Spark Coverage Cup

Media relations is at the heart of a successful campaign and our team take great pride in beating their colleagues to win the weekly Spark Coverage Cup vote.

The winning piece of coverage isn’t just about circulation or credibility. A great business national or broadcast piece doesn’t always beat trade coverage – outcomes are key. How effectively was the client’s message communicated? What was the engagement like? Did it result in leads?

While earned coverage is now only part of what we do, the impact of what we deliver is often why clients choose to work with us in the first place. It’s why 80% of our clients come through referral and why some of our clients have stayed with us for over ten years.

Below are some of our previous highlights:

Coverage Cup 07/04/2020

We’re back with another Coverage Cup dispatch written from the kitchen table, and the Spark team has been working as hard as ever to secure coverage – despite the attempted distractions from children, pets and the fridge (you can see what the team has been baking on our Instagram). While the news has understandably been dominated by coronavirus, we’ve been adjusting messages on the fly, and secured plenty of great client coverage.

Kicking off this week’s nominations is the Blue Yonder team, which secured coverage in diginomica after an interview with customer HEMA, discussing the new challenges they are facing in the supply chain due to coronavirus. Also in the running for this week’s Coverage Cup is MuleSoft – the team secured coverage in Computer Weekly with a piece examining how the company is preparing for an API-driven future and why other businesses should do the same.

Even with its focus on coronavirus at the moment, the government managed to release figures on the number of UK firms to suffer repeated cyber-breaches in the past 12 months. The RSA and Verizon teams took the opportunity to hijack the news, with RSA encouraging a review of the cyber risks from external parties and Verizon discussing the need to ensure staff are aware of potential security risks. Between them, the teams secured coverage in Infosecurity Magazine, SC Media, Information Security Buzz, DIGIT.FYI and National Technology News.

Opinion article coverage has also been rolling in over the past few weeks. Firstly, the Elsevier team secured coverage with Speciality Chemicals for a piece on the need to shift practices in the chemicals industry to more sustainable methods and materials. Next, the NTT team secured a great placement with Computer Business Review for its piece on how to effectively digitally transform. Finally, in a timely piece, the SoftwareONE team secured coverage with Tech Radar Pro with a piece on how to secure systems with a rise in remote working.

Rounding off this week’s nominations is something a little bit different from the Couchbase team with an award entry they wrote earlier this year. With the winners of the annual FStech Awards announced recently, the team had the satisfaction of seeing their entry secure a win for Couchbase.

With the world relying on technology more now than ever, we’ve also turned to tech to upgrade the Coverage Cup – social distancing measures have introduced an online poll (no more duplicate votes from across the office!) and a video call to announce the winner. But one thing will never change – in true Spark fashion it’s as hotly contested as ever.