How to put The YOU in YouTube

In the last decade, YouTube has become one of the most influential social media channels and that’s thanks to the rise of bloggers, vloggers and influencers. With over a billion users, YouTube has become a platform for teenagers and young-adults to keep up-to-date with regular vlogs, a place for adults to re-watch clips from their favourite TV programmes and even a place for travellers to watch holiday reviews or restaurant reviews. But what about YouTube for business? How can you create a channel which reflects the key parts of your brand and puts you ahead of your competitors? We find out…

Brand Consistency

Your social media channels should be consistent with one another and this is key to your brand. This doesn’t necessarily mean that you should be sharing exactly the same content, but things like cover photos, logos and colour schemes should be seamless across your social pages. YouTube is a slightly different kettle of fish as you need to use other social media channels in order to share your videos. BUT the goal is not to rely on the other channels and make your YouTube channel the place to be!

Take a look at our own Youtube Page as an example.

Variety

No one will want to subscribe to your page if the content is dry and boring. Upload a variety of different videos that truly reflect the message of your brand. Post team videos, fun videos or videos that celebrate a certain national day such as National Coffee Day or National Dogs Day! Just like on Twitter and Facebook, you should be posting a combination of posts to keep your page fresh and exciting.

Here’s an example of a fun video we made for one of our clients

Schedule your Posts

Don’t just think that scheduled posts are for Twitter and Facebook. YouTube has a publishing feature which means you can schedule your videos to upload at a certain time. This explains how vloggers can be at a press launch but still upload their videos on time - is there anything these influencers can’t do?!

Utilise YouTube Live

People want to see what you are up to right now! Even if it’s an office video, it can still be exciting. Film your team and ask them what they are up to. It will keep your channel active.

Be the Expert

A professional channel is very different to a personal channel. Make your YouTube channel the platform for people to come to for expert knowledge. You can do this by posting review videos or team interview videos.

We’ve been working on an exciting new PR project and shared this on our YouTube channel.

Use the Tags!

Before publishing your post, you can add tags along the bottom of the publishing page in order for subscribers and non-subscribers to be able to see relatable content. Your videos will then become categorised and will be easier to search; if they’re easier to search then you’ll attract a more relevant audience who are more likely to subscribe.

Video Length

Too short and it will hardly be worth posting. Too long and your viewers will get bored. We recommend uploading a video between 1-2 minutes depending on whether your video is an interview or a news piece.

Our client’s new Garden Terrace launch is a perfect example.

Admin

Fill in the bio, the description and include a good cover photo. Blank spaces will only make your channel appear unprofessional.

Quality Videos

Always upload your videos in HD quality or whatever the best quality for your phone or camera is. We recommend using your smartphone to take videos for YouTube as it’s easier to use, a lot quicker and surprisingly good quality.

Check out Sunny Bird PR’s Re-brand as an example of a good quality video.

PR Campaigns - The Good, The Bad & The Viral

This month’s roundup of PR campaigns feature three brilliant examples from Walkers, who fed Londoners using an interactive bus stop, Nisim’s scientific approach to hair care and a simple yet successful campaign from Vision Express.

#TWEETTOEAT

Although a few years old now, we really like this campaign from Walkers in 2014: The nation’s favourite crisp brand transformed three London bus stops into tweet-activated vending machines as part of its 'Do us a Flavour' campaign.

With Walkers already renowned for its quirky and talked about campaigns, this one was no different. Passers-by of the novel vending machine bus stops in Clapham and Oxford Street were encouraged to tweet @Walkers_busstop, triggering the vending machine to deliver a free packet of crisps to the tweeter.

"Walkers loves bringing fun to the nation and we are extremely excited to launch the first ever Twitter vending machine on the streets of London" said Walkers marketing manager Lee-Teng Chung at the time.

The 2014 'Do us a Flavour' campaign championed six ‘finalist’ flavours which included: Sizzling Steak Fajita, Chip Shop Chicken Curry, Pulled Pork in a Sticky BBQ Sauce, Ranch Raccoon, Cheesy Beans on Toast and Hot Dog with Tomato Ketchup. The vending machines were stocked with one of the six finalist flavours and dispensed 260 packets of crisps daily. The public were also encouraged to vote for their favourite flavour online, taking it from an interactive campaign to a social media campaign.

Not only was this campaign a success on social media, but it also made the consumer media with articles on big hitters such as the Mail Online (2,302,409) and a number of features in trade press too. All in all, another campaign packed full of flavour from the big, crispy giant of crisps.

LAUNCH OF NEW HAIR GROWTH SHAMPOO GETS THE TEST OF TIME

Anyone who has ever regretted a haircut knows it can seem like an age before the upsetting trim grows out. So is there a way to grow out hair quicker? Hair care brand Nisim claims there is, with the launch of its ‘F.A.S.T’ (Fortified Amino Scalp Therapy) shampoo and conditioner which promises to make your hair grow up to 99% faster in one month.

Before being stocked in major retailers, the product was clinically trailed on over 1,000 men and women. On average, test subjects found that after 12 weeks of massaging this product into their hair with every shower, their hair grew around 30% faster than usual. One subject even experienced an astonishing 99% boost in hair length!

Nisim also sent free samples of F.A.S.T to a range of journalists and bloggers for them to try and testament to its effectiveness, resulting in a number of reviews online and in print. Most prominently, a Daily Mail journalist trialled it for four weeks and wrote a review, analysing her hair length at the end of each week. Within the feature, two trichologists (that’s hair and scalp specialists to you and me) also commented on the results and explained that it may not have been the ingredients in the treatment that made her hair grow, but that it was more likely due to the fact that she was massaging her scalp 14 times a week and conditioning her hair every day.

Despite the words of doubt from the trichologists, Nisim achieved three Mail Online (2,302,409) features and over 50 pieces of coverage over the course of two years. This included reviews from bloggers and journalists, product roundups and launch features.

VISION EXPRESS TELLS US WHY WE NEED REGULAR HEALTH CHECKS

Vision Express created the last campaign in this month’s line-up. On the back of National Eye Health Week which took place last week, the visionary company compiled a feature that was as simple as it was effective.

The article starts with an unsettling quote by Vision Express optician Omar Hassan, emphasising the importance of regular eye checks and encouraging us to continue reading. He says: "With many conditions, 40% of vision could be lost without the patient noticing anything is wrong… I see patients with sight problems that could have been prevented if it had been diagnosed earlier."

This statement is followed by a list of which risk factors to look out for as well as what to expect of your eyes through different ages. The article covers eye health among kids and teens, people in their 20’s and 30’s, 40’s and 50’s and those who are 60+.

The beauty of this feature is its simplicity: From our perspective, it looks like the only asset required was some research on people’s eye health habits as well as an in-house expert to advice on eye health through the ages and provide further commentary within the article.  

In short, it appears that Vision Express used assets it already had to create a topical and relevant feature. It was published on the Mirror Online (895,503) and shared further to the Mirror’s 952,000 Twitter followers, proving that a great PR campaign doesn’t have to be eye-wateringly expensive!

PR Campaigns - The Good, The Bad & The Viral

This month’s round-up of weird and wonderful PR campaigns include a hotly debated cosmetic surgery campaign, a travel company causing an actual brawl in Derby, hipster weddings, a fudge Mayan temple and the current topic of Instagram and promoting body positivity.

COSMETIC SURGERY FIRM PUTS BLOGGERS FRONT AND CENTRE

Cosmetic Surgery brand Transform channelled the power of bloggers to help tell personal stories to promote a number of procedures.

The bloggers used included; Sarah Ashcroft (That Pommie Girl) who discussed her breast enlargement, Monikh Dale (Tres Monikh) discussing her lip enhancement, Lydia Millen discussing her laser hair removal and Scarlet Dixon (Scarlett London) discussing her rhinoplasty.

The Instagram and YouTube accounts of the bloggers were used to drive the campaign, looking to position the brand as the best for cosmetic alterations among young women, but also explaining their back stories and their experience with Transform.

The campaign launched in Spring 2016 and ran for a year, with a total spend of £770,000. The material contained no call to action, with Transform hoping to attract fans of each blogger in a more organic way.

The campaign was a hit with the blogger’s followers, gaining support through likes, comments and shares. However national press such as The Guardian and the Mail Online debated whether this was a positive campaign for Transform. A particular video of Sarah Ashcroft was used as a TV advert explaining the process of her boob job and after a week of being aired the video was banned due to it being seen as 'exploiting' young women's insecurities. Online press agreed that the video painted a negative brand image, claiming that it encouraged younger women to get a breast enlargement to gain confidence.

The Blogger stories represented a marketing shift for the company, moving from prioritising TV and print and instead leaning towards digital and social media platforms. This proved to be a popular campaign with the bloggers and their followers; however the general public did find criticism.

JET2HOLIDAYS CAUSES MASSIVE BRAWL

Next, we are looking back at a travel PR stunt gone wrong. Travel company Jet2holidays inadvertently caused a mass brawl as they offered the general public the opportunity to win free flights to a selection of European destinations.

The invitation was put out across their social media channels and people turned up in their droves to the chosen areas in Derby, Nottingham and Leicestershire. Upon arriving in Derby, Jet2holidays had collected a group of young, staff members dressed in red morph suits and the general public were instructed to track them down across the city and tap them for the chance to win free flights. Unfortunately, members of the public rugby-tackled, barged and fought their way to the free flights, with a number of people getting hurt in the process.

The disastrous stunt was covered by BBC News, Mail Online, The Telegraph, The Mirror and The Huffington Post. Additionally, members of the general public took to twitter to express their unhappiness with the company.

I SHORE DO

It’s official. The hipster craze has reached its crescendo. They’ve commandeered the man buns, lumberjack shirts, funny coffee choices, vegan food, tattoos, pretend glasses, handlebar moustaches and beard accessories and now they have their own hipster weddings.

Hipster (hɪpstə): A person who follows the latest trends and fashions, especially those regarded as being outside the cultural mainstream.

Andaz, a hotel in London’s hipster origin Shoreditch, launched the ‘Get Shore-hitched’ wedding package, carefully crafted with all the hipster needs in mind. The package features handcrafted graffiti invitations created by local street artists and complimentary tattoos. Newlyweds can feast on canapés and a wedding breakfast menu created by Shoreditch street food vendors after the ceremony, which will take place in the hotel’s Masonic Temple, a secret room hidden in the depths of the hotel. The hipster wedding fun doesn’t stop there, post-wedding, a local Shoreditch designer will recycle wedding dresses into an outfit that can be used over and again.

We might be seeing the light at the end of the hipster trend, but this is a good way for the East London hotel to highlight and strengthen its relationships with local suppliers and come out on top of this niche market. Coverage-wise, this was picked up by a good number of titles including; The Independent, Good Housekeeping, the Metro and the Evening Standard achieving some hip PR for the hotel too.

We wonder how long it’ll be until we see the hipster divorce?

SUGAR HIT!

We’re looking way back to 2013 at a very successful PR campaign by British heritage brand Tate & Lyle. To celebrate a range of golden and brown cane sugars, the leading sugar brand lured unsuspecting journalists to the world’s first ‘edible hotel’. Very Hansel and Gretel of them – albeit without the witch.

According to the Mail Online, “Lucky residents munched their way through vanilla sponge cushions, windows and walls clad with 2,000 macaroons, a rug made from 1,081 meringues and 20 kilos of marshmallows.”

The Soho-based guest house took a team of 14 cake makers more than 2,000 hours to bake and 900 hours to decorate, and was created using more than 600 kilos of sugar. In addition, there were themed rooms including a Golden Syrup room and a Mayan-inspired room which included a fudge Mayan Temple.

The main objective was to inspire consumers to ‘get creative in the kitchen’. We think they did a rather tasty job as the stunt was covered numerous times by leading media outlets – surely that has to be the icing on the cake, no?

MYPROTEIN JUMPS ON THE BODY POSITIVITY BANDWAGON

Sports nutrition supplement MyProtein wants to show the world that gaining weight through a high protein diet does not only make you feel better, but makes you look better too. To prove this, they challenged 12 women to gain weight healthily through a MyProtein diet and exercise regime. The women then posted their before and after photos along with their before and after weights on Instagram with the hashtags #gainingweightiscool and #screwthescale. Some of them gained as much as three stone and we believe most people would agree that they look better in their fuller, more toned after-photos.

With this, MyProtein has done two great things. First of all, they have created an incredibly visual fitness campaign that stands out in that it doesn’t tell you that you need to lose weight to look fit and healthy, but rather that gaining weight may be a better option. Secondly, it jumps on a very current trend which is a brilliant way to get noticed; the hashtags used in the campaign have been popular among fitness practitioners and body positivity campaigners for some time and have been used on Instagram thousands of times. By using these hashtags, MyProtein did a great job in appealing to a community that aligns with their core messages of promoting health and fitness. Although whether telling women gaining weight will make them hotter really screams ‘body positivity’ is still a topic that’s up for debate.

The campaign gained worldwide coverage, from Daily Mail and Daily Star in the UK, to People and Insider in the US, as well as outlets in Poland and Germany – showing that people love a positive health message all across the world.