Client
Foodmek Ltd provides design, manufacturing and installation engineering solutions, mainly for the food and drink industries. It supplies some of the largest food processing plants in the UK and has exported to more than 20 countries since its foundation in 1971.
Campaign Objectives
Foodmek agreed the following objectives for the campaign (part of its 2021 PR Plan Objectives):
- Get Foodmek on to the radar of potential clients, particularly in a growth sector they had already successfully entered, as well as potential future staff.
Metrics agreed:
1) Sectors subsequent enquiries come from
2) Location of visitors to website – shown in Google Analytics and Bitly. - Increased awareness of the company locally, regionally, Scotland and throughout UK.
Metrics: Location of website visitors and number of visitors to website via a range of channels including Direct Input, Referrals and Google Organic search terms.
Tactics
A news release was written to promote the 50th Birthday of the company, its impressive growth performance during 2019 to 2021 and other key messages including continuing investments in staff, equipment and R&D, its contribution to the fight against Covid-19 through supplying vessels to a test kit manufacturer, a continuing healthy order book and commitment to a net zero environment goal and supporting its local community.
Features based on the news story were also placed in key sector trade magazines identified by research into which title in each market would deliver most reach to the decision-makers who place orders.
Channels
The channels used were:
- Paid – editorial space was bought in the trade titles identified with discounts negotiated by ASM Media & PR after it was established none of the titles in either sector would use the story as ‘free editorial’ because it was essentially promotional of the brand.
- Earned – The news release was sent to local, regional and Scotland-wide media plus regional and Scotland-wide business support organisations.
- Shared – The client’s LinkedIn Company Page was used to share a link to the release as a blog on its website and many of the media business support organisations shared the story on their social channels
- Owned – The news release as posted as a blog on the Foodmek website.
Campaign Outputs, Out-takes, Outcomes and Impact
- Earned media coverage achieved a total potential reach of 5,718,321 readers across offline and online channels.
- Referral Traffic to the Foodmek website increased by 525% over the two months following the publication of the news story (including the publication of the features) compared with the same period before.
- Direct Traffic to the Foodmek website increased by 41% over the two months following the publication of the news story (including the publication of the features) compared with the same period before.
- Traffic from Other Sources increased 340%
- Total Users of the website increased 12%
- New Users of the website increased 13%
- Enquiries and orders from existing customers increased substantially
- Enquiries from potential new customers increased
- Locations of enquirers increased
- One of the trade magazines used was identified as an effective source of website traffic
- Print coverage was identified as an effective communication channel
- Foodmek’s LinkedIn Company Page was proven to be an effective source of website traffic
- Media relations was proven to be an effective tool for Foodmek