Anne's Airings
Caroline's Confessions
Monica's [Un]mentionables
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ANNE'S AIRINGS
A Little Chatter About Twitter
It is no secret that Social Media is all the rage and Twitter is joining the popular crowd. As a staunch believer in Web 2.0, I hadn’t realized that many people don’t know what Twitter is or how to use it. Some business friends approached me to help them understand Twitter, so I put together a short tutorial that I want to share with you.
What is Twitter and how do I use it?
Twitter is a micro-blogging and social networking service that allows its users to send and read other users' updates (otherwise known as tweets), which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length.
You can follow a user which shows their tweets on your home screen.
Each user has a user name that begins with @. Bolt PR’s name is @BoltBuzz108.
To tweet another user, you can @ them (a public message) or DM (direct message, private) them.
If you like someone’s tweet and think others will find it useful, you can RT (retweet). ex: @boltbuzz108 Great social media article! RT: @sm07 read my latest blog: www.myblog.com.
But does this Twitter hype hold any real value for a business?
Twitter allows businesses to engage with customers, industry professionals, prospective clients, the media and others from all walks of life.
The Purpose:
If you join Twitter, let us know! Follow Bolt Public Relations at http://www.twitter.com/boltbuzz108.
Posted by Anne Carr, 12/18/2008
Comments? Email us at blogfeedback@boltpr.com and we’ll post your feedback!
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ANNE'S AIRINGS
Get into the Holiday Spirit - JellyRadio.com Toy Drive to Benefit Ronald McDonald House of San Diego
So those of you who know Bolt PR know that we love participating in community outreach and spreading holiday spirit. So easily we get swept up in the day-to-day activities of running a business and hearing others talking about the struggling economy. While those are serious issues right now, opportunities like a toy drive allow us to get a glimpse at the bigger picture. JellyRadio.com is hosting a huge SixOneNine toy drive to benefit the Ronald McDonald House of San Diego. JellyRadio.com is committed to helping sick children and their families have a little fun this holiday season with new toys.
Donors will receive raffle tickets for a chance to win hundreds of dollars in prizes. Check out the details at www.JellyRadio.com and listen to them online (celebrity DJ’s, hip-hop and R&B music… need we say more?) For more details, see the recent press announcement in the Bolt PR Press Room.
Posted by Anne Carr, 11/17/2008
Comments? Email us at blogfeedback@boltpr.com and we’ll post your feedback!
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ANNE'S AIRINGS
Business Malleability
Yesterday I was inspired and encouraged as we listened to a couple of entrepreneurs tell their tales of failures and successes at an event in San Diego. Both of the featured speakers had created and sold a few Internet companies over the past decade. They shared their roller coaster experience and encouraged other entrepreneurs to keep going. The nugget that resonated with me the most was their advice to be flexible with your business.
Times are always changing and so is the market, which has been accentuated and endlessly discussed lately due to the economy. The key to success is molding your business to fit the needs of the market. This is true for any product or service in almost any industry. One speaker gave the example that his business originally was creating a social networking community but that it transformed into an Internet Security business because it was more in demand.
As a public relations firm, Bolt is always looking for new and better ways to generate attention for our clients. To do so, we watch media and market trends by reading everything we can get our hands on, networking, attending workshops and talking to everyone. Then, we act on the information, molding our services to the ever-changing market, but never compromising the quality of the clay.
Posted by Anne Carr, 11/14/2008
Comments? Email us at blogfeedback@boltpr.com and we’ll post your feedback!
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MONICA'S [UN]MENTIONABLES
What Buzz Word Should You See on Your Business Plan?
Businesses tend to use the buzz word “marketing” for everything. It is a rare occasion in the small to midsize business world when a business owner will say, “I need PR”, and that is not because public relations campaigns are for large businesses only. It is because business owners aren’t always aware of the use of different tools in their toolbox. They just think it’s all marketing.
The first step in identifying your needs is asking yourself one simple question, do you want to increase your business’ exposure? If you said no, you are done and have no further work to do, congrats!If you said yes, do not fret because the steps to increase your business exposure are easy if you take the proper steps to understand what resources are available to you.
So I was sitting with a colleague last week who asked, “What should I be listening for when I’m looking for people to refer to you?”
My response: “Anytime someone says ‘I want to increase my exposure’, that’s a candidate for PR. Direct them our way and from there, we can serve as a resource for whether or not this person is a fit. A lot of people don’t understand what PR actually is and it’s our job to help them identify their exposure goals to see if PR will bring about the desired results.”
First things first, advertising, marketing and public relations are related, but not the same. They can be partnered together to maximize results, but differ in the results each brings. Here are a few notes to understand the differences:
Research is the primary focus with marketing, but you must research a lot of different avenues to build a strong foundation for the next steps in your marketing campaign. You will want to research your current clients to see what strengths and weaknesses each account/client possess to understand what your ideal clients should be like, analyze your client communication practices, research your competition to ensure that your prices, messages, products and services are competitive, evaluate the way that you position yourself in front of prospective clients, and become an expert in your industry to understand where and how you should communicate with your prospective clients.
Advertising is an artistic, smaller form of communication that often uses few, if any words, to convey a message to current and potential customers. This can be an expensive tool, and once an ad is run in a publication once, it retires and never runs again. That is, of course, unless you have a large budget and can pay for multiple runs. Furthermore, advertising is you talking about your business and may not establish your credibility in the public eye since the information is biased and typically very ‘salesy’.
Public relations is the art of communicating with various sources of public information, often media outlets, to see if they would be interested in covering or publicizing your news. The information is then developed by the media outlet to inform the public about a given service, product, person, organization or event. When an unbiased and influential person or media outlet publicizes a story on behalf of an organization, serving as a third party opinion, it lends credibility to the given organization and increases its exposure. The message will never be retired and can be re-positioned and tailored to meet a given audience’s needs. Every article that is published is archived online and can help increase an organization’s visibility on the internet by generating more ‘hits’ when searching for that organization online.
So now that you know a little bit more about the buzz words M, A and PR, you have to assess your exposure goals to identify which resources are the best fit for accomplishing your exposure goals. Once you sit down and develop a list of your organizational exposure needs, you should be able to identify what resources to utilize.
For further input on identifying your exposure needs and goals, contact us at Bolt PR to serve as a resource in your ‘increasing exposure’ mission. And by the way, feel free to contact other PR firms, too. We know you’ll call us back. Our other clients did.
Posted by Monica Kenney, 11/4/2008
Comments? Email us at blogfeedback@boltpr.com and we’ll post your feedback!
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CAROLINE'S CONFESSIONS
PR & Career Workshop: My NextWork Operation Recharge
The economy has made it tough on a lot of folks. If you're finding yourself looking for your next career move, then check out this workshop. It's powerful stuff:
My Nextwork™ Operation Recharge is an interactive workshop that encourages San Diego job seekers to focus more on identifying what their next great career opportunity looks like, and less on just finding another job. It provides attendees the opportunity to dive deeper into their own needs and motivators to better identify the ideal work situation for them. Find out whether you are unhappy with the organization, dissatisfied with your position, or both, so you can make the right decisions for your future!. Included in the two-day workshop is a DISC Behavioral Report and in-depth review, interviewing techniques, interview applications, body language skills, resume writing tips and review, networking and personal marketing, negotiation skills, job search insight, strengths and challenges exercises, and more. Registration is required. Register online at http://www.nextworkservices.com/events. For more information, contact Nextwork Services at (760) 420-8444 or events@nextworkservices.com.
Posted by: Caroline Callaway, 10/7/2008
Comments? Email us at blogfeedback@boltpr.com and we’ll post your feedback!
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MONICA'S [UN]MENTIONABLES
PR & Marketing: A Perfect Match
Effective Business Development Plans Utilize Both Public Relations and Marketing Efforts
A common misconception in the business world is that public relations and marketing are the same and that an effective business development plan can be successful by incorporating one of the two options. However, a business should incorporate both elements to maximize brand awareness. To understand how both roles should be balanced within an organization’s business plan, it is imperative to clearly define public relations and marketing and to explore what tactics and tools are used in the two different fields.
Public relations is literally the act of establishing relationships with the press (print and broadcast media) to promote a particular organization. Accomplished through a variety of tactics, the most common approach is to disseminate press releases to specific contacts at media outlets. Editors at these publications are flooded with phone calls and emails every day, so public relations practitioners use their expertise to effectively differentiate an organization and tie the news in with the outlet’s coverage. Public relations practitioners also provide editors with background information about the organization to ensure they have all the elements needed to develop a strong article.
In addition to press releases, public relations practitioners also develop bylined articles and organizational literature (i.e. press kits, sales presentation, Web site content, case studies), coordinate special events, forge strategic partnerships, arrange for involvement at speaking engagements, offer media training programs, and some even handle crisis communications. Public relations practitioners are direct extensions of the organizations that they serve and work as mouthpieces to establish a business’ credibility and presence in the marketplace.
On the other side of brand management is marketing, which incorporates consumer research to effectively position a product/service within the public eye to drive awareness and to create a demand. A big element of marketing is researching and anticipating what consumers’ needs are now and what they will be in the future. Marketing involves such tasks as coordinating efforts with advertisers, foreseeing market trends, and developing direct mail materials, promotional literature and signage solutions.
Research has shown time and time again that buyers must see, hear or read about a product or service numerous times before taking action. For organizations to reach their target audiences multiple times, they need a plan that involves public outreach. This plan can include everything from participating in community events, securing media coverage and creating a direct mail campaign, to advertising in magazines, hosting speaking engagements, and securing award nominations in their target industries. Each of these tactics, as well as many others, are accomplished through marketing and public relations campaigns.
As the business world becomes more complex and credibility among organizations becomes increasingly difficult to establish, creating a positive image is of the utmost importance in defining and differentiating one company from the next. When properly coordinated, public relations and marketing campaigns will work synergistically with one another. As organizations take advantage of these efforts to realign their business plans, profitable results, customer trust and increased brand visibility can be expected.
Posted by: Monica Kenney, 10/6/2008
As published in SUCCESS Magazine (Adobe PDF)
Comments? Email us at blogfeedback@boltpr.com and we’ll post your feedback!