10 Secrets to Killer Copy

Whether writing for PR or for business the universal truths we use when writing professional PR copy can be applied to emails, letters, business proposals, speeches and pretty much any written word in business.

We all want writing that’s compelling, interesting, and unique. We need writing that’s magnetic. In short – killer copy. Luckily a few simple techniques can make any piece of writing more compelling.

Here are NettResults’ top ten ways to help you write copy that draws the reader closer:

1. Don’t hedge
“Hedging” is when you go out of your way to cover every contingency in an argument. Example: “Nowadays almost all tech-adapt travelers have at least some sort if electronic book reader.” The hedges are “almost all” and “at least some sort.” These may be strictly true, but it’s soft, flabby wording that lacks impact. Instead: “Tech-adapt travelers love electronic book readers.”

2. Repeat a phrase

Repetition establishes structure and rhythm. Repetition taps into the part of our brain that loves rhyme and meter. Repetition pulls the reader into the flow of your writing. Repetition isn’t difficult to use. Repetition is annoying if overused.

3. No passive voice

Passive voice is when you switch the positions of the subject and object of a sentence. For example: “The man hit the computer” is in active voice; passive voice is: “The computer was hit by the man.” Notice how passive voice uses more words without adding information — usually a warning sign of flabby writing.

The wrongness of passive voice isn’t universal, but wouldn’t it have been killer if I had said that passive voice isn’t always wrong?

4. Brevity!

I don’t care how good your writing is, most people won’t read more than a few sentences. Today’s society affiliates with 140 characters. The best policy is to just write less.

5. Use short sentences

Short sentences are easy to read. They’re easy to digest. It’s easier to follow each point of an argument. Sometimes longer sentences — especially if divided up with dashes — are an appropriate tool, especially mixed in with shorter sentences to break things up. If you think short sentences are incompatible with excellent writing, read Stephen King. Or Hemingway.
6. Provoke, don’t solve

If you’re writing a report that is supposed to cover all the bases, this tip doesn’t apply. But if you’re trying to be persuasive, don’t try to handle every objection in one sitting. Your goal is to get the other person to respond: To ask you about a feature of your product, to challenge your assumptions about a competitor. Don’t solve every problem, leaving no stone unturned; leave them wanting more.

7. Eliminate trash adjectives

Most adjectives and adverbs don’t add information; they just take up space and dull your message. Example: “I’m very interested in quickly assessing all suitable software options.” Remove the adjectives and you get the same message, but sharper: “I’m interested in assessing all software.”

8. Be direct

Pardon me, dear reader, but if it wouldn’t be too much of an inconvenience, could I trouble you to do me the favor of applying your obvious considerable facility with the English language to just get to the damn point?

Flowery, respectful and qualified wording is appropriate when you’re asking a waiter to do you a favor without spitting in your food. But it has no place in killer copy.

9. Tell a story

I knew a girl named Sophie who couldn’t figure out why people couldn’t understand the benefits of her software. She had feature and benefit bullet points but they just weren’t sinking in. One day Sophie changed her tactics completely. She wrote up a one-paragraph story about how one of her customers saved $125k by using her software. After that, sales were a lot easier.

10. Write informally

Sure, informal writing isn’t “professional.” And yeah, using phrases like and yeah violates the brevity rule. But it’s usually smart to write like you talk. Being informal helps you come off as a real person.

‘course, it can git to be too durned much, s’don’t go ’round makin’ it hard to just plain understand what in blazes yur talking ’bout.

They say first impressions are most important, and often your written word will be the first impression someone has of you! So take the time and care to make it killer copy.

Do you have any suggestions?

Journalists’ Top Five PR Pet Peeves, and How to Avoid Them

A new white paper out today by Cision has a simple but powerful message for PR professionals.

There are the generic top 5 peeves that all journalists around the globe seem to have:
(1) Sending generic mass email blasts to journalists;
(2) Ignoring what the journalists or outlets actually cover;
(3) Making unnecessary follow-up phone calls;
(4) Pitching identical stories to competing outlets; and
(5) Not taking “no” for an answer.

Getting over these are relatively simple...

1. Keep it personal
Know the person you’re talking to. Research your target contacts in advance and personalize your communication. Never send a mass e-mail with zero familiarity about the recipient. Journalists who take emailed story ideas want proposals tailored to
them personally. Nothing is more impressive than proving you know someone’s history; at the same time, nothing is less impressive than sending out a blanket press release with no introduction.

2. Know what people cover
Nothing annoys a journalist more than receiving a pitch that clearly demonstrates no knowledge of his or her coverage area. Do your homework, offer interesting information that is relevant to the stories that journalist is working on, and you are more likely to be rewarded with a return call.

3. Be helpful – not a pest
Don’t follow up an email with a phone call. With many journalists’ inboxes overflowing with week-old, unread messages, they commonly complain about being “badgered” by multiple phone calls shortly after getting an email. The best rule of thumb is: If you hear back from a reporter, editor or blogger, he or she is interested; if not, move
on.

4. Be transparent about story exclusivity
Don’t pitch an exclusive story idea to multiple competitors. Let a contact know whether you’re proposing an exclusive story or if the story is being shopped around to various contacts. It’s a good way to maintain transparency and spark interest. Journalists are competitive and a story is more likely to get traction if a journalist knows it’s a scoop.

5. Develop a thick skin if your proposal is rejected or ignored
Not every pitch will get used, but journalists often keep valuable PR contacts on file. Remember that developing a relationship with a reporter, editor or blogger is the best way to score coverage, and it usually takes time to develop these relationships and build trust.

So simple, but still ignored every day.

Do we agree at NettResults with the above points? Mostly...

It is all about relationships. There is no doubt about that. But the "don't call after an email or you'll be a pest"? If you have a good relationship with the media, and call a journalist you know well for a number of things (not just to follow up with a 'did you get my email') then the fine line of 'pest' turns into a 'friendly chat' - and who doesn't like a friendly chat?

Of course the alternative is to just do everything on email and never call a journalist. But how does that develop a relationship?

Note to any client - if you walk into your PR agency and it sounds like the Mary Celeste with perhaps only the sound of finger hitting keyboard, you need to check the validity of your agency's media contacts.

10 steps to creating a winning PR plan

Coordination and specifics throughout are essential for crafting a winning campaign

Creating a public relations plan takes time, knowledge, and understanding of your company’s or client’s needs and wants. Here are some steps to ensure you capture those elements in the plan-creation process and that you create a relevant and useful plan for your company or client.

1. Know your company's or client's current situation. This is essential to knowing where the company stands, where the company is able to go, what the company's market/industry looks like, and what direction the company is headed. It puts things in perspective.

2. Know your resources. This can be a part of the first step, as it is a part of the situational analysis needed to understand where your company or client stands. This can help you better build your tactics and strategies while considering budget, time, and other resource limitations.

3. Know your objectives and goals. Also essential to the PR plan’s success, you must know where the company hopes to go. Like driving with no directions, a PR plan with no goals or objectives is an aimless action with no knowledge of what could come, or even what results are desired. Be sure that the PR plan's goals are in line with the rest of the company's overall objectives, and ensure that they are clear to all involved.

4. Know and define your target audience(s). This means that you've defined your target buyer audiences and target media audiences. Each audience will need a different message and a different approach. Knowing these audiences will help you to frame your strategies and tactics so you can reach them effectively.

5. List messages and strategies you will use to reach your target audiences. These should be in line with your stated goals and objectives; if not, the plan is off to a bad start. Know that your strategies and messages also must relate to one another; otherwise, you need to address the disconnect.

6. Define the tactics you will use to effect the strategies you've listed. If, for example, a strategy is to enhance a company's brand awareness, tactics could include community outreach, social media use, press conferences, etc. You must define your strategy before addressing your tactics and assigning them to a message.

7. Create a timeline for implementation. This needs to be realistic but challenging. Remember that there should be no lapses in the PR plan as press releases are being sent out, events are taking place, or media are being engaged. There needs to be constant reminder to the public that the company is alive and well, which can be done with a continuous flow of information.

8. Delegate obligations and responsibilities to your team or your client's team to ensure all parts of the PR plan are completed. This helps to ensure that all are on board and know their responsibilities and duties. This is crucial to bringing the PR plan to fruition. This step should be done with everyone involved, so no one feels overburdened or left out. This involvement in the plan’s creation gives everyone a feeling of responsibility for its success.

9. Create measurements of results/success. To know if your plan is effective, create measurements and benchmarks for the tactics you implement. This is a place for the PR team to gauge the success of the plan and to see whether the goals were realistic. Creating measurements can also show what could have been done with the expertise and estimations of a PR firm or team.

10. Review the plan after implementation and conclusion of the plan. This is the time when all who helped to create and carry out the plan can share their thoughts on what went well, what didn't, and what can be done differently in the future. This helps ensure that future plans have a chance of being successful. It also encourages group members to work for the company's success by giving everyone a chance to talk and to contribute to the next plan.

The key thing to remember when creating a PR plan is that every plan is going to be unique and different for each company, and even within the same company, they will be different for each plan objective. Do your homework before creating a plan, and be sure that you work closely with the company or client to make the plan a success.

Mind the Gap

I came across this interesting take on the 'information gap' interpreted by Jeff Monday.

When we come across something new that is not explained by our previous knowledge or experiences, an information gap is formed. If you are a communicator, understanding how to use this gap will have great rewards. Next time you have to develop company's messaging think about it!

What do you think?

Learning from Dubai's Poor PR

Define a PR crisis for your organization....

For 'Dubai inc', it could be defined as causing major money markets to fall, having international media 'ridicule' fiscal policy/investments or having your ruler cartooned as drowning in a sea of debt on the front page of perhaps one the world's most respected newspapers.

Such is the past 10 days for Dubai.

What happened and what can we learn from this?

I think it went down something like this.... Picture a boardroom 50 stories high with all glass windows, over looking sun, sand, the beautiful crystal clear coast and major development including infrastructure that will soon be appearing in the Guinness Book of Records. Imagine the smell of coffee, and the obligatory three facial tissue boxes on the large, modern board room table, surrounded by black, ergonomic, modern mesh chairs.

Someone mentions in passing that there is a loan for something like $3.5-billion that needs to be paid by next month, but it's questionable whether money is in the right place to make that happen. "No problem," someone says, "everyone wants a piece of Dubai, we'll just ask our debtors to hold out for another 30 days". Someone more senior replies, "Interesting idea, but seeing as we're asking for 30 days, lets just ask for 6 months - I mean, why not?". Several nods of heads, because that's what you do when someone more senior suggests something.

A couple of faces look to the person who has to think about publicity. "No problem here. Next week is Eid so we'll all be taking it easy for a week and isn't the U.S. celebrating something along the lines of Thanks Giving so Wall Street will be closing early? We'll sent out a note to a couple of the media who always write exactly what we ask them, most media outlets will be on vacation - no one will remember a thing".

Nice idea... except... while that might of worked 2 or 3 years ago, in the dusk of 2009 there have been changes that have even permeated as far as Dubai...

1 - Media is less of a puppet. Days are gone when they simply 'cut and paste' from a release just because it comes from someone important. Many reasons for this - all of them good.

2 - Media never sleeps. Social media resonates 24/7 and the more advanced media groups have reorganized so they can work cross-globe 24/7, irrespective of cultural holidays.

3 - Never, ever, ever create a media vacuum. It's PR101, but if you do not provide the facts and all the facts to the media in a timely manner, the media will get the facts from somewhere else. That somewhere may be less than gracious. That somewhere may include so called experts that known nothing about what they talk. That somewhere might have a grudge to bare. In short - not good.

4 - It all comes out in the wash. Organizations that play it less than 100% clean risk dirty washing falling out of the hamper every now and again... and in tough financial times it can be like someone turned the hamper upside-down. Was always this way, but today's ultra-connected and social society means that no one is exempt and news travels fast.

The lessons are pretty simple really. It's not rocket science and someone should of seen this coming. Maybe they need a new PR agency...

Wow, did Dubai just get a beating in the international press!

It was felt around the world, but perhaps the most punishing in the ever-cynical British press.

Unfortunately the 'Dubai Machine' was not at its tip-top performance, and whomever was in charge of media on that day must of been out of the office celebrating Eid Al Adha, because they created a media vacuum that the press love as they can make things up and call on non-experienced 'experts' who really have no idea.

Lets set the story straight.

1 - Dubai World is NOT the country. Saying that 'Dubai World' has a $59b financial problem is not the same as saying that Dubai (or the United Arab Emirates) is bust! Dubai World is an investment company that manages and supervises a portfolio of businesses and projects for the Dubai government across a wide range of industry segments and projects that promote Dubai as a hub for commerce and trading. It is not, however, guaranteed by the Dubai Government.

2 - Some might argue that $59b is not a huge sum when compared with some other corporate bailouts (e.g. when Lehman Brothers went into bankruptcy protection, it owed more than $600 billion). In reality, Dubai World still has a lot of valuable divested assets, so their only shortfall is a US$3.5-billion loan, which the company is unable to repay by its December deadline.

3 - Concerns over the fallout from Dubai's debt problems contributed to the main European stock indexes falling over 3% on 26 November. This was followed by drops in Asian stocks on 27 November. However the European stock markets rebounded as investors' fears subsequently subsided as they decided the estimated debt wasn't big enough to trigger a systemic failure in global financial markets.

4 - And pretty much anything else you've heard around this subject is just false. Dubai is as bankrupt as 1920s Germany (The Guardian) - not true. India may take over Dubai as Russian oligarchs shoot at each other on the Burj Dubai (The Independent) - certainly not true. "There are not that many people when you go out shopping, and there are almost no Westerners in the bars and clubs," according to Sarah, speaking to the BBC - we don't know where she's going - certainly not the places this office socialize at! It's not a fiscal Armageddon. It's just not, in global terms, actually that significant.

But what sells newspapers?

The Millennials working in agencies – R U ready?

Research from over 200 global PR agencies by the University of Oregon shows interesting conclusions that Middle East agencies should take heed of. The Millennials (or Gen Y, Generation Me, The Net Generation, or Echo Boomers) can broadly be defined as those between the ages of 12 and 28 years – in short the younger members of our agency teams.

Gen Y is the most wanted & coddled generation in history. Howe & Strauss (authors known for their theories about a recurrent cycle of generations) summed Gen Y’s up neatly, “they are more numerous, more affluent, better educated, and more ethnically diverse. More important, they are beginning to manifest a wide array of positive social habits that older Americans no longer associate with youth, including a new focus on teamwork, achievement, modesty, and good conduct”.

Why are they like this? Most commonly brought up by helicopter parents (remaining closely overhead, rarely out of reach, whether their children need them or not) with both parents working and more disposable income than previous generations, Gen Y has often been branded as having attention spans less than a goldfish and only being able to absorb information in very short chunks.

Having grown up with the Internet, it's also the first generation that's completely comfortable with technology. And their childhood passion for computer games means they like clear objectives, with a start and an accomplishable goal (games end), knowing exactly where they are at all times (i.e. how many points they have scored).

This is important as there are a lot of Gen Y – 70 million - almost three times the number of Generation X. So what does this mean for the managers in Middle East agencies? Well, if we understand what Millennials want, we can make our agencies run more efficiently. So here’s the top 10 ways to cultivate relationships with Millennials:

10 - Less politics & favouritism. Add more team building events - especially if you also have Baby Boomers in your team.
9 - Keep your promises as a manager. Gen Y has been brought up being given what they expected. If you disappoint they’ll walk.
8 - Understand mistakes. Gen Y sees no harm in making them so have realistic expectations and don’t view mistakes as failures (their parents didn’t).
7 – Give more autonomy & responsibility. But paradoxically don’t expect accountability.
6 - Allow & encourage innovation. Gen Y live for innovation.
5 - Listen, solicit opinions and recognise their influence. Gen Y like to give it and just as their parents did, they’ll expect you to listen to them.
4 - Provide training & opportunities for growth. Gen Y loves to learn.
3 - Prioritise employees’ needs and work out how to provide a work-life balance with home commute options.
2 - Provide fair compensation: based on achievement, workload, level of responsibility, market norms.
1 - Communicate! More regular, recognition, openness, honesty, instructions, feedback & defined roles.

Gen Y like to communicate, so speak to them… you could also email, Tweet, blog, connect over FaceBook and get LinkedIn… but whatever you do communicate.

Crisis Communication - proactive planning

Explained in 90 seconds:

LEAD & detractors

It's not exactly rocket science, but one simple method for getting online and embracing social media is LEAD (listen, experiment, apply, develop). This creates a simple road map that will help companies thrive in the online world’s environment of constant change.

We see a lot of work on attracting new advocates, but one thing that I am constantly asked about is how to work with detractors.

The most important thing in social is to address your detractors. Influencers are a combination of advocates and detractors but detractors are 4-8 times more likely to speak than an advocate (yeah, I made that stat up). Understand and disarm your detractors by talking to them.

But should all detractors be treated equally?

First up, we like to differentiate between 'branded' and 'unbranded' social noise makers. Waggener Edstrom define this very neatly... "Branded media has an associated value exchange with its name. Unbranded media has voice and influence, but the name does not (yet, perhaps) carry value by itself. Regardless of whether it’s branded or not, each voice carries weight and influence, from either the edge (unbranded) or the center (branded). And media can move between the two states: X, the gossip guy, started out as a nobody, while Z, who used to be influential, is rarely heard from anymore."

Then it's traditional (yes it still exists) PR methods that need to be implemented to actually make a difference.

Only the paranoid survive.

3 easy steps to extend your social media beyond Facebook & Twitter...

So you have a handle on Facebook and Twitter. You may even blog a little. Think you have it covered? Sorry – not even close. At NettResults we break social media sites out into three levels:

Tier 1: Register and engage
Del.icio.us
DocStoc
Business week's Business Exchange
FaceBook
Flickr
FriendFeed
LinkedIn
Scribd
SlideShare
StumbleUpon
Technorati
Twitter
YouTube (also Vimeo, Viddler, Revver & Yahoo video)

Tier 2: Set up branded profiles, use as warranted:
Digg
Google Groups
Windows Live Space
Yahoo Groups

Tier 3: Claim your name and monitor
Bedo
Brightkite
Friendster
Gather
Identi.ca
Imeem
Meetup
Multiply
MySpace
New York Times (TimesPeople, NewsWeek)
Ning
Orkut
Piscasa
Plurk
Spoke
Tribe.net

The hard way: go to each site and do what you have to do.
The easy way: call a reputable PR agency such as NettResults and that agency set up and engage social media sites for you.