Corporateinklings

Know Your Audience

Before I joined Corporate Ink, I thought PR was just about pushing out news-- creating a steady drumbeat of announcements, advisories, and releases.

Boy, was I wrong. The first lesson I learned here: PR is about audiences.  Know your audience when you write releases. Know an editor’s audience when you pitch a story.  Know who cares, why they care, and why your story matters to them. And know how, when and which channel is best for reaching them.

As soon as I embraced these guidelines, engaging with audiences became easier. I see where our clients’ stories and news fit and how it could make an impact. 

Just last week I had a perfect opportunity to test my new found skills. One of my clients has a flight tracking application for the Palm Pre, and I found a little chatter online about Palm’s migration from free to paid applications. Working with client, and keeping consumers’ needs in mind, we crafted a few brief communications – straight from the client to the thread. Giving the customer what they wanted – straight talk on how to manage the transition – resulted in a round of thanks and even one customer wondering out loud why the apps were ever free – that’s how valuable he found them.

It’s not easy – crafting communications with media, colleagues and even friends – with their views top in my mind. But I’m learning is that it’s the only way to communicate effectively, to keep a conversation alive, move things forward and ultimately achieve the goal for my clients and myself.

- By Kate Greenough

Part of the Pitch

Has anyone else been inundated with email from ‘Facebook’ or ‘The Facebook Team’ for the past week?

Over the past 4 days I’ve received 20 Facebook phishing emails – taking a variety of approaches to try to get me to open a file or click on a link to reset my password or update my account (I’m still getting them now as I write this blog post – increase the tally to 22). 

The first one that I got was late on the October 26^th.  By about mid-day on the 27^th I started to get really annoyed until I realized…this is a pitch!

I did a quick search online and sure enough, this was a story that was a perfect fit for one of our clients. Our team huddled and got a quick breaking news pitch out the door.

You never know where an opportunity will come from. Usually, we’re scouring the news morning, noon and night for the latest breach – but in this case it was right in front of my face. We take an incredibly aggressive approach to media relations, and finding creative ways to tie our clients into breaking news stories is one of our biggest differentiators.  Being a part of the pitch gave me a jumpstart on the news and at the end of the day we had some nice wins for the client.

  - By Dan Brennan

Work Smarter by Working Less

Ahh, the Wall Street Journal: Gotta love it. Last month, the Work& Family column told us we can work smarter by working less. Not a bad idea, right? But read between the lines of the Boston Consulting Group survey that spawned this hardly new observation, and it’s really quite frightening.

It seems that BCG is worried its consultants don’t have enough of a life.  They’re working too hard, and keeping their b-berries on too long. So they made a new policy: 12 separate teams would have to ‘take a block of predictable time off every week.’ This  ‘groundbreaking four-year study’ is set to be published in the Harvard Business Review this month under "Making Time Off Predictable--and Required."

I’ll admit, I was expecting something noteworthy that we could apply here at Corporate Ink. From what I’ve seen in the past 15 months, the more the economy has suffered, the harder everyone is working. Too many of us work nights, and weekends, certainly in dribs-and-drabs. While it’s all rather compelling, even addicting, I have learned from my own experience that a true break is the rest we need.

So what did BCG come up with? They’d start with one night a week on their own, with no email or expectations of work. Which means, of course, that it was still fine – even expected – to work six nights a week.

It’s no surprise that these highly competitive folks feared losing something – an edge, a promotion, a bonus – if they didn’t stay plugged in. But why didn’t anyone – at the Journal, or BCG, or HBR – call out the lie here? Improving work life balance doesn’t mean working 6 nights a week, instead of seven. It means having a real life, with real dinner, 7 nights a week, ideally. And when you tell your employees you believe in work-life balance, mean it. And make it possible.

  - By Amy Bermar

Bread and Circuses, Redux

 What did the Roman Empire do when it was in decline, to help the people still feel good about being Romans?  They staged massive events that took people’s minds off the reality that they were starving and the Gauls were breathing down their necks.  

Fast forward 2000 years – Michael Jackson dies. Instead of mock naval battles in the Coliseum, we have a media circus.

Don’t get me wrong.  Michael’s death is a sad, sad tale of an immense talent lost, no doubt. But honestly, in the scheme of what’s happening – GM to lay off 4,000 white collar workers by Q4; fall housing prices still dragging down the economy; D&B reports 100,000+ business failures since last year, I have to ask:  does it really deserve front page coverage in the Wall Street Journal and 5 minutes on NPR?

Sure People and ET should wax poetic for the next month about Michael and all he meant to anyone who grew up under his spell….but the WSJ and NPR.  Seriously.

What’s happened to the 4^th estate? The independent voice that’s supposed to keep us all honest and aware of what’s really important?  Not to shine the spotlight on distractions that take our focus off the issues that impact our daily lives, families and communities.  Like debt that’ll choke a horse and unemployment that’s straining resources everywhere.

Lemme know if you hear the circus train, too.

- By Susan Bassett

General Catalyst Pools Marketing Experts: Go. Target. Open. Integrate.

I just attended a fascinating workshop hosted by General Catalyst Partners for its portfolio companies. The topic: Marketing Through a Recession. But the content was nothing about battening down hatches or retreating, or finding ways to cut costs – all that has been done, of course.

This session mixed two dozen portfolio companies, a handful of trusted vendors, and a few top thinkers, including Jeffrey Rayport, former Harvard Biz School professor and now Monitor marketing consultant, and David Kenny, one of the savviest web marketers around – the former CEO at Digitas, and now the chief digerati at Publicis.

So what are they saying?

Like any top-flight consultant, Rayport boiled it down to 5 rules – which could be summed up as ‘just give it up.’

1. Target your core group – and then give them all the information they could possibly want.

2. Understand your community – who they really are. What drives them? What do they care about? Now make yourself real – and give them a reason to get active on your behalf.

3. Work the Web – this means unleashing the power of the social network. Adopt an open source mentality, and position yourself as an aggregator of terrific, compelling content.

4. Recognize that each customer will experience you differently – at the desktop, on their phone. Design the interaction for that experience.

5. And integrate, integrate, integrate. Assume that all of your marketing is cross-channel.

What does this tell me? That our blog – and our clients’ blogs – will be better and more compelling if we’re more honest, more open, and take more risks.

That sharing information is absolutely the name of the game.  For two years, we’ve been predicting that vendors will become the new publishers. There is an absolutely vast opportunity to create deep, credible information—and syndicate it. Because users will be clamoring for information, even if they don’t know exactly where to get it right now.

 

Teaser:  There’s more on the front-lines of advertising.

To come next week:

* How Nike targets specific viewers – this means you – with demographically targeted commercials on cable TV.

* How China is trying to keep consumerism ‘manageable.’  

* How Proctor and Gamble and IBM are selling shampoo in India. And what it really takes to sell technology to one of the world’s biggest advertising companies. (This is a lesson for absolutely anyone targeting the F 100.)

   - Posted by Amy Bermar

PR Means Having to Say You're Sorry

I was raised in the midwest. I know, it’s a funny way to begin this entry, but it explains a lot. I am very generous with my “pleases” “thank yous” and especially my “I’m sorrys”.

I’ve learned quickly that, even though it may seem polite to constantly say these things, in this business, it can get you eaten alive.

The truth is: things happen. Sometimes interviews don’t come through, promised users suddenly can’t make the interview; pages can be cut, bylines and case studies can be pushed back for months. Although it is important to own responsibility and make the impossible happen, we live in a world of things going wrong.  Though some people like to yell (they say it’s stress-relief); groveling and I’m-sorrying doesn’t really fix it.

What this Midwesterner has learned:

1. Stay calm and collected.  Sounding frazzled just makes everyone more upset.
2. I’m sorry will do it. Once is enough.
3. Do something real. Did a piece cut your client out? See if the reporter can use the information on another piece – or maybe see if it’s a fit for the Web site.

Because the best way to keep a situation under control is by having good relationships with both your clients and with reporters. After all, we’re all just trying to get the story out there.

 - By Kristen Waples

You Underestimate the Power of the Dark Side

As a former TV Producer, PR folks were once the bane of my existence. They‘d offer up bad information, flood my inbox with mindless press releases and would always call 5 minutes before deadline. But to be honest, the biggest reason they drove me nuts was that I just didn’t see the value in what they did.

Today, I blog before you a changed man. I’ve converted to “the dark side”, as the self righteous media elite like to call it. For the past year, I’ve been slinging press releases, burning up the phones and helping clients use new mediums to build communities.

If I could say one thing to my former self, it would be “PR works, period.” The right message delivered to the right audience at the right time is what drives business.

Want Proof?

A client just sent over an “A” lead generation they received for one of their target customers- a major creditor.  The lead came as a direct result of feature coverage we landed in a key industry rag.

There’s tremendous gratification when your hard work translates into something tangible.  As a producer, I loved watching our live coverage and daily news stories broadcast to the masses. And today, I take great satisfaction in seeing a piece of coverage appear in print, knowing full well that it could bring in the next big customer.

- Posted by Michael Italiano

 

Millennials: who needs ‘em?

Yesterday’s WSJ carps about millennials and how they want more pay, more flexibility, more responsibility and don’t want to work hard. I don’t buy it.

The Journal puts these newbies at 7 to 28 years old. While none of our staff are in middle school, we’ve got a few who graduated college pretty recently. They’re great: smart, committed, hard workers – and ready to be challenged.

Yes, they want explanations. They crave new challenges. They want praise. So what?

They like to be asked for their opinion. Who doesn’t?

They like flextime. Who doesn’t?

Yeah, sometimes they cry. Ok – truthfully, that one I can live without.

But think about it -- is what the so-called millennials want really so bad? If our newest talent brings a fresh take on what we can do for our clients, and the energy and accountability to make it happen, then I’m all for building my company with this generation.

- Posted by Amy Bermar

Censorship S*cks

Way to go, China. You get to host the 2008 Olympic Games—an opportunity which any city in the world would kill to have—and what do you do? You counteract all the fuzzy feelings which the games are thought to foster—sportsmanship, community, international goodwill—by censoring the media. So much for coming together as one big, happy, diverse family.

As it turns out, the prospect of receiving filtered news created quite a tizzy, with everyone from The Wall Street Journal to Perez Hilton mouthing off. And no wonder, seeing as how China both reneged on a promise and rendered scores of journalists flocking to Beijing mute by blocking access to websites deemed too “sensitive”. How can the Olympics promote a strong sense of community when they’re raising issues of political repression and making so many people feel alienated?

I, for one, am disappointed. The censorship regulations blackened this year’s games (as if the smog in Beijing wasn’t doing a good enough job), causing us fans to approach them with apprehension and doubt instead of eagerness.

Frankly, I still tuned in. But with an increased awareness of what I was missing.

- Posted by Rachel Round

Leveraging LinkedIn: A New Twist

LinkedIn has long been seen as a great place for job searching, filling open positions and finding partners. And it’s no secret that for PR people it’s a great source of intelligence about reporters and analysts – very useful in helping clients successfully engage.

But recently we found a new twist on the LinkedIn story. One of our clients benefited when a reporter who posted a query to his LinkedIn community -- looking for sources for a story. A client’s partner recommended the company’s new product – and voila, the client was interviewed for a story in CSO.

Sure , there’s lots of ways reporters reach out for sources. HelpAReporterOut is one that’s getting a lot of attention lately. What’s really cool about using LinkedIn to find sources is that reporters are (in theory at least) turning to a trusted community first. I have to believe that recommendations that come to the reporter this way get a closer look.That’s not to say we all need to go find all the reporters we’ve ever talked to and send them invites to link to our profiles. The rules for building relationships with reporters are the same – regardless of where the connections take place.Would you accept a LinkedIn connection from someone you didn’t know? Reporters won’t either. Make sure you’re only reaching out to a reporter that you know and that knows you. Typically, the best time to make a connection is while you’re working with them on a story. After the interview, follow-up with an invite.And remember a wide net of reporter connections doesn’t actually mean anything if unless you keep the communication consistent. Check your page every week or so for updates. The community evolves regularly and it’s likely that there are opportunities to connect that weren’t there last week.  How are you using LinkedIn in new and creative ways?

- Posted by Dan Brennan