Award-winning PR case study: Raising awareness of Alabama Rot
167 pieces of media coverage
3.34 million estimated coverage views
25% of all website sessions driven by referral traffic from media coverage
Since 2020, R&Co Communications has worked with Anderson Moores Veterinary Specialists (AMVS) on a PR campaign around the symptoms and dangers of cutaneous and renal glomerular vasculopathy (CRGV) in dogs – a condition also known as Alabama Rot.
AMVS is a small animal referral hospital in Hampshire and part of the Linnaeus veterinary group.
In 2023, we focused on raising awareness of the symptoms of CRGV among dog owners nationwide using a strategic PR campaign, positioning AMVS as the UK’s foremost authority on the condition.
Our key objectives included:
- Achieve national and regional media coverage with backlinks to drive referral traffic to the website
- Coverage to be achieved during CRGV season – between November and May
- Use PR to increase searches for ‘Alabama Rot’ in search engines
OUR APPROACH
The PR campaign focused on raising awareness of the symptoms and dangers of CRGV in dogs – a condition also known as Alabama Rot – to B2C and B2B audiences.
Targeting B2C audiences
We used case studies to secure strong B2C media coverage, as personal stories from families impacted by CRGV are the most effective way to secure coverage and generate awareness of the condition.
The case studies were used to drive audiences to AMVS’ dedicated Alabama Rot website, which features a live map of UK cases, symptoms checklist and FAQs, via backlinks in the media coverage achieve and via social media.
Targeting B2B audiences
Key messages of the B2B campaign followed a similar theme in terms of alerting veterinary colleagues to new cases, locations, total case update and signposting to website.
We also secured industry PR opportunities with clinicians David Walker and Josh Walker giving them a platform to demonstrate their expertise on CRGV.
In total, 95% of all coverage was achieved in Alabama Rot season (November to May) and the relevance of the coverage is demonstrated by the significant amount of referral traffic driven to the website from online news stories.
Referral traffic
A quarter of all website sessions were driven by referral traffic from media coverage, with Google Analytics data showing press coverage drove 12,705 referral sessions to the website.
Regional coverage is the biggest driver of referral traffic, showing our approach to raising awareness on a local level via the map and case studies is the most effective way to drive engagement.
PR and social media activity helped to generate:
- 50,538 total website sessions
- 18,387 from organic search
- 13,490 sessions from referral
- 9,982 sessions from organic social media
Organic traffic
The success of the campaign is also underlined by its influence on search behaviour; Google Trends data shows an increase in searches for ‘Alabama Rot’ in 2023.
The media coverage achieved increased online searches for keywords related to Alabama Rot, driving traffic to the website via search engines. Analytics data shows large spikes in traffic that correlate to our earned media coverage and demonstrate the success of the campaign in reaching and educating people on Alabama Rot.
Due to these excellent results, our work won the PR Campaign of the Year at the Veterinary Marketing Association Awards 2024.
This was an outstanding entry, well done! The strong link between Alabama Rot and Anderson Moores as the ‘go to’ specialists is expertly established.
The judges also commend the achievement of ‘tone of voice’ to raise awareness without scaremongering – a fine line well done, and cross media penetration also successfully navigated.
The judges also noted that this campaign has all been achieved on a relatively modest budget.
Veterinary Marketing Association Awards Committee
Learn more about our veterinary PR and marketing services or find out how we develop a PR strategy for our veterinary clients.