Five Skills for Exceptional PR

“What exactly do you DO?” It’s a question us PR folk hear frequently, most often from parents, acquaintances, and high school friends, (siblings stopped asking moons ago), those who aren’t in our professional circles and are several industries removed from those that consume me daily. Some of my favorite people in the world are as far away from my profession as you can imagine — they plant and sell trees, design and sell jewelry, build houses from dirt, teach children with disabilities to read, and support women in their right to choose whatever it is they want to choose. Yummy professions that I love to talk about, yet most of those folks don’t know exactly what I do, and I love them for it.

But there’s a crop of people who need to have a firm grasp on what we do and why: those who want to work in PR. We’re growing, searching for more great people to round out the incredible team we already have here. We’ve worked with interns who have not studied communications but get it and excel immediately, and those who are graduating with “Public Relations” inked on their diplomas who don’t like to write. Curious. We’ve had senior team members give us and our clients their skills, enthusiasm and loyalty, and those who take their business relationships for granted (the proverbial match to the bridge in most books).

The process of building our team has sparked some interesting discussions here about what it takes to succeed long term in our profession, and the nuances we look for in candidates new and seasoned. We’re a protective bunch (over our clients and our team) and because my partner and I have been successful for two decades and still love what we do, we thought it right to share some of our learnings. For success in our field, we’re looking for a blend of talent, passion, integrity, respect and humor. Let’s break it down:

1. Talent. Obvious, right? The skills needed for PR are different from those required in other professions, but would serve you well anywhere. You need to be an incredible multitasker, intelligent, creative, tenacious, thoughtful, organized, and calm. Yes, calm. It gets pretty harried in our line of work, and you have to keep it cool. There’s also a lot of activity in the brain every moment, and you need clarity and organization.
2. Passion: You need to really care. Really. It’s not just a product we’re promoting, it’s our client partner, and our success is directly tied to their success. Their wins are our wins. Their happy customers make us happy. We absolutely HAVE to care about that. If you don’t get excited when you land a great story or hear “great idea” from your client fairly often, you’re in the wrong field. It’s simple, really.
3. Integrity. We all have this, right? Well… The PR profession is famously knocked for its lack of integrity. I’ve not experienced the horrific stories reporters tell about PR pros in the two decades I’ve spent here. Have we all made mistakes? Sure. Human nature, folks. But we’re doing exceptional work to promote exceptional products, strategies and people, and it’s coming from a place of genuine integrity.
4. Respect. Again, sounds obvious but boy have we seen some things here! We don’t take a single thing for granted. Companies and clients are entrusting us to do great work for them. We do it. We appreciate that they’ve given us an opportunity to help grow their businesses. They’re spending valuable resources on our brain power, we love that and we appreciate it very much. We thank them for their trust, we deliver what we say we’re going to deliver. And if this respect isn’t bi-directional, then we bid adieu, because we also respect ourselves and our teams in equal measure.
5. Humor. Critical. I’m not sure what more needs to be said. You absolutely have to laugh at yourself, make light of situations, and keep it all in perspective. Life is funny all around you. Lighten up.

We’re looking for a few new talents to join our team. If you have the above chops, and enjoy collaboration and challenge, flexibility and fun, then give us a call!

Cheating on our Website with Facebook

Concept is populating a shiny new Facebook Page for our business, which showcases our clients and successes, goings on, team, news, points of view, and other goodness. As we’ve spent time on it this past week, posting and uploading, writing and customizing, we’ve commented to one another how easy and fun it’s been to build it out. (The kind of fun that has me working into the wee hours when my client work has long gone to bed.)

But now that we’re nearing launch phase, I’ve started to wonder, isn’t this all on our Website? And that was my husband’s first question when I asked him to come take a look. While I was hoping for a  simple, “Wow, honey, that looks great!” I didn’t get that, and instead defined why a Website works with Facebook, rather than in place of. (My husband is a great “so what?” meter.)

My description of the evolution of communications and the way people engage with brands today didn’t quite do it for him. But then I drew the smile, head nod, and “yeah, that looks great, honey!” with the following comment: To ensure people are reading our blog and staying informed on our company, they need to come to our site, or subscribe to our RSS feed, which few traditionally do for small and medium sized businesses. With Facebook, our content appears in front of our audiences, where they already are, without asking a single thing of them.

We’ve seen dynamic communication and audience growth work well for our clients through the Facebook Pages we manage. Now it’s our turn! And what about your business? If you’ve asked yourself about the virtues of Facebook vs. your Website or blog, consider the following:

1. Replace your Newsletter:  Are you doing a company newsletter? Consider replacing or augmenting it with content on Facebook. Invite the same people on your mailing list to join your Page. You’ll likely receive more Likes and Comments than you would have in replies to the newsletter.
2. Make a Great First Impression: Facebook is becoming the de facto place for people to look for and at your company (like LinkedIn replacing resumes). It has the power to replace a Website for quick introductions and information. Let your Facebook Page be the first impression you make about your business, brand values, mission and work quality.
3. Extend your Company Voice:  Are you looking for ways to develop or extend your company’s unique point of view and brand? We love the new Facebook feature that allows you to edit as your brand, so your Likes and Comments appear from your branded Page, rather than individual person, giving your company its own voice.
4. Stay in Front of your Audience:  Nearly 1/3 of the world’s population is on Facebook, including most of your friends and family, colleagues and business prospects. They’re already there, and your brand can be there as well, speaking to them, asking questions, sharing content and starting conversations.
5. Separate Business and Pleasure:  Do you blur the line a bit between business and pleasure on Facebook, but don’t like spamming your pals with corporate promos? Facebook Pages (rather than Profiles) let you keep personal it its place so you’re not mixing biz speak with photos of your kids.

So yes, this content is all on our Website, but you’re all on Facebook. We still love our Website, as we do our blog and LinkedIn profiles and Twitter feeds, but Facebook is dynamic and interactive and allows for easy updates and conversations. We’re  excited to engage with our friends, colleagues, clients and prospects through another channel, and show potentially the world what it is we do. We do realize “the world” will not be Friending our Page — but it’s there for them regardless, and that’s the point.

Now don’t worry, blog, you’re the first one I turned to for this post — but only because you so smoothly populate our Facebook and Twitter feeds automatically. If you didn’t do that, well, our parting would be such sweet sorrow.

The Call-To-Action Makeover List – Get Consumer Reaction the Right Way!

I came across a great HubSpot blog post today by Diana Freedman that every good marketer needs to read and consider when developing their next online campaign. A call-to-action (CTA) is the critical element of any online promotion that often times gets thrown in at the end of the planning and design phases, simply because its a checklist item. Don’t just settle on “contact us” and call it a day – the call-to-action is one of the single most important elements that is going to determine if you create a positive, desired reaction by your prospective consumer.

Happy reading!

5 Signs Your Call-to-Action Needs a Makeover

By: Diana Freedman

A call-to-action (CTA) is an image or text that tells your readers what action they should be taking next on your site. Hopefully your calls-to-action lead to landing pages where you will collect your visitors’ contact information in exchange for some sort of offer that will benefit them. So an effective CTA equals more leads and conversions for you!

Unfortunately, there are many wrong ways to create a CTA (including a complete lack of an actual CTA). Here are a few ways you can tell that you need to makeover your site’s CTAs.

1. Your Landing Pages Aren’t Getting Traffic

One of the most obvious signs that you need to rethink your CTAs is that you’re not getting traffic to your landing pages even though your site overall is getting decent traffic. This may be because your offer and corresponding CTA don’t answer the crucial question your visitors want to know: “What’s in it for me?” One of the weakest calls to action is “Contact Us.” You want to be sure that you’re offering something that visitors are willing to exchange their contact info for.

Some ideas for lead generation offers include:

• Free eBooks
• Free whitepapers
• Free webinars
• FAQs
• Kits

Also make sure that your CTA is clickable. Many times I’ve seen a great offer on the page that either isn’t a link or is a broken link.

2. You’re Not Getting Leads

A lack of leads is another obvious sign that your CTAs need an overhaul, and is also tied to the fact that you need a compelling offer. But you also want to be sure that your CTA accurately matches the offer. Don’t overpromise on the CTA in hopes of increasing your click-through rate!  If your readers click the CTA and reach a landing page where the offer doesn’t match up, they’ll navigate away from the page instead of filling out the form. So it’s also important that you follow landing page best practices to ensure that your landing page matches the CTA and offer

3.  Your visitors have to dig to find a CTA

I often see the only CTA hidden away on a single child page that takes three clicks to get to. That means that if your site gets 300 visitors per day, that’s 300 lost opportunities to get leads (minus however many actually navigated or Google-searched to that exact page the CTA lives on).  There’s nothing wrong with having your primary call to action right on your homepage. In fact, there should be a primary and secondary CTA on nearly every one of your website pages.

4. Your CTA Is Below the Fold

People are lazy. It’s the truth. Just like most people don’t go past page #2 in Google, people don’t like scrolling down if their eyes don’t find something interesting in less than 5 seconds. Place your CTAs above the fold so the user can see them without scrolling down.

5. Your CTA doesn’t stand out

A bit of text in the sidebar isn’t going to be enough to grab your visitors’ attention. Make your CTAs bold, with graphics and colors that they can’t miss. Contrasting colors can help draw a visitor’s eye to the action you want them to take.

AdAge: As Media Market Shrinks, PR Passes Up Reporters, Pitches Directly to Consumers

Michael Bush at Advertising Age published a very interesting, poignant article today about the shrinking media market and the direct effect it’s having on the PR industry as a whole. Specifically, the way in which we garner coverage for our clients, engage customers and communicate key messages.

With roughly 30,000 reporters leaving the U.S. newspaper industry in 2008 alone, it’s a sure thing that marketers are looking for new ways to communicate directly with end consumers and disseminate their product messages. We can no longer rely solely on the traditional new product pitch to a targeted list of media in hopes to secure coverage. PR professionals need to be looking at other outlets and platforms (à la Facebook, Twitter and YouTube) to engage their clients’ customers in creative, sticky ways.

The article sites great examples of how companies like Coldwell Banker, Best Buy and Mastercard are using social media tools and original content to reach customers and share messages without having to rely heavily on traditional media write-ups or reviews.

My two cents…Embracing new communication channels is an inevitable and important part of PR this day and age, however it does not lessen the importance of maintaining relationships with traditional media and news outlets. After all, that is what our job is about – relationship building. “Earned media” will always provide a company with a higher level of credibility and help them achieve leadership in their respective industries and we simply can’t forget that.

Click here to read the full article on Advertising Age.

Oh, and Happy Birthday to Digital Advertising! The first digital banner ad ran on October 27, 1994 on Hotwired.com, the first commercial digital magazine on the Web and the offshoot of popular Wired magazine. Great walk down memory lane by Frank D’Angelo at AdAge here.