PRBreakfastClub

Phone Talkin © by Martin Cathrae

Journalists, as a group, have a lot of pet peeves: sources who want to go off the record for no good reason, overly literal editors, the Oxford comma. But the biggest complaint? Getting calls from flacks who want to make sure that their email arrived. We live in 2013: the email always arrives.

Jeffrey Young, an otherwise calm and thoughtful Huffington Post reporter, once wished death on PR pros who dare to waste his time following up on an email (“DIE IN A FIRE,” he tweeted). Read the rest of this entry »

my brains - let me show you them © by Liz Henry

Public relations today faces a vexing problem: our brains aren’t big enough to keep up with the promise of the technology that we now have available to us. Now, I don’t mean to cast aspersions on my peers, the reality is that, regardless of industry, no one has a brain big enough to deal with the increasing power of tools that allow for great social interconnectedness.

According to Robin Dunbar, most of us can only maintain meaningful social connections with about 150 people: Dunbar’s Number. As detailed in a thoughtful Bloomberg BusinessWeek profile last month, the 150 number comes up again and again: it’s historically been the size of a military company, of an ideally sized factory, of the average Christmas-card list of a British family. Read the rest of this entry »

In today’s digital day and age the need to remove unwanted Facebook pictures or posts is not at all uncommon. Online assets like a personal Facebook page are becoming an increasingly important part of any individual’s reputation management strategy — especially if you’re on the hunt for a job. That’s where SimpleWash comes in. Read the rest of this entry »

Our friends over at MyLife.com have created an infographic on the top 10 failed social media sites (below the fold).

Agree/Disagree with their ranking?  Why? Let us know in the comments. Read the rest of this entry »

You’re likely no stranger to writing content for your blog. As you adapt to a writing schedule that works for you, take your content creation strategy one step further by submitting guest posts to other blogs.

After all, when it comes to the Internet, the wider your digital footprint, the better. And regularly contributing content to blogs you admire (and whose audiences align with your own) is an effective way to expand your readership, increase your personal brand recognition and showcase your knowledge and expertise.

Before you submit your guest post, however, it helps to make sure you’ve covered all of your blogging bases. The devil’s in the details, right? And that’s never truer than when it comes to blogging. Just consider the following 4 tips your guest blogging checklist:

Whether it’s at the end of your post, included in the email or added as a second attachment, don’t forget your bio. Keep it short—3 to 4 sentences should be sufficient. And in addition to telling the blog audience about yourself, be sure to include links to pertinent websites, too, including your About page, social profiles, etc.

As someone who edits a large amount of guest blog content (and prepares content for other sites, too), including links is one of the most helpful things you can do when submitting a post. Don’t go crazy—instead, aim for 3 to 5 links and make sure you’ve included one in the first sentence. When you’re searching for relevant links, don’t forget to go to the site that’s hosting your guest blog and search for a related post or two that would make for good back links.

Keep in mind that when you’re guest blogging, the less work you can make for the blog owner, the better. If possible, when submitting your post include a primary photo (and any relevant screenshots). Another tip? Don’t mail it in on your images and for sure don’t swipe them from somewhere on the Web. Just because they’re on the Internet doesn’t mean you can use them. So when it comes to images, make sure they are good ones. The V3 team tends to steer clear of cheesy stock art—instead, we use tools like Compfight to find images that are relevant but entertaining. Just don’t forget to include a photo credit and accompanying image link either in the body of the blog or in your email.

Before you submit your post, take a quick cruise through the site to see if any submission guidelines are available. Some sites, for example, may prefer that you submit your post in HTML format or follow other specifications including a minimum word count, etc. The editor or site owner may relay this information to you once your pitch has been accepted, but if not, it doesn’t hurt to see if those details are available elsewhere. Again, it’s all about doing your homework first and minimizing the work for the person who’s gracious enough to feature your work.

Of course, when it comes to the actual blog content, you’ll want to make sure that the tone and subject matter aligns with the blog to which you’re submitting. You’ve likely had some sort of communication with the site editor or business owner so you’re not blindly submitting content. This helps get your relationship off to a good start and hopefully paves the way for future guest posting opportunities.

And another tip? When your post goes live, be sure to pop back to the site and respond to any comments as they’re posted. And don’t forget to share the post, too!

I’d love to hear more from the guest contributors out there. What else do you do before submitting a blog?

Image via Raygun

As a new year begins, many PR consultants will be updating their clients’ strategies for the next twelve months, and it is therefore important that they use this time to refresh ideas. With increased competiveness due to the challenging economic climate, agencies would be remiss not to develop creative strategies in order to ensure client retention. Read the rest of this entry »

The argument about who owns social media corporate-wide is ongoing. Usually the debate about “ownership” is between PR and marketing and it gets tiresome. I believe that practitioners are often so self-absorbed and so accustomed to operating in silos that they have trouble stepping back and taking the long view. Read the rest of this entry »

The running joke in social media circles is that Google+ is a wasteland. No one goes there or pays attention to anything posted there. Facebook and Twitter remain royalty with all other networks orbiting them. The more this myth is believed by communications pros, the more we do a disservice to ourselves and to our clients. Facebook is dying. Slowly but surely, it is committing suicide. I won’t be so bold to say that Google foresaw this when it launched G+, but clearly it has positioned itself as a viable alternative since Facebook went public. Read the rest of this entry »

If you’ve yet to see Part 1 of this fantastic interview with Social Media and overall Marketing smartie Mark Schaefer, head on over to the B2B Bliss Blog and take a read and a gander at the video interview with Elizabeth Sosnow.  Also, subscribing wouldn’t be worst idea in the world either.

Or, if you’d like to be all wild and crazy about it, watch the below one first, then go watch part 1 as dessert . Read the rest of this entry »

In case you hadn’t noticed (though in all fairness I usually post about it sooner) we’ve gone on our annual winter hiatus.

But Read the rest of this entry »