Maja Pawinska Sims 24 Jul 2023 // 11:49AM GMT
LONDON — Next 15, the owner of PR agencies MHP Group (including Mischief), Outcast, Archetype, The Brandwidth Group and M Booth Health, said in a trading update that it expects revenue for the full year 2024 to be up by between 5% and 8% and reported that trading for the five months to 30 June had been “resilient, despite a very tough comparator period”. The group said it has seen organic growth in customer insight, customer delivery and business transformation, while customer engagement showed “a modest decline, in part due to some client spend delays.” Despite inflationary pressures, Next 15 is also predicting full-year operating margins to increase, compared with FY23, due to an “improvement in trading from the Engine acquisition” in March 2022. The group also said it continues to work with clients on AI and anticipates the pace of change to be rapid.
LONDON — Unlimited has launched a new B2B arm, Unlimited B2B, to offer content production, PR, brand storytelling, social and influencer, account-based marketing and customer relationship management to B2B and technology companies. The new offer combines the specialisms of Unlimited Group sister agencies Nelson Bostock (integrated communications) and TMW Business (integrated marketing) and the 100-strong team will be led by former TMW Business London MD Faye Hawkins (pictured, centre) as managing director of Unlimited B2B. The division will be underpinned by Unlimited’s Human Understanding Lab, made up of 120 data scientists, behavioural scientists, researchers and neuroscientists.
LONDON — The benevolent fund of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR), Iprovision, has launched a new fund aimed at helping those from lower socio-economic and underrepresented groups to commence or advance a career in PR. The 75 Fund marks the 75th anniversary of the CIPR, and has an initial pot of £75,000. It targets educational initiatives to lift people from socially or financially-disadvantaged backgrounds out of potential financial hardship by supporting career development and progression. Applications are open to CIPR members at all grades. Non-members can also apply and, if successful, will have their first-year membership fee sponsored by the CIPR.
LONDON — Consumer and media intelligence and communications platform Cision has introduced a new real-time media insights service, CisionOne. Powered by Cision’s proprietary artificial intelligence and machine learning models, CisionOne features include media monitoring, a brand risk score to identify potentially harmful content such as hate speech, fake news, controversy, sarcasm and spam, narrative tracking across social and earned media, and ‘Stance’ – an alternative to traditional sentiment analysis that puts social and traditional media conversations in context to uncover the intent behind words about topics, brands, companies and individuals. CisionOne will debut in the UK, followed by additional markets including the US within the next year.
RIYADH — Jummar PR & Communication, headquartered in Saudi Arabia, has joined global independent agency network PROI Worldwide, which has 90 PR and communications agency members across 165 cities in 60 countries. Jummar PR & Communication managing partner Ibrahim Al-Mutawa said joining the organisation would enable the agency to support clients in Saudi Arabia looking to expand internationally.