Season's Greetings from Sermelo
2018 has been a fantastic year for the team here at Sermelo. We've moved office, now sharing with the lovely team at WE Communications, we’ve started working with a range of new clients, and continued to build on our strong relationships with our highly valued existing clients.
We’re also very happy to have welcomed three new colleagues, who have all settled in extremely well.
As we move into the holiday break, we wanted to share a quick overview of our highlights, blogs and news from the year, and also wish a fantastic holiday to you all!
As always, we'd love to hear your feedback, so please do get in touch with us at info@sermelo.com
Our Monthly Highlights for 2018
January: 2018 got off to a busy start as Sermelo continued to provide ongoing support for De Beers Group ahead of a major technological announcement.
February: This year, we have seen a number of high profile cyber attacks, and the impact data breaches have had on companies’ reputations. In February, Jonathan shared his thoughts on the cyber issue, in his blog, ‘When cyber strikes’. Within the blog, Jonathan discussed the benefit of having a crisis plan in place, as the frequency of cyber attacks will likely continue to rise.
March: In March we were happy to welcome Gillian Edwards to Sermelo as an Associate Partner. Gillian joined the company with over 15 years’ experience working in corporate communications, including six years as a broadcast media spokesperson. Her particular areas of expertise includes messaging and strategy, campaign planning, integrated communications, spokesperson training and crisis and issues management.
Since joining Sermelo, Gill has been working closely with ABB on a number of initiatives and overseeing various crisis trainings that Sermelo has conducted around the world.
April: In April we were excited to be joined by a new consultant, Rosanna Baird. Rosanna joined Sermelo having previously worked in communications at SSE, following her degree in Politics and International Relations at the University of Aberdeen.
Since joining Sermelo, Rosanna has been working on a number of accounts, such as FM Global, ABB, Andermatt and OI.
May: In May, Sermelo once again supported FM Global following the update to its industry leading Resilience Index tool. The tool allows users to compare the resilience of the business environments in nearly 130 countries and territories, and gives powerful insights to users by examining five-year country trends and can learn what drives each country’s resilience. Each year Sermelo always enjoy seeing the changes in the Resilience Index tool, and we were able to achieve a wide range of coverage in trade and national media.
June: In June Ele Emmerson was welcomed to the Sermelo team. Ele joined with over 15 years’ experience working in corporate communications and public affairs, working across a range of sectors including retail, technology, manufacturing and healthcare. Her expertise includes messaging and strategy, stakeholder engagement, campaign planning, issues management, and corporate responsibility communications.
Since joining, Ele has worked closely with a number of clients such as FM Global and ABB, and provided support for a number of media trainings and crisis simulations.
July: With a host of communications crises unfolding in 2018, Gill Edwards took the opportunity to outline some of the basics that should be implemented when dealing with a crisis. In Gill’s blog, ‘How to keep communications human in a crisis,’ some examples of badly handled crises were highlighted, such as United Airline’s response to a passenger being dragged off the plane in an act of ‘re-accommodating’ him.
Gill then continued to explain the importance of ensuring that the tone of a statement is correct, otherwise businesses can often make any crisis worse.
August: With 2018 marking the first year of compulsory gender pay gap reporting, many interesting insights into various companies and industries were created, with the discussion around Diversity and Inclusion significantly widening.
In-line with this renewed focus on Diversity and Inclusion, Ele shared her thoughts on the importance of communications in building a culture of diversity and inclusion in her blog, ‘Diversity and inclusion – communication can help build the right culture and show commitment’. Ele outlined the how vital it is that businesses effectively convey the right diversity and inclusion messages to their employees and customers.
September: One of our clients, Owen Illinois (OI), a leading glass bottle manufacturer, launched OI : EXPRESSIONS, an innovative technology allowing businesses to create highly personalised and customised designs on glass bottles. Sermelo were very happy to support the launch of this product, and organised a press day with key OI executives meeting with a range national and trade journalists.
October: Tom and Rosanna were both able to visit our client, Andermatt Swiss Alps, seeing the amazing new developments taking place in Andermatt, such as the new Raddison Blu Hotel and Gotthard Residences, as well as the Schneehüenerstock-Oberalppass gondola, linking Andermatt and Sedrun to create the largest ski area in central Switzerland. As always, they both had a great time in the Swiss Alps and the whole team are looking forward to continuing our work with Andermatt in 2019.
Jonathan was also in New York for the annual meeting of The Crisis Protection Network discussing the future of the global network and how the whole team continue to work together to improve crisis preparedness for companies around the world.
November: Ben articulated the sensitivities brands must acknowledge introducing new campaigns or products in his recent blog, ‘Nuance and Tone when dealing with Emotional Attachments’. As 2018 has highlighted, our world is increasingly divided into various viewpoints and groups, and brands must take care when communicating around subjects that can prove divisive, particularly when those subjects evoke strong attachments from consumers.
December: In December, Andermatt Swiss Alps officially opened the Schneehüenerstock-Oberalppass gondola, linking the Andermatt-Sedrun resorts.
This link creates the largest and most-modern resort in central Switzerland, popular with both freeriders and more relaxed skiers, hosting a wide variety of slopes suitable for all ski levels. Sermelo were deeply involved in the promotion of this link, conducting outreach to a variety of national and trade media outlets.
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