Socializing 101—Making Connections with 140 Characters or Less

One thing that I have learned throughout my career is the power of social media. The informal, conversational atmosphere of social media platforms somehow brings people’s guards down and creates a community atmosphere. Twitter, in particular, has become one of my most valuable PR tools. When you’re trying to get you client’s news noticed in a sea of other PR people, you have to stand out. It’s really that simple.

This is where learning the art of 140 characters or less comes in. Here are my suggestions for making connections with key press and analysts to ensure that next time your email doesn’t land in the trash:

• Do your research: Make sure that you are following all of the relevant press and analysts for your client’s industry. Many times you can find out what they cover based on their bio and the type of content that they tweet. I would also suggest seeing who these people follow. It’s a good way to discover new relevant press, analysts and publications that you may not have found otherwise.

• Engage & interact: This may feel a bit uncomfortable because you don’t know many of these people yet, but as I mentioned, Twitter is a very informal community and you can get away with things that you normally wouldn’t in the real world. For instance, retweet stories, reports or any other content that they may post that you find interesting or relevant to what your client does. If you find a good story, share it on your Twitter and tag the reporter that wrote it in a complimentary tweet. Everyone loves compliments. Even by strangers on the Internet. Reply to a tweet or join in on a discussion that you find of particular interest. While you typically wouldn’t interject into a conversation that didn’t involve you in real life, it’s perfectly acceptable and welcomed in the Twittersphere.

• Get personal: Many times press and analysts use their Twitter accounts to share both personal and professional news and updates. Don’t be afraid to retweet something that you find funny or strike up a conversation about something that you both enjoy whether it be hobbies, television shows, music or anything else. Remember, the point is to stand out and what stands out more than bonding over a love of spinning or Game of Thrones (just an example).

• Call to action: Sometimes you will have an immediate need for your Twitter interactions like pitching a story idea or getting time on their calendar to schedule a briefing at a conference. In these times, it’s important that you bring your interactions full circle. Establishing these relationships won’t benefit your client if you don’t seal the deal. Most of the time, conversation will start on Twitter and then migrate to email where the details and logistics are hashed out. In other cases, you may find that there is not an immediate action to take. Perhaps it turns out that the reporter wasn’t relevant or you were simply relationship building. That is fine. It’s important to continue to nurture and maintain these relationships as you would a real-world friendship. Nobody likes the friend that only texts when summer rolls around because you have a beach house, right? The more you continue to invest in these connections, the more likely you are to get a response when you do have a client that would be of interest.

So you’ll see, in PR there is true value in cultivating professional relationships on a platform that is instant, conversational and effective. If you consistently implement these tips into your PR practices, not only will your emails see a lot less trash and a lot more replies, but you’ll undoubtedly see you Twitter popularity skyrocket. Double win.

52 Tips for Strong PR – A 2014 Users Guide: Tip 2: Be an Agent of Change

Clients change, messaging changes, markets change, priorities change and you change. There is very little about our job that stays the same. Even reporter’s beats change, meaning the person you spent the past 12 months developing a relationship with, might not care about your client anymore.

The job of the PR professional is to be an agent of change, helping your clients or company update and evolve its approach, message, programs, etc. so that they can leverage the change that swirls around them. It’s not easy and requires dedicated time and effort from senior members of the team. Often at agencies, this work is left to junior team members that might not have the experience to understand the changes, or appreciate how they might impact a client or company. It’s a learning curve that everyone goes through, so agencies and in-house PR teams need to ensure they have the processes in place to ensure junior team members understand the who, what, where, when and why of a successful media interaction plan.

Of course, it goes beyond staying on top of who is covering what at any given publication. It’s keeping on top of the market drivers that are changing within your client or company’s industry. This presents opportunities to engage with reporters, bloggers and other influencers that might not otherwise be interested in your company, and could lead to more detailed or specific coverage of your company.

A recent example is the changes in the HIPAA requirements that were announced last fall. We had a client that had just launched a product for this market a few months prior. That meant that they were not well-known to the reporters covering Healthcare IT, so while some had expressed interest when the product first launched, interviews didn’t always translate into coverage. We followed up with our target list in advance of the ruling going into effect and offered our client as a background resource to explain what these changes meant to companies working in the field. The uptake was much higher as we’d set up our client as an expert on a topic that reporters knew they’d be writing on. These interactions lead to several key stories in both the healthcare IT vertical, but also several in higher level tech and business press. This all came with the added bonus that our client is now a trusted resource for these editors and our agency is known as one that doesn’t just pitch client news.

It’s also important to make sure that the broader market understands any changes or shifts your clients or company makes as they evolve and grow. The last thing a company needs as it makes a change is for the industry pundits to misunderstand, misinterpret or misconstrue a change for something that it is not, especially if the change is dramatic, such as a product redesign or executive departure.

Bottom line, your job is to help your company through any change or transition it might go through. And when you do, stay calm (see Tip 1!)

Hashtagology 101 - A Slightly Slanted New Lexicon for a #HashtaggedWorld

The word hashtag is part of the modern lexicon, even earning a definition in the Oxford Dictionary. We were recently having a conversation about creating a hashtag for an upcoming client event. As one team member pointed out, it’s all about creating a mechanism to track a conversation. Granted, this has to be kept in the context of social media, and with the limits placed on conversations on certain platforms (Twitter’s 140 character count for instance), but it seems to me that the concept of hashtags and hashtagging could easily become about more than that. So in the interest of wasting time on a Friday afternoon, here are some potential outgrowths of the use of hashtags to further the proverbial conversation and expand its fundamental usage and lexicology far beyond reasonable or practical usage:

·         Hashtagology – the study of hashtags and their use in social conversations

·         Hashtagographer – a person that studies hashtags and probably makes a living as a social media expert. Probably needs a bit more sun.

·         Hashtagimifcation – the point when the hashtag becomes the thing, instead of the thing that is was originally created to support

·         Hashtagterbation – a series of tweets between a certain set of people that includes an increasing number of conversational specific tweets relevant to this conversation only

·         Hashtaggery – the creation of a hashtag to see how far and wide it travels across social networks (i.e. a Twitterific game of tag)

·         Hashtaganigans – creation of a hashtag specifically designed to tweek someone else, all in fun of course. For mean usage, see next entry.

·         Hashtagslapped – the twitter version of the B@!CH slap, only used by “mean girls” and wannabes

·         Hashtagvolent – the hashtag to be used to describe the people who regularly and maliciously hashtagslap others or better known as people that need a #realitycheck #timeout

·         Hashtagtentious – arrogant or pretentious use of hashtags, used just to show how smart someone thinks they are, or might be #aintnoeinstein

·         Hashtagologist – a combination of connected hashtags used in tweets that all make a specific point, but when used independently aren’t very appealing (like a French Gimlet, when all ingredients are mixed together, it’s a cool drink on summer afternoon but independently don’t make a lot of sense to drink by themselves. I mean, who drinks St-Germain?)

·         Hashtagged – when a hashtag is created to call attention to a specific person or event, or if a person is called out specifically at an event (e.g., #NorthWest, #DennisRodmanNKorea)

·         Hashtagaphobe – someone, maybe someone reasonable, that has an unnatural fear of hashtags

·         Hashtagaddict – someone that uses hashtags for everything, including usage outside of social networks #rockstardefinition

·         Hashtagelicious – a wonderful new hashtag created that is just too good not to share or use

·         Hashtagitude – when a hashtag is used as the equivalent of two snaps up (e.g. #WhatHaveYouDoneForMeLately #GetBackToWork, #Rude, #waitaminutenow) and you know who I’m talking about @JMcDonaldPR

·         Hashtagified – mostly used in the Southern United States, used to mean that a concept has been used to death and is now on its deathbed

Any and all others are welcome until this topic is #hashtagified #jumptheshark.