Last night we were delighted to be among four Suffolk companies which reached the finals of the EADT Business Awards for the category of Small Business of the Year. We are very proud of everything we have achieved in the last year and thought you might like to see the award entry which wowed the judges.
Prominent is a multi-award-winning PR consultancy delivering full-service PR, brand and reputation management and dynamic, creative and strategic solutions across all sectors.
The company won three golds and one silver award in the Chartered Institute of PR PRide awards in September 2017 and was named Outstanding PR Consultancy of the Year for the Anglia, Thames and Chiltern region.
In April 2018 its director Helen Rudd was named PR and Communications Managing Director of the Year for the East of England at the annual Influential Businesswoman Awards, hosted by Acquisition International.
The company has grown significantly in the last four years, winning a number of influential clients and developing an ambitious five-year growth plan with the help of its six-strong team of professionals.
This is based on a 61% increase in turnover in year one, 59% growth in year two and 40% growth in three.
Our business and team strategy are interlinked - all staff are involved in key decisions to take the company forward. This has involved a full rebrand last year to reflect Prominent’s growth so far.
Our strategy has seen the following successful results:
Winning new clients
In the last 12 months, we have taken on the contract for the National Federation of Roofing Contractors (NFRC), our most prestigious client to date and the UK’s largest roofing trade association.
We have also won the British Christmas Tree Growers Association (BCTGA) and since taking on this client in April 2017 we have secured 249 pieces of print coverage with a combined reach of 47,853,742 people. We have also seen a 15% increase in social media followers - 75% as a direct result of a Facebook competition we devised and ran as part of a large campaign to raise awareness about the environmentally-friendly credentials of real trees.
Other clients we have taken on include Suffolk based businesses Anglia Care, SMY IT, KLH Architects and Daniel Connal Partnership – all four were a direct result of personal recommendation.
We have also won project work for Felixstowe Town Council through which we social media trained all councilors and in-house staff and the Felixstowe Dementia Action Alliance, who utilised our in-house design service for a full-agency provision.
Most recently, Prominent successfully won a place on the communications framework for the Southern Housing Group, the UK’s biggest social and community housing provider, and a consortium of London Borough Councils.
Client retention
Our client retention is extremely high. We have four clients who have been with us since we started the agency. We currently have 21 clients (12 on retainer who have all been with the agency more than a year).
Our aim is not just to win new business but to keep current clients happy and promote the organic growth of these clients. We do this by consistently delivering bespoke solutions to deliver game-changing business impact for clients using a wide range of platforms.
This involves up-selling and cross-selling - capitalising on the skills of our multi-disciplinary team.
An example of this would be our work with business consortium Choose Woodbridge, which has increased its monthly retainer with us twice in the last six months because the work we have produced has had such impressive results on visitor numbers to the town.
We started by supplying a simple responsive PR service – sending out press releases and creating copy for the news section of its website. We are now managing the whole of the email correspondence, the blog, the newsletter, the events listings and have created a series of tailored workshops for members to better understand social media and how to use it for effective business growth.
One of our most impressive success stories in terms of client retention and growth is East Cambridgeshire District Council. We started on eight days a month of PR provision for this local authority, quickly increasing to 12. We have now seen this increase to 16 and are providing ECDC with a full-time PR service which includes 24/7 assistance and working in-house. This has proved to be extremely cost-effective for the council which has access to a team of six without employing six people.
Our innovative approach to this client has seen us work closely with the senior management team as well as all staff, attending committees and representing the Council externally.
We managed all the communications around the General Election and several local by-elections and daily communicate council messages, manage its reputation and celebrate its successes. We have also developed social media channels to make them more accessible to the general public and helped them design and create a recycling superhero Michael Recycle which has helped give them an impressive 60% recycling rate – higher than most local authority areas in the UK.
Team growth and development
The team has a unique dynamic and chemistry and this has become key to its success.
The business recognises the value of talent so has always embraced flexible working around childcare, mental health days, remote working and even allows dogs in the workplace.
This has allowed it to retain and recruit amazing people.
Prominent was started by Helen Rudd four years ago with a handful of clients and one freelancer.
It now has a team of six full-time employees including Ellen Widdup, an award-winning former national newspaper journalist, and Abi Gagen, a highly-skilled press officer and marketing expert who was named Outstanding Young Communicator of the Year 2017 for the Anglia, Thames and Chiltern region.
Also on the team is an expert in PR for the built environment Kerry Doy who is to be instrumental in plans to develop a construction specialist department in 2018/19.
The most recent additions to the team include Angharad Pearce, an experienced account manager with particular skills in digital PR and event management, and Emily Grimes, a superb graphic designer.
At Prominent we take Continuing Professional Development (CPD) very seriously and all team members have a dedicated training budget allocated.
We have weekly team meetings to ensure everyone is supporting clients appropriately and we also have monthly Caring is Sharing sessions, designed to spread knowledge.
Each team member has been involved in creating their own Personal Development Plan which outlines where they want to go in their career and the training they would like to do. This has allowed Prominent to develop specialisms as well as expand skill-sets.
Helen is in the process of taking on our first apprentice which is a very exciting step towards educating someone and supporting their development in a career which is very difficult to get into it. We are also currently recruiting for a further member of the team due to recent growth.
Helen has also recently taken on the services of a business coach to help drive growth.
Innovation
With every client, we devise a strategy based on the brief and objectives choosing effective tactics to get the most out of our budget.
A good example of this would be our award-winning work on British Baby Box.
This company introduced the 80-year-old Finnish tradition of baby boxes to the UK and it came to us looking to boost brand awareness, increase web traffic and secure sales.
However, while BBB had wholesale partnerships with a number of high-profile health and government organisations, charities and leading retailers, media had to be kept to a minimum for confidentiality reasons. This meant we had to approach PR in a more innovative way.
We did this by utlising the growing trend for “sharenting” – particularly on Instagram – singling out a number of new parents and pregnant bloggers and celebrities to send samples to. This demonstrated our expertise not just in traditional PR – but in digital PR.
In the six months before we came on board the website had 9,483 new visitors and 1,243 return customers with 32,924 page views. In the six months since we came on board this increased to 40,483 new visitors (up 327%), 8,863 return customers (up 613%) and 154,463 page views (up 369%).
We also saw a 550% increase in social media followers.
This translated into the sale of more than 30,000 Baby Box products.
On top of improving the sales and digital presence of the brand, we also provided the marketing materials which saw the brand win a lucrative contract to launch in John Lewis with an exclusive partnership.
Finally, we linked it to two MPs who had lost children to stillbirth and cot death, both of which are now working with them to create legislation to promote safer sleeping practices and devise specific safety standards for baby boxes in the UK.
Prominent was handed Gold award in the CIPR PRide awards for its innovative work with British Baby Box and proving that successful PR does not need to rely on traditional methods and big budgets.
Customer care and social responsibility
Prominent supports an annual charity of the year and this year is concentrating its efforts on the Charlie Watkins Foundation, set up in memory of a young man who took his own life last year.
Our pro bono support has helped launch Chat with Charlie – a university-based platform for young people with mental health issues.
We have also raised awareness of the wider issues and secured a slot on ITV Anglia which on social media had 79,000 views and 785 shares.
We have created a promotional video for the charity which will be used at all future fundraising events and which tells the story of Charlie and the aims of the foundation.
Additionally, Helen and Abi are running the Great East run together in aid of the charity.
As far as CSR is concerned, budget is also made available by Prominent to sponsor employees outside of work - including Helen’s hockey team and Abi’s local football team.
We helped launch Ladies in Property Suffolk (LiPS), a networking event which happens 3 times a year and helps foster relationships and share best practice in the built environment sector in the county. We have sponsored all seven events to date and provide pro-bono PR, social media and event management support.
“Prominent PR deliver an exceptional service and have transformed our internal and external communications. They have helped us win awards and win clients. We are extremely pleased with the impact their work has had on raising our profile in the local community and beyond. They have helped us build our business in a cost effective manner.”
Laura Harrington-Rutterford, Partner – Attwells
“We have been incredibly impressed with Prominent PR. They are professional, efficient and enthusiastic, work as a team and have a very proactive, creative and innovative approach. Their connections and experience have also proved invaluable to enhancing our company brand.”
Sarah Simons, Co-founder and Director – British Baby Box
“The Prominent team have played a big part in bringing our event concept to reality. They are a committed, hard-working and dedicated team who always go the extra mile – doing whatever it takes to make the events a success. I thoroughly enjoy working with them and know I can rely on them 100% to deliver the best service.“
Spokesman for Mister Jack
Prominent is an award-winning PR consultancy with a reputation for getting results.
It helps ambitious companies build their reputation, reach new audiences and stand out from the crowd.
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Email us on: hello@prominentpr.co.uk
