4 Characteristics of PR Campaigns

What makes some PR Campaigns successful while others are flops?? Are you really know why???

Actually, while they are a lot of variables in every PR campaign, they come to realize that the most successful campaigns is to share a 4 characteristics things in common.

1) They have a goal

2) They have detailed plan for reaching the goal

3) They are well researched about the goal/issues

4) They are constantly monitored and tweaked as needed.

In other thought.  What are some of other characteristics of successful PR campaigns, that you think it can be??

Why Should PR use Media Monitoring

Hi Readers,

My question today is, why should PR Pros used media monitoring??? can you comment on this?? 

From my reviews and reading, when a fortune 500 company or government agency or non-profit pro wants to know what's being said about them in the news, they will turn it to a media monitoring service.  What is media monitoring actually??? 

Media monitoring services track information on television, radio, in print and on the net to keep on top of publicity, trends and the success of media campaigns.  In directly, what we want to know if the satellite media tour aired in all the broadcast markets we booked?? we must check with the media monitoring services.  Did you want to know if the new product is being talked about on the monitoring show? you will directly asked your media monitoring service.

Media monitoring service is essential in this day and in the age of information overload.  If you are in PR Pro, they can be your best friend...really?? yes it is.  It not only can a media monitoring service send you a full report of coverage.  For a PR pro who is doing a good job, they can getting the work out with the media monitoring immediately, they getting her client or product in the spotlight and media monitoring report is cold hard proff that something has gone wrong with the campaigns.

So, keep in mind that these are several types of media monitoring services can also provide analysis of your media mentions.  As what you will know, when PR pro need proof of media coverage, expert analysis and metrics to calculate the success of their PR campaigns, they will turn to media monitoring services.

How to Capture Timeline Market???

Hi Readers,

Refers to the above title i would like to make Facebook as an examples in my writing today..why???

Because Facebook is a big design's, the "Timeline" hasn't officially been released yet, and still have plenty of time to plan how we can take advantage on this "life organizations" feature for the business.  As what we know, while Facebook users will initially back at the big change and threaten to leave, eventually they will settle down and work with what they're been given.  This is what i would like to dicsuss.

As a companies like yours that work with the new Facebook will be the ones that shine.  The marketing options will be greatly expanded and provide even more opportunities to reach a new customers once it's unleashed.  Let's take a look what you're  expect.

Every company has their own story right?? and all the story is unique as the product as well.  Now, the brand page can tell that story overall.  Just like each Facebook user can tell their own story on their home page, company like their target, coca cola and the customers can show how they're involved in over the years.  From the beginning to nowdays, it came birth to the latest development and people can see the story of the business as well.

With these can, you as a PR person can begin this process now, even before the official release of Timeline.  Reach back into the company past and pull up tidbits from when you were just starting out.  You can post a funny story to be tell and tough challenges to overcame.  If you company is recent enough, you can repost Facebook message from when you were just starting out.  This will help you to get started organizing the Timeline and can make people more interested in the stories when the time comes and everyone is switched to the new format.

Monitor The Web for Brand Mentions

Online reputation management is essential.  Almost everyone is involved in social media these days.  Did you know??  Your customers are all over Facebook, Twitter, Blogs and message boards.  It's vital that you'll take a proactive approach to monitoring the conversation surrounding your brand actually.  In that situation you can find the important conversations and jump into them to strengthen brand by engaging with your target audience.

The good news is that there are plenty of great tools out there that can make it easy for you to monitor the internet for brand mentions.

Application you can used:

1) Google Alerts

2) HootSuite

3) Tweetdeck

4) Broad Tracker

In addition to monitoring the web for brand mentions, you can also tracking with the followings:

Keywords - can use the tools above to track mentions of important keywords related to your niche.  This is helpful for staying current on the industry developments, and it could present opportunities for you to jump into the conversations with the target audience.

Competitor mentions - it's always a good idea to keep an eye on the competition.  It's not only, you need to know what they're up to know what they're up to.  But it's also to helpful to see how their reputations is faring.

Links - Monitor the back-links, so that you can see anytime and someone else to the website or drops a link directed to your facebook or Twitter.

Employee mentions - the employees are the face of the company.  We need to know if they're doing anything that's going to reflect poorly on the brand.

Coupons as PR

I'm back!!!

Today i would like to discuss about coupons as PR.  

Can coupons can be used as a public relations tools?? or they are firmly in the marketing campaigns?  Business experts have argued about this for ages actually...and the influence of the internet hasn't exactly helped to settle the scores.

In fact, its probably blurred the lines even more website like Groupon, MAD and Foursquare are changing the face of the coupon and making it more of a way to interact with customers rather than simply get them in the store..right?

Whichever side you're on, marketing or public relations, it barely matters; what matters is getting those folks through the front door and buying the stuff.  Coupons are a great way to do that.  So how you all thinks that its effectively can used them as a PR tools??

In event???

One things website like Foursquare do so well is to create "hype" around a store's coupons.  The managers have been know to pull off some pretty elaborate situations for their business, resulting in a veritable swarm of new customers. For instance becoming "mayor" of a restaurant can get a customer free stuff like drinks, food or even merchandise. 

How it does translate to the public relations??

To stay mayor that long, user must go to the story to check-in.  If users are holding a contest to get these coupons, then people have a chance to talk to you and to their fellow customers about the experience in that place.  This is translate PR quite easily, especially if you also combine the experience with other social media in Facebook.

Other social media

Speaking of other social media, this is also a perfect way to bring public relations to the store while also giving the customers a break.  Many business will give out deals if folks "like" their own page or business page.  That;s a great way to bring in a new people.  The promise of future coupons can be a great way to ensure those users don't jet as soon as they're gotten what they need from their initial coupons.  Coupons can come in the mail all the time, but users wouldn't say that interacting with customers at all.  But to give people opportunity to "earn" them, like coming to the store and using their phone to check in, then it becomes something else entirely.

Social Media on the Rise - Declined

Social media rising to the top or sinking to the bottom when it comes to advertising and marketing.  It seem like we get a different answer depending on who we ask for?.  Some will say that it's on the decline, that people are beginning to realize there's no replacing a real live human.  Others says that's ridiculous and there's no time like the present to jump on the bandwagon..

What you choose??

The Rise
Clearly many aspects of social media on the rise considering the advent of brand new social media platforms every day.  Most of these are very specific platforms, like oneclimate which is platform for not to profit/social change organizations and lovers.  These randomly pop up and vanish all the time.  The enjoy a wide variety of success, depending on how large the niche is they operate within.  There are also major release like Google plus.  Plus is expected to make huge impact on the social media market landscape, taking on giants like Facebook and Twitter.

The Decline
When someone says social media is in decline, they don't mean the actual practice of it.  I've seen it more accurately describes as moving away from calling everything and more towards streamlining social media into the rest of the marketing in one smooth stream.  When business social media first started, people were unware of whether it was going to turn into just another way for companies to shill for their product.  This will caused the current practice to creating social identities for otherwise faceless companies.

Crisis Plans - Basic Needs

Today i would like to write about social media crisis and the basics plans company needs.!!!

Does your company have a social media back-up plan??? do you???

When a crisis hits, we as a PR person in our company need to jump on it immediately.  Otherwise, things can easily spiral out of control.  If we don't know what to do, we can easily miss the chances or make a things worse..

What Good???

A major incident spread through the internet like wildlife showcasing just on how important social media really is actually??? I read about the case of "an editor at cook's source magazine".  A cooking and recipe rag in the north-east US, decided to rip off a recipe she found on the internet.  When the victim contacted her about the compensation, the editor responded she should be lucky because the magazine included her at all.

What can we do??

A social media crisis plan doesn't take too much work to set up.  Start by determining what the potential problems might be, will it likely be something about the product or service.  Known in advanced what might get throw the way so that we can prepare to block it when the situation actually arises.  Instead of floundering around, or ignoring the situation like cook source did, we will have a step by step plan to follow.  We have to consider by giving everyone on staff separate tasks.  when time is of the essence, say during a major product recall, we may not be able to handle angry facebook and twitter posts all at once. 

Think of the social media crisis plan as our fire drill.

The Keys to Social Media Success

There are many keys to success with social media.  Instead of just having to use one to unlock a door, you're required to use many for just only one lock!! One door might need the build relationships key as well as the do proper research to unlock the key.  Another door requires the learn SEO to build a community and to hire social medai manager keys before it opens.

However the prizes behind these door make the effect and key searching well worth it, whether you're already required a few of these or are just starting out and need some motivation, by knowing what the end result is can be very helpful.

Deep Loyalty with Customers

This is the one of the biggest doors we can unlock, and it may require most of the keys we have on the social media key ring.  These keys include "branding", "tweet useful info" and inspire confidence among many others.  Loyalty from the customers can result in long term ROI and steadily increasing revenue.  However, it's not about money.  Brand loyalty might also mean forgiveness in the face of a good or scandal.  Also, it can vbe used a gateway to future loyal customers when we tell all the friends and family members about us.

Better Reputation

For this door, we need keys like "respond to gripes on Facebook", "donate to charity" and "have a back-up plan in case of a disaster"  Behind this door lies the opportunity to be better known throughout the world as a reputable business.  When the general public sees how well we handle a crises of everyday questions and complaints, it will eventually strike them that we treat customers like each one is a treasure.  When it happens, the public will become confident that when they deal with us they will get a satisfactory customer experience.  From the moment they enter our shop or log into our website, all their needs will be met.  Confidence in the business willingness to always do the right thing can quickly translate into money in the pocket. 

Become a brand

Are you really want your business to be known for your product??? i think YES! When people think of custom made pencil toppers, of course you want them to think of your custom made pencil toppers right??.  if this is the case, they we should need social media keys like "perfect logo" and be more creative.

Actually branding is all more about a "feeling" than anything that we can put hands on.  Creating a brand isn't simple, but if we can pull it off, people will associate our business with a certain feeling or aura.  To fulfill that side of themselves, they will head to the front doors and but away.  

To achieve all this, we must simply get the right keys!..

Opening Door Social Media Vs. Facebook

Hi readers, I'm back to share with you about how to open the social media door by using a Facebook???

The pathway to success has many doors you must open.  However, they aren't  in a straight line by any means.  Have we ever played a video or video game??? where should we start out in a central hub and have to find key or treasure in surrounding hallways?  Actually finding success is a not like that.  One of the doors must unlock in the social media door.  It's a recent addition to the maze of success but quickly became a very crucial one.  If we don't unlock the social media door,we're missing out on quite a bit a treasure...

Why Facebook??

Out of all social media outlets available, but why is facebook the door handle?? Actually it's simply of the most direct routes that we can take to reach the customers.  Facebook can become a "one stop shop" for the business if we update it correctly.  Not only that, we can converse with the base, and we can upload pictures, run a chat forum and even create a simple store front.  If we want to talk directly to the visitors, record a video and put it on the facebook page.

Opening the Door

After using a Facebook to open the social media door to success.  We can integrate other forms of social media into the campaigns.  Assembling a dedicated fan base on the facebook page makes it easy to get followers on twitter and Linkedln.  Opening social media door through Facebook also provides an opportunity to broaden the horizons.  It's really a great route to go and gives us a head start on the rest of the business career online!!!

Promote Yourself Online!!!

Promote yourself online??? sound like so funny and weird right?? but of course it is.  It originated on the internet, how in the world would be an offline thing as well?? As a matter of fact, offline social media promotion can be just as important as posting on blogs and email campaigns.  I would venture its one of the most overlooked aspects of a social media effort.  Most of the things that PR must do is to promote social media campaign offline are relatively simple too.

Plain Language in PR

Using simple language to communicate with journalist is not considered bland but effective.  Whether PR Campaign targets community or business publications, it is unlikely that reporters reviewing your press kit will be familiar with specific industry jargon.  Providing them with information in plain language is the surest way to get point across, significantly improving your chances for media coverage.

Plain language keeps messages simple, but not simplistic.  it neither talks down to the reader.  It structures information logically, in familiar terms.  

PR Person!!

Public Relations is an intense and difficult job that can be rewarding and disappointing.  It can be exciting, and mind boring.  PR, more often than not is misunderstood by people outside of the industry.  Increasingly, the lines between PR, marketing and advertising are becoming more blurred and taking the industry into a new direction.  In short, once you got below the surface, PR is not what it appears to be from the outside. 

To be a PR person, you need to posses a certain skill set than can be broken down into two categories; "human skills and professional skills".  Human skills include things such as patience and congeniality, while professional skills include the ability to speak publicly and write professionally. 

Human Skills - [Patience] it's waiting to hear back from journalist or producers that you have pitched, or simply understanding that a PR campaigns takes time to gain traction and evolve, if you don't have patience, you will never be able to be PR person.

The best PR people are people who can put things into context.  The ability to take an idea and narrow or broaden it is important when it comes to pitching a story, as well as when it comes figuring out how to target the story.

Professional Skills - [Writing] don't have to be a novelist.  You can't write a decent letter, memo or most importantly, press release.  Despite the proliferation of emails and instant messaging, the ability to communicate via the written word is something lost on many people who have grown up in the electronic age.

[Orating] Public speaking is not easy, and it certainly takes most people time to get comfortable in front of a large group of people.  PR people need to be able to articulate their through and their company's story in front of an audience, be it a group of employees or a swarm of media. 

PR takes an immense amount of research and PR people who don't understand tools such as blogs, search engines and premium search services suffer the consequences.