Every month we compile a few of our favourite #CrackingClientCoverage and social success stories – here are our picks for June.

City Year

Social mobility has been in the news this month with the report from the Social Mobility Commission. One of our clients, City Year UK, addresses the issue of social mobility head-on through their programme of placing volunteers in schools in deprived areas. On the back of this report, we secured two thought leadership pieces for Sophie Livingstone, the Chief Executive of City Year in The Independent and The Times Educational Supplement.

Read more “Our #CrackingClientCoverage for June!”

Last Saturday wasn’t a regular Saturday evening. I spent the evening with two of my biggest female role-models – Sheryl Sandberg and Malala Yousafzai. I don’t think either of them need any introduction.  The talk, organised by Intelligence Squared, was on the topic of ‘facing adversity, building resilience and finding joy’ – all hugely relevant topics for these uncertain political times we live in.

Sheryl’s talk offered a really useful ‘life toolkit’ so I wanted to share some of the key points that I took away: Read more “Facing adversity, building resilience and finding joy”

Well it’s been another eventful June, and we’re only half-way through! We have a hung parliament, or maybe not – we’ll find out next week if the DUP emerge as the Conservative’s ace in the hole. For now, the UK is left dangling in an all-too-familiar state of political limbo. But in the world of PR, there’s no time for complacency. Read more “PR and politics”

This year we have been working with the British Tomato Growers’ Association to encourage people to buy British in the lead up to and during its British Tomato Week (22-28 May).

Starting our outreach in January, our strategy involved three main tactics:

1. Inspiring Brits to use British Tomatoes in their cooking: To inspire Brits to cook with locally grown tomatoes during the week, we worked with a top recipe developer and a renowned food photographer to shoot six delicious family friendly recipes using fresh British tomatoes. These recipes were then pitched to newspapers and consumer magazines.
2. Creating a news story: To capture the attention of the national media, we commissioned a survey that looked into people’s attitudes towards buying British produce post-Brexit. We used key news-hooks such as the recent Spanish vegetable crisis in our research to ensure the story felt new and current.
3. Amplifying through social media: After launching a British Tomatoes Instagram account and refreshing the existing Twitter account, we reached out to key social media influencers and companies with large online profiles asking them to get behind the week’s hashtag. We managed to secure #BritishTomatoWeek posts from a number of influential food accounts  – including all the major supermarkets.

Here is our favourite piece of coverage, and the good news is that we’ve heard from our client that British tomato sales are on the up!

ITV This Morning

Read more “British Tomato Week: Encouraging Britons to buy British”

Stand Agency, award winners! We are very excited to have won Best Use of Media Relations at last night’s CIPR Excellence Awards for our work on Anchor’s Standing up 4 Sitting Down campaign.

Standing Up 4 Sitting Down is an important campaign that aims to increase awareness of a little-understood issue facing older people in the UK – the lack of seating on the high street which is deterring older people from getting out, increasing loneliness and isolation, and seeing the economy lose out on £3.8 billion each year.

Read more “Stand Agency, award winners!”

May was a month of more cracking client coverage. Here is a roundup of the best bits.

City Year UK

City Year UK research hit the headlines this month as they called for the campaigning parties in June’s election to support apprenticeships and other forms of employee training. This fantastic City A.M. piece came at the beginning of Learning at Work Week, placing City Year UK at the forefront of volunteering opportunities for young people in the UK. City A.M. continued to cover the story the next day as well!

Read more “Our #CrackingClientCoverage for May!”

On Thursday 25th of May Stand Agency staff were whisked off to Suffolk’s incredible Wilderness Reserve for its annual away day.

Set in the Walled Garden of the estate, it was great to get a recap of Stand Agency’s successes this past year and hear the business plan for the years to come.

Luckily for us Mother Nature put on her summer best and the sun shone all weekend. From alfresco dinners, bike rides and wine tastings to bonfires and sunny swims – here are some of our favourite snaps from Stand’s Big Weekend:

Read more “Stand Agency away day 2017”

Meet the newest member of the Stand Agency team!

How and why did you get involved in PR?

For me, it actually dates way back to my childhood days where I spent many hours sticking my very own newspapers and magazines together (so cool I know!). After embarking on a Multimedia Journalism degree, I knew I was destined to be a story teller. It wasn’t until I began working on the feature desks of regional newspapers and glossy lifestyle magazines and hearing from passionate PRs, that I realised my heart lies with the ‘dark side’. PR affords the opportunity to completely immerse yourself in an idea, a campaign or a client and see it come to life.

Read more “Meet Stand Agency’s… Katie Elliott!”

Our Standing Up 4 Sitting Down campaign has not only been shortlisted for two PR Moments Awards and shortlisted for two CIPR awards, it has now been shortlisted for two PRCA Dare Awards! The campaign was developed and delivered in partnership with Anchor and has been shortlisted for two awards:

Media Relations Award: This award recognises campaigns that use targeted media relations to achieve excellent results.

Charity/Not for profit Award: This award recognises exceptional PR campaigns delivered by or on behalf of charities or social enterprises.

Standing UP 4 Sitting Down aimed to make the British public aware of the lack of seating on the high street which was deterring older people from getting out and increasing loneliness and isolation.

Read more “We’ve been shortlisted for two PRCA Dare Awards!”

Here’s a quick intro to our newest Senior Account Executive.

How and why did you get involved in PR?

I’ve always been fascinated by what makes people tick and how we engage with the world around us. I studied psychology at university, and when I finished my degree I was drawn to the variety and interactivity of PR. I wanted to work in a creative yet challenging environment that focuses on inspiring change, and PR was a great fit.

What drew you to Stand Agency?

I immediately felt so at home when I joined Stand. The passion that everyone has for the organisations we work with is so inspiring, and I love helping our clients towards positive change. It’s an incredibly supportive and encouraging environment; you’re given the opportunity to work on brilliant projects and you have so much fun whilst doing so.

Read more “Meet Stand Agency’s… Grace French!”