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Column Inches at Christmas Time

It’s that time of year again – news desks across the country are being snowed upon by a veritable avalanche of over branded, tenuous, Christmas-themed releases.

The majority of these releases won’t see the light of day.

But for the Consumer PR – this is probably THE most crucial time of the year to achieve column inches for your brand.

So what can you do to ensure your Christmas release doesn’t end up in the bin?

1. Be imaginative – and make it current:

We all know that news is on a loop and that papers will use the same stuff year in and year out – Cost of Christmas, Greatest Christmas Movies, Highlights of the Year – but is there anything you can do to make your story more current, more topical – give it a fresh top-line news angle – this could mean the difference between a stick and a page-lead.

2. Look at sales stats:

Sales stats are a great way to achieve product-based coverage – they can create interesting news stories because they make a comment on current trends and lifestyles – all great tabloid and mid-market fodder.

So look to see if sales of any products are up this year – it doesn’t even need to be a considerable increase – but if it’s an interesting enough product it’ll work.

Look into the reasons why this would be. Why are people spending more on XXX – is it due to a change in lifestyle – the recession – are men becoming more like women? Give it a reason.

Look into regional, gender or age differences in spending habits – who is spending more or less on what products? Make a statement about specific demographics.

3. Don’t flood the market:

One or two Christmas-themed PR stories will make a national newspaper each day. So don’t send reams of Christmassy press releases out.

It is not the case that the more journalists see your brand name, the more inclined they will be to use your Christmas release.

Think quality over quantity.

4. Don’t waste money on stunt-like festive PR shoots.

Balance risk and cost. Unless it’s an absolute cracker – stunts are a very expensive way to get no pick-up whatsoever.

Celebrity endorsements and pricey stunts can work but again, be creative – it needs to be a belter.

If you work in-house – use an agency who know what they’re doing – we rate Taylor Herring and Cake PR in the stunt department.

Here’s an example of a belter of a Christmas PR stunt for Lakeside shopping centre  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1325899/Chantelle-Houghton-reaches-new-heights-Lakesides-Christmas-tree-fairy.html

5. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking your story will appear because it has a Christmas slant.

Poor stories end up on the spike whatever time of year they are filed – and at Christmas, because of the sheer volume of releases being sent to news publications, you need to be even more creative than ever.

Consider, and I realise this is controversial – perhaps NOT giving your story a Christmas theme.

Coverage at Christmas is coverage at Christmas – it doesn’t necessarily need to be about Christmas.

Another New Face! Sarah Heron, our new Head of PR, introduces herself: "When I grow up I want to be……."

Well day one is half way through and I’ve been made two cups of tea and taken out for lunch - who said there’s no such thing as a free lunch? What do you mean that was just for the first day?

 My daughter asked me this week when I grew up what did I want to be? Well at 41 this may be a moot point, but I simply said “happy.” As we spend up to 20% of our life at work, I’m damn pleased I’ve found a chilled and going places agency to work for!

 As an avid shopper and lover of retail therapy, Raw is the perfect agency as it has a wealth of retail clients and shopping centres. I have also managed to jump on the bandwagon just as the PR department has been nominated for a CIPR award. Kudos!

 Since leaving Leeds Met Uni (too many years ago to mention) I’ve worked for many of Yorkshire’s PR agencies; including with the vivacious Kirstyn twelve years ago when I was a fresh-faced graduate. From there I’ve famicidely moved my way up to Head of PR, which is where I luckily find myself at Raw.

 When away from work my loves are simple:

1. My small daughter and the amusing things she tells me, like “Mummy wouldn’t the world be a better place if everyone just told jokes lots.” And that “rich people with land should give everyone a bit and share.”
2. Good food and baking cakes
3. Asti
4. Cleaning (yes I’m obsessive)

 

A New Face in the Raw Office!

Hi there! Just a quick blog post introducing myself, Joyce – the new Social Media Executive for Raw Creative Ltd.

I’m an Events Management graduate from Sheffield Hallam (as of July 2012) and claim Cambridge as my hometown, despite my indistinguishable accent (thanks to an American dad, and Italian mum and going to school with kids with Suffolk accents).

 As a lucky employed graduate, I am really excited to have found such a great opportunity with an exciting agency! My role here at Raw will be diverse, including looking after the social media accounts,  looking into social media strategies, community management, and content creation, as well as helping around the office and liaising with our in-house PR and design teams.

I have a real passion for social media (you can follow me on pretty much any platform out there!); I love how it changes all the time, and how it’s changing the face of communication, especially between businesses and consumers.

As well as social media, I love cooking (or rather, eating) food, reading as many books as I can, and travelling (don’t get me started talking about travelling or I’ll never stop), and my new favourite hobby at the moment is knitting (currently working on an excellent winter scarf).  My claim to fame is that Dick Van Dyke (from Mary Poppins) is my Dad’s uncle, and I once got a call-back to go onto Come Dine with Me.

It’s fair to say that my first day at the office has been great (and that’s not just my American enthusiasm); After a lunch with the PR girls, and getting my hands on the accounts I look after – I’m ready to get stuck in!

 

The Raw Studio Is On The Move!

The big move is on Friday the 20th January, and then fingers crossed we will be fully operational in our fresh new studio come Monday 23rd January. We are taking plenty of snaps of the big move, so no doubt they'll be a blog post made out of them showing off our new studio.

Im personally looking forward to getting my hands on the big blank walls at the minute. If you have any inspiration you can throw my way regarding design studio or office interior design ideas, then do so. Have plenty of ideas so far but no harm in having more.

Holidays Are Coming!

THE SPARKLE OF CHRISTMAS ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS

The evenings are getting darker, days are getting colder and grand light switch-ons are happening all over the country. Back in the day, wintery signs like these would symbolise the beginning of the Christmas season. Not anymore, due to the phenomenal brand power, the beginning of the nation’s festivities is now triggered by the first play of Coca Cola’s uber popular holiday anthem, ‘Holidays are coming’ on our screens!

This year, the multi billion dollar company is pulling out all the stops for its Christmas advertising campaign. As well as the television ad, which had its first 2011 play on Saturday 12th November, and the annual limited edition Coke Can featuring the world’s most renowned fizzy drink-lover, Santa Claus, the age-old Coke lorry is touring the country! Visiting 100 locations nationwide, the giant truck will be spotted by millions, bringing to life the advert in celebration of the brand’s 80th year of festive advertising. Now that is a campaign to be proud of.

The power of festive TV adverts cannot be denied, Toys R’ Us recently experienced a Facebook backlash after replacing their original ‘Magical Place’ Christmas ad with an ultra modern version with a brand new theme song. The advert, which was first shown in 1989 (the year I was born!) was, for many, a treat they expected on their screens throughout the season. Christmas is a traditional time of year and the great British public love their routines. National brands choose to take full advantage of this, creating advertisements that become a part of the yearly festive routine, M&S and John Lewis never disappoint at getting viewers into the Christmas spirit and the new Littlewoods advert certainly tugs at the heart strings of the impressionable public.

Better go, we have some Christmas Press Releases to be getting on with!

I Found A Blood Donation Advert At The Chip Shop Awards

With the Chip Shop Award winners being announced in just a matter of hours, The Drum has highlighted a few of the many entries to feature actor Charlie Sheen. Who was on the mind of many creatives as the sacked catchphrase spouting twitter legend.

One of the entries takes on a subject I talked about tackling on our blog the other day, 'Giving New Life To Corporate Identity'. Which was all about an identity for organ donation and how I wanted to have a go at blood donation. I don't think this one would fly but funny never the less.

The Chip Shop Award winners will be announced later tonight at a ceremony in London, and if you're not going, you can follow The Drum's live blog from the event - taking you through everything that happens.

Or you can join in the conversation on Twitter through #chipshopawards

Check out the Chip Shop Awards website to see further finalists for this year's awards.

Giving New Life To Corporate Identity

I was thinking about a similar topic to this the other day 'Blood Donation' and how a lot of people including myself don't even think about going and giving blood. This put my creative hat on and how I would go about connecting with people like me and encouraging them to go and do it.

Then I came across this, a corporate identity designed for an organ donation initiative created by DDB an advertising agency in Dubai. I think it works as a simple, well executed logo that strikes an emotional chord and subtly prompts people to open up to the idea. When you pledge an organ, you gift someone a new life.

Would probably still want to tweak this slightly myself but love the idea, may start with my own blood donation project first.

How To Drive A Graphic Designer Crazy

COMEDY WARNING - Just a note before we start, this is supposed to be sarcastic and funny. So please don't follow too closely. Sources: myself, fellow designers and design haters.

Designers are admittedly a rare breed, but who do graphic designers think they are? I mean, it’s the client that came up with the idea to get something designed, it’s the client that is picking out the colors, it’s the client that’s doing all the work. Right? All the designer is doing is putting some colors on a screen.

Here is what I’ve found out you can do to really drive your graphic designer crazy. Not sure why, but designers are a little touchy and precious about their creations.

Microsoft Office

If you’ve got a great idea, put it into Word and send it to the designer. Got images? Toss them into Word too. Flowcharts are definitely best in Excel. All your assets should come in some Microsoft document because everyone loves Microsoft Office.

Fonts

Helvetica, ask for Arial. Arial ask for Comic Sans, this the best font ever. Hands down.

More is better

What’s all that white space? Lets add some images up in that margin. Also, we can shorten up the page if we get rid of all that white space in-between paragraphs. Margins and padding are for dummies. That’s valuable real estate. Ohh maybe we could put some clip art up there. If you have a child who is currently working on his art project, get him to sketch out what you want with his crayons. Designers love that.

The Logo

Always send your logos to the graphic designer in a Word document. Didn’t you already learn this? It should be small and low quality. Ask them just to take it off your website. Don’t worry, they’ll be able to perform magic and make it look awesome; at no extra cost of course. Once they get it in the design, always ask for it to be bigger. Bigger is better. Make everything bigger.

Get Specific Generic

Here are good things to say to your designer: I want a design that really speaks to me. Something that is now. Can we add a little pizazz and jazz it up just a bit? Make it pop. Our goal here is to make it aspirational. We want it to be different but just like theirs. We are looking to target children, families, couples, students and we also attract a lot of OAP's. You have the freedom to be really creative here.

Then when the designer adds pizazz and all that jazz, tell them that you didn’t want your design to look like that. What the hell were they thinking? You told them what you wanted, something very simple (attach new word document with scanned pencil scribble)

Copy (the text)

Remember to send through a full A4 page of text to go on your A5 advert. This is important the more information you get on your advert the more the consumer has to read. Remember also to keep repeating yourself to get that message across. How about pulling things out and adding it again in big colourful stars?

Colours

Pick strong colours like red and blue. And when the design comes back to you, tell them you didn’t want red red. Have them bump it down a notch. And that blue is too blue. How about we change that to more of a sky blue. And where is the green?

Deadlines

Take your time approving the design. This is an important decision so take days, weeks or even longer. But once you give the feedback, demand that the designer turn it around in less than 24 hours. I mean, how hard can his job be? You did all the work here.

And we’re done!

This is great, it’s perfect. We’re all done, except can we make the lady a little more happy and that blue is more of a morning sky blue, can we change it to evening sky blue? Also that night time skyline is too dark can we make it sunny?

Ohh and I have another project for you. Since you know my style, can we do it in 1/2 the time and cost this time? It’s pretty much the same thing, only different colors and layout.

Finish us!

After you have beaten them within an inch and they have abondoned all hope of winning an argument. You want it yellow and purple?, yellow and purple it is. Six differnet fonts? Sure. Once these crucial final amends have been made, tell them you are disappointed by their lack of initiative. Tell them, they are the designers and you were looking for their expertise and talent. That you expected more creative input.

You should now have a broken designer. Now all you have to do, is wait to complain about the print you sourced yourself ;).

Something For Guys To Keep In Mind This Christmas

By Craig Marshall

When buying your loved one gifts this Christmas, just keep this Ad for JC Penney: Beware of the doghouse in mind. It's easy to get there, not so easy to get out! I have already exchanged one gift, thanks to this little bit of genius from Saatchi & Saatchi.

Credit Squeeze & Recession? Advertise your way to safety

By Craig Marshall

First of all the media was full of the credit crunch, then it was economic slow down but now the dreaded ‘r’ word has started to rear it’s ugly head.

Several indicators suggest the UK in 2008 is at least in an economic slow down; house prices are falling, many companies are announcing reduced profits and the figures from the British Retail Consortium suggest that the high street is suffering its worst performance for three years. The work on the iconic two Lumiere towers in Leeds has been put on hold due to the most difficult credit conditions in 30 years. 

So what do you do facing a recession? Is it time to pull on the purse strings? Do you take out the hatchet and cut your marketing budgets to save costs? Is this the right thing to do?

The first thing to ask yourself is whether you see your marketing budget as a cost or an investment. The best way to look at it is the latter but you would expect me to say that. However there is evidence to support the case for maintaining or even increasing your marketing spend.

In times of a recession, the market can provide an opportunity for businesses to build a greater share of the market through aggressive advertising without affecting short term profit. On the other hand businesses that reduce media spend suffer a loss of market share.

How can this be, well basically look at it this way. It is something called ‘share of voice’ (the percentage one company has of the total amount of advertising directed to the same target audience). In a recession, it is likely that some companies will reduce their advertising spend, which allows those companies that maintain or increase their spend to steal market share from them.

This suggests that success in a recession is not just about being ‘brave’ and continuing to advertise and invest in your business, but it also requires that at least some of your competitors aren’t so bold and are cutting back. So during the credit squeeze it is inevitable that your pockets might feel a bit deeper, that is why you want a brand and design consultancy that produces outstanding results everytime. Achieving the return on investment you are looking for and getting more for your money.

So when you are reading the headlines over breakfast tomorrow and it’s all ‘economic doom and gloom’ it might be time to get your marketing team together and give us a call on 0113 394 7979 and ease the pressure of the credit squeeze.

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