Company: Durrants, London, UK
Company Description: Established over 125 years ago, Durrants is the UK's leading media planning, monitoring and evaluation agency providing services to a wide range of communication clients from FTSE 100 companies to government departments and PR agencies to charities.
Nomination Category: Products & Product Management Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Best New Product or Service - Media & Entertainment

Nomination Title: Helping Communications Teams Succeed in the All Media World

   1. Tell the story about this nominated product or service (up to 500 words). Describe its functions, features, benefits, and sales results to date. You may include here hyperlinks to product photographs and data sheets. IMPORTANT: Begin each link with http://, and enclose each link in square brackets; for example, [http://www.youraddress.com]:

          In a world of expanding media, communications teams are constantly being
          challenged to ensure that the right message is getting to the right people.
          Whether they are trying to set the agenda or simply reacting to it, our clients
          needed a service that would help them manage their messages effectively.

          We worked to create a unique solution that would help our clients do this. In
          2006, we launched the Durrants PR platform, seamlessly integrating media
          planning, monitoring and evaluation. A web based service; it allows the client
          to plan and execute campaigns faster and more effectively and then track and
          measure campaign success.

          With a database of over 30,000 UK journalist profiles, the Plan module allows a
          communications professional to research exactly who to send information to and
          then distribute it online. The team can then log any follow up in individual
          journalist's records for the whole team to see. Finally, the service allows the
          Communications Director to see all press office activity, across campaigns,
          helping to ensure that everyone is 'on-message'.

          Durrants Monitor then provides the Communications team with the results of
          their campaign: their coverage. We monitor over 10,000 sources in the UK and
          from over 100 countries worldwide (the most comprehensive service in the UK),
          so they can be sure that we won't miss any of their mentions. Precision
          coverage is delivered to their desktop from 6:00am so that they are always
          informed. It can then be distributed, with a few clicks to the relevant people
          throughout the organisation.

          Finally, Durrants Evaluate provides the correlation between the team's
          activities and the media coverage achieved. Reports such as volume of coverage,
          favourability of coverage and share of voice provide instant analysis of the
          campaign's success.

          Whilst many companies provide component parts of this service, we are the first
          to provide all three services in an integrated way. The benefits of this are
          huge:
          ? One system and one point of contact give control, simplicity and
          efficiency in what can be a complex process.
          ? The web based service means that busy communication professionals can
          manage their entire campaigns, wherever they are.
          ? They can justify their communication strategy and prove their worth to
          the Board instantly by running reports on the team's activity and the success
          achieved as a result.
          ? The service provides valuable feedback for future planning. All
          coverage is attributed to journalists in the Durrants system so the team can
          easily see what was previously written about the organisation and whether to
          contact them again. They can also refine strategy by analysing levels of
          success compared to team activity, allowing them to continuously improve.

          Launched in November, we have been delighted with the response to our new
          service and already boast a broad range of clients, from Mitsubishi to United
          Utilities to Médecins Sans Frontière who tell us they value the service
          immensely.
           

   2. List hyperlinks to any online news stories, press releases, product reviews, or other documents that support the claims made in the section above. IMPORTANT: Begin each link with http://, and enclose each link in square brackets; for example, [http://www.youraddress.com]:

          http://www.durrants.co.uk/
          http://www.durrants.co.uk/integrated_services.jsp
          http://www.durrants.co.uk/clients.jsp

   3. Provide a brief (up to 100 words) biography about the leader(s) of the team that developed the nominated product or service:

          Jeremy Thompson, Managing Director
          Jeremy began his career on The Thomson Corporation Graduate Scheme and spent 4
          years working through sales, publishing and product development at Sweet &
          Maxwell. He then spent 2 years building PR Newswire's internet and press
          monitoring service in the UK. Prior to joining Durrants, Jeremy was Deputy
          Managing Director of the news division of Xtreme Information, responsible for
          operations. He worked closely with the Deloitte mergers advisory team to lead
          the integration of Durrants and Xtreme News in 2004. Jeremy graduated in
          classics from Manchester University.

          Simon Fathers, Product Development Director
          Simon joined Durrants in 2001 from the Thomson Corporation. Previously at
          Churchill Livingstone and Sweet & Maxwell, he has 20 years' experience of
          product development in media and professional (legal, medical, business)
          publishing. For the last 11 years he has specialised in transforming hard copy
          formats into successful web-delivered services. Simon trained as a solicitor
          after graduating in law from Sheffield University.