SEVENTYPR BLOG MOVES

Hi all,

We have now moved our blog to our website so it is now incorporated into www.seventyninepr.co.uk so we can manage it much more easily.

So, dont despair, simply visit
http://www.seventyninepr.co.uk/blog

Thank you.
Anas

PR and Marketing to the ethnic consumer population in the UK

UPDATE -

Since we last posted a little while ago, there has been some activity on a national level.

A report has finally been published extolling the importance of targeting the ethnic consumer and why it is vital create dedicated PR and marketing strategies for them. It came a full month after 79PR, on this very blog, gave you the run-down on how you can do it and integrate within marketing plans.

The published document talks about why advertising and marketing spend should create focused campaigns for the increasingly diverse UK ethnic population.

It’s a topic we have been campaigning about for years. What the report doesn’t do is show you how to do it. It's all well and good telling UK marketeers what they should be doing, but it's not a case of just going and doing it. It requires specialist planning and attention and that is why 79PR devotes so much time to this topic and is now a ethnic PR specialist.

Check out our blog last month (which has been recieved fantastic feedback) on a comprehensive run-down on the things you need to consider and do even before you create a marketing plan for ethnic consumers. 79PR is currently in the midst of conducting one of the most comprehensive insights what the ethnic consumer’s behavioural trends and consumer habits are today via a dedicated research campaign.

The results will be out very soon. Keep it pinned to this blog.

Seventy Nine PR - A PR firm based in Leicester, ethnic PR specialist.

http://www.79pr.co.uk/

http://seventyninepr.blogspot.com/

Marketing and PR in 2010

2009 was a funny old year. This year definitely saw a seismic shift in the way that PR and marketing is executed.

It had to happen, but the internet and the digital revolution has taken over PR. Fact. In 2009 clients were no longer after the inches in newspapers and magazines. They wanted a bigger bang for their buck. And this meant embracing the digital age.

Although digital 2.0, PR 2.0, social media PR or whatever you want to call it was already on the scene, last year the egg fertilised.

And today building a marketing campaign has to involve web PR. Clients expect a digital presence. Facebook and Twitter campaigns are a must for the marketing managers.

Last year many PR agencies hastily rearranged their service offering by including digital into the marketing mix for their clients - to good effect. The reason PR, and digital PR in particular, did so well last year in a recession was the acknowledgement by businesses that PR actually provides good value for money. In a nutshell it costs less and brings credibility to your business.

One of the unsolved mysteries, and will remain so for a while, is how you measure online PR during evaluation type. Traditonal media was easy. Get a ruler, measure the inches and multiply with the ad cost. Then, depending on what PR agency you are, multiply it by 3,5 or 7 times to get the equivalent ad value (eav). In the digital world, things are not quite so easy. There are so many factors that need to be taken into account that it is a real task to get the eav.

Twitter - definitely the website for marketeers in 2009. Whether it remains so is anyone's guess. The funny thing about digital is that the more connections you make via social media, the more alone you get. Sure, digital campaigns give you the big hits and quick growth but are you actually engaging with the end consumer? Are you? Indeed, we reach a critical mass very quickly, but do we really know the people who become followers or friends. It seems via the digital revolution, and in particular social media, we seem to have traded quality for quantity.

If reaching a certain number on the friends list is seen to be a measure of success for marketeers, we have real problems. We know the names of the people on the friend list, and we know their friends of their friends, but do we really know who they are? The intimacy of your end-user seems to be lost in the tech waves. The more people we reach, the less we know about them and from a consumer and branding perspective this defeats the object of marketing.

Twitter and Facebook are a great way to grow the numbers, but for a consumer it really is a soulless experience. And when you lose the soul, you forget what makes the consumer tick. Sure, they will click on the link for your great new viral, but their affinity to your business ends when the video finishes.

Expect more of the same in 2010. The digital revolution will continue to grow. PR will continue on the road of creating even crazier stunts for clients to get column inches (see earlier posts for some stunts of 2009 or click here or here). Flashmobbing will become more popular. Another Meerkat-inspired character will front the campaign for something-saving website.

In my opinion Twitter will carry on growing, but somewhere along the way we will have to start paying for its use. It's not making money so it has to claw back money somehow. Staying on the prediction vibe, we will see more and more newspapers charging for content use. So, those media websites we visit everyday for free will become monthly subscription service.

We can't leave the blog without mentioning what 79PR will be up to. One of the major things we are doing is a guest blog for various publications to help those targeting certain markets. The editor of the publication will speak, in no uncertain terms, about how they would like PR's to work with them and what works and what doesn't. If there are any publications, especially ethnic outlets, you require more information for, then please contact us on info@seventyninepr.co.uk and we will help you. After plenty of work towards the back end of last year in event consultation we are looking to set up 79Events sometime in the next few weeks. And finally, we want to make a change for the positive. As such, we are in the embryonic stages of a major campaign to help youngsters understand media with a series of courses and seminars with industry leaders.

No doubt, we will keep you posted.

Best.
The 79PR team.

http://seventyninepr.blogspot.com/

A fantastic digital viral

Hello,

Back by popular demand! It's a personal favourite of the 79PR team and it continually makes into presentations we do on digital. It was on our old blog and disappeared following our website and blog redesign. So, after numerous requests, here it is again.

For those looking at it for the first time, have a look at how digital can transform your marketing - even for something as selling beds! However, a word of caution. The trick to making campaigns like this successful is how you virally market it. It's not as simple as just making the video and posting it onto video sharing websites. If in doubt, please contact 79PR team and we will explain this comment.

For background - The stunt was started by US university students, and was then taken up by staff at a furniture warehouse for Bensons for Beds in Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire, who made their attempt to set a Guinness world record for "mattress dominoes".

Forty-one employees at Bensons for Beds in Tewkesbury stood in a front of a mattress to start the sequence. The video of the attempt has gone since viral on the internet in what has become a big marketing coup for the company.

It goes to show how your business, with a bit of imagination (and a video camera) can come up with an effective ad without paying big sums to advertising pros.

An excellent way to create brand awareness through a clever marketing stunt.

Enjoy!

The 79PR team

Is social media a fad?

Still not convinced about the benefits if social media and what it can do for you?
Have a look at this.



http://www.seventyninepr.co.uk//digitalpr/#

Contact us if you need more information on the role of Digital PR in your marketing plans.
The 79 team