Virgin Media has released the second instalment of its ‘To Better and Beyond’ creative platform, which sees a new protagonist with an unstoppable spirit, the Goat Glider, take the spotlight to embody Virgin Media’s superior WiFi Guarantee. In partnership with VCCP London, Virgin Media has created its new integrated brand campaign to showcase the company’s new ethos and tagline ‘See What You Can Do’ – all with Virgin Media’s ultrafast broadband. Inspiring the nation to reach their fullest potential and never settle for less, the campaign reflects Virgin Media’s promise to never stop in its quest to make things better for its customers and challenge the status quo. Virgin Media offers the UK’s fastest WiFi Guarantee of any major provider, promising customers minimum download speeds of 20Mbps in every room or money back. The bold and playful campaign will roll out throughout the UK across multiple platforms, airing on 7th July during ITV’s new Black British drama ‘Riches’ and will lead with a hero 60” film directed by celebrated Director, Sam Brown. Following the success of the award-winning Highland Rider, Virgin Media and VCCP London collaborated with Emmy and Bafta award-winning Untold Studios again to create the courageous mountain goats. Built in CGI, the mountain goat will feature across a number of upcoming brand and trading campaigns across multiple formats. ‘Goat Glider’ runs until 22nd October across TV, BVOD, Social, Retail, co.uk, The O2. MG OMD handled the media planning and buying for the campaign.
Elixirr, the challenger consultancy firm, has announced the appointment of former Springboks rugby captain turned entrepreneur, Bob Skinstad, as partner, effective from July 1. As well as his unique sporting background, Skinstad brings decades of boardroom and advisory experience to evolve Elixirr’s business development capabilities. Skinstad is tasked specifically with bolstering Elixirr’s sport and media services network, which is an area undergoing tremendous growth. Since leading the Springboks to victory during the 2007 Rugby World Cup, Skinstad has built 20 years of experience across a multitude of industries, including advertising, media, sports and technology. After founding a hospitality business, and later selling it, he joined venture capital firm Knife Capital in 2015 where he founded the UK partnership, as well as co-founded the Section 12J entrepreneurs fund, KNF Ventures.
Global brand design agency Bloom continues its expansion with the appointment of Nick Clark as Executive Creative Director. Clark brings over 30 years of invaluable experience in brand design, including a noteworthy five-year tenure as ECD at a major global agency in New York, and numerous client projects throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa. During his career, he has collaborated with many brands across diverse categories, spanning elevated luxury to beloved everyday favourites. Clark and Bloom share a core belief: strategic and creative design is fundamental for helping brands connect more meaningfully with their audiences and making a positive contribution to everyday lives.
A new survey of UK human resources (HR) managers and directors working in sales, media and marketing shows they will need three years to be ready for the impact of AI on the workplace – yet all of them believe artificial intelligence (AI) will deliver benefits. In total 35% said it would take a minimum of three years before they were prepared for the impact of AI on their roles, and fewer than one in five (18%) said they would be fully prepared for the potential impact of AI on the workforce within the year. To integrate AI, 43% were investing in their tech teams, while 47% were already trialling AI in their businesses. The survey, commissioned by research-driven consultancy YOHO Workplace Strategy, also asked the respondents which jobs would be most impacted by AI. HR directors and managers working in sales and marketing put customer services and support at the top of the list (31%), followed by IT and technology jobs (27%), finance and accounting (27%), education and training (22%) and manufacturing and production (20%).
In order to enhance its expansion in Latin America, Petco has implemented Teamwork Commerce‘s omnichannel solution to manage its more than 118 stores in Mexico and Chile. This implementation includes Point-of-Sale (POS), Loyalty Program and Inventory Control, all integrated with its CRM and Online Store. Thanks to the cloud-based functionalities of Teamwork Commerce, Petco offers “Club Petco,” a program where customers receive coupons based on their purchase accumulation, whether they bought in-store or online. Furthermore, a strategy was implemented to streamline the checkout process by incorporating QR code scanning for grooming services and bulk products, allowing multiple items to be added with a single scan. For Petco, this initiative proves to be highly valuable as it consolidates information into a single system, facilitating the checkout process and eliminating human error through devices that provide a better user interface and enhanced experience. Additionally, by adopting a “paperless” philosophy, customers can opt to receive their receipts via email or through the Petco app.
Resolution Design, a marketing and design agency based in Wiltshire announces wins across food & drink, construction and furniture design sectors. The agency has been appointed by Norfolk-based South Pickenham Estate to work on its new branding and labelling. Resolution Design already has English vineyard Roebuck Estates amongst its portfolio, as well as Hong Kong Gin , making a significant mark on the food and drink industry. Further appointments will see Resolution Design enter into the construction and furniture design market as they partner with building contractor Gaiger Bros , and street furniture solutions company Langley Design . For Gaiger Bros , a complete overhaul of the company website is on the cards. Langley Design requires a new website to build on its success and support ambitious growth plans.
UK ticketing service Skiddle, has entered into a partnership with search and digital marketing agency, Click Consult, who will implement a content marketing strategy to further support Skiddle’s national growth. Following a successful local strategy in London, online music-event ticketing service, Skiddle, has approached Click Consult to revamp their current content marketing strategy to generate recognition and interest in the brand on a national scale. “Helping Skiddle improve their brand awareness throughout the UK is one of the things Click do best, and through an expert content marketing strategy we’re sure to see success.” said Charlotte Chapman, Head of SEO at Click.
Experience design agency Bompas & Parr presents a first-of-its-kind think tank: ‘The Feel Tank’. The Feel Tank is a think tank with a heart, taste buds and an eye for the extraordinary. ‘The Feel Tank’ is a unique form of strategic futurism that harnesses the powers of sensory stimulation to unlock new ideas for brands. Sensory stimulation has a long-acknowledged, yet highly complex, relationship to cognitive performance. The Feel Tank calls upon over a decade of multi-sensory exploration for some of the world’s most exciting brands, to guide and shape the future of experiential design. The Feel Tank is a strategy and futurism offering from Bompas & Parr, the world-renowned experience design studio. Building on 15 years of experience across a wide range of sectors (F&B, LBE, mobility, and more), The Feel Tank mobilises the collective strategic power of the studio team. It combines and crystallises the outlooks of architects, development chefs, designers, creatives, researchers and makers, to produce future-proofed creative and strategic trajectories for brands, businesses and organisations.
Tech Mahindra, a provider of digital transformation, consulting, and business re-engineering services and solutions, has announced an integration with Microsoft to enable Generative AI-Powered Enterprise Search. The new offering, Generative AI-Powered Enterprise Knowledge Search under Tech Mahindra’s TechM amplifAI0->∞ suite of AI offerings and solutions, will help enterprises increase effectiveness and personalization by using generative AI to unlock the full potential of enterprise data and present a multi-modal, multi-channel search experience. Tech Mahindra’s Generative AI-powered Enterprise Knowledge Search integrates Microsoft Azure OpenAI Service, Azure Cognitive Search, and Azure Language understanding to help enterprises unleash knowledge accessibility in a unique way, which will eventually improve the knowledge quotient within organizations. This will bring multiple AI-led capabilities like content summarization, knowledge graph-led knowledge structuring, and a new kind of query interface.
