Cicero & Bernay Public Relations

Our Services - at a glance

• » Strategic Planning
• » Settings / Aims / Objectives
• » Media liaison
• » Media training
• » Press conferences
• » Media monitoring
• » Newsletters
• » Photography
• » Videography

• » Database development
• » Direct Mail
• » Trade fairs / exhibitions
• » Events
• » Seminars
• » Community liaison
• » CSR
• » Crisis management
• » Research
• » Read more about our services

Strategic Planning

What we do to make sure your public relations programmes are well targeted and will achieve your outcomes. It means doing our homework and coming up with a plan that will include critical paths, clear objectives, means of measurement and reporting back, and the actual tactics that will be used in your public relations programme.

Aims / Objectives / Settings

The alignment of proposed public relations activities with your vision, mission and long term strategic plan. This is critical if we are to ensure you get a return on your investment. It needs to be done right at the start, so that both you and we know exactly what we are doing and why.

Media Liaison

Important to ensure that the media knows who you are and where you are coming from. Good media liaison can help you get more and better media coverage by building relationships with the journalists important to you. Our role is to introduce you to the media and help you manage your relationships with them.

Media Training

Used to give clients the knowledge and confidence they need to deal with all media but especially in radio and television interviews. Doing a media interview is different from the type of public speaking you do at conferences and seminars, for example. Media training can help both you and the media get the best from any interview, by helping you look professional and giving the media “sound bites” they can use.

Press Conferences

Gathering the media together in one place for an important announcement. Should be used infrequently and only for big news stories. There are up to 10 press conferences a day in Dubai, so having a press conference for anything other than a big story can be an expensive waste of time. With so much "competition" we can encourage attendance at your press conference by ensuring what you are announcing is "real news" while, at the same time, designing something quite different that will interest the media.

Media Monitoring

Keeping up with what the media of all types and other people are saying about you, and also your competitors. Media monitoring also provides a way for us to identify opportunities to talk about you and your products/services.

Newsletters

Are a good means of keeping people up to date with what you are doing. A regular newsletter can help build better relationships by giving people a greater understanding of your values and can be also used for sales promotion by including discount coupons and other special offers. Normally a “chore” for most companies, our “turn key” newsletter service makes it easy for you.

Photography

A picture is worth more than a thousand words. The right sort of picture can get you on the front pages of all the newspapers while good video footage can do the same on television. While this opportunity doesn’t arise every day, making your pictures interesting will increase the chances that your press release will be used and given a better place on the page. We know which photographers can get that “one in a million” shot, but also provide high quality, very usable pictures every time.

Videography

In recent years videography has increasingly become an effective tool in public relations, to communicate company values, messages, core work, business and CSR activities as well as introducing key personnel.

Cicero & Bernay offers you the following video services:

• Script Development • Filming • Editing • Output of the video into tapes and DVDs

We can use videos in many ways to support and achieve your business objectives... Read more about our videography service

Database Development

Modern public relations aims to talk directly with the people important to you, rather than filtering your messages through the news media, who often put their own slant on your news. In order to be able to do this, we need to know who the people are that you want to talk to, and how we can directly reach them - by mail, phone, SMS, email and personal deliveries. A good database will have all the information we need to make sure that you send the right information to the right people – i.e. targeting women aged 40-plus in high income households for luxury spa treatments.

Website Design / SEO

This is one of the major areas where we can have an important influence. We know Google and Yahoo use keywords to find your site, but it is no longer enough to just have your keywords in the title and “meta tags” of your website – they must also be in words in your page content. We are specialists in Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) techniques that make your site easier for Google and Yahoo to find.

If you want a new website, or your current one upgraded – talk to us first, and we will design you one which you can be proud of. Read more about our web design service...

Direct Mail

Often called database or direct response marketing elsewhere, because the information is now sent out in many ways other than mail. We are well placed to take full advantage of the opportunities with two very experienced direct mail experts on our team, using delivery methods like courier services or personalised mail to PO boxes, SMS or email.

Trade fairs & Exhibitions

Dubai has a trade show almost every day and you can spend a lot of money on the trade fair circuit for little real return. We can tell you which trade fairs will attract the people you need to talk to, and encourage them to attend. More importantly, we can use our award-winning experience to get potential customers to step onto your stand and engage with your representatives. We can also get the media interested in your major product or service announcement and extend the reach of your news much wider than the trade fair audiences on their own.

Events

While trade fairs/exhibitions can be excellent for reaching trade-related audiences, events offer a means to engage directly with a wider range of people in an often pleasurable way. We can organise events of your own for your customers and other important people, or work with you to get maximum advantage out of supporting another event. And the type of event is only limited by our creativity, which means almost anything is possible.

Seminars

Roundtables, seminars and speaking engagements - All of these have the same intended outcome – to position you as the experts in your field – and to make sure everybody knows about it. We can set up roundtables on your behalf, identify appropriate seminars/conferences and get you on the keynote speaker list, and look for opportunities where you can interact with other professionals that you want to impress. As well as create the opportunities, we can produce the presentation materials you require and train you in how to use them properly.

Community Liaison

Many projects can have big impacts on “ordinary” people as well as customers, suppliers and other groups. Engaging with the community is a necessary step, especially when you need the approvals of officials to carry out your project. They are less likely to be helpful if it is obvious that there is going to be a public “backlash” simply because the people don’t understand what you are trying to do. Community liaison doesn’t mean “giving in” to public pressure, but often a good community liaison programme can identify compromise solutions that actually benefit both sides.

CSR

Corporate and social responsibility programmes (or CSR for short) can be one of the most powerful public relations weapons in your arsenal. Don’t think of them as charity – CSR is all about the legacy you want to leave your children and grand children when you are gone. What you and your company are doing can have a major impact on the environment and society in general. By showing that you genuinely care about these things, you can win lifelong friends – and customers. While many CSR activities are not expensive, they do need to relate to what you do, and what your customers believe in.

Crisis Management

If you haven’t had a crisis yet, then now is definitely the time to start preparing for one. Statistics show that every company will experience a crisis at some stage. Being prepared may be all that keeps you in business, depending on the severity of the crisis. We can help you prepare a crisis management plan that will give you a written step-by-step process in which everyone in your organisation knows what to do and say, when that crisis occurs.

Research

Used to identify what people and customers think about you and your products/services. Doing research can make sure your public relations programme is reaching the right people and giving them the right messages. Repeating the research after the programme can measure whether you have succeeded. We have solid in-house experience in developing research programmes and questionnaires whether online, through focus groups or by telephone to get meaningful results that you can use to improve your product or service if required.