PropTech – the application of information technology and platform economics to real estate markets.

Around March 16th I, like most, was fearful of what lay ahead. The implications of Covid-19 stretching its awful hand over the world made for grim consideration not just in personal life, but also in the evident threat to my clients’, my team’s and my own livelihood.

The Guardian recently released an article written by an AI robot. Yep, that’s right, a fully coherent persuasion on, get this, the topic of whether AI will destroy the human race...

As a student, it’s bad enough having your final year of school cut short by a virus that’s compiled merely by a single-stranded RNA, a few proteins and thin lipid envelope approximately 120nm in size. Now, an untested algorithm has knocked a few letters off your predicted grades. Oh 2020, haven’t you done enough?

Lucinda Carney is CEO of Actus Software, a chartered psychologist and a client of CommsCo. She gives her perspective on hiring a PR agency on the day the lockdown started.

In the latest of our CommsCo Catch Ups, we chatted with award winning entrepreneur, investor and global executive leader, Paul Excell, COO and Director at ScaleUp Group (SUG).

Covid 19. Coronavirus. Lockdown, Social-Distancing, Furlough, ‘Quarantinis’... the list goes on and on.

Donald Trump is in the news again (shock). This time for tweeting something controversial (shock). It’s a fake video of a racist baby (sh…OK, actually this is bizarre, even for the President).

This week our amazing team helped host a virtual press conference for 63 journalists across 18 countries. On the same day, we won a new account.

Amongst global headlines quite rightly dominating the news, it might have been easy to miss the recent announcement from the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC), that national newspapers can now keep their print circulation figures secret

In a recent CommsCo Catch-Up, we sat down with AI advisor and founder of Greenhouse Intelligence, Andrew Burgess, to discuss how AI can help organisations weather the current crisis.

We’re well aware that the current crisis means many businesses are having to think on their feet and re-shape their services. It’s a difficult time for all, personally and professionally, but at CommsCo we’re committed to doing everything we can to help.

In an age where we subscribe to so many digital services, should we be paying for quality newsgathering as well?

Late last year, The ScaleUp Institute announced the appointment of successful scaleup entrepreneur Adam Hale as its new chairman. Hale is also advisor to the ScaleUp Group, Chairman of DevOpsGroup, non-executive director of Unit4 and board advisor to e-days.

In our latest 'media insights' blog, we pick the brains of NS Business editor Dan Robinson, talking everything from good PR practice and autonomous vehicles to Morrisons meat pies

In our first blog post of the decade, CommsCo talks to PR Week's news editor Arvind Hickman about the biggest news stories of last year, the ethical issues of certain comms campaigns, and what 2020 holds for the media and PR.

There have been some awe-inspiring events that have driven me to summarise the end of this year at CommsCo. Amidst a crazy 12 months’ political upheaval, we’ve been quietly – or rather, loudly - building the profile of our portfolio of scaleup companies, and that at least is something worth celebrating.

Don’t get me wrong - I thoroughly enjoyed my three years of communication studies. This blog is not going to criticise PR degrees, nor it is going to be full of regrets of undertaking one

Ensuring your PR and marketing strategies are aligned is critical to maximise its potential within the organisation – so how can the two departments work together? In the first in our series of CommsCo Catch-Ups, we chat to Adam Sharp, CommsCo client and co-founder and CEO of MarTech consultancy, CleverTouch Marketing to discover more.

The journey; a stalwart of mankind’s history and littered throughout literature and art, each one brings its own, unique challenges.

Big reputations and big names often gravitate towards PR agencies that are just as large. With hefty budgets at their disposal and the need for a sizeable PR team to manage operations, it’s a reasonable move for multinational organisations. Yet smaller companies often want a piece of this same sizeable PR agency pie, mistakenly believing that the bigger the agency, the faster and better the results.

Given we have the pleasure of working with many brilliant startups and scale ups in the tech scene, we were delighted to see the launch of Startups Magazine this year.

We're back with our 'Media Insights' series as we catch up with Joe Bush, managing editor at Electronic Specifier, the design engineers' resource guide to news, products and technology from the global electronics industry; and contributing editor to Startups Magazine, a digital and print magazine helping tech startups connect the dots on their entrepreneurial journeys.

Picture the scene. You’ve set your client up for a Sunday Times business profile but the opportunity isn’t quite right for them. You have set another up for radio but they really wanted TV.

On Your Bike Likes - the start of a new Instagram era?

In the midst of countless new world days, today marks potentially the most millennial of them all: #WorldEmojiDay; or, in emoji,???(ironically, there is not an emoji symbol for an emoji so I’ve used the most popular, dubbed, ‘Face with Tears of Joy’). A day created to celebrate all things emoji. If anything typifies 21st Century socio-cultural norms, this is it?

Last week we were approached by a business journal to explain why PR is so valuable to startups and scaleups as they turn their innovative ideas into businesses. As the agency for challenger brands, we know just how important it is to find your voice in the ever-expanding tech market. Stealing mindshare for exciting scaleup brands is why we exist.

Former Notbinary automation arm selects the PR agency for tech challenger brands to promote its work with government and Not For Profit organisations

When I first started university, my Dad told me that only half of what I would learn would be in the classroom, and the other half would be life lessons learned outside of academia. I was sceptical about that ratio then, and I’m still sceptical now, but for an entirely different reason.

Today’s a good day. You’ve worked with your client to get an insightful piece of thought leadership written up, and pitched it to an interested journalist. Now you’re just waiting for it to appear.

Disruptive HR tech scale up appoints challenger tech PR firm to drive UK profile

We continue our Media Insights blog series as we catch up with Lisa Baker, editor of UK Tech News.

In the first in our 2019 series of ‘Media Insights’ blogs, we caught up with Abby Sorensen, Chief Editor of Software Executive Magazine, SoftwareBusinessGrowth.com and Executive Editor of Channel Executive Magazine.

As CES 2019 draws to a close, this year’s show has provided insight into the coming tech trends of 2019 with 8K TVs and folding phones some of the hottest technologies on display.

It goes without saying that regardless of your business focus, innovation isn’t just for January. But when it comes to PR programmes, a lot of companies seem to run out of steam as Q1 creeps to an end. Those multi-tabbed comms plans so painstakingly constructed in the dark days of December may, by February, lay as long forgotten as most new year’s resolutions.

It seems almost everything, from politics to football, has been compared to a ‘finely poised game of chess’ at some point, often with varying degrees of accuracy. But what about PR? For those of us who don’t know our poisoned pawns from our Nimzo-Indians, what can Magnus Carlsen and his recent triumph over Fabiano Caruana in the world chess championship teach us about PR strategy in 2018?

Last night CommsCo PR took its clients, partners and journo friends on a journey around Europe via the medium of wine at a tasting at the Humble Grape in London.

This week we welcomed Matthew Carrozo to the CommsCo offices, as he traded in laid-back Lisbon for bustling London. Head of Communications at Unbabel, the translation-as-a-service AI scaleup that’s breaking down language barriers around the world, Matt chatted to the CommsCo blog team about the differences between Portugal and the UK, how to forge a successful agency relationship, and of course, his dog Moses.

As part of the budget this week, it was announced that the treasury would be releasing a commemorative Brexit 50p coin on 29th March 2019 as the United Kingdom leaves the European Union. Having been campaigned for by The Sun, it reported the news as a victory for the paper. The coin, which will read, ‘Peace, Prosperity and Friendship with all Nations’ is described as ‘an enduring gesture to mark Brexit as a landmark national moment’.

5 October 2018, London: Unbabel– the enterprise software company that combines Artificial Intelligence (AI) with a global crowd to break down business communication barriers has chosen CommsCo as its retained PR agency for the UK, EMEA and North American regions.

Some tips for driving results while keeping it simple

Last week I finished my internship with CommsCo, where the team took me under its wing for three weeks and showed me the ropes of PR in a professional environment. I’ve interned elsewhere for longer periods, but nowhere has taught me more in such a short time. It’s been educational, exciting, and engaging in equal measure – for anyone in my position considering applying for some PR experience themselves, I definitely recommend it. Here are just three reasons why:

Last week, amongst the disconcerting headlines about the uncertainty of the British high street, with retail giants such as House of Fraser struggling to stay afloat, emerged an encouraging story of a small fish making waves in a big pond. As well as being picked up in local waters by national papers and the BBC, the story of Scott’s Fish and Chips, on the A64 outside York, popularity has even been promoted by Chinese state media because of the buzz it has created almost 5,000 miles away.

Twitter chats are an increasingly useful tool when it comes to opening discussions with influencers and industry professionals. As well as achieving more social traction, they’re also a platform to show off your client as a trusted voice and an expert in their field.

It’s been three months since GDPR came into effect, yet organisations are still sending out marketing emails to individuals who have not opted-in. ‘Legitimate interest’, the loophole that businesses everywhere are using to continue outbound marketing, has been a saviour for marketing teams. Unbeknownst to many, however, that loophole is about to be closed for good.

If someone told you that one day marketers would be marketing to an algorithm, would you believe them? Would you be even more shocked if you were told it’s already happening?

You may not love it, with its clunky platform and wonky algorithms, but LinkedIn has steadily built its potential to be a key part of business sales strategy over the last few years.

Normally, if you can summarise the outcome of a meeting by saying:“So, we’re all the same. But we’re all different too.”

From policing pollution to sending satellites to the stars—Poland is tech’s hottest hub

And so London Tech Week comes to an end – with 55,000 of the world’s best and brightest minds finishing their final conferences and discussions on latest industry happenings and developments.

Gorkana’s State of the Media Report sheds some light on the all-important relationship between PRs and journalists today. The findings show that 75% of the media prioritise an accurate story over a breaking story, and only 3% say that they are willing to trust content from social media and blogs.

In a piece that initially appeared in UKTN, CommsCo MD Ilona Hitel explains how tech founders can roll out a successful PR media strategy to help their businesses flourish.

In days past, companies were winning if they managed to sort out storage solutions that could stand up to big data and somehow manage to extract useful data for analysis. As time marched on, many of the large global big data firms were able to demonstrate the benefits of big data analysis, usually via large global customers, a handful of whom consented to basic press releases extolling the technical veracity of big data in action.

Hosted by John O’Connell, chairman of the UK’s ScaleUp Group, last week’s event provided valuable advice for technology entrepreneurs in the UK ScaleUp space.

After three years of battling through your degree comes the time to join another fight, the fight for employment. That’s the great thing about graduating: you’ve spent three years, sitting through lectures and seminars wondering where it’s going to get you. Well, now it’s time to apply those skills.

GDPR. We know you’d rather not dwell on it, but the 25th May deadline isn’t something that small businesses can ignore. With strict new laws around data protection, you might be in the dark about what PR and marketing “post GDPR” is going to look like. Well, we’re here to help.

When the “London tech scene” is mentioned, what part of London do you think of? Shoreditch? Camden? East London? It’s likely that the Borough of Richmond does not spring to mind.

In an era of ‘security tool fatigue’, it’s more important than ever for cyber security companies to stand out from the crowd.

(Or, oh no, not another article about GDPR!)It’s May 25th 2018 and you want to send an email inviting your database of contacts to a great event you’re hosting. But wait, do you have their consent to email them, or to even hold their data?

Wondering what 2018 could mean for PR/journalist relationships? We caught up with Adrian Bridgwater, journalist for Computer Weekly, TechTarget, Forbes and The Register to find out his tech predictions, surprises, and how he sees the state of the media in the year ahead.

Now we’ve helped you master the email pitch, the next frontier is the arguably more fearsome phone pitch.

There are some B2B tech topics and themes that stand the test of time. After many years of industry discussion, they’re still relevant in today’s technology landscape. Then there are the others. A tired collection of buzzwords that have been done to death, and will not under any circumstances be regarded as “news” to any editor. Here are a few that spring to mind:

Earlier this month, we spoke to Jessica Twentyman, contributor to the FT, the EIU and Diginomica, and Editor of Internet of Business, to find out about her PR bugbears, the state of the media and her biggest tech surprise of 2017.

2017 was a huge year for tech scale ups. With ‘top ten’ start-up listings cropping up everywhere, it’s hard not to be amazed by the variety of new tech talent — from workforce management to automation and AI to cyber security companies.

When assessing what makes effective PR, it’s important be self-critical where necessary, and address where there is need for improvement. In business, new year’s resolutions are a chance to improve ourselves, our teams, and the success of the company’s brand.