News & Views

There’s been plenty for comms professionals to learn from what’s been a fascinating last 12-months.

Oil giant BP and its beleaguered boss Tony Hayward made schoolboy error after error, making his name forever synonymous with the phrase ‘I want my life back’.

The World Cup bid team was left red-faced when England was soundly thrashed to the prize by Russia, despite its brilliant presentation and a number of votes apparently promised. It’s difficult to fail in a more spectacular way, and lessons will inevitably be learnt from the ‘arrogance’ many feel the team displayed. (more…)

Posted by
Ben Hewes

With businesses battling ongoing employment law red tape, Freshfield has helped launch a new dedicated service for Lancashire law firm, Harrison Drury Solicitors.

For businesses that sign up to the insurance-backed service, called HR Compass, potential costs of legal fees, claims and settlements arising from employment disputes will be covered.

Freshfield’s branding and design team created a new corporate identity, as well as marketing collateral which was implemented across digital channels. (more…)

Posted by
Simon Turner

Sally Sykes, communications director for the Health and Safety Executive, writes for Freshfield on the challenges of debunking health and safety myths.

Having been at the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) for over two years, I have seen plenty of myths about ‘elf n’ safety’, many of which seem to proliferate during the festive season.

I head up HSE’s communications team who work tirelessly to change perceptions and differentiate the serious work of the HSE in regulating industries like chemicals, nuclear power and offshore oil drilling. (more…)

Posted by
admin

Strange how we’re all thrown into the grip of a crisis just because of a decent fall of snow.

BA heralded that it was managing its own issues at Heathrow with the help of bottles of water, blankets, and free wi-fi. Free wi-fi? Are they not in the service business?

Safety, of course, is the main priority and rightly so, but it seems BA made a sorry mess of the simple things of how to manage a crisis. Even BA chief executive Willie Walsh admitted the company had not done enough to communicate with passengers at Heathrow about their flights, though this now seems to have been rectified through BA’s use of mobile apps. (more…)

Posted by
Paul Tustin

Sponsorship of Formula 1 is big business, billions of pounds worth, and is just one of the reasons Bernie Ecclestone can afford a £200,000 watch. 

Now there is often controversy on the advertising regulations in Formula 1, especially with the often maligned tobacco advertising legislation, but over the past couple of weeks the big controversy has been the naming of the teams competing.

Lotus Cars, one of the nation’s most iconic brands, is going through something of a revolution at the moment. Historically a niche vehicle manufacturer only focusing on sports and racing cars, it recently announced ambitious plans to overhaul its current range and unveiled five new cars in front of an astonished audience in Paris. (more…)

Posted by
Matthew Reed

The blizzard of leaked information through Wikileaks brings into question the whole issue of crisis planning and protecting your reputation in an age of lightning fast online communications.

More than 90,000 documents, dated between 2004 and 2009, on the war in Afghanistan alone have been released in the Wikileaks deluge, as well as 400,000 secret US military logs on the war in Iraq, and thousands of US embassy cables. We still do not know whether all of this information is verified or not.

The site has also given access to the documents to three newspapers – the New York Times, Der Spiegel and the Guardian – ahead of public release. As the media rushes to publish the revelations, everyone is left asking who might be behind such huge leaks. The Pentagon has already launched an investigation but still Wikileaks refuses to name its sources. (more…)

Posted by
Paul Tustin

Chris Shaw, course leader for the BA (Hons) in Public Relations at the University of Central Lancashire, on the future of social media.

With delicious irony, a Tweet directed me to an online article in the Daily Telegraph last week in which Milo Yiannopoulos slammed social media gurus as a “a rag-tag crew of blood-sucking hucksters who are infesting companies of all sizes”.

And I couldn’t help laughing when a young social media specialist told me how a senior brand manager had remarked during a meeting that “loser-generated content” was a waste of everyone’s time. (more…)

Posted by
admin

Making any established brand more appealing to a younger audience is a challenge.

But when it concerns an organic dairy brand like Yeo Valley it’s all the more difficult.

However, global advertising agency BBH may have done the trick with the new Yeo Valley rap ad. (more…)

Posted by
Sam Nayi

Freshfield has achieved the coveted Consultancy Management Standard (CMS) – the gold standard of service for the PR industry, only weeks after joining its awarding body.

The CMS is an independently-audited set of eight tests which a consultancy must pass as a member of the Public Relations Consultants Association (PRCA). It combines elements of ISO 9000 and Investors in People with criteria specific to the public relations industry.

In October, Freshfield joined some of the UK’s most successful PR businesses by becoming a member of the PRCA. (more…)

Posted by
Andrew Taylor