MRG Conference 2008:Promotion of Research in the Media

As REM’s “It’s the end of the world as we know it” begins to play, this year’s MRG conference gets underway and David Lucas and Keith Donaldson, joint chairs of the MRG, introduced the conference and summed up the organisation’s past two years of activity

Commenting on the current economic slump and its effect on the media research market, they optimistically quoted Sir Martin Sorrell’s claim that by the next biannual conference we shall be out of this economic downturn.

Steve Barrett, editor of Media Week, presented the first keynote speech of the conference, where he demonstrated the benefits of promoting media research in the media press.

With the economic downturn, he explained the importance of promoting research in the media, stating that research provides not only good content for the likes of Media Week but also excellent exposure for the findings.

Companies that survive recessions often come out at the other end in a stronger position than before, so he recommended doing all possible to promote your activities during that time.

Learning how to write press releases, exclusivity agreements, knowing who to speak to at publications to promote your research, as well as targeting the correct audience, are all vital to the success of promoting your work, according to Barrett.

Further reports from the MRG conference will appear on MediaTel.co.uk’s NewsLine service over the next three days.

MRG: www.mrg.org.uk