Welcome to the NettResults Blog... a few stories on how we see public relations, social media and marketing both in the Middle East and Internationally.
Beautiful things come in small packages.
The public’s desire for brevity is universal. Blame it on MTV, blame it on media as a whole, but if CNN can bring you the “Hollywood minute” to sum up all entertainment news into 60 seconds and Fox gives us “The World in Eighty Seconds”, you can sure cut some of that press release.
Edit your media copy to make it as short as possible. Then edit it again to shorten it. Then pass it to a colleague to get them to shorten it.
Keep it short. Period.
There is a too much drivel out there. Pick up 99% of press releases and read the boilerplate (the last paragraph that explains what the company does). Drivel! Too many ‘isms’ and not a lot of sense. Really – most of them don’t actually make sense. Try looking at an online press release service and just read a few.
1. State the wow!
2. Cut the jargon
3. Dress up the message with enhancers
4. Streamline approval
Don’t tell me what the company does – tell me what it offers its customers. It’s not the company that sells the product or service, it is the benefit that customers obtain from it that is your message.
Buzz words are not for media copy. They should be thrown out of the dictionary all together, but seeing as I’m not an editor for the Oxford English, we can together work to get them out of your PR tools.
For a start, lets delete for good – next-generation, core competencies, out of the loop, value-add, think outside the box, results-driven, empower, knowledge base, at the end of the day.
We once had a South African girl that worked for us. She diariesed, theorised and actionised herself out of a job. We could not handle it any more. Don’t use three words if it can be said in one and don’t use words of three syllables if it can be said with one syllable words.
So now that you have cut to the wow, and cut out the jargon, you have some room to clarify even further with some message enhancers. Examples include:
Analogies
If you’re not using public relations properly it’s like shouting to a room of def people.
Antidotes
When the United Nations World Food Program wanted to radically increase their donations but didn’t have much of a budget they approached NettResults. Let me tell you what we did for them…
Endorsements
The Holmes Report recognised NettResults at the Saber Awards as the leading PR agency in the Middle East and Africa region.
Examples
For one of our clients, Creative Labs, we guaranteed the amount of coverage we would achieve week after week - showing that we stand by our service level.
Statistics
Typically we can increase your marketing budget by a factor of five. If your retainer value is $10,000 a month, then we will be getting $50,000 of coverage equivalent – i.e. that is how much it would have cost you if you’d paid to advertise in the same space.
Testimonials
As Amer Farid of Habib Bank AG Zurich says, “We have partnered with NettResults for over eight years now because they not only produce great results, but they are as passionate about our business as we are.”
One last thing to add clarity to your message is to update your approval process. A press release should be like a racing horse and not a camel. The camel is what you get if designed by a committee. Your press releases and press materials are not to be designed by committee. Streamline the approval process. If at all possible keep the product managers away – then it won’t get too techy. The less managers – the clearer the message. At all costs keep the legal department away – they’ll water your message down with their neurotics.
A powerful beginning and end with stick with your listeners
- Oprah Winfrey
It’s well talked about in the PR industry that journalists receive between 50 and 100 press releases a day and use about one a day.
You would have a 1 in 50 or a 1 in 100 chance of getting your story picked up if this was down to chance. Luckily it isn’t. There is a way to beat the odds and get picked up every time.
In Selling the Invisible, marketing expert Harry Beckwith writes about the study of an apple and the pomegranate. When people are shown a series of objects for a few seconds, say a group of fruits like an apple, pear, peach, plum, and a pomegranate, what are they most likely to remember? The first and the last item in the list – the apple and the pomegranate.
The same is true for you PR copy writing. Grab the journalists attention and you’ll get them to actually carry on reading your piece. And this is the first stage of getting picked up.
In journalism, when a headline of a story is buried somewhere in the middle of it, it’s called ‘burying the lead’. It not good journalism.
In broadcasting media ‘The Lead’ is when journalists introduce a story. In television this is typically fifteen to thirty seconds. It’s meant to be so intriguing that you’ll want to hear the rest of the story. If all the leads are good then you’ll watch the entire newscast.
A strong start is relevant for all writing you work on and all tools you produce. For a press release this is really simple. You get a headline – use it wisely. This is not the headline you’d like to see the journalist use – this is your number one pitch to the journalist to get them to carry on reading.
It is normal convention to get into your release – geographical location, date and companies positioning statement. Boring! Let’s break convention. At NettResults our agency standard it to add three bullet points after the heading. Be bold, be provocative, and above all sell the story so the journalist will read on.
How to end? Use the last paragraph of your press release to quote the client in some provocative or newsworthy way. Use the end of your press release format to include a call to action for the journalist, so they can reach you and get further information, images or an interview.
Start strong. End Strong. Be strong.
If you know SCORE then you may have a perception of retired grey tops with some outdated business acumen. Well after a few months of personal coaching I can tell you it’s anything but. In fact the Score Orange County, CA chapter has amazing members.
This week I attended a session presented by Tom Patty (Tom was part owner and manager of a highly successful ad agency before selling it – some of his best work includes being integral in the Apple 1984 Super Bowl TV advert). All of the presentation was fantastic – more on that another time.
He presented such a clear and concise picture of agency (PR, but could be any retainer based service industry) workings in regards to the client purchasing process that I wanted to share. Tom’s too modest, but I’ll call it the Patty Hierarchy of Needs.
1 – Client fires exiting agency (or is new out of the blocks and didn’t have one)
2 – Searches for the right agency
3 – Shortlist a handful of hopefuls
4 – Pitch (agency side just love this part!)
5 – Account is awarded
6 – LOVE has to be transmitted
Inevitably, the account is lost and the process continues it’s loop. The real question, as Patty puts it, is how long the LOVE can continue.
There are plenty of great examples of agencies hanging onto accounts for multiple years. At NettResults we have accounts for eight plus years, but what is the success of longevity?
For me that question is simply answered. The agency has to ONLY do two things well, consistently month on month:
1 – deliver measurable results with a positive ROI
2 – a positive, mutually respectful personal relationship with the client
I’ve seen many accounts that have one or the other, but not both, and these are not the ones that survive. The few that have both gain longevity.
Continue the LOVE.
The Background: As we repeatedly point out on this blog, you have to be good at persuasion if you want to be good at PR.
The Find: It’s not news that popularity breeds popularity and people follow the herd, but social psychology research points out that this principle, known as “social proof,” can radically improve results and is often underutilized.
The Source: Tips on polishing your persuasion skills from, ‘Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to be Persuasive’ - by Noah J. Goldstein, Steve J. Martin, Robert B. Cialdini.
The Takeaway: What’s social proof? It’s the psychological term for looking for confirmation from the crowd when you’re unsure whether to act. When I was a student my friends and I would start lines outside of closed doors and see how many people would join the lines. Often we’d get 20+ joining our queue. Why? Social proof.
Business leaders can harness the same principle. A classic example is a recent program written by Colleen Szot that shattered a nearly twenty-year sales record for a home-shopping channel. Szot simply replaced the classic call to action– “Operators are waiting, please call now”– with “If operators are busy, please call again.” Rather than imagining bored operators filing their nails, home shoppers pictured phones ringing off the hook. The implicit message: others must be buying, so should you.
The researchers behind Yes! set out to see if this principle could work for hotels too. Along with the usual environmental message and images of crystal clear water and rolling green fields on the cards asking patrons to reuse towels, the researchers placed a message indicating that the majority of guests already chose to reuse their towels. Guests whose cards subtly employed the principle of social proof were 26% more likely to recycle their towels than those who saw only the basic environmental protection message. That’s a big improvement at no additional cost to the hotel.
The Question: Are there unused opportunities to put the principle of social proof to work in PR?
And the Obvious Answer: Of course there are. Suggesting to one media that your story has already got a good reception from other media may well be useful.
The Background: As you know, good PR is all about the art of persuasion. You are persuading the client to go with your strategy and persuading the media to cover your client.
The Find: Giving a reason, any reason, may help you persuade others to do as you ask.
The Source: Tips on polishing your persuasion skills from, ‘Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to be Persuasive’ - by Noah J. Goldstein, Steve J. Martin, Robert B. Cialdini.
The Takeaway: This is based on research carried out by behavioural scientist Ellen Langer and her colleagues, which involved someone trying to cut in line to use a photo copier.
Langer set up three scenarios:
1 - A stranger approaches someone waiting in line to use a photocopier and simply asks: “Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine?” Sixty percent of people agreed to allow the stranger to cut in line when faced with this direct request.
2 - Next, a stranger made the same request but added a reason: “May I use the Xerox machine, because I’m in a rush?” Nearly everyone (94 percent) agreed.
3 - Finally, the stranger approached and gave a totally senseless reason for the request, but still employed the word ‘because’: “May I use the Xerox machine, because I have to make copies?” Despite the inanity of the reason, 93 percent of people still complied with the request.
The Conclusion: If you want to persuade someone to publish a story or cover your client’s news, give them a reason. Of course, a good reason is best, but even if you think your reason is less than compelling, this research suggests that the media are more likely to comply than if you had given no reason at all.
Why is giving a reason going to improve your PR coverage? Because the research says so.
In May 2006, Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web stated:
So what does this mean to international public relations?
We’ve hardly got a firm grip on Web 2.0 and already we have to understand and utilise Web 3.0. Well don’t start to get too tense – there is still a wide variation as to what Web 3.0 really is or means. But at this point in the middle of 2008 there does seem to be a trend emerging in the form of the semantic web.
To help appreciate Web 3.0’s applicability to PR, BurrellesLuce suggests we consider the following relational statements:
* PRSA is a well-known organization for public relations professionals.
* Jane Doe is a member of PRSA’s Detroit chapter.
* PRSA publishes a monthly journal called Public Relations Tactics.
It’s easy for humans to process such concepts, but for computers it’s a very different matter. Since computers and machines do not understand syntax and logic the way we do, they are unable to link ideas together. The semantic web seeks to “describe the relationship between things (like A is a part of B and Y is a member of Z) and their properties (like size, weight, age, and price)” in a language recognizable to computers.
Unlike the Internet, which relies on human editing of documents, the semantic web allows information to be digitally pulled from a variety of sources and synthesized with precision.
BurrellesLuce continues to suggest three ways Web 3.0 could improve the work lives of public relations professionals
1. You’ll be able to spend less time searching for relevant information. Web 3.0 will permit you to do what you do best — craft and disseminate your organization’s or client’s messages.
2. More-focused messaging will increase the odds of pinpointed delivery to your intended audiences. The ability for your audience to “pull” the appropriate information as needed (think RSS on steroids) means less “pushing” of your ideas onto a general audience.
3. Reaching the appropriate targets will allow for the development and maintenance of deeper, more-productive relationships.
In an effort to create an interactive dialogue between businesses and consumers, many public relations professionals heavily use online technology, including social media, podcasts, and viral video. For those who are just beginning to take the plunge or who haven’t yet considered doing so, using these communication channels can stir up some anxiety.
With Web 3.0 capabilities in place, PR professionals could, in theory, cross reference data both in and outside a given social network, as well as other sources — helping to zero in on a targeted audience. Each audience member, in turn, could use the same method to find providers most closely aligned with its needs. The high precision and speed offered by Web 3.0 will enable PR practitioners to create closer one-to-one relationships, shedding the one-to-many approach common to traditional outreach efforts.
Which of course all good PR professionals know, means we have to get increasingly personal with the media we interact with. One press release email spammed to 100 contacts is not going to cut it. If you work agency side you have to understand the client deeply, understand the media deeply and marry the two in a personal manner.
For many public relations professionals, selecting the prime channels to use when reaching their targeted audience can be a daunting challenge. The task is made even more demanding when the intended audience spans several generations. Sometimes targeting generations helps overcome the complexity of multiple international markets... if only there was a good way to target the generations.
BurrellesLuce has released an interesting white paper that does just this.
Broadly speaking, today’s PR audience comprises four generations. Listed below are the generally accepted parameters of each group, and historical milestones that helped to form their worldview:
* Traditionalists (born before 1946) – Were shaped by the Great Depression, World War II, and the Korean War.
* Boomers (born 1947 to 1964) – Came of age at the time of the civil rights movement, the sexual revolution, the Cold War, the Vietnam War, space exploration, and the assassinations of prominent national figures.
* Generation Xers (born 1965 to 1976) – Were young observers of, or participants in, the Watergate hearings, the first energy shocks of the 1970s, the women’s liberation movement, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the first Gulf War.
* Millennials (born 1977 to 1989) – Grew up during a period of large-scale school shootings, the Oklahoma City bombing, rapidly advancing technology, the impeachment proceedings against President Clinton, and the attacks of September 11, 2001.
Generational values at a glance
Their research shows that each generation also possesses a distinctive set of core values. These widely shared beliefs and perceptions shape decisions and behaviors.
A generation’s core values should matter to a PR practitioner because they can significantly influence message development. The following lists the core values that are most closely associated with each generation, although not necessarily exclusive. In addition, people born in proximity to the cutoff points may internalize some of the the values that more typically characterize the generation on the other side of the chronological divide:
Traditionalist = Hard work; Dedication; Respect for rules; Duty before pleasure; Honor
Boomers = Optimism; Personal gratification; Team orientation; Involvement; Personal growth
Xers = Diversity; Fun and informality; Techno literacy; Self-reliance; Pragmatism
Millennials = Optimism; Confidence; Civic duty; Achievement; Respect for diversity
Media usage also varies
Not surprisingly, some research* shows significant differences in media consumption by generation. For example, the two older generations spend more time following the news and are more likely to read print versions of newspapers than do the two younger generations.
Another way of slicing the pie:
multi-generational media and life stages
One research model applies terms such as Traditionalist, Boomer, GenX, and Millennial not to an age group but rather to the types of media utilized. Thus, a Boomer who often logs on to social media sites, chat rooms, and online communities may actually align with Millennial values. Similarly, a Millennial who eagerly peruses the printed pages of newspapers and magazines may exhibit core values closely resembling those of their Traditionalist or Boomer counterparts.
Other research has suggested that a generation also can be understood in terms of the stage of life in which individuals find themselves. So in theory, a career-driven Xer who is experiencing all the events associated with that lifestyle could just as easily be a woman in her 30s as a woman in her 50s.
Communications tactics that bridge the generation gap
Ultimately, there is no “one size fits all” medium, as audiences vary widely. However, there are ways to ensure that you are communicating effectively with each of the commonly defined generations.
1. Understand your audience by demographic. A little research can go a long way. Determining the gender, age, and other key characteristics of your core audience is the first step in creating a successful campaign. Your marketing department should have the data to share with you; if not, start to gather it on your own.
2. Shape messages based on audience values. Knowing that Boomers often view themselves as team players who value personal growth while Millennials see themselves as confident individuals with a respect for diversity can help you build messages aligned with each constituency.
3. Use media channels most frequented by your target audience. A large part of getting your message into the right hands involves knowing how and where your audience gathers information. If you’re looking to reach a general consumer audience, you may find beneficial research from analyst firms such as Forrester or Jupiter. Better yet, conduct your own customer surveys and interviews, which will enable you to target your messages with precision.
4. Pay attention to those responding. Cross-generational values and multi-generational media outlets can cause your messages to reach more than just your intended audience. Therefore, you should closely examine who responds to the calls to action contained in your news coverage, in order to properly tailor future messages.
Nice!!!
*The Pew Research Center, The Maturing Internet News Audience, 7.30.06
The Pew Research Center, Generation Online, 12.05
Annual Knowledge Networks, How People Use TV’s Web Connections, 3.11.08
A recent study of Journalists in the US (stated in PR Week) found news releases are used by 90% of business journalists as sources for story ideas.
However, as 54% of those same journalists say they also turn to bloggers, press releases must go beyond simple text and incorporate features like links, social media tags, images and when possible video.
Quick technique tips:
1 – DO include links to pages where multiple instances of your key words/phrases reinforce your message
2 – DO place terms in key positions like headlines and first paragraphs
3 – DON’T go link crazy – too many links confuse journalist
4 - DON’T use low res images – opt for high res multimedia that can easily be used (or provide links to high res)
While we are in the PR business we are also most definitely in the customer satisfaction business.
To exceed customer satisfaction makes them feel good and makes our life easier (happier clients are so much easier to deal with).
From my experience there are three simple ways to achieve this:
1 – Get ahead of the client
Don’t you sometimes know that given a day or week the client is going to ask for something? If you haven’t been offering proactive creative ideas on an account and are worried that the client is going to call you on it, then it is possibly time to get ahead of the client and go on the attack before you have to defend.
The more you work within an industry the easier it is to get ahead of a client.
After working with Creative Labs and them telling us about the convergence of technology and music... We then used the same ’convergence’ story with O2 and Motorola.
2 – Infuse Passion
The one complaint I hear about PR agencies is that they are not passionate about the client or the client’s product/services. Believe me, when I sell into a client I am so passionate that they believe I would do anything for their brand. That is one of the small secrets of sales and it is also a secret of happy PR clients. Use the client’s service/products and learn to love them.
3 – What’s new
It’s something that you should constantly be asking the client from their company perspective. I have had too many meetings with Habib Bank AG Zurich to mention which starts by me asking, “What stories do you have for us” just to be met with silence. When I then ask them to tell me everything in the bank that is new I normally come away with 4 or 5 stories.
The other side of the “What’s New” coin is being able to tell the client what’s new in the region and their industry. You can pick this up very quickly by reading the newspaper a magazine and logging into international web sites.
These three simple concepts will help you make the client happier and will make your life easier.
And everyone in PR wants an easier life.
