Filed under: Social Media
An infographic from Text 100:
The University of Illinois at Chicago has ranked the nation’s 75 largest cities by the social media acumen of their city governments, and Denver ranks seventh:
1. New York
1. Seattle
3. Virginia Beach, Va.
4. Portland, Ore.
5. San Francisco
6. Kansas City
7. Denver
8. Mesa, Ariz.
9. Louisville, Ky.
10. Philadelphia
10. Long Beach, Calif.
10. Sacramento, Calif.
Denver Broncos VP of PR Jim Saccomano has turned to Twitter to call out a “reckless ‘journalist’” at the Sporting News for reporting that Broncos QB Kyle Orton has demanded a trade.
Curious to know whether you are a “pinhead,” part of “the in crowd” or a member of “the flock” online? Take Cohn Marketing’s Facebook quiz.
Social media pundits Brian Solis and Jason Falls will be in Denver to discuss social media strategies and tactics at the “Explore and Engage” event on Tuesday, June 14. Registrations are limited to 120, and the first 50 get a copy of Solis’ book, Engage, thrown in.
Filed under: Social Media
A request from Jen Lester at Philosophy to “like” The Review, a monthly publication serving the advertising, marketing and media industries in Colorado.
Filed under: Social Media
Denver-based agency Armada Medical Marketing has launched Periscope, a national medical marketing blog. Armada intends for the blog ”to become a mainstream medical marketing hub featuring discussions on marketing, public relations, social media and the practices which empower health care clients.”
The Denver Post compiles its list:
- @carmeloanthony
- @woodypaige
- @chadfowler
- @redheadwriting
- @fireland
- @caytonholland
- @darthvader
- @onetracktweet
Filed under: Social Media
Mashable has named Adobe, Best Buy, IBM and Weber Shandwick as four of the top employers for social media professionals.
Filed under: Social Media
Umar Haque in the Harvard Business Review is the latest to argue that most companies are merely scratching the surface of what social media can do for brands.
(Hat tip: Don Jennings [@djenningspr] of Lois Paul & Partners)
Circulation numbers are still king, of course, but here is the ranking of U.S. newspapers according to their Twitter followers (Note: it only ranks the newspapers’ primary Twitter accounts).
The Denver Post ranks a very respectable eighth, although the follower numbers fall off a cliff after the top three.
- @nytimes – 2,668,948
- @wsj – 464,591
- @washingtonpost – 204,514
- @latimes – 83,335
- @usatoday – 72,929
- @newyorkpost – 57,605
- @chicagotribune - 34,490 *
- @denverpost – 32,755
- @dallas_news – 24,726
- @seattletimes – 22,286
- @suntimes – 18,952
- @freep – 18,851
- @nydailynew – 15,744
- @houstonchron – 14,108
- @azcentral – 10,407
- @oregonian – 10,338
- @phillyinquirer – 9,819
- @SFGate – 9,508
- @clevelanddotcom – 7,943
- @MN_News – 7,008
- @NJ_News – 6,181
- @SDUT – 5,886
- @tampabaycom – 3,168
- @insidebayarea – 2,810
- @cctimes – 2,705
- @mercurynews – 2,536
- @newsday – 2,302
Weber Shandwick has released a new report that examines the roles CEOs play in social media, and the news is mixed:
Our analysis revealed results that were good and not-so-good. Robust signs exist that CEOs are actively taking charge of their corporate reputations and demonstrating leadership through communications. For the most part, they are extensively quoted in the business press, frequently deliver keynote speeches at conferences, and participate in business school forums. But when it comes to digital engagement and social media, CEOs are generally “unsocial.” As more CEOs take on the mantle of “chief narrator,” however, we expect that this will change and change fast.
Fast Company examines BP’s “Twitter trouble,” and the implications for every business.
Shawn Martini at the Colorado Farm Bureau learned the hard way that joking about natural disasters rarely ends well (see former Chicago Bears great Dan Hampton for another recent example). I have no idea what Shawn’s original Tweet was (it has since been deleted), but here is the string of apologies he has offered for it so far:
@RealPRMedia I see that now. My apologies.
@zarchasmpgmr @stevehirschhorn @HKoren @tweet_fail@pookla @wcwestfeldt @5280PRGal @hardcorps80204 My apologies. The joke was in poor taste.
@hardcorps80204 @milesbeyond @mackaymiller @tedrock et. al. My joke abt the #boulderfire was in very poor taste. My sincerest apologies.
@RealPRMedia Thank you for your understanding. I do apologize 4 the comment. Very poor taste on my part. My prayers R w/ everyone affected.
@thegoodhuman Very much agreed. Please accept my sincerest apologies.
Update: Here is Shawn’s original Tweet:
7000 ac. fire in Boulder. sure gonna take lots of Priuses &solar panels 2 make up4 that big ol’ carbon emission
Filed under: Social Media
Webbiquity compiles what it thinks is the list.
Filed under: Social Media
Public relations firms are better delivering on the promise of social media because the industry understands the art of persuasion while edgy digital firms continue to be too focused on the technical tools. At least that’s what Ad Age says.
Filed under: Social Media
If your eyes glaze over when annoyingly hip people like Paula Berg, Melissa Hourigan and Larry Holdren try to explain Foursquare to you, here’s everything you need to know about it in 1:58:
Filed under: Social Media
Peter Shankman and Sarah Evans compile the list.
Ahhh, delicious irony. The self-important Jacob Morse is profiled in the New York Times for spending his time “calling out the (grammar mistakes of the) self-important” on Twitter. In the spirit of Mr. Morse’s endeavor, I’m starting a “Name that Tweeter” contest to identify the authors of notable tweets. The first (and likely only) installment:
“Its impossible to eat sopapillas with hiney and not get sticky.”
Identify the author and you win lunch and a free Bawmann Group pen.
UPDATE: 5280 publisher Daniel Brogan correctly identified Andrew Hudson, publisher of the brand new Andrew Hudson’s Jobs List Blog, as the author of the Tweet. Andrew’s Tweet was quickly followed by a second one that read, “Arrrggg. I meant ‘honey,’ not ‘hiney.’”
Filed under: Social Media
B.L. Ochman at WhatsNextBlog examined the Web sites of America’s largest companies and found that “it would have taken Nancy Drew to find the company blog, or Facebook page, or Twitter feed, or all of its YouTube videos.” Why? Ochman suspects that companies “fear that they’ll lose control of their brand if too many people know they can have a say,” with Nestle a classic (and recent) example.
- A PR industry survey found that corporate PR salaries dropped 11.3 percent and agency salaries dropped 10.6 percent in 2009.
- New York Daily News columnist Bob Raissman has had it with drive-by PR experts offering their analyses of the Tiger Woods crisis communications situation.
- Using Nestle’s recent Facebook debacle as a jumping-off point, The Atlantic offers “5 Lessons from Social Media Disasters.”
Better not let your company Tweet something congratulating an Olympics athlete for doing well – the USOC or IOC may come after you.
The college football season is nearly over, so it must be time to start complaining about the lack of a playoff system. To get ahead of the curve, the BCS launched a social media campaign last week touting its effectiveness, but Advertising Age takes the campaign to task for simply spewing propaganda rather than engaging fans.
Social media guru, author and MediaonTwitter co-founder Brian Solis will be in town Tuesday (tomorrow) for a book signing/tweetup. The event is from 5:30 – 7:30 p.m. at Tryst Lounge in Larimer Square. Click here for additional details.
Filed under: Social Media
Advertising Age compiles the list.
Triangle eyes and noses are for amateurs. Check out these social media/tech-inspired Halloween pumpkins.
(Hat tip to 104 West Partners/Johanna Erickson)
Filed under: 104 West, blogs, Digital Idea Media, Metzger, Social Media, Story + Welch, Turner PR
If you are devotee of social media and its implications for public relations, check out a new social-media specific blog that features posts by 104 West’s Elaine Schoch, Metzger’s Elaine Ellis, Digital Idea Media’s (and MediaOnTwitter’s) Melissa Hourigan, Turner PR’s Ef Rodriguez and me. The blog is called Social Byte – http://socialbyte.net.
Probably somewhere between $400 and $20,000 per month, according to the The Wall Street Journal.
Filed under: Social Media
Want to rub shoulders with social media stars such as Brian Solis, Peter Shankman and Melissa Hourigan? Apply to be a volunteer MediaOnTwitter editor. If you are interested, email Melissa Hourigan a 200-word resume.
Filed under: Social Media
Congratulations to Denver social media guru Ef Rodriguez, who launched his inaugural Huffington Post column this morning.
That community college-loving Sara Evans can try to take full credit for the Media on Twitter database, but we all know that it is a collaborative effort among Brian Solis, Peter Shankman, Sara and Denver’s own Melissa Hourigan and Ed Dunigan.
Teach Colorado Republicans how Twitter works (specifically that people can see your tweets even if they don’t “follow” you), and how open communication can be a good thing, even if not everyone agrees with you.
Filed under: Social Media
75 percent of women surveyed say that social networking sites do not influence what they buy.
Denver social media guru Ef “Pug of War” Rodriguez has made the move from JohnstonWells back to Turner Public Relations, where he got his PR start and where he will lead the travel/tourism/outdoor agency’s social media efforts.
JohnstonWells President and CEO GG Johnston said her firm is tapping Elizabeth Jumel to lead its social media practice. “After careful consideration, we decided that Elizabeth’s 11 years of experience and her insight into the right mix of social media and traditional media are exactly what our clients need right now,” Johnston said.
The Washington Post may be bearish on Crocs’ future, but that isn’t enough to stop mommy bloggers from doing whatever it takes to get a free pair.
Was Barack Obama “the first presidential candidate to move beyond traditional PR tactics?”
The New York Times profiles a new breed of small business owners who are turning to cost-effective social media tactics to make up for a lack of marketing budget.
Metzger’s Doyle Albee has an interview with author Deirdre Breakenridge, who with Brian Solis wrote Putting the Public Back in Public Relations: How Social Media is Reinventing the Aging Business of PR. Here is an excerpt of that interview (you can read the entire interview on Metzger’s “Media in the Millennium” blog):
Doyle Albee: What one common PR practice would you like to see stopped immediately?
Deirdre Breakenridge: For too long, public relations professionals have been accepting corporate broadcast messages that are pushed from the top down. We’ve also contributed to taking these messages and crafting news releases riddled with hype, spin and industry jargon that doesn’t make sense to anyone except for the executives who approved them.
There’s a much better approach; it’s a bottom up strategy that consists of listening to customers and other stakeholders in their web communities and then providing the story and information that is customized to their needs. Today, PR professionals must help brands to see that they can have direct conversations with their customers, if and only if they stay away from the meaningless broadcast messages. Brands must focus on helping people to gather, share and organize information to make informed purchases. I would like to see PR professionals put the public back in public relations and that means abandoning a broadcast message mentality and truly taking a one-on-one approach that lets you listen and engage with people to build a strong relationship.
DA: What positive practice do you see many practitioners still doing too little of?
DB: There are PR professionals who are solely relying on Internet and social media communications rather than picking up the telephone to talk to the media or other important influencers. Technology makes it so easy to forget about the human voice connection. However, it’s critical to take all of the digital connections and turn the virtual into physical reality. After all, the best outcome of social networking is a meeting with a blogger or influencer, whether it’s on the telephone or in person.
Human interaction will always be the most important means to truly build a relationship, which takes time and commitment. Sure, a lot of progress can be made via the Internet. For example, Brian Solis and I wrote our entire book without ever meeting in person. There was a lot of email and IM back and forth as well as social networking. But, the bottom line… when we met in person that’s when the relationship grew and reached new heights. Today, Brian and I are on the telephone, at conferences presenting together and working both online and offline to promote our book.
So, as practitioners, although we have to keep up with our Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn status updates, it’s imperative that we move these interactions forward. Pick up the phone or meet in person; that’s the point where the friendship is validated and it becomes even stronger.
Scatterbox makes the case that “engagement” eventually will give way to noise and a relentless bombardment that will cause the “the hottest social media thing since the one before it” to collapse under its own weight.
I keep reading media articles that position politicians such as U.S. Rep. Jared Polis as technology-friendly leaders who use social media to connect with constituents, and I have to shake my head. Rep. Polis has 2,439 Twitter followers, and he has followed a grand total of 59 of them back. To Rep. Polis, Twitter appears to be just another bullhorn through which he can spread what he wants constituents to hear. And he isn’t alone:
- U.S. Sen. Mark Udall – 2,016 followers; follows 10
- U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman – 1,140 followers; follows 17
- U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter – 714 followers; follows 9
- State Sen. Josh Penry – 185 followers; follows 9
The power of social media is in creating relationships – or at least engaging conversations – with people who matter to you (and to whom you matter). Of the major elected officials in Colorado, only one at least makes an effort to create the appearance he uses social media to listen to constituents:
- Gov. Bill Ritter – 2,149 followers; follows 2,002
And, surprisingly, a significant number of high-profile Colorado politicians aren’t even using Twitter yet:
- U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet
- U.S. Rep. Diana Degette
- U.S. Rep. Betsy Markey
- U.S. Rep. John Salazar
- U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn
- State Sen. Brandon Shaffer
- Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper
The Mile High Social Media Club’s June meeting is this Wednesday. The details are:
Mile High Social Media Club
Wednesday, June 17, from 5–8 p.m.
Wynkoop Brewing Company
1634 18th Street, Denver 80202
Click here to RSVP (the event is free)
Filed under: Social Media
GBSM’s Steve Silvers argues that although social media “isn’t actually selling anything but itself” right now, you cannot afford to ignore it.
Is BusinessWire blocking its clients from including links to PitchEngine in press releases it distributes? PitchEngine says yes, but BusinessWire isn’t saying anything. Right now, it appears individual BW employees are enforcing the rules at their discretion, so we’ll see where the official BW corporate policy lands.
If you are interested in following the tweets of Denver’s PR community, PRSA Colorado is assembling the comprehensive list.
The “Media On Twitter” coalition – Digital Idea Media’s Melissa Hourigan, Elgin Community College’s Sarah Evans, Help a Reporter Out’s (HARO) Peter Shankman, FutureWorks’ Brian Solis, and TrackVia’s Ed Dunigan – announced today that the database has moved to its permanent home at http://www.mediaontwitter.com. The database has grown to nearly 1,000 reporters, editors and producers since it launched three weeks ago.
Cori Keeton Pope of Keeton PR was featured in a KMGH/Channel 7 story on companies that are using Twitter to connect with consumers.
Free drinks alert! The Mile High Social Media Club’s April event is “How to Improve Customer Service and Protect Your Brand Through Social Media,” and will feature Bridgeline Software’s EVP/GM Tim Higgins. The details are:
Mile High Social Media Club
Wednesday, April 15, from 5-8 p.m.
Curtis Hotel, 1405 Curtis Street
Click here to register
Inexplicably, the FTC is considering revised guidelines that would hold companies liable for inaccurate statements written by bloggers who receive samples of the companies’ products.
Filed under: Social Media
WhatsNextBlog compiles the list of tools. (Hat tip: PRNewser)
JW’s Gina Seamans and Cactus’ Ashley Boyden, working with Elaine Ellis and her team at Metzger, are taking Colorado PRSA social:
- Blog – http://www.prsacoloradoblog.org/
- Twitter – http://twitter.com/prsacolo
- Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=42147389576&ref=ts
- LinkedIn – http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=1823848&trk=hb_side_g
IZEA (formerly PayPerPost) founder Ted Murphy believes it has taken the industry three years to “warm up” to the idea of sponsored conversations such as blog posts. And with the trend evolving to include Twitter and Facebook, questions of disclosure and authenticity will take center stage.
PR firm Waggener Edstrom has launched Twendz, a Twitter tool that examines tweets on topics and calculates whether opinions on them are trending positive or negative.
Which means there’s a 50 percent chance it has jumped the shark.
Boulder-based social networking guru Dave Taylor has formalized a consulting agreement with Metzger Associates to help the agency’s clients “maximize their effectiveness in today’s online conversations through public relations tactics, blogging, podcasting and through social media sites such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter.” Details of the arrangement are here.
Filed under: Social Media
Bill Sledzik, a professor at Kent State and a public relations veteran, makes the case.
(Hat Tip: PRNewser)
Filed under: Social Media
PR pro Brian Solis, online journalist Tom Foresmski, blogger Neville Hobson and Social Media co-founder Chris Heuer have teamed up to form AdHocnium, “an ad-hoc agency that trains PR firms and clients to use new media.” PR Week has the details.
Nearly half of reporters are using social media tools such as Facebook, LinkedIn, blogs and Wikipedia to research their stories. So are you using those tools to talk to (or at least influence) reporters?
Johnson & Johnson brand Motrin got schooled in the finicky art of social media over the weekend when one of the ads it wanted to “go viral” did just that. Unfortunately, the conversation, which began on Twitter and spilled over into the blogosphere, focused on why the ad was insulting rather than clever.
By 8:30 last night, the Motrin website was down as the company removed the ad. Unfortunately for Motrin, the print executions will continue for another month before they cycle out.
Filed under: Social Media
Sure social media is interesting and can be effective. But it has been missing something. We had trouble putting our fingers on it, and then it hit us: it has been missing a regulatory oversight body. You know, an organization that can deliver the kind of standards that will prevent the confusion that has reigned over the industry. Now we all can know that blogs are Web 2.0, podcasting is Web 2.1, Vlogs are Web 2.2, Twitter is Web 2.3, etc. And because Richard “Head” Edelman is involved, we can be assured it will be “authentic.”
Filed under: Social Media
Denver Water has gone Web 2.0, and “Johnny Flush” is seeking friends.
