The challenge
Carswell Gould was commissioned to devise a plan and deliver activity for Port Solent’s through-the-line marketing communications activity. The objective for the activity was to raise awareness of Port Solent and drive footfall from targeted customer groups through effective content, creative and advertising.
The solution
Our approach was to establish the building blocks of the Port Solent brand, before rushing into any large scale promotional activity.
Port Solent brand is the emotional connection with its audience and its website the primary shop window, so these two things needed to be treated with great care to ensure that the foundations were in place, before we built upon them with targeted communications.
Once the strong foundations were in place, we used a mix of promotional channels and techniques, harnessing printed, OOH, broadcast and digital media. The chosen digital media included social media, geo-targeted mobile and programmatic advertising. We also made full use of Carswell Gould’s position as the south’s best connected agency to maximise exposure through PR with bloggers and in the regional and local media.
The results
A complete reimagining of the visual and verbal identity for Port Solent, including a new set of brand guidelines and design templates.
A new website, which has been designed and built to be device agnostic, therefore working just as well on a mobile device as on a desktop. The site also features a secure area for each of Port Solent’s tenants to access and edit the content on their own specific pages.
User sessions on the new website have immediately risen by over 24%, with over 50% accessing the website on a mobile device.
A development and delivery of the #picportsolent promotional campaign that focuses on the fun of visiting Port Solent created a buzz on social media. Resulting in a 756% increase in reach on Facebook, a 24% increase in impressions on Twitter and the creation of a brand new Instagram account.
The campaign also included striking bus mega-rears, email newsletter and a radio campaign, which are all helping to drive an increased footfall to Port Solent.
