I’ll be the first to admit, I am always skeptical about team building and bonding things. Many public relations agencies have their methods of team bonding, from purge days to beer Fridays. Being part of a team is integral to working at an agency. Got to have trust right?
Now I’ve been through my fair share of team building exercises over the years, from ropes courses to stupid scavenger hunts where you have to go into a diner and just say “burgermeat,” but recently I encountered the most amazing team building exercise – one that I will back 100% and recommend all agencies get involved in…Intramural Sports! Continue reading →
Line Up 2, a small, easy-to-learn game for the iPhone is one of my favorite iPhone apps for killing time. It’s a very simple game that requires you to locate 3 or more blocks of the same color next to each other and tap them. Simple right? Rows continue to pile on from the bottom and if the top-most block hits the ceiling of the game screen your game is over. As you advance in the game the rows pile on faster until you hit a certain score and then they slow down again. Additionally, the longer the chain of blocks – the higher the score. So if you see a very long chain forming as the rows pile on you have to determine if you should wait to get the most bang for your tap score-wise or if you should just tap tap tap along. And did I mention you only get a set number of taps per round?
This simple game is a perfect analogy for the PR pro’s activities. Continue reading →
[This post originally appeared on Antonia’s Blog at Social Glitz. Normally we don’t repost materials, but this particular piece merited an exception. — Ed.]
There’s something I’m increasingly starting to notice about myself and before you ask, no, I do not like what I’m noticing. Like not at all. I have issues. Serious issues. Not *that* kind of issues but issues nonetheless. I tweet a lot. I facebook a lot. I spend a lot of time reading blogs. I take pictures of my smoothie to then put them on Facebook and Twitter because I’m so excited about drinking a smoothie. That, my friends, I call a serious issue. Not to mention, the nature of my job fosters this bad habit. But hell, I enjoy my job! Now what?
Thanks to the digital age, I often miss the point of the simple things right in front of me. Enjoy the moment, Antonia. Oh and whilst you are at it, grasp the period of solitude with both hands and hold onto it as long as possible. Trouble is my hands are too busy tweeting about the moment I’m apparently enjoying right now to start thinking about holding onto any moment of solitude. (Issues!!) Continue reading →
It’s a given that involvement in social media demands us to be omnipresent. We need to be available and accessible to our friends and fans in all places at all times in order to respond to those who enter our world and want to get to know us. Developers have become keen on this by introducing scheduling and management tools like HootSuite and Tweetdeck, as well as some other “stand-in” devices. The constant emergence of new tools and updates makes it impossible to keep up, though. Along a learning curve paved with good intentions, we are likely going to commit some unintentional blunders, or social media faux pas. Continue reading →
“I work to promote the president and the message that he’s trying — the messages he’s trying to convey to the American people. But I also work with the press to try to help you do your jobs, to help you cover the White House, cover the administration and report on what we’re doing here.”
— White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, explaining his dual role of serving the President and the press, Feb. 16, 2011.
A ha! Finally we have a high-profile public relations executive saying what we all know to be true but far too often neglect to properly explain: in public relations, like many other professions, we’re playing a constant back-and-forth internal battle between our clients’ best interests and serving the public good. Continue reading →
As the global economy continues to waver, things are looking positively rosy for advertising and public relations firms. With Veronis Suhler Stevenson predicting a 55-percent increase in U.S. spending on public relations services by 2013 (up to $8 billion annually), news has been rushing in from all sides of the major ad holding companies of expanding revenues and new digital opportunities.
The uptick in optimism started last week when Publicis reported a 19.8-percent increase in full-year revenue. Omnicom added to the fun after reporting 2010 revenues that were up 6.4 percent, which prompted this headline from the normally stoic Financial Times: “Omnicom heralds advertising acceleration.” Not a bad assessment of happy days to come.
In celebration of more than a year of using social media to leverage our networks and connect those in the PR industry who are seeking new jobs with those seeking new talent, the #HAPPO (Help a PR Pro Out) initiative is moving offline for a special opportunity to build relationships in person. As my #HAPPO co founder Arik Hanson recently wrote, “We’re taking HAPPO to the next level by organizing our first U.S.-wide live and in-person HAPPO Hour chat.”
Whether you are a job seeker, looking to hire, or simply hoping to meet some of your “Twitter friends” in person, I hope that you’ll join us For those in the New York metro area, I’ve been working with the other NY area #HAPPO champions (Tiffany Winbush, Deirdre Breakenridge & PRBC’s very own PRCog) and a team of volunteers to organize a casual event at Connolly’s pub. It will take place from 6-8pm on February 24th.
Here are a few quick tips to help you make the most of the opportunity to integrate social and face-to-face networking: Continue reading →
“Poppin bottles in the ice, like a blizzard
When we drink we do it right gettin slizzard
Sippin sizzurp in my ride, in my ride, like Three 6
Now I’m feelin so fly like a G6.”
-Like a G6, Far East Movement
I can only imagine this is the theme song of the week for the National Red Cross.
On February 15th, the @RedCross sent out an unusual tweet at 11:24PM with the hashtag #gettngslizzerd. No—there wasn’t a new emergency at hand although I’m pretty sure there are a few safety tips that the organization could offer to prepare the country for #gettngslizzerd. The only problem at hand was an accidental tweet that was meant to come from a staff member’s personal account. Continue reading →
If you haven’t heard by now, the NFL had a giant game in Dallas a few weeks ago. It brought in buco-bucks, drew the largest viewership in television history and made a lot of fans from a small town in Wisconsin very happy. So one would think that the league left the Lone Star State feeling awesome and without problems.
Well, if you haven’t been living under a rock and you pay attention to sports, or news for that matter, you know that the league is facing a major PR issue that may tarnish their image. This doesn’t concern the looming lockout of the players (a PR conundrum for another day), but rather folks who fill their coffers – the fans. You see, there were over 90,000 fans who purchased tickets to come to the game, problem was the seats weren’t available for over 1,000 of these ticket holders to be sat in during the big game. This was because the seats were not completed and did not pass muster of the fire marshal. Continue reading →
In this third, and final part, of the series, Justin Goldsborough examines whether companies needs crisis plans or social media crisis plans? Part 1 of the series can be found here, and Part 2 is here. Continue reading →
