Every six months or so I like to catch up with the shy and reserved Warren Johnson from W Communications on the podcast to talk about the financial state of UK PR.

And to my surprise- it’s that time again. The first 6 months of 2023 are basically done and dusted.

My sense is that it’s been a bit of a phoney 6 months or so - the PR sector has been expecting a downturn but beyond a significant tech sector-wide wobble at the start of the year, which has in the main come back, it’s been OK, not stellar but OK. And in many cases surprisingly OK.

But on the show today we’re going to chat about some of the recent league table results we’ve seen in PR, what constituted good numbers last year, and how the last 6 months have been. We’ll also attempt to put some predictions on what might be about to happen next.

W has a fee income of £15m, with offices in London, New York and Singapore. It employs approximately 180 people globally and 150 odd in London.

A reminder that the final entry deadline for The Creative Moment Awards is Friday 30th June.

Thanks to the PRmoment Podcast sponsors, The PRCA.

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

3 mins Warren reviews the performance of UK PR in the first half of the year. What’s up, what’s down, what’s flat?

“What was quite alarming...was that despite the UK agencies reporting strong growth, they were falling down the international rankings”

“We (the UK) are not fully aware of our own demise at the moment and what a second-rate country we’re becoming”

“UK PR had a strong start to the year… and there is now some preemptive belt tightening client side”

Everyone had a strong Q1 with a slight softening in Q2 as the economic outlook, which doesn't get any worse but shows no sign of recovery.”

“Overall H1 was relatively robust but we all (PR firms) had to work a bit harder than we were expecting to make those numbers”

9 mins Bearing in mind inflation how much did PR firms need to frow last year, to increase their profits?

“Our profits grow in line with our revenue…we’ve not had any challenges in our margin.”

“It’s something Graham Goodkind once told me - he said he wanted one thing as a KPI for him as a CEO and that’s a margin number”

“It’s harder t maintain that margin than it ever has been, there’s been rampant wage inflation and a requirement to offer greater benefits than there ever has been.”

“We’re big advocates of in-person collaboration so we’re doing as much as we can to encourage people into the office but that comes at a cost.”

“The other big hidden cost is mental health - which increasingly seems to be sitting away from the government (as a responsibility) and on employers.”

“We just rolled out private health care for our company and extended to private mental health care - important to do but these are all costs that chip away at the margin.”

“As an industry, we are very good at being inventive…as our margin gets challenged in one area we are able to find opportunities… in certain other areas.”

“I certainly get the sense that people are pitching a lot less…pitching is probably the most inefficient thing you can ever do.”

“The less you pitch the better…that will hit your margin more than wage inflation”

13 mins  What do clients want at the moment?