Nick Band

This article on PR Week yesterday offered nothing new in times of the PR recruitment market. It is hard. It has always been hard. Attracting and retaining the best talent is a constant challenge for PR agencies. Never in my 20 years' in the industry has there been a "easy" time for hiring. It has typically always been skewed to candidate led or client led. That said some of the challenges of course have changed, both with attitudes of candidates and agencies but also methods of hiring. I remember having to ring prospective candidates at their work desks to headhunt them, well before people would just send off generic messages! What I always say to candidates and clients is it is always evolving and always changing. The lows don't last, but nor do the highs for either side. Retaining your best people is always your first step in also hiring the best. Hiring for attitude and aptitude over "perfect on paper" almost always works better. Listen to your people, what are their priorities? Actually action things you discover. Listen to your recruitment partner, we have a huge amount of insight into the market and what candidates want, which processes are working and where people want to work. Oh and above all else. If you want to have the best teams, hire diverse talent. It makes commercial sense, you will do better work that reaches wider audiences and to top it off "a diverse and inclusive culture" regularly comes up high on priorities for my candidates. Yes times are tough right now but "this too shall pass". https://lnkd.in/eSBsQ-95

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Clearly PR has hit 13,200 viewers of its content this year so far - not literally of course, that would be disastrous for our own PR. There is a theme that has emerged over the type of content which resonates the most. After the home, about, team, and careers pages, the most accessed content away from the structure of the site itself has been as follows: 1. CASE STUDIES: This supports the assumption that customers want to look beyond the bling and see if you really do deliver on your claims. We're very happy about this as we've got some absolute crackers on there, with one case study in particular taking centre stage (https://lnkd.in/encEz3Uu). 2. INSIGHTS: B Corp to B Corp Newsletter - our free fortnightly newsletter aimed at helping fellow B Corp businesses to get more from their PR. No sales, no sign up required, just great insights and real-world practical PR ideas for businesses to consider for their organisations (https://lnkd.in/eaHgpptz). 3. ORIGINAL RESEARCH & THOUGHT LEADERSHIP: Greenwashing Index report - an analysis of the prevalence of 'greenwashing' mentions in the UK media. Did you know that mentions increased more than 50% in the six months to 31st December 2023? (https://lnkd.in/eRYk_dqr) 4. TOPICAL COMMENTARY: Sunak's comms team screws up again - thought leadership piece on a trending story that caught the media's attention (https://lnkd.in/gpwpu4_k). 5. HOW-TO: How to get media coverage as a new B Corp business - this was a piece to camera that I recorded that provided a number of tips on how B Corps can get the attention of the media at a time when being a B Corp is no longer newsworthy (https://lnkd.in/eZYgfKds). So, in summary, content that adds value, offers possible solutions to everyday business challenges, sparks new ideas and innovations, and backs up your claims of how good you are as a service or product provider to those consuming it, is picked out by your audiences which in turn helps you stand out. Hope this helps you when planning your own content calendar for 2025! #PR #ContentMarketing

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A lot of great people from a lot of great agencies have added their voice to this piece from Siobhan Holt in PRWeek UK, so naturally I’m keen to chip in my two pennies too.    Let me start by saying this: pitches are great. I love that collective agency energy when you’re working on a big response and how they push us to challenge our thinking. Obvs I love them less when we don’t win, but: life. They can be brilliantly run and terribly run, and while I think a pitching code of conduct is a lovely idea, it’s one that perhaps feels a tad lofty in ambition, needing buy-in from, well, everyone - agencies and brands - to work. Until such a time that we enter PR utopia, I think agencies need to figure out what their hard lines are and stand their ground more. There are also plenty of great clients out there who run brilliant pitch processes, and even when we don’t win, we feel valued and respected. Be more like them.   Adding to the list, some of my personal pitching red and green flags include:   🚩 No budget? No thanks. Giving a budget, even a ballpark, is essential because we want to shape our response to fit what the brand has to spend. Otherwise we might come up with a corker of an idea the client can’t afford and that will make them sad 💚 People who give the gift of time. We work quickly but obviously we will deliver a better and more in-depth response when we have been given a decent chuck of time to respond   🚩 8+ agencies on a pitch list. Brands should feel empowered to be braver and only choose the top 3-4 agencies they really want to see 💚 Client teams who equally invest a significant amount of their own time into the process and who who make themselves available outside official check-in moments for clarification and sense checking. Big fan    🚩 “Submit your pitch online and we’ll shortlist the ones who will get to present.” *Shudders*. Time investment from the agency aside, I guarantee we will bring our ideas to life better than you reading them ever will (even if you have a vivid imagination) 💚 Proper post pitch feedback for the ones you don't win - it's hugely appreciated when clients show respect for the effort, the agency and the work that went into the response, and we want to hear where we fell short. Tell us, ideally on a call   🚩 Key decision makers not being involved in each stage of the process. From the Q&A to the tissue to the presentation, everyone has a different point of view, different motivations and different objectives – and we want to hear them! That collective thinking helps us shape the best, most considered response    These are fair questions and challenges to ask from the outset of a pitch, but there will always be some processes you enter which will take you close to your hard lines. Then it’s up to you whether or not you choose to step over them. #pitching #newbusiness #pr #comms

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Good morning today spent with one of our clients at 44 Communications Ltd talking through the results of recent research into one of their core channels. In the past (read: pre-covid) we used to run semi-regular Focus Groups to find out what employees were interested in for the channel. Whilst they were valuable, they took a lot of time to organise and pulled hard-pressed workers off the job for an extended period of time. Not easy to do when there are deadlines and priorities competing for attention. So, this time we worked with the client on a programme of 'Speed focus groups' - fast conversations with employees asking a set of questions and quickly exploring themes. No more than a few minutes of time but some great insights and ideas raised. Added to survey results, these give some flavour and life to the numbers, helping us work with the client to frame an action plan. It's not the first time we've done these. It can be hard getting opinions from front line workers whose priority is service delivery on tight schedules and with limited resources. So, it's important we take time to design measurement approaches that fit their world rather than demand they fit into ours. Just goes to show, research and insight can be done even when operating circumstances may make it seem difficult. It's always worth asking the question "what do you think about...". #internalcommunications #research #engagement #measurement #channels

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Finding your north star story Our bespoke storytelling workshops will bring your brand to life. If you want to create a compelling and consistent north star narrative that will guide every conversation and all marketing collateral, then it's time to spread the word through storytelling. Through the power of narrative, we elevate brand messages to become more memorable. Why? Because, web sites become more welcoming, pitches and presentations become more powerful, social media more shareable, speakers more striking, content more colourful and PR more influential. Through storytelling, we care less about facts and more about feelings. This is how we help you cut through the noise. #global #PR #brandstorytelling #contentmarketing #marketresearch

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"About two-thirds of the agencies taking part in this year’s PRWeek UK Top 150 Consultancies project continue to have all-white boards." PRWeek UK Does this come as a shock? No, Not really for people working to build a more inclusive industry. These numbers were to be expected. I feel some anger and more despair..............It is not just me but research shows that most DEI efforts since BLM and COVID were performative and opportunistic, so they were doomed to fail. Within our industry there has been a disproportionate focus on diverse hires, numbers and representations - but at lower levels. Here we are talking about some of the most powerful agencies in the world and the UK. They advise clients on reputation, DEI, sustainability and are asking their clients to change to be relevant in the future! Ironical considering they are not willing to or see the need to change. Change does not happen when you maintain status quo. Change does not happen when you don't invest time and money into enabling that change. Change also does not happen without a vision. And change will definitely will not happen without the buy in from industry leaders and board members. Incremental change is good, but increasing representation at leadership levels and in the C-suite requires transformational thinking, a willingness to adapt, to recognise that this is an imperative, allocate resources and hold themselves accountable. To see any real change in my working life we need to recognise that ethnic minorities with leadership aspirations face (and will face) the broken rung, the glass ceiling, glass cliff and a system stacked against them, that encourages homophily. Small comfort that the number of black and ethnic minorities in the industry has increased from last year, but we know leadership aspirants will drop out when they cannot see role models or people like themselves leading. Industry leaders know that DEI can no longer just be a talking point or tick box, it is a fundamental building block of social justice and a human rights concern. We will be held to account! So, let's see leaders step up, and be accountable not just for profits but for building a fairer industry. Well done PRWeek UK on the insights👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽 #buildbackbetter #inclusionandbelonging #rolemodels #ethnicminorityleaders

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At last the UK's creative services industry is getting the recognition it deserves. It's on a list of eight industries the UK government considers ‘growth driving sectors’ and is included in a new #industrialstrategy, published on Monday. (The strategy is contained in a document called ‘Invest 2035: The UK’s Modern Industrial Strategy’.) Call me thin-skinned, but I've always been frustrated our industry has been overlooked by previous governments, who have not recognised that it’s world class and a significant contributor to our economy. That fact is acknowledged by the government in its report that notes, ‘According to the Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre, the creative industries accounted for 67% of the UK’s digital exports in 2021’. HMG’s plans for the industry include ‘unlocking private investment, boosting exports, and developing its highly skilled workforce’. So far, so big yawn. What’s more interesting is the government’s recognition that ‘the sector plays an important role in driving growth across regions and nations, through creative clusters and corridors across the country that spread opportunity and prosperity in communities’. For those of us with long memories, we’ll recall that regional creative clusters is not a new idea and in some areas, such as Brighton or Bristol, these have happened naturally without government encouragement. But. The government has included our industry in its Magnificent 8 and so we should be thankful. Other countries, notably Germany and Japan, have better track records when it comes to national industrial strategies. It may be because they're culturally more comfortable with the  ten year plus time frames involved, whereas our political time frame of minus four years hold sway. And a top down, centrally driven plan may sit uncomfortably with an industry that has ‘creative’ in its title. But the demand is there. You only need look at the giant Shinfield Studios - a hugely impressive 18 stage, film & TV studio complex in Reading and the even bigger one planned for Sunderland to see that international investors have already given our industry a vote of confidence. And the jobs are there too. A scan of online jobs board, indeed, shows there’s 3,000+ social media jobs currently open. I can't vouch for the quality of these jobs, but if they’re in agencies I'd like to think they’d be in a benevolent working environment with an emphasis on respect, collaboration and personal development. The government’s strategy is in a Green Paper that’ll be upgraded to a White Paper after a consultation period that ends on November 24th. By then it wants to hear from the industry and I’d urge anyone in my network who’s involved in a professional trade association to lobby their body to submit something. It doesn't have to be long; a single side of A4 will suffice providing it’s cogently written. But we have an opportunity here to help further shape a world beating industry. 

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We've been creating again. Here's our latest mini-guide to crafting a meaningful PR strategy in a changing environment. What are your key PR concerns today?

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There are few whose names are more synonymous with the UK #PR industry than Matthew Freud. He pretty much invented the concept of networking... Anyone in our industry - or with an interest in politics, the cult of celebrity or the power of the media - should listen to this podcast from When it Hits the Fan with David Yelland and Simon Lewis (you can find it on BBC Sounds). There's so much to unpick, but one fascinating claim Freud makes is that reputation - which the PR function is responsible for - can increase the value of a business by 50%. He argues that if you have two identical, publicly listed companies but one is more 'widely admired' than another, it would command a 100% premium. A powerful statistic. Why don’t PR or communications budgets reflect this? We’ve tended historically to be the poor relation to marketing in terms of spend. Reputation should be the biggest priority for the C-suite; whether that's ensuring the workforce (internal comms) is clear on the values and vision of the business; or sending out the right messages to the market. Also, a good reputation means current and prospective customers will respect, value and aspire to connect with the business. You don't have to be a celebrity or politician to care about reputation - every business should be ensuring that everything they do reflects the values they want to adhere by - whether that's through their #ESG reporting, their #socialmedia community or their #mediarelations. Does the PR industry have a reputation crisis of its own?

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Is business development currently your biggest headache? Certainly, two recent surveys suggest this is the case for Agency Leaders. According to a report in PRmoment, research from The Pulse Business Ltd states that 63% of PR & Comms Agency CEOs are grappling with new ways to grow their businesses. And the recent BenchPress State of the Agency Nation Report (for agencies over £1m) highlights that 40% of Agency Leaders cite winning new business as their biggest challenge. Would you like to take a quick but effective diagnostic that will help you better understand how to treat this headache? My business development scorecard has been specifically designed to help agencies better understand their level of fitness when it comes to sales. By asking searching questions around: 1️⃣ Positioning 2️⃣ Process 3️⃣ Planning 4️⃣ Pitching You'll identify where your strengths and weaknesses lie across the agency. Test it on your senior team to establish if there is alignment (you might be surprised - often times there isn't!). And if it throws up suprises, I'd be happy to hop on a no-obligation call to discuss the findings. Let me know how you get on. 👇 https://lnkd.in/eZKF99kp

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A few days ago, I published the post below here on LinkedIn and on other social networks about my blog being in Vuelio's listing of the Top 10 UK PR blogs 2024. Some nice reactions here (thanks!) and there. On LinkedIn, though, within a few hours, I'd received email pitches and DMs from people wanting me to publish guest posts, with the promise that they'd promote the posts and "amplify my SEO presence," to quote one. All in exchange for "just a few carefully selected links," to quote another. It’s clear that LinkedIn is fast becoming a breeding ground for inauthentic, spammy, approaches. But the real question is: How do we maintain trust and authenticity in a space that’s increasingly being exploited?

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This is the forever conundrum in #agencylife There's a real disconnect between the 24/7 nature of comms (with social, 24/7 news cycle etc) and what new grads want from their workplaces. PR is not 9-5 by its nature. There are many ways of offering flexibility in workplaces but if logging off every night exactly on the button is your thing, your options for progression could be limited in #comms About to tune into the below to see if any of these fellow comms professionals have the solution... https://lnkd.in/eQMFSVH6

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Not so much a lightbulb moment as an ongoing evolution of an industry that was once very publicly accused of 'fannying about with press releases'. I defy anyone to have made the prediction 20 years ago that PR would become the wonderful toolkit of tactics that we have today. Of course, we expected change, but some of the ways in which we are expected to adapt copy and to deliver content are way beyond the parameters we were once given. While that can be somewhat overwhelming, not least as every day really is a school day, it is also really exciting as we explore current trends and new and innovative ways of working. We will be heading to London tomorrow to meet with a client and to capture multimedia content, trend-led social posts and traditional editorial copy to share with media. Never a dull moment and a further reminder that as an agency, Open Communications UK Limited is SO lucky to work with the best brands - and clients - that trust us to push boundaries and to try new things. Watch this space for updates. #PR #Tactics #Content #Multimedia #SocialMedia

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We think our Catch the Sun model is pretty useful for busy marketing agencies and departments. In this video, Maddie discusses how it works and why it’s so good at creating extra time for our clients around the globe. 🌎🔥 Keen to work with us? Get in touch today for a free 15-minute discovery call. 🎉💃 #communications #agency #copywriting #editing #proofreading #femaleledbusiness #founder #marketing

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The Chartered Institute of Public Relations State of the Profession Survey is out and I find this a helpful temperature check for my industry. Headline stat is that the average salary across the PR profession has fallen by more than £3000 in two years. Also tucked away in the Working Patterns section of the report, 37% of practitioners say their working hours have increased over the past 12 months. One saving grace is that the gender pay gap seems to be closing - down to £3894 from £7074 two years ago but there's still work to be done. I see this data as a reflection of what I see and hear anecdotally amongst clients and colleagues - comms pros are working their socks off but not always appropriately renumerated for it. The top challenge that respondents say they are facing in the next 12 months is AI and its impacts (39%). In the previous two surveys (2022 and 2021) mental health issues were the top challenge, and that still features in the top 10 challenges we face as an industry. The mental health of my fellow comms pros is fast becoming my Roman Empire. So how do we embrace the opportunities of AI and other practices to work smarter and not harder? Link to report below, also handy write up by Stephen Waddington - thanks for flagging this early doors yesterday.

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🔥 Crisis Management Lessons from the Frontlines 🔥 In our latest episode of Embracing Marketing Mistakes, we gain insights into crisis management from Ann Wright, founder of Roughhouse Media. With a background as a BBC journalist and media trainer, Ann shares invaluable tips on handling brand crises effectively and an amusing story about visiting the worst hairdresser in the country. Key takeaways: 📢 - 🤔Preparation is Key:** Establish a detailed crisis strategy. - 💬Effective Communication:** Understand team roles and maintain transparent communication. - 🚀Social Media Savvy:** Integrate social media into your crisis plan. Tune in to hear Ann's real-world anecdotes, from a high-profile media investigation to a hair-raising undercover operation! 🎧 Listen now: https://lnkd.in/eTz9mj2V #CrisisManagement #MarketingMistakes #BrandSafety #MediaTraining #EmbracingMarketingMistakes

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