Tesco wasn’t the only success. We’ve been fortunate enough to be able to broaden our offering to UK businessmen, through our magazine ‘Springboard’ produced for UK Trade & Investment. We have expanded the communications offering from the magazine, to include web content, iPad, Twitter and facebook; making this a real multi-medium communication project. Uncle Clint and the digital team created a wonderful website for Battens Disease Foundation, building on our expertise in the charity and medical sector.

We also seem to have carved a niche for ourselves in the event publishing sphere. After producing the Royal Society Centenary and Lord Mayor’s Show Guide, we have been commissioned to produce the Scott Centenary programme, commemorating Scott’s 1912 expedition. Maybe the call from Buck Palace for 2012 is overdue?

I could also mention how we have worked with Kia Motors (UK) Ltd. to market its range to the business buyer via ‘Fleet eureka’ magazine, or the new projects we have created for British Heart Foundation, but that would be bragging.

You cannot ignore the tough economic conditions we have to work in, but what has struck me about 2011 is the desire of our marketing partners and clients to broaden and deepen their relationships with current and future customers. There are still some great marketing ideas and initiatives going round.

What has also struck me is the constancy of customer magazines to deliver brand messages, and how magazines are still welcomed in customers’ homes and lives. Other media still struggle to deliver this level of trust and intimacy.

I think this highlights that marketers understand the need for a ‘whole brand experience’, and that brand development to be successful needs a holistic approach. Fortunately, on and offline media now offer the tools to deliver something close to ‘the brand experience’. But in many markets, particularly service, the brand delivery point is human. It is the interaction between staff and customer that makes the brand promise reality. So how do you ensure that the staff  become living exponents of the brand?

I accept that recruitment, training and development are significant factors in the creation of first class brand ambassadors; I also put the case for great internal communications. We are witnessing a revolution on the delivery platforms for internal communications. Companies should (and occasionally do) recognise that staff are internal customers, who view the time spent reading internal company communications as part of the total reading and media mix. Time spent on one media (internal) is time not spent on consumer media. The result of this dynamic is internal magazines must challenge other media on the basis of editorial quality and design standards to generate readership. To this end forward thinking companies are using sophisticated and well designed magazines to replace the company newsletter. This lends itself easily to repurposing as an e-magazine or email newsletter. The e-magazine offers a great opportunity to create an extra dimension to the delivery of information with the use of streamed video and sound clips and of course are easily accessed via the company intranet.

Intranets increasingly are purposed outside of the merely functional. Again most intranets owe their existence to the need for companies to standardise their procedures, not necessarily their external message. Of course they also have a useful function in spreading knowledge of company performance targets and staff achievements. But they do offer a great vehicle for internal brand development, ensuring a deeper understanding of the company’s position, message and deliverables.

So where is this all going? As ever the secret is content. If we accept that the delivery of great service is part of the brand, and we are dependent on our staff for its delivery, why are internal communications still the handmaiden of the industry? I contend that it is because we have forgotten that internal communication must inspire as well as educate. Readers are time poor, why expect them to give you more of their hard earned time if you fail to apply the highest standards of quality to your internal comms. More importantly….innovate, use all the platforms as an internal brand experience…make it alive, make it inspiring and make it fun and easy to understand. In this way you internal communications (horrible word) becomes a mechanism to deliver great service, increase customer and staff satisfaction and increase profits!

It goes without saying that this may not be delivered by one of the traditional ‘internal communication’ agencies, but a company with experience of developing a brand. The Customer Publishing industry specialises in creating in depth brand experience using word and pictures to deepen the understanding and empathy of the individual with the brand.

After all isn’t that that’s what we are doing…internal brand advocacy?

As a long-standing user of its award-winning Emagine system, PSP Rare is looking forward to reaping the benefits of this union.

Commenting, PSP Rare’s production director, Emma Elmer, said: “Rhapsody has a unique offering in the marketplace; a true end-to-end, seamless workflow solution which we employ to maximise the value of our publishing content, whatever the channel.

“One such example is springboard magazine, published on behalf of UK Trade & Investment. The title is published on multiple platforms, including traditional print, e-magazine and iPad format and in multiple languages.

“Emagine is used throughout the whole process, by every user, in multiple locations. It’s central to our content management, quality control and production process. It gives us the ability to manage our content and the repurposing of those assets from the outset in a secure, managed environment.

“The world of publishing becomes ever more fast-moving – it’s good to have a partner who listens to a publisher’s requirements and puts the systems in place to fulfil those needs. We wish Rhapsody every success!”

ENDS

For further information, contact Emma Elmer at PSP Rare on 020 7566 9910 or email  emma.elmer@psprare.co.uk

Editor’s note: PSP Rare was founded in 2002, and is the only contract magazine publisher to have two former APA chairmen as its managing directors. It currently publishes magazines for Kia Motors UK, the British Heart Foundation, UK Trade & Investment and the Corporation of London.

However once all of the above has been done I will sit in my armchair with a welcome cup of Earl Grey and read through the latest magazines to arrive at Chez Varcoe. And in the run up to Christmas I am spoiled for choice. Sumptuous gift catalogues from a variety of High Street retailers tempt me to start thinking about what to buy for who and more importantly what to ask for myself!  Several food magazines show me how I can compete with Nigella or Gordon in the kitchen over the festive season whilst certain charity publications show me how to get my health back on track after six weeks of excess.

I relax and enjoy the visual, textural and inspirational pages and before you know it I have invested an hour of my own time allowing a variety of organisations to influence my behaviour – and that hour is time that many online marketers are still striving to capture.

Digital media are an increasingly important part of all our lives but we would be foolish to dismiss the power of print too soon.

Supported by a grant donation from the Clothworkers’ Foundation, the BDFA has briefed the Clerkenwell-based agency to take its website to a new level of design, function and versatility and increase its appeal across all user groups.

Founded in 1998 by a small group of parents of children with Batten Disease, the BDFA achieved registered charity status ten years ago. It has continued to support families, raise awareness and facilitate research into this group of rare, genetic, progressive, neurodegenerative, metabolic diseases that occur in children and adults worldwide.

PSP Rare’s digital creative division was established last year to integrate emerging digital technologies and website design into the group’s traditional contract publishing services. Its previous third sector experience has included a major programme of digital communications and website design work for Jeans for Genes.

Agency director, Clint Golding commented: “The BDFA is doing some excellent work supporting a broad network of people affected by Batten Disease. Our brief is to completely overhaul the existing website, redesigning, rebuilding and helping with visual and content strategy to make it more accessible, appealing and relevant to its diverse range of user groups.”

Andrea West, charity manager at BDFA added: “Our charity is very grateful to the Clothworkers’ Foundation for a generous grant which has enabled us to commission PSP Rare Digital to work with us to develop our new website. “This represents a very important step in the development of the BDFA as it enables us to expand the invaluable support we provide to affected families and represents an important tool for raising awareness of this devastating disease.”