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There’s no question that Social Media usage is on the rise, and that more & more businesses are growing curious about how to jump on the bandwagon.

Jumping on a moving bandwagon can be treacherous, though.  Without a full understanding of the techniques, best practices, and morés, you could embarass your brand by screwing up royally.  This is still a brand-new field, and mistakes are expected, but there are also shining examples of success, and we can all learn from these pioneers.

The Society for New Communications Research, a nonprofit global think tank dedicated to the study of new media and communication, is trying to capture these case studies.  The organization recently announced its “call for entries” for its 2007 Excellence in New Communications Awards program.  The deadline for submissions and nominations is September 28, 2007. (Disclosure: I’m a Senior Fellow of SNCR and one of the contest’s judges). 

According to SNCR’s press release, “The awards will recognize innovative organizations and individuals who are pioneering the use of … social media (blogs, wikis, podcasts, online video collaborative tools and other new and emerging communications technologies) in the areas of marketing, public relations and internal communications, advertising, media, politics, entertainment, academics, community and cultural development.”

The awards will be presented at a SNCR gala in Boston this December. The award winners will be featured in presentations at the Symposium program and all of the award-winning case studies will be published in SNCR’s New Communications Review publication.

What will YOU contribute?  How will YOUR work be remembered?  I can’t wait to read all about it. 

Posted by Todd Defren at 09:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Just got back from vacation.  It was incredible.

I suspended any reflection about “lessons learned” during our holiday until after I’d spent the better part of yesterday scrubbing the ol’ in-box of its 46,000 unread messages.  (That’s no joke: I get a lot of email!)

So, what did I learn during my time outside the echo chamber?

That the echo chamber doesn’t count for much to those who do not reside within it. 

Ask the lady who sells pigeon food in the plaza outside of St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice.  Ask the traditionalist Swiss farmers we met on a twisty road in the Alps.  Ask the paddleboat captain who ferried us across Lake Lucerne.  Ask the harried-looking Minneapolis-based CPA who rode alongside us on a bike tour through Munich or the jovial Australian businessman who joined our hike to the Disney-esque Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria.

Ask ‘em and they’ll tell you:  they’ve never heard of Robert Scoble, or Mike Arrington, or Twitter or Facebook (or, hell, even “blogging”).  Haven’t heard much about all that New Age-y Internet stuff.  Don’t care a lick. 

For most of these folks, Life’s too interesting, or too hard, as it is.  Most of them lack the luxury of “time,” much less a broadband Internet connection.  They’re just scrapping to make it through each day.  

But, what does it mean, to say, “the echo chamber doesn’t count for much to those who do not reside within it?”  It can’t just mean, “Let’s stop taking ourselves so seriously all the time.”  That’d be a trite lesson, eh?  “I went on vacation and gained some much-needed perspective.”  That may be true, but, “zzzzzz.”

The broader lesson, I think, is this: as bleeding-edgers continue to blaze trails, via their creation/adoption of new communications tools, it’s important to remember that we shouldn’t just embrace “tech for tech’s sake” but rather should skew towards those technologies that are going to be readily absorbed by mainstream folks (and even Swiss cowbell coppersmiths).  These people may not be tech-savvy but they are tech-savvy enough to grok the easy stuff.  And, they are fascinating!  We will be the losers if we don’t find a way to engage with them, and promote ways for them to engage with one another.

Thus, I think a technology like Twitter is simple enough, and valuable enough, that a far-flung family might use it to keep in better touch with one another.  While in Switzerland, we met up with my wife’s uncle (a retired copier repairman and genuine saint) and her aunt (a brilliant psychologist) for the first time in years.  Both have Internet connections: why not get the whole family linked up via Twitter, to maintain the ties that were recently re-forged?  E-mail chains take too much time and thought; they ultimately peter-out.  A “family” Twitter network might just be easy enough to survive and thrive.

(By contrast, the thought of explaining and setting-up a Facebook profile for these middle-aged German-language speakers would have literally killed me.)

Anyway, had a great time.  More pics to come, in future days.  The Nikon D40 worked great – so glad I brought it.  We took almost 700 pictures and there’s hardly a clinker in the bunch.

Posted by Todd Defren at 09:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

Been waiting too long for this… We’re off to Europe for two weeks, after what promises to be one extra-grueling day in the office today.  Some sights we expect to see?

And …

And …

I’m taking along my beloved Nikon D40, with the hopes that the pics I post upon our return will be as good as these images (all of which I nabbed through a quick Google Image & Flickr tag search).

I have to say, it’s gonna be weird to go without Internet access for two weeks.  No e-mail?  No Twitter?  No Facebook?  No frenzied early-morning scouring of Techmeme for meaty blog topics?  Something tells me that I’ll pull through okay.

I hope that ya’ll won’t forget about PR-Squared while I’m gone.  Keep sending that linklove!  Don’t delete that RSS feed!

Ciao! Auf wiedersehen!

Posted by Todd Defren at 08:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

Before reading this post, you may as well check out a few sites that have already explored Google News’ suggestion that it will soon allow newsmakers to comment directly on the stories that Google has aggregated.  Good, interesting, thought-provoking perspectives can be found with each link you click above.

Now, here’s my take.

The initial challenges that Google will face (as others have mentioned) will most likely skew towards verifying newsmakers’ identities and, forming & enforcing policies about whether PR reps can react on-behalf of their clients. (Do you foresee Lindsey Lohan scouring Google News every day? Neither do I.)

But, those challenges can be overcome.  The challenges that intrigue me have to do with SPEED and DEPTH.

In the time that it’s taken me to write this blog post (thus far), the Google News homepage has changed at least 3x.  It changes all the time.  By its nature, the site’s “Page One” format is dictated by the timeliness of news.  As topics fade (and this can happen quickly), the headlines get archived. 

In my experience, any newsmaker who would be keen to comment on an article is going to probably require several hours (if not DAYS) to respond.  In the case of corporations responding to Almighty Google, the Legal and Marketing depts – and even the CEO – are probably going to want to get involved.  It’s gonna take a while; it’s gonna bog down corporate resources.  By the time “the official response for Google News” is ready to go, the topic du jour may have been bumped to the proverbial “Page Two.” 

Most companies won’t bother responding to news in the Google News Archive, eh?  There’s only so much value to having your two cents digitally archived, “just in case,” til the End of Days. 

Meanwhile, I sincerely doubt that Google’s algorithms will be tweaked to sustain a topic’s place on “Page One,” just because the newsmakers are offering their comments.

They couldn’t, really – because for every time Pakistan’s prez is willing to shoot over an email to Google, there will be a zillion times when “regular folks” who are in the news will flood the Google News editorial team (“That Malaysian earthquake killed my dog!” … “I’m a neighbor of the crime victim!” … “My daughter is an American Idol finalist!”). 

Google is not likely to “hold” news topics on “Page One” for everyone seeking their 15 minutes of fame.  If you can’t “hold” an article’s place on “Page One” of Google News for all newsmakers, you probably shouldn’t do it for any of ‘em, right?  Speed kills.

Then there’s the question of depth.  Combined with the fact that any corporation in the news is going to need to call on outside counsel and/or to divert internal resources to respond “safely,” there’s also a question as to whether the Google News team will give these newsmakers a truly open forum.  Rather than futz around negotiating with Google, why not just blog about the news yourself, at your convenience, at the official corporate blog? 

Granted, you could lose bajillions of readers by posting to a corporate blog vs. Google News, but, posting to the corporate blog ensures accurate content and – more importantly! – allows all readers to comment directly & engage in a direct conversation with a newsmaker.  That capability is not possible on Google News.

Having said all that – using the words “Google” and “fail” just feels wrong, doesn’t it?  Google doesn’t fail.  Between their cash horde and the power of the perennial “beta” status that most Google apps enjoy, it’s hard for the search giant to ever truly fail.  Also, they deserve credit for ballsiness.  This is a big, bold move: Google News moves from aggregator to content producer, but without the burden of doing any actual reporting.  Pretty sweet.

Now let’s see if they can meet the challenges of Speed & Depth.  Maybe they can pull it off.

Posted by Todd Defren at 09:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Many pundits have weighed in on the pros and cons of PR firms dabbling in Search Engine Optimization techniques.  Most of the Big Guys are buying-up SEO experts, to serve as a resource to their other marcomm shops.  Certainly, if nothing else, PR agencies need to be cognizant of SEO principles when writing content for news releases, et al.

But there’s another mechanism for applying SEO techniques to the PR realm, courtesy of my favorite innovator, Shannon Whitley. 

Shannon has integrated his PRXBuilder service with the Google AdWords API, so that his PRX customers can optimize every news release for the Google Ad Network.  Creating a “NewsAd” is a simple part of creating a release at the PRXBuilder site.

The result is deceptively effective.  This is another tool in PR’s new-media arsenal.  

Example: Widgets Corp. announces a new product, the BigWidget.  Their Social Media News Release can now not only include T’rati tags but can also use “NewsAds,” using keywords to optimize their release for organic SEO as well as for the Google Ad Network.  If the prospect sees a NewsAd during their Google search for “widgets,” their subsequent click will take them right to the Widgets Corp. news release for the BigWidget.

Shannon recently ran his own experiment, using the launch of our Newshound Facebook app as a test case.  He found that:

“(The) NewsAd-assisted release was almost 7 times more likely to be viewed when compared to (a typical) release.  Additionally, the Google ad itself has been displayed over 430,000 times across the internet.  Although the 430,000 viewers didn’t see the full release, they’ve at least seen the (Newshound) name and a little blurb about it.” 

Those are some heady statistics for a first-run with the NewsAd service. 

Creating a contextual ADVERTISEMENT for NEWS RELEASES is a cool and powerful concept.  Hard to see a downside.  Color me intrigued. 

Related links from Tom Foremski (who takes an interesting POV) and Shannon himself.

P.S. – Yes, of course you can create your own “NewsAds” without using PRXBuilder.  But it’s great that PRXBuilder has automated the process.  (Have you ever created an AdWords campaign on your own?  It’s not rocket science, but it’s also not a lickety-split project.)

Posted by Todd Defren at 12:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)

Today’s NYTimes article titled, “It’s An Ad, Ad, Ad, Ad World” discussed how Digitas (part of the Publicis behemoth), et al., are using targeting technology and low-cost labor to create up to “4,000 versions of an ad for a single brand, whereas 10 years ago they might have run (up to) five versions.” 

The goal is to create a system with which advertising agencies can “use data about consumers” to “decide which advertising message to show at which moment to every person,” regardless of the medium.

This has been the Holy Grail for a long time now.  The advertising industry is focused on CONTEXT.  They’ll be slicing up our individual online usage patterns into wafer-thin targeting algorithms for their ad servers.  The ads we’ll see online will be constructed especially for us. 

How boring.

I mean, I don’t mind seeing ads lovingly selected just for “Todd S. Defren” – I wasn’t turned off by the talking billboards in Minority Report.  I can see how CONTEXT adds value.

It’s just kinda boring, imho.  It’s all database-driven, “if X then Y”-level stuff. 

If Susie has been reading “DailyCandy,” offer her an ad for some Kate Spade bags.  If Tommy’s researching cars within 24 hours of reading the “DadCentric Blog,” show him an ad for a crossover-SUV.  Zzzzzzzzzzz.

Public Relations, by contrast, is less concerned with CONTEXT and instead strives to influence CONTENT.  And Content drives Context. 

Public Relations professionals might induce the writers of DailyCandy to check out an up-and-coming designer.  PR pros might convince the poppa at DadCentric to write about a new book focused on work/life balance.  Of course, it’s up to the content creators to accept the “pitch” and to craft interesting, honest editorial about these products.  

There’s nothing nefarious about that process.  If our ideas (or clients or products) stink, then the articles won’t get written – or will trash our stuff outright!  Greater transparency in the 2.0 era will make PR ever-more accountable to suggest ever-better story ideas to content creators. 

Great story ideas lead to great content.  Great content attracts lots of people.  Lots of people attract advertisers.  Advertisers want to effectively reach out to individuals.  Advertising agencies use math+creative to engage consumers, on the periphery of great content.

PR is “the whisper in the ear.” 

With its sophisticated tracking systems, Advertising is increasingly becoming “the lean over the shoulder.”

Posted by Todd Defren at 09:36 AM | Permalink

I was dismayed to see that Rupert Murdoch had succeeded in his quest to buy Dow-Jones & Co (D-J).  I think that the Wall Street Journal’s vulnerability to this underwhelming bid represents a failure of vision on the part of its former custodians.

The WSJ had been able to maintain its edge as the world’s most respected business paper, even as the world of business swirled, changed, crashed, and re-invented itself in the past 10 years.  That’s a redoubtable advantage but one which was basically mishandled.

For example, why did Dow-Jones elect to sign an “ironclad,” exclusive agreement to provide news content to CNBC, through the year 2012?  Why didn’t Dow-Jones management think about leveraging a reputation for quality coverage and top-notch reporters to create its own “WSJ Channel?”  They could have given Bloomberg, CNBC, et al., a run for their money on the content side, and opened up a major channel for their print and online advertisers to escalate their investments with D-J.

Why didn’t the Dow-Jones management decide sooner – and with more decisiveness – to “free up” greater portions of the WSJ Online?  As reported in today’s NYTimes, “executives at News Corp. are keen to explore whether more of (the WSJ’s online) content ought to be offered free online to increase the audience and attract advertising…”  You can’t tell me that the D-J team never considered such an option, especially if they ever noticed the rise of social news aggregator sites like Digg.  Couldn’t they have experimented with such concepts?

In that same NYTimes article, reporter Richard Siklos says “Murdoch has shown in the past that he is willing to experiment, even knock over some sacred cows.”  That’s exactly the kind of thinking that should have inspired the Dow-Jones organization’s prior management team. 

It’s too bad that the opportunity to be creative and daring with the august WSJ brand will now be exploited (err, umm, “leveraged”) by an organization that has proven willing and able to play fast and loose with the news.

If I were running the NYTimes, I’d get imaginitive, starting today, about how to best invest in its own Business section.  Now is the time to gird for war; now is the time to show the world that it need not lack for in-depth, unbiased Business coverage.  Are you listening, Gray Lady?

Posted by Todd Defren at 06:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)