Flack's Revenge

PR 2.0 Lessons from the Republican's Twitter Play Book

Yesterday, I tweaked the Republicans for the way they market their candidates.

Today I give back with a post that offers some grudging respect for how they have been using Twitter in this campaign season, which l learned about in the NY Times article For Campaigns, Twitter is Both an Early-warning System and Weapon.

The article shares ways in which the campaigns have used Twitter to stay on top of trending topics and rapidly respond to developing stories... as well help create the stories.  The article says:

If the 2008 presidential race embraced a 24/7 news cycle, four years later politicos are finding themselves in the middle of an election most starkly defined by Twitter...With 100 million active users, more than 10 times as many as in the 2008 election, Twitter has emerged as a critical tool for political campaigns, allowing them to reach voters, gather data and respond to charges immediately.

Some of the tactics mentioned can be used to support other types of communications efforts, with the caveat that there are few things that rival a presidential campaign when it comes to the volume of media interest, coverage and Twitter chatter.

I have distilled information from the article and present it below as list of tips (excerpts are in italics). 

Keep fingers on the pulses of media sentiment, interest and bias

Mr. Romney’s operation... believes that it can ferret out bias among reporters by analyzing their posts.. Their war room compiles all the Twitter messages from the press corps at every event and e-mails them to the campaign staff.

Mr. Romney’s aides say they can get a sense of where a story is headed before it is published simply by reading reporters’ Twitter messages

Correct the record

The campaign will push back on posts that it thinks are incorrect or unfair, and nearly every reporter who covers Mr. Romney has received a Twitter-inspired lecture

Engage directly with and influence consumers/voters

With Twitter, rapid response has an even bigger role, with campaigns needing creative ways...to push their message, hoping to attract the attention of reporters and supporters.

Mr. Gingrich’s political team... used Twitter to reach out to voters who had posted positively about guns, a group he felt would be receptive to Mr. Gingrich.

Use sponsored tweets to amplify the message and align with hot topics

Campaigns can pay for “promoted” messages and accounts so that when users search Twitter for certain words or phrases, the campaign’s account or a particular post is the first result.

Rally supporters

Twitter has transformed debates, aides to various campaigns say. Mr. Hemingway said he provided Gingrich supporters he considers “influencers” with debate-night instructions, from hashtags to the best times to post.

Use as a focus group

The campaigns can also monitor segments of the electorate to see what arguments are resonating. During a few of Mr. Obama’s recent speeches, his campaign posted some of the lines on Twitter and watched which were most shared...For a top Romney strategist, Twitter is the lens through which he consumes debates. “You can just follow the reactions,” he said. “It’s basically a focus group.”

Respond to competitors

When Newt Gingrich said in a recent debate that he was a man of “grandiose” ideas, Mitt Romney’s campaign pounced. It sent mocking Twitter messages with a hashtag, “#grandiosenewt”, encouraging voters to add their own examples of occasions when they felt Mr. Gingrich had been “grandiose.”

 

If Data Center Tech Were Marketed like the Republican Candidates

I heard about the latest out of a seemingly endless number of Republican debates, and thought back in
amusement about a comment a friend posted on his Facebook page.  He said, sarcastically I hope, that he was looking forward to more and hoped they continued even after the election.

The campaign season so far also made me wonder what it would be like if data center tech was marketed like the Republican candidates.  Here are a few possibilities, below - do any others come to mind?

• The leading vendors would host industry round tables in every market timed to key events in those markets
• The round tables would be staged like Jerry Springer talk shows, where questions are designed to start fights and rile the audience
• The participants would all argue about whose solution holds truest to industry ideals like high performance, bandwidth, improved energy and space efficiency and low latency
• They would pile on the market leader and attack it for not achieving those ideals in a socially acceptable way
• Their leaders would fight over who was most like industry icons
• Their leaders would call each other out about hype, bluster and grandiosity

Most of all they would talk, talk talk.

 

Who ARE You Today? The Question Ties PR Field Up in Knots

Asking the PR profession to agree on a definition for what it should be today has tied the field up in knots.

There has been much blog debate about PRSA's efforts to redefine public relations, and lots of dialog on Twitter (check out the hash tag #prdefined to track the conversations).  And it is not just insular industry chatter, e.g. the NY Times covered the effort a couple of the months ago (see Redefining Public Relations in an Age of Social Media).

I guess it is like the cobbler's kids that don't have shoes - us PR folks are supposed to be great communicators, yet can sometimes struggle when we are the client. The question can be a lightening rod, too, and asking it - as well as expecting an answer that everyone can agree upon - is not easy.

I had been sitting quietly on the sidelines until I got an email from Heidi Sullivan of the Cision blog. She asked me late in the day last Friday on my thoughts, for a post she was working on - I decided that I was tired of procrastinating about the topic and came up with something I thought was simple and to the point:

“I define public relations as the practice that helps companies, people and brands express themselves in the best possible way.  It is about helping them communicate – directly, and with and through intermediaries – to advance their objectives.”

You can see what others thought by visiting the Cision blog, and checking out the three leading contenders on the PRSA site (the industry group is now asking for comments before putting this to bed).

Perhaps it is misguided and overly ambitious to expect everyone to agree on a single definition for such a diverse  field.  You can't help but think that the result will be a camel, that is a horse built by a committee.

But I am glad that I finally gave it some thought and responded, and urge others who have not had their voices heard to chime in too.

Don't be a PR "Order Taker"

I spent a number of years in tech sales before getting into PR. In sales, you learn pretty quickly to aspire to be more than just an order taker. True salespeople know how to to get to "yes", whether that means overcoming objections, applying consultative techniques, etc. 

Similarly, I like to point out that true masters of the PR craft are not just "order takers". Let me explain.

Many, especially those who are new to the field, tend to prefer the easier pitches - those about cool products or well known and respected brands, for example.  And it's not hard to see why.  After all, It does feel great to get a warm reception when you call the media, or sometimes even have them call you about a story. On the other hand, the campaigns that require more work generally result in more rejection and frustration.

But the best PR people know how to take a set of facts and a given client situation and turn this into a great story, even if the appeal is not obvious at first. They are not just order takers, but apply creativity and persistence to break through and earn coverage.

This also gets back to the role of marketing in helping companies and products to succeed. I remember, awhile back, a young account executive told me he believed that it is the best products that always win in the market; of course that is not true. Most markets have a range of competitors, each with products and services that have their pluses and minuses. Often, it is the company with better marketing that jumps to the head of the pack.

Please note, I am not claiming that PR alone can (or should even try to) turn lousy products into successes. Nor that you should emphasize charm and slick selling skills over substance.  I am saying that, all things being equal, PR can be the force multiplier that can help you succeed - and it is not just the order takers who will get you there.

5 Ways to Get Attention for Your Content

My monthly column is now live on the Windmill Networking blog.  

The first column in the series discussed the benefits of combining social media and content marketing.  The second installment suggested new year's resolutions for content marketers, to help, for example, overcome some of the challenges.

Today's column offers tips for overcoming what is perhaps the greatest challenge in using social media to advance content marketing objetives: namely, how to draw attention to your content amidst an explosion of media and info choices.

The timing is funny as Fast Company had an article yesterday that said that there's no shortage of content, but there's nothing worth reading (see Marketing Emergency).

My article highlights the importance of optimizing story, wrapper and delivery mechanism, and offers the following tips.

• Tell a great story
• Master short forms of communications
• Know the hot topics and where your customers live online
• Stay ahead of the market
• Leverage social and influencer equity

To find out more, please check out the full article on Windmill Networking.

PR: Stressed for Success

There has been a lot of Twitter buzz in the wake of a CareerCast study that listed public relations as one of the most stressful professions.

I believe that PR can be a very rewarding career, but do find it stressful at times (in particular, life at a PR agency can have its trying moments).  The fact that few people understand what the field is about can also be frustrating - I find that I am constantly explaining what I do for a living .  I think my kids finally understand what PR is, although at first they were hoping that my career can somehow help them get on TV.

Awhile back, I wrote on the Fusion agency blog about the field and its challenges in my post PR's Moment of Truth.

The reputation of PR is not helped by the fact that many people outside the profession simply do not understand what it is about.

When you think about it, it is simply amazing that we go out there and get the job done every day, considering the many skills that the average PR person who manages accounts is expected to master. He or she must be a word smith; a storyteller; a good conversationalist; a salesperson; a customer support person; a marketing strategist; a manager and resource coordinator; an MC of sorts, to facilitate interviews and press events; and a media specialist.

 

 

Socializing Content Marketing: Overcoming 4 Obstacles

I wrote my second column for the Windmill Networking blog.  It ran yesterday, and picked up where my first
post left off (that one covered the benefits of combining social media and content marketing).

Yesterday's story was about overcoming obstacles, and suggested the following new year's resolutions (see below for an excerpt):

1. Marketers should resolve to get smarter about social media.  They must roll up their sleeves, jump into social media, and master the ins and outs of each network (I understand that just about everyone participates these days; however there is a big difference between being a passive dabbler and an expert; if you are to master it you need study what works, experiment, and constantly learn – especially about metrics and how to improve them).
2. Be open to new ideas about content. To be successful, you need to go through a shift in thinking. What this means is that the marketing content that you use for social media cannot be thinly veiled sales materials.   Your content needs to be something that is authentic, strikes the right tone and delivers truly useful information.
3. Look beyond technology and process.  It is not all just about technology – while there is technology involved, it is easy to get lost in a thicket of APIs, SEO, algorithms, auto-posting, curation technologies, etc.
4. Stop chasing the viral Holy Grail.

The post goes into much more detail: I encourage you to visit the link and read the full article.