Engaging Your Audience through Multiple Channels
I recently attended a session on “The Convergence of Marketing & PR in a Digital Age” presented by PR Newswire’s Director of Emerging Media, Michael Pranikoff. Michael started off with a statistic stating that in 1965 you could reach 80% of adults with three 60-second advertising spots on the major television networks – ABC, CBS and NBC. Today, you would need 117 prime time commercials to produce the same result. His point?…
We are no longer a homogeneous audience paying attention to a limited number of news outlets. Technology has enabled the media to reach very narrow audience segments with specific content.
Another interesting statistic: today, 72% of people on the Internet belong to at least one social network, which translates to 940 million users worldwide. (This rings true – both my parents and my kids are on Facebook – eek!) And today many people are “friending” and “following” brands that they like. So, what does this mean for corporate brands, and their marketing teams?
- First, it’s important to realize that most people don’t distinguish between “traditional media” and “digital media.” People are just looking for information, and these worlds are overlapping and melding, so there is no need to silo these functions within a corporation.
- Second, consumers (including B2B buyers) have direct access to all sorts of information from many different sources, not just news reported by the media. This means as PR practitioners and marketers, we need to think holistically. We need to be aware of both the corporate “brand voice” as well as the “social voice” – the human, interactive, two-way communications that are taking place involving your brand.
- Third, companies need to drive the conversation. Contrary to the belief that the proliferation of social media means you are no longer in control of your brand message, it is important to shape the conversation so that you have some measure of control over it.
Michael talked about the “long tail of corporate content” referencing the concept discussed in Chris Anderson’s book The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More. Applied to content distribution, PR Newswire says that they tend to see an immediate spike in pick-up of news, but then there is a “long tail” as the news gets redistributed through search, sharing and blogging.
To make the most of this trend, he recommends that organizations “keep talking” in order to shape the conversation about their brand. Specifically, create more frequent, but shorter messages. This will level out the spikes in content distribution.
Attending this presentation was an excellent reminder that we need to continually reevaluate our assumptions and past experiences with PR and marketing as the way people gather information continues to expand. PR and marketing communications are key elements of the “brand voice,” that can also spark the “social voice” to reach our target audiences through multiple channels with timely and relevant information.
Here’s the link to one of Michael’s presentations on SlideShare. And Happy New Year to all!
Leading or Following? Communications Excellence Plays a Role
I have been thinking a lot about this lately – how communications operational excellence impacts both internal and external momentum.
Over and over, I have seen that the companies that rise to leadership positions have one commonality. They may or may not have the best offering but what they really know how to do is leverage both their internal and external communications in a strategic manner. They know how to create value through their communications. They are consistent and excel at talking about their vision, and how their offerings are going to change how things are done today. They understand that their vision needs to be validated by customers, partners and third party critics. And it is done in a very thoughtful, purposeful manner.
Firms that have mastered communications operational excellence typically have a “corporate story champion” that is driving it through the organization. Almost always, it is the CEO or the VP of Marketing (with the support of the CEO). Everyone in the organization understands the vision and corporate story and can tell the story at some level to their constituents. Companies that are successful at this create internal momentum. Everyone is on the same page. Everyone is working to achieve a common vision.
The same process applies to external communications. Each external spokesperson has to be on the same page and following the corporate story line. This applies to every executive, every sales and marketing person, and customer service rep.…they are all communicating to the outside world on the company’s behalf. Each announcement needs to tie back and illustrate how the company is working to a common vision/goal. This needs to be done frequently and consistently.
Unfortunately, what happens frequently is that we get caught up in the everyday minutiae of “close the deal” or “announce this partner/product/customer” without providing context of how the company is executing on their strategy and vision. This results in a very tactical communications program and a missed opportunity to create value.
This is really what separates leaders from the followers.
BREW Boston Kicks off with a full week of events
BREW Boston kicks off this week with more than 15 events targeted at helping and educating entrepreneurs in Greater Boston. So, check it out and I hope to see you there – BREW Boston 2010
Boston Region Entrepreneurship Week…oops, Month! BREW Boston 2010
It was only six weeks ago when Joe Caruso, Advocate for Entrepreneurs for the past 20 years, called his friends with a great idea…let’s celebrate everything related to launching and nurturing companies in the Boston area. Silicon Valley does it; New Orleans does it, so why not Boston? The greater Boston area is full of seasoned resources and a history of success but we in New England seem to forget that we have a rich and fertile ground for innovation. We just don’t think about it in this way.
Just off the top of my head, here are a numbers of companies that were started in Greater Boston. Let’s see, back in the good old days Boston incubated tech hardware companies like DEC, Wang, and Wellfleet and software companies like Lotus (Ok, I am dating myself!). Early Internet companies such as Open Market, Lycos and TripAdvisor among others were also started here. More recently we have had RSA, EMC and Netezza (just acquired by IBM for a mere $1.7B). And there are a number of consumer companies such as Dunkin Donuts, Nantucket Nectars, Sam Adams Brewery, and Au Bon Pain that have all flourished in the Boston entrepreneurial ecosystem.
All of these companies have brought innovation and lots of jobs to our economy.
Joe’s vision started modestly with a weeklong series of entrepreneurial events hosted by the community that provides resources and support to entrepreneurs. Somewhere along the way, BREW took on a life of its own. With close to 50 events, it now runs the entire month of October!
Attendees at BREW events will have the opportunity to win items such as books on entrepreneurship; gift certificates for mobile-phone based gifting, free website design and coding, and free printing services… as well as benefit from free beer being supplied to a few events by local breweries.
And who does not like handcrafted beer?!
So, check it out www.brewboston.org and I hope to see you at least one of the 50 events!
Why is Blogging Important?
To Blog or not to Blog?
That seems to be the question I am getting a lot these day from executives that are trying to allocate budgets and people resources. Face it, a blog takes time, time that is hard to find when you are wearing several different hats. Believe me, I know. I struggle to find extra time in my schedule to blog.
But a recent study conducted by George Washington University and Cision suggests that a corporate blog is becoming as important as a corporate web site.
The study found that nearly nine out of ten journalists (89%) say they use blogs for online research. Only corporate websites (96%) are cited by more journalists as a source of online information. WOW!
However, the study also showed that 84% of journalists believe that news and information delivered by social media, including blogs, is less reliable than information delivered by traditional media. Lack of fact-checking, verification, or reporting standards was cited as the number one reason for their skepticism. No surprise here!
As a result, according to the survey, most journalists turn to public relations professionals for assistance in their primary research. Editors and reporters surveyed said they depend on PR professionals for “interviews and access to sources and experts”, “answers to questions and targeted information”, and “perspective, information in context, and background information”.
So here are the top reasons why you should blog:
- Blogs give you a platform to convey information that may not be newsworthy to the industry at the moment, but may be important and/or relevant at another time.
- Corporate web sites and blogs are the top two online destinations that journalists use to gather information.
- Blogs provide a platform for your opinions and unique perspective. It provides a medium for thought leadership without external filtering.
- Blogs help with search engine optimization.
So, if you are not blogging, you really should reconsider your communications strategy. It is becoming as important as your website.
What We Learned from Scott Brown’s Win
By Dana Harris
Last night was an extremely exciting upset for the Republicans, a huge change for Massachusetts and for future politics in Washington. Scott Brown, a relative unknown, came from behind as an underdog to win the late Ted Kennedy’s U.S. Senate seat. But as a PR professional, I found the communications strategy in the last 10 days of the campaign very interesting and saw many lessons learned for Red Javelin‘s clients– emerging-growth technology and consumer companies that are typically the underdog needing to compete with the big “machines” of the technology sector.
So what can we learn from Brown’s win? Here are some of my thoughts:
- Lead with direct, clear and simple messages. And repeat them often. Come up with 3 of these messages and stick to them in your communications efforts. People will then remember who you are and what you stand for. One of the simple statements in his winning speech last night was a great example of a direct message as he discussed the issue of defending terrorists in our nation. He said “Our tax dollars should go towards weapons to stop them, not lawyers to defend them.”
- Show your differences. Brown clearly articulated the issues and how he differed from his opponent Martha Coakley. Technology companies need to do a better job of stepping outside of their company bubbles and analyzing their competition, and distinguishing why their solution solves a business problem better than other ones out there.
- The importance of listening to your target market. Brown’s statement of “The people’s seat” and focusing on “listening to the people” resonated with most voters. Technology companies need to listen better to their customers – the people that buy their products and services – and learn what they really need and want, what issues they are experiencing, and how they can better solve these problems.
- Show your character and tell your story. The press is interested in real stories around real people. They like to get “under the hood” and see what makes successful companies run, who makes them run and is behind the latest and greatest product or service. Brown displayed passion, energy, determination, and showed his easygoing, down to earth character which turned many voter prospects into voter sales.
- Bashing your competition can come back to haunt you. Coackley’s negative ad campaign turned off a lot of voters here in Massachusetts. I am a firm believer in sticking to positive messages about your company and products and avoiding the desire to slam them as it doesn’t get you anywhere.
- The use of social networking to communicate. We all now need to understand that social networking is here to stay. It is critical to integrate social networking into your communications, even when targeting IT and enterprise-level decision makers. People make decisions based on opinions they gather from colleagues, peers in their industry, friends and family and are feeling more comfortable sharing their views on social networking services such as Twitter and Facebook. Tap into this and use communications to nurture your influencers.
I’d love to hear your comments on other communications tactics we may have learned from the Mass. senate race so post them here!
Leveraging 2009 for Growth in 2K10
For all of us in the emerging tech market, I think that although we all are happy to say goodbye to 2009 and ring in the New Year, we have all learned much in the process. This year has allowed us all to take better stock of what works and doesn’t work in our companies. We took time to smell the coffee, slow down, and appreciate more than before. CEOS tweaked and critiqued their corporate expenses and budgets and became more creative with their resources, leveraging activities off one another and taking advantage of social media tools to evangelize their opinions across the web.
We want to congratulate all those companies that have survived this year. These survival tactics, along with tenacity, perseverance, and the ability to stay flexible and creative should help us all in 2010. I believe smaller emerging-tech companies need to continue to do more with less. From a communications perspective, companies should look in 2010 to:
• Create more original, high quality content and leverage the heck out of it
• Consider visual ways of telling your story including online video
• Share this content socially through appropriate social networks
• Use marketing and PR resources to generate great ideas to create well told stories
• Get closer to your customers and try to get your biggest product champions to speak for you
• Leverage offline marketing activities in PR efforts
• Make sure you have an ongoing communications/PR program
B2B marketers can no longer ignore that buyers are more savvy, looking for digestible chunks of content when making decisions and need to be engaged over many months. We believe that companies that rise to leadership positions excel at targeting their key audiences, and are consistent at communicating industry vision, market and product validation. Consistency is the key word and marketing to prospects is not a stop/start activity.
Lastly, Red Javelin would like to send a word of thank you to all of our clients who fought the battle in 2009 with us. It has been a pleasure working with all of you, representing so many exciting sectors of the technology market and may 2010 take your company to a new level of growth and success.
Hit Your Target in 2010!
I love the new marketing tools! I use them every day. Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, SEO, and Inbound marketing are all essential tools for any Internet marketing program.
But here is my gripe. More and more, I hear entrepreneurs and VCs claiming that this is all they need to launch companies or generate momentum for their young developing companies. I have also heard frequently “Customers will find us…organically” (BTW, I have a bridge to sell you). While I understand that many of these statements are motivated by the fact that new companies don’t have or need to preserve cash, when I hear blanket statements like this, I see a giant red flag waving in the wind.
Back in the day when I did a three-year stint as an analyst/management consultant, I specialized in the start-up world in the area of network convergence (ok – I am really dating myself here!). During that time, my team sat through close to 700 start-up briefings and we quickly became very astute predicting a start-up’s success based on what we heard in the initial briefing. By the end of each briefing, my colleagues and I would confer, count up the number of red flags we could see, and form our opinions on whether or not the company was going to make it. Our track record turned out to be very good.
Each one of my colleagues had a hot button – for me, I wanted to dig into their go-to-market strategy. If I believed that the company had a product that somebody actually needed (you would be surprised how many don’t) and that the management team had the fortitude and passion to see the venture through (this is really about believing in what you do and have the perseverance and know how to make it happen), then I wanted to understand the strategy and tactics of their go-to-market strategy.
I wanted to know how the team was going to help the sales force, the guy on the front lines, holding the bag every day because that person had the biggest mountain to climb. I wanted to know the details of who they wanted to partner with, how they were packaging themselves, how the company was going to generate leads, and how the company was going to shorten the sales cycle. I want to know how they were going to create the “push and pull” needed to generate momentum.
The devil is in the details. This is where we would usually see many red flags.
So, let’s examine the new tools. SEO and Inbound Marketing allow you to be “found”. Blogs, Facebook, and microblogging allow you to have conversations with prospects and customers. All are very good things. But each one of these tools serves a particular purpose in the marketing mix.
How can you be “found” or start a conversation if nobody knows that you exist? How can people search on a new product category that isn’t defined? Who is going to read the blog that you have spent days and weeks creating and populating with content? Why would anyone follow you on Twitter if they never heard of you?
I would argue that you need to communicate both broadly as well as in a targeted fashion using all types of tools – that you need to blend the old with the new. Even in this new world where Social Media or Inbound Marketing are without question important tools in your marketing mix, if you tell me these are all you need to market your company and product this is another one of those huge red flags. I would place my bet that you will not be around next year or will not have had a lot of success to talk about. Good marketers understand that you need a number of activities and communications vehicles working in harmony to generate momentum with the buzz.
Tech Tuesday Rocks
Last night I attended my first Tech Tuesday event held at the Microsoft NERD building on Memorial Drive. Here is a shout out to Microsoft for providing the food and beverage at the event. For those of you not familiar with Tech Tuesday, it is an informal gathering held on the second Tuesday of every month for geeks, tech savvy professionals, DIY-ers, press, and other industry luminaries. Attendees bring their laptops, robots, new cell phones, gadgets, and other new-fangled devices for ad hoc show and tell. It is a great venue to show proof of concept, solicit ideas from peers, or refine your pitch.
It is hosted by the Mass Technology Leadership Council and tech luminary Dan Bricklin. At the beginning of the event, Dan gave each attendee an opportunity in two sentences to introduce themselves and promote what they are showing.
Last night there was a group of entrepreneurs from Ireland that are visiting Babson for a week-long boot camp of entrepreneurial studies. Several of them have already launched successful ventures in Ireland and are looking to scale beyond Emerald Isle while others are getting ready to launch iPhone apps in the near future. I had a lively discussion with Barry Lynch from Nifty Nosh, an online food ordering service for take-out on how they were using Twitter to promote special events for their client restaurants. What I found interesting about the conversation is that they were using what I would call “classic pull through channel marketing” using new social media tactics.
Blank Label is a newly launched online company that provides custom dress shirts for the trendy male. This is a very cool and interesting company that has the foundation of a successful venture. I particularly like their belief in Connected Individualism - I think this concept has great promotional potential. Blank Label launched late October using social media as their primary vehicle to get the word out. Good start but here is the challenge. I hear this all the time from young twenty-something entrepreneurs and also from VCs – social media and SEO are the only tools I need to get the word out. NOT! (I will pontificate more on this subject later in the week!)
There were a number of very experienced and seasoned professionals taking a look at this company. Within 15 minutes, we as a collective group came up with at least a half dozen of ideas on how this start-up could enhance their presence in their target market. The ideas ranged from innovative video to grass roots event marketing – fashion shows in nightclubs, partnering with universities and graduate programs, and the list goes on. All great ideas. And this is what Tech Tuesday is all about. Sharing ideas, mentoring innovative companies, and keeping it all in Massachusetts.
