PR+MKTG Camp (Facebook, Twitter) is coming March 3 to the Seattle Public Library. With successful 2009 events in Atlanta and New York, we will have camps in five more cities in 2010.  In addition to Seattle, we will be in Chicago, Toronto, London and by popular demand, a camp again in New York. For more information about Seattle, see the registration page at Eventbrite.

One recent notable change is our new name.  We were originally known as PR Camp,  The new name, PR+MKTG Camp, reflects how social media is blurring the boundaries between PR and marketing.  In addition, if PR+MKTG Camp has an agenda, it is to help align the two professions, create more effective account teams and serve the enterprise as the whole.  That name reflects these objectives.

I am working with Dean Landsman of the Landsman Communications Group. We are already building momentum in Seattle. SMC Seattle is also partnering with us,  given our mutual commitment to community building and social media.

Many of the moderators for the four different sessions are already on board.  Here are some of the moderators who are scheduled to participate:

- Elliott Pesut – Campaign Management Specialist, Alaska Airlines

- Sean O’Driscoll - Co-Founder and CEO, Ant’s Eye View

- Buzz Bruggeman – Active Words

- Shauna Causey – Communications/Community Relations Manager, Comcast

- Colleen Moffitt - Founding Partner, Communique PR

- Anne Marshall – Director, Public Relations, Drugstore.com

- Kat Tillman – Senior Account Supervisor, Edelman Digital

- Jon Winsell - Strategic Services Director, Emerge Partners

- Renay San Miguel - Reporter, King 5 TV

- Maya Bisineer – Founder, Memetales

- Betsy Aoki - Sr. Program/Product Manager, Social Media, Microsoft

- Rod Brooks – CMO, Pemco Insurance

- Bill Hankes – Vice President, Corporate Communications, Real Networks

- Monica Guzman – News Gatherer, Seattle P-I

- Kenton Olsen – Manager, Digital Media, Seattle Seahawks

- Brad Nelson - Starbucks

- Wade Rockett - Digital Strategist, Weber Shandwick

- Tac Anderson – Social Media Director, Waggener Edstrom

- Laura Porto Stockwell – Senior Director, Digital Strategy, Wongdoody Communications

NEW ADDITIONS:

- Tom Biro - Vice President, Allison & Partners

- Greg Shaw – Director of Advocacy and Policy
 United States Program, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

- Scott Porad – CTO, Cheezburger Network

- Ben Straley – CEO, Meteor Solutions

- Jeff Sandquist – Senior Director of Platform Evangelism, Microsoft

- Shannon Paul – Online Communications Manager, PEAK6

- Xavier Jimenez – Principal, Spring Creek Group

- Kevin Pedraja – Vice President, Sterling Communications

- Patricia Vaccarino – Managing Partner, Xanthus Communications

- Amy Bohutinsky – Vice President, Corporate Communications, Zillow

- John Henry Giddings – Director, West Region, PR Newswire

Agenda

8:00 AM - Registration and Breakfast

9:00 AM – Impact: Understanding how social media is reshaping traditional PR’s and marketing’s principal roles and core competencies

In this session, we examine the impact of social media on storytelling, relationship building, branding, conversations and transactions.

10:30 AM – Impact and Strategy: Aligning PR and Marketing

In this session, we explore how better alignment can improve outcomes.  Discussions will focus on identifying common disconnects between PR and marketing, integrating account teams and defining performance metrics.

12:00 Noon - Lunch

1:15 PM –

Execution: Measuring Success

In this session, we evaluate different tools used to measure success, looking at such criteria as their accuracy, effectiveness, usefulness and cost.

2:30 PM - Strategy and Execution: Achieving Internal Buy in for Your Social Media Programs

In this session, we focus on defining ROI and how PR and marketing can set realistic expectations for achieving buy in from clients and management.

4:15 PM - Wrap Up

Sponsors and Partners

We are still looking for additional partners and sponsors for our event.  We are grateful for the support of Social Media Club Seattle, PR Newswire and Emerge Partners for their support.

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post 

Is social media transformational?  That was the topic of my panel discussion this past weekend at University of Georgia’s Connect 2009: Integrating Social Media and Traditional PR.

I was joined by Aaron De Lucia senior vice president of Porter Novelli, Austin and Melanie James – University of Newcastle (Australia) who  joined via Skype from her home.

And thanks to Professor Karen Russell for inviting me to participate. It was also great to connect with Jeremy Pepper, Toby Bloomberg and Bert Dumars.

Jeremy Pepper and Toby Bloomberg

Now I can make a strong case supporting the contention that social media is forcing PR to undergo transformational change. Consider:

- From a technical perspective, the social tools we are using gives us greater reach at a lower cost.

- From  a human resources management perspective, it shifts the balance of power giving younger professionals a leg up on their older counterparts who are less familiar and less comfortable with social media. It decentralizes authority and makes everyone in the the organization a spokesperson.

- From a business development perspective, it is enabling PR professionals to cultivate vice presidents of corporate communications and marketing to be clients.

- From a job function perspective, it is moving us away from media relations and more into customers relations. Or put another way, it is disintermediating journalists as the vehicle to deliver and validate our news. We now can go directly to the user, and the user increasingly comes directly to us.

- From a message perspective, we are more comfortable with negative comments going public and more able to admit mistakes, when it doesn’t go against legal or HR.  More information is transparent, though proprietary information is still subject to non-disclosure mandates.

But Is It?

But professor James isn’t quite so sure.  Her comments on the panel suggests that social media adds only another layer of work to what we are doing with traditional media.  As she pointed out, PR professionals spend a lot of time:

* deciding whether social media should be part of your program or campaign
* defending whatever decision you’ve made
* implementing the social media aspect of your activities
* evaluating what if any impact it’s had

So what exactly is so transformational?

And now to contradict myself, I can the make case that social media only reinforces our core competency — relationship building.  Now non-experts and fans have joined reporters and industry analysts as our target audience.

And fundamentally, it is just as difficult to demonstrate bottom line impact.  Even as social media becomes another revenue source for agencies, in many ways we are still a cost center. And some may argue that over time, we will just allocate fewer resources to traditional media so the top line growth is debatable.

So where do you come out in the debate?  Now the conference was held at the University of Georgia, so the answer may be academic, but the truth is, regardless of your perspective, social media is becoming more central to what PR does. I think social media is giving PR an opportunity to play a great role in the overall marketing, customer experience mix. But whether you buy into the hype and hyperbole, one part of our job has not fundamentally changed:  deliver value to our clients.

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post 

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post 

I attended  a Tweetup up in Atlanta put together by Jeremy Porter and featuring noted author David Meerman Scott who was in town on business.  I had a chance to catch up with Bert Dumars, hang out with social media regulars Michelle Batten, Toby Bloomberg, Paul Stamatiou, and Jamie Bardin and meet Chad Rothschild, Rani Quirk, Maggie Buerger and Karen Russell. Oh yea and tweet

Michelle and I were drumming up some support for our Social Media Club Atlanta event next week at Manuel’s Tavern.

The session is called “Brand + Consumers: Dating and Mating in the Social Arena” (part one of our Summer 2009 “Social Media Love Affair” three-part program series).  We’re hosting local industry brand leaders, looking at the brand/consumer social media relationships within their respective categories, and asking:

1) Who’s In and Who’s Out?
2) What’s the Reason for the Attraction?
3) Good Dating vs. Bad Dating
4) When to Keep Dating and When to Breakup

If you are in town, come by.

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post 

Last week, I extolled the virtues of blended communication.  Today, I want to show how new and traditional media can complement each other to deliver more effective communication with a wider reach.

Press Releases and Corporate Blogs – Blended communication leverages both.  Press releases should be used to announce major (material) news.   They represent a point in time when a deal is reached, a product is launched or an appointment is made. Unfortunately companies can abuse them to disclose information with little or no news value beyond the companies involved.  Corporate blogs function differently.  Used correctly, blogs are not repackaged press releases, but a platform to discuss ongoing developments in a way that invites comment and feedback.  For major announcements, blogs can put a human face on company efforts, while press releases can deliver a more formal voice.

Placement and Search – While gaining importance, search results lag behind placement as a key PR success metric. Blended communication combines story placement and SEO. Beyond awareness, placement in key publications generates legitimacy and validation for a company position.  It also serves to enhance search results. But search merits equal importance. A concerted SEO strategy helps users find company information who don’t care about particular publications or reporters.  It includes optimizing press releases and other “content” including podcasts, pictures, videos, graphics and pictures that are often found in a newsroom on a corporate website.  It takes into account how more and more people process information – on their own terms (search or otherwise) – pun intended.

Context – Blended communication strives to create content that reflects the dynamics of the medium. For example, I did a posting last year about CBS’ online strategy for the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament. Their traditional website CBSsports.com led with content for their 18-49 year old male demographic while their Facebook led with community targeting a teenage to 34 year old demographic. One led with news and scores and the other on team pages, smack talk and tournament pokes. It’s related information processed differently for different audiences.  (Below, the first is the Facebook page and the second is the website page from the to other day.)

Swarming – Blended communication anticipates a negative or positive review in an influential publication and enables PR to respond in real time.  Used to be you had to wait for the story to appear.  You would send a letter to the editor if you disagreed or took out a page to advertise your position.  That’s impractical in the hyperspeed of the Internet.  Instead you can now use the power of the web to your advantage.  You can create blog postings, build microsites and use SEM to support or rebut the story when users search for the article. In some respects, it is swarming or engulfng a news item with related and relevant content.  It helps to create balance when the news is negative and  amplification when the news is good.

Personalization – Blended communication uses new media to humanize traditional coverage. Imagine last fall if the CEOs of the Big Three automakers had used new media to supplement traditional channels in making their case for a government bailout. Going before Congress was national news covered by all the major news organizations. It merited press releases, the distribution of testimony and media interviews.   But also imagine if the CEOs had traveled in hybrid cars, met with dealers and customers along the way and used Twitter and YouTube to personalize their stories. It would have changed the entire dynamic and demonstrated a mastery of multiple forms of media.

In short, blended communication is strategic communications. It looks beyond tools and technologies and integrates different ways of delivering information.  It reflects the way we process news, and the way corporate executives measure it.

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post 

Today, you can find many agencies that only practice new media, but very few if any that only do traditional.  And while Twitter may generate the buzz, corporate executives generally turn to the Wall Street Journal for validation.  Despite the inroads that new media has made, traditional media rests solidly in their comfort zone. Social media continues to confound many of them, even as they admit that they should get it.

Corporate executives notwithstanding, is the distinction moot? After all, a growing number of readers go online for their news. (The Seattle Post- Intelligencer just did away with its print edition.)  News outlets engage in blogging, rely on crowdsourcing (CNN iReport) or offer APIs (New York Times) that allow readers to mash content.

Have we reached that point that it’s all just media as PR professionals like Hilary Mckean, partner and director of Ketchum South here in Atlanta contends?  Or is it more the case that clients still want to keep new and traditional media separate as Paull Young, a senior account executive at Converseon has observed?

For me, traditional includes print and broadcast journalism as well as company generated materials like press releases, websites and annual reports.  New includes blogs, social networks,  user generated content and relies more on search than placement.  Traditional means  impersonal, formal and structured; new is intimate, casual, and interactive.  New media thrives on breaking rules; traditional media strives to follow them.

Enter Blended Communication

Which is more influential?  The verdict is still out, but for the foreseeable future blogs, press releases, newspapers, social networks and broadcast networks will all be around — feeding off each other for content and credibility.

Given the influence of new and traditional media, I prefer to focus on how to blend them.  A blended PR strategy takes advantage of each allowing one to complement the other to build more relevant results.  Placed in this context, we can begin helping reluctant executives to see social media more holistically. Otherwise they will continue seeing new media as gimmicks or something to be used on an ad hoc basis.

Blended communication is more than the sum of the parts.  It brings complexity, increases options and eliminates binary thinking.  

To be sure, sometimes, as in in the case of financial news, personal, authentic communication is inappropriate, and sometimes an objective approach doesn’t hit the right emotional chord.  You need both.  And you need them to work together.

Next posting, I will offer some examples of how blended communication can work for you.

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post 

Today I graduate from blog.com and relaunch Bernaise Source on Wordpress complete with a working RSS feed.  I want to thank Jim Young at Webwise Enterprises and my good friend Rachel for her help.

I begin my redesign with the tagline that ends all my posts:  “Let me get back to you.”

Familiar to any PR person who does not have an immediate answer for a reporter, the phrase may seem a little dated in the age when news waits for no one.  I don’t long for the good old days.  Rather, it’s a recognition that deliberation and confirmation are sometimes good things. It also reinforces the idea that blogging is an ongoing conversation.

But today, PR professionals can’t live on reporter relationships and impressions alone.  New media has forever changed how we do our jobs. Beyond new strategies,  we need to understand the new tools at our disposal.  Knowing such things as how to design blogs, how to build online communities, how to use SEO and how to measure results are now basic requirements.

In subsequent posts, I will explore what I call Bernaise Source – the rich blend of new and traditional communication.  It’s tempting to abandon newspapers and network television for blogs and social networks, but you can’t.  The new and traditional each have a role to play – even as the majority of people now get their news online.  Understanding how they work together is the key to a successful communication strategy.

I will also continue use my adopted home town of Atlanta as a backdrop to explore the tech and gaming communities.  The tech community is a source of innovation, and the gaming industry can teach us a great deal about fans, community building and social networks.  In PR, games  have been underplayed – no pun intended.

It’s a full agenda, perhaps too full. Let’s just say, Bernaise Source is a work in progress.

As always, I welcome your feedback to keep me honest and on message.

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post 

Yesterday, at the third annual Southeast Venture Conference in Atlanta, the opening keynote speaker Tim Draper, managing director of Draper Fisher Jurvetson, asked the more than 700 attendees “What revolution are we creating?”

Thanks to Eric Gregg SEVC director for the comp ticket.  I am accustomed these days to the more casual atmosphere of SoCon09 and Startup Riot where entrepreneurs are all wearing jeans and online using Twitter.

That was not he case yesterday.  I took out my suit, put on a tie and observed capitalism in action where handshakes and personal relationships still matter.  Deals, not laptops, were on people’s minds.

Among the keynotes and company presentations, I was encouraged by the optimism even if there was no escaping the tough economic reality we currently face. Times like these require adaptation.

John Yates the partner-in-charge of the technology group at Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP brought the point home when he asked members of the panel to compare 2008 and 2009.   Today, one VC sees fewer business plans focused on widgets, and another was witnessing a flight to quality and observed that people are looking for the long haul.

Few companies presenting on the first day focused on the social web, but all were technology driven.  One presentation that I missed was LivingSocial - a social network that allows people to review and “share their favorite movies, books, games, music, restaurants and beer” and integrates with Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, hi5, and Orkut.

While few in the audience seemed to support a stimulus package, Draper ever the optimist viewed the current situation as a perfect opportunity for companies with vision and a solid business plan. It just is going to take longer.

“This is the best time ever to start a company.”  Draper said, reminding the crowd that many of the largest and most successful companies started in rough times including GE, Chevron, Westinghouse, Microsoft, Adobe, Skype, and Johnson and Johnson. See Tech Journal South article.

“Entrepreneurs, this is your time. This your moment, go out and do something.”

These days that sounds revolutionary enough.

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post 

These days you are more likely to read about bankruptcies than M&A activity, but Delta’s merger with Northwest Airlines last fall is an interesting case study for marketing and PR professionals responsible for social media integration.

Social media can help with the transition, but it can also add another layer of challenges if each company has a pronounced social media strategy.  I have long maintained that successful social media efforts must reflect a company’s corporate DNA. A merger can change all that.  A botched social media integration strategy can undo years of hard work.

So how do you preserve a company’s authentic voice when you are combining two different employee cultures, two different customer bases and two different sets of social media practices?  In any corporate merger or acquisition, the name of the game is “seamless transitions.”

Social Media Lessons:  Learning from Delta

According the Katie Mingo, using social media to integrate Delta Airlines and Northwest Airlines was a top priority.  Katie is in charge of content optimization and interactive marketing at Delta.   You may have seen her bookend Delta’s inflight safety video.

Corporate blogs: You essentially have three choices when each company has a corporate blog (as opposed to brand blogs) – kill one, keep two going separately or merge them.  

Killing one is clearly the quickest solution, but perhaps unnecessarily drastic. In creating a combined company, it’s important to foster good will by courting employees and customers alike.  Blogs can help by going beyond the news and providing insights into people making the changes. The logical solution is to repurpose content and link to each other’s blogs.  Over time, two blogs will organically become one as the content increasingly overlaps.

Fortunately for Delta, this was not an issue; Northwest did not have a strong presence.  But Delta did use its blog Under the Wing as a platform to “make employees feel more welcome and help customers with the transition.”   Believing that is always better to show than tell, the blog essentially replaced what would have been a static list of FAQs.

When the merger closed in late October, Delta used its blog along with ongoing internal and external communications to recognize Northwest’s culture, history and employees.  The kickoff posting featured a vintage Northwest timetable.  Subsequent postings focused on integration including several about Delta and Northwest employees helping with a Habitat for Humanity project in Brazil.

Open vs Closed, Centralized vs Decentralized Communications: Some corporate cultures are top down and buttoned up.  Others are more open and give individual managers more discretion to make communication decisions.  As a former vice president of corporate the latter scared the hell out of me, but I recognize that a degree of independence is essential for social media to work.

At Delta, corporate communicates vet all blog posts as they would news releases and other communications.   Mingo noted that Northwest employees generally had another layer of approval, which impacted the communication process.

So what happens when open and closed cultures combine?  Of course the acquiring company’s culture wins, but here again social media adds a layer to consider in the transition process.  Employees need to adjust to how information is communicated.   For a more centralized company, a merger can also be an opportunity to experiment with social media – especially if it proved effective at one of the merging companies.  Social media tools like wikis and employee forums can also be useful to foster engagement, collaboration and greater familiarity.

Amplifying Traditional Media: Lastly the marriage of mergers and social media can help amplify traditional media. Beyond blogs, Delta’s social media strategy includes Flickr and YouTube.

One video of Northwest Airlines being repainted with the Delta logo and colors went viral leading to 100,000 views.  The video caught the attention of The Learning Channel. The program Busted Knuckles did a special on how to change brakes on an airplane.  The producers followed an aircraft maintenance technician around.  Social media was involved in the promotional phase.

Having been involved in many mergers over the years, I understand the tension that combining cultures and resources can create.  Social media should be a required part of the process.  Like any use of social media, success rests on maintaining authenticity and respecting your targeted audiences.  

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post 

Yesterday was a day of contrasts -  It began at Technology Association of Georgia’s (TAG) Technology Summit — thanks to Patrick Gaul who had an extra seat at his blogger’s table.

I was joined by fellow bloggers David Cohen, Amani Channel, Sherry Heyl, Justin Rubner, and Lance Weatherby.  Though to be honest Twitter seemed to be the platform of choice.

Hundreds of members from Georgia’s business establishment were on hand to honor some of the state’s most innovative technology companies the honorees.

Among TAG’s 2009 Top 10:

CCP Games North America –  a gaming company, creators of Eve and part of Georgia’s gaming future.

PlayOn Sports! – digital media company that allows fans to watch untelevised, high quality local community content.

Asankya – creators of a cloud application acceleration service.

NanoLumens – makers of digital screens that can be contoured in any shape and size.

New York Times columnist and author Thomas Friedman was the featured speaker.  One of his biggest applause lines was when he told the crowd he was for startups, not bailouts.

Shotput Venture’s Open House

That evening I attended Shotput Venture’s open house to kick off their efforts to find the next generation of web entrepreneurs.  The organizers expected 75 attendees; 200 showed up and a third were Georgia Tech undergrads.

One such student Andre Nasri is developing a iPhone application after working with fellow students on an automated login system.

The scale of this venue was less grand, but the goals were no less great:  to discover promising startups and help build Georgia’s technology future.

Good economic news is in short supply these days, but across Atlanta there seems to be no absence of innovation.

Let me get back to you.

Tweet This Post