At Proctors, our people make us who we are. Bold. Brave. Imaginative. Resilient. But resilience doesn’t mean things are always easy.
It’s truly taken a village to see us through the last 12 months. And this article explains more about how our team spirit and collaborative culture have helped us to balance the books throughout these difficult times – and flourish, rather than just float.
When COVID first hit in the beginning of 2020, the consensus was this epidemic would be around for three months in the UK, and we should start to see signs of economic recovery beginning in July 2020. (No comment!)
At the time, we’d just finalised our financial forecasts for the year ending March 2021, but it was clear we needed to review these figures.
After revisiting our forecasts, we worked on a realistic model which would see a dip of around 30% in the company’s income for the first quarter of 2020, before gradually returning to 100% by the summer. We then expected we’d see an uptick in work – to around 130% by the end of the year – as clients rushed to spend already -approved budgets.
Despite knowing now that the information on the pandemic’s duration proved to be inaccurate, this approach placed us in excellent stead.
Our biggest challenge was managing cashflow. With fee income dropping, we still had to cover our business costs. It became crucial to cut costs wherever we could – and quickly.
We reviewed our overheads, and any payments deemed non-essential were stopped or placed on hold. The government also launched an initiative called the CBIL Scheme, and allowed us to defer our PAYE and VAT payments, helping us manage cashflow.
We also made the decision to place any money received from loans or PAYE and TAX deferments into a savings account. As we knew the funds were always going to have to be repaid in March 2021, we decided to only use them if we had to.
Employee utilisation is something we’ve always used to measure productivity across the business at Proctors. It describes how much time any staff member is spending on achieving paid work each month.
During the pandemic, we were able to use our employee utilisation data to forecast upcoming work, and quickly identify the staff members who would be under-utilised over the coming weeks and months, and the skillsets where there wouldn’t be a lot of work coming in from our clients. We could then place those affected employees on furlough, whilst ensuring all other staff had high utilisation levels, reducing our costs while keeping our clients happy.
Over the last few years, we’ve introduced a number of KPIs to ensure we’re always performing efficiently, aiming to be within the top 10% of agencies of our size, financially. This has given us a strong financial foundation, allowing us to continue to support our clients who were also struggling though uncertainty.
Our relationships
Externally, we’ve been part of a working group of Financial Directors within creative agencies for the last four years. Pre-COVID we would meet quarterly, discussing all things financial and operational as well as sharing ideas, best practice tips, and KPIs.
At the beginning of the pandemic we met via Zoom, and as usual shared our latest updates – only this time, we discussed how to approach the upcoming challenges which would affect all of us.
Many agencies cut back on their non-fee earning staff, including new business and marketing. But our own stance differed: as long as we weren’t at a net loss, we would continue to look for new clients and deliver new initiatives to our existing ones.
We kept our new business and marketing team together, giving them the creative and technology staff needed to work on pitches and ideas – and for us, it paid off, resulting in new clients and new business.
Despite a number of businesses in the aforementioned Financial Directors group making different decisions based on what might work best for them, being part of a community that shares knowledge, resources and support has been invaluable.
Those invaluable relationships have extended to our clients too. Like many other businesses, we’ve been there for our clients – and vice versa – during an incredibly testing year. In most cases, we’ve gotten to know each other even better, and have built even stronger business and personal relationships with many of them.
A challenging time for the world, for our business, and for our people. It was so important to us to ensure our employees felt valued, informed – and were able to have just a little fun wherever possible.
Over the last year we’ve introduced a number of new staff initiatives, including our Quarantine Quiz. We originally introduced the quiz to raise money for the Quartet Community Foundation, donating to their Coronavirus 2020 Response Fund, as well as to boost our teams’ morale while we’ve all been forced to work remotely.
And unlike many of the Zoom quizzes we might have held in our personal lives, to this day The Proctors Quarantine Quiz lives on! The format has now evolved slightly, with different staff members hosting each Wednesday, and one lucky winner claiming a £50 Amazon voucher in a nice little midweek boost.
We’ve been rewarding staff for more than just their general knowledge, too. 2021 has seen the return of our famous Proscars awards. The Proscars are our quarterly awards by employees, for employees, with every staff member able to vote for three colleagues they believe should be rewarded for their hard work. Our three winners then get to choose a prize – either £250 in cash or £400 in vouchers.
To get us all moving, we’ve been further breaking up the working week with weekly lunchtime fitness and yoga sessions, hosted by a personal trainer online. And if you’d rather gin than gym, on Fridays our weekly virtual social kicks off at 5pm – although, it’s strictly BYOB!
If all that wasn’t enough, each Friday afternoon our Chairman, Roger Proctor, sends out his weekly ‘Good News’ email. Just as it sounds, it’s a cross-department weekly catch up about all things good – inside and out of work – and an informal welcome to the weekend.
As well as looking after our finances, it was also critical our staff had access to the support they needed to look after their personal wellbeing.
We engaged a psychotherapist and Mental Health Consultant to run a series of wellbeing workshops and Q+A sessions with all Proctors employees. This was followed up with a further series of workshops with our managers, providing them with additional tools to guide and support their team, as well as handouts on working from home, managing stress and more.
Throughout the pandemic, we’ve continued to promote our Employee Assistance Programme, offering 24/7 GP, legal and financial helplines, with options for counselling and psychiatric therapy available through our private medical insurance.
We also felt it was important to offer extra help to those who might be struggling with the pressures of family life in lockdown. Therefore, we sought to share helpful guidance and tips to P+S parents for effective home school and balancing with work as well as providing additional flexibility for maintaining work balance and wellbeing during additional childcare and home schooling. We even set up regional and international remote working agreements for those who benefited from being with their family outside of Bristol.
Christmas looked different in 2020, but we still managed to celebrate in style. In lieu of our traditional knees-up, we sent a hamper brimming local treats and bubbles from The Mall Deli in Clifton to each of our staff. But it was also important for us to give back too.
We joined forces with Caring in Bristol to donate a video in aid of homelessness in our city, helping to raise over £20,000. And we’ve kicked off the new year in a similar way by sponsoring Lebeq Ladies – a local women’s football team, in our community of Easton, Bristol.
Our future
None of the positive action we’ve taken should be viewed as temporary.
We intend to continue treating Wellbeing as a priority across the Group, and are continuing with initiatives in this area, such as with Mental Health First Aid training for select staff in June.
Above all, our people will continue to steer our direction moving forward: whether that’s via team surveys, policy and process updates or with lots of creative ideas. Because this has been one of the hardest times in recent memory to manage and market a business. And tough times lie ahead. But with a strong foundation, and an overwhelming commitment to your original values, it is possible to stay above water – even in the most testing of times.
If you’d like to talk to a truly ‘people first’ agency, we’re herewith a listening ear. So talk to us, at [email protected].
Bristol’s world-renowned product development agency Kinneir Dufort (KD), has launched a new initiative, XXEquals – the UK’s first majority female team designing products for women across the consumer, industrial and medical markets.
Fuelled by the growing need to design more female-centred products, and to improve the gender balance in the design industry, XXEquals is already working on projects including smart femcare solutions, sustainable period products, voice recognition software, and futures research.
KD has previously developed pioneering women-centred products including a revolutionary breast scanning bed.
Comprising a multi-disciplinary collective of KD experts – 75% of whom are women – XXEquals is pushing for better gender balance across product development, in a move which is set to potentially benefit millions of female consumers worldwide and KD’s global blue chip clients.
The initiative breaks new ground in the product design industry, and is helping to pave the way for young women interested in careers in product and industrial design.
KD’s CEO, Merle Hall, says: “We are incredibly proud to be the first UK consultancy in the product design industry with an arm which pro-actively focuses on products and experiences for women. It feels like there is truly a need to bring more women to the forefront of innovation and product design.
“XXEquals offers female-focused insight and an empathic design approach, resulting in innately intuitive products. We need to develop a deeper consideration of the physiological or psychological differences for female users.
“As an agency with a strong purpose – to design a better world – we feel it is our responsibility to instigate change. We are proof that a better gender balance is possible in the product design industry and we would love to support other businesses driving equality where possible.
“We’re not where we want to be yet, representative of the world around us, but we’re focused on our goals. It’s important to us to remember that men always need to be part of the solution too, so we draw on the brilliant expertise of our male strategists, researchers, designers, engineers and makers, who are well versed in allyship and also very engaged in the initiative.”
Around half of the world’s population is female and women buy 85% of household products, yet data shows only 5% of the product and industrial design industry is female.
With the femtech market predicted to reach $50 billion by 2025 and 93% of women currently buying over-the-counter healthcare products, the business case for gender balance in this industry is powerful.
Merle Hall continues: “Without expert female representation throughout the innovation and development process now, more opportunities will be missed to leverage real life experience and create brands and products which close the gap between assumption and reality.
“XXEquals launches as we are seeing women being adversely affected by Covid, and shortly after the issuing of a Government call-out for views to inform the new Women’s Health Strategy for England, which aims to change the male-by-default approach to health and care system.”
KD has longstanding partnerships to help solve the design industry’s gender balance issue. One is with Kerning the Gap, a campaign to encourage more women into leadership roles in the industry.
Founder, Nat Maher: “I think XXEquals will be highlighting an issue that has been long understood and long accepted, and it should be accepted no more. But also, what I think KD will do as pioneers is work with their peers to work out how they get better at it. KD wants change for the industry, and not just for itself. That is why XXEquals has my full and unbridled support.”
KD’s CDO, Craig Wightman adds: “As a man working in design, I have, for too long, felt uncomfortable about the number of situations I’ve observed or been directly involved with, where products used by women are conceptualised, designed and developed by men. That is not to say that male designers cannot design well for women, but why would you not want to have your audience and users better reflected in your design and decision-making team? It just makes sense.
“I have always felt that it’s important to have respect for the people we are designing for. It is about empathy and putting yourself in the shoes of the product user. Having a more gender-balanced team is an important part of achieving that goal.”
The below XXEquals podcast episode is now available:
Twitter: twitter.com/xxequals
Instagram: www.instagram.com/xxequals
For more information visit: www.XXEquals.com and www.kinneirdufort.com.
With less than a decade left to achieve Vision 2030, many organisations in the KSA region have successfully embarked on the journey to digital transformation. This is especially true when it comes to internal operations, streamlining workflows and taking administrative tasks online.
Some, though, will have found the task of transforming their marketing functions much more challenging.
The reason? Internal, administrative processes are fundamentally different to marketing tasks, and will require a different mindset to succeed.
Internal processes are typically clearly defined, as are the roles of users. When it comes to digitalisation, the objective is to automate repetitive administrative tasks providing greater efficiency and transparency. For many internal operations, the IT environment is well-defined, and the success of moving away from legacy processes to new software, programs or processes relies simply on ensuring their robust, secure implementation.
In these circumstances, transformation projects can involve long development cycles and large capital budgets, and traditional IT project management frameworks are often appropriate.
But compare this with the role of marketing. Just as with other internal processes, any new technology needs to enable your team to efficiently operate at scale and to integrate securely with your CRM and ERP systems. But here the similarity ends.
Marketing technology connects your team to a constantly evolving audience with developing needs and preferences, and a fast-moving, innovative technology landscape where today’s new attractions quickly become old news.
Your marketing team’s focus is on optimising your commercial impact across all points in the customer journey. They rely on multiple digital channels, new media techniques and real-time data to connect with their audience and outpace the competition.
In short, speed and accuracy are of the essence, and your team needs to operate consistently and efficiently at scale.
You need the foundations of a good marketing automation system. But in the fast-moving world of marketing, the ability to innovate, test and learn is vital for competitive advantage.
Given these drivers, applying a traditional, large-scale IT approach to marketing digital transformation is doomed to failure. In fact, the stories of organisations who’ve tried and failed are widely publicised. For those still battling on, by the time their project is complete the media landscape and their audience will have moved on, with more nimble competitors steps ahead alongside them.
Marketing transformation can’t be viewed as a capital project with a start and end date. It requires a framework environment to enable a constant state of innovation, enabled by minimum viable products (MVPs), deployed in test-and-learn sprints.
It might sound counter-intuitive, but the framework anticipates and accepts a certain level of failure. However, it also ensures you integrate successful innovations to create an evolving, interoperable, open ecosystem over time.
So how does it work?
Every development is planned, managed and measured by its potential and actual impact on Return-On-Investment (ROI).
Discovery and planning are vital parts of the marketing transformation process. They create the vision and framework for everything you do.
While it would be a mistake to adopt small innovation sprints at the expense of thinking big, with your vision and framework in place, you can then narrow your focus down to a few key marketing processes.
By assessing the points in the customer journey that will produce the greatest commercial impact, whether through efficiency or improved customer acquisition and retention, you can create a prioritised roadmap of development sprints.
It’s at this point that many projects falter.
Once you’ve prioritised your starting innovations, there’s no doubt you’ll come across a number of cases where your system needs full integration and complete end-to-end interoperability to work optimally.
Instead, you need to focus on the minimum viable product (MVP) you need to test the innovation and measure its ROI.
The MVP approach may well require additional manual processes to start with, but it will put your innovation in the hands of your users quicker, and prove (or disprove) its commercial return against a smaller investment.
The push for modernisation from Vision 2030 is a bold, ambitious aim. To achieve it, marketing must have a clear vision for what the ultimate customer journey looks like, and how technology can facilitate it.
Success doesn’t rely on a large capital budget to create the ultimate, perfect machine: It lies in an agile framework, enabling a constant state of ‘test-and-learn’ innovation. An attitude which champions flexibility, evolution and growth is key, as is a commitment to innovation and a focus on ROI.
This shift in mindset can often be the biggest cultural challenge for an organisation to overcome. That’s why at Proctors, we work closely with our clients across the KSA region – and the world – helping them to achieve success and avoid the pitfalls which cause stalled or failed digital marketing transformation initiatives.
Get in touch with us and let’s talk about how we can innovate your marketing strategy.
Bristol educator boomsatsuma is expanding, teaming up with George Ferguson to drive for change, with new studios in the Tobacco Factory, to host four creative BA (Hons) degrees.
Work is underway installing the purpose-built education facility, which will welcome students in September 2021. It will comprise two new film studios, a screening lecture space, computer suite, games lab, darkroom and specially designed creative space, where students can develop and discuss ideas in an inspiring environment.
Mark Curtis, boomsatsuma director, states:
“We’re very excited to be located at the Tobacco Factory, what a great place to live, learn and tap into the opportunities afforded by the Bristol Creative industries. Tobacco Factory’s success perfectly illustrates what can be achieved by and for the people of our city. This is a significant investment for the future, bringing higher education into this part of the city, which we expect will enrich opportunity in the area to fuel the next creative generation, for film production with a progressive cross-over into virtual production and the games industry. If you want to see change do something different.”
The new degrees have all been accredited by Bath Spa University, whose Head of School of Creative Industries, Dr Susan McMillan, who is also a board member of Bristol Creative Industries, is excited at the potential positive, saying:
“I am a huge supporter of boomsatsuma: they are reaching parts that Universities and other colleges cannot reach, as well as developing future creative talent in new and exciting ways.
“The creative industries deliver significant economic, social and reputational value to Bristol, the region, and the UK’s economy. The pandemic has had a negative effect on education and severely compromised the future for young people. boomsatsuma and their move to the Tobacco Factory creates a real opportunity to lead on rebuilding our creative sector by nurturing and developing the socially diverse, creative young talent, creative employers will need, post-pandemic.”
Freya Billington, newly appointed course director of boomsatsuma’s two new BA (Hons) Filmmaking degrees – production and post-production – enthuses about the new facility:
“In keeping with boomsatsuma’s ethos, this degree has been designed alongside our industry partners to specifically address where the skill shortages are and help develop graduates that are completely prepared and ready for employment. The two pathways, Production and Post-Production, allow for students to engage with and develop an understanding of the whole filmmaking process but also specialise up to a professional level in their chosen field. Whilst the studios will be equipped with current Industry-standard equipment and software, capping the intake also enables a focus on each student’s individual career and personal development.”
Alongside the Film degree, the Tobacco Factory will house boomsatsuma’s Games Art VFX BA (Hons) and Documentary Photography BA (Hons) degrees, in addition to the Bristol School of Acting’s new partnership, located in Tobacco Factory Theatres, with its Acting for Screen BA (Hons) and accelerated Acting for Stage & Screen BA (Hons). Freya continues:
“We will be limiting spaces to 20 spaces per pathway to ensure personalised teaching, attracting students nationally, but are also making sure there are opportunities for local communities.
“We are going to proactively collaborate between the degree courses. The mutual benefits for filmmakers, actors, games VR & VFX developers and photographers to work together under one roof is a fabulous plus for these students. I’m sure the fact that there’s a ground floor café and bar will also be appreciated!”
Building on 13 years of successfully delivering post-16 level 3 diplomas in digital and creative qualifications, the new location strengthens boomsatsuma’s partnerships, adding to course locations with Bristol creative companies at The Royal Photographic Society, The Bottle Yard Studios, Films @ 59, Ashton Gate Stadium and the Engine Shed.
The South Bristol location is an important link for education opportunities for the diverse, often overlooked communities of Bristol, into creative industries within the region. This is an ethos close to the heart of George Ferguson CBE, the city’s first independent Mayor, architect, sustainability campaigner, community champion and creator of the Tobacco Factory mixed use project. He states:
“I am thrilled at the prospect of boomsatsuma adding to the great creative community that has grown up around the Tobacco Factory project. I have watched their growth with interest and they are a perfect fit with our mission to benefit South Bristol culturally and economically.
“Education and the creative arts are such strong drivers for positive change and the social and environmental benefits that follow, which is more important than ever as we fight our way out of the dire time that we have all been through.
“Tobacco Factory has always looked to encourage and host enterprises that bring opportunity to this part of the city, and give a platform for the untapped, diverse talent that is all around us. Education will fuel Bristol’s creative community with relevant, local skills, bringing us new messages and viewpoints on life.
“We are delighted to be part of what we see as a sustainable recovery from this culturally and economically bruising pandemic. We could not have a better start than giving our young people the chance to grow and meet their full potential.”
Applications are open for courses at https://www.boomsatsuma.education
Pictured Left to Right: Mark Curtis. Freya Billington.George Ferguson.
Sought after indian themed jewellery from Emma Chapman from Frome and Jaipur was again the highlight of London Fashion Week. This short film explored her story and sources of inspiration.
2021 brings with it a welcome wave of change in how we think about work.
Now, more than ever, people are empowered to drive their own careers. But to thrive in this environment needs a shift in mindset and some core behaviours.
This series of four bitesize sessions with Katie Scotland is designed to help everyone grow … to use your strengths to feel more confident, have more impact, build better relationships and create more inspiring ways of working together.
Each session takes the latest thinking from inspiring sources and practical experience, and packages it up for you in simple frameworks and actionable steps to get you started.
Everything in these sessions can be applied to yourself and your team so, not only can it help you grow, you can build your own leadership to help those around you grow too.
MINDSET : Thursday 11th March 9.30 (1 hour Zoom)
Growth comes when you use your strengths to lean into challenges and solve problems.
FEEDBACK : Thursday 25th March 9.30 (1 hour Zoom)
Growth comes when you are clear on your strengths, and what is holding you back.
GOAL-SETTING : Thursday 15th April 9.30 (1 hour Zoom)
Growth comes when you are focused on how you make an impact.
PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY : 29th April 9.30 (1 hour Zoom)
Growth comes when you step into things you might not have done before, without the fear of ‘getting it wrong’… when you share your voice and ideas, knowing that the people around you have your back.
… anyone at any level who wants to learn or feel more equipped, whether you are a seasoned business leader or at the start of your career… in a small team or large organisation.
You can find out more and book your place for each individual session via the links above.
Places are £30+VAT per session (BCI members), £45+VAT non-members
“Katie has a real skill for helping you find the gems that will enable your growth. She is empathetic and honest, gently challenging your preconceptions to help you see yourself in a fresh light – leaving you not only clearer about what and why, but with realistic and tangible steps towards how.” ~ Kate Lenton, Taxi Studio
Katie Scotland is a leadership and career coach.
Katie has studied and practiced coaching and leadership development over the last 7 years, working with individuals from early career to C-Suite, from small business to large organisations (for the likes of OVO Energy, Iris Worldwide, Taxi Studio and Loom Digital).
Katie focuses on turning inspiration into action, helping people and businesses reimagine their futures and creating practical plans to get there.
Back in the day (and by the day, I only mean a few years ago), your email address used to be the passport to the internet; now it’s your mobile number, your mobile and apps that unlock everything. The average global Android user spent 27% of waking hours on mobile in April 2020, up from 20% in 2019 (App Annie).
A mobile is in peoples’ hands every day – in lockdown we’re carrying it into every room! It’s actually harder to keep people off mobile than driving them to it. Therefore, we need to ensure we’re making the most of the various ecosystems that brings with it. Brands need to start thinking of mobile as a way of life, not just a device or a screen size.
CRM is at the core of apps
Customer relationship management (CRM) is at the core of apps – a good app becomes a customer’s focal point for interaction with a brand. For example, apps like Amazon and Sainsbury’s Nectar etc used to be an evolution of a website. Now they are the default destination for looking up anything to do with your history with the brands, as well as the easiest way to use their services.
In today’s day and age, it’s the easiest way to start and build personalised conversations, so brands can use it for rewards; changing behaviour; keeping users sticky; building trust; and getting a good understanding of the user’s needs and order history. I say easiest. You can’t just bosh out an app and assume some Field of Dreams magic will happen. You still have to prove the value to your audience; you have to put their needs ahead of your own gains.
And those gains are plentiful! As well as making your customers more sticky, more likely to keep using your service over others, you will start unlocking insight into their spending patterns, their hard transactional data and their behaviour and preferences.
Prove your app deserves space on their phone
Customers are so much more likely to use an app if it’s good. If it’s seen as a bit rubbish, they won’t want to interact with it or share it. Same with a mobile website – don’t immediately force people to get your app or ram it down their throats. Deliver them a great experience on the site first, prove your app deserves the space on their phone and that it will be useable. The worst thing you can do is put more barriers between your users and the content they want.
The key is to make sure you’re understanding the user’s ecosystem. Align your needs with customers and don’t put any barriers in the way. People want a frictionless experience – sending you from an email to an app where passwords are already stored and customers can use single sign on, etc. Customers expect the mobile experience to be seamless and relevant. It’s your job to facilitate that. Helping them is ultimately going to help you. A good customer experience means your customers will spend more. According to a research from PWC, 86% of buyers are willing to pay more for a great customer experience.
Don’t do it just because you can
We do a lot of cool stuff with mobile, in email particularly. People on their mobiles are more likely to be able to see all the interactive innovative coding. That being said, we make sure to never do it just because we can. Time and again I see people using ‘in-email’ technology because it’s available, not because it improves the user journey. It’s about the fundamentals of the next course of action for a user, and if that’s using mobile then great. Every interaction a customer has with your brand will inform their experience, regardless of which channel this interaction occurs on.
It’s also easy when thinking about mobile experiences to ignore or forget about the journey for desktop users. People want to be able to have the experienced tailored to them wherever they are. In email that means not scrimping on designing a less interactive experience; play to the strengths that a bigger screen has. For web-based journey’s, make sure the right tools are in place for people to effectively complete that journey outside of the app you’ve spent so much time developing. Whether that’s making sure the login process is as smooth and frictionless as possible or that the service you are offering is just as easy and exciting, don’t keep forcing people down the channel you’ve chosen.
Mobile devices and apps have quickly become a huge part of our everyday lives. It’s a wonderful opportunity for businesses to strengthen brand loyalty, recognition and streamline the customer experience. Just remember, while mobile is an exciting and worthwhile avenue, as with everything, you need to do it well.
Put the customer experience first, prove that you have something to offer and remember to prioritise those personalised conversations.
At this time of year, our marketing team asks people around the business for their predictions for the following 12 months. Whilst we can usually have a good stab at what the next year will hold, 2020 has thrown everything up in the air.
This time last year, very few people would have predicted a global pandemic, or the impact it might have.
So, who knows what next year will bring. But as I look ahead to 2021, I hope we will value bravery, of ourselves and those around us, and appreciate those who encourage us to be brave. A character trait that doesn’t always get the limelight, I think there are at least three specific areas where it will be valued even more than it has been in years gone by.
Marketeers across the board, from senior decision makers at brands to the agencies they employ, need confidence to follow the courage of their convictions. To be brave embracing new technology and risky creative ideas for their message to resonate in a crowded landscape.
Many of us have heard the adage “we’re in the same storm, but not in the same boat” this year. With friends and colleagues working from home, and at times physically isolated or in quarantine, we need to be brave for our friends’ sake. Brave by dialling down our own fear of rejection or being excluded and reach out to them. Demonstrating compassion for others, and making an effort to listen with empathy may for some be like rays of sunshine in their day.
And we need to be brave in believing in ourselves. To have increased confidence that we can do something which may feel challenging. Bravery in the hope and faith that tomorrow will be brighter, and we’ll get through this if we look out for each other and stick together.
If this thought resonates with you, and you want to wear your heart on your sleeve more than just figuratively, Relabelled Clothing is a local independent ethical business with some apt ‘Brave’ apparel for adults and kids.
This article was written by Andy Brown, Chief Financial Officer at Armadillo.
Rob Greenfield is an environmental campaigner, activist and adventurer.
Rob undertakes projects and adventures that highlight environmental issues and provides advice on how to lead a more sustainable life. The campaigns include Trash Me (wearing all the trash of a typical American for a month) and also growing and foraging all of his food for one whole year.
He is a keen blogger so the web design had to put a focus on this. Therefore the Blog page is clearly laid out and cleanly designed, which was one of the main objectives of this web development project.
In terms of web development, this was a custom build from scratch using my own base theme. This allows me to have complete control of the development and future updates.
I undertook all the web design and development aspects of the project in order to best showcase Rob’s work. The site is a custom WordPress build, which makes updating information and adding posts, videos and projects extremely simple.
This site runs purely on renewable energy. The hosting is through Green Geeks, a 300% green hosting platform.
Using WordPress as the Content Management System (CMS), I was able to design and build this website with the end user in mind. I used Advanced Custom Fields (ACF) in order to make the site completely manageable by the client with just a few clicks.
2020 has been a wild year for everyone. With the health scare of COVID-19 and the almost immediate culture shock of isolated working, it’s safe to say that things will never go back to the way things were, and that’s not a bad thing. Whether your business is just kicking off or growing bit-by-bit, the correct use of language is now more important than ever.
When you think about it, language usage is hugely prominent in our day-to-day lives: idle chit-chats; meetings; writing emails; reading a book on the train. And yet, I’d bet it’s not the first thing you’d consider when figuring out your business or brand identity. There are plenty of elements to consider, but your copywriter is the key piece in putting the ‘this is our sound’ jigsaw puzzle together.
Before you start contacting your customers to tell them everything about the products or services they simply can’t do without, you first need to figure out who it is you’re selling to. Old. Young. Married. Single. Animal lover. Coffee enthusiast. You get where this is going.
Unlike what your mum or dad told you when you were just a kiddie, nobody is totally unique. Groups of us have shared interests, fears, pet peeves, and desires. Even if you’re looking to engage people of varying ages, ethnicities and backgrounds, they should all have something in common.
For example: you sell miniatures for painting. Brian from South London is an 18-year-old student who works in a coffee shop. He recently signed up to your email list after buying his first miniatures set from you. Dora is a 40-year-old account executive from Manchester who has been buying miniatures from you, twice a month, for over a year. Brian and Dora might not have many things in common, but they both love painting miniatures. That’s a bit of a simplified example, but the point is that both Brian and Dora are reading your communications for a reason.
Once you’ve figured out your target audience, it’s a good time to think about your brand identity. What formality do you want to use? Have you figured out your tone of voice? This is all of the delicious stuff you need to think about when it comes to your brand guidelines, because your use of language will need to be consistent across the whole board. Social media, email, digital advertisements, press releases, train station posters, sky writing, the works.
There will be a number of internal factors that might cross a few choices off the list for you – if you’re offering funeral services, it’s not a great idea to advertise with a chatty tone or use copy riddled with iffy ‘knock knock’ jokes.
That’s it! That’s the magic formula. Know your audience and know your product.
Once you’ve got those down, the fun part comes in: putting it all together. Writing short, snappy bits of copy isn’t an easy task. It’s a balancing act. Though creative communications are fun, they’re pointless if you don’t inspire your customer to react. Clicking on call to actions, heading to the website to browse, buying one of your products – this is the real goal behind you reaching out, isn’t it?
At the same time, you don’t have to stick your copy in a chunky paragraph and be done with it. Some people might enjoy it, but most don’t have the time to trawl through it. The real craft is putting your point across and keeping your customers’ attention.
Say you’re selling a new brand of pencils. Depending on who your audience is, you might call your business ‘Stationary Centre’ or ‘The Write Stuff’ or ‘2B or not 2B’, and from those we (the customers) already have a feel of what language you might use. Take the following sentence:
We offer HB pencils, mechanical pencils, graphite pencils and refills for all your writing needs. Visit our website to find out more.
It’s formally written, no nonsense, and gets the point across with no frills, and that’s fine. You could probably guess which business title above might go with it. But, if you wanted your brand to be a little less formal and more chatty, you might write:
Whether you’re filing your taxes, sketching your dog or drafting your screenplay masterpiece, our exceptional range of HB, graphite and mechanical pencils are an essential tool for all of your projects.
Though it’s longer, it’s nicer to read and gives your customer something to relate to (which gives them a reason to think about why they would need your pencils).
Look around you. You’ve got hundreds of examples of good, bad, and utterly bananas use of language, it’s just about figuring out what works for you, your customers and your products.
This article was written by Emily Sowden, Copywriter at Armadillo, and first appeared in Brand Chief Magazine.