JonesMillbank, Bristol-based video production company, has successfully won a contract with University of Southampton to produce their flagship undergraduate campaign video.
The multi-channel campaign will launch ahead of the University’s 2024 recruitment campaign, bolstering and highlighting their existing reputation and global rankings.
JonesMillbank were invited to a competitive pitch for the opportunity, reflecting their growing experience, insight and reputation in the higher education sector. They join existing clients including the University’s of Bristol, Exeter, Winchester and Central Lancashire.
“We’ve worked in the education sector since day one and we absolutely love working with universities; the challenge of engaging and communicating with an ever-changing, dynamic audience is one our strategists and creatives relish” said Russell Jones, Director at JonesMillbank.
“University of Southampton chose us for our bold, creative and impactful concept, and we’re incredibly excited to be given the opportunity to bring it to life.”
University of Southampton is one of the world’s leading universities, placed in the top 100 universities globally in QS World rankings. They are also a founding member of the Russell Group, an organisation of 24 top UK universities committed to maintaining the highest research and teaching standards.
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JonesMillbank are a full-service video production company.
They work in-house with a talented team of multi-disciplined creatives, telling authentic stories for a range of clients such as University of Bristol, IDLES, NHS England, The Royal Mint and Battersea.
jonesmillbank.com
01173706372
[email protected]
Paid Social is when companies and brands display sponsored advertising content on third-party platforms, such as Instagram and Facebook, targeting audiences that match their brand. Marketing professionals use Paid Social strategies to increase traffic to their website or content, improve or increase marketing efficiency and market to larger audiences to capture new subsets of customers.
After the 2021 pandemic, social media saw a considerable rise in users, and people spent more time online than ever before. As a result, people’s activity on platforms such as e-commerce websites and social media stores increased, allowing companies to target audiences more precisely to match their brand. Through Paid Social, companies can post ads to audiences with a higher chance of the users interacting with the content.
The amount of companies using Paid Social in 2022 has dramatically increased due to the increased global engagement with social media. According to Search Discovery, this number is set to grow even more by 2025 to 4.4 billion users. People also spend much longer on social media platforms, averaging 147 minutes daily for the average person.
Social media strategies have become much more streamlined, and eCommerce websites are becoming one of the most accessible platforms for consumers to purchase products and services. In addition, the ease and simplicity of buying and consuming content through social media has enabled companies to generate traffic and sales much more efficiently. For example, through Paid Social, companies can streamline their advertisement to be seen by more specific audiences who are more likely to interact with the ads—leading to further sales.
Privacy and user safety have moved to the forefront of significant changes in how companies use Paid Social. According to a recent article by Clicky, after Apple updated IOS15 in September, 80% of global respondents chose not to be tracked. Companies will have to look into how they target audiences and how they can make their Paid Social campaigns more effective, reflective of the updated statistics.
Being diverse and authentic has become crucial to running successful ads. According to the same article by Clicky, 75% of Gen Z are more likely to support and use brands that are authentic in the way they advertise products. Companies must use original methods that reflect their message, story, values and overall products to attract their desired audiences. Paid Social can allow companies to do this on a larger scale, targeting audiences more likely to interact with their content. Companies that are more diverse in their advertisement will also see greater impressions and reactions. Diversity in the platforms companies use will also significantly impact the responses they receive to content. Companies that are also diverse in how many social platforms they use for their Paid Social ads could triple their audience reach and subsequently generate higher impression rates and CTR. TikTok is becoming one of the most powerful platforms for marketing, with over 1 billion users each day; utilising new media is a crucial way of reinventing Paid Social strategies and getting the most out of campaigns.
Short video content has dramatically impacted how we market and advertise products throughout 2022. Going into 2023, this remains the same. The increase in users on platforms such as TikTok and Instagram has seen many ways people use short 1, minute videos to create effective and engaging content while also allowing companies to interact with influencers within their subject audience.
According to Hootsuite, users of TikTok spend 95 minutes a day on the platform, and 78.6% of users use TikTok to find entertainment, making it one of the leading platforms for Paid Social. In addition, according to Hootsuite again, Google Trends’ interest in the platform has increased by 1,125% since 2020, meaning you will likely start to generate the most impact on TikTok going into 2023.
Influencers and the rise of Influencer culture on many social media platforms have created a unique and powerful influence on Paid Social and advertising on social domains. Despite being around for many years, the amount of organic user-generated content creators has increased rapidly throughout 2022, especially on social platforms such as Instagram and TikTok, where short video and review video logs, or ‘Vlogs’, are used daily.
According to an article for fbcomms, new social media platforms such as BeReal are set to emerge even more and become more prominent in 2023, hoping to break through into the heavily populated market. However, they pointed out that many new social media platforms tend to be niche sites with limited impact. However, utilising the trends produced by these platforms is useful when considering the design and storyline of companies’ advertising.
We live in a world with a far shorter attention span than generations before. Short videos, animations and interactive aspects of content can be a great way to get and secure audiences’ attention and get them to interact faster. Platform algorithms are introducing new ways in which content creators and brands can create two-way dialogues with their audience, rewarding those who produce successful content. For example, Instagram allows viewers to like, comment, share, and add stickers to social posts and stories. Aspects like this are a great way of building and maintaining relationships with followers. It gives audiences more say and enables brands to edit and shape advertisements to get the best results.
Since 2020, after the pandemic, we have been talking about the increase of people shopping online compared to the number of people who shop in physical stores. According to fbcomms, people will likely not have to leave their social platform to shop for goods and products advertised through posts. Through media such as Instagram and Facebook, customers will be provided with an even faster route to purchase products without going to another website or a different platform. Ensuring companies keep up to date with the ever-changing world of eCommerce is essential to running successful online businesses and creating an impactful online presence.
Paid Social is a fun, creative and highly effective method of finding potential customers and is considered by some to be one of the most effective ways of marketing in the current social image climate. Paid Social allows brands to connect with a target audience specific to their brand and gain a more extensive reach through the size of the platform. Focusing on diversity, interactivity, video and animated content, and eCommerce performance will help brands get the most out of their advertising going into 2023 and how Fanatic can help you.
Our Paid Social and Digital Marketing experts will consider your audience, competitors and existing online presence and branding to create a Paid Social campaign that is sure to get impressive results. Get in touch today and find out how we can help you on your Paid Social journey.
UWE Bristol has unveiled its new immersive Sound Shower experience at Bristol’s Cribbs Causeway and Cabot Circus. Showing a mesmeric snapshot of campus life, the film was created by Skylark Media.
Filming took place at the university’s Frenchay campus and city with the support of student contributors. Multiple locations include the Atrium cafe, Centre for Sport, student union, library, as well as at the Arnolfini in the city centre.
Stephanie Lee, Marketing Communications Manager at UWE Bristol says, ‘This is a really exciting film project with Skylark Media where we’re creating a film for a specific sound shower unit which will sit in Cabot Circus and Cribbs Causeway shopping centres to promote the university and bring campus life to the people of Bristol, so they can get a real immersive experience and sense of what it’s like to study here on our campuses.’
Skylark Media MD Jo Haywood adds, ‘For a unique out of home experience, we came up with a fully immersive concept using an Insta 360 camera on an extendable pole. It sits within the stitch line which then becomes invisible in post-production. The result is a fully immersive film that mimics a FPV drone – flying around from location to location or locking into subjects for detail. Diegetic sound is added in so that the viewer can eavesdrop into those private moments.’
You can experience UWE Bristol’s immersive Sound Shower at Cribbs Causeway or Cabot Circus this month.
Samaritans is launching an ambitious fundraising campaign to get people talking about the ‘S’ word. The charity’s winter campaign, which runs from November through to January, includes a TV ad created by Skylark Media Bristol and Campfire Agency.
#BreaktheSilence is a fundraising campaign where Samaritans is calling on supporters to donate and share their support with others via their social platforms. The campaign includes a series of short videos featuring callers and listening volunteers and a television advert to run in unison with the campaign. Skylark was appointed to handle creative production which included all live action content and photography for the integrated campaign.
Bristol based Skylark Media MD Jo Haywood says, ‘Talking about mental health and supporting each other is important within the Skylark team. So we are delighted when the Samaritans asked us to deliver their winter campaign, #BreaktheSilence. We hope that the impact of the emotional storytelling in the TV ad, ‘Silence is painful’ and the authenticity of the callers and listeners in our short video series will encourage people who feel isolated to break the silence and reach out to the Samaritans this winter.’
Paul Power, Creative Director at Campfire Agency adds, ‘I know that all of us at Campfire Agency are proud to be working with Samaritans on their Break the Silence campaign – because silence really does cost lives. When you think that someone in the UK dies by suicide every 90 minutes, it brings it home how it important this winter campaign is.
With the cost of living crisis, it’s going to be a tough few months for so many people, so there couldn’t be a better time to launch these powerful communications, from DRTV and direct mail to digital and social.
With distinctive photography, powerful stories and hard-hitting messaging about suicide, we believe this integrated fundraising campaign will create an emotional connection with millions of people across the UK.
If it encourages one person who’s reaching crisis point, to start talking about suicide, then all the hard work will have been worth it. If we can raise nationwide awareness and essential funds for Samaritans on top of that, then we know the Break the Silence campaign has been the success we all hope for.’
Samaritans Executive Director of Income, Sonya Trivedy says, ‘The #BreakingtheSilence campaign is an opportunity to drive the conversation in these times of continued uncertainty, with issues such as loneliness, isolation and the cost of living crisis, meaning it could be a challenging winter for many people.
“Hopefully this new campaign will reassure people that Samaritans volunteers are here for people to talk to when they are ready to break their silence. Mental health, wellbeing and suicide are things that affect every one of us. With #BreaktheSilence we want this bolder messaging to encourage people to sit up, take notice and be moved to take action so that we can work towards our vision that fewer people die by suicide.‘
‘Silence is painful’ airs from 9th November on ITV Digital, Sky Media amongst other channels. The campaign runs until January 6th. For more information visit www.samaritans.org.
JonesMillbank, Bristol-based video production company, were commissioned by leading engineering consultancy firm Hoare Lea to celebrate the arrival of the National Satellite Test Facility (NSTF).
As unseen stewards of communication, man-made satellites keep us safe, informed and entertained, and their voyage into space demands phenomenal technical skill at every stage.
World-class science research, expertise and innovative testing transports them from concept to lift-off, and the unique design of the NSTF’s ‘cathedral-like’ facility means the chaos and challenges of space can be recreated here on earth.
Specialist equipment shakes, bakes and blasts satellites in the final phase of their ground development, testing them to their limits and arming them with the best preparation possible before their final journey into the unknowns of the cosmos.
JonesMillbank worked with Dr Jackie Bell, PhD, an aspiring astronaut and theoretical physicist who featured on BBC’s Astronauts: Do You Have What It Takes?, whose own journey through the space industry has tested her in every way imaginable.
The film was shot on location at the facility in Oxfordshire with support from RAL Space.
Visit https://jonesmillbank.com/work/hoare-lea/national-satellite-test-facility to view the film and https://hoarelea.com/2022/11/03/the-national-satellite-test-facility to find out more about the project.
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JonesMillbank are a passionate full-service video production company
They work in-house with a talented team of multi-disciplined creatives, all the while telling authentic stories long before it was cool for a range of clients such as University of Bristol, IDLES, NHS England, The Royal Mint and Battersea.
jonesmillbank.com
01173706372
[email protected]
JonesMillbank, Bristol-based video production company, worked with independent marketing communications agency Golley Slater to bring its campaign for Save a Life Cymru to fruition.
It comes as data reveals that every year in Wales more than 6,000 people will have a sudden cardiac arrest and around 80% of those will happen in the home. New data shows that almost one in four of us (24%) have witnessed someone collapse and possibly need bystander CPR and defibrillation intervention.
Yet, less than half of adults in Wales are confident in performing CPR: however, when people understand that on calling 999, the call taker will talk you through CPR and direct you to the nearest registered defibrillator, 73% of adults said that they would feel more confident to intervene.
Survival rates fall by 10% every minute without CPR or by using a defibrillator, can improve a person’s chance of survival.
Golley Slater developed the campaign strategy and creative for Save a Life Cymru – Help Is Closer Than You Think – which aims to show that if you see a cardiac arrest, there is more support around you than you might realise and commissioned JonesMillbank to produce and create content across the campaign, including bilingual TV commercials, radio commercials and social adverts.
Supporting studio photography was also captured to roll the campaign out across digital, print and OOH.
“Working on the production of such a holistic campaign, let alone one for a good cause, was a fantastic opportunity and allowed us to add a huge amount of value and experience” said Russell Jones, Co-Founder at JonesMillbank.
“We already work with NHS England and a number of individual Trusts and we understand the importance of that value alongside impactful messaging”.
Dave Warfield, Creative Copywriter at Golley Slater said “the team over at JonesMillbank built a fun, creative relationship with us from the off which made treatments of scripts and finding inventive solutions enjoyable and painless.”
Lewis Clements, Senior Art Director at Golley Slater added “being so well organised on shoot days and accommodating in post-production kept the atmosphere upbeat throughout the process and made all the difference in bringing our ideas to life, exactly as we imagined them. Real patience, craft and willingness from start to finish.”
Production was shot on-location in Wales at Little Man Coffee in Cardiff and Firebug Studios in Barry.
Save a Life Cymru is Wales’ national organisation which aims to improve cardiac arrest survival rates in Wales. The Welsh Government-funded organisation promotes CPR and defibrillation within communities and encourages everyone in Wales to learn or to top up their CPR skills.
Visit https://jonesmillbank.com/work/nhs/save-a-life-cymru to view the campaign and behind-the-scenes stills.
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JonesMillbank are a passionate full-service video production company
They work in-house with a talented team of multi-disciplined creatives, all the while telling authentic stories long before it was cool for a range of clients such as University of Bristol, IDLES, NHS England, The Royal Mint and Battersea.
jonesmillbank.com
01173706372
[email protected]
JonesMillbank, Bristol-based video production company, worked with Matter to help launch a Kickstarter campaign for their product, Gulp; the world’s first microplastics filter for washing machines.
Every time we do our laundry, up to 700,000 microfibres are released from our washing machines and pumped into our waterways.
Gulp captures these microplastics before the ocean does.
It’s the first, sustainable, long-lasting solution, with zero additional filter costs and no disposable parts.
JonesMillbank worked with Matter’s team, including Founder Adam Root and Product Director Lucas Horne to bring Adam’s story and Gulp’s technology to an audience across Kickstarter and social.
“Working closely with the team at Matter was a great experience; it’s always nice to work with a client who are open to and trustful of your ideas” said Russell Jones, Director at JonesMillbank, who was also scriptwriter and assistant director of the production.
“The fact that the story and product is green-purposed and aligned with our strategy and net zero credentials was a benefit to boot”.
Lucas Horne, Product Director at Matter said “JonesMillbank did a fantastic job in pulling together a compelling creative that really told the story of Gulp and Matter’s development in a captivating way and the campaign was fully funded in under 30 minutes.”
You can view and back the campaign at www.kickstarter.com/projects/aroot/gulp-self-cleaning-washing-machine-microplastic-filter and view the campaign content at jonesmillbank.com/work/matter/gulp-kickstarter.
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JonesMillbank are a passionate full-service video production company
They work exclusively in-house with a talented team of multi-disciplined creatives, all the while telling authentic stories long before it was cool for a range of clients such as University of Bristol, IDLES, NHS England, The Royal Mint and Battersea.
jonesmillbank.com
01173706372
[email protected]
Five new recruits, including Business Director and Media Director, join UM, McCann Bristol’s media operation
UM Bristol, part of McCann Bristol is strengthening its media operation with the appointment of five new team members, including a Business Director and Media Director, following a successful first half of the year for the agency.
The media team form part of the overall integrated creative services offer at McCann Bristol and provide media buying consultancy and delivery across all channels.
Georgia Vine-Thomas joins the team as Business Director, bringing with her a wealth of experience working in planning and managing media buying for a number of leading global network agencies across clients in entertainment, automotive, banking, tech, retail and travel. Her experience includes working with blue-chip brands such as P&O Cruises, Netflix, HSBC and Paramount.
Meanwhile, Aled Schell joins as Media Director, bringing over ten years’ experience working at independent media agencies and media owners.
In addition, the agency also welcomes Grace Perrett as Senior Media Manager, Beth Cooper as Media Executive and Shabrina Hidayat as Digital Media Executive.
Managing Director at McCann Bristol, Andy Reid, said: “The Bristol media operation has achieved great things so far this year and these new appointments are a reflection of the success and growth we are seeing in the business right now. It’s great to welcome five new members who will strengthen the Bristol team and drive even more success in the future.”
Georgia Vine-Thomas added: “I’m really excited to have joined Bristol’s media operation. It’s a brilliant opportunity to be a part of a growing media team which is producing excellent work for its clients, whilst evolving with a number of new joiners. Together, there is huge enthusiasm for what’s ahead!”
JonesMillbank, Bristol-based video production company, were commissioned by Cheltenham-based global coffee brand SOHO Coffee Co. to produce a range of brand-level photography.
“Whilst not our primary service, we’ve always supported clients with photographic commissions given the similarity in the disciplines. In fact most of our film crew started their lives as photographers” said Russell Jones, Co-Founder and Director.
“SOHO Coffee Co. are a new client but their values resonated with our own; SOHO actually stands for Simple, Original, Honest, Organic”.
The photography is part of a brand and menu overhaul, utilising bold colours and real people, with large-scale OOH and digital advertising in mind.
The JonesMillbank team worked alongside food stylist Joanna Resiak (www.joannaresiak.com) and makeup artist Naomi Lake (www.naomi-lake.com).
“It’s always a pleasure working with talented specialists. Both were fantastic and Jo made syringing egg yolks onto sausage sandwiches look easy” said Joffie Burt, Head of Production.
Visit jonesmillbank.com/work/soho-coffee/studio-photography for a selection of photos and behind the scenes stills, else keep your eyes peeled at your local SOHO Coffee Co branch and online.
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JonesMillbank are a passionate full-service video production company
They work exclusively in-house with a talented team of multi-disciplined creatives, all the while telling authentic stories long before it was cool for a range of clients such as University of Bristol, Battersea, The Royal Mint, IDLES and Randstad.
jonesmillbank.com
01173706372
[email protected]
Video marketing is fundamentally the use of video content to promote and market products and services, increase social and digital engagements, and educate and reach target audiences. That’s a lot of potential uses, which is why video marketing is becoming ever prevalent with our clients and the brands of today. Audiences are also watching more online video content than ever before. This growing appetite in viewership and engagement has made it an ideal channel for performance marketing.
Something that has become crucial to the acceleration of video’s success within marketing is that now it is truly measurable like the other more established performance channels. Marketers and brands are now able to feel more assured by results like Return on Investment (ROI) and Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) offered by video, as we’re able to effectively see its influence on traffic, leads, sales and audience impact. Video is a tried and tested way of driving high performance ads and generating results across a variety of metrics.
Performance-driven creative and creative-driven performance.
What? Well, traditionally campaigns have either been led around an innovative creative idea, but this idea, whilst it may be unique, or eye-catching, lacks value if it doesn’t lead to tangible actions or results. At the other end of the spectrum we see campaigns heavily led by KPIs, but lacking creativity. We believe in finding a sweet spot; we’ve proven that great things happen when you find a balance and believe that brands of today will need to shift their focus from one or the other and merge the two.
Rethinking the way we approach creative to be optimised for performance is not about being less creative or restricting big ideas, it’s about bringing data to the forefront and using that to inform our decisions and learnings. By re-prioritising the way we approach creative, with data-led insights upfront helps ideas reach the audience effectively, resonate emotionally with their needs and drive the desired outcome. By no means should data mean ‘do the same as everyone else’, it should give you the ground to understand what resonates and how to differentiate yourself in your market. Ultimately, performance-driven creative is focused on the end result, the desired action, therefore for the concept to work, it needs to deliver results.
Bringing this back to video, with an ever-changing landscape of video trends and platform capabilities, even on a daily basis, our creative intuition of how to capture attention best can be subjective, emotionally led and provide a narrow view. This is where data helps to steer our vision towards what is proven to be most effective, ensuring that ideas are backed by something more than instinct. As well as steering the idea, it’s also important to be aware of the best practices for each platform with a generic view and specifically for your audience – for example, are the majority of your audience watching on a mobile device or desktop, do they perform better with or without sound, what length is most effective? Each of these data points can inform how to optimise your video content.
When it comes to optimising channel-specific content, take this example from Mercedes Benz. This YouTube pre-roll concept has really embraced the requirements of this format and engaged the audience in a creative way that directly links to their specs. The ad creative makes clever use of quick video cuts and great sound design of a roaring engine to engage its viewers’ senses. This way, its audience can actually see and hear the intensity of reaching 60 MPH in only 3.8 seconds.
However, from our experience this also works on a much smaller scale, with more agile budgets. Take one of our consumer brands, independent, family-run company Cotswold RAW. We’ve been working with them since they started up and video was a new consideration for them – something we were keen to grow to differentiate them in the pet market and demonstrate their expertise, unique offering and quality of product. Working within a limited budget from a one day shoot, we managed to create two master ads (one consumer focused and one for their retailers) social cuts (for Facebook & Instagram) and cut downs for YouTube pre-roll ads – that’s a lot of content! When it came to results, we managed to get tails wagging. On a limited ad spend over a highlighted month period, this led to an incredible conversion rate of up to 46.6%. Off the success of this campaign, we are now currently in the production process for a new video series.
On the other side of our client roster, Cytel, the largest provider of statistical software and advanced analytics for clinical trial design and execution, looked to us to develop and support their new brand messaging. For this we took a multi-channel approach to video, we utilised LinkedIn to ensure we could reach their defined target audience within the pharmaceutical and biotech industries. We also created additional uplift in awareness by integrating YouTube into our approach, which allowed us to target specific relevant video content to generate the most effective levels of engagement and retention. This gave us a multilayered approach and therefore greater depth to our brand awareness results.
Finally, test and learn, test and learn. A huge part of the success of our campaigns relies heavily on optimisations and an integrated approach to reporting. Feeding back learnings to evolve existing campaigns as well as using them to inform new development of visuals and messaging is a huge part of creative performance. Testing and analysing efficiently is the best way to be effective.
Historically video is (generally) approached by the industry as “part of a wider campaign” and often handed to a one-off production agency and director who haven’t been involved in the same brand journey and strategy as the creative agency.
Being fully integrated at AUK, our unique approach helps us to ensure video is ingrained at the heart of our brands journeys and considered as part of a wider marketing strategy, not just a singular campaign activation. We think beyond just making amazing content, we also consider how and where to use it for maximum impact and results.