THINKing

Forgotten Gems

Through no fault of their own, sometimes really good posts just get overlooked. Here are a few forgotten gems you may have missed.

Grandma Says -  Southern grandmothers have often said, “there are only three times a respectable person’s name should be in the paper: when you are born, when you are married, and when you die.” This is the one area in which I part company with my grandmothers.

Brand Euthanasia -  Some brands should be allowed to die, or if that fails, then we owe it to them to kill them.

New Business Tip: Do Great Work For Current Clients -My marketing mentor, Bill Loeffler, once said the the best new business program is doing great work for current clients. He was right.

The Value Of Connections – As we have discussed before, the value of connections in business cannot be underestimated. I’m talking primarily about tight connections that you use ruthlessly to help you achieve your personal and professional goals.

To Market, To Market… -  What does buying a fat pig have to do with your business? Stick with me and all will be revealed.

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Top 5 PR Posts

Our PR-related posts are among the most well-read. So, I thought we’d bring to the forefront some evergreen features on PR.  Now, let’s review.

Communications Planning 101 - Developing a communications plan requires a disciplined approach. Your first order of business is reviewing your current program for impact and efficiency.

How To Be A Great Radio Guest - Radio – despite changes in media habits – still is a great way to get in front of a lot of people. As a radio talk show guest on a national program, millions could hear your message.

Pithy Pitches - Your painstakingly crafted email pitch is completely customized and ready to send to the in box of that carefully targeted reporter. There it goes! Did you hear that? That was your email pitch being deleted.

Six Tips For Perfect Email Pitches - Your media pitches can go straight over the plate. With a little forethought, and a few tips, you can throw fewer balls and more media relations strikes.

Slow Day? Create News -  Sometimes there seems to be no client news worthy of coverage. That’s when the savvy PR pro digs deep into the old bag of tricks and pulls out one of these ideas to perk things up.

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How To Be A Great Radio Guest

Radio – despite changes in media habits – still is a great way to get in front of a lot of people. As a radio talk show guest on a national program, millions could hear your message. Talk radio listeners tune in about 20 percent more than the average radio listener.

Being a great guest takes some work on your part. Let’s review what you must do in order to attain great guest status.

Be Available. Journalists of all stripes complain about not being able to reach sources when they need them. With radio, it is not just a 9 – 5 job. The great radio guest will show up whenever he or she is needed.

Be Conversational. This goes beyond your ability to carry on a good conversation. You must speak clearly, concisely and in terms the average listener understands. Start throwing around business-speak like “that’s not in my wheelhouse” and get booted off the show before it starts. In fact, don’t talk like that when you are not on radio!

Be Ubiquitous. It was true when I was in radio and it is still true today, radio people follow their print brethren. If you have been quoted by a news magazine or newspaper, radio producers are more likely to have you on. And, help producers locate you. Make sure you have an online presence and that you have your media clips accessible so producers can determine if you are the right source for them.

Be In The Moment. If you are out pitching yourself, take advantage of the news cycle. If there is nothing happening currently that ties your expertise into the topic of the day, then wait. Your day will come.

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Front Page Coverage – That’s What I Want!

Does everyone in business seem to think all you have to do is call the local daily paper and they come out to do a page one profile of your business? With all the downsizing, it’s hard enough just to get the media to open your emails or take your calls. Getting a front page story just because you want it: priceless.

I was talking with a prospect once who tossed this off as if it was no big deal, “of course we’d like to have the paper come down, meet our principals and do a profile of our business.” Another one wants to become a “rock star-type celebrity” in his industry.

Well, I’d like to win the lottery, but at least I know I have to buy a ticket first in order to be in the running.

Got any thoughts on this subject?

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5 Best Posts – January 2010

We had some very popular posts in January – some old and some new. I thought I’d share them with you.

1. 8 Ways To Use Twitter Lists
2. Twittering Journalists
3. Be Relevant
4. When Billboards Go Bad
5. 7 Ways To Kickstart Your 2010 Marketing 

What’s your favorite?

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Time For The Spin Cycle

It’s always interesting to see how the media and the politicians try to spin a story. Let’s take a look today at the Massachusetts victory of Republican Scott Brown over Martha Coakley in the bluest of blue states. Here’s what they are saying about it:

Boston Globe

Boston Herald

USA Today

New York Times

Fox News

Washington Times

What do you think about the coverage of this race’s aftermath?

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Top Content 2009 Edition

In case you missed some of our most read content this year, below is a sample of the top posts of 2009. Is your favorite here?

Twittering Journalists

Customer Retention Strategies

When Billboards Go Bad

Twitter: Time Waster Or Cool Tool?

Branding Lessons From Santa

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Marketing Spending Pays Off

Well, here’s a big surprise: small businesses which spend more during a downturn actually do better financially. Marketing professionals have been giving this advice to businesses of all sizes since the first recession. But too many business leaders make marketing their first, instead of their last, cut. It’s nice to have some empirical data to prove our assertion.

According to the “Small Business Marketing Health Check” report from Hurwitz & Associates, there is a correlation between small businesses that are doing well and greater marketing spending. Almost two-thirds of small businesses that expected increased revenues had raised or planned to raise marketing spending, compared with just 32% to 36% of businesses with flat or declining revenues.

During previous recessions, American Business Press has sponsored two studies on marketing expenditures, and the group found that:

- cutting spending on marketing and advertising during a recession produces negative short and long-term results in relation to sales and profits

-  additionally, during the 1974 – 75 recession years, the study found that companies not cutting marketing had higher sales and net income during those years and the two following years compared to companies which cut in either or both recession years.

But you have to be smart. A recession is not a time for profligate spending. You need to determine what is working best in terms of immediate lead generation and sales. Luckily, this time we have access to lower cost, easier to track digital media.

The previously mentioned “Small Business Marketing Health Check” indicates that smaller businesses were shifting away from traditional media and toward social media, email newsletters and search.

“The survey clearly reveals that the use of low-cost Web-based marketing tools is playing a strategic role in helping businesses succeed,” said Laurie McCabe, partner, Hurwitz & Associates, in a statement. “Making a few changes to incorporate more online tools into the marketing mix seems to be a key ingredient to small business success.”

What are you doing to tweak your marketing during this recession? Let us know.

Related articles:

Retailers Boost Spending on Holiday Advertising

How To Thrive In A Recession

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Twitter Lists: Twittering Journalists

Finally, Twitter is offering a lists function. None too soon.If you need more info on Twitter lists, Mashable is a good resource.

We set up the My Creative Team Twittering Journalist wiki last year in order to develop a directory of journalists who were using Twitter. This was not an ideal solution, but it was good enough at that time. With the new Twitter list, we can move that wiki online. This makes it easier on everyone to follow twittering journalists.

We have established a USA Twittering Journalist List and a Canada Twittering Journalist List. They are not yet complete, but feel free to begin following them, and let us know if there are other journalists you are following who should be on the list. Next on our agenda, media outlets using Twitter.

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News Media: Your Slip Is Showing

You’ve probably read about it by now – the hoax pulled on the media by a group posing to be from the US Chamber. The CopyWrite, Ink blog has a good overview.

And it was a hoax on the media, not on the US Chamber of Commerce, as Bloomberg characterized it. Says Bloomberg,

The Yes Men, a New York group that pulls pranks on corporations, issued a fake press release and the text of a purported speech by Chamber President Thomas Donohue under the chamber’s letterhead yesterday, said Jacques Servin, a Yes Men member. The imposters also held a news conference at the National Press Club with ersatz chamber officials.

No, this was a hoax on the media. Plain and simple. Today’s media follow their template and biases, try to get the “news” out too fast, with little to no fact-checking.

Reuters called it more correctly after the fact. Initially, they too ran with the false story that the US Chamber of Commerce was changing its position on cap and trade. That’s what the liberal media wanted to hear and that’s why they didn’t question it. That’s what I mean by the template.

Today’s media members are overwhelmingly liberal.  A 2005 UCLA study confirms this. Former CBS newsman Bernard Goldberg has written a book on the subject – Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How The Media Distort The News that was spawned by an op-ed piece he wrote for the Wall Street Journal. Goldberg says that it’s not a purposeful left-wing conspiracy. According to an article in Newsmax,

Goldberg, who spent his last years at CBS in the doghouse for his 1996 Wall Street Journal piece, says that if these correspondents were to take a lie detector test as to whether they slanted the news leftward, they would deny it and pass with flying colors. Many of them don’t consider that they’re leaning in any political direction. They really think they are simply mainstream. There is no other side of the argument except what you hear from a few right-wing nut cases. In their world, mainstream conservatism doesn’t exist.

Don’t be surprised by more of these hoaxes.They are just too easy to perpetrate.

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