Lord Sugar has invested in an eclectic mix of businesses since 2011, when the prize for winning BBC show The Apprentice changed from gaining a job in his Amshold group of companies to receiving backing for an original business plan. These have included an ergonomic nail file, a recruitment agency for the hi-tech and pharmaceutical industries, a chain of skin treatment clinics and, last year, a digital marketing agency. Each business receives £250,000 of startup funding and access to mentoring and support from Lord Sugar. In return he gains a 50% stake in the company and new market extensions for his empire. They also expose Lord Sugar, a tycoon who made his name manufacturing computers in the 1980s, to industries with which he is largely unfamiliar. Through his backing of Climb Online, the brainchild of Mark Wright, winner of The Apprentice 2014, Lord Sugar is a player in the world of search engine optimisation (SEO) and pay-per-click (PPC) advertising – a hugely competitive market inhabited by countless agencies offering similar services. It seems a strange fit for the straight-talking Lord Sugar, who has previously criticised marketing’s propensity for jargon[1]. However, he insists it is an industry he has long wanted to tap. “I’m interested in technology, always have been, and despite my age I’m up to date with what’s going on,” he says. “This is a real 21st-century industry and I need to be involved in that market.” The business has had a strong start, notching up 150 clients in its first nine months of operation. This includes a deal with coupons website Groupon, agreed last month, that will see Climb Online provide SEO and PPC services to the large base of small businesses that use Groupon’s platform. Climb Online employs 25 people, has a seven-figure turnover and achieved profitability…

The ad is not due to air until 2 December, but Post Office CMO Pete Markey gave an exclusive preview of the spot during his presentation at the Festival of Marketing this morning (12 March). The advert again features The Inbetweeners actor Simon Bird, who began fronting the Post Office’s campaigns[1] earlier this year. It shows Bird sending a Christmas parcel in a Post Office branch before daydreaming about running in the snow and performing a ‘chest bump’ with Santa Claus. It ends with the line ‘Christmas. Sorted’. Markey said the ad was part of the Post Office’s efforts to achieve a deeper emotional resonance with consumers. This involves appealing to the ‘system 1’ brain – a term used by neuroscientist Daniel Kahneman to refer to people’s unconscious responses and feelings. This contrasts to the more superficial, conscious thinking that people do via the ‘system 2’ brain. “We’re trying to show the feeling that you get from sorting things out through the Post Office,” explained Markey. “We’ve deliberately moved away from just telling you what we do. A year ago our Christmas campaign was about telling you what we had changed, the fact that we’re open for longer and all the things that we do. “That worked very well on one level, and performed very well commercially, but it didn’t go deeper into actually changing the way people feel about the business. We’re starting to look much more at both system 1 and system 2 thinking, to really show what customers are feeling.” The Post Office has embraced neuroscience as it looks to dramatically improve its customer experience. Markey, who joined the Post Office 18 months ago[2] from RSA Insurance Group, said this included testing heart and sweat monitors on customers as it experiments with new concept branches. The first…

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