#MandelaMonth: Rise of the philanthropic campaign

Oresti Patricios

Ornico actually started as a part-time wedding video production company in about 1979. At the time, Patricios needed to earn spending money while studying at university, so that was an opportunity he leaped at. They were actually the first company in South Africa to film wedding videos when everyone else was doing it on 8mm film. He also reveals that the name ‘Ornico’ is a combination of the first names of Patricios and the two friends with which Ornico was started: OResti, NIck and COsta.

As a brand intelligence firm with presence now in 14 African countries, Ornico offers expert knowledge into the concept of brand, media and reputational intelligence and research, especially against the impact of social media.

Patricios says, “I don’t believe we can look at a brand through a single lens and one dimension, because consumers engage and experience the brand in many ways. They don’t wake up in the morning thinking that they want to look at brand advertising or deliberately plan to engage with the brand on social media.”

Multidimensional customer journeys

Instead, that customer journey is multidimensional and when that journey engages with the media, Ornico is able to measure and evaluate the communication. Therefore, they monitor most communication disciplines, including paid, earned, owned and shared media; create data; and analyse this data in order to provide clients with an independent view of their communication, while also providing a benchmark against industry competitors.

For many years, Ornico has advocated for using all-encompassing measurement and evaluation standards, as they say the AVE (Advertising Value equivalent) measurement model is outdated and not dynamic. Instead, communication needs to be evaluated and measured against success factors, which can include social outputs such as followers and likes. However, to really understand the effect of your communication, Patricios says brands need to also look at the outcomes. The question for brands, marketers and advertisers thus is “What are the objectives for this communication?” Those objectives must then be measured.

Ornico Group's AMEC Awards for their CEO SleepOut campaign measurement

Of their recent AMEC wins for just this – “Best use of measurement for a single event” and “Best measurement of a not-for profit campaign” on the CEO SleepOut^TM, Patricios says it serves as confirmation that South African companies have methodologies that are world-class and that we can compete with the best in the world. Shifting focus further afield, he says, “It means African brands can measure their communication using a world-class methodology and approach.”

Explaining the winning concept of the CEO SleepOut^TM then, with which they partnered in 2015 in order to help with fundraising, Patricios calls it an opportunity for leaders and influencers to use their power for the greater good and to participate actively towards social change. The concept of the triple bottom line (TBL) is becoming more and more important for many companies, and while he does not believe it to be mandatory, he asserts: “It should be something people want to do to make the world a better place. The one big issue companies need to look at in the TBL framework is the social perspective and how they can make a difference.”

At the end of the day, education is a critical factor to ensure South Africa grows and helps people to become employable. That’s why this year’s CEO SleepOut^TM will support education, crucial for South Africa’s success and growth both economically and socially.

Patricios says fundraising is difficult in any environment, so using a unique method such as the CEO SleepOut^TM helps everyone to engage with and to understand the social issues at hand.

Shifting focus to the year ahead, he envisions business in general will focus on trends such as evaluating and measuring everything you do, due to tight budgets; increasing efficiencies through Artificial Intelligence and machine learning; and generating smart data from big data.

Click here for more on the CEO SleepOut^TM. For more information on Ornico, visit their press office and follow their Twitter stream.