The SBPR Social Media Challenge

Every January the Sunny Bird PR team take on a social media challenge, which sees the team go head to head to win a holiday abroad!

At the beginning of this month, each team member presented their yearly review of the SBPR social media channel they manage, including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn. We analysed our engagement, reach, impressions and followers and pinpointed the content that worked, and the content that didn’t work so well from 2019. Using this information, and up to date research into social media trend forecasts for the year ahead, the team have now prepared their January social media strategy for each channel.

What is the Challenge?
The challenge is for each team member to organically increase all the social media statistics on the channel they manage by 100% compared to December in just one month. This means doubling engagement rates, post reach, post impressions and follower increases.

Of course, successful content is not one size fits all, each social media platform has different algorithms and measures of success. If the team are going to succeed, they will have to work hard, do lots of research, carry out lots of split testing, create bespoke content and unmissable opportunities for their audiences to engage.

Why do we do it?
With social media algorithms constantly adapting and changing, no business can afford to be complacent with their social media strategy. At Sunny Bird PR we pride ourselves in being social media experts, which means we always reflect and put into practice our own up to date knowledge across the SBPR social media platforms as well as providing this service to our clients.

Who’s doing it?
Laura is all business on LinkedIn and her tactic is: “To engage more with other users on LinkedIn to create meaningful connections and improve the engagement on our own LinkedIn page.”

Josh will be putting all of his creativity into 180 characters on Twitter where he will: “Include call to actions within each post to maintain engagement.”

Grace is going to be stunning Instagram with beautiful imagery and engaging stories: “I am going to create aspirational imagery to feature on the feed with informative captions and lots of well thought out hashtags.”

Annabel will be sharing all of our news and updates on Facebook, and asking for our community’s feedback: “My Facebook content will start conversations through sharing Sunny Bird PR’s knowledge and asking our followers for their opinions in 2020.”

How will we stay on track?

Every Monday in January the SBPR team will meet and discuss what they have achieved for their social media channel in the previous week, analysing each post and engagement, discussing how they can improve for the next week – if we want to smash our goals, we should be improving by 25% week on week!

These meetings are an opportunity to celebrate successes, offer honest critiques, and where the whole team can make suggestions for improvements. By discussing our progress as a team, it means we all gain a strong insight into each social media platform – preparing us for when we switch up our platforms in 2020.

Our next social media course is from 10AM-2PM on Thursday 20th February, tickets are available on our website www.sunnybirdpr.com/social-media-course. At this course we will share our tried and tested social media tactics to help you maximise your social media presence and use it to the best of your advantage. This half-day course will teach you everything, from paid for advertising to organic reach and all the jargon in between.  

Building A Community on Social Media

When it comes to creating a direct line of communication with your audience, there is no tool more valuable than social media.

Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn aren’t just platforms for you to share your brand’s content with your audience, they also provide you with a way to communicate and engage with your brand’s followers creating your very own community. Brands that do this successfully are rewarded with organic brand champions and ambassadors as well as a sounding board offering a valuable insight into what is, and isn’t, working for their brand.

Two brands that have successfully created engaged social media communities are Jimmy’s Iced Coffee and Bliss Sanctuary for Women.

On Jimmy’s Iced Coffee’s social media accounts the team frequently share content posted by their community, and they respond to every comment in their unique and funny brand voice.

Bliss Sanctuary for Women make sure that their posts address their audience in first person, and use images of real guests who have visited their sanctuaries.

The social media shop window

You should approach your brand’s social media in the same way that you would your shop window if you had one. It is the first thing a potential customer sees when deciding whether they will engage with your brand.   

This means that social media isn’t just a shop window for content, it offers your potential customers an insight into how you deal with customer service issues too. If a potential customer browses your social media pages and sees that you are not creating a community with your audience, not answering their questions or listening to their opinions they are likely to take their business elsewhere.

So how can you build your community through social media? We have compiled some tips below to help you get started:

1.) Actively communicate

It might seem obvious, but communication is the foundation of all successful social media platforms. Brands which respond to comments, ask questions, and involve their followers with brand decisions gain not only the trust, but the respect of their followers.

2.) Be consistent with your engagement

Consistency is key when it comes to social media. Set aside half an hour at the start of every day and half an hour at the end to completely dedicate time to your social media engagement – this might be answering your audience’s comments, tagging them into posts, following new accounts or sending responses to messages.

3.) Step outside your own feed

Social media isn’t just about the space that your brand calls home, but the space that your followers, competitors, fans and collaborators curate too. Take the time every day to comment, like, share and engage with the content produced by these accounts. Both the Instagram and Facebook algorithm will prioritise your content if it detects that you are making meaningful connections with your followers – which means the more conversations you are having, the more your content will be seen.

4.) Make use of social media tools and trends

Instagram stories are more than just a feature to post quick snippets and videos. You can use stories to host polls, schedule Q&As, quiz your audience and much more. Stories that ask for involvement from the audience stand out, and when your followers see that you are asking for their opinions, they will want to be involved. 

5.) Keep it real

Making the most of real-life events and moments for social media content is an essential way to raise your brand’s value in the eyes of your customers. Showing your customers that your brand exists outside the screen builds your credibility, and keeps your brand feeling human. From working with influencers, highlighting your staff, shooting content at events and inviting your community to try products, there are many ways that you can bring your brand to life in your content.

For example, if you are a fashion brand, you could consider using a social media influencer that your community admires to promote your product. This activity could be as simple as sending an influencer a gift and asking them to share it on their social media platform.

An engaged social media community is an invaluable asset for businesses and can help to increase brand reputation, grow brand value in the eyes of the customer, and to receive constructive feedback. By dedicating your time to building your own community, we guarantee that you will see positive, tangible results for your business.

If you would like to learn tried and tested social media tactics to help you maximise your social media presence, grow your online community, and use it to the best of your advantage, then join the SBPR team on Thursday 20th February 2020 for our Social Media Masterclass.  Our half-day course will teach you everything, from building your community to increasing your organic reach and everything in between.

https://www.sunnybirdpr.com/social-media-course

Journalist of the Month

This month we are catching up with Emma North, a freelance journalist who has written for titles such as Glamour, ELLE, Vogue, The Telegraph and Fabulous magazine! Emma will be heading to our client’s luxury women’s only retreat, Bliss Sanctuary for Women in Bali, with her mum in January, but before she heads off Emma has taken 5 minutes out to complete our SBPR Journo of the month questions…

What are the 5 words that best describe you?

Loyal, calm, friendly, empathetic and creative

What magazine do you love reading and why?

Ooh - I love reading Cosmopolitan for their up-to-date and engaging topics. They always seem to be one step ahead of everyone else in terms of controversy and interesting reads. I also love to read Grazia for the celeb gossip and beauty pages. Joely Walker is my female crush. 

What is your favourite book? 

The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair by Joel Dicker 

Which song makes you dance?

Crazy in Love - Beyoncé. It used to be my ringtone in the days before iPhones. Every time I hear it, I think my LG flip phone is ringing and I want to dance.

What has been your best career moment? 

Having my name credited in Funmi Fetto's beauty bible book, Palette.  I assisted her as beauty assistant which was a dream come true. I reached out to Funmi years ago and she's been my mentor and inspiration ever since. Big love to her.

What advice would you give your 20 year old self? 

If you're scared - don't waste your energy worrying and do it anyway. What's the worst that can happen?

Where are you happiest? 

I'm happiest at home in Devon, with my dogs and my family, eating pasta. Or on a Caribbean beach... I can't decide.

Who would be your number one dinner guest and why?

I can't choose just one! I'd have to say Freddie Mercury or Mahatma Gandhi. Freddie would be so entertaining and charismatic. Gandhi would explain to me how I can find peace in this crazy world. 

If you could have any superpower, what would it be and why?

I was cabin crew for 4 years and spent my life on long haul aeroplanes, jet lagged and exhausted. For that reason, I always swore if I had a superpower it would be teleportation. Travelling sucks. I'd like to be able to click my fingers and be somewhere instantly... primarily for naps.

If you had to ask us one question what would it be? 

Are there any clients that you dream of working with and why?

___________________________________________________________

Josh - Paddy Power – they do crazy and outrageous stunts to get them noticed in the busy betting sector and I’d love to be part of the creative.

Lizzie - Farrow and Ball – just because I love them so much; their ethos, branding, colours, and style!

Annabel - I would love to work with a brand which creates Christmas decorations - I am absolutely obsessed with the decorations that Paperchase makes, and I love their stationary too!

Grace - I would love to work with Nars, the make-up brand. I love their make-up and their campaign imagery. They always collaborate with amazing celebs, host incredible events and can be quite controversial with their branding!

Laura – I would like more travel clients and luxury retreats in places like the Maldives, Caribbean etc. – mainly so I can visit them!

Journalist of the Month

Photo: Sarah Brick

Catriona Innes is currently Features Director at Cosmopolitan where, in the name of investigative journalism, she has joined an undercover police force, worked as a Playboy Bunny croupier and – for one night only – performed a stand-up set with just two hours’ practice. When she’s not trying on other careers for size, she edits, writes and commissions the award-winning features section of the magazine. Originally from Edinburgh she now lives in London with her husband and cat.

Catriona took some time out of her publishing duties and undercover exploits to answer the notorious SBPR questions…

1.What are the 5 words that best describe you?

Eeeek, I really don’t know. I’d like to think I’m positive (though my friends also know I do like a good bitch every now and then), hard-working, fun (even if I don’t bring the fun I tend to gravitate towards those who do), sleepy (if I don’t get my nine hours that would change to grumpy) and, I guess, happy. I’m very happy right now.

2.What magazine do you love reading and why?

I always get all the weekend supplements – I absolutely love the Guardian Weekend, their long-form features have inspired me throughout my career. I’m also loving ELLE since Farrah Storr took over, the memoir piece at the front is always so moving. And Red for motivation and good advice. American GQ costs a fortune to get here, but is worth it for the long-reads.

 3.What is your favourite book?

I always recommend The Lost Art Of Keeping Secrets by Eva Rice, it’s one of the few books I’ve read again and again. After Long Silence by Helen Fremont is a brilliant memoir about a woman who discovers that her family is Jewish and that her parents were in concentration camps. They hid it from her to protect her. I’ve bought it about five times as I keep lending out copies to people that I don’t get back.

 4.Which song makes you dance?

Raise Your Glass by P!nk.

 5.What has been your best career moment?

Getting my job at Cosmopolitan. As soon as I read the first rebrand issue I knew I had to work here – it was at a time when lots of magazines had taken out long-read, investigative features and Cosmopolitan was bucking the trend. I wrote in straight away saying I loved what they were doing and applied for the job of Senior Editor as soon as it came up. Since then I’ve commissioned so many features I’m proud of, as well as writing a huge variation of reports on more serious issues like sexual assault in the porn industry and going undercover with a police force who catch predators on the London underground to lighter things, like when I performed a stand-up comedy set or went to work in the Playboy club.

 6.What advice would you give your 20-year-old self?

Career-wise: keep going and trust yourself. I had a lot of wobbles in the early stage of my career where I thought I just wasn’t good enough and would stop emailing editors with my pitches. But now I see that I should have gone for it more and not taken silence as a “no” (I now realise editors are SO busy so that’s probably why they didn’t reply.) Life-wise: carry on having adventures, they matter so much more than the clothes you’re wearing or anything that could bring you ‘status.’

7. Where are you happiest?

Golden hour, first night of a festival, surrounded by friends, can of Strongbow in hand.

 8.Who would be your number one dinner guest and why?

P!nk. But not sure it would be that fun for her. I met her once and couldn’t speak I was crying so much.

 9. If you could have any superpower, what would it be and why?

Teleportation. I’d love to be able to, in an instant, visit my family and friends in Scotland.

10.  If you had to ask us one question what would it be?

What do journalists do that make your job harder?

It’s our job to make journalist’s jobs as easy as possible, so it’s interesting to think of it the other way around. Here’s what the team thought:

Lizzie: Not answering the phone or replying to emails.

Alex: It’s only happened once but naming the client’s product wrong in press did not go down well. The other frustrating thing is not being able to get feedback why a feature doesn’t make the cut.

Josh: Judging the story before they’ve heard it because I’m a ‘PR’ or ‘Press Officer’.

Laura: Not crediting the brand or company when we have provided the journalist with brilliant quotes and images for their story.

Sunny: Saying they are going to feature a story and then no doing it, as it’s very difficult to explain why stories get spiked to clients.

Catriona’s first novel The Matchmaker is available from November 28th and can be ordered here.

Clientversary: Bournemouth Collegiate School

The Sunny Bird PR team is celebrating its one year ‘clientversary’ with Bournemouth Collegiate School. The independent school first approached the team with two objectives; to increase the school’s enrolment figures through regional press and raise the profile of the school on a national level by highlighting its USPs and sought-after sports facilities.

To do this, Sunny Bird PR developed a strong media relations campaign to ensure BCS was featured in its target publications year round. To assess how and where to focus our media presence we conducted an initial survey of parents to discover where they heard about the school and what they thought about it to provide us with knowledge and focus for our approach. We discovered that 64% of parents discovered BCS through word of mouth and local news, which became a core focus of our PR strategy. We knew that regionally, local pupil success stories are always well read with friends and families sharing the news to their wider network on and offline. Each month, we produced several stories championing the pupils’ success from Wimbledon tournaments, to literary awards and everything in between. With the pupils at BCS being such a talented and high achieving bunch, we were never short of material and managed to secure 28 pupil-led stories in key regional publications throughout the year.

Our second approach was to establish the school and its teachers as education experts and leaders in their disciplines. To do this we worked closely with the school’s headmaster Mr Russell Slatford to identify newsworthy topics and trends in education which he could comment on. We targeted key journalists in the national and education press and offered them exclusive opinion pieces or interviews with the headmaster himself. Over the year we secured 14 comment opportunities for Mr Slatford on a wide range of topics including Brexit, charity work, school uniforms, the importance of sport and iGCSEs. The long form interviews were featured in a plethora of trade titles and pitched to national press ensuring BCS was firmly in the contact books of national education journalists and broadcasters including the likes of The Daily Telegraph and Channel 5 news.

Alongside championing the school’s pupils and staff we created features to highlight BCS’ unique offerings such as the prep’s Forest School and the senior sports academies, interviewing Heads of Departments as well as pupils about their experiences. Through this tactic we were able to highlight the school’s core philosophy of providing ‘education with character’ and place it in magazines and newspapers read by prospective and existing parents.

In total, over the past 12 months SBPR achieved 64 pieces of coverage for the school in target titles including in The Daily Telegraph, Schools Week, Country & Town House, Education Investor Global, Independent Education Today, Dorset Life, Wiltshire Life, The Lymington Times and the Daily Echo. That is an average of five pieces per month which reached more than 1.5 million people!

How to... Contact a Journalist

A good relationship with the press is absolutely key for PR, without this your story will never see the light of day but how do you cultivate one of these elusive, sacred relationships? Journalists are absolutely inundated every day by 100s of emails, calls (mobile and office), direct tweets, old fashioned post and people turning up at their offices armed with product for them to try. On top of this barrage of communication on all fronts, journalists still need time to research and write their articles. So how do we get through all this noise and make ourselves heard without becoming a nuisance and being ‘ghosted’?

1. Journalists are human too

- Don’t send them blanket emails, don’t just BCC your pitch out with a generic ‘Hi’ or ‘Good Morning’ as it will end up unopened in the trash – they’ll know that you’ve sent it out to the world and its dog

- Take the time to read their articles before sending them information on your product/brand/service/story to ensure that it is suitable and refer back to one of their articles so they know that you’ve bothered to do your research

2. The early pitch catches the coverage

- Email journalists earlier in the week and in the morning because fewer journalists work on the weekend and your email should appear in their inboxes when they’re planning out their work for the week

3. Know Thy Journalist

- Going back to ‘journalists are human’, they all have their own preferred style or method of communication. Some will never respond to emails, others will only reply to emails and never take calls, some like that personal touch and can spare five minutes for you to see them face to face, others use twitter to get their stories. Unfortunately there’s no shortcut to this – you just have to learn and remember. We make a point of finding out from our journalists and here’s a peek at some of their bugbears and preferences...

We’ve spent years cultivating our relationships with journalists and have worked hard to make sure that we know them well enough to pitch the right stories to them at the right time with the assets they like best. This has paid off, not only do we get stories placed in the most coveted titles but they even like us! You can see what some journalists say about Sunny Bird PR here... https://www.sunnybirdpr.com/testimonials/

4. Keep your eyes peeled

- If a journalist says they’re going to run with your story, politely ask for an expected date so you can keep an eye out for your coverage – no one wants to go through steps 1-3 and then miss the coverage after all that hard work!

- If it’s a hard copy, make sure you get a copy when it does come out, hell, get two or three copies

- If it’s online, save it down so you always have a copy in case they take it down in the future

- Share it far and wide on all your social platforms – make sure it’s well presented if it’s a scan or an accessible link if it’s online

5. Remember your manners

- Say thank you!

- Send a handwritten, personalised card and some chocolate (that’s what we do) to the lovely journalist that featured you – if you keep them sweet they might even feature you again :) 

We hope this blog post has been useful and will fill you with confidence next time you’re approaching the press. We appreciate that it’s incredibly time intensive and there’s no short cut to creating these relationships. If you would like to get your story into the press but don’t have that much time on your hands feel free to give us a call on 01202 293095 or drop us a line at hello@sunnybirdpr.com.