National daily freesheet Metro has appointed Diffusion PR to drive forward a new social media strategy. Diffusion has been given the responsibility of building awareness of Metro’s online offering to the 3.5 million consumers who read the paper daily in 33 cities across the UK. Read More

Insurance brokers can no longer afford to shun social media; it’s too effective at bringing in new business. But you must set a few rules first – and, most important, think about what you’re going to say. Diffusion director Ivan Ristic comments. Read More

LONDON, 13 May 2010: Thomson Local, the UK local search company, has appointed Diffusion to develop and implement integrated digital campaigns to increase consumer awareness and traffic to ThomsonLocal.com.  Operating for over 25 years and with a database of 1.8 million businesses, Thomson has evolved to become the leading local search company in the UK.

The first campaign, Britain’s Punniest is a competition to find the UK company with the wittiest name.  From ‘Spex in the City’ to ‘Thai-tanic’, members of the public will be able to upload photos of the small business names which make them laugh out loud to a special microsite, where they will also be able to vote for Britain’s Punniest.  Consumers who make submissions and vote will get the chance to win a holiday to Las Vegas with the overall winning business set to receive over £5,000 in marketing support .

Diffusion will be driving entries and traffic to the site via an integrated tradition media and social media campaign targeting national press, SME media, blogs, forums as well as social networking sites including Facebook and Twitter.

Mark Cox, Corporate Communications Manager, Thomson Local commented: “We have seen a fantastic registration rate since we gave consumers the ability to rate and review businesses on Thomsonlocal.com last year.  As the site continues to evolve and new features are introduced we are constantly looking at new ways to engage users. We wanted to work with an agency that really understands how to integrate social and traditional media, whilst not forgetting how important ‘local’ is to our brand”.

Ivan Ristic, Director, Diffusion added:  “ThomsonLocal.com offers a really fantastic service to its users that goes far beyond basic search and directory services. Its target user base has a fragmented media diet across traditional and social media that is particularly suited to an integrated approach and we’re looking forward to implementing an effective campaign and enjoying a successful partnership with Thomson Local.”

The issue of how to measure the value of PR activity is contentious at the best of times, with the debate around AVE raging as fervently today as it did ten or 20 years ago. But a new subject for debate has reared its head, with the rise of social media. Suddenly, the question of measurement becomes far more complicated. Diffusion’s Ivan Ristic is featured as one of two industry experts. Read More

Findings from a landmark PRWeek/Diffusion survey of 128 clients, drawn from across in-house comms, marketing and digital departments, reveal exactly how organisations are grappling with the challenge of integrating social media into their existing operations. The Digital Integration Report should be required reading for anyone involved in comms. There has been much conjecture about what clients want from digital, but quantitative data is still difficult to come by. Read More

The Conservatives have proved to be the most adept of the major political parties at harnessing Facebook, with more than twice the number of “connections” – friends, fans or members of a party or political candidates’ profile – than rivals Labour or the Liberal Democrats, according to the Diffusion Facebook and Politics Report. Read More

The Tories are enjoying a big advantage over both Labour and the Lib Dems across key measures on the social networking site – including presence, popularity and engagement, according to the Diffusion Facebook and Politics Report. Read More

Diffusion’s Facebook and Politics Report shows that the Conservative Party has taken a significant lead in the political march on social networking site Facebook during the approach to the election. Read More

Diffusion has been appointed by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to launch a major online campaign to encourage restaurant-goers to ask the question: who gets the tip? Diffusion will be targeting national and regional food, lifestyle and entertainment blogs. Read More

Diffusion PR has been called in by Get Connected, an advice helpline for young people, to refresh Get Connected’s social media and search engine strategy. Diffusion’s task will be to implement thought-leadership campaigns on how technology can help young people’s emotional wellbeing. It will aim to increase fundraising from online channels and use social media to reach young people directly, promoting the charity’s online and mobile phone support services. Read More