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70 story ideas that will get you publicity*

Tuesday, April 7th, 2009

One bright mind

* Disclaimer: Please consider seeking the help of an experienced PR pro when pitching these story ideas. You should be aware of them all so you can alert these pros of newsworthy happenings at your company. So often, clients are surprised by just what may be of interest to the media. All of these ideas are tried and true, meaning that I’ve had ink from each and every one. Enjoy!

Operations

You are moving locations
You are adding a location
Company name change
Expansion plans are announced
Company adds a new division/new services
Cutting edge program no one else is offering
Construction begins on a new project
Announce first, best, only program
Quarterly/yearly earnings
Unusual office policies
Announce expanded service area
New clients, customers, contracts

Digital (the preponderance of health and lifestyle reporters have been replaced by tech reporters who are always looking for new stories!)

Announce new website
Announce website redesign
New or redesigned blog
Online promotion, like a Twitter scavenger hunt
Announce a social media campaign
Host and promote a webinar

You hired a new employee
You promoted an employee
Employee wins certification/award
Employee appointed on a board
Executive profile for business magazines
Summer internship program

Marketing

New logo/brand
New ad campaign
Promotion/giveaway
Grand opening
Story about company featured in national media outlet
Announce new customer incentive
Customer appreciation event
Send photos into the social pages of local and regional magazines after a high-profile event

Industry

Industry-specific trend story for trade publications
Industry-related event promotion
Announce staff attendance at an industry conference
Announce speaking opportunity at industry event
Announce membership/leadership in industry associations
Byline article on best practices
Company earns industry honors
Ways you are leading the industry
Sponsor an industry event
Announce participation in trade show
Make a magazine’s list of best, fastest-growing

Corporate Social Responsibility

Announce employee-driven program like canned food drive or sending care packages to the troops
Announce new corporate giving program
Announce title sponsorship for charitable event
Announce major donations to charitable organizations
Anything that involves kids! Maybe you host the local Future Business Leaders of America for a day to teach them what you do.
Announce a one-day promotion to donate your service/product to area non profits
Challenge another business or organization to beat or match your fund raising goal

Human Interest

Company anniversary
Employee with unusual hobby
Employee who overcame the odds
Office weight loss challenge
How is your office going green?
“Good News” story to counteract all the “bad news”
Random acts of kindness
Random acts of randomness (I knew a business that got press because it saved a piece of pound cake in the company fridge because it had the image of the cartoon, ZIggy in it. I also knew a law firm who got press because its employees were taking care of a nest of baby geese in their backyard)
New art installation in office
Office interior design and how it relates to productivity

Problem-Solution

Offer advice that solves readers/listeners/viewers problems
Regular segment on TV news (great for chefs, landscapers, financial planners)
Become a guest columnist for the newspaper or local magazine
Make a list (best places to eat)

Trends

Holiday-themed story
Season-related story (think summer and dematologists)
Pop Culture-related story
Animal-related story
Economy-related story
Current events (like Wimbledon)

Tags: Public Relations, Public Relations Agency in N.C.
Posted in Public Relations | Comments

Things We Love 4/1

Wednesday, April 1st, 2009

Debbie loves Chuck, the cute nerdy (not) guy that comes on NBC every Monday at 8:00 p.m. and makes me laugh out loud for an hour – Zachary Levi stars as Chuck and he’s constantly getting in and out of close calls with super secret spy pal/love interest Sarah. I rarely get this attached to TV characters, but this is one of the few programs that I schedule my evening around. I’ve become a fan on Facebook and I’ve checked out their website a time or two. I usually post something about the show on Twitter or Facebook before or after tuning in. Sigh. I have a TV crush. Sorry dear.

Holly loves parents on Facebook – I know it sounds a little crazy, but I honestly love that my parents and their friends are starting to hop on the Facebook train. My Facebook profile has become such a personal, important component of my life over the last four years, and it’s nice that now my parents are able to take part in it. I no longer have to describe in detail the events I went to or the pictures I took, because all of that is for their viewing pleasure on my page. I’m excited we are learning how to use social media to stay connected as a family - I just hope they keep the stalking to a minimum.

Kelly loves the Wilmington Azalea Festival. By far the best party every year in the South, the Azalea Festival is a five-day celebration of local artwork, tours of amazing gardens, rich history and southern culture. With concerts, fairs and pageantry, there is something for the whole family to enjoy. I first attended the Azalea Festival shortly after moving to this beautiful coastal town five years ago and I have not missed one yet!

Kirsty loves “Living Social” is social cataloging for Books, Movies, TV Shows, Albums, Video Games, Beer, Restaurants and more. Its “Pick Five” is also the hottest trend on Facebook. The site touts itself as the the most comprehensive interest-based online community, helping more than 7.5 million users catalogue their interests, seamlessly integrating with Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, hi5, and Orkut. That’s for sure. Facebook friends across the nation have been bonding over the top five movies they grew up on, the top five albums of all time and the top five TV shows they’ve seen every episode of.

Nathan loves delicious – No, not tasty snacks, though he does love those, too, but what is considered a social bookmarking site. In other words, in the same way you can “bookmark” a page in your browser for viewing later, with delicious you can bookmark it online, allowing you to access it from anywhere that has an internet connection. What’s more, you can also share all of your bookmarks easily with your friends! For example, check out what Nathan has bookmarked recently.

Susan loves Clever design – Some people go through life plotting out stories based on random actions they see. Some notice smells wherever they go. Others see designs and patterns in even the most innocuous settings. And then I see pictures like this, where the latter of those types saw something and took the time to make it a reality simply because they could, and I just sit in awe a few minutes.

Tags: Events, Facebook, Graphic Design, humor, Social media
Posted in Graphic Design, Public Relations | Comments

Power Breakfast Series Draws 500+ Biz Leaders to Learn about Internet Marketing

Wednesday, March 18th, 2009

Greater Wilmington Business hit another homerun this morning with its Power Breakfast Series on Leveraging the Power of the Internet. More than 500 business leaders gathered to learn from six local business owners, myself included. Brett Martin, owner of Castle Branch; Fred Meyers, owner of Queensboro Shirt Company and Chip Mahan, owner of Live Oak Bank had compelling insights on how they have effectively used the Internet to grow their businesses.

Justin Queen of Blu Zeus and Mike Duncan of Sage Island brought the web developers’ perspective into the discussion. I spoke on the impact of Social Media on today’s business arena and how it is changing the balance of power in marketing communications and putting it into the hands of consumers and business people online.

If you weren’t able to attend, check Greater Wilmington Business’ website at www.wilmingtonbiz.net for an article detailing the discussion.

Some points on social media to remember:

Social media has changed the balance of power — people are using online technologies like Facebook, blogs, etc. to get the things they need from each other rather than from traditional institutions like corporations
Social media involves two primary elements — people and technology. Concentrate on the relationships first; technology second
If you’re thinking about adopting social media into your marketing mix, use the POST method (courtesy of Forrester Research): People, Objectives, Strategies and Technology.

PEOPLE — Understand where and if your customers are engaging in social media
OBJECTIVES - What are your goals?
STRATEGIES - Determine what methodologies to use to achieve your objectives
TECHNOLOGY - What applications should you use? Blog, Social Network? Wiki?

Social media is all about conversations with people. So keep people first and foremost in your planning. Who are your customers? Where are they online? What information is important to them? How do they like to access this information?

Thanks again to Greater Wilmington Business for hosting the series. Publisher Rob Kaiser and his entire staff have done a wonderful job with this quarterly series and I look forward to the next one. Every local business owner should try to attend. But sign up early. He’s sold out each breakfast!

Tags: Internet Marketing, Marketing, Social media, Social Media in Wilmington N.C.
Posted in Marketing, Public Relations, Talk | Comments

PR pros have leadership role to play in social media

Monday, March 16th, 2009

Traditional PR and marketing agencies are going the way of the dinosaur. And when I say traditional, I mean ones that are not incorporating social media and internet marketing into their core services. Why is the traditional agency threatened? Because traditional media (TV, radio, print) is no longer the most relevant voice in the marketplace. Today’s conversation is online - and consumers are the ones doing all the talking.

Here are the stats to prove it (courtesy of Adam Singer, author of The Future Buzz):

• 1 trillion - the unique # of URLs in Google’s index

• 2 billion - number of searches Google does each day

• 684 million - the number of visitors to Wikipedia last year

• 70 million - the number of videos on YouTube

• 133 million - number of blogs indexed by Technorati since 2002

• 77% - percentage of active Internet users who read blogs

• 3 million - the number of tweets per day on Twitter

• 150 million - number of active Facebook users

• 236 million - number of visitors attracted annually to Digg

Lots of impressive numbers, but what do they mean? These stats illustrate that millions of people around the world are online, talking to each other about everything from their favorite rock star to the type of car they like to drive. People have taken the conversation online and away from traditional media and businesses. Forrester researchers Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff call it the Groundswell in a book of the same name. The groundswell is “a social trend in which people use technologies to get the things they need from each other, rather than from traditional institutions like corporations.” In other words, people are looking to each other for information and are no longer relying solely on the marketing information provided to them by businesses.

Because of this, businesses have lost control over how their companies and brands are perceived by consumers. The balance of power has shifted, away from business and into the hands - and keyboards - of consumers. Is this a threat or an opportunity? Depends on your perspective. Businesses thrive on control, so this lack of control is discomfiting. But if you take the time to understand the groundswell and how you can participate, it presents an overwhelming opportunity to directly interact with your customers.

This phenonemon has many names: groundswell, social media, online conversation, etc. Call it what you will. But it all boils down to two primary components: technology and people. A mistake made by many business people is to focus on the technology. They jump into blogging and Facebook with great enthusiasm but with little strategic thinking. As Li and Bernoff point out, the successful way to engage your audiences online is to “concentrate on the relationships, not the technologies.”

So if the social media is about relationship-building first, technology second, shouldn’t you entrust your online marketing to your communications professional, not your IT department or website designer? The savvy PR practitioner is already engaged online and has both the technical and communication skills to help businesses master this new frontier. More and more PR agencies are incorporating internet marketing capabilities in-house so they can present their clients with an integrated approach to communications. One that marries traditional “offline” marketing with new online opportunities.

It’s a new world, and I’m thrilled to be in it.

Tags: Marketing, Public Relations, Public Relations Agency in N.C., Social Media in Wilmington N.C.
Posted in Public Relations | Comments

Three PR myths debunked!

Thursday, March 12th, 2009

2929634939_b6d71dd48b_b Everyone in the world thinks they can do PR. Many even think they can do it well. It just happens to be one of those job fields in which people have trouble understanding just how much work goes into planning an event or getting your client on the 6 o’clock news. So here’s how you know whether or not you have the chops. My three PR Myths Debunked will help bring the old school practitioners up to speed, help teach the well-meaning youngsters and help weed out the posers who don’t know what they’re doing.

1. Public Relations is the same as Publicity. Seth Godin just posted a great article on this subject on his blog. Simply, publicity is getting ink or airtime. Yea! Clip!

Public Relations is the ability to get your message out across your communication channels, helping you to better connect with your audience. I will tell you when I started out I was the best there was at getting my client on the news. I had so many story ideas, I couldn’t keep them straight and I had good relationships with reporters so I knew they would cover them. Well once I had an idea so good, I pitched my client right out of the story! They didn’t include his quote in the package because I had lined up so many other third party sources. It was my fault because I didn’t prepare him with the messages he needed to convey that would have kept him in that package and made him and his practice look like a pro on TV. Hard lesson learned.

At Talk we are always proactively working to prepare our clients to make the most of these public relations (not publicity!) opportunities. Because as we say, an interview is just an opportunity to get your key messages our to your audience.

2. Media is your number one target. This is a very old school idea. But a hit that gets picked up on the front page of your local paper, circulation 100,000 is no match for a press release that gets picked up on Google News, page views 1,000,000. The Internet has made it possible for us to pitch our clients directly to their audience in addition to through the media. Because of this fact the way we tell our clients’ stories and the way we write and target our releases has changed as well. The new Bible at Talk is David Meerman Scott’s “The New Rules of PR and Marketing.” This is required reading for folks ready to ditch their old methods in exchange for newer and ultimately more effective ones.

3. Events are an effective public relations tool. Correction – events CAN be an effective public relations tool. Unfortunately many people get into the field of PR so then can plan events, and just wind up in over their heads. An event that wastes hours of your time and thousands of dollars from your marketing budget and accomplishes zero of your communication objectives is a failure.

Be wary of any public relations or marketing counselor who advises you to have an event for what you perceive is just for the sake of having an event. Instead, ask your counselor if they can come with a clever promotion that costs no money but brings them media attention. This is what we do best at Talk. One source of inspiration is Peter Shankman’s book, “Can We Do That?! Outrageous PR Stunts that Work and Why You Need Them.”

Photo by: Caruba

Tags: Public Relations Agency in N.C.
Posted in Public Relations | Comments

Things We Love

Wednesday, March 11th, 2009

Debbie loves The Alternative Board or TAB – The Alternative Board® brings together owners of privately-held businesses for peer advice and business coaching. Board members meet monthly to learn from one another’s successes and mistakes to grow their businesses. Dallas Romanowski at dallas@cap-corp.com coordinated TAB in the Cape Fear region. There is a charge for membership. Worth every penny.

Holly loves the new Facebook fan pages – This week Facebook made the change from their standard fan pages, which left a lot to be desired, to the new design, which is strikingly similar to a normal profile. Businesses and organizations with a fan page now have the ability to share a status, appear on news feeds and provide a layout that Facebook users understand. Check out the Talk fan page to see how we have taken advantage of these awesome changes.

Kelly loves “Win Without Pitching”, a sales guide to success for marketing communications agencies – This training manual is the ultimate guide book for any business owner looking to learn how to position their business for profit. Win Without Pitching offers tips and tools that help bring dignity, competitive advantage and financial reward to owner-operated firms that have grown tired of traditional cold calling practices. Reading this manual has given me a brand new understanding of the business world and how to gain that competitive advantage.

Kirsty loves Watchmen. I saw the movie last week, unaware of the story and fell in love. Reading the graphic novel this week, I’m enamored of the story and can see why it is the only “comic” on Time’s list of 100 best novels since 1923. While critics have given the film mixed reviews, everyone agrees that its opening credits are the best part of the film. yU+Co., creator of countless title designs from 300 to Enchanted, designed this montage of vintage superheroes from their hay days to their demise throughout American history, set to the tune of Bob Dylan’s “Times they are a-changing.” And while I love this incredible piece of film, I don’t love Warner Bros. requesting yU+Co. remove the popular clip from its website. Here’s the story of the bad publicity move along with the visually stunning six-minute clip.

Susan loves Magpie – Like Google Ad Words, Magpie uses keywords to match your company’s product or service to potential customers. This pay-per-tweet service starts an online conversation about your company. It identifies Twitterers who are already talking about topics related to your company or product and spreads the word like a web-based form of six degrees of separation.

Tags: Advertising, Marketing, Public Relations, Social media
Posted in Marketing, Public Relations | Comments

No budget marketing tips

Friday, March 6th, 2009

When times get tight, it’s no secret that the marketing is the first thing to go. On our blog, we’ve written about what a tragic mistake this is. If you aren’t showcasing your brand out in the marketplace you basically ensure its quick death. Here are a few “no budget marketing tips” to tide you over. Warning: the following strategies require a lot of elbow grease, but if business has slowed down, you have no reason not to try them out. Or, if you’ve had to sacrifice your media buying budget, invest instead in a great PR firm who can guide you through the following no budget marketing strategies:

1. Public Relations

I wouldn’t recommend delving into the world of media relations without a trained professional to advise you, but there are certainly some tactics you can employ to get the press to cover your business. You can learn a lot from Peter Shankman’s free service, Help a Reporter Out. He offers some sound advice to help you be the best publicist you can be for your company.

2. Barter

Smart marketing is so often about creating smart partnerships. Sure you can’t afford to hire XYZ Corp., but if you know they need (and can’t pay for) some of your widgets, then you’ve got a deal! Be sure you have your marketing objectives in mind and reach out to the companies that can help you get there. If you can offer them something they want in exchange, then you’ve essentially doubled your no budget marketing budget.

3. Get online

Does your company offer a product or service that can really help others? Do you think you have advice to share that can help people find solutions to their problems? If the answer is yes, then you were practically born to blog! Check out sites like ProBlogger and CopyBlogger to learn everything from the basics to really sophisticated online marketing strategies. It may not necesarily be comfortable for you to learn the fundamentals of marketing online, but you know what, neither was building your company. And if you want to stick around for the long haul, commit to embracing this wildly effective (and inexpensive) marketing strategy.

4. Network

I’m a huge proponent of “your network is your net worth.” People that say that Chamber After Hours and other professional mixers aren’t effective are simply not effective networkers themselves. You don’t have to join everything. Again, keep in mind your marketing strategy and pick the groups you would like to be a part of, which may have the most key influencers to help you get there. And then you have to work. Hard. Keith Ferrazzi is my favorite thought leader on this subject and you can learn a lot from him about how to create and keep relationships that will help you grow your business.

Tags: Marketing in a Recession, Public Relations Agency in N.C., Social Media in Wilmington N.C.
Posted in Marketing, Public Relations | Comments

Three communication ripcords for your crises

Monday, March 2nd, 2009

Contrary to popular belief, crisis communication training shouldn’t only be reserved for executives at AIG and the like. Its methods and tools can be helpful to any small business owner who may be in a pickle. Here are my three favorite communication “ripcords” to ensure that your reputation won’t free fall when your company is facing an issue that will bring on media and public scrutiny.

1. Understand that news doesn’t necessarily break in newspapers anymore. Thanks to the wide world of consumer-generated news, citizen journalists and social media, companies no longer have the luxury of waiting to respond to bad news. So in the immutable words of one of my crisis communication idols, Tori Clarke, “Deliver bad news yourself, and when you screw up, say so – fast!” This advice has never been more important as it is today, when a picture and a sound bite can travel across the world in a nanosecond and put your reputation at risk. Understanding this fact will help you to develop the sense of urgency you need when responding in a crisis.

2. Tell a story. Here’s a tip for the more advanced students of media training. When your back is against the wall and you’ve run out of key messages to convey your point, always have a “story” in your back pocket. Think of it this way – when you go on vacation and you return and your neighbor asks you how it was, you don’t list the facts, “We boarded the plane to Orlando. We checked into the Disney Resort. We picked up our park tickets. We headed to dinner.” You tell a story. “The funniest thing happened after we arrived at the hotel, they said they didn’t have our reservations! So we waited in the lobby for two hours while they scoured the reservations to find us a room. It was all worth it in the end because they ended up picking up the tab at the Resort’s four-star restaurant!” See the difference? You can do that in an interview too. A good, funny or heartwarming story may take the focus of the negative aspects of the story. So, work hard to become a good storyteller and you can essentially become a good interviewee too.

3. There’s a difference between “no comment” and “I don’t know.” Never say, “no comment.” It is the number one thing you can say to imply guilt. Now, if your lawyers have told you expressly to not comment on an issue to the media, you can say, “On the advice of our legal team, we cannot address that question at this time, but what I can tell you is that we’re working diligently to solve this problem and when we do, you will be the first person to hear about it.” Conversely, always say, “I don’t know,” if in fact, you don’t know. Never speculate or respond to hypothetical answers. The trick to this method is being accessible to help the reporter get the answers he or she needs in a timely manner. So respond, “I don’t have that answer, but let me put you in touch with our Director of Quality Control; when is your deadline?”

Tags: Crisis communication, Media training, Public Relations Agency in N.C.
Posted in Public Relations | Comments

An Online Marketer’s Reading List

Sunday, March 1st, 2009

The older I get, the more I realize I don’t know. Particularly these days, when online marketing is evolving at lightening speed. So I’ve been reading a lot lately. Not just a little. A LOT. Usually I’m good for one book at a time. But these past few weeks, the pile on my bedside table and on my desk has been growing steadily. Here’s a summary of the titles I’m enjoying right now. I hope you enjoy them too.
The Cluetrain Manifesto, The End of Business as Usual by Rick Levine, Christopher Locke (@clockerb), Doc Searls (@dsearls) and David Weinberger (@dweinberger) - The Cluetrain Manifesto began as a Web site (www.cluetrain.com) in 1999 when the authors, who have worked variously at IBM, Sun Microsystems, the Linux Journal, and NPR, posted 95 theses that pronounced what they felt was the new reality of the networked marketplace. According to Locke, “the fundamental principle of The Cluetrain Manifesto is that companies have been blind to the sea change that the Internet represents, and are desperately clinging to methods that workded wonders in the broadcast era but that are radically counterproductive online.”

The New Rules of Marketing & PR by David Meerman Scott (@dmscott) — Scott argues that marketing’s old rules are becoming more and more irrelevant. With the decline of traditional mass media marketing (TV, radio, print), there are new opportunities online. Scott provides a guide to RSS, vodcasts and viral marketing, without neglecting the fact that technological wizardry can’t substitute for a well-thought out marketing program.

Groundswell by Charlene Li (@charleneli) and Josh Bernoff (@jbernoff) — These two Forrester Research analysts have created an excellent primer on social media (You Tube, Facebook, Twitter, etc.) and how your company can participate — and benefit. The book will help you evaluate new social technologies and guide you on how to build these technologies into your business.

Search Engine Optimization Plain & Simple by Andrew S. Hazen, founder and CEO of Prime Visibility — An outstanding book on website optimization and search engine marketing. A step-by-step guide to making your website the number one result in customer searches on every search engine.

Web Design for ROI by Lance Loveday and Sandra Niehaus (@sandraniehaus) - A how-to book on how to design your website to maximize your ROI and how to get your website to increase your sales and leads by 10% to 50% or more.

Don’t Make Me Think by Steve Krug (@skrug) — An easy-to-read book on how to create a website that allows users to surf merrily through a well-designed site without having to think too hard about how the site works. Krug uses a mix of color screen shots, cute cartoons and diagrams to make his points. Much of the content is devoted to proper use of conventions and content layout, and the “before and after” examples are superb.

Tags: Marketing, Social media, Social Media in Wilmington N.C.
Posted in Marketing, Public Relations, Talk | Comments

Things We Love

Wednesday, February 25th, 2009

Debbie loves South’nFrance bon bons – Not only are they absolutely delicious hand-dipped chocolate bon bons made right here in Wilmington, but they are an excellent example of smart marketers. I’ve been delighted to see this company written up in many local media outlets and I’m constantly impressed with the attention to detail they give every aspect of their business. Bravo!

Holly loves Costa Rica – After vacationing there for one fabulous week in January, I absolutely fell in love with this breath-taking country. I learned a lot and saw a lot during vacation, but there was still so much more I wanted to know. Luckily, Costa Rica is started a blog just for their English speaking visitors. The blog details unique trips, awesome adventures and first-hand accounts of all the cool things you can experience there. For my next trip I’ll be sure to check the blog before making any plans!

Kelly loves the book, “The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding” by Al Ries – I so enjoyed Mr. Ries’ previous book, “The Fall of Advertising, the Rise of PR” that I had to check out his latest branding bible. Ries does an amazing job demonstrating the only way to stand out in today’s marketplace is to build your product or service into an internet brand, and provides step-by-step instructions you need to do so. Very good read for those interested in taking your business where the rest of the world is….the Internet.

Kirsty loves Slumdog Millionaire – This underdog film that almost went straight to DVD, dominated the Oscars and helped to shine a light on life in that part of the world. The result? Great publicity for Brand India. People are going gaga for the dancing, the music and the clothes in Slumdog. And everyone is looking for ways to position themselves with the movie to get a piece of the spotlight. Just consider the more than 6,000 Google News hits after the Government of Mumbai announced it was giving free homes to the child stars in the film.

Susan loves Facebook causes – The social media giant has an application that allows users to create and support causes they care about. And then recruit more supporters by inviting friends to join the cause as well. A few causes Talkers support on Facebook are Cape Fear Habitat for Humanity, Carolina Canines for Service and Community Financial Education Foundation (CFEF). Stay tuned for Talk’s Project Pet Project cause to hit Facebook later this week.

Tags: Marketing, Public Relations, Social Media in Wilmington N.C.
Posted in Branding, Marketing, Public Relations | Comments