Instagram Update – Interactive Polls

You may have noticed in the last few weeks that Instagram has introduced a new feature that allows users to add polls to their Instagram stories. The new ‘interactive poll sticker’ enables users to upload a photo to Instagram stories and create a simple two option poll which they then place on top of the photo. The poll collates the results in real time and then like a normal Instagram story, it disappears after 24 hours.

As the creator of the poll you’ll be able to see how many votes each option receives, along with the choices that each voter makes. It provides direct interaction with your followers and has proven very popular since its launch at the beginning of the month.

Simply create an Instagram story, swipe up and choose the poll function, customise the options and then the app collates the results for you.

There are a number ways that this new fun feature can be used to boost your Instagram game. Below are just a few suggestions to get you started…

1)       Ask for feedback

There’s no better way to find out what your audience wants than to come straight out and ask them. The new poll tool is a quick and effective way to do this. Questions could include:

·         Do you like our new packaging design?

·         Would you like to see our product in a bigger size?

·         Would you like to see more blog posts with tips? Or fun personal blog posts?

·         What flavour do you prefer?

2)       Jump on the back of trending topics

If there’s a trending topic or current event, then join in the discussion and engage with your audience. Pose questions around the topic in a way that will relate to the majority of your audience, whether that be through playful questions or questions of a more serious nature. It shows that you’re aware of the events that are important to your consumer and that you relate to your target demographic.

Remember the trending photo of the trainer that recently divided the nation? Some people were adamant that the shoe was grey and aqua, others convinced that it was pink and white. This would’ve been a brilliant time to harness the new Instagram poll feature in a fun and engaging way.

3)      Market Research

The new poll tool can be used as a free way to collect data from your audience. If you’re sourcing responses from other social media platforms then including your Instagram stories audience will boost the volume of data collected.

There are many creative ways to incorporate the new polls feature into your social media strategy. It’s a useful and fun feature that can easily be used to engage with your audience. Give it a go today!

How We Increased Traffic by 3,535% for a New Website

There are so many routes to the consumer through media when it comes to launching a new product. Our job at Sunny Bird PR is to assess these routes and choose the most effective for each client and their product.

Before Regrowz launched its hair thickening product for women we carried out extensive research through a bank of 30 case studies who trialled the product for six months. From these case studies we found a high percentage of women suffered from thinning hair or hair loss after giving birth. This led us to carry out further research in this field and from this we found a number of celebrities who had also been through the same experience.

We then sent out Regrowz for Women to the agents of these celebrities inviting the celebrities to trial the product. As a result of all our research and targeted approach to celebrities we secured a celebrity endorsement from Jennifer Metcalfe who posted on her Instagram and Twitter channels about the amazing results she’d had from using Regrowz for Women.

Jennifer’s Instagram post received over 6,000 likes in just 24 hours and over 10,000 likes in under a week. As Jennifer had tagged Regrowz into the post, we saw the Regrowz for Women Instagram channel go from 886 followers to 2,200 overnight – a huge 248% increase in followers.

The Sunny Bird PR team reacted to this immediately and shared Jennifer’s endorsement on the Regrowz for Women social media channels with a link to the Regrowz website offering a 15% discount. This reactive social media activity increased traffic to the Regrowz website by an amazing 3,535% - a phenomenal result for a new product and website.

To find out more about celebrity endorsement and if it could work for you and your brand call the team on 01202 293095 or email hello@sunnybirdpr.com

We Achieved 103 Pieces Of Coverage In One Year (8.5 Pieces Per Month) Reaching Over 249 Million People

It's always a great feeling when you summarise the results from a yearly PR campaign and let's just say that there were high fives all around when we summarised the recent PR campaign for card company thortful.

Start-up company thortful is an online card company that focuses on supporting creative talent and having a card for every occasion. They came to us to help launch their brand to the media, opinion formers and target demographic. Their objective was to build brand recognition to boost card sales and boost repeat online purchases. The online card marketplace is crowded so we knew that we needed some seriously creative PR campaigns to truly make them stand out amongst the competition.

As well as promoting the general card range, Sunny Bird PR also developed a number of creative PR campaigns that would garner as much coverage for thortful as possible. This included the following:

-          Product placement and card round up pages
Throughout the year the team held multiple one to one media meetings in London and we ensured that thortful was always front-of-mind in advance of all key seasonal times of year (Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day etc.). Press became so used to seeing our faces (which is only ever a good thing) and thortful became synonymous with original, fun and thoughtful cards. Many journalists requested card samples for themselves and family members as a result and it was a brilliant way to introduce the media to the brand.

-          Father’s Day ‘the best advice your Dad ever gave you’
The team travelled 1,000’s of miles across national train networks to collect the best advice people had received from their fathers. This campaign resulted in some great quality coverage within the Mail Online as well as social media and consumer engagement.

-          Breast Cancer Awareness Month
Sunny Bird PR enlisted a thortful creative to curate a range of empathy cards. The idea behind the campaign was to create a range of cards that is different to the traditional ‘get well’ cards on the market. The creative herself previously suffered from cancer and was positioned as an authentic case study. This campaign resulted in 20 pieces of coverage in titles such as Mashable, Metro, Elle Online, Independent.co.uk and Good To Know.

-          Gary James McQueen ‘Are you OK?’ card range
The team collaborated with the nephew of the late Alexander McQueen to create a collection of ‘Are you OK?’ cards to tackle mental health stigma and to give thortful the opportunity to be positioned within the fashion and health titles. A mental health charity partnership was secured to add authenticity to the collaboration and the collection was featured in 17 titles, including; Hello Fashion Monthly, Emerald Street and Country & Town House Online.

-          Launching the Father’s Day Sock Card
Father’s Day 2017 saw the launch of the Father’s Day Sock Card – a gift and card in one. The team issued personalised samples to leading TV producers and male presenters who were also fathers. Not only did the team source the names of the influential fathers, but the card designs were chosen for them based on their public persona and taste. This activity resulted in stand-out coverage on ITV’s This Morning with Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield in a Father’s Day gift guide. The programme was watched by over 3 million viewers and thortful saw a direct increase in sales as a result.

-          Launching the Keepsake Cards
Sunny Bird PR pitched the Keepsake Cards as an alternative Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day ‘gift and card in one’. The press feedback for the Keepsake Cards was very strong, especially among the supplements. All key journalists received personalised Keepsake Cards and we offered them the opportunity to order a free Keepsake Card as a gift from thortful for a loved one of their choice. The activity was in line with thortful’s key messaging of always being thoughtful and it resulted in some great coverage, including pieces in S Magazine, Notebook and Fabulous.

-          Trade and Business outreach
Sunny Bird PR targeted key trade and business titles to ensure that thortful was positioned as a voice of authority and a start-up that was shaking up the card industry. The founder, Andy Pearce, was pitched as a successful entrepreneur and the face of the brand which resulted in standout coverage being achieved within the following titles; Marketing Week, Growth Business, Fresh Business Thinking, Progressive Greetings, Entrepreneur & Investor, Campaign Week and Enterprise Nation.

-          App reviews
One of thortful’s secondary objectives was to encourage sales through the thortful app to boost repeat purchase. Sunny Bird PR targeted journalists who often write app reviews specifically and also seeded the app and a free code to key mummy bloggers. This activity resulted in positive app reviews both in key national newspapers and on high circulation blogs. These reviews often included direct hyperlinks to the app store so that the app could be purchased. The blogger coverage also provided an opportunity for a ‘step-by-step guide on how to use the thortful  app’ to be published which educated the reader on the pros of using thortful over the competition. Coverage secured included; Metro, Mummy Constant and The Mirror.

The results are in!!!
One year, lots of media meetings and multiple creative PR campaigns later and we have secured 103 pieces of coverage with a reach of 249,370,993. The coverage spanned from high circulation online titles such as Mail Online, Mashable, ElleUK.com, Express.co.uk and a prime daytime TV slot on This Morning’s Father’s Day gift guide that resulted in a direct spike in thortful website traffic and Father’s Day sales.  

Want to find out more? Drop us a line on 01202 293095 to find out how a creative PR campaign could work for you too.

​​​​​​​19 Regional Client Wins in 12 Months

As Sunny Bird PR celebrates its fourth year as a public relations agency it also celebrates what has been a phenomenal year with a rebrand, office move and an influx of new clients and staff. 

Originally based in Basepoint, Hurn, the agency soon outgrew the office space and moved to Bournemouth town centre in September 2016. Sunny Bird, the owner of the agency explains: “We always assumed that we’d attract a lot of regional clients but in our first three years it was mainly national and international clients.”

Originally called Little Bird PR, after the colloquialism ‘a little bird told me’, Sunny made the decision to change the name as so many of the international clients didn’t understand the saying: “Some clients said they’d assumed from the name that we were a small agency and at three years in we really weren’t so I thought I’d change the name along with investing in a rebrand and an office move to reflect the agency more accurately.”

Since the rebrand to Sunny Bird PR and the move to large, central Bournemouth offices the agency has experienced a huge growth in regional client wins. “We’ve had a fantastic year with 19 regional clients signing up in the last 12 months. I had planned on expansion which is why I’d chosen such large offices but I had no idea it would happen this quickly or that we’d win so much regional business.”

The team at Sunny Bird PR specialises in having a fresh approach to modern media and creating strategies for brands to connect with their consumers on a regional, national and international scale. For more information call the team on 01202 293095 or email hello@sunnybirdpr.com.

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!

How Well Do Your Newsletters Perform?

We all get them and most of us have some experience of sending them but do they work? We’ve spent some time fine tuning our own newsletters which has proven to be very effective. The average open rate is 24.79% with an average click through rate of 4.19%.

Following our hard work, we now have an average open rate of 45% and a 15% click through rate.

Not sure what open rates or click throughs are or keen to improve them? We’ve used our experience in improving ours to share some tips with you. The newsletter can be a powerful tool if it’s used properly, as a PR agency with communication at the heart of everything we do, it is imperative that we don’t just send out newsletters but that they are effective. Email marketing in general offers one of the best returns on investment when it comes to your marketing budget, this doesn’t just magically happen though; we have to work for it.

To ensure our messages are read and engaged with, we have focussed on improving two important metrics: open rates and click-through rates.

Open Rate

The open rate is the number of recipients who opened your email. Here are three tips to improve your open rate:

Resend unopened emails

It can be disheartening to see that your carefully crafted newsletter hasn’t even be opened but don’t take this as a personal slight, very often people just haven’t had time to open it. So, try resending your newsletter to the recipients who haven’t opened it yet with a new subject line. This way you’re getting another chance at being read without having to create new content. This can increase your open rate from 30% - 50%.

Delivery times

Depending on who your recipients are and what they’re typical day involves, they are likely to open emails at different times. Experiment and try sending your newsletter at different times of day to see if it obtains a higher open rate. We’ve found that as most of our recipients are business owners, a lunch time send out works best as they’ll hopefully have some time to open non-urgent, work related emails then.

Words that trigger spam filters

More than 100 billion emails are flagged as spam every day so avoid using any trigger words, overuse of symbols and unusual formatting. This site provides a useful guide for avoiding spam filters: http://blog.automational.com/2016/03/08/spam-trigger-words-to-avoid/

Click-Throughs

A click-through is when the recipient clicks a link within the email. This is a great way of increasing traffic to your website or delivering a call to action. Here are five tips to improve your click through rate:

Keep it simple

People need to know why they should click on a link and they need to have an incentive to do so, if the message is unclear then people won’t commit to a click.

Mobile responsive

A huge 65% per cent of all emails are first opened on mobile devices. And because we’re all impatient, you need to make sure your emails load quickly and are easy to read, otherwise we give up and delete.

Click bait

We’ve all been subject to this, a shocking statement on a social media post but you can’t find out the whole story unless you click on the link: click bait. You need to do this on your newsletter to up the ante on you click through rate, try piquing the reader’s curiosity and tapping into what your intended audience would want to know.

Videos

Research shows video email marketing is on the rise and has a 280% higher rate of return than traditional emails. Insert a relevant video (not one of your dog doing something cute) to capture your audience’s attention and motivate them to click.

Multiple chances

Give your newsletter the best chance possible when it comes to its click through rate by creating many call to actions. We hyper link specific words to our website as well as adding buttons such as  ‘Find Out More’, ‘Read More Here’, ‘Find Out How’ depending on the content.

Now for the call to action (it would be amiss to miss), if you would like some advice or support with your own newsletter get in touch with the team on 01202 293095 or email us at hello@sunnybirdpr.com

Journalist of the Month

Jocelyn Bailey is a freelance journalist who was previously the Beauty Editor at Woman magazine. Jocelyn has taken a few minutes out from writing health and beauty features to answer the infamous Sunny Bird PR questions…

1. What are the 5 words that best describe you? It's really difficult to describe yourself. Optimistic, definitely. Friendly, I hope. Conscientious. Persistent. And maybe quirky. I probably shouldn't mention being a bit impatient sometimes...

2. What magazine do you love reading and why? Does The Sunday Times count? That's a whole week's reading right there. If not, probably Allure, which has often been inspirational as well as informative. Online, I really admire Get The Gloss.

3. What is your favourite book? To Kill A Mockingbird. 

4. Which song makes you dance? Any big Michael Jackson dance title - Beat It, Billy Jean, Black or White, Bad - how could anyone keep still?

5. What has been your best career moment? I don't think I can pick one moment. I've had a lot of highs over the years and a few lows, too. That's just what happens during a long career. But going freelance in LA was pretty sensational!

6. What advice would you give your 20 year old self? 'Put him down and concentrate on your work.' (Probably much the same thing I was always told at school, really.) Actually, at 20 I wasn't a fully-fledged journo yet, so maybe it should be, 'Just don't give up - it'll all work out fine.'  Oh, and 'Listen to your mother!'

7. Where are you happiest? Either at home, or with my friends in L.A.

8. Who would be your number one dinner guest be and why? I can't decide between Frank Sinatra and Anne Boleyn. Having both would be cool - I wonder if they'd get on? But if the guests have to be alive I might go for JK Rowling. Or the Queen. Or Billy Connolly. Wait - how about a dinner with JK Rowling, Billy Connolly and Donald Trump? That would be brilliant!

9. If you could have any superpower, what power would it be and why? Either telepathy (because no-one could tell me any lies or keep any secrets, professional or personal, ever again) or perhaps telekinesis, which might be more fun (and fabulously useful). They're both powers of the mind so maybe I can I have both.

10. If you had to ask us one question, what would it be? "Dear God, why me?!?!"

“We’ve loved working with you and we wanted to find out a bit more about you.”

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.