The Swiss Association for Internal Communication (SVIK) is holding its third national conference on "Successful Internal Communication: Effective Use of Instruments". The event will take place on May 14, 2009 from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. in the auditorium of the HWZ Hochschule für Wirtschaft in Zurich.
The speakers are Andreas Schönenberger (Country Manager Google Switzerland), Pascal Lorenzini (Head of Internal Communications Swiss Post), Leila Summa (New Media Expert), Markus Gerber (Head of Communications Holcim Switzerland), Harry Graf (Head of Corporate Communications at EWZ) and Martin Nellen (Head of Corporate Communications and Brand Management Helvetia Insurance).
The conference also offers participants the opportunity to discuss the design, implementation and use of current internal communication tools in four breakout sessions.
The price for conference participation including aperitif and documentation is CHF 340. The complete event program and registration at www.svik.ch.

The digital marketing agency Orange 8 Interactive is starting 2009 with four new employees in the areas of performance marketing and IT consulting. A total of 36 people are now working for the agency in Biel and Zurich, as announced on Wednesday.
Manja Pfeiffer will be working as Senior Account Manager of the Performance Marketing business unit in Zurich. Among other things, she is responsible for customer acquisition and support. The media management graduate gained experience as a web marketing specialist at fashion mail order company Charles Tyrwhitt and as an account manager at Tradedoubler (Switzerland).
Lukas Jung works as a consultant and project manager at Orange 8 Interactive in Biel. He studied media and communication sciences at the University of Fribourg and earned his spurs as a planner and copywriter at an advertising agency. For the last three years, he was responsible for internal and external communication at Yellowworld. Simon Zryd is also a media and communication scientist from Fribourg and will be joining the agency as a project manager. Finally, Marc Pietronigro supports the IT department. He is a newly qualified IT engineer specializing in security.

The Zurich advertising agency Hochspannung has created a new advertising campaign for the Langhart painting business. The subject shows an art-loving couple walking through a gallery who are more interested in the paintings on the walls than the works of art. The slogan: "No question, a real Langhart."
The aim of the campaign is simply to publicize the Langhart painting business. The motif will be used as an advertisement in art and culture magazines and on flyers. It was photographed by Marc Straumann.
Responsible at the Langhart painting business: Wolfgang Potocnik. Responsible at the advertising agency Hochspannung: Matthew Katumba, Alex Taiganidis, Tom Fäh, Marco Huber, Stefanie Fricker, Andrea Bruggmann. Photographer: Marc Straumann.

No Feeding Allowed
It’s common knowledge that advertising can sometimes be a bit like a zoo. For example, advertising messages are often pinned to the fur and antlers of bears and deer—animals otherwise known for their ferocity. That’s because these little creatures are simply a hit with consumers. This is confirmed by a survey conducted by the Nuremberg-based market research firm Konzept & Analyse. Bears are the most popular, led by the brown teddy bear from the Bärenmarke commercials—even though it remains unclear to this day what bears actually have to do with coffee cream. And what about toilet paper? Never mind. The Charmin bear, introduced as recently as 2000, follows its fellow bear in second place on the podium of the most popular advertising animals. «Moo,» says the purple Milka cow, sneaking into third place. Although she passed her peak long ago, she’s still a welcome sight. Lurchi’s time, on the other hand, seems to have run out: the shoe-wearing salamander had its heyday from the 1950s through the 1970s. TV viewers are fed up with monkeys. The Trigema chimpanzee takes the “loser coconut” title. And the humor—ranging from corny to crass—of Jägermeister’s “Eighteeners,” Rudi and Ralph, is now getting on most people’s nerves as well.

A Big Step
Werbeanstalt Schweiz has completed its first projects for its new client from Germany—Sandoz International. The visual, which is used in advertisements and brochures in both English and German, clearly highlights the fact that Sandoz is a pioneer and trailblazer in the field of biosimilars. The confident headline «One small step for us, but one giant leap for mankind» complements the image and echoes Neil Armstrong’s words from 1969. Biosimilars are so-called follow-on products of existing biopharmaceuticals, and their importance is growing worldwide: Currently, more than one-third of all drugs in development are biotechnology-based.

Freelancer Portal Now Features a Marketplace
According to Managing Director Monica Miraldi, more than 80 percent of the approximately 40 advertisers listed on Freelancerportal.ch have already received specific job inquiries—and have thus more than recouped their annual membership fee. Anyone who signs up for a new one-year membership by the end of January will receive the first two months free of charge. Starting immediately, the portal—which is also supported by Werbewoche—now features a marketplace where users can search for and find spaces, furniture, or other items. In addition, the existing option for a full profile—including a resume, schedule, and work samples, which is particularly appealing to creative professionals—is now supplemented by a “Light” version. This is especially suitable for freelancers who cannot or do not wish to showcase their work—such as consultants. A one-year membership costs 350 francs.

Shop Without Leaving a Trace
Consumers have power. And consumers bear responsibility. Every purchasing decision they make has consequences for people, animals, and nature: Those who fill their shopping carts in a sustainable and environmentally conscious way are doing good. Those who shop thoughtlessly can leave a deep ecological footprint. But how do you consume responsibly? How do you shop sustainably? The best place to do so is at Coop—that’s the message from Krieg, Schlupp, Bürge/Springer & Jacoby. Coop has been committed to sustainability, ecology, and ethics for many years, as the new campaign once again reminds us. Featuring a total of four designs, the campaign has been appearing since December in all Sunday newspapers as well as in daily and weekly publications.

Corporate Films, a division of Condor specializing in image and product films, was able to secure the first two places at the New York Festivals. The product film "Book of Dreams" for the Schaffhausen watch manufacturer IWC won gold, while silver was awarded to the fast-paced and action-packed film "Panther Command im Einsatz" for the armaments group Ruag Electronics. This is the first time in its 61-year history that the company has won both gold and silver at the prestigious festival.

As Media Focus announced on Wednesday, the Swiss advertising market grew slightly overall in 2008 thanks to good results at the beginning of the year. Advertising pressure increased by 2.6 percent to 3.95 billion Swiss francs. The advertising and media research company announced on Wednesday that this puts 2008 in the middle of the 10-year analysis. Advertising pressure was recorded in the print, television, radio, poster, cinema, teletext and Internet sectors.
However, December brought a decline of 1.1%. However, there were no clear signs of the recession spilling over into the advertising industry. With the third consecutive month of decline, television could be identified as the first victim of dwindling advertising budgets.
For the year as a whole, cinemas lost the most ground with a drop of 10%. The three biggest advertisers in the last month of the year were Coop, Migros and L'Oréal.

The Basler Zeitung is cutting 22.5 jobs, BZM announced last week. This means that a fifth of the editorial staff will be cut. According to Editor-in-Chief Matthias Geering, readers will therefore receive around 14 percent less content: the daily size of the jacket section will be reduced by four to five pages, and the eight-page weekend supplement will be discontinued from March. Production will also be reduced, even though BaZ has just been named "Europe's most beautiful newspaper". The paper Miss Europe is cutting back on make-up. Compromises have to be made, says Geering.
With around 83 new full-time positions and a budget of around 20 million francs, the BaZ editorial team has a similar budget to four years ago when the new concept was launched. The editorial upgrade to 105 full-time positions only took place in 2006, when the Basellandschaftliche Zeitung (bz) joined the Mittelland Zeitung (MZ). So has the decline in advertising, particularly in the job sector, put an end to the "newspaper war" in WG 31? "No," says publisher Matthias Hagemann, "because we are only marginally reducing staff in the regional section." And in future, the jacket section will also be better than that of MZ, which is also cutting jobs. The large circulation (90,000 copies), which has been distributed in the bz core area since the BaZ offensive, will also remain untouched. "We earn good money with it," says Hagemann. He also does not want the discontinuation of the weekend supplement to be interpreted as a retreat. It was indeed a response to the MZ's Sunday. "But because BaZ doesn't feel any disadvantages as a result, we can take this measure." Geering also emphasizes that the editorial cutbacks are primarily taking place where competition from free media is toughest. According to Geering, however, money can still be charged for good regional information in the future.
However, BZM is also cutting back elsewhere. In the last six months, it has already cut around twenty jobs - at Radio Basel 1 and BZM Online, for example. "We are making savings everywhere, but we are deliberately not making cuts in the editorial department first," says Hagemann.
On the other hand, an expansion of the BZM Board of Directors has been announced: Publi Group CFO Andreas Schmidt has resigned, while the previous six-member board has been increased to eight members. New members include Sam Keller, Director of the Fondation Beyeler, lawyer Niklaus R. Gadient and Ulrich H. Moser, member of the Board of Directors of Rivella and the media agency Mediaxis. It is worth noting that the direct personal ties with PubliGroupe, which holds 37% of BZM, are a thing of the past. Although Moser and Gadient were proposed by Lausanne, "as far as I know, they are not on the payroll there", says Hagemann. This is important, "because a Board of Directors must, for example, fully support our own management". In this respect, however, the previous P-representatives had found themselves in a conflict of interest that was consistently objected to by the majority shareholder. With the new composition, Hagemann hopes that the relationship with P can be normalized - at least at BoD level. At operational level, on the other hand, he is once again seeing "clear signals to the contrary" from P. These include, for example, the new value-added tool that Publicitas Basel has been offering since the beginning of the year (see WW 1/09): a credit of one percent on the advertising volume that local customers book in BZM titles but via P Basel. Hagemann classifies this P tool as an "unfair scheme" and as "exploitation of a dominant market position". It is a disguised account bonification. BZM will react "appropriately". Hagemann was also annoyed that Publicitas CEO Robert Schmidli accused BZM of price dumping at the Dreikönigstagung. In the past, P Basel had made several alleged tariff violations, which BZM had been able to refute. "Schmidli's accusations are nothing more than an excuse for his own misconduct," says Hagemann.

Markus Knöpfli

(Caption: Publisher Matthias Hagemann)

The full version of Snowfriends.ch has been online since December 20, to the delight of a number of bloggers who write about their passion for snow every day. "We wanted to create a website where skiers, snowboarders, cross-country skiers and sledgers of all ages can give each other tips and share pictures and contacts," explains Tom Hauk (41), Head of Brand Communications at Swisscom and an enthusiastic skier himself. Swisscom has been the main sponsor of Swiss-Ski for Swiss skiing since 2001. Now the company is offering amateur snow sports enthusiasts an information and discussion forum - and in doing so is subtly thawing its image as a cold communications service provider. The website states: "As a Swiss company, Swisscom feels connected to Swiss traditions and our culture. That's why we support winter sports enthusiasts young and old." Snowfriends.ch is intended to underline the credibility of this commitment.
The site mainly offers blogs where registered users can discuss Swiss ski resorts: Where are the best rösti with egg? Where are the best parties? Which freestyle park is the coolest? Snow freaks can also vote on which is the coziest mountain pub or where sledging is the most fun. The forum is supplemented by photos from the ski resorts, betting games, the (paid) mobile game "Ski Challence Mobile", weather and piste reports, event calendars and background information on the Swiss Ski National Team. Cuche, Gut and Co. also write articles on Snowfriends.ch themselves and give insider tips for the Swiss ski resorts in interviews and videos.
Snow fans among themselves
Every user can create a Facebook-style profile with a photo or an avatar that is given their own face via a photomontage. The profile is supplemented by personal data such as favorite ski resort, favorite food in the mountains and e-mail address. Anyone who wants to can also enter their telephone number, which can prove to be very practical: "Our users are already using Snowfriends.ch for things that we haven't even implemented yet," says Caspar Coppetti (33), Chief Strategy Officer at Advico Young & Rubicam and responsible for the website. "For example, they arrange to meet by e-mail or cell phone and go skiing together." Swisscom has already achieved its first milestone: spreading the joy of snow sports.
Of all the offerings, the blogs run best. They are neither moderated nor edited. "That's a risk, of course," says Tom Hauk. "But we wanted to take the risk. Because if a website is recognizably controlled by the provider, the motivation of users to get involved decreases. Snowfriends.ch is designed by the users themselves." The courage seems to be paying off: So far, no undesirable content has had to be deleted. And if a clever tourism association posts an overly promotional blog entry, it is immediately punished by attentive users. The community controls itself.
Ad-free fun
The website is free of advertising banners and logos, and Swisscom has dispensed with flashing incentives to buy. Only the reference to the iPhone 3G as a competition prize on the homepage gives the user an idea that the red and blue communications service provider is behind the offer. However, anyone interested in finding out who is responsible for the website will quickly find out in the second navigation level, on the "Respect" and "FAQ" subpages.
The live launch of the website was also advertised cautiously: stickers on chairlift safety bars, posters in the ski resorts and online advertising were the first steps. "We've held back on branding so far," says Caspar Coppetti. "Because the site is an experiment and we first wanted to see if it works. Now we can promote the community in a targeted way." Last weekend, Coppetti, Hauk and their team got the advertising drum beating in Wengen. Large-format posters at lift stations, information stands, a Snowfriends corner and an autograph session with the athletes of the Ski Nation flanked their promotion. And a merchandising set consisting of a hat, scarf and gloves will soon be available to order via the website.
The rating stickers also guarantee attention: "Recommended by Snowfriends.ch" and "Snowfriends.ch advises against". "With these stickers, our members can now also give ratings offline, for example for pubs, lifts and slopes," explains Caspar Coppetti. "Simply stick them on site and you're done." It remains to be seen how much fun lift operators and innkeepers will have with this form of voting. And what comes in summer? "Good question," laughs Tom Hauk. "But we're not revealing that yet! What is certain is that the site will continue." Snowfriends can look forward to it.

Anne-Friederike Wilhelm

The users of Snowfriends.ch were eager to share: within four weeks, they wrote 310 blog posts and uploaded 1457 pictures.

Swisscom has not linked its online community with Bluewin.ch. In combination with the rigid news portal, Snowfriends.ch could not have developed such power.

Snowfriends.ch is advertised with large posters and stickers on the safety bars of chairlifts.

The publishing company Punkt ch AG will take over the former company Media Punkt AG and its business operations. The publishers announced this in a press release on Tuesday. The major shareholders will remain the same. The new board of directors consists of members from the predecessor company: Ernst Buob as chairman, as well as Michael Grabner, Andy Rihs, and Eugen A. Russ.
In connection with the relaunch of .ch in October, the company has now also decided to make a fresh start with the operating company, said Board Chairman Ernst Buob in response to a question from the SDA. At that time, newspaper founder Sacha Wigdorovits had stepped down from the company. At the time of the relaunch, the shareholders had planned to increase the share capital of the old company from 10 to 18 million Swiss francs. However, this plan fell through due to investor opposition, Buob said. The new company has a share capital of only 5 million Swiss francs.
The remaining funds needed would be provided by the shareholders in the form of loans. However, Buob declined to provide further details on this matter. According to the company, the relaunch of the publication has been successful so far. In November, readership figures rose to over 300,000. According to the WEMF media analysis, .ch reached an average readership of 204,000 in the first six months of 2008.
Since its relaunch in the fall, the commuter newspaper has been available in approximately 2,000 newspaper boxes on public property in several Swiss cities. The previous door-to-door delivery service was deemed a failure at the time and was replaced by the new distribution method.

The dispute over the move from Berlin to Munich has escalated at German private broadcaster Sat. 1: The employees of Pro Sieben Sat. 1 responded to the call for a strike by the DJV and Verdi unions and stopped work at 12 noon on Tuesday. The strike is to last until midnight on Wednesday.
With their strike, the employees want to increase the pressure on the Group's management in the dispute over the redundancy plan. The dispute is about the conditions of Sat. 1's move from Berlin to Munich and a possible social plan. According to the German industry service Horizont, the works council of Pro Sieben Sat.1 has so far rejected this.
According to the union, the staff's central demand is the conclusion of a social collective agreement, in which the financial conditions are regulated both for departing employees who cannot move to Munich and for those who are offered a new job. In addition, more jobs are to be retained in Berlin. This is to be ensured by a multi-year employment guarantee.
According to Sat. 1, broadcasting operations are not at risk overall despite the strike. The broadcaster only reported that there could be bottlenecks in the presented programs "Sat. 1 Magazin" and "Sat. 1 Frühstücksfernsehen".

The newly licensed Winterthur local station Radio Stadtfilter will go on air at midnight on March 6. The station will report in detail on cultural and political life in Winterthur, according to a press release issued by the radio station on Tuesday. In addition, a substantial, non-commercial music program will be broadcast around the clock.
It can be received in the Winterthur area via FM on 96.3 MHz, cable and Internet. Radio Stadtfilter received its license last summer. It is operated by the Radio Stadtfilter association. It now has around 400 members.

Publica Data has published the audience figures for the second half of 2008. Compared to the previous year, the Swiss radio market is relatively stable. In German-speaking Switzerland, around 90 percent of people over the age of 15 listen to the radio every day.
In French-speaking Switzerland and Ticino, the figure is just under 88%, with the medium increasing its listener minutes in all Swiss language regions. The biggest increase in usage per listener was in German-speaking Switzerland. Compared to the previous semester, a radio listener there listens to the radio 7 minutes longer - a total of over 2 hours per day.
Foreign radio stations have lost reach in all Swiss language regions.