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A Virtual PR Geek Dinner

Posted on November 16, 2006 by Luke Armour

Update: I made New PR ! Thanks, Constantin.

Well, I had this crazy idea. And like a fool I acted on it. I couldn’t help it. It was driving me crazy. I had to let it out.

Since I’m in Ohio and jealous of all the geek dinners and social media events, I made one up. Yes, I fabricated a geek dinner with some influential PR podcasters and me at a bar.

And well, sure, I took a few creative liberties. But only at the expense of other people, see. Deep down, I’m sure they truly appreciate the attention.

Special thanks to the guys at Inside PR (Terry and David) and For Immediate Release (Shel, Neville) for being good sports about this (I hope). Special guest appearance by Paullscilla, Queen of the Desert.

It comes in at 11:10, and my testers enjoyed it. I hope you do to.

Link straight to the mp3 here.

Filed under: Frivolity, Social Media, Virtual Geek Dinner | Tagged: , , , , , | 32 Comments »

Beth Farrell wins SNCR Award of Merit

Posted on November 5, 2006 by Luke Armour

My friend, former co-blogger and former fellow graduate student won an award from the Society for New Communication Research for her outstanding work in non-profit blogs during her graduate studies. She posted about it here and on her own presentation page. The SNCR posting reads:

The Society’s awards program honors innovative organizations and professionals who are pioneering the use of social media (i.e., blogs, wikis, podcasts, collaborative tools and other forms of participatory communications) in the areas of marketing, public relations and advertising, politics, entertainment, academics, and community and cultural development…

In the Education category, two Awards of Merit were presented:
· Vanderbilt University News Service
· Elizabeth Farrell for a student research project.

Beth was nominated by the outstanding Auburn U professor Robert French who sent her case study in for consideration. If you know Robert, you know he is passionate about social media and he also does great work in the non-profit arena. He was particularly interested in Beth’s work from the start and was impressed with the results.

One thing you need to know about Beth, her work is incredibly thorough. Professors remember her for her great work, her great formidable, solid, thorough work. Robert told me in an IM that her work is “quite…um, comprehensive.” I’m not making fun, well, I might be. Because Beth’s work is incredibly well planned out and somewhat exhaustive. Other students used to love having her in classes with group work. Me included.

Social media is changing the world. Whether people want it to or not. Whether people think it is or not. I just hope communicators, especially PR folk, get it together to be champions of this change in the way the world builds and maintains relationships. That’s why I got into PR, to tell stories, to be a voice. I’m especially intrigued by the SNCR work, and their tireless efforts to bring new communication into the light.

Congratulations, Beth, and good luck with the future plans.

update: added a link

Filed under: Proud of PR, Public Relations, Social Media | Tagged: , | 1 Comment »

What Color is Your Expert Social Media Guru?

Posted on October 24, 2006 by Luke Armour

crayon-logo.jpgParachute, my eye. I want to know what color your favorite social media, new marketing hero is.

By now you’ve heard (unless you live under a blogosphere rock, i.e. are offline) that all our favorite podcasters have joined together to form an honest to goodness virtual company focusing on all aspects of communication. Instead of offering social media as an afterthought, crayon will be incorporating every strategic tool at its disposal to fit the needs of its clients.

Shel writes:

The biggest boxes of crayons come chock-full of dozens of colors, Joe notes, but most communicators (marketers, advertisers, PR folk, corporate communications pros) seem always to start with red, green, and blue. crayon is ready to pull any color out of the box and we definitley [sic] will not start with red, green, and blue.

And that’s great. But I want to hear from you. What colors are your social media magnates? Mine are as follows:

  • Holtz says to me a fuzzy wuzzy brown
  • Hobson is nothing less than a burnt sienna
  • CC Chapman couldn’t be anything other than atomic tangerine
  • Jaffe is a toss-up between razzmatazz and purple pizzazz

Best of luck, gentlemen, to you and your NY behind-the-scene troop, as well as your incoming freshmen. I wish I could join you, but my accolades aren’t as bright and I’m not sure what I can do from NE Ohio. Keep on keepin’ on.

Filed under: Public Relations, Social Media | Tagged: , , , , | 1 Comment »

Cleveland PR/Journo Thoughts

Posted on October 22, 2006 by Luke Armour

As I posted last week, I attended a BusinessWire breakfast in Cleveland last week. Cleveland’s kind of a hike for me, especially at 8am, but I persevered and made it. I also managed to forget my camera so I don’t have any cool photos to prove I was there. Except this badge they gave me I took a picture of when I got home.

I had been especially interested in the panel of speakers as well as the topic. Panelists were John Kroll, Deputy Business Editor of The Plain Dealer, and author of the retirement blog Not Fade Away; Thomas Mulready, founder of CoolCleveland; and Chris Thompson of the Transparency Works blog and Vice President of Edward Howard & Co. Moderator was Denise Polverine, Editor-in-Chief, Cleveland.com.

I took away some valuable statements that really made me think about some things. I wanted to share those with you in no particular order.

  • Kroll mentioned that the communication that we’re having today is different, that it used to be two companies communicating. Even though it was it was reporter to PR pro, it was really the two companies talking. Now it’s people talking, bloggers blogging, conversations raging. The Cluetrain is apparent in Kroll’s comments. “Bloggers are not a species,” Kroll said, “bloggers are people.” This comment reminds me so much of Shel‘s common phrase that it’s not that we don’t trust blogs, it that we’re skeptical of anyone until we learn to trust them. In person, in print, or online, it doesn’t matter.
  • Thompson pointed out that new analytics in the online world are making it easier to measure almost everything. He said we’ve “gotten rich by not measuring anything and telling the client it’s all fine.” Times are changing. Are we ready? My view is that some of us are ready, but most aren’t. I’m hedging on this one my self. As an industry, I think PR is not ready. As an industry I think news media is not ready. But we are moving forward, just behind the tide.
  • As I huge fan of RSS (I recently gave a talk to a PRSSA chapter on RSS), I was shocked to think of a negative side to it. Thompson made a great point that perhaps RSS makes things too segregated. We’re narrowing ourselves into ignorance. This is something I struggle with everyday. Personally, I avoid this by subscribing to RSS feeds that I don’t have any personal interest in and then scanning the headlines just to keep rounded. But he’s right. The narrowcasting approach has made it very easy to target certain people, but infinitely more difficult to hit those people who reside on the fence. In any given opinion-swaying campaign, be it political or consumer, B2B or otherwise, the only people you really target are those who are decidedly undecided. You’re never going to change the minds of the top percent of supporters for both sides. But with this incredibly narrow focus, how do we attempt to reach the minds of the undecided? Demographics (and psychographics, etc) for television and print change daily, I’m guessing, as new technologies are adopted by more and more people. Advertising and PR is getting more and more difficult, while getting seemingly easier. Not to mention Thompson’s point about narrowing ourselves to ignorance. I thought we, as Americans, were ignorant enough. Hold me, I’m frightened.
  • Kroll made a great point about newpapers going online. He said, “we’re still a traditional media,” referring to the Plain Dealer, “[companies] still talk to us as little as they ever used to.” I laughed about that. Isn’t it funny? PR people are always pitching stories, but journalists are looking for real news. It’s laughable to see how often we miss each other. Kroll’s point demonstrates that things are surely slow to change. There’s some comfort in that(?)
  • Kroll also noted that the great thing about the new media tools is that the news media and PR are finally up to where education was decades ago. It’s sad to think that PR and News take so long to adopt change and new technologies. However, I’m not sure education is on top of it either… I mean, I just got my Masters and one of our undergrad professors was still using her doctoral notes from 20 years prior to teach us PR. Maybe it was my school, but there is NOTHING comforting about that. I mean, a colleague of mine even told her, “that’s kind of sad, don’t you think something’s changed in twenty years?” The prof hasn’t budged.

So the event was excellent. Denise and Thomas also said some great things, but I only jotted down so much and it’s taken me ages to post even this. I also had the privalege to meet Cleveland’s own civic voice, George Nemeth from Brewed Fresh Daily who left me this thoughtful comment on another post.  Thanks, George, hope to see more bloggers in NE Ohio soon.

Filed under: Future of PR, Public Relations, Social Media | Tagged: , | 1 Comment »

BizWire Breakfast

Posted on October 10, 2006 by Luke Armour

Headed to Cleveland tomorrow for an early breakfast sponsored by BusinessWire entitled 100 years in the making: Public Relations Past, Present and Future —The Changing Face of Journalism and PR

Should be fun, one of the speakers is blogger Chris Thompson (Vice President, Edward Howard) from the Transparency Works blog. I’ll be reporting on that sometime later this week.

Filed under: Admin Notes, Future of PR, Press Release, Public Relations, Social Media | Tagged: | 4 Comments »

Association of National Advertisers Steppin’ Up

Posted on October 9, 2006 by Luke Armour

Stuart Elliott is at it again. Using mainstream media to bring awareness of new media. His recent article covering last week’s 96th annual conference of the Association of National Advertisers made me feel like cheering. Some highlights, which do not preclude reading the article, include some big names from big brands. They see the trends and understand it. “Too late” some would say, but I don’t. Hell, a majority of PR people are just figuring this out.

Said Stephen F. Quinn, senior vice president for marketing at Wal-Mart Stores:

“Today, the customer is in charge,” Mr. Quinn said, “and whoever is best at putting the customer in charge makes all the money.”

Said James L. McDowell, managing director at Mini USA:

“It’s a great thing every day to wake up and see what consumers have done to the brand…”

Burger King is one brand that has been pushing the limits in the social media space. Said Russ Klein, president for global marketing, strategy and innovation at Burger King:

“It’s more important for us to be provocative than pleasant.”

And perhaps most importantly:

“We can’t manage what happens out there,” said Lawrence Flanagan, executive vice president and chief marketing officer at MasterCard Worldwide. “It has taken on a life of its own.”

Filed under: advertising, Future of PR, Marketing, Public Relations, Social Media | Tagged: , | Leave a comment »

Second Life: It doesn’t matter if you like it

Posted on September 25, 2006 by Luke Armour

I’ve been trying to avoid Second Life as much as possible, both in writing about it and getting involved in it. Mostly because of the contention between some of the folks in the PR blogosphere. I have my own thoughts on Second Life and they’re not much to write home about. I haven’t tried it, I’m not planning to for a while, and I’m not sure what the draw is. However, one thing I am doing is paying attention to it. And I’m doubly glad there are communicators out there who are paying attention to it and reporting it so I don’t have to. The fellas at For Immediate Release: The Hobson and Holtz Report are doing just that.

And they’re getting bashed for it by some folks who I believe have little right to criticize. Students and young PR professionals, still wet behind the ears, are giving these two highly seasoned verterans a hard time? Ridiculous. I see where they’re coming from, but to voice one’s opinion with such arrogance to people who were practicing communication professionals before some of them were born is distasteful. What really kicks me in the pants is FIR is Shel and Neville‘s podcast, they could talk exclusively about edible underwear if they wanted to, it’s their show. Don’t like it, don’t listen. They welcome comments, so make your point and leave it. Don’t harangue them, am I right here?

But like I said, I’m not a huge fan of Second Life, because I personally think it’s pretty stupid. That really doesn’t matter, does it? I think eating fruits and vegetables is stupid, too, but the truth is you can’t avoid it. If you don’t like SL and think it’s a waste of time, that’s okay, so do I. But to blindly ignore or refuse to talk about anything that affects the communication field – that’s a mistake.

I think Second Life is an odd time drain, but there are many, many people who don’t. And that’s what matters. How many people thought the owning a car was stupid? How many people thought reading was stupid? How many people thought the Internet was stupid? FIR Show 170, Shel Holtz says it very well.

For more information, read about Kami’s PR meetup in SL and Lee Hopkins’ rather humorous take on it. Also, Shel points to Text 100’s YouTube Video explaining the connection between SL and PR. The video is a must watch for beginners. It doesn’t make me want to sign up, yet, but at least I have a few answers if a client asks me about it…

Filed under: Future of PR, One to watch, Public Relations, Social Media, technology | Tagged: , | 10 Comments »

Friday Frivolity

Posted on August 10, 2006 by Luke Armour

Why doesn’t my blog spell checker recognize the words:

blog

blogger

blogs

blogging

podcast

podcasting

podcaster

Social media my eye, there’s nothing social about these programs, they don’t even recognize each other!

Filed under: Frivolity, Social Media | Leave a comment »

See Value in Letting Go

Posted on June 13, 2006 by Luke Armour

This article from the New York Times (By STUART ELLIOTT Published: June 13, 2006) put a smile on my face. Letting agencies make strategic decisions for the company? Sounds good to me. I mean, agencies are supposed to know their stuff, so why not let them go about doing it?

Last year when I was in England, CEO of Edelman London, Stuart Smith, gave me an analogy that I've used often since. He referred to agency work as having both "arms and legs" and "brains" that are offered as part of the services. Sometimes organizations just need help with the tasks at hand, writing, creating, building things – that's the "arms and legs." The "brains" come in when an organization needs help with the strategic planning. Some companies need one or the other, some utilize both. But it has always seemed to me that a smart thing to do would be to hire an agency with proven strengths and let it do its job. Allow it to develop strategies with you, not just do things you tell them to. I mean, I would personally never hire a contractor to remodel my kitchen based solely on my design…I mean, I know nothing about…uh, buildin' stuff. That said, I would never let my contractor rebuild my kitchen without my input. I would utilize both the contractor's brain and her arms and legs to get the job done.

From the article:

One change is meant to help General Mills adapt to the new-media landscape as it tries to reach consumers using nontraditional approaches like the Internet, e-mail marketing and branded entertainment.

"The old media are alive and well, but the new media are in a very steep growth curve," said Jeffrey Merrihue, chief executive at Accenture Marketing Sciences in London, a unit of Accenture.

"You need to plan to take advantage of the opportunities and prepare for a future when the new media are more and more important," Mr. Merrihue said. 

This article shows just another way in which new media channels have allowed good companies to find ways to use them. They might not understand the medium completely, but there are those who do. And letting those people do what they know how to do is a great start for both the organization and the representative agency.

Filed under: advertising, Marketing, Public Relations, Social Media | 1 Comment »

The Blogger Dichotomy

Posted on June 6, 2006 by Luke Armour

This is a little late, but I've been mulling this topic over for a while.

Spawned by this this post by Wagstaff, I've been wanting to post something about this since I read it as well as add some of my own thoughts on the subject. Wagstaff goes into detail about PR people and bloggers, it's an interesting read. Be sure to read the transcript of Richard Edelman's Q & A linked from Wagstaff at Weinberger's site as well as Richard's own commentary on the subject. There are some tips that you can sort through.

Bloggers. Bloggers are people, too. Sometimes they are rather influential people, but they're people. How does one, as a blogger, balance life and blogging? Mike Sacks wrote an interesting post recently about how disappointed he is with PR bloggers the other day. His point was this: Write about PR if you're a PR blogger. I mostly agreed with him. But nobody is just a PR blogger. These people are also tech geeks, PR pros, fathers, sisters, managers, idealists, realists and daughters. You have to sort through what is out there and find things that resonate with you. (Read the comments on Mike's post, too, they're interesting. Oh, also, Mike doesn't like it when bloggers write about blogging, so he's probably rolling his eyes about this, too. 😉 I can't help it.)

We're used to journalists writing about their beats. A journalist rarely mentions in a post about political unrest in Kerplakistan that his daughter is teething and isn't that cute. Would I read a magazine that didn't stay on topic? Probably not. But blogging is different, blogging is people, blogging is all the person at least some of the time. That's what makes it so cool.

But the balance is hard to attain. Where does one put the fulcrum? Am I a PR blogger or a person? Am I a professional or a guy with a chip on his shoulder? Am I a representative of my agency or a solitary entity. All of the above I guess. I suppose we all find our groove and fit into it, as both a blog reader and a blog writer. It is incredibly hard for me to unsubscribe to feeds I've been reading since I found the blogosphere even though I rarely find anything of value to me in them. Why? Because I might miss something. And it's also hard for me to write about things that interest me if I feel my readers might find them off topic, but it's who I am.

We should all really be grateful that I'm not blogging about the Stanley Cup Playoffs (I probably would be, except that I don't get OLN).

So, blogging is an anomaly that we're not really quite used to merging with the "real world" yet, there's clearly a dichotomy between who we are and who we present ourselves to be. And it's something we need to be ready for if we are to work with bloggers to help spread our messages. I'm up for the challenge.

Filed under: Future of PR, Public Relations, Social Media | 4 Comments »

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