Even as Public Relations evolves, there is something that never changes: pitching. I would love to say I craft each pitch individually for each blogger, journalist or analyst but the truth is, work loads make that nearly impossible. Much like journalists don’t have time to read every single pitch, PR people are don’t have the luxury of time to tailor each pitch. My personal goal is to tailor as many as possible but there is almost always some level of “cutting corners” when you have five clients and need to engage with as many media targets as possible.
Through regular pitching we do have the opportunity to build relationships with the different bloggers and journalists that we interact with and those relationships are the reason I continuously push my client to be focused on relationship building rather than sheer coverage numbers. In my experience, one story in TechCrunch can shut down a start-ups site purely from readers clicking on the link in the post. Those are traffic numbers that large amounts of marketing dollars cannot buy and it only takes that one story to make it happen.
That begs the question, when our focus in on quantity, not quality, can media pitching be successful. At one point in my career, I represented a large online retailer and we would pitching over 1,000 targets with each announcement. Can you imagine tailoring each of those pitches? With the exception of the targets we deemed “top tier” (based on reach and DMA), I would blast pitch rest of the targets utilizing pitching software. What was interested to note during that time was that many of those blast pitched would respond while none of the top tier would which resulted in updating the “top tier” list into a “relationship” list not dependent on reach or DMA but responsiveness.
It is through that experience that pitching became fun. Focusing back on the quality of the relationships, not just the quantity. Sending exciting news to the relationship list first and calling in the occasional favor when the news wasn’t as gripping as it could be.
A good friend of mine and former colleague Ged Carroll (@R_C), recently shared the presentation I embedded below. It’s very interesting to review, especially for those of us who work in a cross between public relations and social media. With that mix between controlled and open conversation, striking a balance is key.
Slide seven in particular offers up 7 strategies for that online engagement. While most PR professionals are well versed in blogger engagement much like media relations, Ged is challenging us to do more. This includes being active participants in online communities, even going that extra step and creating our own. Please enjoy the presentation and share any thoughts below.
Crisis communications is one of the parts of my job that I find most interesting. Fortunately, crisis rarely arise but it’s critical to be prepared for the reality that they may one day occur.
Crisis can mean many things. This can range from what could have been a viral video disaster for Domino’s to the illness or death of an employee. Domino’s is a great example of what to do. After a video leaked depicting employees doing gross things with the food that would eventually go to the consumers, Domino’s reacted. They made sure to let everyone know that the employees were let go and that this was a unique incident rather than a nation wide issue. The company even responded in video, using the original format of the disaster. They were calm, cool, collected and dealt with reality.
Then there are companies like ACORN. With employees giving out tips for running a prostitution business, it’s no surprise that this quickly turned to a major PR nightmare. Unlike in the Domino’s case, this was not an isolated incident but shown in several additional videos at several location. Instead of dealing with the issue, the company threatened litigation against the you videographer and team (they have since moved forward with that threat). The company has some internal issues that need to be dealt with but they should have learned something from Domino’s. Video doesn’t just go away, you need to deal with the situation, acknowledge the problem and develop a communications strategy around what is going to be done to fix the problem. Attack the people that pointed out the problem will not help your image.
As you may have guessed, I’m a huge fan of slides and presentations and I believe this one from Tunheim Partners goes through a few examples of Crisis and how the communication was great or how it could have been better. Domino’s is my favorite in recent history but there are many more examples of the good, the bad and the really ugly (ACORN)
The globe is turning out to be a small world after all. With social media extending to every end of the globe, it’s interesting to look closely at what is out there and what networks to leverage depending on who you’re planning to reach. Vincenzo Cosenza, PR professional and former Microsoft Italy marketer created the below map utilizing Alexa and Google Trends for Website traffic data in June of 2009. The map shows the top social network in each country:
Local Social Networks:
The world is not limited to social networks that are popular in the United States. Below is a list of popular and local social networks outside of the expected:
The information Vincenzo Cosenza tracked lead to some interesting findings about social media activity throughout the world:
• Facebook is continuing it’s reign as the top social network by extending through Europe
• QQ, the leader in China, is the largest social network in the world with 300 million active users
• MySpace is no longer a leader except in Guam
• V Kontakte, similar in looks to Facebook, is the most popular network in and near Russia
• Orkut is popular in India and Brazil
• Hi5 is a leader in Peru, Colobia, Ecuador, Portugal, Mongolia and Romania
• Odnoklassniki is a leader in some of the former territories of the Soviet Union
• Maktoob is the most important Arab community/portal
With Education being such a focus today, here is a recent presentation by Lauren McSwain-Starrett discussing social media and new technologies in higher education:
I discovered this presentation by Joseph Stabb posted today. Very interesting thoughts on using social media for Twitter. If you’re interested in learning more about Joseph Stabb, follow him on Twitter: @joestabb
Shortly after starting this blog I went on an amazing “disconnected” vacation to the great state of Alaska. I took a cruise for 7 days that stopped in various spots in Alaska and Canada and with the cost of phone calls and email access on the ship, I thought it best to just disconnect for that week and it was truly an awesome adventure. I’m a San Franciscan by birth and have lived here my whole life with the exception of a brief stint in Prague to teach English. Connectivity is my life and the center of technology innovation is my backyard. Being a person that updates Twitter and Facebook on a regular basis for both personal and professional reasons, it was difficult to disconnect.
This experience reminded me of one of the fundamental challenges I’ve seen during my time working in Public Relations, disconnecting is nearly impossible but it is necessary for health and sanity. How do you step away when there is no pause button?
My career was in a state of transition when I decided to sign up for the cruise. I had left my full-time position at a large PR agency and was consulting with my current agency. I was in discussions about going full-time so I decided to sign up for the vacation and build that into my plan because I know how agencies work and getting that time off at a later date would be difficult. That being said, I do work for an awesome agency that respects that need for “time off”. It was difficult to mange because there is never a good time for a vacation but I had my tickets in hand, developed a back-up plan and left for my trip.
My recommendation for all my busy PR people, schedule time off and take it. Work closely with your manager and team to find the best time but know that there is not perfect time to take a vacation in this crazy industry. Be disconnected if at all possible because you will come back refreshed and rejuvenated and even more passionate about what you do on a day-to-day basis.
In the PR world, it’s a thin line between Traditional and Non-traditional media. In general, we think of traditional media as the journalists and editors that write for main stream publications that are available in print and possibly online as well as radio and television. Non-traditional media encompasses everything else.
Is it really that simple? I don’t think so. I used to work at a very traditional PR agency, where traditional media was understood and non-traditional media is a black hole. I took it upon myself to try to understand what differentiated these groups and how we, as PR people, should approach these two very different groups. After a lot of research and looking into what best practices are, I found more similarities than differences.
I try to approach all media with the same perspective. The person is just that, a person. Each one is different which requires a tailored approached. I’m not going to say I’m innocent of big PR cardinal sin (blast pitching) but if at all possible, tailoring is key. When I worked with a media list that had nearly 1,000 targets on it, it would have been impossible to deliver timely news and tailor each pitch.
The approach does change based on the person, not based on their title (e.g. blogger, editor, radio host) and that’s where I think the focus needs to evolve. It’s not traditional vs. non-traditional, it’s approaching your target(s) with the utmost respect and thoughtfulness and that will gain their interest (or disinterest) in what you are pitching.
One of my goals with PR Blogette is to learn and share the knowledge I gain in a simple, straight forward format. This is where my “One Pager” series comes in. It’s just a simple as it sounds, one page about a social media tool or web site that can be of use to Public Relations professionals. My goal is to stay away from judgement and share some basic facts about the tool or site with anyone who is interested.
My first one pager focuses on Twellow. I am constantly on the prowl for ways to identify and engage with relevant people on Twitter for both my personal interest and my client interests. So far, this is an interesting tool that provides a little more than a traditional Twitter Search.
I’m happy to email you the slide if you’re interested (prblogette@prblogette.com) and hope you share your recommendations of other tools in the comments section of the post.
Public Relations is continuing to evolve each year, each month and each day. This is a place online to discuss, digest and explore that evolution and look into what the future holds.
A traditional public relations professional at heart, the PR Blogette created this blog as an opportunity to learn from the web and evaluate both [...]more →
Endicot Arm Glacier in Alaska
