Category: Uncategorised

1. What’s your career background, in brief?

After graduating Cardiff University with a BA in Journalism, I did an internship with a radio PR agency in North London for a few months. Then I decided it was probably the perfect time to shoot off travelling for a bit, so I did a ski season in St Anton, Austria, before starting my role at Whiteoaks.

2. What’s the most challenging job you’ve ever had?

Probably my job of selling Jägerbombs while I was at university! It may seem simple, but trying to navigate through crowds and dancefloors of nightclubs with a tray of 15 shots was no easy feat…

3. What apps, technology items and gadgets can’t you live without?

I couldn’t live without my iPhone. Twitter is my favourite app, mainly for the funny videos.

4. What’s the best advice you’ve been given? (life or career advice)

I can’t think of a specific piece of advice, but I think Forrest Gump sums it up relatively well with “life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re gonna get”.

5. Name one thing about your job that gives you a sense of satisfaction or makes you leave the office smiling…

Having a good laugh with my team.

6. Do you personalise your workspace?

Not intentionally, but yes… I came into work wearing a sloth onesie for a charity fundraising day and since then I haven’t been able to live it down, so for my Secret Santa gift I was given a load of sloth merchandise, which is now on my desk. I also currently have a mini Christmas tree because why not, it’s nearly Christmas!

7. What’s the first thing you do in the office in the morning?

Seek out the coffee – I can barely function otherwise.

8. What are you reading, watching or listening to at the moment?

I’m watching the new series of Masterchef: The Professionals and RuPaul’s Drag Race: All Stars 4. I’m a big fan of Drag Race – I spend most of my down-time re-watching episodes of that and Brooklyn 99 on repeat.

Innovate. Transform. Grow. Bold words, but all certainly applicable to Fintech Connect, which bills itself as the UK’s largest fintech trade show. Held at the ExCel in London last week, it didn’t let me down, with speakers and representatives from major institutions like Citigroup to smaller niche players like Smart Valor.

Our agency has a strong heritage in the Fintech space and we’ve represented disruptive firms from across the industry, from Regtech to small business finance and data management to invoice financing. This is an industry landscape that is constantly shape shifting, influenced by the regulation agenda, consumer demand and mobile technologies, to name just a few.

A glance at the speaker sessions and workshops gave just a flavour of the huge variety of solutions on offer: from augmented reality in banking to tokenised investments, the opportunities created by open banking to machine learning. This is an industry that is fertile hunting ground for innovation and it is a source of huge pride to see London and the UK rightly recognised as the perfect base for these sorts of companies to launch, grow and thrive.

I was fortunate enough to speak with a few of the home-grown Fintechs at the event and find out how their transformative technology will meet one or many market needs.

Their passion and belief is admirable, but it also strengthens our own resolve. What is clear to me is that PR is a strategic investment for these firms – it isn’t a budget pot they are willing to fritter away so that they get it again next year. Instead, it drives and supports strategic business direction, from breaking new markets to attracting external investment, increasing sales to generating new leads.

So as we continue to disrupt our industry with our results-driven engagement model, it was heartening to hear that these firms require a communications agency to complement their own company ethos or approach.

As a proof point, have a look at our work with Fraedom, a hugely disruptive B2B firm in the commercial credit cards and spend management space, which earlier this year was acquired by Visa.

Doing things the ‘same old way’ has been a terminal error for businesses in the past – and those working in the financial services and Fintech space know that better than anyone. Different results need different approaches, different ways of thinking and similar disruptive philosophies, which is where I think Whiteoaks truly sets itself apart from the rest.

A number of Fintech and digital technology trends are having a big impact on the financial services industry right now. Artificial Intelligence, a strong compliance framework, CRM systems, Blockchain and the subject of this blog, Regulatory Tech which is more commonly termed Regtech. We all know the background: after the financial crisis in 2008, an enormous volume of new regulation and compliance responsibilities were placed on financial institutions. In response, those organisations looked for help from technology start-ups aiming to ensure that they better manage the vast amounts of data and conformity to a myriad of international regulations, including most recently, GDPR and MiFID II.

The Regtech sector has evolved in the last 10 years and the new technologies help compliance professionals to save costs and increase efficiencies on their regulatory burden – and at their best discover that regulation can be a new revenue stream.

The focus areas in 2018 and 2019 are automation, intelligence and data analytics. This combination helps financial companies with the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)’s KYC (Know your Customer) and AML (Anti-Money Laundering) screening, and transaction monitoring. As a result, the industry is finding that Regtech works better for large institutions – the volume of data required to ‘train’ an AI engine to the stage where it can provide meaningful data analysis is heavy and improves over time.

Yet Regtech has been, often unfairly, dogged by an argument that it will negatively impact on employment prospects and employee satisfaction levels. The current reality is that Regtech shouldn’t and won’t replace professional, qualified and knowledgeable people. The capabilities are meant to take the load on repetitive, expensive, data-heavy jobs and data analysis – in exactly the same way that Business Information (BI) product suites have helped businesses to achieve the same outcome, for many years. Compliance professionals continue to provide consultancy, strategy, data management, risk intelligence and advice, and ultimate oversight of their company’s regulatory approach.

From everything that we see about Regtech, the excitement is in its ability to make it possible for experienced compliance professionals to spend more time doing what they do best, and as a result adding the most value to their business.

But what are the key challenges? Data portability is a Pandora’s box. The dream for clients to easily and seamlessly switching to a service provider with the best offering is often not realised. Most Fintechs arguably are still not working on the same platform as the big financial institutions but with Regtech, that may be about to change. Whilst innovations in customer experience may be seen to be optional, compliance is non-negotiable.

Banks are finding that they must open up their operations, with potential Regtech partners only too happy to oblige. As well as the business, the opportunity provides them with access to years and years of legacy data. Armed with this, they can apply the complex algorithms required to make the bank’s compliance operations more efficient. As the algorithms iterate, they’ll learn and make their own tech business better and more competitive.

Nevertheless, data portability is a huge mental and operational challenge for large financial institutions. It forces them to change everything they thought they so far believed: client data security is paramount and keeping their own business practices utterly confidential is not up for discussion. In fact, recent research by Asset Control, the leader in providing proven, high-performance systems for financial data management, shows that more than a third (37%) of those financial firms think that legacy data platforms are the biggest obstacles to improving their data management and analytics capabilities.

What is data portability? How should it be embedded in the financial company? Who can access the data? These are the key questions for 2019…

—

And for further reading about the current compliance landscape, the Thomson Reuters Regulatory Intelligence team has published their annual ‘Cost of Compliance’ 2018 report, benchmarking opinions from compliance professionals over the last nine years.

Content is still king. We keep hearing it, we keep saying it. It forms the basis for almost all PR and marketing campaigns and is one of the most important ingredients to set a brand up for success in terms of building awareness, saliency and generating leads. But there’s a big caveat. To get your business messages across, impress your customers and prospects, and reach your communications objectives, it needs to be the right content.

Getting the basics right isn’t enough

Of course, it needs to start with good content — well written or spoken, cogent, relevant and smart — but that’s no longer enough. With so much content out there, being well scripted isn’t much of a differentiator. Yes, it’s important, and yes there’s a certain skill in doing it, but creating engaging content encapsulates so much more.

In the context of planning for a campaign, the variety of content must reach the right audiences with the right messages through the right channels. It’s about understanding their pain points, the industry they operate in and what they’re trying to achieve as a business.

Not all of this insight comes from desk research; in fact, your communication strategy is doomed to fail if this is your sole method. Instead, a critical part of campaign planning comes from talking to the people who know the audiences best. And that’s the Sales and Marketing professionals.

Different sides, same coin

The rivalry and discontent between the two teams has been well documented in the past — with much of it anecdotal. After all, it’s a better story to write about two groups at loggerheads.  Yet, our own independent research into the collaboration and understanding between Sales and Marketing leaders, ‘A Perfect Match: ABM and ABS’, yielded some contradictory results; 87% of the Sales and Marketing decision-makers we spoke to said they believed they were aligned with their counterparts. Catch the main findings from the research here and download the full report in the link above.

And that’s critical when putting together your content plan as part of an account-based approach to Sales and/or Marketing. Marketing adds value when it comes to the company messaging and the wider industry outlook; Sales on the other hand has the deep insights into customers and prospects in terms of their challenges and requirements. Both outlooks influence your content strategy and help you understand the audiences and personas that are being targeted in the overall campaign.

Down to tactical business

From strategy to tactics, the right content and understanding of personas helps shape the assets you’re creating; articles for thought leadership to educate and demonstrate knowledge; customer success stories for reinforcing proof points; blogs and vlogs to show both thought leadership and personality.

Related: Unleashing the power of buyer personas and account-based marketing

It also helps in determining which assets are better suited to the different stages (and aims) of the campaign journey. Long copy, like whitepapers and eBooks, is great for education and awareness, while shorter copy, such as blogs and social media posts, is ideal for reinforcement and attracting interest.

Don’t settle

Ultimately, having the right content (in terms of messaging, type and length) in place means you can start off your campaign on the right footing. And it’s worth remembering that good (ahem, really great) content doesn’t have to have a short lifecycle. It can be repurposed into other assets, used in different campaigns and can seed complementary social media plans. So while good content is… good, having the right content is even better.

In our recent webinar, ‘Partnering with Sales: A Marketer’s Guide’, I discuss much of this guidance as part of the broader content for marketers designing integrated marketing plans. You can watch the webinar anytime to suit you, here. I hope you find it useful.

Susan Richter, Head of Marketing Communications

Tell Us Your B2B Tech Story

On Tuesday 27^th November, US space agency Nasa landed a new robot on Mars after a dramatic seven-minute plunge to the surface of the Red Planet. It was NASA’s first attempt to land on Mars in six years and the jubilation of Nasa employees said it all. It was a truly historic day and testimony to the effort and expertise employed on this perilous and what many considered, insurmountable challenge.

The InSight Lander’s journey of six months and 300 million miles is the culmination of Nasa’s £633 million two-year mission which aims to shine new light on how the Red Planet was formed and its deep structure.

After the successful landing, InSight’s project manager Tom Hoffman was quoted as saying: “The InSight team can rest a little easier tonight now that we know the spacecraft solar arrays are deployed and recharging the batteries.”

While working on a mission to Mars may not be directly comparable to working on a marketing campaign to launch a new technology product or solution, there are some striking similarities. Each starts with an ambitious goal which can invariably get eclipsed along the way. Each requires experts in their own right to commit to the mission and work collaboratively to get the product/solution into orbit. All in all, the landing on Mars teaches us that anything is possible with hard work and expertise. This is where Whiteoaks International can play a starring role.

If you are a marketing or internal PR professional working in technology with stellar expectations and looking to rest easier at night knowing you have given your all, it would be worth considering hiring an external specialist B2B Tech PR Agency.

At Whiteoaks International we develop strategic, yet creative PR campaigns which are highly targeted with persona-driven tactics and approaches.

At Whiteoaks we can guarantee tangible and impactful results that are underpinned by robust performance commitments and formal service level agreements.

Finally, to see what we do in practice, you can read some of our client case studies on our website.

As we stop to catch our breath and get ready to look back at 2018 and the developments in our industry, one debate that shows little sign of slowing is the ongoing challenge between PR and SEO and how the two disciplines should work together.

The reality is, is that there is no easy answer. However, it’s vital that we consider how to make the most of the synergies and benefits in coordinating PR and SEO as part of integrated marketing campaigns. Likewise, I think there is a need to provide a better understanding to our clients on what is achievable in helping brands be more visible and salient online, and how PR can truly support and deliver against this objective.

At a PR Moment conference in the autumn, a debate on this subject found some common ground but there are some key challenges that PR agencies must not be afraid to tackle head on and be prepared to have bold conversations about with their clients.

As part of the discussions, one of the clear advantages that PRs have over their SEO counterparts is that SEO professionals naturally think about how to please search engines, while PR and Marketing practitioners think about creating content that is interesting and exciting to audiences through multiple channels, including the likes of Google. Top tips articles, for example, is short, punchy content that can be used as a way to promote and drive traffic to your website, relevant for both prospective and existing clients. Relevant and updated content is still king, so the advantage for PRs who know how to tell a good story means that SEO will work better.

It’s essential that SEO and PR experts work closely and not in a combative manner. SEO is a way of providing an online legacy to every campaign – continually building upon and increasing campaign ROI at the beginning and over time. And to thrive, working with a content calendar where PR and SEO comes together can be invaluable.

Alongside this, there was one clear takeaway when trying to bring PR and SEO together to benefit working with the media. For example, clients may ask for back links in their content, but we have to remember that there is a clear differentiation between earned and paid media and we cannot treat both the same.

However, there are some ways to encourage journalists and media editors to include links in coverage, but before these are outlined it’s important to point out what is unacceptable. Do not waste your time asking a journalist if they will include a link without good a reason. It’s up there with calling a journalist to ask if they have ‘received your press release’.

So, how do you persuade a journalist to provide a link? Follow these simple tips and it will increase your chances greatly:

• Provide links to a worthy report – for example, more information than a journalist can include in an article
• Create a useful tool for clients or customers and tell your media contact about it – e.g. a budget calculator – something that people will want to use experiment with, etc.
• Select terminology carefully – use words like source/credit to data to ensure your content has the gravitas it deserves.

There’s no doubt the debate about how to get the most from PR and SEO investment will continue for some time yet. However, the key thing to remember is that, done properly, integrated marketing is more important than ever. Together PR and SEO are more than the sum of their parts.

Black Friday is upon us.

The day when thousands of bargain hungry shoppers rush to the high street to snap up some pre-Christmas goodies. Or do they?

Recent research by one of our clients has found that more than three-quarters of UK consumers plan to avoid stores on Black Friday this year.

The prospect of shoppers not hitting the high streets and retail parks reinforces the importance of retailers investing in their online platform, helping them to fight back against the dominance of brands like Amazon.

One way that omnichannel retailers can boost total revenues is by harnessing the power of customer reviews.

New research from our client Feefo suggests that many people heading to the high street over the festive period will be relying on customer feedback before making a purchase. A massive 94% of consumers who are considering buying a product or service will check online reviews.

Furthermore, genuine reviews have now replaced friends or family as the most reliable source of information – 84% of consumers say feedback from real customers is the biggest influence on them, whereas only 52% now depend mostly on the recommendations of friends and family.

While it’s clear that brands which invest in platforms to gather customer feedback can reap the rewards, shoppers are increasingly aware of fake reviews.

The internet is flooded with them, with many people profiting by selling fake, positive reviews on open review platforms which allow anyone to create a profile and leave feedback.

Consumers can also be misled by endorsements on platforms like Instagram. The photo and video-sharing site has enabled many online influencers to earn a living by being paid to market products. However, this week the company announced that it’s cracking down on fake likes and comments by using tools which can identify accounts that use third-party services and apps to artificially boost their popularity.

So how can retailers tackle the fake reviews which risk their own reputation?

One way is by choosing a reviews platform which ensures only genuine customers are invited to review. Not only should reviewers be required to have a verified email address, there should ideally be a transaction linking the review to the reviewer.

Finally, if you’re heading out among the crowds this Black Friday, or like me prefer to snap-up a bargain online, you’d be wise to consider whether the glowing online review you’re reading is genuine, or a festive fake.

When the Fintech industry started to emerge as a strong sector within financial services a few years ago, all everyone could talk about was how on earth the big, established, traditional banking institutions were going to compete with the gutsy ‘start-ups’ which would change the way that the finance industry was run.

At a conceptual level, it’s true that Fintechs have overhauled the way that the quartet of central banks, capital markets, consumer banking and B2B banking and payments are run. Some of that transformational change can of course be attributed to the reaction and needs spinning out from the financial crash in 2008 and the various austerity measures that have followed around the world.

In retail banking, while the consumer banks started out by partnering with Fintechs to provide customers with more channels, services and options, some are now starting to venture out by bringing some of those learnings in-house and launching their own fintech-based businesses. They’ve watched those Fintechs bring an open and agile approach to digital service, including personalisation in both communications and payments plus diversity and control with payments options, and they want some of it for themselves.

Probably the most high profile retail banking example is when, earlier this month, Nat West announced the launch of Mettle, an app-only business bank for SMEs. The big ‘threats’ from those fintechs have of course been realised in the success from the likes of Monzo and Atom – innovating, yes, competing in customer experience, yes. And growing fast.

In the B2B space, partnerships have proven to be where the real value is still best added for the end user, the finance institution and the payments provider who operates between the two. In fact, just a few days ago, the importance of partnerships in the B2B paytech space was underlined by an announcement that new guidelines have been developed with the “aim of addressing the issues that prevent Fintechs and financial institutions from becoming successful allies.”

A key component of the Treasury’s Fintech Sector Strategy has seen a number of big banks and Fintech companies working with the British Standards Institute to create the new Publicly Available Specification – PAS 201:2018. In essence, any Fintech from the UK or abroad will now have a detailed framework to work within when gearing up to pitch to banks to ensure that they meet the complex myriad of compliance, data and security obligations that both parties will be subject to should they decide to work together.

This critical initiative underlines further just how much the fintech industry – and the broader financial market as a whole – has matured in recent years. And, whatever the outcome of Brexit is, anything that means that the UK can still be a financial services leader around the world, creating an environment where businesses have the landscape to innovate with support from Government and industry, is to be wholeheartedly applauded.

A business like Fraedom, one of our clients, which works with global banks to power their commercial cards and with businesses to manage their payments in nearly 180 countries is a case in point of the power of B2B paytech partnerships. Recently acquired by Visa, this company is making sure that its clients can stay competitive with personalised, convenient customer experience, improve user retention and ensure compliance to the current regulatory landscape. Here’s our case study detailing what we’ve been working on for Fraedom, which includes UK and US brand building and PR.

At the moment, barely a week goes by without store closures or high street woes featuring in the headlines. Just last week, news broke that in the UK, 14 shops are reported to be closing every day with more than 2,700 closing in the first half of this year. In recent months it has become abundantly clear that this isn’t a sustainable situation and retailers have called for “decisive action” from the government to support the high street.

However, with Black Friday around the corner and as many of us turn our attention to Christmas shopping, might tech be the answer to the high street’s problems? How are retailers securing their place on the high street this Christmas? And beyond into 2019 will implementing the latest in retail technology both on the shop floor and in stockrooms and warehouses turn their fortunes around?

One thing I’m sure we can all relate to is getting to the shops only to find out that the items we wanted are out of stock. For many of us, this will have resulted in us heading home and buying the desired item online. This, while working out well for online and omnichannel retailers, isn’t such a great result for high street stores. Fortunately, this is one area retail technology partners are now able to help with, using artificial intelligence to more accurately forecast and assess the supply chain to avoid such situations, especially during the busy Christmas shopping period and subsequent January sales. More accurate forecasting will ensure retailers have the right stock in the right sizes and colours to meet customer demand.

Similarly, technology can be used for workforce management, allowing retailers to predict when the store might be busy and ensure there are enough staff members on the shop floor – there’s nothing worse than wanting to pick out that perfect Christmas party lipstick and finding there’s nobody behind the counter to help. While these solutions might not be visible to shoppers, their impact on the retail experience can’t be underestimated.

In-store technology, on the other hand, can be used directly by customers to make the shopping experience smoother and faster. For example, retailers can adopt apps which allow customers to scan and shop without even having to visit a till. These apps also provide a platform through which retailers can engage with customers and enhance their experience by offering them discounts and offers tailored to their likes and previous purchases as soon as they enter the store.

The idea of the in-store experience is something retailers must pay more attention to. While online competition has no doubt played a part in the high street’s struggles over recent years, it is time for bricks-and-mortar stores to use the factors that differentiate them to fight back.

Although it might not always be possible to match online pricing, it is possible to give consumers with a more bespoke experience that justifies them spending those few extra pounds. Personally, I love the buzz of the high street at Christmas and, frankly, wandering the aisles as ‘Last Christmas’ plays in the background makes me feel like I’m in my very own version of Love Actually, which is something online retailers definitely can’t provide. Retailers must recognise the benefits a physical store provides by allowing customers to try, taste, test and touch products, as well as find out additional information, and make sure their local store delivers on this.

In the run-up to Christmas, it’s vital that brands do what they can to offer their customers a unique experience that can’t be replicated online. By using the latest technology, high street stores can turn what many now see as a ‘showroom’ back into a store, which not only attracts customers to browse but also to buy.

Will you be tempted back to the high street this Christmas? Personally, I’ll definitely be hitting Guildford High Street to hunt out some stocking fillers from Anthropologie and Oliver Bonas in the coming weeks.

Let the Christmas shopping commence!