How uplifting it is to read positive success stories in the Yorkshire Post’s special supplement recognising the achievements of the region’s vibrant PR and advertising companies.

Our client ICM Creative Communications is showing above average growth in an industry in which fees increased on average at 9.8 in 2008 compared with an 8.5 hike in 2007. Quest PR, which will have grown by 25 per cent by our year this December, featured prominently in the supplement with the below article.

From the Yorkshire Post:

Quest PR: An ethos of success

Since launching Quest Public Relations in 2001, MD Sharon Cain, a former Sky TV and BBC reporter, has built a business with an enviable reputation.

Growing at an average of 25-30 per cent year-on-year, the agency has established itself as a leading practitioner of business-to-business PR, media training, corporate communications and new media.

Quest’s client portfolio spans multi-nationals such as aeronautical giant the Goodrich Corporation, some of the region’s leading SME’s, and not-for-profit organisations including The Institute of Export and International Trade.

Built on a platform of quality and accountability, Quest has operated out of bespoke offices in Harrogate’s Cardale Park since 2006. It has scooped a host of awards including the unique honour of being the only UK PR agency to win the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) ‘Best Small Team’ accolade for three consecutive years.

Continuing this rich vein of acclaim, the agency is also in the running for two CIPR regional awards this month. The business has made the ‘Best Use of New Media’ shortlist and Quest account manger, Nick Pickles, is one of three finalists in the ‘Outstanding Young Communicator’ category.

Quest’s clients are also triumphing on the awards platform, with the agency’s submissions helping to secure gongs in the Yorkshire Post Business Excellence awards and the Institute of Director’s recent Yorkshire and Humber ceremony.

Cain’s founding vision of a PR agency that ‘goes beyond the ordinary’ is being transformed into reality. Quest boasts a high-performing team of experienced practitioners and former journalists that thrive on the newsroom ‘buzz,’ possess commercial acumen - and deliver real, tangible benefits to clients. Quest is just one of a handful of UK PR agencies which guarantees clients coverage up-front in their target media.

“Our growth has been underpinned by demonstrating time and again how highly-tactical, focused PR can make a real difference to the bottom line, attract the best employees, and position organisations as authoritative commentators in their fields,” said Cain.   

“We align PR to clients’ business plans and deliver the recognition and profiling which accelerates their goals. As a growing SME we can relate to the challenges and pressures facing expanding businesses.”

This assertion is backed up by clients, some of whom have been with the agency since 2002. Lesley Batchelor, chair of the Institute of Export and International Trade, said: “The Quest team are a delight to work with and add significant value to me and the organisation. They approach everything with energy, passion and creative thinking.”

Underpinning Quest’s practices is a commitment to corporate social responsibility and transparency, which has seen the agency play a pioneering role in creating what is believed to be the UK’s first one-stop shop for CSR services.

The CSR Consortium was established in November 2007, bringing together 21 businesses across the North East to provide strategic and tactical expertise across the full range of corporate social responsibility issues.

In addition to this commitment, the team has also donated more than 80 days pro-bono PR support to good causes including children’s cancer charity Candlelighters, Cancer Research, and Henshaws Yorkshire, Society for Blind People in recent years.

In 2008 the team provided media relations to WalkTalk, a major project spearheaded by 7/7 survivor Gill Hicks, who lost both her legs in the bombing, and her husband Joe Kerr - to bring disparate communities together between Leeds and London.

A strong advocate of supporting female entrepreneurs, Cain has worked with Forward Ladies inspirational dynamo Etta Cohen to launch a series of pro-bono Female Emerging Entrepreneurs (FEE) development groups for owner managed businesses. The MD has facilitated her own group since November 2007 and is one of Yorkshire Forward’s 100 Female Ambassadors.  

Billing itself as ‘the home of good journalism’ the agency has also attracted staff from multi-office national PR agencies, enhancing its expertise in key areas including new media and crisis communications.

Its journalistic creditionals are equally impressive. In addition to Cain’s 13 years’ journalistic expertise, the Quest team boasts former journalists from the Sunday Telegraph, Vogue and Yorkshire Post newspapers.

Additional milestones in a formative year include Quest PR achieving the Investor in People accreditation - an accolade the team shared with its clients and partners at a celebration event at which entrepreneur Deirdre Bounds, founder of i-to-i volunteer travel, presented Quest with the IiP plaque.  

Said Ms Bounds, a speaker and mentor who sold her company to First Choice last year: “The recent successes including achieving Investor in People is well deserved and testimony to the team’s energy, passion and commitment to always excel and to go that extra mile - and beyond.” 

Confident of continuing to attract the best staff and poised for more significant growth, Quest PR powers into 2009 with dynamic plans for growth and further expansion through a potent combination of organic growth and acquisition.