PR = Public relations. Here, a “PR firm” refers to a company that handles public relations work on behalf of a company to build effective relationships between a company and its publics. Sunny Side Up is one of Japan’s largest PR firms. We speak to Mr. Ikai, Sunny Side Up’s Executive Officer and Director of Public Relations Division 1, about the company’s use of AnyTag and how public relations and influencer marketing will stack up for the future.
About Sunny Side Up
Sunny Side Up (SSU) has influenced various trends in the public relations domain in Japan through its unique marketing and communication expertise. This includes strategic public relations, promotion efforts using public relations, and sports marketing. Their slogan is “We want to create fun and excitement.”
Interviewer profile
Shingo Ikai
Executive Officer, Director, Public Relations Division 1
Ikai joined SSU in November 2016 with a professional background spanning overseas digital marketing and public relations companies. At SSU, he oversees projects for startups, food delivery service companies, large commercial facilities, cosmetic manufacturers, and local governments.
Please share with us about Sunny Side Up’s business
SSU’s business domain covers a wide range of areas from public relations to promotion and sports marketing for hotels, commercial facilities, tech companies, sports teams, and even local governments. There are four business units that handle various projects, and among these four units, I am in charge of the one that focuses on public relations services, which is one of SSU’s core strengths. Many of our staff have been with the company for a long time and are highly skilled in PR. In addition, as an executive officer of the company, I am responsible for driving business for the PR services unit, which has more than 50 people including department heads and managers. Part of my scope also includes acquiring new projects and also take part in highly challenging projects. 。
KPIs by businesses are changing
What do you think businesses are now looking for from PR firms?
They are looking for us to develop content based on PR concepts unique to SSU, and to design and execute effective communication measures to deliver that content to the target audience, rather than just expanding awareness through broad publicity efforts.
In the past two years, how have the requirements of businesses changed?
In recent years, we have been asked by our customers to visualize the effects of PR more than ever before, and the setting of KPIs in PR has changed bit by bit. An increasing number of businesses today want to visualize the effects of their PR KPIs, such as whether PR efforts have changed the attitude of consumers or whether sales have been impacted by PR activities.
For example, a company can set the number of search queries as a KPI, where the number of searches conducted on a search engine is used to visualize the impact of PR efforts. I think this is similarly connected to visualizing changes in consumer behavior. In addition to digital indicators, KPIs may also be set for the number of new visitors to a store.
Measurement of impact as the biggest advantage of working with AnyMind
Why did you choose to work with AnyMind Group?
In order to achieve results beyond what businesses are looking for, there are increasing opportunities to implement other measures in addition to publicity such as expanding awareness and placing ads through social media platforms. With the evolution of technology, social media alone offers a variety of services such as Twitter, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. With consumer preferences becoming more diversified, it is necessary to utilize the right service for the right target audience and purpose. AnyMind has developed a wide range of tools and feature sets even just in the social media and influencer marketing space. These tools enable market, social media and influencer analysis, the selection of influencers that match our client’s product based on data, and can even influence the creatives for posts. By proposing data-driven measures using AnyMind’s offerings to our customers, we are able to provide marketing services that lead to more business generated than ever before, and since we can easily verify whether or not the measures are actually effective, our clients can have an even greater sense of security.
Public relations concepts x social media marketing give us more depth and breadth in our client proposals
What changes have occurred within SSU since you started working with AnyMind Group?
There have been two obvious changes. First, our knowledge of PR using influencers has deepened. Every other week, an AnyMind expert gives us insights on social media trends, best practices in influencer marketing, TikTok case studies, and more. This has deepend our knowledge and enabled us to make a wider range of proposals. The classes have also brought SSU and AnyMind closer together, and we have more opportunities to consult with each other, not just about influencer marketing. Second, as a company, we are now able to provide value beyond PR, which has led to sales: approximately 10% of our sales portfolio within the PR business unit now comes from influencer marketing. Recently, the areas of utilization for influencer marketing have increased. A wide range of industries, including cosmetics and beauty, hotels, local government, and even outdoor brands, are increasingly using influencers for their initiatives. The more niche a product is, the more likely it is that influencers will be able to make the most of their influence. In Japan, where audience preferences are becoming increasingly segmented, we believe that opportunities to utilize influencers, regardless of vertical, will increase further in the future.
What do you think of AnyTag, our influencer marketing platform?
At SSU, we use AnyTag especially when proposing social media initiatives. For example, we can analyze how much support an influencer or talent has on social media platforms, and the attributes of the influencer’s followers, and we can easily check the dashboard to see which influencers are truly influential.
The dashboard also allows you to check CPA (cost per acquisition) and ROAS (return on advertising spend), as well as the reach and engagement rates from social media activities. We can review the results in detail on AnyTag, such as “How much impact did it have on purchases,” “What kind of new customers did we acquire,” and “What kind of creative in what categories can achieve high performance.” Since reports are real-time, we are also able to show them to our clients on the spot and explain the results to them.
We want to use AnyX to provide value beyond the marketing realm!
What would you like to work on together in the future?
We are currently offering proposals centered around PR x Influencer Marketing. IN the future, we would also like to work with AnyMind to provide services that cover all touch points along the customer journey.
SSU has done PR for both domestic and international companies and products, and AnyMind does business globally in the commerce space, which I believe contributes to the company’s sales and other growth areas. In the future, we expect to see an increase in requests from overseas companies wanting to sell their products in Japan, and Japanese companies wanting to sell their products overseas. Therefore, by combining the strengths of the two companies, we will be able to expand recognition both domestically and internationally, develop e-commerce capabilities for our customers, increase sales through influencer marketing, as well as manage product orders and inventory. We believe that the attractiveness of products and services can be maximized by combining the power of PR with these series of processes. We also have high expectations for the recently launched AnyX, an e-commerce management platform that integrates a range of solutions to make the operation of multiple e-commerce channels easier and more efficient, and to sell more products. We have high expectations because AnyX can provide value that goes beyond each marketing measure and into the business space, including logistics, store sales, and other data.
Solutions through AnyX I look forward to working with AnyMind to create “fun and excitement” in Japan and globally in the future.
Left to right: Mr. Ikai from Sunny Side Up, Shirahama from AnyMind Group
■For more information
https://anymindgroup.com/contact/What is AnyTag?
AnyTag is an end-to-end influencer marketing platform that provides data-driven influencer selection and discovery, campaign implementation, real-time measurement, and more. In addition, AnyTag can also be used as a social media analytics tool by linking it with clients’ social media accounts. As of the end of June 2022, AnyTag has access to more than 450,000 influencers in over 45 markets globally. URL：https://anymindgroup.com/products/anytag/
