Social Media for Event Promotion

Social media in advance of events is a great way to network before you are even there. This year is the most activity I’ve seen in advance of the ICSC Las Vegas conference. Between LinkedIn discussions for the ICSC and Tweets, we’ve been able to set up interviews for our clients with media who are attending. In addition, an ongoing dialogue of contacts is being made through the ICSC LinkedIn group. I have my settings so that I get emails for discussions in this group, and it really has worked well for us.

Grammar Note: Alls they need to do is drop the ‘s’

In a world dominated by texting, casual emails and social media, good grammar is not always the highest priority. But in working with media we need to respect good grammar, verbally, and of course, in writing. Because the better something is written, the better chance the writer has of seeing it published, somewhere.

Speaking to media also calls for good grammar and usage. So here’s a simple tip about a common verbal usage mistake: Alls we need to do is drop the ‘s.’ And that’s the tip.

I was driven to write this when I heard a sportscaster use the word “alls” this morning in speaking about yesterday’s NBA results. The “s” was soft and subtle, but it was there. Most listeners probably didn’t even hear it, but since good PR is built on good writing, it jumped out at me.

In fact, I hear it often. Some of the most educated people use it commonly in speaking. But you never see it in print. Unless it’s a contraction as William Shakespeare used it in his comedy All’s Well That Ends Well. Coincidentally, I also heard a broadcaster say this today while I was writing this blog. She said: “All’s good.” These two words demonstrate proper usage in a full sentence and are totally correct.

An interesting footnote: when I wrote “alls” for the first time ever, in this post, my grammar check in Microsoft Word didn’t pick it up. So I looked in Merriam Webster’s dictionary and in Word Central. There were no entries.

“Alls” is, however, in the Urban Dictionary. It is listed as “the coolest way to say all.”

I realize I don’t necessarily embody “cool,” and I also know when the next generation of texters and Facebook users are in the business world, grammar concerns will likely be considered archaic. But in the field of public relations, today, we need to practice good grammar every day.

So enough writing about this non-word, and hopefully, I don’t sound pompous. All I want to do is help!

Watch for more common writing and grammar errors in future posts.

The NJ Small Business Development Centers: A Valuable Resource for NJ Small Businesses

In my quest to grow Caryl Communications as a company and update my own personal marketing skills, I attended a seminar this morning sponsored by the New Jersey Small Business Development Centers (SBDC), called “Marketing Upstream – Get Out of Your Comfort Zone.” We had a small group of diverse entrepreneurs and a strong leader to direct the group. The course included marketing theory and practical advice and perspective, as well as good action items.

 

I learned at this seminar that the SBDC is a valuable resource for small businesses in New Jersey. Created by President Carter and expanded by Ronald Reagan, the SBDC offers programs in marketing, finance, business planning and more. Even better, SBDC provides FREE one-on-one counseling about any topic or business challenge you have. They have 10 locations in NJ with programs provided in collaboration with our state’s community colleges and universities. I will be doing more with SBDC and will keep updates coming.

After the Earthquake: A Multi-media Moment

By Caryl Bixon-Gordon
When the earthquake hit on Tuesday in Paramus, New Jersey, like many northeastern residents, I didn’t know what to do. I thought about having our staff stand in doorways as I remembered that advice from an earthquake I experienced in California. But since the shaking had stopped, I decided instead to find out if it was an earthquake, and we all agreed, the quickest source we could access was online. So we opened Twitter.

The first Tweet came about 1 minute after the quake with a tsunami warning for the Gowanus Canal. We were perplexed. I knew the Gowanus Expressway from traffic reports but didn’t know it also was a body of water. And a tsunami? So much for the credibility of Tweets.
Out of curiosity, I searched the Gowanus on Google and found http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gowanus_Canal.

We stayed on Twitter for a while on Tuesday, and we also went to online news . . . and we called our mothers, husbands, kids and friends to find out if others felt what we did. They did – in Tenafly, Fair Lawn and Manchester, New Jersey; the personal first-hand reports were definite proof that the event was bigger than our office. Then, we turned on News 12. We kept it on the rest of the day as we all were somewhat unnerved; we wanted local news, and getting back to work just didn’t feel like business as usual.

On Wednesday, I turned on the Weather Channel as I always do. The meteorologists were tracking Hurricane Irene and highlighted topics from Twitter as part of their new social partnership. (I found myself impatient as I wanted to see the track of the storm.)
Broadcast news also used Tweets and Facebook posts, bringing a combination of local, regional, national and international perspective to their reports.

As a public relations professional, I drew three conclusions from the experiences of the earthquake: First: Social media is a valuable immediate news source, although not the last word and not always credible. Second: Traditional media sources continue to embrace social media, testing new ways to integrate these evolving sources of opinion and fact into their medium. Third: multi-tasking is fun.
And so, my preference for news is multiple screens and sources, like Tuesday, when one staff member was on Twitter, another on Facebook, several on the phones and one watching TV. It was a true multi-media moment at Caryl Communications.

Leverage Your News to Build Credibility with Customers and Prospects

One of the greatest benefits of PR is news exposure in the media, which builds credibility for your company, services and/or products. To leverage this exposure with your customers and prospects, use online links and email to your audience.

Today, many programs like Constant Contact (which is the program we use), as well as other e-mail systems, enable you to easily manage a list and send messages to a target audience. Posting a link through any e-mail program will allow the reader to open the article, which usually remains posted online with an active URL for several days or more. And since you are accessing the original media source with the URL, there is no need to obtain permission, as you are not reproducing the article in any form.

Most daily newspapers keep a link up for a week or longer. After the article is removed by the publisher and replaced, the original link often will lead the reader to a media archive, many of which remain on line for extended periods, even as much as a year or more.

To maximize interest from your readers, select news clips that position your firm in an authoritative position and contain updates regarding your industry. You can explain a bit about the piece in your own email.

Develop a timely method for disseminating news about your company by drafting a template and modifying it based on the specific news item you are sending. Paste the URL into your own e-mail message to create a simple e-mail blast that highlights your Good News!

PARAMUS SUNRISE ROTARY PUBLIC RELATIONS: THE FOUR-WAY TEST EMBODIES OUR MESSAGE

At a recent Rotary District 7490 meeting, I was selected as secretary of the Paramus Sunrise Rotary club to speak with members of district clubs about public relations strategies to help spread the word about Rotary, its events and accomplishments. Because of the devotion of Rotary, and its principals, defined by the four-way test, publicizing Rotary activities is as natural as just about every project and the people who make it happen are newsworthy. For those who are not familiar with Rotary, the four-way test states: “Is it the truth? Is it fair to all concerned? Will it build goodwill and better friendships? Will it be beneficial to all concerned?” It was these simple statements, all too often forgotten in the pressure of daily life and work that drew me to Rotary.
As a result, my presentation was simple – I outlined the news releases and resulting news clips that we generated to highlight the activities of the Paramus Sunrise club and its members. The club is very involved in giving and in “living” the four-way test, so our job is simple: We use photos from all events with short copy since “a well-taken photograph” goes such a long way to encourage your story to be published.
The Paramus Sunrise Rotary club was chartered in June 2008. Since its inception, the group has donated to Theo’s Work, Children’s Aid and Family Services, Freedom Walk Kids of America, Turn a Frown Around Foundation, Pony Power and the Rotary Paul Harris Foundation. In addition, the group’s first annual fashion show in May 2009 raised more than $10,000 for Rotary’s Gift of Life, which afforded Lacy-Ann, a sick child from Jamaica, the opportunity to travel to the U.S. for life-saving heart surgery. It is a pleasure to be involved and do what we can to promote the valuable work of this group and the entire Rotary organization.

A few useful directories

This is a list of a few useful blog directories that I’ve found. Please check this list often b/c I plan to be adding new stuff to it regularly.

Active Networking is Encouraging Sign at Recent IOREBA and NAIOP Events

Two annual real estate events in January provided encouraging signs of activity for the start of 2010. IOREBA’s Urban Developer’s Night in Newark and NAIOP New Jersey’s Real Estate Forecast in Short Hills both attracted record numbers of participants and an unusually high level of energy considering the woes of the past year. Brokers, developers, architects, attorneys, accountants and other commercial real estate professionals compared notes and shared stories as they networked and seemed thankful that 2009 had ended and they had survived.

While no panelist at either program predicted a robust turnaround this year, several highlighted some brightening signs. One IOREBA speaker may have said it best when he forecasted a “sideways year” but also described an increasing number of corporations starting to talk about long-term objectives and real estate for the future.

Simply put – participants at both events “worked the rooms” and really seemed to be enjoying themselves. Their common professional thread was real estate as they confronted the economic realities of 2010 together.

While social networking has its place, there’s still nothing quite like being out with people, especially some you’ve known for decades. I guess it’s the human contact, the camaraderie and encouragement, that helps you move forward into an uncertain economy together and derive a feeling of optimism just from the energy of being there.

Public Relations: What you can expect from your agency in Today’s Environment

The public relations industry, which includes a broad category of marketing activities, has become even broader by today’s definitions. The growth of new media and the critical role of the Internet along with the worst economy in more than three decades have created challenges and opportunities for individual organizations looking for PR services, and for the professional PR practitioner.

Some firms that recognize the power of PR but want to cut costs in the current recession may decide to try to bring it in-house as their business has slowed. The mistake in this reasoning is it diverts the professionals from their first order of business and dilutes their effectiveness in their work and in their PR results.

Navigating the current ever-changing landscape of PR, incorporating strategic integrated activities, and achieving measurable results ultimately requires a tremendous time investment. It is far better to negotiate fees now with your current agency or look for a more reasonable firm that is willing to work in the recession to help you achieve exposure into the recovery and then grow from there.

The goal is to use a PR agency to provide expertise and creativity to refine and achieve your immediate and long-range business goals. PR integrates with other marketing disciplines and because of the credible nature of the news industry, media exposure is integral to any campaign. By highlighting a company’s core competencies, a well-planned PR program will distinguish your organization from the competition and increase credibility for your products or services.

The client’s primary responsibility is to work candidly and confidentially with the agency to define their goals, business activities, strengths, weaknesses and key people.

The agency’s job is to support its marketing goals and determine the real news, trends and activities that are appropriate for promotion through public relations. The agency then develops themes and story concepts and generates compelling copy in their work with the media. In essence, the public relations professionals is a reporter for clients, who is always ready to leverage real news and reach direct consumers and can prospect audiences, and help the client become a valuable resource for diverse media outlets.

Will Newspapers Survive?

Will Newspapers Survive?

“The medium is the message” . . . Marshall McLuhan

I was encouraged, professionally and personally, by the WSJ’s article on January 4, 2010 outlining positive signs for the print news industry (Ad Influx Brightens Hopes for Newspapers, Magazines).

The importance of the news media for public relations practioners is obvious, especially those that focus on media placements.  As a result, navigating the changing landscape of the print industry has presented new challenges as well as opportunities for PR firms.

During 2009, recessionary pressures and the proliferation of the Internet presented a real threat to the future of many publications. The loss of ad revenues and declining circulations made even the most trustworthy publications an endangered species as generations of online readers turned to the Internet as their first source of news.

In fact, on the news side, just an hour after the 7.0 Earthquake hit Haiti on January 12, 2010, most of the first news updates communicated to traditional news agencies and broadcast media seemed to arrive through Twitter.

As a result, the debate continues – the immediacy of broadcast is less threatened by new media,  but the question remains — will the print industry survive?

As a personal reaction, during recent vacation time, I enjoyed the pleasure rather than the pressure of reading the newspaper, waking slowly to coffee and the NYT:  Perhaps it was the artistically designed layouts in print — or the tactile experience of turning the pages, folding the paper, separating the sections and seeing the whole as well as the parts. Print offers a feeling and perspective that can’t be duplicated by a rigid computer serving as the medium for the Internet and for reading news. 

Therefore, I don’t believe the print industry will become extinct, even if it evolves into a niche medium for those who want to feel what they read. Because as McLuhan said, “the medium is the message,” and while a computer laptop may heat up your lap, it rarely warms the heart.