Howorth appoints two Practice Directors

Howorth has appointed two senior Practice Directors to manage its ongoing growth across its consumer technology and corporate practices.

Amanda Kiddle and Kathryn Torpy will now lead Howorth’s Digital Lifestyle and Business to Business (B2B) and Corporate practices respectively.

Howorth’s Managing Director, Graham White said: “These key strategic appointments ensure that Howorth has strong and experienced leadership across key areas of the business. Both roles are vital in delivering our long term growth plan, broadening our offer and ensuring continued commitment to excellence and added value for our clients.”

Kiddle joins from the UK, bringing with her a wealth of consumer lifestyle experience, having led large consumer teams and driven award-nominated brand campaigns at some of London’s top PR firms including Edelman and Weber Shandwick UK. Kiddle’s extensive brand building and reputation management experience stretches across a range of industries and includes global clients such as Samsung, Warner Bros, Reckitt Benckiser, Mars and Kraft.

Torpy has been instrumental in the growth of Howorth’s B2B and Corporate practice since its inception in 2008. Formerly a journalist in Brisbane, including The Courier Mail, her international PR experience includes business, finance and technology from in-house and consultancy positions in the UK, US and Australia. Her more recent client experience includes Microsoft Australia, CTIMySmart, LexisNexis and Bluescope Steel.

“Howorth recorded its best ever fiscal year in 2010, with headcount now at 35 people,” said White. “In addition to our broader enterprise technology business, which had another terrific year, our B2B and Corporate and Digital Lifestyle practices both enjoyed strong growth. With these two new appointments, we are excited about the year ahead.”

Howorth is part of Ogilvy PR Australia, the country’s largest and most awarded public relations agency, which has scooped more than 50 Australian and global trophies in the past two years.  In 2010, Howorth took top honours amongst all WPP-owned worldwide PR agencies, winning best PR campaign of the year.

How do you get distributors x-cited about steel?

In the face of challenging economic conditions, BlueScope Steel asked the Howorth business-to-business/corporate public relations practice to help build distributor awareness of its Australian manufactured XLERPLATE® steel plate products, converting them from passive referrers to passionate champions of the range.

Steel producers and on-sellers had an extraordinarily tough year in 2009, with sales and revenues falling as global demand for steel weakened and import competition increased. While the public relations campaign needed to communicate the core brand values of XLERPLATE® (quality, flexibility, diversity), we needed to deliver these messages to a sales-savvy audience without them being rejected as marketing ‘clutter.’

Howorth’s insight was to package up new product information within a wider marketing campaign, challenging distributors to take part in ‘Operation XFACTOR’.

We took updated sales collateral, developed e-communications and a striking X-Factor website to cover off all channels, ensuring that distributors could not help but be exposed to XLERPLATE® steel.  Once the buzz had been created around the product, a three stage online competition created strong incentives for participants to review and retain key product information, with Red Balloon vouchers rewarding those who successfully completed a ‘Quest for Quality’ around the plate’s key features and benefits.

Howorth worked with Random Studio and Alpha Salmon to deliver the PR campaign, including the development and design of marketing collateral and website. Participation rates have been strong and initial feedback has been overwhelmingly positive:

“I wish our marketing department thought of this a long time ago”
“Really clever concept…”
“Appreciate all of the new info. Thanks so much”
“Quality information”

The first phase of the PR program will continue through to May 2010 – Howorth is also in discussions with BlueScope Steel about subsequent phases of the campaign.