Welcome to the PRmoment Podcast.

Today we’re chatting with Rachel Allison founder and CEO of Axe & Saw about whether there is a tension between using inclusive communications that are able to reach a diverse audience and the most one size fits all approach in most marketing campaigns. 

We’ll also talk about what Gen Z and minority groups want and need from their PR employers.

Axe & Saw has 10 employees, a fee income of £600K and was founded in March 2021.

Thanks as ever to the PRmoment Podcast sponsors The PRCA. 

Here’s a summary of what Rachel and I discussed:

2 mins Is there a tension between inclusive communications and the one size fits all approach used in most marketing campaigns?

3 mins Communicators now have a proliferation of channels and multiple customer segments - does that mean multiple and varied bespoke marketing campaigns will become the norm or are scale and consistency still important?

“There is a need for both…talk about people on the fringes of your community”

6 mins To what extent do we all think and feel differently depending on our ethnicity and background?

8 mins How can a better understanding of these differences help brands better plan their communications?

9 mins An important part of this change is the need for the communications teams to include a diverse range of communicators. How are we doing?

12 mins What does success look like when it comes to the diversity of PR and communications?

15 mins What do minority groups need from their employers?

“Class can play a huge impact on whether you feel that your voice is heard”

23 mins There are plenty of stories of larger agencies hiring aggressively from smaller firms that have a diverse workforce. How much of a problem is that at the moment for smaller independent agency owners?

26 mins Rachel’s agency employees work 4 days a week. How does that work? Does Rachel employ 20% more people because the agency works a 4-day week?

30 mins What do Gen Z employees want from their employers?

Welcome to the PRmoment Podcast.

Welcome to the latest PRmoment Podcast with me Ben Smith. Today we’re catching up with David Hart. David has had over 20 years of experience working in corporate affairs - both in-house at the likes of Coca-Cola and SAB Miller and agency side at Fleishman Hillard and Burson Marsteller (now BCW.)

Before Christmas, I saw him posting about the lessons he wished he’d told his younger corporate affairs self and so we invited him onto the show to talk in more detail about his nine lessons of corporate affairs.

Before we start do check out our latest free-to-attend webinar The intersection of PR and SEO 2023.

Thanks as ever to the PRmoment Podcast sponsors The PRCA.

Here is a summary of what David and I discussed:

2 mins Why did David decide to write his 9 lessons of corporate affairs?

5 mins Lesson 1: Be bold, creative, take risks and help to sell

“When done right the power of comms is massive…it surprises me when some organisations don’t want to communicate”

8.30 mins Lesson 2: Be confident and bring your sixth sense of “perspective” to a crisis

11 mins Lesson 3: Make your job sustainable by understating the detail of ESG

14.30 mins Lesson 4: Don't just be a story writer

“The worst view of any business is the view from the window of the headquarters”

“Don’t just focus on the leaders…everyone within the business has a story to tell”

18 mins Lesson 5: Stop the press release

21 mins Lesson 6: Be like Jack Reacher - hope for the best; prepare for the worst!

“You're going to have a lot of difficult conversations with a lot of senior people”

“It’s about making sure the team is prepared (for a crisis)”

“There are 2 important pages in any crisis manual…”

26 mins Lesson 7: It’s an exciting time to work in Corporate Affairs - enjoy it

“I’m convinced more corporate affairs and communications professions… will in the future be CEOs - the ability to talk, the ability to engage, the ability to open and to lead discussions around business-critical issues are vitally important to that (the CEO) role“

30 mins Lesson 8:  Give yourself a break

“It (the corporate affairs role) can take over your life”

33 mins Lesson 9: Embrace change

“You want to be ahead of the innovation curve”

 Welcome to the PRmoment Podcast. 

Welcome to our February review of PR Pitches and mergers & acquisitions in the UK PR scene with Andrew Bloch.

 Andrew is a co-founder and non-executive director at Frank PR and is now Head of PR at the new business consultancy firm AAR. He is also a partner at PCB Partners where he advises on buying and selling marketing services agencies. 

Thanks to our PRmoment Podcast sponsors, The PRCA.

Here are a few of the highlights that Andrew and I discussed:

2 mins News of big wins for Citypress with Siemens, The Romans with Heineken and BCWwith Swissair.

“The best corporate agencies think with a consumer lens”

PHA bag a couple of wins 

Andrew talks us through wins for Ranieri and Stir.

“It’s a never-ending journey between appointing specialists and consolidating agencies”

12 mins Finn Partners win Wagamama’s and Greater Palm Springs.

14 mins Good Relations wins the Kuoni account.

15 mins Andrew gives us his rundown of this month's PR M&A activity, including the big Markettiers deal.

16 mins Andrew explains the Social Chain deal.

18 mins Clarity continues its acquisition strategy by purchasing Australian agency Sefiani Communications.

20 mins Andrew talks about ANM’s vertical acquisition strategy.

21 mins Spider buy a Tiger!

Welcome to the PRmoment Podcast.

Today we’re chatting with 3 Monkeys Zeno UK managing director Jo Patterson about the encouraging trend of female leaders occupying more of the big PR agency roles in the UK.

When Jo and I talked about this in our pre-show chat it got us thinking and here is a non-exhaustive list of top female PR agency leaders in the UK:

We’ve got Jo at 3 Monkeys Zeno, Jo-ann Robertson at Ketchum, Jo Carr at Hope&Glory, Nicola Todd at Ogilvy PR, Pippa Arlow at Smarts, Ruth Kieran at Cirkle, Ruth Allcurch at WE, Sian Morgan at Cow, Sharon Bange at Kindred, Rebecca Grant at BCW, Ali Maynard at Manifest, Cath Taylor at Taylor Herring, Angie Moxham at The Fourth Angel, Kate Stevens at Axicom, Georgina Blizzard and Nicky Regonzonni at The PR Network, Mandy Sharp at Tin Man and Emma Kane at SEC Newgate, Fenella Gray at Porter Novelli and Bibi Hilton at Creative Access.

And to be clear there are loads more I could mention - but you get the point. There seem to be more female leaders in top agency positions than there have been in recent memory - perhaps than there has ever been before. And one of the things Jo and I will talk about on the show today is the potential reasons for that.

For those of you that are not aware 3 Monkeys Zeno has a fee income of £9m in the UK and 80 employees. Zeno started out as Edelman’s conflict shop but has grown into a global agency with a fee income of about $150 m. About 70% of Zeno’s revenues are in the US.

Jo became the UK MD of 3Monkeys Zeno in October 2020. Previously she was UK MD at Porter Novelli and a board director at Red.

Zeno bought 3 Monkeys in 2016. I always think of Zeno as a fairly new agency but for any PR agency history buffs out there, it was founded in 1998.

Before we start do check out our latest free-to-attend webinar “The State of Social 2023: Channel Disruption, Influencer Growth and The Great Data Integration Challenge.”

Thanks as ever to the PRmoment Podcast sponsors The PRCA. 

Here is a summary of what Jo and I discussed:

3 mins Jo talks about why we’re seeing more women PR agency CEOs.

“We’re (women) still only tracking at about 40% for leadership roles.”

7 mins Jo talks about the benefits of female leadership traits in a progressive working environment.

“It’s the people you surround yourself with… charismatic leaders who are prepared to stand up and shape their organisations…and having the freedom to do that.”

10 mins We’ve probably seen a rise of misogyny in society. There seems to be an upward trend of obnoxious macho culture.

13 mins How do we make sure that in PR we don’t lose those gains that we’ve made?

“Greater protection for the challenging life stages that people go through”

“Enshrining policies into governance”

“Openness and confidence go hand in hand”

17 mins Jo talks about the role models that have helped her in her career - Lesley Brend at Red, Fenella Gray at Porter Novelli and Barby Siegel at Zeno.

“I like working with good people regardless of gender”

20 mins How is the Zeno business doing both globally and in the UK?

“About 50% of our work now is global”

21 mins In the UK 3 Monkeys was known for its consumer work, how has that evolved since the acquisition?

23 mins You are the first leader of the business in London who wasn't part of the original 3 Monkeys team. Has that been an advantage or disadvantage for you do you think?

25 mins When an agency like Zeno buys an agency li

Welcome to the PRmoment Podcast.

This is a bonus podcast where we chat about Rajar’s latest results. For those of you that aren’t aware of Rajar - it was established in 1992 and operates the single audience measurement system for the radio industry in the United Kingdom

Each quarter it publishes the listenership figures for UK radio and this offers a really interesting insight for PR people on how the UK public is engaging with this important channel. 

On the show today we have Alex Williamson, senior newsroom producer at Markettiers to talk us through the latest Rajar results for Q4 2022

Before we start do check out our latest free-to-attend webinar “The State of Social 2023: Channel Disruption, Influencer Growth and The Great Data Integration Challenge.”

Before we start, thanks to the PRmoment Podcast sponsors, The PRCA.

1 min Alex gives us the highlights of this quarter's Rajar results.

2 mins 49.7 m people in the UK listen to the radio each week with an average of 20.3 hours per week

3 mins The BBC has a 47% share of radio listening, but which BBC stations are on the rise?

4 mins How did commercial radio do and which commercial stations are on the rise?

5 mins A discussion of the rise of targeted radio channels, including Boom Radio and The Greatest Hits Radio Network.

12 mins What are the opportunities for brands on the radio?

On the show this week we talk to Howard Kosky, founder and CEO of Markettiers4DC.

Kosky founded Markettiers4DC in 1994. Clients include Rolls-Royce, Linkedin and Unilever. The business employs a team of 150 people in the UK and UAE

As many of our regular podcast listeners may know, last week Waterland Private Equity took a majority stake in Markettiers4DC for a reported amount of £50 million. The business has been well known for its broadcast PR credentials in the UK for decades but it’s grown significantly in the last couple of years - with the growth of its research business Censuswide and its digital production firm Through The I.

On the show today we’re going to talk to Howard about the deal and what it means for the future of Markettiers4DC and his role within the business. We’ll also be talking to Andrew Bloch from PCB partners about its role in the deal and how the valuation of Markettiers4DC was made.

Do check out our latest free-to-attend webinar “The State of Social 2023: Channel Disruption, Influencer Growth and The Great Data Integration Challenge.”

Thanks as ever to the PRmoment Podcast sponsors The PRCA. 

Here is a summary of what Howard and PRmoment founder Ben Smith discussed:

2 mins Howard talks us through why he decided now was the right time to sell.

“We were very pleased with everyone’s reaction internally to the shift in behaviour (required) to working remotely…with that productivity increased, broadcast popularity increased, the use of technology in virtual events increased and the use of data increased.”

“Rather than sell the business, we looked for an investor, a backer.”

“In professional services consultancy businesses, if you can get the people management right, you can flourish”

6 mins Why Howard believes the culture of Markettiers4DC is better now than before the pandemic.

“It’s not work-life balance, it’s just life. It’s where work sits within the parameter of people’s lives.”

7 mins Howard talks us through the shape of the Marketteirs4DC group in terms of the venues and headcount.

8 mins The reported deal value is £50 million. Is that what Waterland bought the majority stake in Markettiers4DC for, or does that include their future investments in acquisitions? 

“They (Waterland) shared our ambition with the desire to create a war chest for us to match our M&A plan and ambition.” 

10 mins Is Howard trying to replicate the broad shape of the UK Markettiers4DC business in America?

“North America is a huge opportunity for us.”

10.30 mins The revenues of the Markettiers4DC group are about £30m and the business has grown by about £10m in revenue (30% or thereabouts) in the last 24 months. That’s going some, how did they do that?

13.30 mins Markettiers4DC have been purchased by a private equity group. Did they consider a trade sale?

15 mins As a sell-side advisor to the deal, Andrew Bloch from PCB partners talks us through what his role was in helping put the deal together.

17 mins The private equity debt market is a tough one at the moment, did that add a layer of complexity to the deal?

“We were probably at a stage where we had agreed on the numbers 3 months before…”

23 mins When you’re agreeing on the final number, is it basically a game of poker?

“Waterland is a buy and build specialist”

29 mins Howard talks us through the due diligence process and the psychometric tests!

“When these guys come in they put a periscope us every part of y

Welcome to the PRmoment Podcast.

Today we’re chatting with Andrea Hartley, founder and CEO of Skating Panda about the role of communications in organisations' approach to ESG.

For those of you that are not aware -  ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) is a set of standards measuring a business's impact on society, the environment, and how transparent and accountable its governance is.

Skating Panda is a social and environmental impact creative consultancy in London

Do check out our latest free-to-attend webinar “The State of Social 2023: Channel Disruption, Influencer Growth and The Great Data Integration Challenge.”

Thanks as ever to the PRmoment Podcast sponsors The PRCA. 

Here’s a summary of what Andrea and PRmoment founder Ben Smith discussed: 

2 mins What is the role of communications within the ESG strategy of most organisations?

5 mins Thinking about the internal ESG stakeholders within an organisation, how do you see the role of each? Who needs to own ESG within a firm?

8 mins Where is the intersection between the financial reporting investor relations part of ESG and the softer communications strategy?

8.30 mins How often is the central ESG role of the PR/comms team to simply PR the ESG report?

12 mins How PR and comms people can grow their ESG knowledge? Subscribe to PRmoment’s weekly ESG review here.

13 mins Is the PR/Comms team best placed to write a company’s ESG Report?

14 mins Take a look at some good ESG reports on the ESG Foundation’s website.

16 mins Andrea highlights the Global Reporting Initiative and Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) as ESG frameworks for you to look at.

18 mins Andrea discusses the difficulties of greenwashing, ethics authenticity in the communications of ESG and purpose.

“We have planetary boundaries, there are boundaries to what our planet can do and we’ve got to remember that”

23 mins Andrea talks us why are the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals a useful way to understand, formulate and plan an organisation's approach to sustainability and ESG.

26 mins Much of the work that PR and marketing people do has the objective of persuading people of the need to buy more stuff. To what extent can the ever-increasing demand-led consumerisation of modern society correlate with the need for us all to consume less?

“The risk is to confuse increasing revenue with buying more stuff.”

Here is some more information about The ESG Awards.

Welcome to the PRmoment Podcast.

Today we’re chatting with the senior team at John Doe:  Pamela Scobbie, managing partner and CCO, Gin Trewhella, partner & group CEO and Lee Beattie Partner/Joint CEO.

We cover a few different themes. Wire was merged into John Doe almost 2 years ago to the day - so we’re going to talk about why 2 independent agencies decided to merge and what Pam, Lee and Magin learnt in that process.

Also, one of the interesting aspects of John Doe is that 33% of their employees across their Manchester, Glasgow and London offices are people of colour. So we’ll also talk about how the agency had been so successful at building a diverse workforce.

The third thing we’ll talk about is the type of work coming out of the agency. In our pre-show chat, I asked CCO Pam Scobbie which agency she wanted to model John Doe on, and her reply was Uncommon. So we’re going to talk about the type of work coming out of the firm.

John Doe is a 60-person creative PR firm with 3 offices in the UK. Lee and Pam founded Wire in 2009, which then merged with John Doe 2 years ago. Gin has been at John John Doe for 5 years

John Doe’s clients include Under Armour, Guinness, Captain Morgan, Instagram, Iron Brew and The Scottish Government. It has a fee income of £5.2 which has almost doubled since 2020 - so it is an agency on the rise.

Before we start the final entry deadline for the PRmoment Awards is on 27th January - check out PRmomentAwards.com for all the info you need, including downloading this year’s updated entry form.

Finally thanks to our PRmoment Podcast sponsors, The PRCA.

Here’s a summary of what Pam, Lee, Gin and I discussed on the show:

3 mins The merger between Wire and John Doe was almost 2 years ago. Why did these two independent agencies merge?

5 mins Wire was the bigger form so why did they decide to keep the John Doe name?

12 mins What was the role of The PRmoment Podcast and Rachel Bell in the Wire/John Doe merger?

14 mins How do they merge 2 agency cultures together?

18 mins Why recruitment for PR talent is just as tough outside the M25 as it is in London.

20 mins 68% of the agency is from a working-class background, 33% of the firm's employees are people of colour, and 50% of the London office are people of colour. All PR firms want to build a diverse team - how come John Doe has been more successful in doing this than most?

“We will always prioritise non-white candidates for the first interview”

“It (finding non-white talent) gets easier as you go on, it becomes a virtuous circle. People want to work for agencies where it (diversity) is part of the agency’s DNA.”

“Diversity is a fundamental decision for agencies, it can’t be an optional extra. We (John Doe) don’t want to pick up a diversity award.”

“We did a campaign for Tinder at Pride. Almost the entire team that we put on that brief identified as queer…which means that work was just that much more authentic to the audience.”

“We’ve got clients (which) as part of their procurement process ask for statistics on diversity and change payment terms to 1-week payment instead of 2 months based on the relative diversity of your agency against the rest of their roster - that’s a really clear and interesting example of big businesses that are taking diversity seriously”

32 mins Are there are a bunch of consumer PR firms in the UK at the moment who are pushing each other hard, resulting in a very competitive, innovative market?

“You can see the ad agencies trying to catch up with the channel-agnostic perspective…most of them will still pitch a TV spot because that’s wh

This week on the PRmoment podcast I’m interviewing Greg Jones, European chief executive at Smarts.

Smarts has a fee income of approximately £12.5m and employs 150 people. It’s an agency headquartered in Belfast with offices in  London, New York and Edinburgh.   Smarts is owned by MSQ.

Greg started his career at Shine, before stints at Slice, M&C Saatchi, Splendid and finally back to Engine joining Mischief as creative director before getting the CEO job in 2019. 

He left Mischief to join Smarts last November.

If you haven’t already make sure you download the PRmoment Awards entry form, the deadline for entering is 27th Jan.

2 mins Why did Greg leave Mischief to join Smarts?

6 mins How successful have PR firms been building themselves into integrated PR firms?

“There are winners and losers, there are those agencies that have grasped the opportunities… and there are those that have been left behind, so much of it comes down to client opportunity.

Can you create the opportunity to broaden the type of work that you do for your clients beyond the box that some clients put you into and have you got the people in place to take advantage of those opportunities?”

7 mins What do we mean by (integrated) PR today?

8 mins The implications of the increased agency services on agency businesses.

10 mins What are the expertise areas a modern PR firm needs to have?

11 mins Is it better to have social first people or SEO first people working in a PR firm today - or is it better to have PR people who’ve gained experience within these specialisms?

“I would rather have experts in the room that I know will be able to answer the questions”

“Most agencies will have invested in a head of strategy or a head of creative, that’s almost become a client expectation these days.”

13 mins Most of the creative directors in PR have a PR background: “An earned first creative thinker is worth their weight in gold.”

“There’s not so much of a leap from being an advertising planner to being a PR planner”

16 mins Will community specialists be the next big job title we see emerge from PR firms?

17 mins The need for earned first internal comms specialists within PR firms.

“Internal comms has been largely overlooked…in terms of growth and futureproofing your agency it’s a great opportunity.”

20 mins The difficulty is making it all add up! Is there a fee level you need to get to to be able to bring in these specialists?

23 mins PR has been given a huge opportunity, it’s challenge is not to mess it up!

24 mins When going into an economic downturn agencies will need to get their attack and defence right: Greg talks us through what his Boxing analogy means in practice for PR agency owners.

25 mins How do integrate your offer? 

“It tends to get brought together by client opportunity.”

26 mins A discussion of the investment PR firms need to make in technology tools: As PR has broadened its offer across more channels, so has the need to purchase channel-specific analytics tools.

Welcome to the PRmoment Podcast.

Welcome to our January review of  PR Pitches and mergers & acquisitions in the UK PR scene with Andrew Bloch.

Andrew is a co-founder and non-executive director at Frank PR and is now Head of PR at the new business consultancy firm AAR. He is also a partner at PCB Partners where he advises on buying and selling marketing services agencies.

Before we start the final entry deadline for the PRmoment Awards is on 27th January - check out PRmomentAwards.com for all the info you need, including downloading this year’s updated entry form.

Finally thanks to our PRmoment Podcast sponsors, The PRCA.

Here’s a summary of what Andrew and PRmoment podcast host Ben Smith discussed on the show:

2 mins Andrew gives us his rundown of this month's biggest pitch wins in UK PR, including:

• Premier PR and the Booker Prize
• Organic and The Apprentice (with a shout-out to Taylor Herring’s long-term work with the Apprentice.)
• Splendid and Flock win the Ginster's brief
• MHP and The Royal Mint (again with a shout-out to Hope&Glory’s work on the account over the last 10 years)
• H&K Strategies and Hills Pet Nutrition
• Capture PR win Gala and Foxy Bingo 
• Praytell and Sonus

“The average decision-making period for a decent size pitch is about 6 months.”

“A real lesson for me was that…the period between the pitch and the decision is so critical - show your hunger and determination.”

“It was a 30 agency pitch…that is a huge amount of agencies. You have to be respectful of the agencies' time… it's all about the size of the prize at the end.”

“Making sure the (pitch) process is fit for purpose, respectful and informed”

12 mins A discussion about whether the of trend clients consolidating the number of agencies they use will continue.

13 mins Pitch wise “this is the busiest January I can ever remember.”  Andrew talks us through why there is so much new business activity in the PR market at the moment.

15 mins A discussion about the Tulchan Teneo deal - which saw Teneo acquire UK financial PR specialist Tulchan in a reported £65m deal.

“Teneo gives Tulchan an international footprint.”

16 mins Andrew talks us through how the Tulchan deal is likely to be structured and how the ratio of profit to revenue is important in a valuation of a business.

“Tulchan is obviously a very, very well-run company.”

“We’re seeing consolidation, the importance of scale and building a global footprint”

“The right time to sell is not when you’ve reached your peak, it’s when you feel you’ve got great growth.”

21 mins We chat about Penta’s acquisition of Dublin-based corporate PR firm Hume Brophy.

“For Penta, this deal gives them global reach”

24 mins Andrew predicts that 2023 could have a lot of trade deals in the M&A space.

“There are a lot of big trade organisations and holding groups which are sitting on piles of cash and they need to spend it…to keep their share prices high (acquisitions will bring them growth.)”