The Monday afternoon bombings at the Boston Marathon in Massachusetts sent shockwaves across the world and social networks. As has been the case since Facebook, Twitter and blogs became staples in our world, social media was the place to get immediate information. While not always accurate, it was integral in the wake of this tragedy.
When events such as this occur, it is essential that we make sure our clients aren’t pushing product or seemingly “cheery” type posts during a tragedy of this manner. The world isn’t going to stop, but we as community managers and public relations pros need to be sensitive. This wasn’t the case with well-known social media personality Guy Kawasaki. Continue reading →
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Well New Orleans is finally surfacing after Hurricane Isaac made an appearance in our city. As a communicator it was hard to be without power. No power may mean no AC and everything in your fridge is spoiling but to a communicator no power means no TV and no internet. I was so desperate for information and to connect with the outside world that I went as low as to “watch” the radio. Continue reading →
NASA scores a big PR win with the Mars landing of the Curiosity Rover
Welcome to Friday and another edition of “The Summer Week That Was.” Aren’t we lucky to work in a profession where news is always plentiful? Here are this week’s top five news stories:
Everyone knows that the NFL is practically bending over backwards to appeal to their female audience. Can we attribute the decision to put the first woman referee (well, technically she will be a Field Judge) on the field as part of their massive and well-targeted PR campaign to women? Or is the decision to let Shannon Eastin participate due to the NFL referee lockout caused by a collective bargaining agreement dispute? I suspect it’s a little bit of both. In my opinion, a savvy PR move by the NFL.
Hold up there social media cowboy (or cowgirl). Are you telling me that IT-decision makers, a demographic you would logically think gathers information from social media resources, considers other sources outside of social media to be more valuable for news gathering? Looks as if this survey may turn conventional wisdom on its head about the shift towards social for information and research prior to making a purchase. At least for some demographics.
Holy rapid fire tweets. There is no doubt that Twitter has stole the show as the social media platform darling of the 2012 London Olympics. 2,000 tweets per minute? Over 28 million total tweets about the games? Insane numbers. And the 2nd half of the Olympics is just getting into full swing.
I thought this was an interesting story not from the perspective of how quickly Alaska Airlines responded to the criticism, not because social media fanned a firestorm of complaints and negativity for the brand and not due to the fact that an airline ranked #1 in customer satisfaction can experience a problem of this magnitude. My interest was how people flew off the handle without knowing the whole story and how industry regulations and gut perceptions that consumers are unaware of often drive decisions. Before you complain about something, make sure you know both sides of the story.
In case you hadn’t noticed, NASA has sort of become the red headed step-child of taxpayer angst over government spending. Mired in a two year slump and with a dearth of projects on its plate coupled with public disdain over its budget, NASA needed a little PR shot in the arm. They are after all, more focused on successes than PR campaigns but at this point in their history, they needed the Rover Curiosity landing to pump up perspective, which as you know, is the bread and butter of PR.
That’s it for us on this Friday afternoon. Enjoy the weekend and do something fun with family or friends. Before you know it, the sun will be going down at 5pm and we will all be slogging through the dreary winter longing for days like this where the warm sun shines and the ice cream tastes just a little bit better.
Is it really August already? Wow, ½ a year in the books and still so many things to accomplish this year. I overheard someone say that school starts next week for a lot of kids? Whatever happened to being able to bike ride and swim the whole month of August?
Hope you have been having a good summer with time to rest with family and friends. Here’s this week’s top five news stories: Continue reading →
Nowadays it is not unusual to hear someone being fired for something they posted online, tweeted or said in the media. It seems there is a new Internet gaffe every day, and sometimes these faux pas are committed by industry insiders who ought to know better.
The latest head to roll for a media gaffe was Joe Williams, a writer for online publication Politico. Williams and Politico had a mutually agreed partying of ways after right-wing media targeted him for saying that “Mitt Romney was more comfortable around white people.”
To many people in the African American community this comment was accurate and harmless, but after right-wing site Breitbart.com whipped up a frenzy of outrage, Williams and Politico began to look bad. Continue reading →
Ah yes, the last full week of the month of July. That means two things… Summer is almost over and NFL training camps are opening. Of course some little “gathering” in London is going on, but no one is really paying attention, right?
In all seriousness, the 2012 London Olympic Games will be something of a social media games, too. How so? Well, you have read on, friends! Continue reading →
We like to think that we (sometimes) know it all. In this age of gurus, jedis, and ninjas, it is easy to have a sense of social entitlement. I’m sure you are thinking about a time you thought you were BMOC (Big Man on Campus). Maybe a blog post blew up; maybe you had a tweet shared by a celebrity.
On Friday, Cathryn Sloane had an article posted on NextGen Journal, titled, “Why Every Social Media Manager Should Be Under 25.” Sloane, a recent graduate of the University of Iowa, writes. Continue reading →
Two words in the English language are sometimes very hard to say. That would be: Thank You. Now, before you click off to another site because you think I’m going all Emily Post, let me explain.
You see, as we become more social, we are becoming more impersonal. It shouldn’t be that way. Just because we interact on Twitter, Facebook, etc., it doesn’t mean we should forget what it means to actually talk to someone. Quick texts from an iPhone or brief emails from your office desk may say, “Thx” or “:-),” but is it really a thanks? Continue reading →
“Bring out your dead!” “I’m not dead.” “’Ere, he says he’s not dead.” “Yes he is.”
”I’m not.”
-Monty Python and the Holy Grail
How many times have we read about the end of times for Twitter and Facebook? Hundreds? Thousands? What ever the number has been, it’s getting a little exhausting.
The latest version of “social media Taps” was an analyst saying that Facebook would “disappear” in five to eight years. Eric Jackson, the founder of Ironfire Capital said, “…(t)hey are going to disappear in the way that Yahoo has disappeared. Yahoo is still making money. It’s still profitable, still has 13,000 employees working for it. But it’s 10% of the value that it was at the height of 2000. For all intents and purposes, it’s disappeared.” Continue reading →
For the most part, I find the PR industry’s trade publications — PRWeek, PRNewser, PRNews, etc. — to be good standard-bearers for effectively covering the ins-and-outs of this diverse and growing industry. Sure, they tend to focus too much on AOR announcements — the old-time stock ticker-tape reports of PR — but they do the job.
So I try to do my best not to critique. Look, reporters and editors have a tough job at those publications. They are reporting on the very people — PR pros — who know how to promote a cause or a person better than anyone. So I imagine there is quite a lot of pushback and calls for fluffier fluff pieces than at your standard trade reporter’s job. Continue reading →
