Kelly Oldham, office coordinator at Macclesfield-based Smith Goodfellow PR, explains why the business should win the marketing and PR category of the Guardian Small Business Showcase competition.
We started out with the intention of raising funds for a very worthwhile charity, and along the way experienced a number of unforeseen positives. Using our PR skills in increasing brand awareness, we maximized the opportunities by creating four challenges as part of a 12-month effort to raise as much as possible.
There were lots of fun pictures and videos from our mud run, night hike and abseiling, and we generated lots of content to share on social media and our website.
We made collages to show visiting clients, highlighting the cause and the type of people they’d be working with at our company. By the final challenge (a 24-hour bike ride), we had people visiting our live webcam feed all night, and engaging with us over Twitter with messages of support. We used a series of handmade signs to respond.
We earned lots of positive comments and shares via social media, doubling our original fundraising target. Our efforts resulted in being shortlisted to present our campaign to Theo Paphitis at an awards evening. We showcased our creative flair by performing an epic poem (complete with props) describing our ‘series of extraordinary events’.
While the main purpose for this campaign was to support a charity, we also benefitted by raising our profile, building stronger relationships with our existing clients, strengthening our team cohesion as well as developing links with new people within our target profile.
All entries which meet the competition criteria are published and our judging panel select a shortlist of the three for each category. Winners are announced at an awards ceremony in summer 2016.
