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[mikepompeyfan] 11/7/2013 06:07

Marketing spending up in good sign for economy
More top British businesses have increased marketing spending in the past three months than at any time in nearly six years, data seen as a key indicator of economic conditions reveal.
The number of marketing departments increasing spending was its highest since the third quarter of 2007, before the financial crisis and recession prompted cuts. Some 22pc of companies surveyed increased their spending in the second quarter of this year, compared with 15pc that continued trimming, giving a net positive balance of 7pc.
The upbeat finding comes from the IPA's Bellwether Report, a quarterly poll of executive in 300 top British companies. Conducted since 2000, it is seen as predictive of the overall state of the economy as it indicates how aggressively chief executives are willing to pursue sales.
Online spending was particularly strong and drove the overall increase in budgets. A net balance of 17.4pc of marketing departments increased their digital outlay as they chased customers on the internet. Other forms of spending were positive but in low single digits.
"The second quarter is looking like one of the best we've seen since the onset of the financial crisis in terms of a positive signal for marketing budgets and the wider economy," said report author Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit.
"With marketing spend a key barometer of the health of the economy, not only is GDP growth likely to have accelerated in the second quarter, but the Office of Budget Responsibility's official forecast of 0.6pc economic growth this year is all of a sudden starting to look overly pessimistic."
A net balance of 14pc of companies surveyed are also planning to increase their marketing spending across the whole of 2013, the most positive annual forecast for two years.
The survey also asked about business confidence. It gave the most upbeat assessment since the third quarter of 2009, with a net balance of 27pc feeling positive, up sharply from 17pc in the first quarter of this year.
"Companies are beginning to shake off the cloak of recession and are becoming more confident in the economy," said Paul Bainsfair, directoer general of the IP, the professional body for marketers and public relations executives.
"These figures should send a very upbeat message to the wider economy."

[mikepompeyfan] 11/7/2013 06:05

hxxp://www.marketingweek.co.uk/news/marketers-chipper-over-outlook-for-industry/4007308.article

Hopes the gloom that has hung over the marketing industry for the last five years is clearing have risen after an influential report found the net balance of marketers planning to spend more at the highest rate for seven years.
The latest Bellwether report, a quarterly survey of 300 senior marketers from the UK's top companies and a respected barometer of confidence in the industry, says improved forecasts for the UK economy has left decision makers more confident about the prospects for their own companies and industries and more willing to loosen the purse strings.

Almost a quarter (22 per cent) revised their budgets up in the three months to 30 June, compared to 15 per cent cutting spend. The net balance of 7.3 per cent was up markedly on the 0.1 percent reported for the first three months of the year.

The balance of those planning a year on year increase in spend in 2013 matched the previous quarter's 13.5 per cent.

Elsewhere, more than two-fifths (43 per cent) were more confident about the financial health of their own companies than in the previous quarter compared with 16 per cent more pessimistic. The net balance of 27.6 per cent up markedly on the 17 per cent reported for the first quarter.

Marketers also demonstrated increasing confidence in the prospects for the industries they operate in, the 6 per cent net balance a steep rise on the -11 per cent seen for the first three months of 2012.

The increasingly sanguine mood of those polled echoes the trickle of news signalling improvements in consumer confidence and the economy. UK retail sales grew 1.4 per cent in June, according to the British Retail Consortium following a 1.8 per cent gain in May, while reports of improved manufacturing output have prompted many economists to predict the UK economy is on the road to recovery.

Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit and author of the Bellwether report, says the second quarter was one of the best since the 2008 financial crisis.

"The latest Bellwether survey shows companies taking an increasingly aggressive stance with regard to boosting their marketing expenditure, which in turn reflects their views on financial prospects having improved dramatically over the course of the year to date.

"With marketing spend a key barometer of the health of the economy, not only is GDP growth likely to have accelerated in the second quarter, but the Office for Budget Responsibility's official forecast of 0.6 per cent economic growth this year is all of a sudden starting to look overly pessimistic."

The Bellwether report comes in the same week Advertising Association/Warc data shows UK ad spend increased by 2.4 per cent in the first quarter of 2013 to £4.14bn.

Tim Lefroy, chief executive of the Advertising Association says the increase "reflects growing confidence" and "represents an important investment in the recovery".

[red army] 01/7/2013 13:51

£2 2013 target for me.

[red army] 01/7/2013 13:49

£2 2013 target for me.

[scottishfield] 01/7/2013 10:55

chart looking good now, siv can move quite quickly. Added

[mikepompeyfan] 28/6/2013 18:32

hxxp://www.st-ives.co.uk/resources/blog/st_ives/1470_better_together

St Ives Group - blog
Better Together
Scott Logie – Friday 28 June 2013
As headline sponsor of this year's Marketing Week Live show, I have spent the last two days at Olympia. It really is a wide ranging show with everything from events through retail and in-store to insight, data and digital. It can be a little disorientating to wander from being pursued by keen SEO experts to all of a sudden having Rubik's cubes and plastic cows thrust into your hand. And there is a definite pleasure in watching the fear on the data geeks faces as the merchandising girls try to talk to them.

We presented the first findings from the Incite Innovation League Table, with a live interactive vote to look at the perception gap between the audience, assumed to be practitioners and this showed some interesting results. For example, from being quite close to them, I think the way that LV= has re-branded, moved from a purely direct acquisition to a TV driven brand strategy is very innovative and has been successful for them. Clearly the consumer doesn't see this. Innovation is in the eye of the beholder in some cases, yet consistent in others, such as our friends at Apple.

Dominic Fried-Booth from Barnes & Noble/Nook also gave a very informative view on how innovation drives business change and helps develop product to meet consumer needs.

We were also on a Big Data panel, represented by Occam and sharing the panel with Sony and, Tesco Bank, one of Occam's clients. Again this was an interesting debate. Big Data to a certain extent is also in the eye of the beholder. However, there was clear consistency and agreement that often too much focus is on gathering the data and not enough on understanding the application and problems to be solved. As I've said before – big answers, NOT big data!

Our final session, on the second day, was from Amaze who provided some really useful top tips when contemplating a mobile web presence. While using mobile in marketing has been around for years, it is only really now with the prevalence of smart phones that we can really start to get to use tools like location services, m-commerce and near field connectivity to maximise the use of mobile, a really exciting area of development.

The main thing for me from the whole show, and the breadth of topics we alone covered, demonstrates is how wide ranging the world of marketing is right now. To cover all the bases takes a lot of time and effort. However, just like the show, to look at each area in isolation would fail to see the benefit of the whole, and the combination of tools and techniques overall will be what helps brands to survive and thrive.

As we often say at St Ives, great marketing is a combination of thinking and doing; of understanding your customer, what they need and want and then executing relevant engagement across media to deliver your offer at the right time in the right way.

As MW live showed, this definitely works much better when we work together, like apple pie and cheese.

[gswredland] 28/6/2013 08:37

Thanks Mike

[mikepompeyfan] 28/6/2013 08:05

IC has had it's effect this morning. Nice jump in share price and some early buying :-)

[mikepompeyfan] 28/6/2013 06:31

As a non-subscriber to IC l managed to see this much. Says enough for me ;-)

'Go back to 2009's recession and St Ives (SIV), which boasts a long history in such areas of the publishing market as book production, was struggling. Fresh thinking increasingly looked needed to turn the business around and, as 2009 progressed, the arrival of a new management team provided just that. Under new chief executive Patrick Martell, appointed in April 2009, St Ives began refocusing away from low-margin print business and towards higher-margin consultancy-style marketing services. It's a strategy that's delivering results but, judging by the group's modest share price rating, the market has barely begun to give St Ives the credit'.

[lord gnome] 27/6/2013 23:03

'Buy for re-rating' verdict online IC today and probably in tomorrow's mag. Good, positive write-up. Nothing we don't know, but all put together to paint a very bullish picture.

[coolen] 26/6/2013 15:45

Today's board resignation is clearly not linked to the flurry of share sales on 13 June (per previous post).

[mikepompeyfan] 19/6/2013 17:04

If anyone is interested it seems The Naked Trader top sliced and then bought back at £1.42. I would do that, but if l had sold some they would have probably carried on straight up ;-)

'St Ives which I top sliced as it had such a good run, topsliced at 159-8 for a profit of £356 and £3,180 total profit for the site of £3,536. I am keeping hold of the rest, mostly bought a long way lower down in the 90s and as I write this morning have bought a lot of them back on weakness'.

[12at] 19/6/2013 12:21

Bought some more, these prices are too cheap on no serious news

[stevemarkus] 19/6/2013 10:00

I'm not a holder (yet) but have St Ives on watch for a decent entry point. I think the drop yesterday was down to the company not stating whether they were overall in line on profit and revenue. They were very bullish on the newer marketing acquisitions, almost as if to try to distract attention from the underperforming print business. If they had conclude the statement with 'we are trading in line with profit expectations' there probably wouldn't have been a drop.

Cheers,
Steve.

[gswredland] 19/6/2013 09:45

Me too!Good divi at this price and a growth story

[owenski] 19/6/2013 09:28

Bought some more

[johnroger] 18/6/2013 19:44

UK-Analyst comment

N+1 Singer stuck with its "buy" recommendation on marketing group St. Ives (SIV) with a target price of 174p. The broker is impressed with today's trading update and feels that it is indicative of a company which is well on track. N+1 Singer feels that now is a particularly good entry point as the shares have dropped slightly since major shareholder Silchester sold some of its stake. The shares lost 10.25p to 138.75p.

[rubymurray] 18/6/2013 14:01

St Ives revenue down 4% in interim results

In its interim management statement published this morning, the company said that an expected decline in print revenue of almost 10%, resulting from exiting non-profitable markets, had caused a £4.6m decline in group revenue compared to the £110m reported in same period last year.



The decline in revenues was partially offset by the performance of St Ives' marketing services, which experienced growth of 30%.

Revenue and underlying profit across the marketing services division were reported to be "significantly ahead" of the equivalent period last year.

The company said: "We continue to make good progress with our strategy to reposition the group and build an extended range of added value marketing services whilst exiting commoditised print markets."

It said that the figures been bolstered by the recent acquisitions of digital marketing agencies Amaze and Branded3, which the company said had integrated well and created a significant digital marketing offering that complemented and strengthened its existing capabilities.

Progress and investment was reported in the development of the group's consultancy service businesses with the relocation of retail consultancy Pragma to the group's London head office to make room for planned growth.

Additionally market research firm Incite, which was acquired in February 2012, made the division's first move overseas with the opening of offices in Singapore and New York.

Meanwhile St Ives' exhibition and events and point of sale businesses were also reported to have performed well.

In its book printing business Clays, the company said the effect of shrinking run lengths and more frequent reprints was being mitigated by implementing flexible working across the business and investing in digital technology.

The group's direct mail operation, St Ives Direct, continued to battle with a challenging market, "where excess capacity continues to exert downward pressure on prices".

The company said: "We keep the cost base of our remaining operation in Bradford under close scrutiny and will take further action to reduce costs should it become necessary."

The company said that despite ongoing investment in acquisitions and restructuring, the group's balance sheet remained strong and underlying free cash flow continued to be robust.

It added: "Whilst there is no sign of improvement from the difficult trading conditions across our print markets, our marketing services businesses are performing well, growing and combining to offer a unique and compelling customer proposition."

Share price dropped 8.5p during morning trading to 140.5p.

[mikepompeyfan] 18/6/2013 13:27

12at - Wait and see what The Naked Trader says tomorrow in his update if you want reassurance ;-)

hxxp://www.nakedtrader.co.uk/

[douglasallen] 18/6/2013 13:17

Good statement IMO.

Siv is becoming leaner and more efficient. We are coming to a point where growth in the Marketing division will offset falling revenues from Print.

Revenues may have fell back a bit, but margins are improving.

Given the fall in the so today there is a smallish seller in the market. Noting to be alarme about.

[richtea1701] 18/6/2013 13:13

Can only see a smooth progression to 160p + once dust settles this week.

[12at] 18/6/2013 11:52

I understand as holders we tend to emphasise any positive news and play down genuine negative news.

Can someone honestly point out what they feel is negative in the IMS that will cause a further drop in share price and prevent the share price from rising back to 160 and beyond?


At these prices i am tempted to top up (originally bought in at 1.15) but have been cut in the past for 'trying to catch a falling knife'

[mikepompeyfan] 18/6/2013 11:40

Traders with over-realistic short term ambitions exiting imo. Long term picture and repositioning of the business still on track. Wouldn't be surprised to see price move back up.

[redips2] 18/6/2013 10:37

just thinking the same thing ayiman .