Invite colleagues
Like many in our industry, it was with a sense of great relief that I watched the clock tick over into 2010. I was happy to see 2009 vanish – a year that brought little to our profession. It was a year that saw agencies downsize, creativity slump, and media outlets collapse. Unfortunately, we also saw many marketeers demonstrate expertise in the recessionary duck-and-cover maneuver.
Personally, I look forward to seeing a greater emphasis on social media as part of the communications mix in 2010. For those wanting to enhance their social media programs - or who plan to put greater emphasis on social media, I’ve dusted off my crystal ball. It revealed six social media trends you should be planning for in the Year of the Tiger...
Augmented reality changes the way we make decisions
Must be frank – I love augmented reality (AR). There’s something inherently cool in being able to connect the digital and physical worlds via devices such as GPS-enabled smartphones and webcams. Early applications have done everything from telling you< where your nearest Japanese restaurant is (and offering community-based ratings) to letting you try on a pair of new virtual eyeglasses from the comfort of your desk. The opportunity is for PR folks is to figure out how this type of heads up display technology can benefit your clients – and fast!
Corporate journalism fills traditional media vacuum
In spite of media outlet closures, people still want to hear, see or read well-written content. Social media channels give the companies we represent the wonderful ability to fill the growing traditional media story void. They can present their news stories, thought leadership positions, even product information directly to the people they want to influence. The trick is going to be ridding themselves of facile corporate happy-talk and producing content people actually want to consume.
Companies forced to actually speak to their customers
Shock! Horror! The people have spoken and they want conversation. Why is it then that so many companies refuse point blank to talk to their own customers? They’d rather pay bloggers or – heaven forbid – spammers – to own these most critical relationships. I hope 2010 is the year in which Asia Pacific companies realize that social media engagement is the way of the future and empower their staff to interact through blogs, forums and the myriad of other social channels. There might even be some money in it for them....
Web analytics force PR folks to embrace their inner nerds
PR folks aren’t renowned for their skill with numbers. Otherwise they’d be accountants. However they’re going to have to improve their analytical skills if they’re to get anywhere with social media. The greatest argument for social media as a game-changer is using web analytics tools to demonstrate how social media tactics have changed consumer behavior. A myriad of web tools can explicitly show how a forum conversation, blog discussion or Facebook game encouraged an audience to download, vote, view, join or take other bottom-line-impacting actions.
Real time search requires real-time reaction
The growth of Facebook and twitter as search destination has forced the major search engines to incorporate real-time search into their results. Search algorithms still prioritize results based on criteria such inbound and outbound links to quality sites but in parallel they’re showing the latest twitter tweets, news or blog posts. From a PR perspective, this makes the real-time monitoring of these channels even more critical. Regardless of your best SEO efforts, your customers can now see the latest thoughts from the crowd on your company during the same search. These thoughts – no matter how abstract or ill-informed – now have a place of pride on the critical first search engine results page. You need to be ready to respond should the posts warrant it.
Sidewiki helps companies offer an online alternative
One of the greatest fears of social media is the lack of control. Those who publish through blog, micro-blogs, discussion forums or other social channels aren’t bound by journalistic conventions such as corrections, letters to the editor, apologies or take-downs. But with the introduction of Google’s Sidewiki, companies have a digital right of reply. Using this tool, users can make comments that appear alongside a web page – comments that can’t be edited by the page’s owner. Hopefully this advice helps as you bring more social media into your public relations programs. And as the last Chinese New Year firework fizzles out for another year, I raise my glass in toast. May the best of your PR yesterdays be the worst of your PR tomorrows.
- Jeremy
Written on Wednesday, 17 February 2010 22:29 by Jeremy Woolf