Wind Experts Earn Support Thanks to Successful Public Relations

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Banks Renewables enjoyed record public backing with its clear communications


 

Behind the bling PR awardsOur PR agency is recognised as one of the best in Scotland with a string of Gold and Silver PR awards. We want to take you Behind the Bling and explain what that mean for real businesses  a lot like yours. We deliver measurable results, like more sales or more website traffic. If you’ve considered PR, our Behind the Bling series will help answer your questions. 


 

Banidrran Habitat (1)MORE often than not the best public relations experts are working hard to help clients sell more stuff.

But that’s not always the case, because the nature of business success can be pretty complex –sometimes it’s not a simple case of “shift more units”.

If your business is dependent on building public support, changing attitudes or chipping away at entrenched misconceptions, you’ll appreciate the results we delivered for Banks Renewables by:

  • Measurably increasing a groundswell of positive sentiment for a project in the face of organised opposition.
  • Delivering a record numbers of supportive messages for the project
  • Persuading members of the “silent majority” to become vocal project advocates

In the arena of wind farm development, Banks Renewables has a proven record of development with care. Their business is dependent on achieving planning permission for their projects.

But even good intentions, an impressive track record and sustainable credentials won’t always count for as much as they should, particularly in the face of well-organised and vocal anti wind farm campaign groups.habitat experts join Banks Renewables staff to survey the proposed site of Bandirran Wind Farm in Perthshire

However, our planned and methodical PR campaign highlighted the long-term social, business and environmental benefits of the wind farm. And it helped prevent the voices of supporters from being drowned out by a media-savvy and organised minority of protestors.

Impressive reach and frequency
The project is still awaiting a planning decision. However from Jun 2013 to May 2014 we delivered 66 items of local media coverage, which was more than double the target coverage of 24 items.

Positive and favourable tone
What really counted was the tone of the coverage. A careful scoring system was applied and showed that 61 of those items of coverage were scored as positive, four as neutral and just one negative.

Loud and clear messages
We ensured there was a deep and wide penetration of the most important Key Message seeing them repeated to the point of widespread familiarity. In fact all five of the project key messages were mentioned extensively.

Independent voices of support
Persuading members of the “silent majority” to speak favourably about projects is a key measure of PR success for Banks Renewables. The target was to include quotes from independent third party advocates in 33% of coverage. In fact it was achieved in 42%.

Formal statements of support
As a result of our campaign 150 notes of support have been submitted to planners, which exceed the target of at least 100. In fact it is the highest ever number for a wind farm project in the Perth & Kinross council area.

Raising local awareness and support
Banks Renewables’ own research suggests our PR campaign significantly raised awareness and support of its proposals, with a neighbourhood survey showing 49% of those questioned were in favour of the wind farm, compared with 33% who opposed the plans.

Banidrran Habitat (12)Understandably Banks Renewables were blown away by the results delivered by Holyrood PR. Those same results are what secured a Gold Award in Best Community Relations Campaign at the CIPR Pride Scotland awards.

How can our public relations services benefit your business?

If you think your business could use this kind of PR support then check out the many and easy ways to CONTACT US – we’ll be delighted to answer your questions and explain how PR could work for you.

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