Along with the annual council elections, May 3rd will also see the people of Birmingham voting in a referendum for the prospect of an elected mayor. Birmingham is one of 10 other cities that will be voting to decide on the mayoral position which, if accepted, will see an elected candidate take over the council’s [...]

Policy makers all over are starting to see how the design industry can affect the accessibility of new policies. The notion of strategic design is playing a key role in how we are informed of new policies and is especially prevalent within the third sector.
Strategic design is about applying some of the principles of traditional design to [...]

This month saw Big Cat’s CEO Nick Morgan complete the Goldman Sachs ’10,000 Small Businesses’ programme, the first of its kind in the area after a successful round in Yorkshire. The programme is designed to provide high-quality, practical support to the owners and leaders of established small businesses and social enterprises as they seek to [...]

The recent news about Tesco’s profit falling within the UK came as a bit of surprise, but it wasn’t totally unexpected.
Tesco have fallen out of touch with their consumers through out of date marketing campaigns that have been overshadowed by their competitors.  Here are just a few ways that Tesco could rejuvenate there image with [...]

As the Big Cat Corporate Events team likes to keep its finger firmly on the business pulse, it’s evident that there have been some exciting and positive moves within the professional services sector that really strengthen and promote business growth within the city.  With a new partner being appointed at one of the largest insurance [...]

This month we are very excited to announce that we have made two new additions to the Big Cat ranks. Tim Harbon and Guy Dawson join the design and marketing teams respectively following such a successful first quarter with a number of new account wins.
Our new designer Tim has previously worked as in-house for a [...]

Last week saw Big Cat’s Nick Morgan feature in The Business Desk, as he discusses the future of Big Cat and in particular how the business is currently looking to expand.
Big Cat Group is now actively on the lookout for mergers and acquisitions, partly to expand the agencies presence in the London market. Sights are [...]

Champagne all round this month at Big Cat as we are celebrating scooping up not one, but two amazing award wins!
Last week saw Big Cat pick up the Community Engagement Campaign of the Year award at the glitzy Golden Hedgehog Awards, beating off fierce competition from a number of top national agencies. We also came [...]

This week saw Big Cat attend the official launch of the Cultural Olympiad’s West Midlands Programme.  For those of you who don’t know what the Olympiad is, it’s the largest cultural celebration in the history of the modern Olympic and Paralympic movements.
Over the past 4 years more than 16 million people from across the UK [...]

Over the next couple of months Big Cat will be looking into a refresh of its brand and image, as well as launching a shiny new website. Before launching into it, we’d like to get some input from our valued clients and friends!
We’d be really grateful if you could take a few minutes to answer [...]

Earlier in the year The Big Issue Foundation brought Big Cat on board to help deliver and promote the city’s first Big Brum Night Walk, which has successfully run in London for the past 3 years with over 650 people taking part at each event.
Not content with simply promoting the event, Big Cat are jumping [...]

It’s been a very exciting month here at Big Cat with a hat-trick of fantastic account wins.  We’ve certainly been putting in the hours, but the results have been worthwhile!
The first win is a fantastic new campaign with Birmingham Hippodrome providing PR and social media support for its major cultural project, The Voyage. Kick starting [...]

Following Channel 4’s Dispatches documentary, ‘The Great British Ticket Sandal’, the legality of secondary ticket sites has once again been brought to the forefront of debate. Secondary ticket websites have always been more expensive, but now the increasingly high mark-ups just appear to be exploiting desperate fans who will pay anything to see their favourite [...]

With evenings still dark before it hits 5:30pm and winter well and truly settling in, you can be forgiven for deciding to hibernate during those cold nights in the comfort of your home in front of a roaring fire with a cup of tea. But have you ever taken a moment to think about those [...]

Well it’s been a busy month for birthday’s as we celebrated not one but two, more senior dates of birth. Last week, both Antony Tattum and Rob Dudley celebrated the big 40, a considerable achievement bearing in mind what the pair are like. We’re surprised they’ve made it this far to be honest.
The pair are [...]

With the 2nd term of university in full flow, Big Cat were called into action by current clients Glide Utilities to deliver a number of fairs based at campuses around the UK for over 10,000 students.
After creating a bespoke events calendar tailored to best suit Glide’s needs, the Big Cat events team were tasked with [...]

How well do you know your city and the people that live in it? Ever wondered how city life changes when the sun sets? Well this year Big Cat have teamed up with one of the UK’s leading social enterprises, The Big Issue to offer you a unique look at Birmingham at the dead of [...]

Unless you’ve been sitting in a very dark room for the past 12 months you’ll have undoubtedly seen the arguments for and against the High Speed Rail link between London, Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds.

Well today Phase 1 of the controversial project has been given the green light by the government. Whilst many people are shouting [...]

Video views are the currency of YouTube and in some cases I mean this quite literally. For those of you who are only just realising the potential of this platform, here are my five tips to gain more views:
1- Give your video Title/Description/Tags a lot of thought
YouTube gives you a lot of power to [...]

It’s divided opinion among web and print designers since it’s beta launch a few months ago. With some in the web community heavily critical of Adobe’s Muse software, which aims to make web design more accessible to print designers and non-programmers. The main criticisms being that Muse creates extremely untidy code that isn’t SEO friendly, [...]

Companies are looking for more meaningful and creative ways to push their brands out to target audiences. The simple text based press release no longer cuts it especially as newspapers up and down the country are now going digital. With fewer newspapers around, securing coverage in the local paper is becoming more and more difficult [...]

Last week saw the launch of Birmingham’s digital week, which celebrates the city’s achievements in digital innovation and brings people from various sectors together to discuss the impact and value of technologies for professional, creative and cultural industries.
On Tuesday 15th November my colleagues from Big Cat and I had the chance to participate in a [...]

Over the past 110 days or so Google+ has officially been open to the public and last week it’s doors wide open to business use.
Uptake to Google+ is estimated at 1 million members per week but so far there are not any solid stats on how many businesses are using it but from a first [...]

More and more companies are diving into the world of Augmented Reality (AR) in order to provide memorable customer experiences and to bring a sense of fun to their brand. Last week Nivea launched a new AR campaign which enables its target market to see Rihanna perform in front of their computer screens.  All customers [...]

October 2011 saw final preparations put into place for the grand launch of Bournville College’s new multi-million pound campus in Longbridge.
Encompassing services from across all departments, Big Cat Group were tasked with officially launching the new £66 million facility.
12 months in the planning, Big Cat were awarded the contract following a competitive pitch with a [...]

Cask Marque, a pub accreditation scheme, are using smartphones to “gamify” pub going. The Cask Finder app (on Android and iOS) allows drinkers to locate pubs, check in to them, and accrue points that mean – of course – prizes. This is just one example of a growing trend to use mobile phones within hospitality [...]

A week has passed and after numerous foot massages, hot baths and the odd pint or two, the Big Cat bosses, Nick Morgan and Anthony Tattum have finally recovered after competing in last week’s BUPA Half Marathon in Birmingham.
After months of grueling training in rain storms and heat waves and even signing up to a [...]

October is always a busy time for the Big Cat’s. Not only is it Nick Morgan’s Birthday but it’s the companies birthday as well and this year we’re celebrating 11 years of continued growth and success.
The whole country across all sectors has felt the pinch of the credit crunch. Many businesses have fallen at the [...]

With business booming at Big Cat we felt it was about time we expanded our Marketing and Communications team so we can continue to deliver award winning campaigns which wow the nation. So, logically this months Q & A is with the latest addition of the Big Cat family, Hannah Wood. A self-confessed creative perhaps [...]

Planning a social media campaign that works can be a tricky task. 90% of all campaigns are said to fall flat within the first month, the key reason being audience figures not meeting critical mass, therefore the campaign never really going viral. September saw Big Cat team up with energy and communications company Glide and [...]

So, what’s your favourite colour? Perhaps you’re a traditional primary colour type of person, who likes a passionate red or maybe a cool blue? Perhaps you’re a little more sophisticated and like a nice teal? Ever thought about owning your favourite colour? Well now you can thanks Dulex.
Working alongside humanitarian charity, UNICEF, Dulex are offering [...]

This festival season has seen the lines between music festival and traditional food festivals blur beyond recognition.  Over recent years attendees at a music festival could expect to be served greasy burgers, greasy burgers or greasy burgers.
Some of this year’s crop of festivals (not even the food specific ones) have seen the quality of their [...]

This week sees the launch of the gaming industry’s first live TV advert.
The real time adverts for Xbox’s ‘Gears of War 3’ will publicise the number of people playing the game online at the time of broadcast.
The interesting thing about this campaign is that it relies on the product already being used by the customer. [...]

This year is a big deal for The Big Issue. 2011 marks the 20th Anniversary of the first Big Issue hitting the streets and to coincide with the launch, the team behind the publication are working on a number of fantastic events being held up and down the country.
Birmingham will be playing a key role [...]

Six months ago we posted a blog about the lack of good street art around Birmingham City Centre, with the majority only being specially commissioned pieces. I visited Nottingham recently and saw a huge mural spanning the entire ground floor of an abandoned building. Not only was this in a busy part of the city [...]

The UK’s entertainment industry has seen a new partnership formed this week which is set to enhance the West Midlands offering of world class events.
Birmingham based marketing experience agency, Big Cat Group has this month been awarded a six month contract to assist the NEC in sourcing and delivering blockbuster events best suited for its [...]

Scary concept for any PR however there’s been a lot of talk over the past 2 years about the death of the press release and how the digital landscape is re-shaping how traditional publications source their news.
Would social media and digital content really put the nail in the coffin of the good old press release [...]

The notion of an interesting and inspiring office space is a totally alien thought for most office workers today who would generally associate their work space with words such as mundane, boring, dreary, and dull. Could spaces that are thought of by workers with negative descriptions cause a lack of motivation and dissatisfaction at work?
Physical [...]

This month Big Cat are celebrating becoming certified in ISO9001.
ISO allows a company to follow set processes and procedures, minimizing the risk of error and we feel it’s been beneficial for our company in many ways. We’re giving our clients the consistent approach across the board and we’re making sure they receive quality service.

ISO helps [...]

Whilst doing some research for a prospective new client last week we came across this nice little marketing stunt by DHL.

The high impact visuals utilise the space on and around an escalator in one of Hong Kong’s busiest subway stations and despite being rolled out nearly 5 years ago, the viral nature of mobile videos [...]

Over the past few years Big Cat Group has developed and managed a range of world class events including Bodies Revealed, CSI: The Experience, Tutankhamun – His Tomb and His Treasures and most recently The World of Princess. To give you an insight into how these events are secured and delivered we thought we’d put Senior [...]

This past week, the Big Cat Office has looked like a jumble sale with every nook and cranny filled with either a bean bag, BBQ equipment, bunting or some form of party paraphernalia.
No, we haven’t been preparing for the annual Big Cat Summer BBQ but instead counting down the days to Jamaica Live, a 1-day [...]

Biddle & Webb has been an auctioneer in Birmingham and the West Midlands for over 50 years. This year  it decided to re-evaluate its brand including a new logo and print collateral.
Big Cat have taken a great pleasure in getting involved in this project and have worked hard alongside other partners to deliver strong results [...]

6. Partners – events massively benefit from partners who can influence their networks. Event marketing messages that are syndicated via their website, blog, social network or database gain much more gravitas than unsolicited ones from a new event. Partners can provide third-party or word-of-mouth endorsements for your event that are much more powerful than an Ad [...]

Networking is a vital concept that all businesses need to embrace in order to gain contacts and maintain them. Business revolves around using the resources and knowledge of your environment to succeed. Without taking these concepts into account a business will not reach true potential. Having for the last five weeks been working with Birmingham [...]

Top 5 innovative event technologies to make your event really reach the stars.
We are forever hearing how fast technology is evolving and that the latest must-have gadget is being shelved just weeks into its release with its predecessor already in production. It’s hard to imagine how certain technology-based products can progress to an even greater [...]

OK, so you’ve taken the plunge to commit to social media. You understand that the more you engage your customers the more likely you are to keep them. And you know that the way to do that is to engage with them without resorting to interruption tactics and sales messages.

Once you have a strategy, it’s [...]

Last week I attended a conference titled Social Media in a Corporate Context  (SMCC), organised by Communicate Magazine, as a Live-event Blogger. It’s difficult to find a really useful conference that is informative, interactive and filled with interesting case studies, but this event fitted the bill.
Attending the event was a great opportunity for me to [...]

The British brand of premium desserts Gü, founded in 2003, is running a brand relaunch campaign with a colossal budget of £2M -which is one of the company’s biggest marketing investment so far. With this significant amount, Joseph Liu, Senior Brand Manager at Gü Puds hopes to reach consumers who haven’t tried the brand yet [...]