Archive for PR
Facebook Friday: Can’t We Just Be Subscribers?
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The “subscribe” button is a new feature introduced this week by Facebook. Intended for those in the public eye who want to continue posting updates intended for their friends, the button allows them to share certain “public” content to a broader audience, soon to be known as subscribers.
It’s ideal for journalists, actors and other public figures who aren’t in a position to accept every friend request, but who still want to connect on Facebook. If you’re a member of the media, the “Facebook + Journalists” page has all the details, including a “Subscribe for Journalists Guide” PDF they posted today.
No News Can Indeed Be Good News
Posted by: | CommentsIt’s not always the right strategy to seek media attention for your client — especially when it involves one side of a complicated and litigio
us situation. But what if the client wants to react to recent (albeit one-sided) coverage?
Perhaps the best counsel is to view the situation from a reporter’s standpoint, who would be receiving yet a new angle to a story s/he thinks has already been covered. With a little digging how many more sides to the story will now be uncovered? What’s the potential cost to the client in letting the media determine how to use the new angle? Is the risk worth it?
Think of ways other than media coverage to get your client’s story told, including communicating directly with the audience with concise, accurate and relevant information that may or may not touch on the situation at hand — a decision that needs to be weighed carefully and without the repercussions of “he said, she said.”
QR Codes Continue Mainstream Push
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I picked up The New York Times print edition to read the paper old-school style on Sunday but soon had to reach for my iPhone after spotting a QR Code on a full page color ad by Atlantis Paradise Island. The little black icons (similar to the one in this post) are becoming more mainstream in newspaper and magazine ads. Just download a free QR Code reader onto your smartphone, snap a picture of the image and you’ll be taken to whatever the company wants you to see.
The Atlantis QR Code launched a YouTube commercial touting Crush, a new teen night club at the resort. It was kind of strange to be reading the print ad one second and then watching a related TV commercial the next.
Are you incorporating QR Codes into your marketing program yet? We used them to promote sponsors at a client’s golf tournament last year and have heard of them being used on restaurant menus, posters and t-shirts.
Calling All Journalism Grads
Posted by: | CommentsSo you want to be a journalist? For the New York Times? Well then check out this video (and make sure you have a subscription to the newspaper).
Facebook Friday: Rewarding Customers and Reaching Others with ‘Facebook Places’
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Facebook recently introduced “Facebook Places,” a feature that allows users to “check in” to a venue, alerting friends to their whereabouts while providing online exposure for that restaurant, school, golf course, whatever.
We’re in the midst of planning the PR and social media aspect of a client’s golf fund-raiser and have incorporated Facebook Places into the mix. When participants visit the registration table for the “8th Annual TBC Classic” on the morning of Oct. 5 and show they’ve checked in on Facebook Places (or Foursquare), they’ll receive a sleeve of Titleist ProV1 golf balls, courtesy of the company behind the fund-raiser, The Brick Companies.
That’s a nice gift for just pushing a button. At the same time, the golf course (Queenstown Harbor) and The Brick Companies will get a lot of extra social media exposure, as each check-in generates wall posts to the participants’ connections. With the average Facebook user having 130 “friends” that’s a potential added reach of thousands of people.
Get Ready for the QR Code
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Perhaps you’ve noticed those square barcode-looking thingies in the corner of magazine ads or on product packaging. They’re also beginning to appear on posters in malls, stickers, real estate “for sale” signs, and t-shirts.
Called QR Codes (for quick response), we’ll be seeing more of them as they catch on, and lots of PR uses are waiting to happen. Here’s how they work: first you need a mobile barcode reader app on your smart phone (I downloaded QuickMark and Microsoft’s Tag Reader for my iPhone). When you come across one, aim the phone’s camera at the little icon and voila, the QR Code does its thing and instantly brings up a website or displays contact information or generates an email or a text message (whatever the generator of the code wants to share). They’re a way to deliver “saveable” info to someone on the go. Microsoft says they “add interactivity to your physical materials.”
Aim your phone at the QR Code in this post and you’ll find yourself at the Sawmill Marketing Public Relations website. It took me about 10 seconds to set it up using Kaywa’s QR Code Generator.
Jesse Kaye, who runs HomeTryst.com in Washington, D.C., told me he’s using QR Codes for his real estate company. He also created an informative how-to video on his blog. It’s a good idea starter and can give insights into how businesses can use this new technology, including ways the restaurant sweetgreen is using them!
We’re already brainstorming ideas with clients. How about you?
Media Relations Tip #14: Don’t Ask for Guaranteed Coverage
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Here’s a new one, brought to the PR Buzzsaw’s attention via a Twitter exchange this morning:
Gus Sentementes, a reporter with The Sun in Baltimore, received an unusual request from a PR person who wanted a “100 percent guarantee” that Gus would write a story before he would be granted access to the company. No chance to judge its newsworthiness, no opportunity to see if they had anything interesting to say/show, not to mention what Gus’s editor would decide. Promise you’ll write a story first, and then you can sit down with the company reps. Otherwise it’s a waste of time!
Gus was likely as surprised as we were, and sent out a tweet to see what PR people who follow him on Twitter thought.
I tweeted that the PR person was either clueless about the media or did not have the ability to counsel his/her management team about what a bad idea it is, and that it will have negative repercussions for the company/brand down the road.
Gus confirmed in a subsequent post:
“I meet a lot of people and I have a long memory. Just b/c I don’t write about u now doesn’t mean I won’t in the future.”
Later, Gus tweeted how he responded:
“I said making a guarantee would be unethical and unrealistic. I haven’t heard back.”
If any PR people out there have ever requested a coverage guarantee, we’d love to hear your point of view. Has it ever worked? Maybe we can all learn something.
In the January 25 edition of The New Yorker, Ken Auletta’s Annals of Communications column provides a fascinating glimpse into the role the Internet (the author refers to it as the “third party”) is playing in how the White House press corps covers the President and, in turn, how the White House works with the media.
He reminds us that only six years ago, when George W. Bush was finishing his first term, there was no Facebook, Twitter or YouTube and that regional newspapers as well as television stations were profitable enterprises.
To whet your appetite for reading the column, Auletta describes a typical working day for NBC White House correspondent Chuck Todd who, when his day is over, will have done eight to sixteen interviews for NBC and MSNBC (grassy area where he stands with the White House in the background is nicknamed Pebble Beach) PLUS eight to 10 tweets or Facebook pos
tings and three to five blog entries. Whew! Todd says he is “compelled to do more reporting on my Blackberry.”
The column also describes that Politico.com “is the most prominent face of new media at the White House.” In existence since 2006, the site draws more than three million unique visitors each month, making it the ninth-largest newspaper online. While traditional media have curtailed their travel budgets, Politico.com has had a reporter on nearly every one of the President’s domestic and overseas trips.
Finally, the column also details the relationship the President and his Administration have with the media and 
the impact Obama believes the Internet has on its coverage. He told Bob Schieffer on a recent CBS “Face the Nation” show that “…what is different today is that the twenty-four hour news cycle and cable television and blogs and all this, they focus on the most extreme elements on both sides. They can’t get enough of conflict. It’s catnip for the media right now.”
Regardless of your politics, or if you are a journalist, PR professional or some other occupation, the article is a good read and offers glimpses into a world most of us will never be a part of firsthand.
PR Buzzsaw Nominated for The Sun’s ‘Mobbie Awards’ Recognizing Best Blogs in Maryland
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Behind Buzz’s veneer of “smart ass, man-about-town, be seen, be heard and often” lies a modest man who was left speechless upon learning his very own PR Buzzsaw blog was nominated by The Baltimore Sun in its Mobbie Awards program – that’s short for Maryland’s Outstanding Blogs!
Fans of the buzzed one have until this Friday, Oct. 9th to vote by visiting the Mobbie Awards section of The Sun‘s Web site, entering their account information (or registering for a free Sun account) and clicking. No paper ballots in this election!
Buzz is up against an eclectic group of blogs, some with a dedicated, unrelenting get-out-the-vote machine in place. Buzz prefers a more personable approach, so he humbly asks for your votes. If you really care about Buzz as you profess that you do, please show your love for him with your vote. And don’t let him fall behind the likes of fellow blog/candidates “Your A Idiot” (yep, sic and all, that’s the name) or the Sandra Shaw – Weather in Satin blog that keeps readers entertained with posts on WBAL-TV’s bubbly weather forecastress.
‘Social Media Road Show’ – Links from My SMEI Presentation in Baltimore This Morning
Posted by: | CommentsHere are links to some of the Web sites and resources I mentioned this morning during the 2009 SMEI Conference and ”Social Media Road Show” in Baltimore. These are good, basic social media and PR tools to get started, and everything listed here is free.
For those of you who were not there, I covered some of the latest thinking in Twitter and PR before a national audience at a conference of the Sales and Marketing Executives International. 
Have anything else to share? Leave a comment!
There are a number of directories to find Twitter followers. A good place to start is Wefollow, where you can search by topics such as ”Celebrity” or “Social Media” or “Baltimore.”
Looking for a dashboard that allows you to better manage your Twitter follows and set up searches for key terms or competitors’ names? Try Hootsuite or Tweetdeck.
To follow the media on Twitter, try this great compilation of national journalists by Jeremy Porter. Interested in Baltimore? Click on our ”Guide to Baltimore Media on Twitter” link on the right.
Want to engage in a weekly Twitter conversation involving journalists, bloggers and PR professionals? Check out #journchat every Monday 
from 7 to 10 p.m., CST.
PitchEngine is a social media news release builder that enables PR pros to effectively package stories and share them with journalists, bloggers, and influencers worldwide via the social web.
Sign up for HARO to receive free daily summaries from media seeking sources for news stories in development. For urgent source needs, follow the companion Twitter account, @HelpAReporter. You can also follow Profnet on Twitter for leads.
And 10 people in PR and social media worth following on Twitter? Love ‘em or not, here’s a variety pack to get your own list going (in no particular order): Scott Monty, Jason Falls, Todd Defren, Geoff Livingston, Amanda Chapel, Chris Brogan, Shel Holtz, Annie Heckenberger, Bill Sledzik and Katie Paine. [Update - here's a great list of 100 PR people to follow, compiled by Valeria Maltoni.]
[Photo, above right, shows my view from the SMEI panelists' table as Gus Sentementes, technology reporter with The Baltimore Sun, makes a point while Greg Cangialosi, CEO of Blue Sky Factory (center), and Steve Kruskamp, head of social media for 1st Mariner Bank, wait for the mike.]
