It’s amazing how different my inbox changed since Monday. My first contribution to Entrepreneur in a few years goes live and suddenly PR folks everywhere want to bend my ear about this or that. It’s actually good since I’m always looking for ideas for articles here or on the podcast, too, so I don’t mind […]
No Matter What Your Woes, Technology is Never to Blame Read More »
If you’re going to be a guest on a podcast, you need to know how to be a guest on a podcast. It’s easy to think, “Oh, we’re just chatting like on the phone,” and nonchalant your opportunity to be interviewed. When you take that approach, you wind up sounding bad, dumb or both. I
How To Be a Good Podcast Guest Read More »
The most creative public relations move you can make is sitting right under your nose. It might be the most creative move you can make in all of marketing. This week’s food for thought uncovers that creative advantage as a follow-on thought to my Girl Scout Cookie’s story from Tuesday’s podcast episode. I realized we
The Most Creative Public Relations Move You Can Make Read More »
Few people know how to build communications strategies for business growth like Barbara Hannan. She was an instrumental figure behind the Groundswell Award-winning case study of community and influencer strategies executed by Pitney Bowes over the course of the last few years. Her years of experience as a communications strategist puts her in elite company
Building Communications Strategies for Growth Read More »
Drive Down is quite the public affairs case study. And you know who one of the architects of this example was? My mom. That’s right! Sara George of the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet’s District 12 joined me on Go Ahead Caller to talk about how a communications strategy reduced traffic accidents in one Kentucky county by
A Public Affairs Case Study: Communications Saving Lives – My Mom on GAC Episode 53 Read More »
There aren’t many companies that have needed crisis communications as much Papa John’s lately. Living in Louisville, it has been hard for me to escape the latest scuttlebutt, accusation, claim and such coming from ousted Chairman and company founder John Schnatter, who allegedly used a racial slur on a media training call earlier this year.
Papa John’s Launches Crisis Communications Initiative Read More »
In a 2008 panel discussion about influencer marketing and public relations I was asked how I would respond if a blogger asked me to pay them to use the story I was pitching for my client. My response then was I would tell them to go to hell. Certainly, that was a melodramatic way to underline a point
The Irony of Today’s Influencer Marketing Landscape Read More »
A company I advise is building an advisory board. They asked if it would be smart to announce all the new advisory board members at once or each individually to multiply the opportunities to write about them. They are hoping to make an effective announcement out of this. You could ask the same question about personnel
The key to an effective announcement is the ‘why’ Read More »
The first national speaking opportunity I was offered was to spread the word that PR spam was partially the fault of the media database companies, like Cision and Vocus, who were making blogger and media member contact information readily available. The companies responded, strengthening their offerings. But there’s still a lot to be desired. Last
Framing The Blogger-PR Relationship Differently Read More »
The lines between paid and earned media continue to blur. Online influencers and bloggers, unlike traditionally trained media, realize their content and access to their audience is worth money. So when a public relations person reaches out, many more are responding with, “Here’s my fee.” Certainly, there are still many content providers, journalists, bloggers and
New Influencer Campaign Tool The Shelf Shows Promise Read More »
The public relations world that does know me, knows I like to kick up dust. In fact, my first national speaking engagement was a talk with Cision’s Heidi Sullivan and Jay Krall at PRSA Digital in New York after I criticized media database firms like theirs for being complicit in PR spam. John Cass and
Join The Movement To #updatecanspam And Refine PR Spam Read More »
The problem with crisis communications is that when people feel wronged, we yearn for sympathy. It is our human nature to wish both for someone to assure us that we are justified in that negative emotion and reassure us that someone will take the blame for whatever misdeed occurred. When businesses or their employees wrong us,
Crisis Communications: Social Media Destroys Consumer Objectivism Read More »