By Leo Valiquette
Business and trade press journalists regularly find themselves in the position of needing owners or executives who are willing to talk about specific issues in their industries and how their businesses have dealt with them.
For a PR practitioner it’s the classic dilemma – the goal is to drive earned coverage of a client’s story (as opposed to paying for an ad) when many of the media who are receptive may have a different agenda in mind. Hard-nosed and busy executives often brush off interview opportunities if they feel that the nature of the story will not provide a clear and obvious promotional advantage for their organization. “Why should I talk to this reporter about X when that doesn’t highlight the value proposition of my business?” they ask.
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By Alexandra Reid
As a regular feature, we provide our readers with a roundup of the best articles we have read in the past week. On the podium this week are Joe Pulizzi, Social Media Examiner, Memeburn, Peter Shankman, and Fast Company.
5 critical content marketing tactics to consider now
As part of its audit and to set new goals, Content Marketing Institute is focusing on a number of key areas where it wants to improve. In this post, Joe Pulizzi shares five key content marketing tactics that are standing out for the agency.
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By Leo Valiquette
Earlier this year, I had the honour of being involved with Northern Lights 2012, a four-day conference that showcased economic and business development opportunities in Canada’s north, along with the social, cultural and environmental considerations that must be part of any commercial activity up there.
The emerging opportunities in the north, as well as the bargaining power its resources afford Canada on the international stage, are immense. The conference focused on the territory of Nunavut, the region of Nunavik in northern Quebec and the region of Nunasiavut in Labrador. Between them, these regions possess oil and gas reserves that dwarf western Canada’s, a diverse selection of mineral wealth, massive untapped green energy resources and new opportunities for tourism.
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By Leo Valiquette
Customer service, and the lack thereof, is a recurring topic on this blog, and for good reason. As public relations and marketing consultants, we appreciate the profound impact that a poor experience with your brand can have on a customer’s willingness to come again or refer your products and services to others. We may not be customer service experts, but we are active consumers who regularly engage with the front-line staff of numerous brands. And it’s what happens on the front lines that matters most.
Francis said it best in a past post, Kudos for empowered customer service:
“My consistent points are that the cost of acquiring customers is almost always far higher than the cost of keeping them, that effective customer service is the only sustainable competitive differentiator, and that most customer-service operations fail by forcing their agents to be powerless automatons more interested in getting the customer off the line than actually servicing them.”
If your customers do not feel well-served on the front line, your marketing messaging, no matter how well-crafted, will not save you. Your brand reputation is built, not by words, but by the actions of your team at every point of contact, from the reception desk to order fulfilment and after-sales support. The purpose of the words crafted by the marketing team is to evangelize the great service you provide. As marketing consultants we can’t create something from nothing and in the age of social media, what smacks of hypocrisy can come under harsh, and very public, criticism quite fast.
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By Alexandra Reid
We are bringing you our roundup a little earlier than usual this month because we will be celebrating Canada Day early next week when this post would otherwise be published.
We covered a lot of ground this month on our blog, from RIM to training your boss, tribal marketing to productivity tips. We even launched content marketing as a new service offering.
In case you missed any of our posts, here’s a handy roundup:
June 6: Getting the marketing right at an event product launch by Francis Moran and Alexandra Reid
June 14: Putting Ottawa’s puzzle together by Leo Valiquette
June 18: Balancing investment, Minimum Viable Product, and time to market by Peter Hanschke
June 20: Training your new boss by Francis Moran and Leo Valiquette
And on a related note…
In addition to our series, our associates and guest bloggers were also busy writing on a great range of topics. Here are our other posts from June, as ranked by the enthusiasm of our readers:
June 4: Why RIM could and should bounce back: Mobile needs to innovate by Jesse Rodgers
June 5: Levering the power of teamwork to drive a successful content marketing program by Alexandra Reid
June 11: The evolution of branding and advertising by Rob Woyzbun
June 26: Ottawa entrepreneur Scott Annan comments on the relaunch of Mercury Grove by Alexandra Reid
June 12: Content marketing tips: SEO implications for rebroadcast articles by Alexandra Reid
June 7: We launch new content marketing service offering by Alexandra Reid
June 19: 10 questions B2B companies should ask before selecting a content marketing service provider by Alexandra Reid
June 27: 7 ways to stay sane and productive by Leo Valiquette
June 21: PR people really are dead and mindless sheep by Francis Moran
June 8: Is it spring time for venture capital in Canada? by Francis Moran
June 13: Product marketing vs. brand marketing: Separate your product or separate your users? by Ken Rosen
June 25: Tribal marketing for ‘Generation Me’ by Bob Bailly
June 28: Why is there a lighthouse on your brochure? by Francis Moran
June 22: Social Media Breakfast Ottawa: Digital measurement and consumer understanding by Alexandra Reid
Image: Michel Z Binden
By Leo Valiquette
