North Lancashire Men’s Health Campaign

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NHS North Lancashire has appointed Perfect Circle to deliver their InnovateNow Circulatory disease and bowel cancer campaign. Large parts of the population of the North west of England suffer health inequalities, with more men dying from cancer and coronary heart disease than anywhere else in England

Through the campaign NHS North Lancashire will proactively raise awareness of bowel cancer and circulatory disease in specific target populations, to help individuals seek early treatment and ensure the whole population of the North West can access health services regardless of their circumstances.

The funding for the campaign is drawn from the InnovateNow awards for enabling change. The campaign will include the development of a brand identity that will act as a focal point , this will be supported by a campaign branded outreach bus to engage health professionals with the target audience in the workplace and other appropriate venues.

The Perfect Circle team is excited about the project and intends to help improve the health provision in the North West by delivering a first class campaign.

Football Club at Heart of Health Campaign

Telford and Wrekin Council have commissioned the Perfect Circle team to develop a men’s health campaign targeted at 30 to 74 year old males.

Perfect Circle will apply its social marketing expertise to establish a brand, integrate supporting campaign activities and develop a set of communication tools to deliver an increase in the number of health checks taken and a greater awareness of the importance of leading a healthy life.

The whole Perfect Circle team is really excited about this new campaign, which will be centred around Telford Football Club to encourage an increase in mens health checks and an improvement to the lives of middle aged men in the Telford and Wrekin region.

Education Marketing Site Launch Jan 2011

As the UK’s leading education marketing specialist with over 15 years experience serving the education sector, we have built our reputation on getting results for schools, colleges and academies across the UK and have developed proven methodologies to achieve this.

To enable our education clients to get the dedicated information that they require and need, Perfect Circle will be launching Perfect Education in January 2011.  This innovative new website will feature information specific to the education sector and its primary objective will be to provide schools, colleges and academies with information about how they can grow their rolls. 

With a dedicated TV channel that will broadcast Hi definition content and access to free reports on growing schools, colleges and academies, Perfect Education will reinforce Perfect Circle’s positioning as the UK’s leading Education marketing specialists.

If you would like to discuss any education marketing requirements that you may have then you can request a call back or call us on 01706 373440 or visit Perfect Education.

Independent school issues all students with iPads

A Scottish independent Christian school has opted to educate its pupils by ditching paper and pens and instead issuing the children with iPads.

Students at the Cedars School of Excellence in Greenock, Scotland will learn using Apple’s tablet PC, at a cost of about £14.50 per user per month.

Head of computing and IT co-ordinator Fraser Speirs said the move began as an exercise that the private school carried out in January 2010.

“Up until then we had used iMacs in the computing lab, then we moved to laptops, which could be used in other classes outside of IT,” he said.

“These laptops were booked constantly and the students couldn’t get enough of them for the things they wanted to do.”

So Speirs decided that the iPod Touch could be a solution to this demand from classes as it is relatively cheap and gives children access to the web.

“However, there were a few problems with it: it didn’t have a word processor that was suitable, you couldn’t put a keyboard on it and we couldn’t connect it to a projector.”

About a month after that exercise, Apple launched the iPad.

“It resolved all the problems we were having with the iPod Touch and many more besides,” said Speirs. “We realised this was the ideal thing we were looking for.”

Speirs explained that the major challenge in rolling out iPads was adherence to Apple’s terms and conditions. The terms of Apple’s App Store meant that the school could only have five desktop computers synchronising with each App store account. But it could have a reasonable number of iPads synchronising with each desktop computer.

“So we developed a system whereby each form group would have a desktop computer and that form’s iPads would synch to that one computer.

“This allowed us to buy an app from the desktops and move it onto the iPads. Those intricacies were the most difficult thing we encountered,” he added.

Speirs revealed that owing to the popularity of the iPad, the school was not able to obtain much of a discount and had to pay close to retail price. It is currently on a rolling three-year lease.

“When you look at the amount we spend on education, £14.50 per month per pupil regardless of how many classes we take, it is quite affordable really,” said Speirs.

He said that the results have already been quite dramatic. Student engagement has vastly improved, but working out how it affects attainment will take some time.

“Even though we’re not teaching new subjects – we’re teaching the same material – but we’re teaching it in a new way.

“It strikes me that it just makes sense to the kids. They deal with information electronically and so we’re doing things in a way that suits them. We find kids are engaged for so much longer than they were with just pencil and paper – it’s remarkable,” he added.

Should you be interesting in learning more about maxmising the use of iPads in schools, or develop apps then click here, send us an e-mail or simply drop us a line on the usual number 01706 373440.

3G Apps in mHealth targeting Mental Health

Tomorrow’s online experiences have expanded beyond the traditional, browser-based portals to include social media and then expanded again to included the latest mobile devices.

The 3G network has enabled mobile applications to capture the imagination of many and created unprecedented excitement across many industries. The numbers are amazing; with 2.5
billion apps available to download in 2009 and 4.5 billion apps expected to be available to download in 2010.

One area of opportunity is Mobile health or mHealth. This is the use of IT and mobile telecommunications to monitor patients remotely, and could help governments, healthcare providers and healthcare commisioners reduce costs related to chronic diseases and improve the quality of life of their patients. mHealth applications include the use of mobile devices in collecting community and clinical health data, delivery of healthcare information to practitioners, researchers, and patients, real-time monitoring of patient vital signs, and direct provision of care via mobile telemedicine.

Following on from the IAPT communications campaign, Perfect Circle is working with a group of leading nationally recognised academic professionals within Psychology, Mental Health and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy to develop a range of 3G apps that will help those suffering from mental health issues.

Generating iPhone apps that will grow your business

Perfect Circle’s experience demonstrates that the most powerful and effective creative mechanics are drawn from an indepth understanding of our customer’s business combined with a proven process that delivers results.

Our Ideation™ Workshop helps your sales and marketing team explore the opportunities that an app will bring to your business.  Perfect Circle will facilitate the workshop to ensure that together we have designed the killer app for your market.

The Ideation™Workshop includes:

- Clear analysis of all appropriate App-Live™ communication channels.

- Facilitation and guidance on the most effective customer acquisition mechanisms to incorporate into your app.

- A complete idea audit to provide an agreed specification for an application, together with Ideation-maps for the top three applications.

The above is delivered in hard copy for your team to review.

Should you be interesting in learning more about apps the read our news, send us an .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)or simply drop us a line on the usual number 01706 373440.

Make sure your customers find you!

Hungry, lost or need a bed for the night? We’ve all been there, but this should no longer be a problem with location based apps. These handy apps make finding locations, products, services…and late night kebabs simple.

There are hundreds of location apps available to download and many of them are free, the Tesco Finder app shows you their 24-hour supermarkets in your area when you’ve run out of nappies, the myStarbucks app locates their nearest store when you’re craving a latte or meeting a friend. The AA Britain app not only provides their maps, but also lets you book hotels and recommends places to eat, whereever you are at in the UK.

So have you thought about utilizing location based apps to your drive sales and raise brand awareness? Well with over 3 billion app downloads to date, it would seem that is plenty of demand.

To find out more on how we can make your business visible to the 3G generation contact us at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

App watch: here comes the summer

This month we’re focusing on apps that will help you get the best out of your summer!

Argos - need a new BBQ or HD TV? This app gives you access to over 25,000 products at your local store, all the latest prices and stock availability; choose and reserve and never queue again!

The FA – keep in touch with the England team, with all the latest news from the World Cup camp with videos, news, fixtures and stats. There’s now less than 2 weeks to go - come on England!!

Clarityn – hayfever sufferers no longer need to suffer this summer with this free app which gives you a personalised pollen forecast wherever you are in the UK and tips on how to manage symptoms.

RHS - this app helps you to choose and grow your own fruit and vegetables, however much time or space you have.  So if you want get green fingers but only have room for a growbag, this app can have you growing your way to your five a day.

The Met Office - is this summer going to be a barbeque summer or yet another washout? This free app gives you 5 day national or local weather forecasts; allowing you plan ahead whether you’re going to need Factor 15 tomorrow or wellies, or both!

TripAdvisor Hotels Flights Restaurants - still undecided where to go or what to do this summer? This app can help you find flights and hotel reviews to plan your next holiday. With access to 35 million reviews and opinions from the world’s most trusted travel site.

To learn how an app can help your business communicate with potentially millions of new customers then .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) us or call 01706 373440.