IMPORTANT - Marketing Webinar, Frequency of Marketing Newsletters, Print Process, PR, Milestone Cards, Marketing Resources, Marketing Message in Shark/My Puddle Ducks, Canva Templates, Details for Paying CHP, Stories & Reels Tip
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Marketing Update Published by Puddle Ducks HQ
19th October 2023
Welcome to the Marketing Update
As always, we use this to communicate any national activity we want you to be aware of, any new or exciting news, reminders of important dates etc., examples of best practice and knowledge sharing.
Key Dates
Star Teacher
- 31st October: deadline for local competition ending and judging to begin.
- 15th November: deadline for announcing local winner.
- 30th November: deadline for submissions to Head Office for National winner.
- 30th November: Head Office judging to begin.
- 15th December: national winner will be announced.
Star Teacher nominations into HQ – please send these to technical@puddleducks.com
New Print Process live from 23rd October 2023 – please see below.
IMPORTANT - Marketing Webinar
We held a Marketing Webinar on Wednesday 11th October and we urge anyone who wasn't able to be there to watch it please. The focus was on the reach of social posts, the new national social strategy and where we would like everyone to focus their efforts to give all activity the best value and chance of success. The recording is in eLearning, please watch it back as we will be issuing more guides/content calendars off the back of it and if you haven’t seen it a) you might not make sense of it and b) you might be spending time working on content that we have asked local offices not to work on. The key message there is to focus your efforts on your customers, your pools and your teachers whilst always bearing in mind the poor organic reach that is now achieved on Meta platforms – sharing is key – watch the webinar to find out more.
We will be issuing the collaborative content calendar to which everyone will input once or twice a year. We also talked about sharing of ‘good stuff’ – you will have seen the fab stuff from Wakefield and Dorset on the Facebook Forum, we also shared further videos on the webinar so please do go and watch these but please, if you have something that has performed well or that you think is particularly good then please show it to HQ and then you or we can share it from there. This is just for a sense check from a brand perspective, so we don’t find out a piece that wasn’t on brand has made it half way around the network before we see it.
We welcome any questions about the content in the webinar, please do get in touch.
Here is a link to the eLearning module: Puddle Ducks eLearning
Frequency of Marketing Newsletters
I’m aware these have been sporadic. Weekly seems to be too much for us as well as you, so we are going to move to monthly and it will always be on the 19th, unless it’s a weekend in which case it will be the following Monday.
New Print Process
We’re pleased to announce this is finally going live on Monday. Rather than repeat the document here, you can read the new process in this guide and if you have any questions, please email ruth.nelson@puddleducks.com
PR
Charity PJ Week will obviously be the PR topic for you all this month but don’t forget about it ongoing. Here is a great example of a story which is basically promoting a new pool but spun as providing much needed spaces for more children. Get in touch with Calvin if you think you have anything!
Milestone Cards
The teacher versions of these are going to print this week! Some of the designs are new and we hope they will be able to be used more frequently going forward. We have ordered enough sets based on total number of BPS and SA teachers in the network; those who teach both programmes will get both sets. Please can you comment on the pinned post in the Marketing Forum with how many BPS and how many SA sets you need and we will send them out from HQ.
We have some lovely new designs and we will work with Technical to integrate these into the lesson plans but they are self explanatory in terms of when they can/should be used/promoted by the teacher - one that you might want to consider factoring into your weekly plans is a 'Swimming Star of the Week' - kind of like player of the match! You could choose to pick one for every lesson or just one swimmer a week or any combination of that but it makes for a nice incentive for swimmers to be chosen and may help promote good behaviour in lessons!
Marketing Resources
We have linked to more resources in the Marketing Resources page on the website to make it more of a one stop shop for your essentials. You will now find the following:
www.puddleducks.com/marketing-resources
- Canva Template Index
- Canva Guidelines
- Link to print resources folder in Canva
- Franchise Landing Page Infographic that lists all the Umbraco 8 module types
- Link to webinar on Umbraco 8
- TRUSTist guidelines
- Brand Guidelines
- Latest Marketing Newsletters
Please always refer to these quick links as if you download them and we update them, you will have an out of date copy – the latest version will always be on this page.
Campaign Monitor Guidelines will be coming soon. If there is anything else you think it would be handy to add as a quick link to on this page, just email marketing@puddleducks.com
Marketing Message in Shark – check and update
You may not be aware but the location of the Marketing Message in Shark has moved from the Franchise screen to a button located in Administration/Messages/Marketing Message – this happened in SP12 but we think has been missed by most franchises as it was in with ASIA. It was moved to make it more accessible to the right team members but unfortunately, with the move, it wiped the existing messages and as of now, only 4 franchises have re-entered a message to appear in their customers’ online accounts. The images show you where it is and remind you what it looks like to the end user.
We recommend you have something like Recommend-A-Friend as a holding message and you can swap it out for things like PJ Week or Star Teacher or other timely messages as and when you need. Max. 250 characters and you can add a link.
Canva – please don’t overwrite templates
We got a call this week from a franchise worried that they had accidentally taken a template out of the template folder and saved it in their own folder – when we went to investigate, the template was in the right place but it had been overwritten, by a different franchise! Please, please make the first thing you do to copy the template before you start working on it – Canva has autosave and it takes seconds so before you know it, you start work on it and you’ve saved over the template.
Stories and Reels
Just a tip – we have seen a couple of Stories and Reels this week using brand graphics that have for some reason squashed or stretched when they have been uploaded to Meta. Preview and check stories and reels to make sure they aren’t being skewed and if they are, we aren’t sure of the reason, so our advice is to delete and re-upload.
How to get donations to Children's Hospital Pyjamas
Pyjamas - please can any pyjama donations be given to your local co-ordinator. Their details can be found here. I know some of you already have relationships with them. If there is no-one near you, please let me know and I will speak to their Head Office about what to do.
If you have collected cash, it can be paid directly into CHPs bank account:
Sort code: 60-83-01
Account No: 20419309
Please make sure you reference the donation with your franchise name so CHP know where to allocate your funds ensuring they will go towards venues in your area.
If you had a Just Giving page, you will have either linked it to CHP or it will be stand alone so follow whatever procedure Just Giving has for transferring funds.
With regards to Gift Aid, on the Just Giving Page if the gift aid option is ticked by individuals CHP will automatically get the funds.
Anyone that is on a sponsorship form giving a donation, will need to sign a declaration form stating CHP can claim the gift aid on their behalf. Please let us know if you require these.
If you have any donations not covered by the above, please let me know the specifics and I can talk to CHP.
