Interviews, insight & analysis on digital media & marketing

NDA Agency News: Clarity, Little Dot Sport, Creature London and many more

Clarity, the global marketing communications agency, has announced a deal with Political Intelligence Ltd, the UK division of the independent public affairs and strategic communications consultancy Political Intelligence. Clarity has acquired the company’s UK business and operations, meaning Clarity now offers public affairs as a part of its wider integrated services. The Independent Political Intelligence businesses in Belgium, Spain and Portugal are not part of this agreement and will continue to operate under the Political Intelligence brand. They will continue to maintain a collaborative working relationship with Clarity moving forward.

Little Dot Sport, award-winning digital content agency and media network Little Dot Studios’ sport specialist label, has been awarded the social media and digital content account for West Ham United Football Club, starting with immediate effect. The three year contract will see Little Dot Sport complementing West Ham United’s in-house capabilities with its unique industry leading digital expertise, bringing more content from the men’s, women’s and youth teams directly to Hammers fans. Assisting with the clubs official YouTube channel, the collaboration underpins West Ham United’s strategy to grow its social presence and increase engagement with its loyal community with Little Dot Sport providing best in class channel management and optimisation.

The Department for Opportunities – the Social Mobility Foundation’s advocacy and campaigning arm – has launched its second campaign to raise awareness of the Class Pay Gap. Following on from the success of last year’s Class Polish campaign, which used comedian, Fern Brady to highlight the ridiculous of classism in the workplace, this year’s campaign takes a more sinister turn. Once again partnering with Creature London, the Department for Opportunities has created a short Horror Film starring Michael Socha (This is England, Being Human, Chernobyl), Jo Hartley (This is England, Eddie the Eagle, After Life) and Jonathan Hyde (Titanic, Jumanji, The Queen). Media planning is being managed by Wavemaker. The trailer will be shown in cinemas across the UK and will be supported by films posters on digital OOH and in print in this Halloween’s Guardian on Sunday. The film will be released on the 1st November with an exclusive screening event at the Roundhouse and will be livestreamed and available to all by the Roundhouse, British Film Institute and the Department for Opportunities. 

Trainline has partnered with British singer-songwriter Craig David to release a brand-new song, ‘Better Days’, as the start of the brand’s I Came By Train movement, which raises awareness of the environmental benefits of rail and encourages pride in choosing to travel by train. Cars and planes create 58% of the UK’s transport CO2 emissions, whereas the entire rail network adds up to just 1.5%. The ambition is for I Came By Train to be a rallying cry for UK travel – with the overall objective to encourage more journeys by train, irrespective of where they are booked or which train operator is taken. To raise awareness, the partnership with Craig David delivers a campaign anthem ‘Better Days (I came by train)’ which is inspired by Craig David’s passion for the environment and sheds light on the importance of making more sustainable choices, such as travelling by train, in the form of a heartfelt love song to Mother Nature. The digital agency for the campaign is BYTE/DEPT.

Anthony Nolan has appointed The Kite Factory to oversee its offline and online media planning and buying following a competitive pitch. The charity, that provides lifesaving blood stem cell transplants to people with blood cancer and blood disorders, has charged the agency with continuing to diversify its channel mix, test new products and provide a holistic overview of the efficiency and effectiveness of its media investment for multiple individual product campaigns as well as its annual brand awareness plan across the year. The incumbent was MediaLab Group.

Mixology, a PR and communications agency, has continued its growth in the B2B marketing technology sector by adding two new clients to its portfolio. The London-based agency recently underwent a brand refresh and repositioned its offer across the B2B Tech, Engineering & Infrastructure, and Tech for Good sectors. The new client wins include Upstream, a technology company in the field of mobile marketing in the most important emerging markets in the world. Its mobile marketing automation platform, Grow, unique in its kind, combines innovations in marketing automation and data, security from online advertising fraud, and multi-channel digital communication aimed at creating personalised experiences for end consumers. Convertr, a real-time customer acquisition management platform that includes Oracle, Stripe, and HP as its customers has also appointed Mixology. Connecting demand channels such as online campaigns and content syndication to CRM systems, Convertr enables marketing teams to turn leads into actionable insights in seconds, not weeks. Mixology PR has been appointed as agency of record for both brands.

Online value retail specialist Studio.co.uk has bolstered its 2022 ‘Get Christmas Ready’ marketing campaign with major media partnerships with ITV Daytime and commercial radio group Global. The partnership with ITV includes a range of co-branded 30” TV adverts featuring TV personality Josie Gibson and competitions that give viewers the chance to win £1000 of Studio.co.uk vouchers in the run up to Christmas. Supporting the ITV collaboration is a campaign with Heart Radio, including sponsorship of Heart’s Christmas station. The media partnerships and buying have been managed by MediaCom’s Manchester team. The creative brand TV ad, radio and digital assets have been produced by IMA Home, while MediaCom in partnership with ITV Daytime’s production team created the ITV partnership creative.