🚀Damian McAlonan

Something you might not know about Mischief: we have access to all of MHP Group's behavioural science insight and expertise. Our work may be a little bit naughty, but at least its backed by science 😈 #strategy #prstrategy #behaviouralscience

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If you want: More brand exposure in UK public sector organisations To get your content in front of multiple stakeholders in the public sector To build relationships, pre tender or to maximise your placement on frameworks/DPS Then simply 👍🏻 this post and let’s discuss how we’re helping our clients to do just this.

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Is branding the most undervalued area of marketing? I enjoy recruiting for branding roles, hearing stories about how campaigns and narratives were crafted, the creative approaches to activations and what people have achieved. How they ties in different channels with a nuanced approach to feed into an overarching brand narrative! I also love seeing tasks in this area as you get to see thought processes behind it. Branding can also be an area that faces heavy cuts during times of economic uncertainty - something that I’ve head from more than a few frustrated professionals!! Interesting read on how Brand Marketers should use metrics and numbers to illustrate branding is as important as performance marketing, especially when they’re working to save their budget. Do you feel businesses should prioritise branding? That they should be aiming to build better brand affinity as the economy begins to grow? Or do you feel there are better areas for them invest their budgets? https://lnkd.in/epGR7xfv

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Fully support the stance of the the DMA (Data & Marketing Association) UK techUK Centre for Information Policy Leadership (CIPL) and Advertising Association. Regardless of the outcome of tomorrow's UK General Election, it is imperative that all political parties recommit to modern data policies. This will ensure the UK can fully harness the power of data-driven and digital technologies which are crucial for economic growth and improved public services. And the pace of this transformation is only continue to accelerate. https://lnkd.in/eR3QXdrA #DataPolicy #DigitalTransformation #EconomicGrowth #PublicServices #UKElection

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📣 Call for Panellists! 📣 The inaugural 'Pop Culture Marketing Trends Summit' will take place at MCM London Comic Con on the morning of Friday 24th May.  It’s a free event aimed at pop culture marketers and comms professionals and those that have an interest in staying abreast of current marketing trends in the context of the rapid and somewhat challenging changes we are all experiencing. We're presenting x5 panels in a whirlwind morning schedule, all of them will be made up of experienced professionals in the following areas: - Industry: Published Media (Books, Comics) - Industry: Games - Channel: Events - Industry: On Screen Entertainment (Film, TV & VOD) - Channel: Creator Each panel will be having a discussion based on three core questions: What changes and developments are you seeing in your consumers or audiences? How do you think your sector is responding and adapting to those challenges? What do you identify as the key marketing trends as a result? So, are you, or do you know a potential panellist? A professional working in the pop culture marketing and comms sector who: - is an avid follower of pop culture marketing and comms trends with an eye on the game and finger on the pulse. - walks the walk as well as talks the talk - enjoys voicing thoughts and opinions and likes talking about them nicely with others - whose employer says it’s ok or even encourages going out and about to talk about things that have been learnt ‘in the day job’ - wants to come and hang out at MCM London Comic Con for the Friday before a bank holiday weekend If that sounds like you or someone you know drop me a line (or get them to) on here or via email (chris@experience12.com).  We’re aiming to curate the most interesting and diverse panels we can to gain as full an insight as possible for the attendees. We will respond to everyone who gets in contact but you may not finally be successful as a pannellist. If you want to get involved apart from being a panellist please feel free to give me a shout and let's have a chat.     IF YOU WANT TO ATTEND THIS EVENT (and why wouldn't you it's a legitimate business case to pop to MCM London Comic Con @ Excel to do some learning and also see fandom consumers free-range in their natural habitat!) More about how to get your mits on tickets next week.

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Proud to announce the first validated score via the ZeroBees Business Impact Tracker. Congrats Diversity Media Sales! DMS performed 26% above media SME benchmark, with strong results in employee and community areas, in line with their mission-led approach. The Business Impact Tracker is a tool designed to support media SMEs (publishers, channel owners, suppliers) to understand where they are in terms of sustainability (across environment, employees, community & suppliers, and governance) and set in motion a plan to systematically improve this - building capacity and knowledge as well as enabling disclosure of where they are on their sustainability journey. Thanks in particular to Legacy Media (Andy Power) for partnering with us on this to enable disclosure though Legacy's brilliant platforms. If you're a media SME interested in understanding and improving your ESG performance - to win investors, clients and more agency traction - get in touch and get your sustainability strategy moving today! #sustainability #media #esg #businessimpacttracker #bit #innovation #goodmedia

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🌟The NHS made history in 2020 as the first health service in the world to commit to Net Zero. This unparalleled journey began during unprecedented workforce, economic and waiting list pressures which have continued since. So, does this make Net Zero a distant pipedream for better times? We don’t think so! We think that environmental, financial and clinical outcomes are inextricably linked! 🚀In our experience Net Zero is a real transformative force for better health outcomes and financial efficiency - making it part of day-to-day health service activity. 💡 Click here to find out how “Cost & Carbon” makes Net Zero real through Carbon Literacy, Greenhouse Gas Capabilities and finding the sweet-spots where Net Zero is aligned with core clinical values and financial outcomes.🌿💰 Be Transformative. Make it real. 🌍 https://pwcuk.smh.re/hsq

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This is an intriguing feature by Sophie Ozoux for Fast Company examining the Chief Marketing Officer role and how the position is undergoing significant changes across the landscape of business, with tenures becoming shorter and some companies questioning the necessity of the position altogether. Many of us have read news over the years of major brands like Starbucks, Johnson & Johnson, and AB InBev rethinking their approach to the CMO role. While consumers might not immediately see the importance of CMOs, their role in driving a company's social impact is crucial. These leaders are often pivotal in implementing sustainability, diversity, and equity initiatives, which in turn reflect a company’s relationship with society. The article provides great examples: Marc S. Pritchard at Procter & Gamble, Jackie Jantos and Josh Penny at Hinge, and Chris Brandt at Chipotle Mexican Grill have all spearheaded campaigns to demonstrate a commitment to making the world a better place. Younger generations have demonstrated that they prefer brands that mirror these values. When businesses undermine the role of the CMO, they lose a crucial voice in effectively communicating these values to their customers. Historically, CMOs have been extremely important in long-term growth and cultural impact initiatives, and the article highlights Google’s Travel Impact Model and Uber’s efforts to aid victims of the crisis in Ukraine. Campaigns by Unilever and Intuit Mailchimp have also shown how marketing can drive social change. The Brownestone Group discusses the power of marketing daily in conversations with our network—and how important the function is for brand building, innovation, and customer service. The insights Chief Marketing Officers can provide on customer data and trends are vital for driving business success. We’re happy to share this thought piece from Fast Company reinforcing how this role remains critical for ensuring long-term, purpose-driven progress within companies. #brandbuilding #business #chiefmarketingofficer #marketing #leadership #socialimpact

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It’s become a personal project to share methods for building self-belief, or self-confidence, with all publishing colleagues who need it - whatever the stage of their career. Through my coaching work I’ve discovered how common self-doubt is, and how overcoming it unlocks potential and improves well-being. I’d love to help others to do the same! So thank you to BookBrunch for inviting me to write this article. I am posting it here for all those who want a strategy to improve their self-confidence.

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Looking forward to exploring the future of magazines in today's ever-evolving media landscape at the PPA 2024 Festival with industry leaders Katie Vanneck from #Hearst and Phillip Swinden from #Haymarket. 📚✨ Key issues we will look at include: 🔹 Consumer brands have some of the deepest connections to their readers around. How do you sustain this amidst the rise of creators and influencers? 🤝 🔹 The challenges and realities of consumer media venturing into B2B verticals. Is this shift as seamless as it appears? 🔄 Let me know what your key questions are. #MediaInnovation #PPAFestival2024 #PublishingFuture #DigitalTransformation

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An arresting morning with Ipsos UK, Lori Meakin, Fernando Desouches and Mike Nicholson from Progressive Masculinity, talking about the oh so very many threats facing young boys - and young girls - today. Brands and companies have a powerful and hugely important role in helping to protect them, and here’s the sweetener (thank you Samira Brophy for the stats), it can actually help the bottom line. So brands, let’s be careful about what we say, how we say it, and where we say it #redefiningmasculinity #progressivemasculinity #genz #toxicmasculinity

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Flying visit* to my wonderful home town of Manchester today, to talk about the art of reframing with Havas Lynx and their highly innovative ViiV Healthcare clients Reframing is defining the problem from a different angle to get to a different solution. The most often quoted example is the Annoying Hotel Elevator: ➡ guests at a new hotel were complaining it ran too slowly. They were paying to stay, not wait. ➡ the obvious answer for management was to speed up the mechanism. Huge engineering challenge. ➡ Instead, reframing the problem from “it’s taking too long” to  “its a waste of my time” resulted in the hotel installing mirrors in the lift lobby; so people could make use of their valuable time with a spot of preening. Complaints over. Reframing is a method. Its equally an attitude; the lemons/make lemonade thing. (Hence the lemony elevator image. Thanks Josh Toogood x Adobe Firefly) Speaking of attitude, I was once again reminded today how Manchester is a city in a state of perpetual reframing; a hot bed of creativity, innovation, entrepreneurship and ingenuity. With a side order of half rice, half chips. Love it. *by train

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A lot of great people from a lot of great agencies have added their voice to this piece from Siobhan Holt in PRWeek UK, so naturally I’m keen to chip in my two pennies too.    Let me start by saying this: pitches are great. I love that collective agency energy when you’re working on a big response and how they push us to challenge our thinking. Obvs I love them less when we don’t win, but: life. They can be brilliantly run and terribly run, and while I think a pitching code of conduct is a lovely idea, it’s one that perhaps feels a tad lofty in ambition, needing buy-in from, well, everyone - agencies and brands - to work. Until such a time that we enter PR utopia, I think agencies need to figure out what their hard lines are and stand their ground more. There are also plenty of great clients out there who run brilliant pitch processes, and even when we don’t win, we feel valued and respected. Be more like them.   Adding to the list, some of my personal pitching red and green flags include:   🚩 No budget? No thanks. Giving a budget, even a ballpark, is essential because we want to shape our response to fit what the brand has to spend. Otherwise we might come up with a corker of an idea the client can’t afford and that will make them sad 💚 People who give the gift of time. We work quickly but obviously we will deliver a better and more in-depth response when we have been given a decent chuck of time to respond   🚩 8+ agencies on a pitch list. Brands should feel empowered to be braver and only choose the top 3-4 agencies they really want to see 💚 Client teams who equally invest a significant amount of their own time into the process and who who make themselves available outside official check-in moments for clarification and sense checking. Big fan    🚩 “Submit your pitch online and we’ll shortlist the ones who will get to present.” *Shudders*. Time investment from the agency aside, I guarantee we will bring our ideas to life better than you reading them ever will (even if you have a vivid imagination) 💚 Proper post pitch feedback for the ones you don't win - it's hugely appreciated when clients show respect for the effort, the agency and the work that went into the response, and we want to hear where we fell short. Tell us, ideally on a call   🚩 Key decision makers not being involved in each stage of the process. From the Q&A to the tissue to the presentation, everyone has a different point of view, different motivations and different objectives – and we want to hear them! That collective thinking helps us shape the best, most considered response    These are fair questions and challenges to ask from the outset of a pitch, but there will always be some processes you enter which will take you close to your hard lines. Then it’s up to you whether or not you choose to step over them. #pitching #newbusiness #pr #comms

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Today's Q1 2024 @IPA Bellwether report showcases a resilient UK marketing landscape, with events and experiences remaining the standout performers with a record expansion. This resilience demonstrates businesses' strong desire to connect with customers, recognising the power of experiences to enable them to achieve this, as well as being a powerful tool to drive their bottom line. Long-term brand building should remain at the forefront amid rising promotional spending. Aligning brand experiences across the different touchpoints with core values and harnessing authentic content created from experiences fosters trust and engagement, and is crucial for navigating the dynamic marketing environment. Read the full report here: https://lnkd.in/eGTDPyN4 #ImaginationGLBL #IPABellwether #UKmarketing #brandexperience #experientialagency #creativeagency

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Impact is our output. We talk about modern marketing being able to deliver two types of impact - cultural and commercial. How do we move beyond the brand purpose debate and into a more grown up and nuanced conversation about the different types of impact we all create as marketers every day? Come and join us to find out.

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Delighted to have been awarded Chartered Marketer status by the CIM | The Chartered Institute of Marketing after two continuous years of CPD and passing the Chartered Marketer Assessment. Chartered Marketer status recognises experienced marketing practitioners who commit to continuing professional development. In an ever-changing marketing landscape, staying up-to-date with the latest developments and innovations remains critical to marketing success. #CharteredMarketer #CMktr #CharteredInstituteOfMarketing #CIM #DigitalMarketing #Marketing #SEO #PPC

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At Street Studios, we have curated some of the best provisions on the UK market, they taste great and are great business models. While there isn't a single solution that can address all our challenges, I encourage all businesses to examine their supply chains closely. I'm sharing some of our findings below, and I would love to hear yours ... Karma Drinks - LOVE CORN - Proper Popcorn - Rejuce #circular #bussniessmodel #smallbussnies #planet #growth #circularity.

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The Roadshow is a great way to develop leadership skills to thrive in a fast-paced bidding environment. Lead with gravitas and drive your team to success through how you communicate. A must-have skill set for any bidding role. Investing in people skills is increasingly more important in this new technological age. Who’s in? #proudtobeAPMP #BIDx #roadshow #skillsdevelopment

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