22nd December 2017

Big Cat’s end of year review and a look into what’s yet to come!

As this year comes to an end, we’d like to thank our fantastic clients for making 2017 great! It’s been a wonderful year for Big Cat and so The Pride would like to share their highlights and achievements from the past year and look ahead to what 2018 will bring:

Hannah Davies, Marketing Director

Highlight of 2017

My highlight has to be the Big Cat rebrand and website going live this year! What a labour of love! I am super proud that our appearance and online presence now reflects the quality of our client work.

Industry Prediction 2018

2018 is all about the end of single service agencies and consultants, making way for agency partners whose consultancy transcends marketing and communications. In 2018, thriving marketing agencies will be those who have a detailed understanding of their clients businesses; not just of their objectives and industry but of their financial performance, their infrastructure and their sales processes.

Marv Robson, Design Director

Highlight of 2017

This year we added a new addition to the Design team and hired Simon Stanyer, a graphic designer with 5 years’ experience specialising in luxury retail, high street and fine art brands. He now works closely with our marketing specialists to create engaging visual content and eye catching animations across a range of channels. It’s really great to be expanding the design repertoire of the studio.

Industry Prediction 2018

Braver colours – this year has been mobbed by bold hues in an effort to instil positivity into a post Brexit consumer. This trend will continue into next year, with brands making conscious choices to hero their flagship colour – standing out in a meme filled social media space.

Jonny Grange, Digital Account Manager

Highlight of 2017

As I’ve only been here a week and a half, it will have to be joining Big Cat and beginning to work on some really exciting digital projects.

Industry Prediction 2018

The biggest trend for SEO and digital marketing is going to be the impact that voice search will have in 2018. The rise of digital assistants has presented a growing market that can change the way search queries are performed. According to Google, 1 out of 5 searches already come from voice queries, so optimising content based on voice search queries is going to be a huge ranking factor in the New Year.

Simon Stanyer, Graphic Designer

Highlight of 2017

In terms of a work highlight, I’d have to go with working on the brand positioning for The White Swan. It’s a project that’s still in development, however working to help them refine the quality of their visual communications has been an enjoyable experience thus far.

Industry Prediction 2018

My predicted design trend for 2018 is ‘brave design’. I see brands moving away from clean, reserved and minimalist design and adopting a more confident, expressive and inclusive stance. This is primarily based around the use of bright, loud colours juxtaposed with expressive imagery and flat design. For example, eBay have adopted this direction by using a variety of bold colours within their product placement on their homepage and Dropbox has adopted a sense of this style via the creative use of its images.

Emily Hickey-Mason, Communications Account Manager

Highlight of 2017

Joining Big Cat and starting to plan the 2018 Aspire Channel Swim campaign. For me, focussing on the expansion of the charity event’s communications has been super exciting and I can’t wait to start putting it in action!

Industry Prediction 2018

Undoubtedly, I believe that 2018 will be the year that harmful gender stereotyping within marketing and advertising will be quashed. Whilst I personally believe this has been a long time coming, brands and regulations alike are finally setting the wheels in motion for a revolutionary change in the way gender roles are portrayed in the marketing and advertising industry.

It was revealed earlier this year that an astounding 50% of ads showed a negative or non-progressive stereotype of women. The Advertising Standards Association has now announced that new rules around gender stereotyping are going to be introduced into 2018.

Smashing harmful gender stereotypes is something that’s at the forefront of our minds and our campaigns for 2018 and we’re excited to be a part of this historical movement.

Keshia Chauhan, Marketing Account Manager

Highlight of 2017

My highlight of 2017 was visiting the incredible Food Logistica exhibition in Berlin. Not only was it amazing to travel with the team and represent the Big Cat Pride outside of the UK, but the exhibition itself provided us with endless inspiration and insights from the fresh produce industry which has proved to be incredibly useful, informing the work we do with clients in this sector. Another personal highlight for me was receiving my promotion to Marketing Account Manager in September! Since starting out as an intern in January 2015, I’ve loved every minute of being a Big Cat and can’t wait to see what 2018 will bring.

Industry Prediction 2018

Having worked with some great F&B brands over the past year, I’ll be keeping an eye out for some exciting new bars and restaurants coming to Birmingham. We have such an incredible community of independents in the city and I imagine that we will see a whole host of unique and original venues popping up in the city adding to that community!

Oliver Richards, Senior Marketing Account Manager

Highlight of 2017

Got to be the Absolutely Karting Bristol video we created earlier this year. We wanted to capture the whole experience, from the attentive customer service, guidance provided by the track professionals and of course, the thrill of racing around in their brand new, 270cc petrol powered, Sodi GT5 Go-Karts! One fun day of filming and some editing flair later, Absolutely Karting have a video fit to showcase their huge, double-level track…

Industry Prediction 2018

We’re all aware of digital influencers and the part they can play in an effective communications strategy but I believe 2018 will see brands recognise the impact of ‘micro-influencers’. There is a wealth of people blogging, tweeting and instagram’ing with a smaller but highly engaged audience who recognise the authenticity of these profiles. As campaigns aim to reach ever more highly targeted and niche demographics, these ‘micro-influencers’ provide a fantastic opportunity for collaboration and engagement with discerning online communities.

Helen Gaskell, Senior PR Executive

Highlight of 2017

Like some of the others, joining the Big Cat Pride has been a massive highlight of 2017 and being welcomed into such a great team. I have also only recently moved to Birmingham so getting to know all the great places to eat and drink in the city is definitely a bonus to this job.

Industry Prediction 2018

Next year I think is going to prove even more challenging for PR professionals with Fake News and technology making our jobs more difficult. Whilst in many ways technological advancements are a benefit, as machines could help with media monitoring, reporting, and research but with the rise of news bots such as Buzzfeed’s open source ‘Buzzbot’ and Reuters’ ‘News Tracer’, it’s going to be far more difficult to pitch stories.

Anthony Tattum, Managing Director

Highlight of 2017

I co-founded Big Cat 17 years ago way back in 2000 and have seen a lot of changes since then. Over the past three years we have transformed the agency’s structure and processes, and invested heavily in attracting an amazing team of like-minded creatives. In 2017 we’ve cemented our reputation in all of our key sectors and won or retained our impressive client roster. The result of all this is the best year so far financially as well as many other softer metrics like staff churn and client satisfaction.

Industry Prediction 2018

Big Cat is a Birmingham-based agency but working with clients across the UK. I think the economy will continue to grow as a whole in 2018 and the West Midlands region will thrive, finally punching above its weight in terms of productivity. There’s a lot of investment and anticipation in the region. This will have the knock on effect of attracting more investment and reduce the brain drain to London.

I’m seeing more and more clients looking to us for business consultancy to get them campaign ready and not just to roll out tactics. I think this trend will continue in 2018 with clients not just looking for agency partners that can offer a seamless collection of marketing services, but also support on tuning up their business strategy to ensure that their marketing and communications investment is as effective as possible.

Big Cat’s end of year review and a look into what’s yet to come!

As this year comes to an end, we’d like to thank our fantastic clients for making 2017 great! It’s been a wonderful year for Big Cat and so The Pride would like to share their highlights and achievements from the past year and look ahead to what 2018 will bring:

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