By Alexandra Reid
I have a hard time believing that Klout is and should be the standard for influence online.
My reasoning is grounded in the fact that Klout, which purports to measure social media influence, is losing clout because of its failure to follow social media best practices. It seems illogical to me that so many of us are measuring our social media success based on standards developed by an unsocial organization.
Allow me to elaborate.
Read More
By Francis Moran
More than two decades ago, I was working with a public relations agency in Halifax, Nova Scotia, that was helping a resource development company counter considerable opposition within fishing communities to its proposal to drill exploratory natural gas wells on Georges Bank. It was a classic case of a clash between a critically important but fading industry — the fishery — and a new and incredibly promising industry — offshore hydrocarbon extraction. We mounted an open and consultative information campaign in the fishing communities most dependent on Georges Bank. We held countless meetings in and around those communities. We hired a local lad, the son of a fishing family, who had become a geologist and had worked in oil and gas exploration to head up our community efforts. And we organised a critical political gathering — a dinner in Halifax to which we invited scores of influential business, political and community leaders to hear directly from the company CEO.
I wasn’t at the dinner but my colleagues told me what happened and I am paraphrasing in the quotes below.
The CEO, almost a caricature of the good old boy cigar-chomping American oilman, got to his feet after desert and, as part of his prepared comments, told the assembled dignitaries, “The problem with you’all is you don’t know how to take risk.”
Read More
In November, we featured a guest post by serial entrepreneur Jason Flick on the complexities startups face working with universities and attempting to commercialize university IP. In today’s guest post, University of Ottawa’s Sean P. Flanigan shares his perspectives from the viewpoint of a university tech transfer office (TTO). This is his first commentary and we welcome your feedback.
By Sean P. Flanigan
There are many networking events and receptions this time of year and I love to take the opportunity to chat with entrepreneurs about their ventures and experts about trends in the markets. The question I hear the most is “What’s new?” Given the number of surprised looks that I get when I answer this question one-on-one, I thought I would spread the word a little further. So here is what’s new.
Read More
This is the next entry in our “Best of” series, in which we venture deep into the vault to replay blog opinion and insight that has withstood the test of time. Today’s post hails from September 2007. We welcome your feedback.
By Linda Moran
Every day for the past week or so I have been receiving emails – via the company’s general delivery box – promising me “Leads! Leads! Leads!” and that I will “get so many leads my sales will go up!” Though faintly reminiscent of Viagra-type communications, I’ve been reading these messages from a “marketing publicity” agency. As a marketer, I pay a lot more attention to the brochures, magazines, direct mail pieces and emails that are sent my way than most people would. As a person who also buys marketing services, I get a lot of this stuff.
Read More
By Linda Forrest
The PR industry has been aflutter with activity in response to the recent efforts of the Public Relations Society of America to crowd source a new definition for PR.
Rather than leave it open ended, PRSA has gone with a fill-in-the-blank (in this case, parentheses) approach:
Public relations (does what) with/for (whom) to (with/for) for (what purpose).
If you wish to weigh in, submissions will be accepted at the above link until the end of the week, with a new definition targeted for publication before the end of the year.
It has indeed been quite some time since the term has been defined, nearly 20 years, during which time the means by which public relations is conducted has evolved markedly from dead trees to digital zeros and ones, shifting from a one-way conversation to a multi-stakeholder conversation.
From the PRSA website:
The PRSA 1982 National Assembly formally adopted a definition of public relations, which remains widely accepted and used today:
“Public relations helps an organization and its publics adapt mutually to each other.”
Read More
-
Beware the million-dollar cheque!
November 28, 2011 by Peter Hanschke
Startups begin with little to no money. Much of the early development of their product is funded by the owner, by his or her friends and maybe even by an angel. Every dollar is used wisely and focused at the topmost activity […]
Read more... -
Return on investment served two ways
November 25, 2011 by Linda Forrest
I had a long and interesting chat with the publisher of a specialized trade publication this morning, the results of which turned my thoughts to the importance of getting a return on investment in PR. I mean this in two ways […]
Read more... -
-
Cheerleaders don’t move the ball down the field
November 24, 2011 by Francis Moran
When the British Columbia Lions and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers meet in the 99th staging of the Grey Cup, Canada’s professional football championship, in Vancouver this Sunday, both teams will have squads of cheerleaders jumping and shouting from the […]
Read more... -
The layman’s guide for bringing tech to market
November 23, 2011 by Francis Moran
When we last spoke with Commentair co-founders Katie and Luke Hrycak, the siblings were busy scraping up the cash for Katie to attend the 2011 Sports Management Conference and Trade Show in Toronto. Unfortunately, she never made it […]
Read more... -
-
There are benefits to publicness and they are worth fighting for
November 22, 2011 by Alexandra Reid
Jeff Jarvis, a widely respected influencer in the media space, spoke at Third Tuesday Ottawa last week about his new book, Public Parts: How Sharing in the Digital Age Improves the Way We Work and Live, the benefits of what he calls “publicness” and why it deserves […]
Read more... -
Take the higher ground: From product to leadership positioning
November 21, 2011 by Ron Weissman
Product checklists are the Silicon Valley product marketers’ crutch. They are so overused as to provide more cliché than caché, as they try “prove” that their product has better features than the other guy’s—as if that’s all that matters to buyers […]
Read more... -
-
Making waves in radio and television
November 18, 2011 by Francis Moran
In our last post, we caught up with Screenreach Interactive founder and CEO Paul Rawlings on his way out the door to attend the Digital Signage Investor Conference in New York. We explored how the company has developed its target markets, including the digital signage […]
Read more... -
Masterclasses in entrepreneurship
November 17, 2011 by Francis Moran
Two of the many events at last week’s Waterloo Region Entrepreneur Week featured presentations by young entrepreneurs who were generous in the sharing of personal stories and business and life lessons learned. Ryan Blair is a self-confessed former hoodlum […]
Read more... -
By Alexandra Reid 
Twitter
Tweets by @FrancisMoranRecent Comments
The Future of A&R – Walabe : [...] http://francis-moran.com/marketing-strategy/top-10-questions-every-strategic-communicator-should-ask... [...]
Traditional Marketing is Dead – Long Live Bikini Waxer Marketing | Scalexl : [...] pointed out by Alexandra Reid on the Francis Moran website content marketing is becoming more and more like journalism. So, it is not just about the content, [...]
It’s Summertime…and the Networking is Easy? | THE MERRAINE BRAIN : [...] In fact, summer is perhaps one of the times least used to network, yet at the same time has shown to be the most productive time to network. People tend to be in a brighter mood compared to during the gloomy winters-especially where I am from in England! Networking needs to be fun and not approached as another chore, like mowing the lawn. (http://francis-moran.com/marketing-strategy/social-media-strategy-why-meeting-in-the-real-world-matt...) [...]