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.
According to the latest B2B Marketing Social Media Benchmarking Report, the most popular social media platform for B2B marketers is Twitter, followed by LinkedIn, YouTube and Facebook. Noticeably missing from the list is one of the fastest growing social media platforms: Pinterest.
When most marketers think of Pinterest, they think of it as a great tool for reaching consumers. The visual nature of the platform lends itself well to consumer goods and other tangible objects – from the latest technology and consumer gadgets to ideas for your garden.
However, this doesn’t mean B2B companies should feel locked out of Pinterest, which according to comScore grew from 17.8 million users in February 2012 to 48.7 million users in February 2013.
A recent Vocus webinar led by Jennifer Evans Cario, “Pinterest: Marketing’s New MVP,” further explored Pinterest’s growing importance in the marketer’s toolbox. Bottom line: Despite Pinterest’s bent toward consumers, the platform can still serve as an effective tool for B2B marketers to reach decision makers.
During the webinar, Jennifer cited Constant Contact as an example of a B2B company that has successfully harnessed the power of Pinterest. The company – which helps small business, associations and nonprofits connect with their target audiences through email and online campaigns – currently has 78 active boards, more than 3,480 pins and more than 7,600 followers.
How does a company that primarily works though email and online create a visually rich page? By creating and sharing content that will help decision makers do their jobs.
If you’re considering Pinterest for your B2B business and need a jump start, here are some content ideas for your business page that we gathered from the Vocus webinar and our observations of other Pinterest business pages:
Create graphics. It isn’t always possible for a photo to capture your B2B company’s products. To get around this, create graphics, infographics and screenshots related to your product. Post these on your company blog to drive traffic back to your website. You should also consider pinning/sharing graphics and images from other sources that complement or are related to your products and industry.
Share research. Whether it’s your own or from other sources, research can help educate and inform decision makers about issues relevant to your products and industry.
Post articles. Articles about your company and your industry, which are often accompanied by an image or graphic, can also be of interest to decision makers.
Think out of the box. From tips to help decision makers do their jobs better to motivational quotes, most anything that is relevant and that could be of remote interest to your target audience is great content for your Pinterest page.
Even if you’re still undecided about Pinterest and whether it’s right for your business, at Communiqué PR we counsel many of our clients to claim their business page now. Should marketing or social media priorities change, your company name is secured and you’ll prevent someone else from claiming your name.
Is your B2B company on Pinterest? Share your tips for getting up and running on Pinterest in the comments below.
Social media can be an amazing tool for businesses, brands and individuals, and there are some great complimentary tools that can help automate the process to be more manageable. However, it is important to ensure you are sensitive to what is happening in the world, and listen and react accordingly. For many brands Twitter is an amazingly deft place to promote content, but depending on world events and how you react to them, your content can be perceived as insensitive. At times, disabling automatic tweets and not distributing content is absolutely the right thing to do.
We provide support for a number of our clients in the social media realm. We create posts, monitor interactions and curate content. Last week when the Boston Marathon explosion rocked the country, we advised our client Attachmate to refrain from posting promotional content on the day of the bombing. In many cases silence or acknowledgement and condolences are the best responses to what is happening around the world.
Since the incident we have been evaluating the appropriateness of tweets on a day-to-day basis.
We learned in fact that some people who kept tweeting and promoting were slammed across Twitter. I came across this article on Ragan.com, “Guy Kawasaki is too ‘popular’ to stop autotweets during Boston bombings,” that talks about how Twitter guru Guy Kawasaki continued with his automated tweets when news of the bombings broke. He was widely criticized throughout the Twitterverse for being insensitive.
So how do you decide when it is appropriate for your brand to tweet when confusion, fear or devastation has swept the country? We’ve outlined three things to consider when deciding if you should post those 140 characters in the wake of tragedy.
- How will your message be perceived? Internalize what has happened and consider how your followers might perceive your message. What is the timing of your tweet and how could your followers react? Could you be perceived as insensitive?
- What are other brands doing? It is a safe bet that if other brands, especially those with a similar business to yours are quiet, you should stay quiet too. As a rule of thumb, go silent the first day of a tragedy. The exception is if there are customer service-related posts to respond to; those are typically acceptable and would not be construed as promotional.
- How much time has passed? The first few hours and throughout the day after a tragic national event has occurred are typically when people use Twitter to update event information. It is a safe bet that the first day of a tragedy is a good day to stay quiet. Each day following the event should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, but many businesses typically go back to posting business as usual.
Part of being an effective Twitter user is not just creating the content, but listening to what is happening and how that can impact your message. Communiqué PR can help your business with developing a social media strategy and provide recommendations for your individual brand. Please visit www.communiquepr.com for more details.
We came across an article in the Economist that serves as an important reminder for us all. Simply put: Journalists are inundated- inundated with more topics to write about, deadlines and, most likely, pitches from PR professionals (and sadly, some of them aren’t very valuable). The article states that for each journalist in the U.S., there are approximately six PR professionals.
This statistic should stop us in our tracks. Particularly since this article was published two years ago, meaning the ratio of journalists to PR folks is probably even more out of proportion today, and journalists are more bogged down in emails and voicemails than ever.
This begs the question, what can we do about this to ensure that our messages are heard? Our goal remains the same as always: great coverage for our clients. And at the end of a journalist’s day, their goal also remains the same: a compelling story. Below are a few nuts and bolts to ensure that PR professionals’ outreach to journalists helps to achieve both of those end goals, rather than adding to the noise:
- Story: Have a good story idea, which includes well-rounded facts and sources and may include references that reporters can check out for themselves. Don’t make unsubstantiated claims assuming that a journalist is going to simply write your points at face value. It’s bad for credibility – both yours and the journalists. Good stories offer context to give readers perspective. It might be interesting to you, but how and why should it be interesting to the journalist’s audience?
- Variety: Have a variety of different ideas and angles to share with journalists throughout the year. Of course this doesn’t mean peppering emails to journalists on a daily basis. It means developing a variety of solid angles (see #1) that may appeal to the journalist so, when the time is right, you can share those ideas. Which leads us to the next point…
- Research: Do your homework. As the last two points suggest, you must know your audience. Research publications first to know their specific readership and what kinds of articles are typically written. If your story idea doesn’t pass the “what’s in it for me” test (from the reader’s point of view) then it shouldn’t be sent.
- Credibility: Be an honest, credible professional. As the article points out, mud slinging against competitors seems to be a more widely used tactic in public relations than ever before. This is inappropriate and does a disservice to you in the long run. You have to earn trust with journalists just like you do with anyone else. Your voice will be heard above the fray when a journalist knows you as smart, respectable and honest.
- Respect: Treat each journalist with professionalism and respect. This should be true with any human being, but it must be said here because in today’s world, everyone can be a published journalist. One blogger’s comments could skyrocket to the New York Times or all over Twitter in an instant; be respectful and professional when speaking to and about others in your industry.
All of the above relate to mindful communication. We must always be aware of a journalists’ point of view if we want to be heard above the fray. Do you have additional tips for engaging with media?
It seems that bad news is all around lately. I’ve heard this comment a lot from people who reacting to the news of the Boston Marathon, bombings, Newtown, Conn., shootings and fertilizer plant explosion in West, Texas. “When it rains, it pours,” we are all saying.
Unfortunately, we’ve also seen a lot of bad reporting raining down on us from news organizations. While under pressure to be first with the news, some are getting it terribly wrong. For example, CNN and the Associated Press erroneously reported that a suspect was in custody for the Boston bombing on April 17. The New York Times originally, and incorrectly, identified the Newtown shooter’s brother as the perpetrator in the awful elementary school attack in the first hours of the event. These are respected news organizations that set the gold standard for reporting in our society, not inexperienced bloggers or tweeters. In their haste to get it first, they neglected to get it right, which has led to a certifiable credibility problem with these once-trusted institutions.
All of this bad news is uncomfortable to absorb and dwell upon. But the news gaffes we have witnessed recently are a good reminder for business to revisit their crisis plans and practice their responses before a crisis hits. It is also a reminder that inaccurate news reporting happens not only because of the pressure reporters are under to get the story quickly, but also because misinformation can come from the news source itself. In times of intense public scrutiny and pressure to distribute information, public officials, first responders, and business people often relay information the accuracy of which even they are unsure at the moment.
If you are your company’s spokesperson, it is your job to make sure you are not that guy (or gal.) Here are a few tips to help in the early moments of a crisis.
Take a breath
You just received some very bad news. At this moment you are probably feeling the same senses as a news reporter who just heard the same news: an incredible adrenaline rush, and a need to get away from your desk and go the “scene” wherever that may be. Unless you are in immediate danger, take three deep breaths. This will take about 30 seconds and will provide the moment of sanity and clarity you will need for the next several hours (or perhaps days) as you work through your crisis response.
Corral your communications team
Today, there is typically more than one person on a communications team. And, they may be scattered across offices, agencies and even geographies. Get them together either physically or digitally. Remind them that you have a crisis plan and how to locate it. Remind them of their specific responsibilities under the plan, be clear about who the authorized spokesperson is for the company, and remind them that each of their roles is important. All need to be working together to make sure Facebook, Twitter, blogs, media liaisons and CEOs are communication the same information, accurately.
Execute against your plan
In my previous blog post “Media Training 2.0” I wrote about how crises are different and perhaps scarier that they once were. No matter what the crisis is, it is important to remember that at the time you wrote the plan you had time to think through the scenario and build an appropriate, level-headed response. Yes, your current crisis may have some elements you did not anticipate and for which you will have to adapt, but the basics you outlined previously still apply. Trust your work.
Fight the urge to react
You will have many people both internally and outside your organization asking, “What is going on? What do you know? What will happen next?” Your role is to provide facts, not speculate. By relaying news to people in your organization ahead of, or instead of, the appropriate outlets of information, you are increasing the chances of misinformation, perhaps escalating the crisis via unintended consequences, and risking your own and your company’s credibility.
Conduct a post-crisis follow up
Once the danger or crisis has past, you need to review the problem and your teams’ response. What worked well? What did you not anticipate? What mistakes did you make? Then, update your systems, roles and tactics appropriately. Finally, communicate this information with your superiors, your fellow employees, and if appropriate, your customers and the general public. Here are a few post-mortems from news organizations that publically acknowledge their mistakes and how they will adjust in the future, that may offer some valuable tips for you as well:
“Getting It First or Getting It Right?,” The New York Times
“Get it Fast, But Get It Right,” American Journalism Review
Google (and search engines in general) have become entrenched in our day-to-day lives. “I’ll Google it” is a common phrase when a query goes unanswered. I personally look to the search engine daily to find everything from recommended reading material to recipe blogs.
Making effective use of Google requires knowing how to use it. Learning the basics of keywords and putting phrases inside quotation marks can help narrow down results immensely. I recently saw PR Daily’s post, “3 Simple Ways to Boost PR Using Google,” and it made me consider the Google features I find most useful in the practice of PR: Google News search and Google Alerts.
Google News
As an assistant account executive, I frequently use the Google News feature to compile and recap news coverage for clients, prepare share of voices or see what journalists have written about recently.
To use Google News, simply search a subject (for example: “Big Data”), then click “More”> “News”. You’ll now have a wide selection of articles about Big Data, from sources Google has predetermined to be editorial (no spam or random mentions, theoretically). You can then filter this content even more by selecting “Search tools” and indicating in what timeframe you’d like the news to be filtered, and whether you’d like to search news or blogs for these keywords.
This feature can be useful in a variety of ways. If you’re writing a pitch about Big Data, for example, and are not sure what the current perception is of the topic in the news, you’ll quickly be able to access recent news articles from which to draw. If you’re searching for journalists covering a topic, you now have that information as well.
Additionally, if you’re curious about what type of editorial coverage a competitor has received in the past month, this is an excellent way to find high profile articles using a company name as a keyword.
However, I will note that if you’re trying to determine metrics around editorial coverage (article mentions, etc.) Google News does not necessarily report all results. For detailed coverage recaps, I recommend combining Google News with Google Search and Google Alerts to make sure you’re not missing anything Google may have sorted out of its news section.
Google Alerts
For those not familiar with the tool, Google Alerts is a subscription service that sends an email notification whenever a certain word or phrase is mentioned online. This might be anywhere – in the news, in advertisements, on a website or in a blog. For companies, it’s useful to know what information is out there about a brand, its competitors and the industry.
In public relations, Google Alerts can be useful for a few different things. I typically make it a best practice to sign up for a Google Alert for a client, its competitors and the industry it’s in as soon as we start work on the business. This allows me to receive information every day about who’s writing about an industry or what events are going on, flag mentions and recommend responses of brand mentions online, and quickly uncover opportunities (for example, relevant events, journalists covering an industry or a client’s competitors).
In addition to being a resource to stay informed, Google Alerts can create an archive of monthly mentions for a client and/ or its competitors, if you’re charged with preparing coverage recaps or a share of voice.
Google Alerts does not contain the same source filters that Google News does, and often catches things a Google News search may not. Moreover, they’re automated, so you’re informed without having to do any research of your own.
As technology continues to evolve, it’s easy to miss out on some of the tools available at our fingertips. Google News and Google Alerts are an easy and effective way to make use of the search engine to enhance PR efforts.
For more on Google News & Alerts, see:
- 3 Simple Ways to Boost PR Using Google, PR Daily
- How to set up a Google Alert: monitor the web for content you’re interested in, PC Advisor
- Ten Tips For Journalists To Get Picked Up By Google News, Forbes
Heather Campbell
Rome may or may not have been built in a day, but brands certainly can be built – or destroyed – that quickly, thanks to the Internet and social media. Rumors spread like wildfire and can ultimately make or break a brand as a result. That raises the question: how can companies wrangle and control their proverbial fires in today’s world of high-speed communication?
Let’s explore two case studies: TED and Beyonce.
TED
TED, a nonprofit that organizes highly respected global conferences about ideas, tackled a tremendous amount of negative backlash on one of its TEDx talks and as a result, temporarily lost control over its brand. As a recent Harvard Business Review article by author Nilofer Merchant explains, TED’s business model became more open, enabling people all over the world to create their own TEDx events without much content vetting by the folks at TED. On the positive side, this spawned an even larger, worldwide community of members, where there can be exponentially more “ideas worth spreading.” Conversely, it resulted in questionable content that angered its typically devoted community and ultimately put its brand in jeopardy.
Merchant underscores the importance of fostering an open dialog with a brand’s community in order to manage an unruly crowd. TED was able to do this and ultimately turned its descending brand image around by following some simple guidelines such as asking its community for feedback then “listening loudly,” which the author describes as “engaging in a dialog through a variety of public forums to understand what had gone wrong and to learn how to fix it,” and following through on people’s concerns. The article goes on to state:
By communicating publicly and person-to-person, TED achieved two things. One was to signal that it was paying attention to people’s concerns. But more strategically, TED learned about a systemic problem that demanded a broad solution.
I’ve always been a strong advocate for transparent PR practices as a foundation of a company’s crisis plan. The idea of transparency can seem scary at first, but this doesn’t mean relinquishing control and all of the company’s private matters to the media. As Merchant explains, companies can make parts of the company open while others remain closed.
During a crisis, constituents want to feel heard and to know the company has a solution (or is dedicated to finding a solution) to a problem. Think of consumer product recalls and software bugs. The companies that openly and swiftly communicate with their constituents regain the most control over the news and their brands. The companies that remain quiet, release impersonal statements, or those that are perceived as scrubbed or watered-down, become distrusted and brand value subsequently diminishes.
Beyoncé
These ideas – responding quickly, accurately and openly– are not new. However, they are the basic tenants of a good crisis plan and deserve repeated attention. In today’s world, where Twitter and other social media outlets abound, it might be hard to stay focused and true to your message when the critics are spreading negativity faster than you can respond. Just ask Beyoncé, who was bashed for lip-synching at the recent President Obama inauguration. An article in Inc. shares how she handled crisis communications and quashed her critics immediately by belting out a live rendition of the Star Spangled Banner in front of hundreds of reporters at a pre-Super Bowl press conference. The article goes on to describe how she basically took a page out of a standard crisis communications playbook:
- Respond quickly.
- Be authentic and genuine in your response.
- If you’ve done wrong, admit fault.
- If your credibility has been called into question, find ways to quickly re-establish it.
The thread that weaves through both of these case studies is both TED and Beyoncé capitalized on their unique voice (no pun intended, Beyoncé), or in other words, their authentic perspective, to help engage their communities and turn negative publicity into positive brand reinforcement.
How have you used authenticity and transparency in a PR crisis?