"Understand your Country" campaign with Business Day

View the other two adverts here 

Pleiades Media was approached by agency Owen Kessel to support Business Day’s brand campaign with PR. The campaign appeals to Business Day’s public mandate to engage with the issues facing South Africa, or face the prospect of having social and economic freedoms eroded and ultimately removed from civil society.

New smart ID cards: hello eGovernment

Pleiades client Gemalto in successful to supply SA’s first smart ID cards

Smart ID cards are now in the hands of some of South Africa’s most influential citizens, and we at Pleiades are excited to have played a role in this technological giant leap for the country.

The cards were supplied by our client, world leader in digital security, Gemalto and our job was to make sure the media knew about this development and understood the technical sophistry behind the cards. We also had the privilege of attending the media conference when Gemalto was announced as the successful supplier of the smart ID cards.

The press release is dead. Long live the e-release!

By Sarah Botha

The Pleiades Media team recently attended a talk held by the Public Relations Institute of South Africa (PRISA) entitled ‘The End of the Press Release’  presented by Sonya Culverwell, editor dynamo of online media and advertising industry go to Adlip. With a somewhat controversial title for us PR practitioners who can live and die by the press release, we were intrigued to hear what more we could learn about the PR landscape which has been embroiled in a vortex of change for the past few years.

The New Look of Public Relations — A Dissenting View by Richard Edelman

Editor's Note: The following piece was written by Edelman PR CEO, Richard Edelman, and was first published April 30th on Richard’s blog. Richard Edelman is the president and CEO of Edelman, the world’s largest public relations firm with 67 offices and 4,800 employees worldwide. Richard has extensive experience in marketing and reputation management, with current assignments for Hewlett-Packard, SAP and PepsiCo. Richard was named the fifth most powerful executive by PRWeek in 2012.

We reposted this piece as it echoes our own views of the changing landscape of PR . 

Article Source: 6.AM 

Monday’s New York Times ran an article by Stuart Elliott on the rebranding of our competitor, Fleishman-Hillard (FH). The firm will “be the most complete communications company in the world… channel agnostic… across paid, owned, earned and shared media,” according to agency CEO Dave Senay. His is a bold vision, to partner with brands and to serve consumers with content that is alluring and worthy of sharing. The firm is hiring from outside of the PR field, from ad agencies, consultancies and brand identity firms. It sounds to me like the creation of a marketing services company within a single corporate entity.

Communications that contribute - introducing the Youth Employment Index

By Kerry Botha 

I have always believed that PR and communications should operate in context.  Companies never speak in isolation.  To be effective they should speak to the current context and debate – certainly if they wish to be heard.  Nando’s quirky and satirical campaigns are brilliant in articulating the nuances and meta underbelly of South Africa’s society and its politics. Their campaigns are savvy too in speaking to the brand’s inherent humour.  Their food is welcome time out as a result.   

New Client Announcement - Gemalto

Pleiades Media is happy to announce that of March 2013 they have added Gemalto to their list of PR clients. Gemalto (Euronext NL0000400653 GTO) is the world leader in digital security with 2012 annual revenues of €2.2 billion and more than 10,000 employees operating out of 83 offices and 13 Research & Development centers, located in 43 countries. Gemalto are at the  heart of the rapidly evolving digital society. Billions of people worldwide increasingly want the freedom to communicate, travel, shop, bank, entertain and work – anytime, everywhere – in ways that are enjoyable and safe. Gemalto delivers on their expanding needs for personal mobile services, payment security, authenticated cloud access, identity and privacy protection, eHealthcare and eGovernment efficiency, convenient ticketing and dependable machine-to-machine (M2M) applications.

Why PR matters: 5 reasons to be PR savy by Mary Murtagh

Award-winning journalist Mary Murtagh has spent 15 years as a reporter and video journalist on the UK’s biggest regional newspapers, glossy magazines and trade press. She knows what makes the media tick and how to attract their attention.

Here are her 5 reasons why your business should be PR-savvy: