Packing a punch
02 May 2008
Brandon Hill has run a high profile campaign supporting the Business Link brand combining TV and radio advertising with online activity and a hard hitting PR campaign.
The campaign spanned the entire South West region - from Cornwall to Cheltenham and Bristol to Dorset - and was one of the biggest of its kind undertaken in the region.
Funded by the South West of England Regional Development Agency, the campaign focused on the start-up and small business sector and involved an innovative combination of TV and radio advertising, media relations, new media and creative events.
Staged during the first three months of this year, the key objective of the campaign was to increase understanding of Business Link among businesses – making a serious difference to perceptions and establishing the brand as their first point of contact for business support.
The approach showcased Business Link in action, demonstrating how it could help ‘real’ businesses achieve their ambitions.
This highly-active campaign worked on a grass roots level, leveraging local resources and partnerships and involved working with brands that reached the target audience.
The approach was to build relationships that created a sustainable platform for future activities. Rather than focus on businesses as an entity, the campaign was centered on the individuals behind the business to show how Business Link could help them with their hopes, fears, ambitions and objectives.
Brandon Hill negotiated an ambitious regional press partnership, giving serious impact to the campaign. The region’s 15 leading newspapers joined a massive editorial campaign that comprised eight pages of editorial appearing in titles spanning the South West from the Gloucestershire Echo and Citizen to the Dorset Echo, Swindon Advertiser, Western Daily Press, Western Morning News, Plymouth Herald, Bristol Evening Post, Exeter Express & Echo and three of the strongest Cornish weeklies.
These newspapers have a combined circulation of nearly 500,000 and a readership of more than 1.5 million. In total 120 pages of editorial featuring more than 120 local case studies were produced - a huge undertaking for the agency and proof not only of Brandon Hill’s unique regional reach but its understanding of business across the South West.
Brandon Hill’s director of the campaign Ian Muir said: “This was the first time Northcliffe Newspapers, who own so many key titles in our region, worked together as a single unit to deliver one major regional business campaign like this.
“It goes to show that our commitment to the South West is matched by our understanding of what makes it tick.”