I have been toying for a while with the idea of a short weekly video that goes into a little more detail on one of the hotter items I plan to include in my Friday Wrap, which I use to curate items of interest to communicators that have been published in the last week..
Each Friday afternoon, Shel Holtz publishes Friday Wrap, a quick-scan summary of the previous week’s articles and happenings in the world of communications and marketing that stood out for Shel.
Shel is well-known as one of the earliest and most prolific podcasters about public relations. He started the FIR podcast with Neville Hobson in 2005 and has been podcasting without break since then. Two years ago, he built on the success of FIR to create the FIR Podcast Network, which distributes a range of podcasts about topics of interest to communicators. (Disclosure: The podcast that I co-host with Gini Dietrich and Martin Waxman is an FIR podcast.)
Now, Shel is experimenting again. He has launched a weekly video podcast, Shrink Wrap. Think of it as a video version of Shrink-Wrap. The curation and judgment that goes into assembling the stories featured in the written version of Shrink Wrap, but with the ability to convey Shel’s personality. Yes, there’s a lot of additional information in an expression or tone of voice.
Take a look. Subscribe. I’m sure you’ll find it’s a worthwhile commitment of five minutes a week of your time.
Snapchat is more than ephemeral with Memories. Pokemon Go rules the world. And we pick up on Walt Mossberg’s discussion of our fragmented messaging environment. Gini Dietrich,Martin Waxman and Joseph Thornley tackle these topics and more on Inside PR 449.
#IPRMustKnow
Snapchat Memories for when ephemeral isn’t enough
Hard on the heels of news that Snapchat has surpassed Twitter in daily users, we say Snapchat switch from its ephemeral-always model to provide users with the ability to save their Snaps using a new feature, Snapchat Memories. Memories lets you save current and previous Snaps and then use them for future stories. So, now you never need to worry people missing that embarrassing photo of your best friend that you sent out 25 hours ago. You can reach into Memories, add the photo to a new story, and start the cycle all over again.
Pokemon Go Goes
Like virtually everyone else this past week, we have been entranced by Pokemon Go. For its privacy implications. And because it has brought the potential of augmented reality to the masses. It may be a fad. But it’s a fad that will have made a difference.
Here an App. There an App. Everywhere an App
It was simple in the days of email: Just settle on your client – Outlook, AOL… and then add all your email accounts to access them in one place. Today, as we spend more of our time on chat, with proprietary, non-interchangeable standards, we are again facing the need to switch constantly between apps – for social networks, for chat. Pain the butt? We riff on a theme recently explored by Walt Mossberg in a blog post, The Tyranny of Messaging and Notifications, and on his podcast, Ctrl-Walt-Delete.
Twitter brings easy analytics to your mobile device. YouTube plays catch up in livestreaming video. And we ask why, after all these years, integrated marketing communications isn’t the norm. Gini Dietrich,Martin Waxman and Joseph Thornley tackle these topics and more in this week’s Inside PR podcast.
#IPRMustKnow
Twitter Engage brings Twitter analytics to the masses
Twitter just made it a whole lot easier to track analytics like follows, @mentions, retweets, and video views, with the launch of Twitter Engage, a new iOS app. Real-time monitoring in your hand. The app launched on iOS in the US-only. You can hear the collective sigh of disappointment from Twitter addicts in the rest of the world.
YouTube Livestreams from your mobile
Livestreaming videos to YouTube from your mobile is about to be possible. YouTube announced at VidCon that it is testing livestreaming with select publishers. Available to the rest of us soon. With YouTube’s huge catalogue of videos that we already have uploaded, it’s going to be competitive with both Facebook Live Videos and Periscope. Does that mean that I have to buy a third phone to livestream events to all three services?
Integrated Marketing Communications: Many are called. Not all answer.
Gini Dietrich wrote in a blog post that, with the proliferation of platforms and the need to integrate ephemeral and chat channels, integrated marketing communications is more important than ever. We’re all heard the term integrated marketing communications for over a decade. Independent agencies seem to have embraced integration. PR agencies in particular have moved to the PESO – Paid, Earned, Shared, Owned – model. So, why isn’t integrated marketing communications practised each and every day? We talk about the impact of tight communications budgets and the persistence of silos within corporate marketing and communications functions. We also look at the legacy of separate profit centres in holding company agencies. The need to maximize returns for individual centres may work at odds with making integrated marketing communications a daily way of life for people working in holding company networks.
Major media outlets launch sponsored content with their Facebook Instant Articles and Jason Keath takes us through the highlights of Social Fresh’s Future of Social research report. Gini Dietrich,Martin Waxman and Joseph Thornley tackle these topics and more in this week’s Inside PR podcast.
#IPRMustKnow
Sponsored Content on Facebook Instant Articles
Neiman Labs reports that two heavyweight traditional news outlets, the Washington Post and The Atlantic, have begun running sponsored content in their Facebook Instant Articles. Happily, the illustration in the Nieman Labs story suggests that the content will be clearly labelled as “Sponsor Content.” I tried to verify that by reviewing my own newsfeed. However, I couldn’t find a single sponsored article from either the Washington Post or The Atlantic. That makes me think that either this sponsored content is so far very rare or Facebook is geotargeting the ads and my Canadian IP address puts me outside of the target area for them.
Jason Keath, Founder of Social Fresh
Jason Keath is the CEO of Social Fresh, which recently released The Future of Social, a report based on research involving over 500 social media managers and executives. Gini tracked him down and interviewed him about the report and the lessons we can take from it. Among the highlights:
Companies that invest in social media tools achieve a greater return than those who don’t.
95% of respondents using social media software report a positive ROI on their social media activities vs. 63% who are not investing in tools.
Social media is best at connecting with existing audiences, customers, strongest leads, fans and stakeholders. Building awareness through social media can be an expensive proposition.
To increase leads and sales, focus more time on fewer pieces of content. For example, Social Fresh invests heavily both in their research and the conference. This enables them to stand out by being deeper and offering more unique insights.
Take your audience up the commitment curve. Ask little of them at the beginning. Reading a post. Downloading a paper. Registering. Then work them up the curve to larger commitments.
Instagram is on the verge of leapfrogging LinkedIn and Twitter to become the second largest ad platform.
Marketers report satisfaction with the results they are achieving with video content and they plan to increase their commitment to it in the coming year.
Is podcasting on the verge of tipping from a creator-driven medium to an advertiser-driven channel? UNU predicts the trends. Microsoft gets LinkedIn. And crises bring out the best in both social and mainstream media. Gini Dietrich,Martin Waxman and Joseph Thornley tackle these topics and more in this week’s Inside PR podcast.
#IPRMustKnow
Midroll acquires Stitcher
A big deal by podcasting standards. Podcast advertising broker Midroll has acquired Stitcher. I think that independent podcasters have reason to worry that, if successful, Midroll/Stitcher will do to podcasting what Facebook did to the open Web. Martin and Gini are still making up their minds about this. Whatever your view, if you care about podcasting, this is an #IPRMustKnow.
The news that Microsoft is acquiring LinkedIn broke just before we recorded this episode. So here you get our first impressions of the potential benefits and downsides of Microsoft’s integration of LinkedIn with its Office suite.
Crisis brings out the best in us
Finally, in the wake of the Orlando shootings, we reflect on the current state of crisis communications, how news flows through social media and the important role of mainstream media to establish context, discern authoritative, credible witness testimony and curate the reports from social media.
Chatbots, Snapchat, PR misadventures and Mary Meeker’s Internet trends. Gini Dietrich,Martin Waxman and Joseph Thornley tackle these topics and more in this week’s Inside PR podcast.
#IPRMustKnow
Chatbots – Destination or Waypoint?
It’s been a month since Facebook introduced Chatbots at F8. Martin reports on his experience with the CNN chatbot. Interesting. For sure. Useful. Not as good as it could be. But Facebook is doing its best to keep you inside its ecosystem of apps. Digiday reported this assessment of CNN’s experience with its Facebook Messenger Chatbot.
Snapchat changes the Discover feature to help publishers attract attention
It was telegraphed by Snapchat. Previewed by publishers. And now it’s here for all of us. The Snapchat Discover feature has been overhauled to a more magazine-like appearance. The hope is that the replacement of the small, circular icons with larger tiles including both text and images will give publishers a better platform to attract attention from Snapchat users.
You know you’re in trouble when the PR person becomes the story
Good PR people advise, prepare and support. But we know that media want to hear the words from the mouth of the principal. I’m sure every PR adviser has a story of having watched even the most well-prepared client get tripped up and make a mistake in an interview. But as PR pros, we’ve held out tongue and dealt with it after the fact. Few of us would dream of stepping in front of the camera or intervening to order a live recording stopped. After all, once the recording starts, isn’t it all fair game? Well, this week we have an example of what happens when a PR person loses sight of the fact that a recording of an interview is the media outlet’s to with as they please. The headline of the article from KWTX news tells you all you need to know: “Question leads to awkward interruption during Starr interview.”
Advertisers are still spending too much on traditional advertising. The big opportunity will go to those who master mobile advertising.
Facebook and Google are even more dominant in advertising and distribution. And Facebook is charging ahead.
Facebook, with both Messenger and WhatsApp, is dominating in the fast growing messaging area.
Not all is bad news for Twitter, as the average daily time on Twitter has increased.
With over 10 billion views per day on each of Snapchat and Facebook, video live streaming is mainstreaming. As Martin says, we’ve gone from live to live – live TV to live streaming.
Are you using the PESO – paid, earned, shared, owned – model of PR? Trying to understand why Google is introducing another new chat app? Trying to figure our how to use Apple’s new Podcasts Connect portal. Or just trying to protect your PR company from defamation litigation arising from online activity?
In this week’s #IPRMustKnow segment, we talk about Google’s announcement of Allo and Duo. Allo is an intelligent chat app. Duo is a new one to one video calling app. They will be added to Google’s existing Messenger and Hangouts app, giving Google a total of four messenger apps in the market. (Did we say Google+? Not really, as it looks like G+ is continuing its long fadeaway.) We talk about what Google is up to. Why new apps when it has two reasonably successful apps already in the market? The answer seems to lie in the integration of Google’s intelligent assistant. But with all the churn in apps, has it lost the trust of people? Has it lost the sheen of the new that enabled newer entrants like Instagram and Snapchat to catch on. Can a middle-aged Google compete with the new and lean startups that have come up? Or will its huge database of knowledge about us give it an unassailable advantage in the era of the intelligent assistant.?
Protecting your company against defamation litigation
If you are an online publisher, you may find yourself on the wrong side of a defamation lawsuit. Gini points us to an article in PR Week by Michael Lasky of law firm Davis & Gilbert. Practical advice for the firm with a problem.
Understanding Apple’s Podcasts Connect Portal
If you’re a professional communicator, the odds are that you are creating a podcast or are considering starting a podcast. iTunes is the channel through which most people receive their podcasts. And it also has a reputation among podcasters to be demanding and unforgiving in setting up and maintaining podcasts. Recently, Apple has introduced Podcasts Connect, a new portal through which podcasters register and list their podcasts through iTunes. And as an illustration of nothing is ever as straightforward as it should be or may appear to be, reports have bounced around social media about podcasters messing up their podcast listing on iTunes as a result of changes they have made via Podcasts Connect. Happily, we have YouTube. And Libsyn, one of the leading podcast hosting services (ProPR.ca is hosted on Libsyn) has posted an “Explaining Podcasts Connect” explainer video. Libsyn’s Krystal O’Connor walks through the functions of Podcasts Connect and shows how to use each. A great resource for newbie or experienced podcasters alike.
The PESO – Paid, Earned, Shared, Owned – Model of PR
Social licence is a frequently-used, but little-understood term. It is referenced often in the debate around energy projects, especially in Canada.
So, if you’ve heard the term and wondered where it came from (coined in 1997 by mining executive Jim Cooney) and why people on opposite sides seem to be attaching a meaning to it that supports their own perspective, you’ll want to read “How social licence came to dominate the pipeline debate in Canada,” by The Canadian Press. It includes interviews with Jim Cooney, as well as advocates on both sides of the proponent/citizen divide.
Early data on the performance of Facebook Instant articles. Periscope makes videos permanent. Donald Trump does something that crosses the ethical line for PR pros. And we look at the deeper issues underpinning the discussion about Facebook’s Trending Topics.
Publishers are reporting mixed results with Facebook Instant Articles, according to Digiday. They are driving traffic, but it is less engaged. Nevertheless, revenue is flowing to publishers. So, Instant Articles as a publishing platform isn’t going away anytime soon.
Periscope is about to make videos permanent with save settings in its app. This is big news. Facebook Live Videos gained a huge advantage over Periscope by making it easy for people to save their videos. By making it easy for users to save their videos beyond the current 24 hour expiry date, Periscope will even up the playing field.
In our main discussion, we turn our attention to lack of transparency in how Facebook’s Trending Topics are selected. This is a far reaching and important issue. It’s about Facebook’s emergence as a media outlet. It’s about dominance of one player. It’s about the level of transparency necessary so that we can assess bias. And it’s about the additional obligation to transparency and scrutiny that Facebook should now be subject to.
During our discussion, we cite several sources that you should read in order to have the facts to make up your own mind about what is at stake:
We’re belatedly celebrating the tenth anniversary of the Inside PR podcast. Terry Fallis and David Jones posted the first episode of Inside PR on April 3, 2006. Back then the tag line was “Inside PR: Going deep on the state and future of public relations.” After recording 200 episodes, Terry and David decided that they’d said all that they wanted to say. But they didn’t retire the podcast. Instead they passed it along to Martin Waxman, who had been co-hosting with Terry and David. Martin, in turn, brought Gini Dietrich and Joseph Thornley in as new co-hosts. And thanks to Terry and David’s benevolence, the Inside PR podcast now has been running continuously for over ten years. That’s a record of longevity that we’re proud of. And we’re not thinking of stopping anytime soon.
Also this week, we give a shout out to original co-host Terry Fallis, who has just been shortlisted for the Leacock Medal for his novel, Poles Apart. Terry has won the Leacock award twice before, for his first novel, The Best Laid Plans, and for his fourth novel, No Relation. The award winner will be announced on June 11. So check your Twitter feed on the evening of June 11 and send Terry your best wishes.
If your practice touches on public participation or digital engagement, the IAP2 North American Conference in Montreal in September may be for you. Members of the IAP2 – the International Association of Public Participation – from the United States and Canada will gather in Montreal for three days of speakers and panels on public participation best practices and case studies. I attended last year’s conference in Portland and found it to be a unique learning opportunity. And this year, I’ll be not only learning, but also sharing some of what I know in a session titled, “Reaching the People at the Back of the Room: Using Online Engagement for More Inclusive Public Participation.”
Also this week, we talk about the Counselors Academy Conference that Martin attended in Puerto Rico. Martin’s big takeaway from the conference was the continuing trend for PR agencies to integrate design, video, paid media and other disciplines as the traditional silos of creative, advertising, PR and content converge.
While at the Counselors Academy Conference, Martin interviewed one of the keynote speakers, Duncan Wardle, Vice President of Creative Inc., Disney Parks and Resorts’ creative think tank. He offers some great advice for priming creativity in our own organizations.
