, while celebrating women who have left their marks on history.

International Women's Day walk

‘International Women’s Day is a global day celebrating the achievements of women and efforts towards making the world a more balanced place,’ says CAF Bank CEO and leader of the IWD Statue Walk Initiative Alison Taylor.

‘This day also marks a timely call to action following two years of a pandemic during which women’s employment has fallen and inequalities involving childcare and unpaid labour have become more evident.’

Supporting with sports
Fourth Day has sponsored the Stockport Vikings Pumas U8s and U13s girls football teams – which play in the South Manchester Girls Football League and Cheshire Girls Football League.

The daughters of two members of the Fourth Day team play for Stockport Vikings Pumas, with one of the team, account manager Caroline Fletcher, also coaching the U8s.

U8s Pumas

Nikki Scrivener, co-founder of Fourth Day said: ‘Working with technology clients we still see lots of areas where women are under-represented. The same is true in football, so we can see obvious comparisons. But there are brilliant signs of change everywhere. IWD is a chance for everyone to celebrate this change and show that we are still striving for more.’

Keeping the conversation going
Vhari Russell and her team at The Food Marketing Experts are passionate about gender equality and will be weaving this into the way they work for 8 March and beyond.

Vhari said: ‘As a business we are part of a number of mentoring programs in which we have the opportunity to share and guide business owners and will be using this opportunity to help women in business thrive. We will be sharing blogs about women in the food industry that have bucked the norm and driven huge growth in their sectors. We’ll be sharing views and content for the whole of March, as it is important to keep the conversation going.’

For more on equality in comms, check out our accessmatters session with Melissa Lawrence about the Taylor Bennett Foundation as well as our interview Advita Patel about the work of A Leader Like Me.

For connecting with journalists writing about these issues, try the Journalist Enquiry Service to receive requests from them directly to your inbox, or get to know the writers covering your sector with Vuelio’s Media Database and Monitoring solutions.

How to support and showcase sustainability in 2022

How to support and showcase sustainability in 2022

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This is a guest post by Sarah Salord, company director at GEC PR.

Sustainability was firmly placed in the spotlight last year thanks to high-profile events such as COP26 and the G20 Summit, and as a result we are all becoming more aware of the impact our actions have on the environment and natural resources.

Consumers are becoming increasingly discerning about the products they’re purchasing and the way they are travelling. The word ‘sustainable’ is now much more than a slogan or catchphrase – it’s a key influence in the consumer purchasing process.

With shoppers now looking more closely at the businesses they buy from, it’s more important than ever for brands to showcase how they as a business and individuals, are incorporating and supporting sustainable practices.

GEC PR works with several clients with a strong sustainable story to tell, and it’s something we as an agency have pushed more to the forefront of our PR and marketing activity during the last year. Here’s how you can do the same:

1. Understand that journalists are now expecting press trips to be carbon-balanced or to have an element of sustainable travel
For example, dropping off and collecting travellers from the airport (also known as ‘Kiss and Fly’) has more of a negative environmental impact when compared with pre-booking airport parking. Therefore, we alert journalists to the benefits of airport parking through carbon-balanced companies such as our client Airport Parking & Hotels (APH.com) which can be one of the most environmentally-friendly and affordable methods of travelling to the airport, ensuring a minimum number of journeys and less time spent on the road.

2. Ensure your client’s long-standing responsibility to sustainable practices is shouted louder than ever
If a client has a strong sustainable story to tell, then place this at the forefront of the communication content plan and strategy. For example, what commitments has the brand pledged to social, environment and economic sustainability for the year ahead and what investments have been made to reduce its environmental impact or avoiding it completely?

3. Adapt your communications strategy where necessary
A key learning during the last few years has been the need to be adaptable and flexible when it comes to creating and managing a communications plan. Find out what big sustainable stories or new developments are taking place for the year ahead, and tie this in with topical content ideas. Also keep it flexible if a big news announcement drops suddenly which provides a platform or hook to shout about the client.

Responsible tourism is one sector during the last few years which has become increasingly important to media, and as an agency specialising in working with travel and lifestyle clients, we have ensured our client’s brand stories reflect this and will continue to do so. The conversation around sustainability will continue to grow and new trends will emerge, and as communication specialists, this brings more opportunities for creativity.

Want to know what travel media professionals  find useful from PRs? Check out our feature on how to pitch to travel journalists, featuring insight from those working across national, consumer and trade publications. 

For more on trends to watch out for in travel comms, download our white paper PR & Media Travel Trends 2021. 

Comms as part of business strategy and planning

Comms: an integral part of decision-making and strategic planning for business

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Kicked off by the pandemic, 2020-2021 presented some of the greatest challenges to businesses this century. As 2022 brings additional topics and issues to contend with, comms leaders are at the heart of an important phase.

At this year’s Corporate Communications Conference, comms leaders from brands including Virgin Media O2, Shell, Kellogg’s and BT provided insight and advice on key short and long-term issues and reflected on how the past 24 months rapidly altered roles and strategies.

The importance of comms in business decisions

Many organisations with executive teams that included comms leaders, departments and data as part of their strategic decision making from the start of the pandemic, saw reputation levels remain steady (even increasing in some cases) and operations continue to function well. The importance of insights that comms can bring, notably the perceptions of the organisation from the media, industry influencers, political sphere, customers and the wider public is high, yet utilising this information to shape key corporate decisions hasn’t always been accepted practice.

Naturally, many executive leadership teams consulted their finance and legal departments early into the pandemic, but including comms in the process allowed businesses to understand the reality of the human impact of the situation and provide a greater level of authenticity in their messaging. As the industry continues to evolve it will be interesting to see how the dynamic between exec teams and comms leaders will develop, as we move away from pandemic-oriented strategies and into prioritising ESG-centred comms.

Sustainability comms and the role of businesses in future

In an era of heightened change in social activism, political change and environmental issues, comms from an ESG perspective needs to be part of every businesses’ strategy. In ESG comms, the wider public are as much a part of the debate as internal stakeholders, including investors and shareholders, as well as staff. Actions versus communications was a key message from the conference, highlighting the real challenge businesses face to ensure what they are talking about doing in relation to sustainability aligns with the reality of their actions.

With ESG comms, businesses have a chance to boost reputation and distribute key business values, particularly as the purpose of business in society changes. There is a growing need for corporations to consider how they position themselves on social issues as well as topics that can be seen to sit outside of their direct business interests.

What does this mean for comms leaders?

As we look ahead in this decade, one of the real challenges for Comms departments will be determining the role of their organisations in society and working with executive teams to balance the voices of their staff and stakeholders with the wider demands in an ever-changing social, economic and political climate”

Find out more about the trends to plan for in 2022 in PR and communications in our round-up of insight from industry thought leaders.

Want more on stakeholder management and engagement? Find out how Vuelio can help.

Accessible Communications Guidelines for Spring 2022

PRCA releases updated guide to help PRs deliver accessible content

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The Spring update of the Public Relations and Communications Association (PRCA)’s Accessible Communications Guidelines is now available for download.

Following its original release in April 2021 and produced in partnership with Current Global, the guide aims to aid PR and comms practitioners ensure that their content is accessible for all audiences they’re hoping to engage.

PRs who want to learn more about accessibility and improve their current offering can find advice and information on creating video and animated graphics as well as the use of language and the importance of representation. In addition to advice on digital and print content, the guide also features best practice on hosting fully-accessible events, both virtual and physical.

PRCA Director General and Chief Executive of ICCO Francis Ingham said:

‘Our guidelines for accessible communications are designed to help every member of the PRCA and the wider industry create more inclusive content and campaigns. The technology and tools to help us do this are readily available. The key priority is to update the way we work to adhere to best practices laid out in the Spring Edition document.

‘I want to recognise Current Global for partnering with the PRCA to develop these guidelines and for helping us instigate change across the industry. I would also like to thank our Digital Inclusion Partner Texthelp for their invaluable contribution to the Spring Edition.’

Current Global co-founder and CEO George Coleman added:

‘Every day content is published that isn’t accessible to all. Over a billion people worldwide have some form of disability, a significant audience many are excluding by default or design. We must change this. Morally, and commercially, it’s the right thing to do. It’s been extremely encouraging to see how well the guidelines have been received to-date; but it’s dynamic space, so a year on it felt timely to do a refresh. We hope they continue to be a valuable practical resource that contributes to meaningful change across the industry.’

The Accessible Communications Guidelines can be downloaded in both PDF and Word format.

For more on accessibility in the public relations and communications industry, here are five ways to make your workplace more inclusive for dyslexic people as well as this interview with Mark Webb and Sudha Singh on fairer representations of disability in PR.