Brief

Santander sought a refresh of their signature Trade Barometer thought leadership, which has been running for over 8 years, aiming to build their brand and highlight Santander’s expertise in international trade. Santander aims to use this to promote their capabilities to customers and help them in their international trade journeys.

Strategy & Execution

H/Advisors Cicero created an insight engine using proprietary survey findings and secondary data to create unique insights on the challenges and opportunities facing businesses.

We conducted a nationally representative survey of 1,000 UK, 400 US, 400 Spanish and 200 Polish businesses with quotas ensuring a minimum number of respondents who were sales and procurement decision makers in businesses with a minimum turnover of £1 million. We also undertook qualitative in-depth interviews with business decision-makers in the UK.

From the research we created a flagship report, national and regional press releases, key messaging documents, animated videos, infographics, and visuals for social media. These deliverables were also distributed to key media outlets to help promote the report’s insights.

We understand the growing needs of businesses and the importance of international trade. Whether a business is starting out on its global journey, or building on its experiences in overseas markets, we’re able to offer support and connections that will help them take the next steps. The Santander Trade Barometer has become an informed voice on international trade and provides a valuable insight into current and predicted activity across the UK.

John Baldwin, CEO at Santander Corporate and Commercial Banking

Result

The flagship report was launched and hosted on the Santander Trade Barometer microsite. Subsequent hero content was used on Santander social media channels. Additional content was used on Santander social media channels. We worked hand in hand with the in-house team at Santander to secure sell-in and coverage across of print, online and broadcast media including BBC Wake up to Money, The Times, The Mirror, The Independent. We also secured regional press coverage by harnessing local Insights from the research.

Brief

CoinShares Group is a pioneer in digital asset investing, which launched the world’s first regulated bitcoin investment fund in 2014 and in 2015 offered the world’s first Bitcoin based securities on a regulated exchange. Today, CoinShares offer exchange-traded products (ETPs); comprehensive services in capital markets; index strategies; active management strategies and advisory services.

Strategy & Execution

H/Advisors Cicero was tasked with mapping the existing regulatory landscape for crypto assets, including in the form of exchange-traded products in 7 EU Member States. The aim was to ascertain regulator positioning on potential UCITS eligibility of CoinShares’ crypto-ETP products, and to influence future policy through building relationships with key regulators/policymakers. 

Result

H/Advisors Cicero secured meetings with all targeted national regulatory authorities, as well as ESMA, allowing CoinShares to gain a deep understanding of the regulatory outlook for crypto-assets and CoinShares’ crypto offerings. This not only helped CoinShares to evolve their own business strategies, but to give informed advice to investors. 

Brief

H/Advisors Cicero was appointed to support Klarna’s public affairs activity in the UK to build a cross-party network of support ahead of the introduction of Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) regulation.

Alongside this policy focus, Cicero was tasked with promoting Klarna’s wider financial services products to policymakers including Open Banking, AI, and price comparison. From the outset, the ambition was to be creative and bold in our public affairs activity and work with the business to develop new tools or campaigns at speed to deliver tangible results.

Strategy & Execution

Cicero supported Klarna with consultation responses on BNPL regulation to ensure their views were clearly articulated to policymakers. We also engaged with key stakeholders including the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, the Shadow Economic Secretary to the Treasury’s team and MPs across all parties. To deliver creative and impactful campaigns, Cicero generated innovative methods to engage with parliamentary stakeholders. Monthly creative sessions were held to generate ideas which would then be taken forward as mini-projects. These ranged from adopting AI tools in public affairs activity, MP newsletters based on product purchases, and promoting an opt-out tool with a Government Minister

Result

Klarna’s views on BNPL regulation were well represented across Westminster to ensure future regulatory change was fair and proportionate. Klarna has also demonstrated to political stakeholders that BNPL is only one element of its business and that it is also a leader in Open Banking, AI and product development.

Cicero is in the process of rolling out AI-led public affairs tools with Klarna to continue to provide innovative ways to deliver public affairs activity.

Brief

H/Advisors Cicero has provided public affairs support for Barclays since 2012, spanning its retail, investment, and corporate banking business. Through the course of our relationship, we have provided strategic advice, monitoring support, engagement campaigns, crisis support and arms-and-legs support for many of Barclays’ public policy priorities.

This has included major changes both to the policymaking environment and Barclays’ business during this period such as:

• The UK’s exit from the EU and the associated reforms to the UK’s financial regulatory landscape.
• Major reviews into Wholesale Markets, the Future Regulatory Framework, the implementation of Basel 3.1, Fintech and Ringfencing among others.
• Closure of bank branches as the industry moves towards online and other forms of banking, a key focus for MPs.

Strategy & Execution

Our objective has been to cover numerous fast-moving and complex policy areas. We have ensured that Barclays is at the forefront of the conversation and able to advocate for its interests, both proactively and in response to relevant policy developments, including:

• Tracking (both backward- and forward-looking) of legislative and regulatory activity providing regular updates on the status of Parliamentary Bills, statutory instruments, discussion papers and consultations. For priority legislation, tracking of amendments during the passage of Bills.
• We also track the broader political sentiment on the Bank through a weekly database of social media comments from political stakeholders.
• Support on the design of events, such as Barclays’ activity at the political party conferences.
• Ongoing support in mapping stakeholder targets across Westminster, Whitehall and other relevant bodies as well as engagement support where relevant.
• Ad-hoc advice on business-critical political developments.

Result

Our guidance and counsel during the last decade has included supporting Barclays through major policy upheaval, including:

• The UK’s exit from the EU and the associated reforms to the UK’s financial regulatory landscape
• Major reviews into Wholesale Markets, the Future Regulatory Framework, the implementation of Basel 3.1, Fintech and Ringfencing among others
• Closure of bank branches as the industry moves towards online and other forms of banking, a key focus for MPs

Most recently, we have been helping Barclays understand and respond to the landmark Financial Services and Markets Bill. Barclays’ Government Relations team provided the following testimonial for our work:

Cicero’s ongoing support relating to the FSMB has been invaluable. They have provided critical insight into what to expect from the Bill, and helped structure our understanding of this wide-reaching legislation which touches on all areas of Barclays business

Barclays Government Relations Team

If you wish to discuss any of the issues mentioned in this article, please contact Sonia in H/Advisors Cicero’s UK Public Affairs team on sonia.khan@h-advisors.global

Brief

H/Advisors Cicero has been supporting Europe’s leading refurbished technology provider, Swappie with their corporate communications in Ireland since 2021. Swappie tasked H/Advisors Cicero with increasing their brand awareness in the market and positioning them as a leader in the circular economy space. Our brief also includes increasing awareness around the concept and benefits to the environment of refurbished technology in general and supporting Swappie’s Country Manager in Ireland to build profile in the media.

Strategy & Execution

Our corporate communications strategy involved a full media audit, the creation of a bespoke target media list for Swappie, introductory meetings with journalists in the business, technology, environment and consumer space, quarterly targeted press releases covering both global announcements and Irish-specific activity like consumer trends.

H/Advisors Cicero also supported Swappie with the opening of its first pop-up store in Dublin and the global release of its first sustainability report. We also media trained Swappie’s leadership team in Dublin across multiple sessions with award-winning former journalist Susan Keogh, sharing her experience across planning and preparations, “live” environment scenarios, feedback and checklists. This training has added to Swappie’s communications toolkit, and H/Advisors Cicero is currently developing a broadcast strategy to maximise this new capability.

Swappie’s awareness in Ireland was low, so achieving cut-through with a consistent and engagement message was a priority. The team at H/Advisors Cicero have thoroughly enjoyed collaborating with Swappie to define its story in the Irish market, and run some creative campaigns that have provided ‘above brand’ benefits

Susan Keogh, Director, H/Advisors Cicero

Result

Our support for Swappie has resulted in a huge increase in both awareness and interest around Swappie with searches for Swappie refurbished iPhones increasing exponentially since 2021. We have supported Swappie’s senior leadership team in developing contacts with key business and technology journalists. We have also secured extensive media coverage for all Swappie announcements and Swappie’s Country Manager has appeared on a number of Tier 1 media outlets including RTE and Newstalk.

Brief

H/Advisors Cicero was appointed alongside North America network partners H/Advisors Abernathy to support long-term media and public affairs engagement for the Oversight Board, the independent content moderation body for Facebook. The Oversight Board’s objective was to display its independence from Facebook and show that it was delivering meaningful change to the company’s content moderation policies, positioning the board as the leading expert on the regulation and self-regulation of social media platforms.

Strategy & Execution

H/Advisors Cicero undertook an extensive reputational audit, using our in-house research team’s polling and interviewing capability amongst the general public, relevant policymakers and wider stakeholders. This resulted in an extensive messaging platform, including reactive answers to hostile and difficult questions.

A calendar of key decision moments was developed to support stakeholder and messaging grids for specific campaigns, and an extensive media and policymaker engagement programme was launched, with several private meetings arranged between the board and journalists (particularly those unconvinced of the Oversight Board’s relevance and independence).

Public-facing ‘two-pager’ narratives were designed and sent to journalists and stakeholders as an introduction, and we executed a continuous programme of media engagement, targeting titles likely to be read by influential MPs, such as The Guardian and the Financial Times.

Media engagement was supported by direct policy engagement in Westminster and Brussels: Strategic advice and policy communications support on the interplay between the Board’s work and upcoming EU policy reforms (i.e. EU Digital Services Act) supported reputation building between the Board and EU Presidents, Commissioners, EU politicians and senior advisers. Support also included speech writing and policy paper drafting.  

After a year of working with them [The Oversight Board] we have secured hundreds of pieces of positive press coverage – especially in February 2022 when we were able to place a positive piece of news with the BBC, Reuters, The Guardian and numerous tech news sites. We now see a hunger to engage with the Board from across the news spectrum – a recent outreach to journalists in April 2022 saw near 100% engagement, and a desire to meet with the OB among journalists who’ve hitherto been more sceptical.

Chris Wimpress, Director of Political Communications, H/Advisors Cicero

Result

The Oversight Board is well-positioned, prepared, and has the requisite media profile to contribute vital thought leadership in anticipation of regulatory measures such as the Digital Services Act and the Code of Conduct on Disinformation in the EU as well as the Online Harms Bill in the UK.