Category Archives: Creative News

Creative News, Marketing, PR and SEO, News, Retail

Cheshire Agency Launch New eCommerce Site For Natura Siberica

Cheshire digital agency Surefire Media have just launched a new eCommerce website for Natura Siberica UK that aims to improve the customer experience and leverage more sophisticated digital marketing tools.

Surefire Media were appointed to work with the brand earlier in 2020 and both the design and development team worked closely with Natura Siberica UK to deliver a new eCommerce website.
The previous website was limited in terms of functionality and layout and with well over half of traffic coming from mobile devices, Natura Siberica UK wanted a stylish ‘mobile-first’ website that would deliver a better user experience and enhance the visual representation of the brand.

Work undertaken involved migrating the Natura Siberica UK website from WooCommerce to Shopify and included extensive theme customisation.
The Shopify platform was regarded as the best fit for Natura Siberica and also opens up a whole range of new marketing opportunities through the use of powerful apps like Klaviyo which will facilitate smarter, more sophisticated marketing activities.

Jessica Smith, UK brand manager for Natura Siberica, said: “Working with team at Surefire Media has been a dream, from the initial phone call through to the final website.
“We needed an experienced company, who would understand the needs of our fast-paced industry, with the ability to respond to new trends and launch new products immediately. We felt that Dan and his team ‘got’ us from day one and are thrilled with our new website.

We’re really looking forward to seeing what we can achieve together over the next few years.”

Surefire Media marketing director, Shell Robshaw-Bryan adds: “We are delighted to be working with such a highly-regarded consumer brand.

With our continued strategic and development support, we’ll keep working closely with the team at Natura Siberica UK to deliver ongoing improvements, focusing in particular on areas like insight-driven conversion rate optimisation and marketing campaign planning as well as providing development support.”

You can see the newly launched eCommerce website at https://naturasiberica.co.uk

Creative News, Marketing, PR and SEO, News

New Search Agency Promises Non-Filtered Insights

A new search agency has been launched to reveal how audiences are really behaving online. Led by search expert, Jack Smithson, Vine Insights takes a fresh approach to helping brands stay relevant and connected to customers.

Based in London and Manchester, this next generation search agency focuses on rooting out customer needs and human behaviours to give communications strategies the edge.

Smithson is a former content director at London agency, Curated, where he worked with leading brands including Specsavers, Essilor and Travis Perkins. On the launch, Smithson said: “Our vision is to create a straight-talking agency that cuts out the jargon and focusses on real-life insights and the non-filtered picture.

“Too often, brands are led by the insta-version of what audiences want to project, rather than the reality. Within search, people have the freedom to be vulnerable, the ability to be educated and the desire to buy, all without judgement. If brands can understand the emotive triggers behind searches relevant to their products and services, they can create content that audiences want to see and engage with. It’s as simple as that.”

Vine is backed by the board of award-winning creative comms agency, Tangerine – Sandy Lindsay MBE, Sarah Halton, Mary Harding and Sam Gregory.

Vine’s chair, Lindsay explained: “The four of us have had a brilliant time building Tangerine into a market-leading, 70+ strong business together and we’ve been looking for another investment opportunity for a while now. Search and online insights is a really exciting area that is moving at pace, so we felt it was the perfect time to get involved. It’s never been more important for brands to know where to place their marketing focus and spend and we were impressed with Jack’s vision for where he could take the business.”

Creative News, Marketing, PR and SEO, News

Online consultancy The Evergreen Agency offer business support to 67 websites in two weeks

Leading online marketing firm The Evergreen Agency has launched a brand new initiative to help support other businesses through the pandemic with a free, personalised video review of their online business.

Aaron Rudman-Hawkins, Managing Director of the Bicester-based agency, who specialise in SEO and PPC, has spent two weeks and 60 hours reviewing 67 separate businesses, who have each received their own video review, completely unique to their own business website.

Aaron, who has continued to provide SEO and PPC services to his full time clients since the beginning of lockdown in March, had the idea to provide free video reviews to businesses, providing expert SEO insight with a personalised touch. The videos include a review of the businesses website as well as invaluable tips to improve their visibility from an SEO perspective. The videos, which are available completely free of charge are aimed at businesses seeking support and expertise in bolstering their online presence. Aaron is pleased to be able to offer his support during times of need for all businesses across the UK.

“I’ve always aspired to help people in whatever way I can and with the lockdown, more time is being spent online with no one able to venture out and about. The knock-on effect is businesses relying more heavily on their website and online presence so we wanted to help as many Oxfordshire businesses as possible to ensure they were set up properly to do this. 67 businesses have now been able to see real actionable recommendations and act upon them.”

Aaron added: “Businesses have realised the important role their website and online presence plays. Businesses also know there is a lot of bad advice and mis-information out there. Just being able to provide short videos in plain-English where I can physically show the viewer what I am saying and recommending. It’s simple and businesses have loved it.”

Businesses all over the country have benefitted from this initiative and with so many people at home at the moment spending more time online, now is a better time than most to make simple but incredibly effective changes to your website.

Lisa Moon, PR Manager at The Somerset Toiletry said:
“As a very small (mostly self-taught) team, it’s challenging to excel in all aspects of digital marketing. Aaron highlighted various aspects which we are overlooking in terms of SEO along with areas of growth in terms of paid advertising”.

Lisa further added that:

“With costs being closely managed under the circumstances, the opportunity to gather some really helpful insight and gain a deeper understanding of ways to improve our website visibility has been greatly appreciated”.

Due to the value, expertise and insight received by the websites who took part in the video review initiative, Aaron plans to continue this offering to help businesses get back on their feet. As restrictions begin to lift across the country and businesses resume activity there will be plenty of scope to improve their current online business models.

Awards, Creative News, News

Continued outstanding success for M Integrated Solutions at World Exhibition Stand Awards

M Integrated Solutions (M), the award-winning communications, digital and experiential agency has won an impressive haul of 10 accolades at the World Exhibition Stand Awards (WESA) for outstanding exhibition stand design and construction during 2019.

The World Exhibition Stand Awards celebrate the very best in exhibition stand design and experience whatever the show, wherever the location. Each of the winners was selected by a panel of judges representing the full breadth and diversity of the industry. Executives from organisations such as Messe Dusseldorf, Cisco, Shanghai New International Expo centre, RAI Amsterdam, ExCel and ADS, the UK Association of aerospace, defence, security and space were identified and then selected to be on a shortlist of over 55 companies.

Commenting on the wins John Young, Creative Director of M, “It is simply fantastic to win 10 awards at the World Exhibition Stand Awards. It is a great result for the dedicated team at M and our clients who continue to allow us to innovate and explore how their brands are viewed and enjoyed. We constantly try to create more experiential ways to bring brands to life, telling stories and showcasing technologies in ever more immersive experiences. It is also important to us that we continue to win awards for a whole range of projects even when the brief and the budget vary greatly. Regardless of the amount of resources at our disposal, we never lower our standards of creativity, dedication and quality.

“Of course, the trust our clients have in us, our innovation and expertise are going to be central as the global events industry comes to terms with the catalyst for change brought about by Covid-19. In this new world of social distancing and international travel restrictions, M’s proven approach as to how the medium of exhibitions is adapting is something we have already started developing. The British Pavilion at Beijing Horticultural Expo is a brilliant example of this, with physical visitor numbers in the hundreds of thousands and the social and digital reach into the ‘billions’ (measured independently by the FCO/DEFRA) the Show Gold Award for Best Pavilion demonstrates how a physical presence, when delivered with a focus on content and storytelling, can also reach a huge audience remotely.

“Face to Face is still one of the most effective ways to win “hearts and minds”, but our ongoing investment in new technology in Broadcast, Augmented and Virtual Reality and Digital Participation techniques for small size groups has now moved into the commercial phase. The recovery of the events industry will undoubtedly come, and M is ready and able to be at the very forefront of that industry resurgence,” concluded Young.

The M client winning entries were spread across 4 clients exhibiting at 4 different events. The total number of awards were seven Golds, one Platinum, one Diamond and one Silver.

Full details:

Department of International Trade, UK Pavilion at the Beijing Horticultural Show 2019

Best Pavilion, Gold
Best Stand at an Agricultural Event, Diamond
Best Story Telling, Gold
Best Sustainable Stand, Gold

BAE Systems, DSEI Exhibition

Best Stand at a Defence or Security Event, Platinum
Best Use of Technology, Gold
Best Use of Stand over 1000 sq metres, Gold
Best Reusable Stand, Gold

Airbus, UK Space Conference 2019

Best Stand, 25-48 sq metres, Silver

SES Luxembourg, Tier One Global Programme

Best Reusable Stand, Gold

To learn more, visit: https://m-is.com/

Appointments, Creative News, News

Cheshire Digital Agency Surefire Media Paves Way For Agency Growth With New Marketing Director

Based in Nantwich, Cheshire, Surefire Media is a digital agency that has been providing web development and marketing services since 2008. In 2018 they made the strategic decision to become a certified Shopify Partner and have since focused their efforts on eCommerce website development and marketing, gaining various individual Google certifications along the way.

Managing Director Dan Lindop states: “Whilst the pandemic has presented businesses with unprecedented challenges, we’ve also been able to identify and exploit some unique opportunities for our clients, for example, helping to get click and collect ordering quickly implemented.

Our decision to become a specialist Shopify partner agency has meant that with a large number of eCommerce retail clients, we’ve managed to navigate our way through the pandemic and have a clear strategic plan for renewed growth in place once life gets back to normal.

To help us move forwards and cement our reputation as a leading Shopify development and marketing agency, we recently made the decision to promote our Marketing Lead, Shell Robshaw-Bryan, to the role of Marketing Director.

This appointment will help us to move forwards and grow the business further whilst our clients will continue to benefit from the 20 years of commercial digital marketing experience that Shell brings to the role.”
Newly promoted Marketing Director, Shell Robshaw-Bryan said: “I’ve been with Surefire for nearly 8 years now and the close-knit team feel almost like family. I’m delighted with the promotion, though an appointment like this would usually warrant going out for celebratory team drinks – celebrating just isn’t the same on Zoom!

The last few months certainly haven’t been easy, but we’re confident we can come out the other side. I’m extremely proud of the fact that some of the very first clients we took on as a business are still with us thanks to our goal of fostering long-term working relationships. I’m very much looking forward to the challenge of helping businesses to recover in a post-lockdown landscape that we’re hoping won’t be too far away.”

Appointments, Creative News, Marketing, PR and SEO, News

David Hillier Takes the Reins as Head of Product Marketing at Adform

Adform, the Integrated Advertising Platform, has announced the promotion of David Hillier to Head of Product Marketing, a newly created role.

Hillier will be responsible for driving Adform’s product roadmap and implementing a Go-To-Market strategy ahead of new releases planned for later in the year. His role will be pivotal in bridging the commercial and product teams and building international awareness of Adform’s sophisticated Integrated Advertising Platform (IAP).

With a breadth of experience, Hiller spent more than five years within the television industry before moving to digital publishing, working for The Independent, London Evening Standard, and The I, before joining Adform in 2014. Having worked with and for Adform in various roles for nearly a decade, Hillier was the clear choice for the new product role. A passionate storyteller, he’s spent many years travelling the international conference circuit as a brand ambassador for Adform, communicating what the IAP means for the industry and speaking directly with marketers about their challenges and needs.

“Adform is a fantastic company to work for, giving me the freedom and autonomy to help make a positive difference to digital advertising – and I am very excited for this new challenge. This is a natural transition based on my previous roles and experience, and the ability to translate both product and commercial needs will help my team and the company to succeed. I’m lucky to work with a team that I’ve built trust and friendships with over many years, and I look forward to seeing what our passion for Adform’s proposition can achieve at an international level.” comments David Hillier, Head of Product Marketing, Adform.

“David steps into this new role at a perfect time. As a well respected technologist and evangelist with a rich background in creative innovation and hands-on experience drawn from his early publisher experiences, David is the perfect choice to bring Adform’s message to new audiences. His ability to translate technology into human terms is a perfect fit for educating on the full potential of Adform’s integrated advertising platform and I look forward to what he and his team will contribute to the narrative in the coming months,” added Louise Kloster, Senior Vice President, Marketing, Adform.

With a creative and empathetic approach, Hillier’s out of work pursuits help him to approach his role at Adform with an energy for innovation. Since 6th February 2020, Hillier has led a team of three as part of Adform’s 12-stong marketing department.

For more information, please visit: https://site.adform.com/

Creative News, News

Ten tips to ensure that your video content stands out

As some people return to the workplace while remote working increasingly becomes the new normal, we can be sure that video’s prevalence is not going away any time soon.

Effectively, every organisation will need to emulate Netflix in the way they communicate their brand, with the creating, scheduling and managing of their video content becoming more and more important.

Video provides an opportunity to be transparent, to present the face of the organisation and to communicate with humanity. This is incredibly important in these times when businesses have to communicate many difficult or strategic internal and external messages.

But it also typically takes a lot of time and money to get video looking right: two things in short supply for many organisations.

User Generated Content (UGC) provides an alternative to big budget productions, but how do you manage the often chaotic nature of UGC and ensure your message is consistently on brand both in look and feel and tone of voice?

The technology in smart phone cameras has improved so radically in recent years that you can now deliver footage of a quality close to that of professional video kit. But with the added opportunity of capturing the moment in a way never previously possible.

But it is important to create premium content so that you can rise above average video production values. Do you want to be a traditional TV company, or do you want to be more Netflix?

Here are my ten tips and insights into how to become the latter.

1. Stability, light and sound
User generated content is becoming more and more prevalent – don’t let the quality of video clips let your brand down. Three things about user generated content that are great: it can be relevant and timely – providing the immediacy of grabbing the moment; it provides the ability to provide a reaction; and it provides a feeling of authenticity.

But there are three ways in which UGC can let you down: stability, light and sound. So, always try to be as stable as you can when shooting footage; control as far as possible your shooting environment; light your subject well; and elevate the audio production to get better quality sound.

2. Time critical content
Keep internal messaging fresh and timely. With many people looking for guidance from trusted people and businesses on what to do when everything is so up in the air, a daily briefing from the CEO and senior management will help to keep a dispersed team together or a client abreast of ongoing changes.

3. Authenticity
This is essential, especially during these difficult times. Hit the right note with a personal piece shot by yourself, of yourself, from your own home.

4. Pre-record
Wherever possible, try to pre-record as well as going live. Pre-recorded footage allows you to shoot as many times as necessary to get the script bang on message; especially with an integrated autocue function on your phone.

5. Consider different locations
Now that we’re all highly skilled virtual workers, consider ways in which you can shoot videos across a number of locations or even countries. Wherever or whenever it is shot, it’s still possible to have the final product edited and passed through legal or brand compliance on the very same day.

6. Brand compliance
Do not let your brand compliance slip when times are difficult. Ensure you stand out from the crowd with professionally produced, fully branded animated intros, outros and lower thirds. These can easily be created well in advance of any shot footage and on-brand video content ensures continuity across all shared communications.

7. Control is key
Centralise all content creation and, more importantly, publishing. Keep full control over what is made public whilst at the same time empowering your staff or clients to run a little wild with their creativity giving them opportunities to create multi angle or even multi camera shots! The choice should be yours to see what fits and what should be left in on the cutting room floor.
8. Keep up with the changes
Right now, businesses need to respond to changes to their working environment and new ways of working on an almost daily basis. You need the ability to react to this and create timely video content whilst it is still relevant and on topic.

9. An essential element to every video
Make it fun, make it engaging or make it memorable. We should always be asking ourselves: will it be watched in its entirety and shared – will it grab attention and pique curiosity? What do you tend to pass on to your connections? Ask yourself if your video content is timely, relevant or rewarding. If it ticks any of these boxes, it’s more likely to be watched and shared!

10. Get it seen!
Promote your video content across social media channels or internally throughout your organisation, fully realising your video’s potential and making it easy for users to find and share.

Alex Hughes is the CEO and Co-founder of video editing platform Binumi Pro. Binumi Pro empowers organisations of all kinds to take control of their video communications in a brand-safe and scalable way. Using the cameras in smartphones, Binumi Pro enables users to shoot and deliver professional on-brand content at a fraction of the cost of traditional video production.

To learn more, please visit: https://www.binumipro.com/

Creative News, News

JPIMedia Achieves Better Campaign Outcomes With Genesys Cloud

JPIMedia helps people in the UK make informed lifestyle decisions using trusted newspapers, magazines and websites. Core to its business are multimedia campaigns and to ensure better outcomes, the organisation teamed up with Genesys, the global leader in cloud customer experience and contact centre solutions. Using Genesys Cloud, an all-in-one solution and the world’s leading public cloud contact centre solution, the media organisation’s employees can handle customer service enquiries with maximum efficiency.

JPIMedia had a long-term strategy to move to a public cloud platform with a single interface and open APIs for tight customer relationship management (CRM) integration. In addition to these requirements, it also wanted to offer its customers more choice by adding communication channels including email, SMS and web chat.

“We needed a simple, intuitive architecture so the team could configure queues, roles and users without involving IT,” says Rebekah Avill, head of commercial systems for JPIMedia. “After benchmarking cloud contact centre solutions from the market, our conclusion was that there was nothing that came close to Genesys Cloud.”

Smart Campaigns to reach the right people

Working with Genesys partner Foehn, JPIMedia’s CRM system is now embedded in Genesys Cloud. This close integration enables its 450 staff to process all incoming enquires faster while handling credit card payments securely through a single interface.

Additionally, due to intelligent routing, incoming calls are directed to the right experts with the right knowledge to handle queries. Agents also have customer data instantly available to them with full view of the customers’ name, location, purchasing and contact history, allowing them to handle interactions with efficiency while delivering a personalized experience to each individual.

One of the benefits JPI Media has realized is the ability to better target outbound communications. As a result of the preview dialling feature, employees can see the next contact on the list and tell the system to make or skip the call, at which point it is removed from the queue.

“Running successful campaigns isn’t only about increasing dials and connections, it’s also vital to make sure you’re targeting the right people,” Avill explains. “That’s how you convert new leads to build a happy, loyal customer base. Genesys Cloud allows us to easily compile call lists and scripts to build this customer base.”

Another key benefit to JPI Media will be the addition of an outbound SMS channel. “Many of our customers are busy tradespeople, such as plumbers and builders, who have their hands full and cannot always get to the phone,” adds Avill. “So, instead of placing a call, we intend to send them a text to remind them their advert is due to expire, along with a quick link so they can renew it when they get home from work.”

Additionally, making a switch to the cloud has allowed JPIMedia to gain better insight into its operations. Avill explains: “We used to struggle to measure productivity and customer behaviour. We knew that email was one of our most popular channels, we could only guess volumes and spot-check for quality. Now, we’ve have much better reporting and transparency of agent performance, channel management and coaching requirements.”

Business resilience advantages

The move to a cloud-based contact centre solution has also alleviated pressures from JPIMedia’s IT team who are no longer swamped with requests and can quickly adapt to changing business requirements. For example, during a temporary closure of one of its offices, JPIMedia simply diverted calls between its Edinburgh and Sheffield contact centres.

“Shortly after going live, we needed to add our customer service teams to Genesys Cloud and move them away from the PBX environment they’d used for many years” explains Avill. “We created, tested and executed the changes for 60 users and five new IVRs within a couple of weeks.”

Having greater autonomy and time back means the IT team can work more with other departments that need support. Onboarding lead times have been reduced. Today, training only lasts an hour, now that the user experience is more intuitive.

The cloud-based contact centre was also instrumental in ensuring business continuity during the COVID-19 pandemic. Following government regulations for UK citizens to work from home, JPIMedia was quick to enable home working for its agents with minimal disruption to day-to-day business. “We successfully transitioned 450 users to a temporary remote working model within five days following government advice. This allows our commercial teams to stay connected with our customers,” concluded Avill.

Creative News, Engagement, News, Pensions

Aegon personalised pension video summaries scoop award for innovation

Aegon’s unique video summaries were recently recognised in this year’s Financial Services Forum Product and Service Innovation Awards, securing the company the top spot in the Marketing and Communication category.

The animated video pension summaries have transformed the average pension communication for members of Aegon’s workplace pensions, featuring real time pension information such as fund values and contributions levels in a 3 minute video summary which provide members with a timely picture of their retirement savings position.

An example video can be found here: http://www.aegon.co.uk/content/dam/ukpaw/hidden/Workplace/video-summary-30-45.mp4

Members can access the videos online at any time – but videos are also delivered by email ahead of the paper statement that is linked to a member’s renewal date. Developed using a matrix of data and gamification techniques, the videos also feature the latest behavioural science insights to shape the design, language, sounds and features, ensuring members are fully engaged.

Videos contain 10 sections that are completely personal to the member and references lifestyle targets rather than setting retirement goals. These include age, value and investment status, with more than 3 million unique script and scene variations.

Digital pension summaries are just one of many ways in which Aegon is adapting its proposition and communication to meet and exceed customer expectations.

This most recent award follows recognition in a report by NextWealth that showed Aegon as one of the leading providers in the adoption of digital processes and the use of esignatures.

The analysis by NextWealth looked at 85 processes across 20 platforms to benchmark adoption of digital processes and the use of esignatures.

Mark Till, Managing Director, Digital Solutions at Aegon, comments:

“Digital communications are creating opportunities to engage people in ways few would have thought possible just a few years ago. Through clever use of customer data, we have been able to personalise communications in a way that really cuts through and which spells out how people can make the most of their finances.

“Video summaries are a great example of the type of innovation we are deploying across our business seeking to work in partnership with employers and advisers to transform the customer experience. We are at the beginning of this journey and have a number of exciting developments planned which we believe will transform the financial wellbeing of the UK.

Appointments, Creative News, News

Sussex marketing agency expands digital team with two new appointments

Sussex based full-service marketing agency PMW Communications has strengthened its digital team since the beginning of 2020 with two new appointments.

Eloise Vass joined as an SEO Manager, a part of the business that is growing exponentially. Eloise started her career as an SEO Executive at a digital agency and will now be working with PMW’s clients to develop SEO and content strategies, improve search rankings, and drive website visitors.

Harvey Woods spent a week at PMW in November as part of a work placement. The company was extremely impressed and he is now a full-time member of the social media team. Having completed a geology degree, Harvey began his career in that industry, but changed his focus after enjoying the creativity that came with looking after the company’s social media platforms.

Harvey commented:

“As well as creating engaging social media content, I’m working with PMW’s design team to develop some augmented reality filters for our Instagram clients, and it’s this focus on creativity that I’m enjoying the most; no idea is a bad idea.”

Eloise added:

“I was drawn to the diverse range of sectors and clients that PMW works with, and as it’s a full-service agency, I’m enjoying working with people across the whole marketing spectrum. Everyone learns something from each other and I’m excited to be part of the team.”

Peter Sutton, Managing Director at PMW Communications, added:

“The digital side of our business continues to increase, and I’m delighted to welcome Eloise and Harvey to the growing team.”