In March, our Promote UK team travelled to the Shanghai International Advertising Festival. As part of our Export Month endeavour, we have had a team of Advertising Association, Department for International Trade and other professionals out extolling the virtues of British creativity.
Advertising Association chief executive Stephen Woodford said:
“UK/China trade is booming and Chinese advertising has high regard for the UK’s creativity, effectiveness culture and global outlook. The presentations and meetings at SHIAF showed all these strengths and more. Inspiring creativity, powerful case histories and the factors that drive successful international campaigns, new technology and best practice in evaluating advertising effectiveness all featured, with a mix of UK practitioners and their Chinese colleagues sharing the stage.”
Another packed day in China for #PromoteUK with @ad_association and @tradegovuk, hosting our ‘Going Global’ Brand Forum at #SHIAF to facilitate collaboration between the UK and China agencies and brands. pic.twitter.com/2Y5VQo3dam
— IPA (Institute of Practitioners in Advertising) (@The_IPA) March 7, 2019
As Promote UK gears up to put the lessons learned from the Advertising Association’s first ever Exports Report into practice, missions like the one to SHIAF are ever more vital. The UK has a huge opportunity to market its expertise and creative excellence on the world stage. Woodford said:
“For the AA, DIT and the IPA, who’s PromoteUK collaboration marks its first anniversary in March, this was the biggest trade delegation so far and kicked off the AA’s first-ever ‘Export Month’. As well as the SHIAF mission, AA and IPA members are heading for SXSW in Austin, Texas, to host a UK advertising day and a delegation of the UK’s leading production companies head to Japan, organised by the APA (the Advertising Producer’s Association) On 19th March, the AA and IPA hold a Leadership breakfast as part of Adweek Europe, to launch the first annual report on the export performance of the UK industry, along with a survey on how the Brexit process is impacting on export growth.
“With a stellar growth of +35% in 2016, UK advertising achieved the strongest performance, not only of the creative industries but of all Britain’s major services sectors, reaching £5.8 billion. “
A gallery of photographs from the trip can be found below.
