The City of Sydney tasked CP Communications (CPC) to engage with Sydney’s centrally located business community to recognise, reward and celebrate local business achievements through the City of Sydney Business Awards. Additionally CP Communications were involved in encouraging the same community to attend a series of seminars designed to provide tactical advice, resources and networking opportunities for SMEs within the City of Sydney.
CPC developed a strategic PR strategy which focused on raising the profile of the awards and the seminars as well as engaging with target audiences with the aim of encouraging them to enter their business in the awards and attend the seminars.
Objectives
- To raise the profile of the awards with target audiences.
- To encourage eligible businesses to enter the awards.
- To present the City of Sydney Council as supportive of the Sydney business community and appreciative of their contributions to the local government area.
The Seminars
CPC developed a strategy to build awareness of the ‘Let’s Talk Business Seminars’ as a City of Sydney initiative as well as increase the number of seminar attendees. CPC developed a media pitch including key information about the events as well as an invitation to attend. This resulted in significant media coverage in a range of different business publications.
In addition to media pitching, CPC provided each speaker involved with information about the event and encouraged them to distribute this via their networks. Information was posted on business listing sites to further reach Sydney business people and boost attendance.
As a result there was an increase in attendees to each of the seminars from 80 to 120, exceeding the campaign’s target.
The Awards
The launch
CPC developed an initial media release to engage the attention of key media including, local news, business publications, ethnic media and online sites. This release included information about the awards including the new categories for the year, interesting local business statistics and an invitation to attend a launch event.
This resulted in many journalists attending the launch function and a significant amount of media coverage which helped to increase the number of awards entrants and public votes from previous years.
Driving entries
The awards had more than 20 different categories businesses could enter. To assist in reaching businesses across a range of industries, CPC developed numerous media angles around several of the key categories. These were pitched to industry publications and resulted in highly targeted media coverage which helped to boost entries in those industries.
Announcing the winners
In addition to media releases being distributed to announce award finalists, CPC distributed an embargoed media release to target publications announcing the award winners. Key journalists were also invited to the gala dinner, with CPC arranging numerous media interviews, including live radio interviews, with category winners.
Results
As a result of the PR campaign award entries increased to more than 520, a significant increase from previous years. More than twice as many members of the public from previous years nominated businesses and there was an increase of over 20 per cent in voting.
CPC achieved significant media coverage reaching over six million people. This included articles in:
- Central Magazine – a story every week the awards ran
- Major metropolitan publications including mX Sydney and The Wentworth Courier
- Major daily newspapers including the Sydney Morning Herald and the Australian Financial Review
- Business magazines including Dynamic Business and Nett
- Ethnic publications
- Industry vertical media relating to the award categories
- Sydney radio stations.
Sydney Public Relations Agency, CP Communications provides specialist media, traditional and online PR strategies that get amazing results. Contact us today. For more great tips visit our website www.cpcommunications.com.au.
