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Ken McEwen Public Relations
Tel +44 1467 633667
ken@kenmcewen.co.uk
www.kenmcewen.com
Dedicated personal marketing and PR support from one of Aberdeen City and Shire's most experienced consultants.
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A (good) picture is worth a thousand words
06/03/12 12:34
Digital cameras and phone cameras are great, aren’t they? As a keen amateur photographer, I love the way I can snap away without worrying about wasting film and I can see the results without waiting for processing. Read More...
City centre investment depends on garden vote
09/02/12 12:40
I only discovered last week that the City Garden referendum in Aberdeen has much wider implications than simply the decision between retaining the existing Union Terrace Gardens or creating a new City Garden spanning the Denburn Valley.
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Diverting energy from the Energy Capital?
19/01/12 17:58
It wasn’t the creation of Enterprise Areas that surprised me. It was the fact that an Enterprise Area for Low Carbon and Renewables technologies appeared to very deliberately exclude the established global centre for energy technology – Aberdeen.
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New attitudes needed to city centre trade
23/11/11 15:42
If I was going to open a shop, I would start out by doing some pretty intensive market research. I would want to know what people want. I would want to know whether there was space in the market for my business.
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A business genius who connected with people
03/11/11 11:41
I have a sticker in my study that says “Steve Jobs for President”. I can’t remember who gave it to me, or when. But, the fact that someone produced and widely distributed it, does underline the extraordinary way that Steve Jobs connected with ‘the people’.
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Hard to ignore social networking potential
07/09/11 13:43
I read today that 26 million people in the UK are now on Facebook. That’s 41% of all the entire population!
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Under pressure? Stick to the facts.
23/05/11 10:09
The recent capture and shooting of Osama bin Laden has provided a reminder of one of the most important principles of supplying information under the full glare of the media spotlight.
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Assessing impact of Chancellor's tax raid
21/04/11 15:17
I was listening closely as the Chancellor delivered his Budget last month. I had a deadline to produce 300 words for a client’s Budget comment to be published in the next day’s paper.
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Millennium Park draws visitors into downtown Chicago
10/03/11 15:11
At yesterday’s City Garden presentation, one of the first examples of city centre revitalisation presented by Charles Landry, author of City Making and Creative City, was the Millennium Park in Chicago.
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Apple shows how diversification can work
04/03/11 14:30
It seems so obvious with hindsight, but as the new millennium dawned, few of us would have seen the logic of a computer manufacturer producing a mobile device for playing music. That, in those days, was the domain of Sony with their Walkman.
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What is the future for your daily newspaper?
16/02/11 17:40
For as long as I can remember, people have been predicting the death of newspapers. Firstly, it was the immediacy of radio and television that was going to kill them off. Now, it is the easy distribution of news on internet.
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Acquisition strengthens Aberdeen's global reach
17/12/10 09:41
It would be difficult to find a better example of Aberdeen’s drive to strengthen its role as a global oil and gas technology hub than the Wood Group’s £600 million acquisition of fellow Aberdeen company PSN, announced earlier this week.
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Read More...Blinded by technology
03/12/10 20:53
I admit to being a bit of a geek. I am excited about the potential of new technology and, whenever there is a new update to any bit of software on my computer, I have to be restrained if I am to resist the temptation to hit the download button.
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Read More...Did they not know or did they conceal the truth?
23/11/10 15:24
The desperate news of financial meltdown in Ireland raises the question of how Western European economies, including our own, apparently turned from boom to bust so quickly.
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Read More...Is being ‘included’ really being excluded?
18/11/10 09:47
I’m following up my previous post with this moving story from Camphill School Aberdeen. It demonstrates how the work of the Camphill Aberdeen charities can make such a huge difference for individuals and for families in crisis.
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Read More...The call that began a remarkable journey
18/11/10 08:56
It was almost exactly seven years ago that Dr Stefan Geider at Camphill in Aberdeen called to ask if I could help with setting up a campaign. What was to follow tested my PR and public affairs skills to the extreme, but I would have been a lot poorer in so many ways had I not risen to the challenge.
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Read More...Putting the "public" back in public relations
15/11/10 14:59
There are still many people out there who believe that public relations is entirely about getting ‘name checks’ for clients in the newspapers.
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Read More...BT needs to build broadband confidence
03/11/10 14:47
I hoped it was our hub playing tricks when the internet went down this morning. But, no, it was a second BT Broadband outage affecting much of Scotland, Northern England and Northern Ireland.
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Read More...Seizing the marine renewables opportunity
02/11/10 09:29
The news that Scotland’s First Minister, Alex Salmond, has called a summit meeting in Aberdeen on December 17 to examine how to secure “the biggest economic opportunity in a generation”, is timely and welcome.
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PR in action as Chilean miners emerge
13/10/10 13:46
The story of the Chilean miners emerging, after more than two months trapped underground, has captured the attention of the world, with good reason. This is a top-notch ‘good news’ story.
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Read More...Ethical public relations: an oxymoron?
11/10/10 14:15
My first-ever PR textbook, the Manual of Public Relations, wasted no time in getting to the subject of ethics in public relations. It was section 1.5.
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Read More...Cutting off the Energy city
05/08/10 16:14
It is more than a little ironic that barely two weeks after business leaders wrote to Transport Minister Stewart Stevenson demanding urgent action to improve the offshore energy capital’s transport connections, news percolates from London that direct rail services from London to Aberdeen might be axed.
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Read More...Sort our transport system say energy capital business leaders
19/07/10 12:03
Today’s Press and Journal, BBC, Northsound and Original are leading on reports that business leaders in Aberdeen have written to Transport Minister Stewart Stevenson demanding urgent action on delayed transport projects in and around Europe’s Energy Capital.
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Read More...The blame culture
17/07/10 17:12
I was laughing at a cartoon linked on their Facebook page by a relative who is a teacher. The cartoon features two scenarios: 1960 and 2010.
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Read More...Good and bad news from world of politics
14/07/10 11:41
Reading today’s Press and Journal newspaper holds out hope and then dashes it. In the early pages is reference to moves to persuade the UK government to support the development of an appropriate infrastructure for Europe’s Energy Capital.
Then, on the letters page, is an example of the in-fighting that has hampered our progress for too long.
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Then, on the letters page, is an example of the in-fighting that has hampered our progress for too long.
Read More...Hyping the gloom?
08/07/10 15:25
Many of us will have spluttered over our cornflakes this morning when we read headlines saying “Spending cuts ‘will rise to £42 billion’ for Scots”.
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Read More...Stepping aside from IoD chair
05/07/10 19:14
So, after four years, it is time for me to step aside and let someone else take over as chairman of the Institute of Directors in Aberdeen. It has been a real pleasure and privilege to chair such a vibrant branch, which has a around 280 business leaders in the Aberdeen.
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Read More...A (good) picture is worth a thousand words
10/06/10 12:44
In this age of digital cameras and camera phones, it is only natural that – with an eye on reducing costs – businesses will question the need to spend upwards of £100 per hour on a professional photographer.
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Read More...Marketing Scotland’s new energy future
24/05/10 14:13
In the immediate years before setting up my first PR consultancy, I was responsible for marketing and promotion at the development organisation for the North East of Scotland.
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Read More...Would the Prime Minister elected on Thursday please stand up?
10/05/10 13:43
For those of us living in Scotland, the current political shenanigans in London are more than a little puzzling. The Conservatives, under David Cameron, won the UK election with the largest number of seats. Surely, therefore, they should have taken over the reigns of power by now?
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Read More...Sir Jackie's name still linked to Pagani crash
29/03/10 13:17
It is now five days since the first reports that Sir Jackie Stewart had been behind the wheel of the Pagani Zonda supercar that crashed in Aberdeenshire, producing an insurance claim of £300,000.
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Read More...Action needed now to secure UK oil industry
15/03/10 12:55
The message delivered by Sue Bruce to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA) that action is needed now to encourage investment in the North Sea oil and gas industry needs to be heeded by our politicians.
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Read More...Innovation, technology and leadership theme for IoD Scotland chairman
05/03/10 10:43
Innovation, technology and leadership will be the themes of Thursday’s (March 11) IoD Aberdeen lunch, where the speaker will be IoD Scotland chairman Raymond O’Hare. Read More...
How does City Square stack up?
14/02/10 13:59
In the 19th century Aberdeen made great strides. Union Street – a viaduct on huge granite arches – was built to extend the city west over the Denburn Valley. It was the realisation of a remarkably forward-thinking vision and a breathtaking feat of civil engineering in an era of wheelbarrows, picks and shovels.
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Toyota’s problems show how crises can devalue a brand
09/02/10 15:53
It might have been Volkswagen that actually used the advertising slogan “if only everything in life was as reliable as a Volkswagen”. But, in terms of public perception, it could have been Toyota – at least, until now.
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Read More...One bark for Labour, two for Conservative
02/02/10 09:40
With the looming General Election, things have obviously got a bit desperate at the House of Commons. The Speaker has started sending out letters to encourage future voters to register. But something seems to have gone a little awry with the system.
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More evidence of distorted view of North Sea oil
25/01/10 09:53
Watching Jonathan Dimbleby’s otherwise excellent programmes on Russia. He was at a BP base in Siberia when he drew a contrast between the industry there and the oil and gas industry in the UK.
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Read More...The benefits of being social
23/01/10 11:03
Camphill Aberdeen City and Shire took the plunge into social media last month, with the setting up of a Twitter account and a Facebook page. Meanwhile long-term social media exponents, The Spires, continue to see the benefits.
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Read More...City Square aims to put the heart in Aberdeen
07/01/10 18:34
Plans to transform part of Aberdeen’s city centre into a large public open space, or civic square, have taken a step forward with the unveiling of a new name and identity for the plan. The City Square, would open off Union Street and build a new public space over Union Terrace Gardens and the Denburn.
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Read More...What happened to our oil wealth?
14/12/09 09:22
For 40 years Aberdeen has been the principal base for the North Sea oil and gas industry. Indeed, it is now one of the global centres of excellence and is recognised as an upstream oil centre that ranks second only to Houston in Texas.
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Read More...One year on there's no end to the gloom
11/12/09 08:47
I was preparing the traditional review of the year for yesterday’s IoD Aberdeen committee Christmas dinner and looked out the notes for 2008. I realised that I could almost have got away with delivering the same messages.
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Read More...Good transport links are vital
18/11/09 12:45
You need to know what people are saying about you
04/11/09 13:18
In some of my recent blogs I have talked about the growth of social media and how mass communication power is shifting from organisations with editorial control and into the hands of individuals armed with nothing more than a mobile phone.
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Read More...Offshore Europe dispels any gloom
08/09/09 20:26
When the organisers said that this year’s Offshore Europe was going to be the best yet, I must admit to some nagging doubts. We are, after all, in the worst recession since the Great Depression.
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Read More...Learn lessons from UK parliament and banks
29/08/09 10:15
This summer PoliticsHome and PR Week joined forces to unveil the first Reputation Index, tracking the reputation of 50 top political brands in the Westminster corridors of power.
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Read More...Don't cut the marketing 2
15/07/09 14:49
Some advice from others on surviving the recession to become a stronger brand ready for the upturn.
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Read More...Social media proves its power again
13/07/09 15:50
Previously in this blog I have highlighted how social media put mass communication into the hands of the individuals equipped with nothing more than a mobile phone.
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Read More...ACSEF maps out vision for the future
12/06/09 10:02
At yesterday’s ACSEF Economic Summit, the chairman, Tom Smith, admitted that he is fond of saying that this region has had “more visions than Joan of Arc”.
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Plans for Aberdeen's new city centre revealed
05/06/09 11:38
Today, the wraps come off the initial plans for the transformation of Aberdeen City Centre. The proposal would create a new six-acre civic space as a focus for the city as it aims to keep its role as one of the world’s premier energy centres.
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Read More...Securing Aberdeen's role as energy centre
15/05/09 14:14
At our IoD Aberdeen lunch yesterday, three business leaders involved in Aberdeen City and Shire Economic Future presented their vision for the future development of the region.
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Some clients still have social media jitters
14/05/09 20:45
The talk in the public relations industry at the moment is very much about social media and their role in the future of corporate communications.
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Read More...The changing world of media
16/04/09 17:48
We are used to the power of mass communication being vested in television, radio, newspapers and publications. Now, as the pace of the internet revolution shows no sign of slowing, we are seeing a real shift in that power.
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Read More...Running out of superlatives
16/03/09 18:26
Is there a danger that we are running out of superlatives to excite and enthral people? Read More...
Your reputation is a key asset
05/02/09 16:10
What are the most important assets in your organisation? Your people? Your premises? Your intellectual property? What about your reputation?
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Read More...Time to focus on oil and gas
12/01/09 14:47
Considering the scale of the industry and its massive contribution to the UK economy, it sometimes seems that the North Sea oil and gas is being deliberately downplayed. But, it is so vital to our future that it should be promoted to the top of our national agenda.
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Read More...In difficult times internal communication is critical
12/12/08 09:24
With everyone being fed a daily diet of doom and gloom, keeping your own people informed is more critical than ever.
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Read More...Tough times? Don't cut the marketing!
11/10/08 15:19
It is one of those business truisms that we all have at the back of our minds. But, at the first sense of economic turmoil, it is still too easy to fly in the face of all the evidence and cut the marketing budget.
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