Rob’s Write Up: Part II

In 2019, a question popped up again and again, “Your event sounds great but I’m unable to attend, can I tune in and watch live, or a replay?”. The team and I began working on a plan that meant we could deliver this in a way that could both engage and educate our community. Our aim was to have a CMA Learning platform live by June 2020, then Covid-19 hit the world, meaning we had to adapt and accelerate our plan. We’re now at the end of May, and already delivered over 100 webinars, with over 2,000 unique registrants. It’s been a superb effort, and I’d like to thank our amazing speakers who stepped forward, and also those that have joined as spectators. Just like our usual CMA events, there’s been great discussion, strong insights, as well as the usual friendly chat.

Rob John, CMA

We’re not done yet…

With more webinars scheduled throughout June, we’ll be continuing to run the CMA Learning platform, and will continuously add to the schedule. As always, if you have a suggestion for a topic, or would like to present a CMA Learning webinar, then please get in touch, we’d love to hear from you.

Weekly Write-ups

You’ll now see our ‘Weekly Write-up’ included in the CMA newsletter, with some key takeaways from each webinar, along with a link to replay each session if you missed it.

CMA Learning Webinar – Week Two

Howard and Edward – How can data insight inspire powerful and relevant consumer content?

Howard, Archant Dialogue spoke about how understanding an audience can help to improve the content you produce, with Ed covering how entSight uses the phrase ‘humanalysis’, which looks at the rise of digital platforms and how the audience requires a new approach, a blend of data sources for a precise view of human behaviour, and understanding that data is not insight. Expertise and passion are also vital to finding essential truths.

Ed gives great examples of where to source information, and runs through the pros and cons of doing this, looking at Google Trends, Savanta, Brandwatch, and Pulsar to name a few. Howard and Ed also ran through a report they both worked on, called ‘Driving Success’. This report looks at the value of print to the luxury automotive industry.

You can watch a replay of Howard and Ed’s webinar here

Blog writing ideas

Dave Endsor – Creating practical and powerful blogs

If you’re thinking of writing a blog, or hit a roadblock on your current blog, then you should check out Dave’s webinar. Giving great insights and examples on blogging, including finding inspiration in unlikely places. Dave also mentioned an example that featured an old friend who was a Marketing Director with a major logistics company. He would look at the labels of outgoing packages and find stories based on where things were going, like the one time he noticed packages going to the Sydney Opera House. 

Dave runs through a number of websites and sources for both primary and secondary data, whilst giving examples of how these can be used. We then moved on to ‘what’s the purpose?’ of writing a blog, and Dave highlights four components, to; inform, entertain, educate or persuade.

You can watch a replay of Dave’s webinar here

CMA podcast breakfast header

Content Breakfast – Podcasting

I may be a little biased, but I thought this was a fantastic webinar, with four great speakers, all offering something a little different. 

Rowan Morrison, (Rationale) runs a podcast with her business partner Svein, and began their podcast – ‘Have you ever?’. It was great to hear the ideas that shape the podcast, including how they put the pod together, especially during lockdown. As well as giving some technical tips, Rowan also gave great examples of where the pod has led them, like taking part in a live Peloton class in New York, to running a live podcast from an Edinburgh bookshop.

There are those that say the podcast space is getting too saturated, but Rowan disagrees, drawing comparisons to books, TV and film. There’s a constant stream of these art forms, and podcasts are no different. So what are you waiting for, there’s no better time to start a podcast. If you’re still on the fence, check out Part One replay to see Rowan’s nine reasons you should start a podcast.

Next we had Gerard Edwards (Podcast Radio), who spoke about having a great series, with fun content … but nobody listens. This happens a lot, and discoverability is a major roadblock when planning and releasing a podcast. 

This isn’t just a problem for podcasting, Gerard talks about Netflix and how even they had a problem with discoverability, which they addressed by making changes to the home page and their trailers. There are similarities between radio and podcast, and one of the advantages radio has is the ability to repeat and repeat. That song sticks in your head, or the presenter becomes your ‘friend’, so as someone looking at setting up a podcast, look at the success in other areas, and try to implement them in your new pod.

Watch the Part One replay here

Family fun adventure

In Part Two, we had Becky Power (Mindshare) join us and talk about branded podcasts. I was looking forward to hearing from Becky, as I believe there’s so much scope for branded podcasts. Becky was the Creative Director on the brilliant Discovery Adventure podcast, which was created for Land Rover back in 2017. 

Becky talks about the brief set from Land Rover, focusing on family fun, and how the team set about creating the podcast. Using sound engineers and award-winning actors, the podcast was a success, not only winning awards, but boasting a 75% listen through rate. If you’d like to see Becky’s talk, and also listen to snippets of the binaural podcast, you can watch Part Two here.

Last but not least, we had Kobi Omenaka, who aside from working with the CMA over the last couple of years to deliver podcast training, is also an influential part of the UK podcast scene, helping to set up the UK Podcast Awards. 

Kobi talked about ways you can monetise your podcast, from sponsorship and adverts, to guest appearances and patreon/fans. However, Kobi talks about the other benefits of podcasting, such as helping your career and profile by growing your network, and also to have fun and let the creative juices flow. There’s nothing wrong with setting a podcast up as a hobby, and it can be no different to you wanting to play football down the park, knowing you’ll never play for Real Madrid. Starting a podcast for fun is certainly enough, and if you can make some money on the side, brilliant … if you can become the next Joe Rogan and sign a $100m Spotify deal, then that’s not bad either! 

Watch the Part Two replay here

New York Skyline, Graffiti

Chris – Amplitude – Lockdown and Beyond: Change as a Creative Force

Chris talked about how history has proven time and time again that we can create new ways of living through a crisis. Giving examples of how change can be used as a creative force and throughout our timeline as human beings, from poverty in New York leading to a change in culture, to music and poetry coming out of the renaissance period.

Chris highlights the ways this can be done, and also says that this can’t be forced. People can and will adapt naturally, this isn’t something we could do regularly to try and and force some kind of positive outcome. Chris went on to talk about the benefits of looking outside your own creative discipline, and gave examples, including work carried out by some of his university students, and how being able to find inspiration from other sectors is a strong skill to have.

You can watch a replay of Chris’ webinar here

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