”Midnight have many strings to their bow, not only as a first class PR agency, but as a team that brings energy, creativity and strategic thinking to all aspects of marketing. Without exception, everyone at Midnight is a delight to work with. They are friendly, responsive and deliver great results, always with a smile on their faces.
Matt WardExecutive Director, Marketing - Howden
The challenge
How Midnight supported the marketing team at Howden by delivering thought leadership content across its priority business lines.
Leading UK insurance broker Howden had been going through a period of expansion through acquisition. In looking to support its growing marketing teams with the right marketing assets and content, the company looked to Midnight to help meet its marketing teams’ needs and support the growth of the business in each of its key business lines.
How Midnight met the challenge
When it comes to content, we know we can call on our team’s powers of investigation and copywriting skills to deliver high-quality, high-value marketing assets the client can rely on to build showcase expertise, inspire, trust and deliver value. To meet its marketing teams’ needs, we developed a system for Howden’s various teams to draw down our copywriting resource whenever it was needed. A brief would come from whichever team needed copywriting support, with our activity either producing content based on the information given in the brief, more in-depth desk research or conducting expert interviews from which to incorporate insight and comment.
As the relationship developed, teams would trust us to offer advice on the best way to deliver content in line with the wider marketing or business objectives. Our aim was to add value beyond pure content support.
And working across so many business units, we had the opportunity to develop stories and build narratives that would attract the attention of Howden’s clients and deliver its key messages in an engaging way, drawing upon our expertise in placing topical content in the media.
Producing high quality content that delivers value
Over the years working with Howden and its marketing team, Midnight has delivered copy and content across a huge range of topic areas, from asset management to health and wellness. Content ranged from topical issues aligned with existing media narratives to thought leadership assets, authoring content focused on future issues and challenges concerning the audiences in each of Howden’s key client service areas.
Our team has worked across so many different business areas and produced every type of content for the client, including website blogs, articles, brochures and white papers. Much of the content is intended for direct client communication, including in-depth articles for client magazines.
One high profile project for Howden was supporting the development of a Football Injury Index, which used open source data around player’s injuries against player salaries. Our team produced a huge, highly-credible report that was used in the client’s own- outreach and PR campaigns to reach football clubs across all the five main football leagues in Europe.
Being flexible to the client’s needs to make their job easier
Over the period of working together, it’s fair to say our team became an integral part of Howden’s wider marketing teams. The support we delivered to Howden’s marketing team is a contributing factor in helping the business maintain its position as a thought leader in each of its client service areas and build a reputation for understanding its clients’ needs.
As the business has grown and acquired other businesses, it’s natural that the need for more content expands with the business. During this period, our remit has grown, delivering our service into marketing teams as they integrate within the business. Acting as a true partner, we work with the teams to ensure they maximise the benefit from our relationship. We love making it work better, investing our time to meet with and work with the marketing team to understand their ever-changing requirements and develop new systems and processes to accommodate what they need.
