Communications
April 1, 2008
How to Get Lots of Press (Trade, That Is)
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Within the industry in which the organization I work for operates, there are a lot of associations serving various segments. There are several trade press outlets serving all those segments. Our particular association has become notable within that very small sphere as having “a PR machine.”
Getting coverage in your trade press is not difficult. Trade press editors and writers are not just reporters, they are frequently champions of the industry they cover and eager to work with organizations in the same industry (usually — though there are definitely some exceptions in some industries).
There are six simple steps to follow:
1. Get busy.
2. Look busy.
3. Send out lots of stuff about points 1 and 2. (I mean LOTS.)
4. Respond when asked something.
5. Recognize that reporters are busy and under lots of pressure and try to make their jobs easier.
6. Never assume that you are entitled to coverage. If you’re sending out the right amount of the right kind of stuff, some will get reprinted, some will turn into front page articles, and some will never get covered at all, but you won’t notice.
In reference to points 1 and 2, what you’re doing should be of primary interest to the industry, not the association. (If you send out lots of press releases and they are all about who’s serving on what committee, what you do will be relegated to a small sidebar, if that, and the really important and interesting stuff you do may wind up getting lost altogether.)
I wish I had more to say on the topic but it’s really just that easy.
March 24, 2008
Who Cares?
Posted by Kevin | (6) Comments | Print This Article
Cindy is obviously a much nicer and more succinct person than I am.
Twitter asks, “What are you doing?” and Cindy’s one-word response is, “Why?”
My two-word response is, “Who cares?” (And that’s censored down from a three-word response.)
Seriously. I really don’t care what you’re doing right now. I don’t care that you’re stuck in an airport line (and “boy doesn’t security suck”); I don’t care what you had for lunch; I don’t care how many pounds you gained or lost this morning; I don’t care that you’re having computer troubles at work; I don’t care if you find something funny or sad; I may be a mean ol’ SOB but I just plain don’t give a flying $%^&.
BUT — here’s the thing: I COULD CARE about all of the things I just mentioned if they were written in an engaging, thoughtful, and meaningful way that used the scenario in question to engage ME and strike a chord in ME and make ME think about something, anything in a new light and ponder how it might apply or in any way affect MY life.
Which is pretty damn near impossible to do in 140 characters or less.
And if you think that all the capital ME and MYs make ME sound selfish, then you are completely missing the point — not just of this blog post, but of COMMUNICATION in general.
Here’s my point: I’m not anti-Twitter. I don’t care enough to be anti-Twitter — never joined, never subscribed, never had any interest other than the occasional bemused look at people’s “feeds” on their blogs. If you think it’s a great tool and resource for your life, then terrific! Use it to your heart’s content.
My point is that it represents exactly what is wrong with “social media” in that it is all SOCIAL and not enough MEDIA. By “soclal” I mean social like a bar or a cocktail party, where the conversation goes something like this:
YOU: Say something witty, engaging, and downright near profound
SOMEONE ELSE: Says something else while you wait for them to shut up so you can talk about yourself again
When folks scoff at the concept of social media, it is exactly this sort of thing they’re talking about. Don’t believe the legal questions and roadblocks that get thrown up; what they are really saying is, “Isn’t that stuff just a bunch of small people with big egos who like to talk about themselves?”
In his comment on Cindy’s post, Jamie Notter said, “People said very similar things about blogs a few years back.”
Guess what? They were right.
While people lately have been posting ad nauseam in the clump about “fear of social media” what seems to have been completely missed is that sometimes people have bad impressions of social media … not because they’re “afraid” of it … but because social media has EARNED those bad impressions.
All too often it’s a bunch of people talking about themselves, posting videos and podcasts that amuse themselves, continuously segregating themselves into those who “get it” and those who “don’t.” They’re not communicating; they’re talking.
Which may be a surefire way to amuse your friends, but I wouldn’t recommend it as a communications strategy for your association.
January 10, 2008
Review: GroupLoop
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(And we pause for a post that is a bit more, shall we say, functional.)
Up until last month, my organization held an account with Grouploop for the better part of a year. I’m pretty sure I first found Grouploop through a blog comment, and I think (but am not sure now) it was a comment on Acronym.
Grouploop is essentially a simple application that functions as a message board and file sharing system for small groups. It is not a terribly sophisticated system in what it offers, but that is why it is also very easy to set up and relatively easy for users (including those who are not particularly tech-savvy) to understand.
I first set Grouploop up because I needed a quick and dirty “closed” communications vehicle for our Board and a few other committees. We wanted to get away from having to mail hard copies of documents to committee members, but emailing large PDF files is problematic. At the time we were still in the building phase of our new website and I needed a quick solution.
Grouploop served the purpose. We were able to quickly set the account up, add members to various groups, and immediately begin posting messages and documents. Having never had such an online vehicle before, and working with members who are not typically web-centric in their daily behavior, for a while the communications were pretty much staff to member, with few interactions between members. Over time, especially when a particularly interesting topic came up for discussion on the agenda last fall, participation and discussion on the site increased greatly.
For associations who might be looking for such a closed loop forum and do not have need for more sophisticated features, I can recommend Grouploop. It’s inexpensive and easy to use, though there are a few issues to be aware of. For example, when posting a message or uploading a file, the poster has to take an extra step to have the message emailed, members of a group cannot manage separate group notifications or opt-out of receiving emails when they are sent, and the emails sent by Grouploop only identify them as coming from Grouploop, not the individual group from which they originate (which can be very confusing when you have members on multiple committees).
The biggest drawback is that it is a separate system, requiring you to add and manage the people in a group beyond your own management system. In fact, that is why it was never more than a stop-gap system for us and we canceled the account with the launch of our new website, which includes an e-groups system we built that is fully integrated with our database and very flexible (all I have to do is a check a flag in my database and the group now exists online for those attached to it).
But, while I like integrated features as much as the next guy, I’m a big fan of quick and dirty when it needs to be done. I can think of a million different ways a million different associations could use a simple program like Grouploop — particularly smaller local organizations, but we’re a national association and it served a good purpose for us.
The hardest part with this system, which is the same for any similar system, is getting people to use it. We discovered that the best way was simply to have something interesting for them to talk about (whodathunk?). And, like me you will probably find it amusing to find the silly name “Grouploop” quickly ingrained into your committee/board culture and enjoy overhearing members ask each other, “Did you see that thing on Grouploop?”
September 12, 2007
Bad Subject Lines
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You’d think by now people would know at least a little something about how to send an email campaign. But tonight I received a piece of unsolicited email (aka spam) with the breathless subject line: “Are You Planning to Enhance Your Member Communications in 2008?”
My itchy trigger finger could not hit “delete” fast enough (though my Outlook preview pane was open just long enough to reveal that this marketing masterpiece was actually being sent by a company that sells email newsletter services … for how much longer, I don’t know.)
Three quick tips on email subject lines you can take to the bank (and one cranky bonus tip that I’m probably wrong about, but feel strongly about just the same):
1) Your goal is to get the email opened, not to make people roll their eyes.
2) Make your email subject lines read like a sentence that someone might actually send to someone else. Avoid Email Subject Lines That Capitalize the Initial First Letter of Each Word Like a Book Title.
3) Keep subject lines short and, as Strunk & White so famously advised, “omit needless words.” Short subject lines don’t just read better … many people have various screen configurations that will only display a certain number of characters under “Subject” in their inbox.
Bonus subject line tip that is much more a personal opinion than the others: Almost never do regular people send emails to other regular people with subject lines that start with the recipient’s first name (as in, “Kevin, Did You Eat All the Cookies?”). I’m sure there’s probably all sorts of data showing that email subject lines that do this sort of thing get opened, but it won’t last long, trust me. You can start the email body with “Dear Kevin” all you want, but avoid temptation to personalize the subject line. It screams “This Is an Ad.”
July 12, 2006
Feeds Aren’t Replacing Email
Posted by Kevin | (3) Comments | Print This Article
It is no secret that I am an unabashed fan of email newsletters (when done correctly — if only more of them were). Last month web usability guru Jakob Nielsen released a new report on email newsletters and had some interesting things to say in the executive summary — I just came across it this morning, and no, I haven’t bought the whole 544-page report yet.
In particular, feeds aren’t replacing newsletters. While the report states the obvious in pointing out that people should stop using the phrase RSS since 82% of the users in the study had no idea what it means, more interesting was the lukewarm reception the concept itself is receiving among end users. Nielsen writes:
“Users had very mixed feelings about feeds. Some people liked viewing information from multiple sites in a single centralized location instead of having to go to each site. Some users also liked scanning a list of headlines without seeing any content that they didn’t ask for. A final benefit some users appreciated was the ability to determine when they would go and view their news items. This is in contrast with newsletter arrival times, which users can’t control.
“On the other hand, many users had negative feelings about feeds. People who are already suffering from information overload resent having to go to yet another source of information. In contrast, email newsletters arrive in a tool that people already use, so they don’t add yet another thing for over-burdened users to do. Email is also easier to archive for later use, whereas feeds have an ephemeral nature.”
Possibly this will change as RSS is “built in” to web browsers, which are a “tool that people already use.” However, I use both Firefox and IE7 interchangeably, and in both cases have used their built-in feed reading tools, and in both cases stopped doing so — not because of any conscious decision to stop but because it just never seemed that useful. (It might surprise diehard Firefox addicts to find that IE7’s subscription tools seem more elegant and intuitive than Firefox’s “live bookmarks.”)
So, what about stand-alone newsreading? Nielsen writes (emphasis added):
“SEVERAL PARTICIPANTS IN OUR STUDY HAD STOPPED USING THE FEEDS ON THEIR MY YAHOO PAGE. Many previous studies have found that users are reluctant to spend time customizing portals, so it’s not surprising that some users simply decided to stop looking at that part of the page rather than edit their preference settings.
“Finally, some users resented the fact that news feeds are divorced from the context of the publisher’s website. These users preferred the serendipity that came from visiting a full-fledged website that offered options beyond the current headlines.”
I am not surprised that people tend to abandon their customized feed pages like My Yahoo. Personally, it took me a couple years to get used to using Bloglines, but I finally do it. However, I pretty much use it to keep up with only about 20 blogs in one folder. There are about 200 other blogs I’ve subscribed to in other folders but I generally don’t open their feeds to look at new posts more than once or twice a month at the most. Compared to most bloggers who claim to track thousands and thousands of feeds these numbers must seem rather paltry but frankly it’s higher than I need. There are just too many blogs out there that confuse “frequent” with “interesting.”
Nielsen continues (emphasis added):
“News feeds are definitely not for everybody, and they’re not a replacement for email newsletters. Feeds can supplement newsletters for sites that cater to users who prefer a centralized view of headlines. These are primarily newspaper sites and other sites with a heavy focus on news and breaking stories, as well as sites that target Internet enthusiasts. FOR SITES THAT TARGET MAINSTREAM BUSINESS USERS OR A BROAD CONSUMER AUDIENCE, NEWS FEEDS MAY BE LESS IMPORTANT. Such sites might be better off emphasizing higher-quality newsletters and a choice of publication frequency.
“Also, our eyetracking of users reading news feeds showed that PEOPLE SCAN HEADLINES AND BLURBS IN FEEDS EVEN MORE RUTHLESSLY THAN THEY SCAN NEWSLETTERS. When you appear in somebody’s news reader, your site has a diminutive footprint that’s rubbing shoulders with a flood of headlines from many other sites …
“Feeds are a cold medium in comparison with email newsletters. FEEDS DON’T FORM THE SAME RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN COMPANY AND CUSTOMERS THAT A GOOD NEWSLETTER CAN BUILD. … Given that newsletters are a warmer and much more powerful medium, it is probably best for most companies to encourage newsletter subscriptions and promote them over feeds on their website.”
It’s been hip to write email off for years, but even while spam filters and short attention spans make good email marketing harder and harder, nothing else comes close in terms of relationship, delivery, and measurable results. As Nielsen concludes:
“Four years ago, in our first report about newsletter usability, we said about the future of email newsletters: ‘There may be none. Legitimate use of email is at war with spam, and spam may be winning.’ Although four years is a very short period in which to assess big trends, we now believe that this assessment was too negative. Email newsletters are so powerful that the best of them do have a future, despite ever-more adverse conditions.”
In other words, the problem with your organization’s email newsletter is not “email as a medium.” The problem with your organization’s email newsletter is the way you’re doing it.
UPDATE: Just read Ben’s post on RSS from yesterday. I agree with him that it’s a good idea for associations to start offering feeds before people start asking for them, not after. While it’s still an open question as to how feeds are really going to be adapted by our end users/customers/members, feeds are now so easy to generate it’s something we should all offer and monitor.
But don’t go swimming in the deep end of the Kool Aid. Unless your members are bloggers or podcasters or programmers or other geek enthusiast types, email newsletters, when well done, will produce better results for the foreseeable future.
February 19, 2006
Blogging Is Over; Long Live Blogs
Posted by Kevin | (2) Comments | Print This Article
How do we know blogging is over? As Daniel Gross points out in Slate, it’s the subject of too many magazine articles, media conglomerates are spending too much money on it, early investors are gleefully cashing out, and “the clueless and the greedy” are rushing to the trough in hopes of grabbing a few leftovers.
To which I say: thank god. This whole “Web 2.0″ bubble has been an irritating sideshow, a tired retread of the mid-90s being played out by people who should know better.
The problem is that too many people are associating “blogs” — a simple interactive publishing tool — with “blogging,” the overhyped media sector. And then it all gets lumped in with all these other so-called Web 2.0 tools.
And then those people completely miss the point that what’s interesting about all this is a change in mindset toward user-created content — how they do it (through blogs, “tagging” applications, vidcasts, whatever) is almost immaterial. Tools are going to come and go. We can talk about del.icio.us and Technorati and Flickr and blogging platforms until we’re blue in the face.
But the only really interesting phenomenon out there right now — what’s bringing it all together — is MySpace. It has over 56 million members and growing. It has 50% of the web community market (10 times more than any other single site, including Yahoo, Craigslist, and LiveJournal). Its traffic is neck-and-neck with Google. (reference here)
It brings all that other stuff — photo sharing, blogging, videos, audio — into one place. And the ease with which it allows groups to form puts other web community sites to shame. (Think MySpace is just a place for teens to hang out? Then check the “Business & Entrepreneurs” category in groups. Sure, lots of junk, but also some rather active groups for business owners and professionals.)
MySpace doesn’t get a lot of respect from the Web 2.0 types because it seems like a lot of juvenilia (and it was bought by Rupert Murdoch) but they don’t seem to have noticed that it’s already done much of what they want to do — on a huge scale. Whether it lasts and grows, or completely falls apart, doesn’t even matter. It’s created an experience that is going to shape the expectations of an entire generation.