Public Relations

Three Keys to Networking Success

Ashleigh Mavros Leave a comment

CONTRASTPRSA defines our collective interest of PR in this way: “Public relations is a strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics.” A key part of that definition is the phrase “mutually beneficial relationships.” Who are we as PR practitioners if we ourselves can’t create these bonds?

In the world we live in, connections are essential. They help us get the job we want, meet the people that will inspire us and market to the audience that is most receptive. If you’re reading this blog, I’m sure you’ve heard you’re supposed to network (the all powerful buzzword), but when you’re a fresh face to the business, it can be intimidating. How are we supposed to hold conversations with people with 25 years more experience? Make sure you’re executing these three tactics to make the most out of networking:

Position Yourself. Successful PR professionals are bountiful but when you’re looking to connect with them, they seem to be an elusive species. Luckily, there are many resources available to help with this process. The best way I’ve found to introduce myself to people I’d like to know is by utilizing my local PRSA chapter. Monthly luncheons and occasional happy hours provide the perfect venue for exchanging knowledge and business cards. Before attending an event, be sure to research organizations of interest and the key people within. This will help you find a way to start the conversation.

Follow Up. Meeting people that are doing what you want to do, and successfully, provides an invaluable insight into how to flourish in your dream career. After receiving those business cards and handshakes, don’t be afraid to connect with them in another venue – online. A Twitter follow or LinkedIn connection can help you absorb the expertise they share (and keep you on their radar for possible future connections). From here, you are starting to build on a solid foundation from people with various strengths, interests, and specialties that you can learn from.

Meet in Person. As PR professionals, successful or aspiring, most of us enjoy a cup of coffee or a cold craft brew from time to time. Although we all know the value of creating a strategic online presence, an in-person one is extremely important, too. These are where you can get into deep conversations and ask your burning questions. Some of my initial go-to’s were: “How did you get into this career?”, “Where do you get your news?”, or “What has been your most successful campaign and why?” No matter where you are in your career, face-to-face collaboration leads to unique points of view and possible paradigm shifts in your own work.

Building your network can be overwhelming, intimidating and time consuming, but with each connection you make, you grow your knowledge base and become the person that an inexperienced you was hoping to connect with.

Christine PielaChristine Piela uses her expertise in public relations, website development, and customer relationship management as the Digital and Social Media Coordinator at Svinicki Association Management, Inc. She attended the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse where she earned her Bachelor of Science degree in Professional and Organizational Communication with her minor in Music. Christine is currently working towards other passions including improving her communication and leadership skills through Toastmasters International and is currently the Mentor Program chair on the Young Pros Committee for the Southeastern Wisconsin chapter of Public Relations Society of America. Connect with her on Twitter or LinkedIn.

Five Ways to Keep Integrated PR Consistent

Stephanie Vermillion 1 Comment

Five Ways to Keep Integrated PR ConsistentWith integrated marketing communications, the focus is usually on which platform you’re using or how you’re adapting to industry changes. But despite all the integrated PR news and happenings, one traditional, important staple remains true:

All messages should be consistent and relevant at all times. (Click to tweet!)

Messages should be reinforced consistently across all communications function – be it a post on Facebook or a press release about a new hire.

In addition to messages being consistent, you should also make sure they’re understandable. The best integrated communications messaging is concise enough that all stakeholders understand the brand.

As a new pro, you’ll impress supervisors if you can understand the fundamentals behind this new PR world. Here are some integrated marketing tips to help you get in the know on this important subject.

Messaging

Everyone in an organization, be it a CEO or intern, must be on the same page on the five Ws: who, what, when, where, and why. This will ensure the outgoing messages are concise and understandable.

If you’re starting a new job but want to comprehend your company’s five Ws, answer each question specifically about your company, ask your supervisor to review your answers, then post them on your wall. The more you integrate yourself into the company – and test your knowledge – the more likely you are to be called on for important tasks.

Photo Filters

Taylor Swift may win at social media by using each platform differently, but this doesn’t always work for everyone. For nearly every business, brand uniformity on all channels is important.

The content doesn’t always have to be the same, but little things like using the same filters for each platform ensure consistency.

Some see the world in Valencia and others view it in Lo-Fi. The brand should have a noticeable aesthetic. For example, Conscious Magazine is a winner in my opinion for having beautifully curated social media accounts. They can be found @cmagazine on Twitter and Instagram.

Hashtags

As an organization, there should be a hashtag that links your conversations together across all social media channels. Hashtags help us discover content curated internally and from members of target audiences.

Color Schemes

A company should choose theme colors to be used across all platforms that are on-brand and consistent. Colors have meaning and subconsciously communicate with the audience, so it’s no coincidence that the leading fast food restaurants all use red, yellow, and green in their color schemes.

Why? Red triggers stimulation, appetite, hunger, and garners attention. Yellow communicates feelings of happiness and friendliness. Green sends a message of nature and relaxation.

When creating assets like images and logos, organizations should use that chosen color scheme across all communications functions.

Planning

As a PR pro, I know nothing can come to proper fruition without planning. The most successful pros – and companies they work for – are always two steps ahead and have a plan for every situation. There should be a planning around National Holidays, potential crises, upcoming company and client announcements, editorial calendars, etc.

Public relations is constantly evolving because of new technology and convergence. Transparency is integral to combating negative stereotypes people have of the industry. And, in order to be transparent, all the functions of communications (public relations, marketing, and advertising) need to correctly reinforce a company’s open, cohesive and honest message clearly across all channels.

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Tiffany WooTiffany Woo is an Account Coordinator at NRPR Group, which is a public relations and social media marketing agency in Beverly Hills, CA. She has a goal of becoming one of the public relations industry’s top practitioners. Find her on Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

How to create an editorial content calendar

Stephanie Vermillion Leave a comment

How to create an editorial content calendarCreating and maintaining an editorial calendar should be an integral part of any PR or marketing strategy.

But, with the ever-growing number of networks to share branded content with our audiences, keeping a well-curated editorial calendar is a daunting task. Here are a few tried-and-true ways you can simplify the process.

Creating your editorial calendar

The first steps in creating an editorial calendar that works for you are outlining the social networks to be used and the brands/blogs/etc. that you need to manage, as well as the depth of detail you need. Knowing these items will determine which services will work best for you.

If you only need to see a schedule of posts, using a traditional calendar app like Google calendar will work perfectly. You can create separate calendars for each blog or brand and color code it all to easily see when something needs to be done. Using a calendar app will also allow you to block out time for development and strategic planning.

If you prefer to see your posting schedule as a breakdown of the process behind creating and posting your content, a service like Trello may be the way to go. With Trello, you can create multiple boards for each step of your editorial process and add cards with topics, ideas or post titles as needed. Cards can be labeled with colors, assigned due dates and shifted from board to board as the piece moves through the editorial process. Drafts of posts can also be attached to the cards.

Using your editorial calendar

Once you’ve decided which type of editorial calendar you need, it’s time to fill it with your topics and ideas. A good content marketing plan is part coming up with great ideas and part actually getting the ideas posted on time. (Click to Tweet!)

Creativity and productivity often come in bursts, so it’s important to let the ideas flow, but to not run wild with posting everything at once, since consistency is almost as important as great content.

Once your editorial calendar is full of fantastic ideas and your content creation is underway, you need to plan how to get it noticed by your audience. As you’d guess, social media is a key component of this strategy.

Using a social media scheduling app, like Buffer, Hootsuite or TweetDeck, depending on your needs. Including which networks you plan to post on for each topic in your editorial calendar is a great way to keep your efforts on track and organized.

Setting aside a chunk of time each week dedicated to scheduling your social media for the week will also make being consistent so much easier. Planning is half the battle, after all!

What are your favorite tools for editorial planning? Please share in the comments below!

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Robyn Rudish-LaningRobyn Rudish-Laning is a graduate of Duquesne University, with a bachelor’s in Public Relations, a master’s in Media Arts and Technology, and currently works as a PR Associate with Pretty Living PR, a boutique firm based in Pittsburgh. Find her on LinkedIn or Twitter or read her PR-focused blog

#ThrowbackThursday with Christopher Penn

Stephanie Vermillion 1 Comment

Editor’s note: This is the second post in our monthly #ThrowbackThursday series, which features a prominent, successful PR pro taking a look back and sharing tips from his/her days as a new pro. 

Earlier this week, we shared five skills young pros need to excel in the PR world, and as many noticed, digital knowledge was at the top of that list.

Christopher S PennToday’s #ThrowbackThursday guest, Christopher Penn, pretty much wrote the book on digital PR. (And by “wrote the book,” we mean authored three best sellers.)

He’s the vice president of marketing technology at SHIFT Communications, co-founder of PodCamp New Media Community Conference and co-host of the Marketing Over Coffee podcast. Christopher has been named one of the top 50 most influential people in social media and digital marketing by Forbes multiple times, and he was named the PR News 2014 Agency Professional of the Year.

So, yeah. When it comes to integrated marketing communications, Christopher Penn is kind of a big deal. Now, let’s take a walk through his PR memory lane on this #ThrowbackThursday!

Question 1: You didn’t start off in PR right out of school. How did you get started in the industry?

It’s funny you mention that. I’ve been a marketer for years and years. The middle of the funnel – lead generation – was really my area of expertise. I could squeeze leads out of nearly any audience with tried and true marketing tactics.

But I ran into a problem: where does the audience come from?

As a marketer, you usually just buy it, with ads or list buys. That gets expensive. In 2012, I was talking to a good friend and agency owner, Mitch Joel, and he said that I needed to understand the agency world.

After that conversation, I reached out to longtime acquaintance Todd Defren, co-founder of SHIFT Communications, and said hey, let’s trade. You teach me about the top of the funnel and how PR works, and I’ll bring the middle of the funnel expertise to your clients. That started a beautiful relationship!

Question 2: Right out of college, what would you say are the most important skills new PR pros should possess?

The Ability to Write

Writing is at the heart of modern marketing and PR. Everything begins with writing, from sticky notes on your desk to 90,000 word books to screenplays for YouTube videos. Even great speaking leverages your ability to skillfully choose words. The problem is, most people aren’t great writers. Most people are average or slightly below average writers who can’t communicate with clarity.

I recommend that every student – and every PR pro – become familiar with tools like SlickWrite and Hemingway. While these tools cannot fix problems with structure, logical flow, or facts, they can identify basic flaws in writing. See this post on up-cycling content for a bit more on these tools.

The Ability to Do Deep Analysis

Statistics and mathematics are core skills for today’s PR pro. I know, I know, you got into PR to avoid math. Bad news: everything has math now. You must have the ability to take data, visualize it, analyze it, and turn it into insights and strategies.

Many students take courses with tools like SPSS and R; when they leave university life, those skills quickly atrophy. Don’t permit that to happen. Download data sets from public sources like data.gov to keep your data analysis skills strong. Practice, improve, and expand your data analysis toolkit.

If you’re facing data analysis challenges, I also recommend my latest book, Marketing Blue Belt.

The Ability to Be Creative

Creativity is one skill area that gets systematically beaten out of you by school and work. The ability to be creative hinges on your inputs, on how much useful stuff is in your brain that you can draw on at any given time. If all you’ve got in your head is junk, then all you’ll produce is junk. (Click to Tweet!) Feed your brain, especially after leaving an academic environment!

The more useful, usable information your mind has to work with, the more creative you can be. (this is also the basis for my previous book, Marketing Red Belt).

Question 3: Many new pros know they need to learn digital marketing skills, but they don’t know where to start. Can you share some tips on how new pros can learn on their own?

Learn by reading. There are great books out there like the Portable MBA on Marketing that can give you a solid foundation. If you’re in a hurry, I wrote a Cliffs Notes style book on marketing called Marketing White Belt.

Question 4: What were some of the pivotal teachings or experiences from your past that helped you become the PR pro you are today?

The biggest lessons come from the martial arts. One of the tenets of the art I practice is “keep going!”. It’s an admonition to never get comfortable, to never believe that you’ve won, and to keep learning.

One of my teachers, Ken Savage, has a great expression, “Teacher for now, student for life”. As we rise up in the ranks of our organizations, we tend to forget to keep learning. We get entrenched. We don’t budget time for learning – and we fall behind. Our organizations fall behind. Don’t let that happen – keep going!

Question 5: If you could go back in time and give advice to yourself during your first year in PR, what would you say?

I would advise myself to buy Apple stock before the 7-1 split last summer. Investing 100 shares in Apple when I joined SHIFT would have cost $12,400. Today that same investment would be worth $87,493.

More about Christopher:

Christopher S. Penn has been featured as a recognized authority in many books, publications such as the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, New York Times, BusinessWeek and US News & World Report, and television networks such as PBS, CNN, CNBC, Fox News, and ABC News for his leadership in new media and marketing. In 2012 and 2013, Forbes Magazine recognized him as one of the top 50 most influential people in social media and digital marketing. MediaPost renewed this honor in 2015. Marketo Corporation named him a Marketing Illuminator, and PR News nominated him as both Social Media Person of the Year and Social Media Icon MVP in 2014. PR News also named him Agency Professional of the Year.

Mr. Penn is the Vice President of Marketing Technology at SHIFT Communications, a public relations firm, as well as co-founder of the groundbreaking PodCamp New Media Community Conference, and co-host of the Marketing Over Coffee marketing podcast. He is a Google Analytics Certified Professional and a Google AdWords Certified Professional. He’s the author of the best-selling books Marketing White Belt: Basics for the Digital Marketer, Marketing Red Belt: Connecting With Your Creative Mind, and Marketing Blue Belt: From Data Zero to Marketing Hero.

Five lessons from the NBA’s Instagram

Stephanie Vermillion Leave a comment

5 Lessons from NBA's InstagramFirst and foremost, let me say that this blog post will not include recommendations on the number of hashtags to use when posting for a client or brand. We can all agree that’s common sense by now, right?

Consistently the NBA’s Instagram account ranks above its counterparts (NFL, MLB, etc.) using video as ranked by AdWeek’s weekly chart. As a result, I decided to investigate what lessons social media managers (especially new pros handling social accounts!) could learn from the NBA’s Instagram presence and implement into their own strategies for clients.

1. Embrace video: If you’re a social media manager, and have yet to embrace creative and novel ways to utilize the 13-second video clips on Instagram, shame on you!

No, but really. The NBA captures its audiences’ attention with the ever popular slam dunks, slow motion clips using #PhantomCam, and teasers of player profiles from NBA TV.

  • Takeaway: Use video on Instagram to its fullest extent. The platform recently rolled out the new update that puts videos on auto-loop (GLORIOUS news!), so use those 13 seconds wisely to tell your client’s story in a creative manner.

2. Play to your followers’ nostalgia: Ask any sports fan, and they could tell you that Michael Jordan is one of, if not THE greatest basketball player to ever step foot on the court.

That’s likely why a photo posted asking fans: “If MJ played today, _____ would be his rival” garnered more than 24,000 comments and 166,000 likes.

  • Takeaway: People by nature are drawn to feeling nostalgic. Understand what makes your audience tick, which in part alludes to the next point. If you’re a style brand, take the opportunity to reminisce with your Instagram followers about Audrey Hepburn donning the beautifully crafted Givenchy LBD for the first time on-screen. Manage a hotel’s social media channels? Take your followers down memory lane with a great moment in the property’s history.

3. Know your audience: The NBA knows that its followers aren’t just interested in seeing a ball put through a net. There’s a culture that comes along with it, which includes style.

Try to name the number of professional players that have their own shoe line. I’ll give you a hint: It’s a lot.

This goes to show that followers will be interested in the players’ footwear and apparel. Throughout this year’s All Star game, followers saw not only highlights from the game but a plethora of players’ shoes for the night, using #AllStarKicks.

  • Takeaway: This can come from a series of tests or by simply knowing the demographic of your audience, but recognize their likes and dislikes, and more importantly, their interests outside of your brand. Find what appeals to them without shoving your own product down their throats. A photo of a large plate of meat likely won’t resonate with a vegetarian restaurant chain’s followers. A photo with an inspirational quote about getting outside and stepping beyond your comfort zone would.

4. Consistency: Take a look at the NBA’s Instagram account. You’ll notice a cohesive theme throughout its images and videos.

Now, this isn’t typically how followers consume content on Instagram, but it allows them to easily distinguish a new post from the NBA in their feed.

  • Takeaway: Set yourself up for success by ensuring your followers instantly recognize your brand’s Instagram posts (Click to Tweet!). Apply consistency throughout, whether it be choosing certain filters, using the same color scheme, including your brand logo in the same location for every photo, etc.

5. Build anticipation: Perhaps Taylor Swift did it best and served us all a dose of her amazing-ness (and her PR savvy!) with the build-up to her new album, 1989. But the NBA sure knows how to do it and do it well, too.

Posting videos from previous Slam Dunk contests, including this one from Vince “Vinsanity” Carter, in addition to cryptic messages about a secret performer during halftime helped build buzz and attention for the annual event.

  • Takeaway: Catch the attention of your followers by giving them a sneak peek or preview of what’s to come, whether it’s a big event (like the All Star game) or a new product launch. Get them talking about you before the big day and you’ll have them waiting with bated breath.

To use Instagram well, you have to think outside the box. To use Instagram to its full potential, you have to ramp up your visual savvy. Here are a few visual tools you can adopt that will make your posts a – wait for it – slam dunk.

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Shandi HuberShandi Huber is a senior account executive at Wordsworth Communications, a public relations agency in Cincinnati, Ohio. An enthusiast for all social media platforms, you can often find her pinning her dream closet on Pinterest or posting photos of her new puppy on Instagram. Connect with Shandi on LinkedIn and Twitter (@shandihuber).