Marketing on Pinterest Requires a Plan
Pinterest has more than 10 million unique visitors per month. It’s a marketer’s dream. Pinterest can absolutely fit into your marketing. First, though, you need a plan.
Corporate Blogging on the Decline? Don’t Read Too Much Into It
New research from the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth analyzed social media usage among The Inc. 500 and found blogging is on decline as other tools like Facebook and Twitter gain popularity among fast-growing companies. Corporate blogging had increased each year, the research found, from 19 percent of Inc. 500 companies in 2007 to more than …
Marketing to Millennials? Influencer Outreach, Not Facebook, Is The Key
Want to market your product or brand to a Millennial? Never mind Facebook; the key to marketing to Millennials lies in reaching the complete strangers who influence them. Bazaarvoice CMO Erin Nelson recently wrote in Forbes magazine that Millennials making a buying decision are likely to seek advice from “those with relevant experience,” rather than …
Deleting Negative Facebook Comments Makes a Bad PR Situation Worse
You have a right to delete Facebook comments that tarnish the image and message you’re trying to convey. Okay, fair enough. But it’s still a bad idea. Here are three reasons why…
5 Nuts ‘n’ Bolts Tips for Building Relationships with Bloggers
Okay, so you’re a brand manager or PR rep and you want to pitch your story to bloggers. You get that it’s a two-way street and you’re sincere about building a relationship. How do you get started? On a recent episode of The Marketing Squad, I shared eight tips for building brand-blogger relationships, and thought …
How Would You Define PR?
On a recent episode of The Marketing Squad podcast, I riffed with Nathan and Brandon on a Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) campaign to define “public relations.” The #PRdefined campaign asked PR, marketing and communications professionals to contribute to the definition. After more than 900 submissions, PRSA generated a word cloud to extract the …
QR Codes a Huge Success in Carolina Panthers Purrsuit
QR codes played a central role in the Panthers #Purrsuit, a mobile/social promotion I created with the Carolina Panthers and Allen Tate Realtors. I’ll break down other aspects of the Purrsuit in future posts, so for now, let’s focus on QR. The Purrsuit featured 26 two-person teams following clues to locations across Charlotte. At each …
Join Me for Panthers Purrsuit 2
Picture this: You’re at Bojangles competing in a paper football contest against the Bojangles accountant. On Facebook you see photos of a friend crushing a hard drive at Goodwill. Then you see a YouTube video of another friend — dressed as Tweety Bird — rapping about 3-D TVs. Carolina Panthers mascot Sir Purr just tackled …
Blogger Outreach Confusion Hurts Brands and Bloggers
“Blogger outreach” might be the most poorly defined term in PR. The confusion is one of definition: What does “blogger outreach” include, precisely? Pitching a blogger in pursuit of free publicity? Sponsoring a conversation on a topic relevant to your brand? What about paying a blogger to write a post for your blog? Lack of clarity creates problems …
ConAgra Foods: A Case Study in Blogger Relations Gone Bad
A blogger outreach effort by ConAgra Foods and PR firm Ketchum is the latest case study in blogger relations failure. Here’s the skinny: Food bloggers and parent bloggers in New York were invited to a VIP dinner with celebrity chef George Duran of TLC’s “The Ultimate Cake Off.” The dinner was at Sotto Terra, “an …