500 ways to do great business

The Swift Awards, a national scheme recognising great local businesses, sponsored by swiftcover.com and run by Brazil, has just given its 500th award. It’s a significant milestone, and in the time that it’s taken us to identify and celebrate 500 exceptional British businesses, swiftcover.com has grown from the new kid in the insurance market to one of the UK’s most recognised brands.

When Brazil won the swiftcover.com account in 2008, the insurer needed a campaign that would appeal to consumers and influencers, whilst also driving brand awareness by generating media coverage outside of the personal finance pages, and in particular in local and regional media.

So, we created the Swift Awards; a PR campaign with, at its heart, a business awards scheme designed to recognise, support and reward local businesses that deliver quick, reliable and hassle-free service, mirroring swiftcover.com’s values.

The business categories reflect swiftcover.com’s insurance products, so we search for the best garages, automotive business, travel firms and pet-related companies across the UK. The awards are judged by a swiftcover.com panel of mystery shoppers, with the award winners featuring on a business directory on the unique Swift Relief website (www.swiftrelief.co.uk), developed to showcase winning firms and allow members of the public and swiftcover.com’s own policyholders to find a great award-winning business in their area.

It’s been a huge success: we’ve visited 60 cities and spoken to thousands of businesses over the last two years to find 500 businesses; but the search continues. It’s helped swiftcover.com establish itself as a household name, so far generating more than 600 pieces of newspaper, online and radio coverage, in addition to the coverage swiftcover.com gets on its own.

To find out more about the awards, visit www.swiftrelief.co.uk

Brazil drives swiftcover.com car insurance to insurance marketing initiative of the year!

swiftcover.com has won ‘Marketing Initiative of the Year’ at the British Insurance Awards – beating off competition from the likes of Direct Line, Aviva and Churchill – for a multi-strand strategy that included an innovative social media and PR company created by Brazil.

The insurance market is saturated, so as a new entrant swiftcover.com had to stand out. As it was also the UK’s first fully internet only insurer, Brazil harnessed online to raise awareness of the company and engage with customers and influencers alike.

To support the launch of the Iggy Pop fronted campaign, which have now clocked up over 80,000 views, Brazil embarked on a social media campaign that used a Facebook page featuring great content based on the ‘Get A Life’ theme, plus a Twitter feed to seed online content and engage with customers.

Brazil also created The Swift Awards, a national campaign to find great local businesses, which was supported by Swift Relief, a hub of unique content including hints and tips, vox pop videos, an insurance jargonbuster and even a viral game, Dance Like A Rockstar, all of which generated online interest and supported traditional media relations.

Brazil’s work, along with traditional offline PR, marketing and advertising, helped boost swiftcover.com’s sales by 38.5% in 2009 and increase brand awareness by 90%.