Presentation by Jasmin Tarique at the GSC Comms Exchange - 'DCLG present: ‘Low cost and quirky – effective campaigns on a small budget’ on 9 October 2014.

1. Great British High Street competition: Case study
Policy aim
To generate local growth through reviving interest, engagement and investment in high streets
Communications objectives
• To change attitudes and behaviour to local high streets – from places you avoid to places you
want to spend time (measure: increased footfall, attitude surveys)
• To generate pride and interest in local high streets (measure: at least 110 towns entering the
Great British High Street competition)
• To stimulate investment in the high street (measure: reduction in vacancy rates, take-up of
events)
Audience insight
Audience: consumers, retailers, local authorities and town teams, entrepreneurs, community
organisers
• In January 2013, 85% of people thought Britain’s high streets were in bad health
(YouGOV/Ch5)
• Internet shopping and out-of-town stores main competitors (University of Southampton)
• BUT the high street remains the number one destination for the combination of shops,
services and leisure compared to online and out-of-town
• Local authorities and town teams could do much more to make use of planning reforms,
business rate reliefs, innovative empty premises schemes, improve open spaces, make
parking easier, etc, as well as taking part in national initiatives with momentum like Love Your
Local Market and Our Big Gig
18 June to 30 August

2. Great British High Street competition: Case study
Strategy/idea
• To promote high streets as not just for retail but for an all-round social experience
• To launch a national competition so people can get behind their high street and feel proud of it – encouraging
‘neighbours’ through local rivalry
• To create an ongoing buzz about local high streets through:
• A national brand to highlight new initiatives and events
• Using local partners (eg MPs and town teams) and partner channels
• Encouraging local authorities to take up support packages, invest in their town centres and think innovatively
• Providing template materials to use for promoting innovative events (and the competition)
• Link up partners to improve the high street offer and links to other schemes such as Love Your Local Market
Partners – Association of Town and City Managers (ATCM), High Street Forum (Boots, Costa, Post Office, etc), MPs
Implementation
April–May ATCM, High Street Forum and DCLG finalise logo, microsite and social media
June Launch of brand, microsite, social media and competition
Ministerial media interviews, visits and letter to MPs
July Ministerial online video, Audioboo interview
August Renewed push of competition – intense digital activity
Digital toolkit of ideas and attractive templates
Ministerial tour of towns
Letter to MPs and town teams
September Judging of competition and announcement of shortlist
18 June to 30 August
Behaviour change – EAST
• Easy: everything online is easy to access, use
and customise
• Attractive: eye-catching visuals via brand, toolkit,
twitter feeds, infographics
• Social: you cannot share a cup of coffee online –
campaign brings fun back to town centres,
encourages support via social media inc sharing
pics, local support ‘thing to do’
• Timely: macroeconomic indicators in favour,
evidence of high street revival, focus during
summer (outdoor weather, school holidays)

3. Evaluation
Media coverage (Parking and GB High Street)
New research
Word cloud
18 June to 30 August
High Street communications intensive push
550
Partners
approached
41 broadcast pieces 45 print articles 60+ online articles
• New analysis by Experian reveals the emergence of the
‘one stop shopper’ who wants to shop and spend leisure
time on the high street (18 June 2014)
• Shop vacancy rates in July are at their lowest level since
June 2010 (below 14 per cent).
• A recent survey (Retail Prospects Index – Business
Strategies/ Churston Head) showed shoppers favouring
more city centre locations compared to large out-of-town
centres
• Consumer confidence is the highest in 12 years (GfK
survey 29 August 2014)
Great British High Street competition
• New high profile Minister
• Audioboo clips
• 2 week High Street tour
• Digital toolkit for Town Teams
• Letter to MPs, Town Teams, local newspapers
• Online videos
• Competitive digital strategy on Twitter
• £1k Facebook promoted post
• Publicise new £50K cash prize
Attractive infographics to encourage applications and continue momentum

4. Great British High
Street competition
18 June–30 August
5,500 mentions of the competition on social
media and online news
Over 130 competition entries
9k page views - thegreatbritishhighstreet.co.uk
4.5k tweets using #GBHighSt reached 33m
Twitter impressions, 364 tweets from
@CommunitiesUK, No 10, Cabinet Office,
@TheGBhighSt
Facebook page 200 likes – 4x gov average
Posts reached 228,200 accounts
YouTube videos 495 views
Audioboos 295 plays
Penny Mordaunt
on tour
5–14 August
Minister Penny Mordaunt’s tour of high streets,
fire stations, seaside towns and
Enterprise Zones
• Mentions of the tour reached 253,339
Twitter accounts
• Tripline map 441 views
• Storify story 166 views
35 Broadcast pieces, 8 print, 56 online
articles
June–August
Entries to the competition (week 1 = 18 June)
Media/
digital boost
& toolkit

5. Great British High Street competition: Evaluation
Direct relationship between social media
engagement and website visits to
thegreatbritishhighstreet.co.uk
18 June to 30 August
Facebook promoted post 22 – 23 Aug
• 162 likes, comments and shares
• Engagement rate 1.1 (Gov average 0.22)
• Cost per click 35p, click rate 1.12
550
Partner
endorsements
• 6.5K unique visitors
• 23% referrals from social media
• 684 organisations tweeted
• 32m twitter impressions
• 12% of traffic to website from Twitter referrals

6. Great British High Street shortlist announcement
Media coverage so far...
3 October 2014
550
Partner
endorsements
8 broadcast 10 print pieces 41 online articles
Social Media activity
Hugely positive response on Twitter
3.9 million Twitter impressions
1,300 Tweets using #GBHighSt
Press release was tweeted 417 times and reached 9m
newsfeeds
128 tweets from @CommunitiesUK, RNN, @TheGBhighSt
Most influential twitters include – Stephen Fry with 7m
followers