For the fourth year running we have made it onto Campaign’s Best Places to Work golden list and despite growing our numbers by 41% in the past year, we have beaten our 2021 placing and have ranked as 31 in the industry and lucky 13th ‘small’ media company!
We asked our MD and a recent Harbour Collective intern to share their views on why MI is indeed, a great place to work….
Richard Slater, MD
It’s great to see that we’re featuring again in Campaign’s Best Places to Work awards. We have strived over the last year to maintain a positive working culture despite all the challenges that have been thrown our way. We will always put a high value on investing in our people to ensure that they feel part of an inclusive, positive, and motivating workplace. We genuinely care about keeping this at our core as we grow, so work never stops on this front; we have just introduced new initiatives around mental health and are about to move to a new office. Hopefully, our continued focus on keeping MI as place where people really enjoy coming to work, will keep us in this list for years to come!
Saul Wickremasinghe, Harbour Collective Intern
On day one, I arrived unsure of what to expect. My newly acquired Humanities degree did not appear overly related to the data-driven media solutions MI is so successful at delivering! However, quickly my reservations were dispelled. It was made clear that a role within the Planning team would suit my skills and interests. My capacity to work creatively and think laterally was encouraged from the outset, and upon arrival, the whole team was extremely welcoming.
I spent most of my internship working under Andy Brander, the Planning Director. Andy was always keen to educate me in the world of media planning and advertising more generally. I learned a lot in a short time.
My placement culminated in the ‘MI Media Planning Course‘. Two teams were given a live client brief and then asked to create a media plan from scratch. Given I had only been at the company a few months, this was a daunting challenge. However, senior management (and my team’s mentor Simon) were generous with their time and eager to provide advice and teaching throughout.
I leave MI Media, having learnt and laughed a lot!
We received a bronze WARC award in the Effective Channel Integration category and were one of only three UK campaigns to be recognised in this global award programme. Full details can be read on the WARC website.
The campaign was a huge success with the fundraising target exceeded by 55%. When looking back at their success, the team believe the following factors were critical to success:
Our strategy for growth was twofold. Firstly, a continued focus on the “business as usual” donor audience complemented by the deployment of an “agreed emergency framework” which outlined our emergency activation approach to maximise on response as soon as an emergency was announced.
We have given MSF the confidence that through increased investment it can continue to grow whilst maintaining efficiencies. The level of growth over the last 10 years has been transformative for MSF UK and through capturing all important learnings along the way we believe has scope to be continued well into the future.
Read about our incredible work with MSF in full on our case study page here.
Big thanks to both the MSF client team and Crafted for a spectacular team effort in winning this WARC award.
Global temperatures are rising, unequivocally driven by human activity, and as a result, extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and closer to home. Fortunately, not all hope is lost. If humans can cut global emissions of greenhouse gases and reach net zero before it’s too late, the world could halt the continued rise in temperature. And now, with the UK due to host the UN climate change conference (COP26), the carbon crisis has finally risen towards the top of the UK’s political and business agendas.
The government has pledged to cut emissions by 78% (vs 1990 levels) by 2035, with a goal of Net Zero by 2050. Net Zero Emissions means achieving a balance between the carbon emitted into the atmosphere and the carbon removed and is a crucial target if we are to stabilize global temperatures.
The UK advertising industry has also now begun to respond to the climate emergency and the need to achieve net zero emissions by setting up Ad Net Zero (A.N.Z.). Set up at the end of 2020 and led by the Advertising Association, A.N.Z. is a not-for-profit initiative with the aim of developing a roadmap for the advertising industry to become carbon neutral by 2030.
Ad Net Zero has identified five areas of focus to help the advertising industry recognise and reduce our own carbon contributions and begin to help influence our clients and their consumers to do the same.
MI Media is proud to have signed up to Ad Net Zero, alongside partner agencies within the Harbour Collective, so we too can play a small part in trying to tackle the world’s climate emergency. By evaluating the emissions produced as a result of our operations and putting greater emphasis on the carbon impact of the advertising activities we plan, we are better able to offset and ultimately reduce our carbon footprint and are committed to the aim of becoming a net zero company by 2030.
PGMBM are a global leader in group litigations. Their current campaign, My Diesel Claim, aims to provide compensation to the millions of drivers who were subjected to the ‘Dieselgate’ scandal. Having already signed up a quarter of a million customers in under two months since the campaign went live, our data-led approach is already having a considerable impact. MI’s sophisticated measurement infrastructure has allowed incredibly quick and reactive optimisation – key to success so far.
Partnering with PGMBM on multi-channel tests across TV, Radio and Outdoor, our sophisticated reporting infrastructure has allowed us to reactively optimise media in just a very short time frame. The results so far have been astonishing and we’re thrilled to be joining PGMBM on their continued growth journey in the coming months.
Richard Slater, Managing Director at MI Media
“We’re really happy to have started with PGMBM, they are at the forefront of addressing the ‘Dieselgate’ scandal and are committed to holding corporations accountable for the damage they have caused and representing the drivers affected. We’ve been impressed with their dynamic and data driven approach which will put them well ahead of their competition.”
We are determined to build strong foundations with our client and strive to support PGMBM’s dedication to enabling global justice through group litigation. You can read more about our work with PGMBM on our case study.
We are really pleased to announce our Currensea win, having secured the planning and buying for Currensea the UK’s first Direct Debit Travel Card (as quoted in Campaign). Currensea acts as a layer in front of a bank’s current account. This gives customers access to market leading exchange rates and means that they only pay when they spend abroad. In a volatile travel market, Currensea is changing the game and looking to drive rapid growth through giving customers ultimate flexibility, value and security for all their travel money needs.
Richard Slater, Managing Director at MI Media
“We’re delighted to be working with Currensea, our experience across the travel and finance verticals mean we’re a great fit. We’re confident we can help them achieve their growth targets this year, they have a great team in place and a unique product which offers excellent benefits to those returning to travel and holidays.”
Paul Foster, Marketing Director at Currensea
“Currensea is changing the game in the Travel Money market. We have ambitious targets as we all look to get back on holiday in 2021, and we look forward to driving that growth across all media in partnership with the team at MI Media.”
As the UK population craves trips abroad and welcomes the continued easing of Covid-related travel restrictions, Currensea launch on TV today (1st July) across Sky to deliver value, speed and security for all their customers’ currency needs when they can travel.
MI Media was set up to do things differently, and ultimately, to do the right thing. In a higgledy piggledy year (to put it mildly) MI has placed a lot of value on ensuring a happy, motivated and rewarded workforce. Health and wellbeing has been a priority and everyone now has access to the Employee Assistance Programme and a Mental Health First Aider. More informally, chins have been kept up with Morning Tea Round zoom catch ups, fancy dress zoom socials and a peloton of 6 cycled from London to Brighton to release some endorphins (when restrictions allowed). We’re extremely proud to have be named as one of Campaign’s Best Places to Work for 2021.
‘Care packages’ of coffee (when Sainsburys ran out!) or wine/chocolate and kids magazines (for mums and dads faced with home schooling ad nauseum) have been gratefully received by the team.
At a time when joining a new company could be totally pants, all MI newbies have received an ethical welcome hamper (full of foodie treats and drinks) and have been assigned a friendly buddy to help them remotely integrate into the wider team. Our legendary Christmas party (sadly not abroad this year but on Zoom) was a virtual triumph with an eclectically creative range of events including drink and draw, laughing yoga and carol singing combined with takeaway treats and boozy doorstep deliveries.
It’s great to be recognised for such an award and congratulations to all the other companies who have also been doing the right thing over the past year.
Yopa is a full-service estate agency providing all the services of a traditional agency for a fair fixed fee. It is is already a top 10 UK estate agency brand with more than 130 members of staff and 150+ local estate agents. Yopa has also appointed a new creative partner, Happy Hour.
Pip Heywood, Chief Marketing Officer at Yopa comments,
“From the start of the pitch process, I was really impressed with both companies. The teams, their data-led approaches and clear understanding of what customers want and need set them apart. They have already developed industry-leading solutions to our brief and, as a company that grew over 75% in revenue terms last year, I’m confident their combined support will catapult us even further ahead.
MI’s founder, Clive Howse comments,
“Yopa is a very switched on company looking to use data to maximise the return from every marketing pound they spend. They are a perfect client for M.i. Media and we are really looking forward to working with the team to accelerate their growth in the market.”
The MI team is working with Yopa to form a comprehensive media strategy centred on data to deliver immediate growth, but also lay the foundations for gathering actionable insights by media, creative, regionality and audience. 2021 looks set to be another big year of growth for Yopa.
