MD3025 Extension of the Central Marketing Budget 2022-23

1.1.    The GLA has a duty to keep Londoners informed about and engaged in the work of the Mayor and the London Assembly. This includes making Londoners aware of the Mayor’s statutory responsibilities so that they may respond to statutory consultations or attend statutory events, such as People’s Question Time with the Mayor and the London Assembly. This also includes making Londoners aware of wider opportunities that stem from the Mayor’s work, including cultural events, programmes and services across the capital. 

1.2.    The GLA’s centralised marketing, planning and budgeting process – introduced in 2017 to bring us in line with Government best practice – allows the GLA to plan resource requirements, and communicate the work and priorities of the Mayor of London and the London Assembly, in an integrated, cost-effective and impactful way. It supports the ambition to engage in a better dialogue with Londoners, and to ensure that the GLA is responsive to their needs. The Central Marketing Budget allocates funding to cover all public information campaign-related activity, including any external costs for creative development, print, production and media-buying.

1.3.    The Central Marketing Budget is also used to promote the policies, programmes, events and activities of the Mayor of London and the London Assembly, enabling Londoners to better understand and engage with the work of City Hall. 

1.4.    In addition to this core work, the need to align communications activity to the pandemic recovery priorities, alongside new programmes focused on that recovery, will also drive new and additional campaign activity that will need to be supported by the Central Marketing Budget. 

1.5.    This covers a broad spectrum of public engagement related activity, including strategy; research; creative services; advertising; digital; print and production; content production; and tools and services required to deliver the work of the Marketing Campaigns team and the Digital Communications team.

1.6.    This work includes, but is not limited to, the following: 

• media planning and buying, including print and digital advertising, social media, and paid search strategies
• printing, distribution and production costs associated with using TfL advertising space
• media agency strategy and auditing fees 
• user research and testing (qualitative and quantitative research)
• content production including a range of creative and digital assets, such as social media content
• video and photography, including production tools, filming and editing services, and livestreaming
• email marketing, including strategy, tools and assets
• creative agency and freelance requirements
• strategic work to maximise the impact of marketing campaigns and digital communications.

1.7.    The GLA’s Marketing Campaigns, Digital Communications, Creative, Digital and Press teams are collectively responsible for communicating and engaging with Londoners about the work and priorities of the Mayor of London and the London Assembly. This is in addition to the delivery of all integrated communications on priority public health issues resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. The teams work alongside all the organisation’s departments that require marketing and public-facing communications support. They collaboratively provide a strategic consultation service as well as campaign management, as required. The teams also work closely with TfL and other functional bodies on significant campaigns to maximise impact and ensure value for money.

1.8.    If approved, this Mayoral Decision delegates decisions on the allocation of funding between the various public information campaigns and activities to the Assistant Director, External Relations, in consultation with the Mayoral Director, Communications, without the need for further individual Decision Forms. 

1.9.    This decision also approves the GLA’s seeking, receipt and expenditure of additional sponsorship from suitable corporate partners for the activities of the GLA Marketing, Creative and Digital teams, in accordance with the Contracts and Funding Code and sponsorship policy, bringing both direct and indirect financial contributions and in-kind support to support their activities. This will be determined based on campaign or project objectives.

1.10.    Since its introduction in 2017, the centralised marketing, planning and budgeting process has enabled the Marketing Campaigns and Digital Communications teams to work more strategically; avoid duplication across the GLA; communicate with greater impact; and deliver better-integrated campaigns that promote and engage Londoners in the work of the Mayor of London and the London Assembly. 

1.11.    Currently, the Central Marketing Budget (£700k) has planned campaigns to deliver across the key strategic priorities for Londoners. This is driven by polling data that shows us what issues are most important to Londoners. This includes campaigns around making London safer (including delivery on violence affecting young people and violence against women and girls); making London greener (including the climate crisis, air pollution and ULEZ); making London fairer (including campaigns on rough sleeping and homelessness); and making London prosper (including jobs and skills campaigns to help drive a strong economic recovery). 

1.12.    Given the importance of these issues – in particular the issue of crime, which insights consistently tell us is the number-one priority for Londoners – there is no scope to reduce the spend on these campaigns to facilitate additional campaigns. The additional £300k is to support the emerging communication needs driven by the cost-of-living crisis. This will include engaging London’s most vulnerable communities – who are often the hardest to reach through other, more traditional channels – resulting in a clear need to invest in specialist targeted paid media, which is often more expensive than traditional channels. This is to engage them with critical communications when experiencing the impact of the current financial situation. Data also shows a need for translated communications in this space to ensure all of London’s most vulnerable communities are engaged and supported with the information they need. 

1.13.     An additional £40k in 2022-23 is required to cover staffing costs in the Marketing and Digital Communications teams to deliver the additional campaign work.

These include:

• a Senior Marketing Campaign Lead (grade 8) to manage and lead delivery on housing, cost of living and homelessness
• a Senior Paid Media Strategist (Grade 8) to add capacity to our test-and-learn digital advertising operation (we have only one person at present, and they are beyond maximum capacity). This function was previously outsourced, costing significantly more money.
• a Digital Designer (Grade 6) to produce digital advertising and organic content for the additional campaigns; the Digital Designer will also focus on rapid-response content production to further communicate other key mayoral priorities, e.g. delivery. 

1.14.    It is assumed these roles will be recruited on a two-year fixed-term contract basis, three months to the end of this financial year (expected start date January 2023, at a cost of £40k as set out in 1.13 above); £160,000 in the next 2023-24 financial year; and £120,000 in the 2024-25 financial year (nine months of 2024-25 to December 2024). Parallel approval through the GLA Establishment Control process will also be required for these additional GLA officers.

2.1.    A centralised marketing budget has proven successful. As such, the GLA intends to continue this way of working, given it is also best practice in government. Objectives and benefits of the Central Marketing Budget include:

• strategic annual planning, and a coordinated and holistic view of how the GLA communicates to Londoners
• full accountability and transparency over spend on public information campaigns
• better value for money for Londoners – for example, visibility of annual budgets has helped to achieve cost savings
• more efficient and effective use of the GLA’s gifted ‘on-system’ inventory from TfL – approximate value, £2m per annum
• more concise budget control, enabling the GLA’s Marketing Campaigns and Digital Communications teams to work with an agile approach, and to respond quickly to external factors and changing priorities
• greater efficiency within the finance and procurement processes.

3.1.    Under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010, as a public authority the Mayor is subject to a public sector equality duty and must have ‘due regard’ to the need to:

• eliminate discrimination, harassment and victimisation
• advance equality of opportunity between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and those who do not
• foster good relations between people who share a protected characteristic and those who do not. 

The duty involves having appropriate regard to these matters as they apply in the circumstances, including having regard to the need to: remove or minimise any disadvantage suffered by those who share a protected characteristic or are connected to a protected characteristic; take steps to meet the different needs of such people; and encourage them to participate in public life or in any other activity where their participation is disproportionately low. This can involve treating people with a protected characteristic more favourably than those without a protected characteristic. Relevant protected characteristics under section 149 of the Equality Act are age, disability, gender reassignment, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, and sexual orientation. 

3.2.    The development of all GLA  campaigns includes consideration of their target audiences. In every case, materials are assessed to ensure they are fully accessible and in line with the public sector equality duty. The GLA will ensure that marketing materials reflect the diversity of London’s population. Staff are trained to recognise and compensate for their own unconscious bias, and communications are governed by brand guidelines that require us to show a truly representative London – reflecting the city’s diversity. The guidelines also ensure that messages are simple and easy to understand with no jargon, ensuring that our campaigns are accessible. Our owned channels are also fully compliant with best practice on accessibility. 

Key risks and issues

4.1.    The GLA’s centralised marketing, planning and budgeting process, introduced in 2017-18, has led to significant improvements in the GLA’s marketing and digital communications function. This includes working more strategically and efficiently, and with agility, which enables the Marketing Campaigns and Digital Communications teams to respond quickly to external events and changing priorities. 

4.2.    This process has the following key benefits:

• Streamlined messaging, ensuring we are not communicating to the same audience in an uncoordinated way. Rather than communicating with the same (highly engaged) audience, this approach enables us to reach a greater breadth of Londoners, ensuring different audiences can engage with the messages that are most relevant to them. This is particularly important within the lens of cost-of-living messaging, to ensure the most vulnerable audiences are engaged with critical information to avoid further disproportionate impact resulting from the crisis. This is in addition to the need to ensure diverse audiences are reached and engaged with, to deliver holistic success. 
• Improved digital communications to ensure we are reaching Londoners effectively online, with appropriate content. 
• Maximising the effectiveness of the marketing and digital resources to ensure we respond quickly to external factors and changing priorities.
• Delivering better value for money for Londoners – for example, annual licences for tools as well as paid search strategies for London.gov.uk.

4.3.    The GLA’s marketing campaigns and digital communications function plans and delivers large-scale campaigns across a wide range of policy areas – for example, rough sleeping and air quality. It also plays an important role in more reactive communications responding to external events and developments – for example, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

4.4.    The proven success of this approach so far will be at risk if the Central Marketing Budget is not approved, and seeking other alternatives would reduce efficiency. A smaller budget, or a budget devolved to other departments across the GLA, would mean less impactful campaigns for Londoners; and would have a detrimental effect on the ways of working to deliver these campaigns and activities. 

Links to Mayoral strategies and priorities 

4.5.    This work is linked directly to the GLA’s core business objectives to: 

•    increase awareness of the work the Mayor, the London Assembly and the GLA are doing on behalf of Londoners
•    increase understanding, engagement and participation of Londoners in key projects, events and campaigns
•    increase Londoners’ opportunities to access and influence London government. 

Impact assessments and consultations 

4.6.    The GLA will ensure services are procured competitively, and sponsorship activities are managed in a fair and open manner, in accordance with the GLA’s Contracts and Funding Code and Sponsorship Policy. Officers consistently aim to secure value for money and make efficient use of funds. 

4.7.    The Central Marketing Budget will be closely managed and monitored to ensure effective and appropriate use of GLA resources. It is not considered necessary or appropriate to consult any other bodies on this proposed decision before it is submitted for approval.

Conflicts of interest

4.8.    There are no conflicts of interest to note for anyone involved in the drafting or clearance of this decision form. 

5.1.    This decision requests approval of additional expenditure of £300,000 in 2022-23 on services required to deliver effective marketing communications, digital communications and engagement campaigns for the GLA. This will bring the total Central Marketing 2022-23 budget to £1m. 

5.2.    Approval is also sought for staffing investment of £320,000 to cover three two-year fixed-term-contract posts to ensure that the additional proposed campaigns are sufficiently resourced to reach Mayoral goals. As detailed under 1.13 and 1.14, this includes £40,000 in the 2022-23 budget; £160,000 in the 2023-24 budget; and £120,000 in the 2024-25 budget.

5.3.    The expenditure of £340,000 for 2022-23 (£300,000 for marketing and £40,000 for staffing) will be funded from Reserves. Any future years’ expenditure is to be requested as part of 2023-24 budget-setting process that will be subject to approval. 

5.4.    Furthermore, approval is sought by the GLA for the seeking, receipt and expenditure of additional sponsorship from suitable partners for the activities of the External Relations unit, in accordance with the Contracts and Funding Code and sponsorship policy, bringing in direct and indirect financial contributions, and in-kind support, to support their activities. It should be noted that, while it is intended that any sponsorship income secured for specific campaigns will be used in supplementing GLA resources, officers will look to make efficiencies to reduce the GLA contribution to campaign costs (wherever possible).

5.5.    This expenditure will be held within the Marketing team, part of External Relations unit within the Strategy and Communications Directorate. This team will be responsible for the delivery of the GLA marketing campaigns, and the associated income and expenditure.

6.1.    Sections 1, 2 and 4 of this report indicate that the decisions requested of the Mayor concern the exercise of the GLA’s general powers, falling within the GLA’s statutory powers to do such things considered to further or that are facilitative of, or conducive or incidental to, the promotion of economic development and wealth creation, social development, or the improvement of the environment in Greater London; and in formulating the proposals in respect of which a decision is sought, officers have complied with the Authority’s related statutory duties to:

•    pay due regard to the principle that there should be equality of opportunity for all people
•    consider how the proposals will promote the improvement of health of persons, health inequalities between persons and to contribute towards the achievement of sustainable development in the United Kingdom
•    consult with appropriate bodies.

6.2.    In taking the decisions requested, the Mayor must have due regard to the Public Sector Equality Duty – namely, the need to eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct prohibited by the Equality Act 2010; and to advance equality of opportunity, and foster good relations, between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic (race, disability, gender reassignment, age, sex, sexual orientation, religion or belief, pregnancy and maternity) and persons who do not share it (section 149 of the Equality Act 2010). To this end, the Mayor should have particular regard to section 3 (above) of this report.

6.3.    The Mayor may, under section 38 of the Act, delegate the exercise of the GLA’s functions to the Assistant Director, External Relations, in consultation with the Mayoral Director, Communications.

6.4.    The GLA may seek sponsorship under its power to charge third parties for discretionary services under section 93 of the Local Government Act 2003 provided that the charges levied do not exceed the costs of provision. If the delegation proposed in this MD is approved, the seeking, receipt and use of sponsorship may be approved by the Assistant Director, External Relations, in consultation with the Mayoral Director, Communications. Sponsorship arrangements entered into by the GLA must be in accordance with its Sponsorship Policy.

6.5.    Should the Mayor be minded to make the decisions sought, officers must ensure that: 

•    any services and supplies required for the effective marketing communications, digital communications and engagement campaigns for the GLA are procured by TfL Procurement and Supply Chain and in accordance with the GLA’s Contracts and Funding Code
•    the GLA and service providers/suppliers enter into and execute contracts for the provision of the same before the commencement of such services and supplies
•    no reliance is placed upon sponsorship income before a legally binding commitment is secured from the sponsor.