Thursday 6th July 2023
A practical approach to measurement
A recent article in PR Week covered the AMEC Conference and the issue of measurement in PR. While the article tackled the lack of clarity around effective measurement in PR, criticising the meaningless PR jargon that surrounds the issue, it still lacked clarity around some of the simple forms of measurement that are available to all sizes and types of company. Measurement that doesn’t involve the CEO, sitting around the boardroom table and complicated methods of evaluation that involve co-o... | Read More
Monday 29th May 2023
Use PR to drive people to your website
Today’s marketing is about content, content on company websites, social media, discussion forums and online media sites, with an ever-decreasing reliance on coverage in the printed media. With this change in focus, comes the opportunity to provide links back to a company website. So, why aren’t more companies leveraging this to?: a) provide evidence that marcoms is driving prospects to your organisation; b) to find out which content generates the most interest; c... | Read More
Saturday 13th May 2023
The other day I received a piece of direct mail from a charity organisation. I won’t name and shame, but it was to do with our woodland. It was in the form of a survey, yet I couldn’t help thinking that they had completely missed out on a PR opportunity. You see all the questions were leading questions, which the author clearly felt would lead to a charitable donations, such as ‘are you concerned about building on our woodland?’ However, the questions had no substance and would pr... | Read More
Friday 21st April 2023
I’m at risk of showing my age here, but how PR has changed and how technology has completely transformed the way we work. My first foray into PR was in 1701…, seriously it was a long time ago, when mobile phones were for a chosen few and we worked on IBM DOS-based word processors, floppy disks and dot-matrix printers. I remember joining a PR agency where only one computer had access to the Internet and we weren’t to be trusted having email available to every desk. If we wanted to fin... | Read More
Thursday 8th May 2014
Gray Matter to take part in Dragons Den
Reading. 7th May 2014: Got a great business idea, that needs some advice to get started, do you already have a business that needs some extra expertise to move to the next level or would you simply like to test an idea with some experts in business? Woodley Business Club is staging a Dragon’s Den event on Tuesday 10th June at 7pm, the Oakwood Centre, Woodley in support of Woodley Carnival and is currently looking for participants to pit... | Read More
Tuesday 25th February 2014
Social Media, Content and the Prosumer
A recent report in PR Week* illustrates the huge potential in social media which many organisations have yet to tap into. Increasingly, marketers are moving away from a business to business model to a business to prosumer model. This has come about from the emergence of social media and the ability to tap into individuals via social networks. If you’re still not convinced about the potential for social media then I’m afraid you have your head in the sand, the data speaks fo... | Read More
Monday 18th November 2013
CIPR Award - Freelance Practitioner
Kimberley Gray of Gray Matter PR has been shortlisted for the Chartered Institute of PR Awards as Outstanding Freelance Practitioner. The awards recognise best practice across the UK PR Profession. The nomination comes from her work with the Psychological Consultancy Ltd (PCL), a provider of psychometric tools and analysis. PCL was launching a new profiling tool called Risk Type Compass, which assesses a person’s attitude to risk. Budget was limited and restricted to onl... | Read More
Monday 18th November 2013
Last week I attended the first Woodley Festival of Business, offering business advice to a wide range of businesses in the local area. For those of you that don’t know Woodley, (where I live), it’s sandwiched in between Wokingham and Reading and as such, is known more as a residential area, rather than a thriving hub of commerce. It’s 2nd best place to live, apparently. It was a great event, modest, under-stated, yet very effective and I was surprised by the number and... | Read More
Monday 22nd July 2013
How much latent talent lies within?
Companies are as good as their talent, but how much does your talent really contribute outside of your organisation? Today’s PR is about content, sharing expertise with others to let them know your business has the best people in the industry. So much knowledge lies within an organisation, yet is it really maximised to its full potential? We can’t expect every senior member of staff to become a PR or marketing expert, yet their expertise is crucial to really good industry positioning. ... | Read More