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Insights for Leaders Navigating
Visibility, Credibility, and Growth.

From media strategy to reputation management, we explore the trends shaping public perception and share the approaches that drive measurable results for growing brands.

Quality Over Quantity

When practicing public relations and striving to drive awareness on behalf of clients, it can be easy to lose sight of the notion that quality, in many cases, is more important than quantity. Let’s be honest: Unless you’re working for Apple, Amazon, Boeing, or another major brand, it’s unlikely your news announcement will appeal to—let alone reach—the masses. However, when your small- to mid-size company’s news is considered “disruptive” to an industry, and thereby newsworthy by press, there can be exceptions to the rule.

Many companies operate in niche industries providing innovative services and solutions to other businesses. However, because this work is behind the scenes rather than consumer-facing, these company’s brands are largely unknown to the general populace. Our client Delta-Q Technologies is a good example of this.

Delta-Q Technologies is a leader in battery-charging solutions that improve the performance and durability of electric-drive vehicles and industrial equipment. In other words, the company develops discrete, highly efficient chargers for electric vehicles and machines and has become the supplier of choice to manufacturers of electric golf carts, aerial work platforms, industrial floor cleaners, and other utility and recreational vehicles.

Delta-Q’s innovative power technologies, realized in the form of compact and reliable battery chargers, equip more than one million electric vehicles, and is well regarded by the manufacturers of industrial equipment.

Recently, Delta-Q released a white paper, “On-board Charger Reliability for Electric Drive Vehicles and Industrial Machines,” which shared new insights into on-board industrial battery charger reliability and validation testing. Drawing on the company’s design and validation expertise, the paper details how original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) can improve integration of on-board chargers into machines such as lift trucks, aerial work platforms, and floor machines.

While the benefits of this research are undeniable—higher charger reliability is leading to improved machine availability and productivity gains by increasing charging convenience—the target audience for this news is limited when compared to a general business or consumer audience. However, we did want to drive awareness of Delta-Q as an industry thought leader with a highly targeted audience of design engineers and decision makers at OEMs of industrial machines and equipment.

We discussed the news value of the announcement and set reasonable expectations of coverage with our client contact. Additionally, we worked together to develop a strategy to focus our attention on securing placement in specific industry publications within Delta-Q’s vertical markets.

To support this news, we managed distribution of the release via a wire service—not with a goal to achieve numerous media hits, but to ensure that the information was available in the public domain. In addition, we shared the news and details on how to access the report directly with a highly targeted list of outlets serving readers for whom the news would be relevant.

The Results

As expected, Delta-Q’s announcement garnered only a few articles. However, the articles were placed in publications that reach exactly the audience for which the news was meant. And because Delta-Q created a landing page on its corporate web site specifically to deliver the research to interested parties, they have visibility into the frequency of white paper downloads, as well as evidence that visitors are coming from OEMs with whom Delta-Q is working to establish relationships.

By setting realistic expectations and focusing on the quality of coverage rather than quantity, we were able to deliver on our promise to reach the audience that matters most to Delta-Q. As a result, a small number of articles in the right publications has helped raise awareness of the company and generated increased engagement with Delta-Q’s website.

For more information about Delta-Q’s power conversion solutions, visit the company’s website, where you can also access the white paper. Following are the articles that resulted from our outreach on Delta-Q’s behalf.

“White Paper Gives Insight into Onboard Battery Chargers,” Lift and Access

“Delta-Q Technologies Provides Insight Into On-Board Charger Reliability,” Industrial Lift & Hoist

“Delta-Q Technologies Releases New Insights into On-board Charger Reliability for Electric Vehicles and Industrial Equipment,” In Compliance Magazine

“The Delta-Q ruggedized industrialized battery charger,” EDN Network

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Smartsheet Introduces New Data Visualization Tool for Enterprises

This week has been a very exciting one for our client Smartsheet, a leading provider of a collaboration project management tool. On Monday, Oct. 20, 2014, Smartsheet announced its new tool, Workmap. Workmap allows users to visualize work and the various people contributing to it in Smartsheet.

By breaking down the traditional organizational chart view of work management, the Smartsheet visualization shows how internal employees and external contributors form work clusters around certain processes to drive work forward. One feature is an enterprise-wide Account Map, which provides organizations with a high-level view of their usage of Smartsheet to identify patterns in work or team collaboration across the organization, visualize hubs of activity, and map it to corporate priorities.

Joshua Greenbaum, a principal at Enterprise Applications Consulting said, “Having this level of visibility into how work gets done and how people internal and external to the enterprise collaborate is uniquely valuable to an organization.” Clearly, Smartsheet is at the forefront of visualization data and we are excited to see how they continue to stay at the forefront of enterprise technology.

We are not alone in our enthusiasm regarding Smartsheet’s Workmap tool. Listed below are links to articles about Smartsheet’s announcement:

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Should Brands Say “Ello” to the New Ad-Free Social Network?

The new social media site Ello has exploded in popularity recently among people seeking a social network that doesn’t fill their feed with advertisements. AdWeek reported that the invitation-only site is receiving 45,000 hourly requests to join, which is far more than the fledgling site can handle. This leads brands to wonder – what is their role on the hottest new social media site?

Ello is being called the “anti-Facebook” for its stark aesthetic and its promise not to allow advertisements, sell data, or require users to register under their real name. The site’s manifesto says that, “Collecting and selling your personal data, reading your posts to your friends, and mapping your social connections for profit is both creepy and unethical.”

Even though the site clearly states its rejection of social-media brand advertising, some brands have already jumped on the Ello bandwagon and created company pages. Among the early adopters are Netflix, Sonos, and the Wall Street Journal.

Many people think these brands are foolish. Ello’s manifesto makes it clear that the site is a gathering place for people who are sick of brand advertising infiltrating their social networks so obviously any brands who try to join the party will be shunned.

But Ello founder Paul Bidnitz’s bicycle shop has a brand page, which some argue sets the precedent that brands are welcome on the site, as long as they’re not trying to advertise. In addition, Ello users choose who they want to follow, so if they do not want to see a brand’s posts they never have to.

So should your brand join Ello? At this point, it would probably be wise to wait. Ello is still in its early stages and it is not clear whether its business model is sustainable. Since it could be a passing fad, it is not worth it to invest resources in it yet. In addition, brands that jump in too quickly without thoroughly evaluating the community dynamic run the risk of facing backlash from other users. For now, brands would be wise to monitor how the network develops in the upcoming weeks and months before creating a page.

What do you think? Should brands jump on Ello now or wait to see how it develops?

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“Fear-bola” and the Power of the Media

It’s impossible to ignore the ongoing coverage of the global Ebola crisis. Reading the latest on the outbreak—particularly in the hardest-hit areas—is at once fascinating and heart-wrenching. It’s deeply troubling. And lately, above all, it’s terrifying.

At the heart of many of the stories around Ebola is its growing danger and the pervasive fear that is rising among the public as a result. The media has even given this a name—“fear-bola”—and in many cases, its coverage of the crisis seems to perpetuate it. CNN has a whopping 16 articles related to Ebola on its home page as I write this, with headlines highlighting everything from false alarms to school closures and CDC failures. The Wall Street Journal is reporting the response as “unacceptable,” while CBS News is saying Dallas might declare a “disaster” over its recent Ebola cases. The negative media attention is so pervasive that the Dallas hospital at the center of the chaos felt the need to hire a PR agency to handle its crisis communications.

Through all of the coverage, one aspect that has particularly struck me is the profound effect of emotions on people’s behavior. Confidence—or its opposite, fear—among consumers is one of the biggest indicators of the state of our economy and of our everyday lives. If I’m scared I’m going to lose my job, I’m not going to go out and buy a house, simple as that. When we lose faith, it defines our mindset and actions.

The media plays an incredibly powerful role in creating this fear or confidence. We rely on the media to inform us, to offer us the facts we need to know and tell us what’s important right now, but we often forget just how powerful this influence can be. By selecting and focusing on certain issues and perspectives, the media impacts our worldview and directly shapes our behavior.

This can be good in some ways. Focusing on an issue, especially one as pressing as Ebola, makes us aware and vigilant. It prompts public support and encourages people to take action. But a fine line exists between reporting the news in a way that promotes a positive response and a way that promotes hysteria. With CNN running ridiculous statements like “Ebola: The ISIS of Biological Agents?” and “’Fear-bola’ hits epic proportions,” I cannot help but find myself asking: At what point does beneficial mass media attention cross the line into fear mongering and sensationalism?

We’ve seen it time and time again. From Y2K, to the anthrax scare following 9/11 and the more recent swine flu outbreak, the media has shown the ability to play a major role in not only establishing what’s top of mind among consumers, but also contributing to a culture of fear that affects the health of our society.

This negative effect was particularly striking last Wednesday when the Dow tanked more than 400 points, with worried shareholders unloading stocks (particularly airline stocks) due to public anxiety over Ebola. It was the worst day of trading in nearly three years—at the center of it all a disease that, although terrible, is terribly hard to contract. Add in the stories of Americans fearfully asking their doctors about Ebola symptoms and others preemptively buying up protective gear, and we get a clear picture of the direct effects of mass media coverage on our daily lives and behaviors.

Ebola is a very real, horrible issue, and I am not in a position to say whether the coverage is justified or the fear is warranted. What I would argue, however, is that it’s critical to be aware of what we are exposed to through the media, to ensure we examine issues from all perspectives, and to thoughtfully consider actual risks before allowing an issue to consume our thoughts. Letting our emotions outweigh reason will only cause panic that does nothing but create an entirely new issue and worsen the one already at hand. There are thousands affected by Ebola who direly need our help, and living in fear is not going to solve the crisis.

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Turning Big Data Inwards: VoloMetrix Secures $12 Million for People Analytics

Are you ready to integrate business intelligence within your company to better understand organizational performance? This week, our client VoloMetrix announced that it has secured $12 million in Series B funding to help grow its business and aims to triple its headcount within the next 12 months.

While many companies currently use real-time, external customer analytics to inform business decisions, VoloMetrix’s technology applies its sophisticated analytics internally to company-gathered data on employee behaviors and the company’s social graph. The anonymous and aggregate data extracted from company emails and calendars illuminates organizational health issues and provides actionable insights for sales, customer satisfaction and employee attrition. Once companies know how time is spent, they can analyze trends and develop business objectives to help streamline and improve performance.

VoloMetrix was founded on concepts from the consulting world—inspired by time-and-motion studies that examine how time is used within businesses around the globe. Last month, the Seattle-based company filed a patent on its algorithms that assess organizational health and examine how internal communication trends tie to business outcomes like organizational alignment, employee engagement and sales performance. It has over two dozen enterprise customers, including Symantec, Genentech and Seagate.

Here is just some of the coverage our team at Communiqué helped to secure surrounding the news this week:

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UW-Spin-out AnswerDash Announces General Availability and Major National Customer

This week, AnswerDash, a website customer service tool that allows visitors to find contextual answers anywhere on the page, announced its General Availability in tandem with a major national customer, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). AnswerDash spun out of The University of Washington’s Information School, after years of research on human-computer interaction, and is the world’s leading contextual answer service technology for websites and web apps.

In his research at UW, CEO Jake Wobbrock unearthed a fascinating connection between language development and people’s experiences online that drove the company’s product design. When a child has a question, he/she typically points at the object in question rather than describing the item and then articulating his/her question about it. Forced to engage in the laborious and time-intensive process of description and articulation, most children would become irritated and abandon the question altogether.

It turns out, adults trying to ask questions online behave similarly if they’re forced to describe and articulate. Pointing is inherently more efficient, requires less output, and makes intuitive sense to both the question-asker and the person answering. And yet, typically, we aren’t able to ask questions online the way that we’d prefer to in person.

When we have a question on a website, we’re generally forced to engage in that very process of description and articulation via live chat, email, or the phone, if we’re particularly motivated. Alternatively, we visit an outdated FAQ page that’s divorced from the original content about which we had a question, and then we dig through a laundry list of questions to hopefully find ours.

None of these options is particularly intuitive or user-friendly, nor do they mirror how humans actually prefer to ask questions: in context and with fewer words rather than more.

That’s where AnswerDash comes in. Websites and apps powered with AnswerDash allow users to click or tap anywhere on the page to see commonly asked Q&As about the text or object. Visitors can also add new questions, and after a question is answered once it becomes part of the “answer layer,” without further involvement by the company. The “answer layer” grows with site visits, illuminating where and when customers have questions, providing quick answers, and deflecting commonly asked questions from escalation to live chat, email, or phone tickets.

A common refrain among briefings with journalists this week was, “[Exhale] That makes so much sense… I wish XYZ site had this. I was trying to accomplish something earlier today and couldn’t figure out how to do it but didn’t want to call and be placed on hold forever and a day.”

In response to the General Availability and customer announcement, Ashley Katz, director of marketing for USGBC said, “We chose to adopt AnswerDash’s technology to offer site users instant answers to their questions. We have estimated that the number of assisted support tickets has been drastically reduced, resulting in over $14,000 in support savings over the last 30 days.”

With AnswerDash’s help, commonly asked question about the USGBC’s LEED certification are answered quickly, efficiently, and contextually. No longer forced to describe and articulate their questions via live chat or phone, customers get their questions answered easily and can proceed with accomplishing their purposes in visiting the site.

Coverage garnered from the announcement includes:

Press release reposting’s included the following:

In the past, AnswerDash has also received great coverage from the following outlets, including Wired, Entrepreneur, GeekWire, Seattle Business Magazine, and Xconomy:

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