Top content or none at all
We all need a hand at work sometimes. When you do, you know there are those people you’re drawn to because they get stuff done, they are on your wavelength, they make your job easier – and most days they make you smile. Great B2B brands can be like that too – your buyers think of them positively, they know what to expect, and your brand delivers. Clearly being that kind of supplier in your…
Valentine's feeling: first impression matters in dating as much as in advertising
Lovers celebrating Valentine's Day tomorrow know it well. All it took was a first sight to know they were made for each other, and they might be right! Research shows that it takes less than a second to figure out such a match – but is it only true for dating? What about advertising?
Five ways digital marketers p*ss me off
Sarah Reakes, Managing Director at KISS, says the job of marketers is to strive for a seamless, pleasurable ‘user journey’ (UX) experience, from initial enquiries through to purchase and beyond.
TikTok vs the rest of us
Snapchat and Instagram feel like ageing figures from that distant era called the ‘2010s’ compared to the monumental rise of new social media platforms like TikTok. But just because it’s the latest and greatest trend to come out of the gen Z social media armoury, does this mean that as marketers, we need to be on it too? Absolutely not.
Tipping points: anticipate them and win
I don’t often watch linear TV with ads anymore – but when I did recently the ad breaks were full of ‘book your summer flights now’. Meanwhile recent news has included climate crises, the demise of Thomas Cook and government help to save Flybe from the brink of collapse. I personally think this was a mistake: there are probably too many airlines and some real tipping points approaching in…
Your 2020 essentials – trust and truth
Our hectic, 24-hour lifestyles have inevitably led to an increase in the number of stories required to keep up with our constantly ‘switched on’ demands, and unfortunately fewer people to produce those stories. This has unsurprisingly resulted in ‘less than accurate’ content being shared across different platforms. Add ‘fake news’ to the mix, and a multitude of channels to communicate across, and…
Young, black, working class and female – and not in that order!
Society has so many misconceptions surrounding different demographics, and as a young, black, working-class female I sometimes feel like I’m in never ending battles made up of stereotypes, myths and restrictions – particularly in the workplace!
Christmas ads 2019: A KISS review
With the BIG day in just two days, the KISS team gathered around the TV, fought for a spot on the sofa and popped open a bottle of bubbly to vote for their favourite Christmas advert of 2019.
Are we measuring the right things?
As leaders and company owners we spend quite a lot of time measuring things like gross revenues, margins and operating costs, or costs of sales. But are we measuring the right things? We try to encourage clients to think wider than this, and frankly at KISS I think we need to try harder ourselves sometimes.
Most Contagious 2019: Sustainable global consumption
At my recent visit to Most Contagious 2019, I wasn’t expecting global consumption to be the emerging trend of the day, however this was a topic that came up time and time again at one of the UK’s biggest marketing conferences.
Brand ambassadors – a dose of authenticity
As I contemplate today’s results, one number stood out to me during the UK election campaign : voter registrations spiked by 236 percent on the final day, and a huge number were aged under 34. Grime artist Stormzy’s final-day tweets probably helped and this got me thinking about the power of endorsement, its strengths and weaknesses.
I bought a Tesla Cybertruck
What? You paid crazy money for a Lego brick on wheels that clearly isn’t fit for purpose when its shatterproof glass failed – to not shatter…
How to make influencer marketing work for your life science organisation
KISS is collaborating with One Nucleus, the not-for-profit Life Sciences & Healthcare membership organisation, to host an event in Cambridge on January 29th offering insights and advice on influencer marketing within the life science and biotech arena.
Crystal ball gazing and car crash interviews!
Nobody can have escaped the recent controversial, toe curling interviews we’ve witnessed lately – Prince Andrew, Jeremy Corbyn – to name a few. They’ve been generating some pretty meaty conversations here at KISS, especially debates about how useful media training and crisis comms could have been and of course, following both, the relevance of damage control and reputation.
Irrational thinking and behavioural science
I recently attended a talk by the brilliant Rory Sutherland, Vice Chairman of global marketing agency Ogilvy. He discussed his first book “Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don’t Make Sense’, which blends cutting-edge behavioural science and a touch of branding magic.
A sense of purpose
Sarah Reakes, Managing Director at KISS, writes: I’m sure I can’t be the only person who feels the need for some clarity and direction in my life right now. It feels as if the country, indeed the world, is being buffeted from one side to another and without direction I could be buffeted along with it.
APG Noisy Thinking – is it possible to plan long-term anymore?
Last week, strategists of all persuasions assembled at Google HQ’s to attend APG's latest event, which focused on the balance of long-term and short-term planning. We listened to great minds from Saatchi & Saatchi, Mother and Adam&Eve during the firestorm of misbehaving technology. Great to see the pratfall effect in full operation here!
The audience you can’t do without
Today’s news is generally depressing and often divisive. As I write, the obvious candidates are Trump, Brexit and the climate. But there are enduring lessons here for us as brand marketers.
World Cup Lessons
I really enjoyed the Rugby World Cup, and we should be pretty proud of how England played. I’ve always disliked sports analogies, and I’m not a rugby fanatic, but it got me thinking about the strategy paradox: how important it is to have both a clear, consistent strategy AND a plan for how to change it.
Influencer marketing – it’s as easy as 1 2 3
I was recently at the EMEA PROI conference in Prague and was asked several great questions around influencer marketing and my opinions on how to do it the right way. It got me thinking - and I don’t believe there’s a universally right way go about it - each case, and each brand, is unique and requires something a little different than the next. However, as a starting point, I think…
KISS team continues to grow
KISS has announced the appointment of David Isaacson to the role of Head of Strategy, Laura Ketteridge as Senior Account Manager, Lamour Nash as PR Account Executive and Olivia Halpin as Junior Designer. All four appointments follow a strong end to the agency’s financial year and form part of KISS’s ongoing plans to grow and continue to meet the needs of clients within the science, technology and…
Managing your brand in a ‘fake news’ world
‘Fake news’ isn’t even news any more. Donald Trump is right in one way: as online ‘news’ sites proliferate daily, and the regulations lag behind the times, fake news is a reality. So, it’s important to think about which news sites you can trust and what to do if you suspect a ‘fact’ isn’t true. And since, in the fight for attention, news and advertising are inextricably linked (finding news is a…
Admitting weakness is not a weakness
I recently had the pleasure of reading Richard Shotton’s The Choice Factory, in which he outlines 25 behavioural biases that influence what we buy. As a junior planner myself, I would thoroughly recommend reading this book – it gives you practical advice on how to apply behavioural science in your work and is full of great anecdotes and case studies.
Proud to be a member of the Public Relations Organisation International (PROI)
Last week three of us headed over to the EMEA PROI conference in Prague. This year’s theme was centred on ‘Building Trust’ – with a particular emphasis on the current scenario playing out across Europe – and how agencies can support clients within this field.