Wates Group
Challenge:
The Wates Group is one of the UK’s largest building contractors
The Wates Group wanted to create a platform with which to position the company as a thought leader on industry issues and shift perceptions of the Group from a ‘traditional contractor’ to a formidable player in the construction industry. Ultimately they wanted to achieve recognition as a successful British company
The other goals were to communicate the company’s success, for example delivery on time and on budget, to position Wates as an industry leading service provider in key sectors, to create a vehicle with which to secure national coverage and would address a wide range of target audiences.
Strategy:
After carrying out research into the ‘hot’ issues and topics for the construction and housing industry through evaluation of the national media and key journalists, K+R recommended that the company should produce a report about the progress being made towards one of the issues on the government’s housing agenda, sustainable development, and create a related action plan for the industry as well as the government and customer sectors
The agency advised Wates to take ownership of this key government issue, as no other construction company appeared to be taking any action
Tactics:
The Report, named, “Failing Communities: Breaking the Cycle” aimed to stimulate the construction industry into action and take on board the key recommendations for the industry concluded from the research. The copy was subbed by K+R and distributed to all journalists writing about construction and housing issues across regional and national press as well as trade press in the construction, regeneration and social housing sectors
Ahead of conducting the research, the agency undertook an extensive feasibility study of journalists writing about the issue of sustainability to determine if they would be interested in the findings.
Once the Report was ready to be published, given the small window of opportunity to reach key media before Christmas, a targeted media plan was developed to roll out the launch of the report to gather the maximum momentum and attention
It was decided that in order to raise awareness and act as a teaser to incite interest for the Report’s launch the following week, K+R would offer the story as an exclusive to the widely read property section of The Times ‘Bricks and Mortar’ for publication just prior to the official launch date. The editor at the time, Catherine Riley, covered the Report in a very positive light as part of an extensive article about sustainable development
The national exclusive was then followed by the release of the story to the rest of the national and regional press at the beginning of the following week, which in turn was followed by the release of the story to the trade press
Results:
Coverage for The Wates Report was secured across national and regional print to an audience of over five million in newspapers including The Times, Financial Times and Daily Telegraph, Yorkshire Post, Birmingham Post and Newcastle Chronicle
The Shadow Spokesman on Regeneration and Communities, MP Alistair Burt requested a copy of the Report
In addition, interviews were set up with Construction News, Contract Journal and Building’s Regenerate supplement who all covered news and/or comment about the Report and Wates’ Chief Executive gave an extended interview about the issue on the CNBC Business Channel
Coverage was also achieved in other trade publications such as Regeneration and Renewal and online media
