Canada Council for the Arts Issues Media Monitoring RFP

This request for proposal (RFP) invites individual consultants and consulting firms (the Firm) with expertise in media monitoring and reporting to submit proposals for services to the Canada Council for the Arts (the Council).

Background:

The Canada Council for the Arts is Canada’s national public arts funder, with a mandate “to foster and promote the study and enjoyment of, and the production of works in, the arts.” The Council champions and invests in artistic excellence through a broad range of grants, services, prizes and payments to professional Canadian artists and arts organizations. Its work ensures that excellent, vibrant and diverse art and literature engages Canadians, enriches their communities and reaches markets around the world. The Council also raises public awareness and appreciation of the arts through its communications, research and arts promotion activities. It is responsible for the Canadian Commission for UNESCO which promotes the values and programs of UNESCO in Canada to contribute to a more peaceful, equitable and sustainable future. The Canada Council Art Bank operates art rental programs and helps further public engagement with contemporary arts. The Council is governed by an 11-member Board. Members of the Board and the Director/CEO are appointed by the Governor in Council. The Council works closely with federal, provincial, territorial and municipal arts and cultural agencies and departments. A federal Crown corporation created through an Act of Parliament in 1957, the Council reports to Parliament through the Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages. It receives funding from Parliament and its annual budget is supplemented by endowment income, donations and bequests. For more information in regards to the above-mentioned, please refer to Council’s following websites:

– Canada Council for the Arts: http://canadacouncil.ca/

– Public Lending Right Program: http://www.plr-dpp.ca/

– Art Bank: http://artbank.ca/

– CCUNESCO: http://unesco.ca/

The Canada Council for the Arts is seeking quotes from vendors able to provide the following media collection and reporting services:

· daily monitoring of national, regional, and local media coverage, in English and in French, on topics of relevance to its various programs and services 

· weekly summaries of the coverarage

· analysis of coverage compiled in a monthly and an annual report

· access to a searchable, current and targeted lists of media outlets and contacts including high impact journalists and inflencers

· customer support, as well as ad hoc monitoring and benchmarking on campaign-specifc coverage

Scope of Work:

It is the intention of the Council to consider the proposals submitted and to not be precluded from negotiating with one, or more than one, of the parties responding to this RFP to finalize technical and commercial terms. The Council reserves the right to accept any proposal, or any part of a proposal submitted that is deemed, in the sole discretion of the Council, to be the most advantageous to it. The proposal having the lowest cost shall not necessarily be accepted and the Council may take into account any criteria in evaluating responses to this RFP. The Council is not obliged to provide reasons to any responding parties with respect to any use of the Council’s discretion. The Council reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to seek further information from, or clarification of, any proposal submitted in response to this RFP, and is entitled to utilize any such information or clarifications received in deciding which proposal it may accept, if at all.

The Canada Council is currently working with an external provider for daily media clippings, a weekly round-up of coverage, and access to media lists. It does its own social media monitoring and reporting, including a monthly summary of social media engagement. It also tracks and reports on its own web metrics. Campaign, initiative or event specific round-up of media coverage, social media engagement and web metrics are likewise done internally. While we will continue to monitor social media in house, we require a service provider that can compliment our internal efforts, by tracking social media activity related to media campaigns and/or journalists of interest and offers to integrated media coverage and digital engagement reporting. The service can be a platform, a service or a combination of both. The option to undertake mass email campaign distributions will be considered, but is not required as part of this RFP.

The Firm selected will be expected to:

· Provide the Canada Council with monitoring services of national, regional, and local media coverage, in English and in French (and occasionally international coverage in other languages such as Spanish, Italian and German for our international initiatives), on topics related to the Council, its grants recipients, arts funding, cultural policy and the arts as determined by the Canada Council (media monitoring), delivered daily before 8:30 a.m. The daily service should be highly adapted to mobile technology and include a wide range of news outlets including paywall, trade, online, print and broadcast publications. Capacity to include social media reporting in daily service will be considered.

· Minimum number of 150 media monitoring users within Council. Preference is for unlimited number of internal users.

· Provide reports analyzing the Canada Council’s media coverage in all media types upon request and via a monthly and an annual report.

· Provide the Canada Council with social media reporting that compliments its media relations efforts and presence/position on social media with respect to topics of relevance to the Council as determined by the Council, upon request and via a monthly and annual report. Social media channels include but are not limited to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin, YouTube.

· Preference is for reports to fully integrate media coverage and digital engagement, including social media (such as, but not limited to, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn) and web metrics and analytics integrating with the Council’s in-house Web metrics and analytics, connecting the dots between our efforts on these various channels.

· Provide the Canada Council with a searchable, updated and targeted list of media contacts and influencers. Preference is for this list to have the capacity to be seamlessly integrated with MS Outlook. 

· Respond to ad hoc requests in a timely and consistent manner.

4.1 TASKS 

Specific tasks, activities, deliverables, and Initiative/Project timelines or milestones will be determined by the Project Authority during negotiation of the contract. The Project Authority will negotiate with the contractor the level of effort (number days), nature and/or scope of each task.

4.2 CLIENT SUPPORT The Council’s Project Authority will:

• Provide overall project management authority;

• Provide the Firm with background documents for review;

• Assist the Firm with obtaining Council documents and data, when required;

• Will be the source of final approval and acceptance of all deliverables; and

• Provide feedback to the Firm on all deliverables.

Due Date:

June 17 

Address:

Contact Name: Pilar Castro Contact Title: Manager, Communications and Engagement Email: pilar.castro@canadacouncil.ca