BUT don’t get too attached folks. As we all know, only a handful of these 30+ new shows will stick around. Ever wonder why networks cancel your favourite show(s) and keep the crappy ones? Me, too. The problem is, your favorite shows might not be my favorite shows… and network television stations (like ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and the CW) depend on mass audiences to survive. That means keeping the shows that attract the broadest audience. It also means disappointing millions of people whose favorite shows don’t make the cut. (I am still mourning the loss of Firefly.)
So how DO ‘they’ decide what shows stay and which ones will take the proverbial long walk off a short pier? It’s not heart. It’s data. Data from a combination of television ratings and social data, such as how it’s trending on Twitter. Ever wonder how television actually ratings work? Check it out on my favourite site: HowStuffWorks.com and start tweeting about your new favourites!
I started this blog to give myself a reason to start writing again. My original intention was to focus on the world of PR and offer some commentary on it. But as time has passed, I feel that this scope has, in fact, limited me. I often struggle with what to post here. Will it be profound? Will it offer value? Does it position me as a knowledge leader? As a result, more times than not, nothing gets posted. Which sorta defeats the point.
So friends, I am widening the scope to encompass all things that I have experienced in my PR life and otherwise. After all it’s my blog and it IS called the Publicist Diaries. I hope you’ll stick with me as I find my way.
Twerking has just become word. And it’s synonymous with Miley Cyrus. Even if you didn’t see her VMA performance, you probably heard about it, read about it, talked about it. And though “What the twerk just happened??!” PR just happened folks. A brilliant publicity stunt.
What IS a publicity stunt you ask? It is a planned event designed to attract attention.
Between twerking (which you can learn here) and her ever present tongue, Miley Cyrus is the center of our attention. She’s the talk of the town. Every town. And with her new album Bangerz coming out soon, it’s the kind of talk that she will soon be cashing in on…
I was reading in the most recent edition of Fast Company, Baratunde Thurston’sarticle how he decided to #Unplug for 25 days. For 25 days he was not on Facebook, Twitter, Four Square or Instagram. There was no peeking on friends’ statuses, no quick FB messages, likes or comments. There were no Instagrams of what he was eating. There were no emails read or sent. He only used his phone to call or text friends to make dates. He focused his time on spending time with friends – in person.
As I read this article, I stared to think about the technology I use daily for business and social. In today’s market, there isn’t really a defining line of when you are “off the clock”, because with our smart phones, we’re always on the clock. This is especially true with us PR folks. Our careers are a lifestyle. If a client sends me a note in the evening, I’ll send a quick reply. I’ll share articles, tweet and re-tweet at all hours. Social networks run 24/7.
This got me thinking about how we interact on a regular basis. I have an iPhone that I use to share content and communicate information daily – from texting, sending emails and tweeting, to managing online communities and sharing thoughts and images through blog posts and Instagram. The least used feature on my phone is well, the phone part. I spend more time texting and sending messages through Facebook to friends than I actually talk to them on the phone. I know I’m not the only one here. We all know that times have changed. But have you paused to think about HOW much it’s changed?
What did we do before we were all so #PluggedIn? Before news alerts were sent to your phone? Before you could stream movies and TV? Before Podcasts? Do you remember how you communicated with friends before social networks? What tools did you use for communicating professionally? How the heck did we engage audiences and get messages out there?
Do you remember:
A time before email?
A time before the personal computer?
Using a typewriter to draft formal communications?
Faxing media releases?
Snail-mailing media kits and party invitations?
Calling people to make plans? Three-way calling? A land line? Corded? Rotary!?
Today we have begun to take for granted the speed at which we communicate. We receive instant gratification by sharing content at the press of one button. We have absorbed this 24/7 culture of consumption into our daily lives without even noticing.
There’s an analogy about how if you want to boil a frog you have to slowly raise the water temperature so it doesn’t notice. If you toss one into a boiling pot, it will leap immediately out. That is what has happened to us with social media. The number of tools has risen at a steady pace; and as we adopt more of them into our daily lives, we start to boil without even realizing it. Until one day we do. Then we do just as Thurston did and temporarily #Unplug…
With new social media channels and sharing sites popping up, it’s easy to jump from one new thing to the next. Especially when you’re an early adopter. But what happens after your initial interest in the property wanes or you decide that the channel just isn’t for you? You stop updating information and forget about it as you move on to the next hot thing.
You may have forgotten about it, but Google hasn’t. Now think about what happens when you are applying for a new job. If someone does an online search of your name does that old information pop up? Does this older information enhance your profile or does it detract? While it’s great to have an archive of your achievements easily accessible for prospective employers and clients, some of the information that is forgotten online can detract from your brand. I’m sure your prospective employer got a kick out of your pics on your now de-funked – and very public – MySpace account.
We joke about people who Google their dates before meeting them in person, but employers do this on a regular basis too. So friends, when was the last time you Googled yourself?
As I am currently looking for a job, I regularly do searches on myself to see what content a perspective employer might come across. What usually pops up are my recent Twitter posts, my LinkedIn profile, links to this blog, Pinterest, old press releases that I sent out and such. And then there’s the other stuff…. There is the Slideshare account I signed up for to so I could access a presentation; my abandoned Classmates info; and an outdated version of my online resume courtesy of Visualze.me (which is now up to date!)
Managing your online and social brand is never ending. So what’s a professional to do? Here are some tips to get your started:
Be selective of which new social sites you participate in. Don’t jump on every new thing just because it’s new.
If you jumped on the new thing and it’s not for you, shut down or deactivate your account.
In case you just missed that tidbit: SHUT DOWN YOUR ACCOUNT if you are no longer using it. You can reactivate most accounts if you change your mind.
If you have negative or outdated content that is not within your control to remove, start posting new content that is representative of your brand. This will help to drive the outdated stuff farther down in searches.
Be mindful of what you publicly share. Be mindful of what you privately share, because once something is shared; it is really no longer private… and the Internet never forgets. (She says in booming ‘movie voice-over’ voice…)
As we focus more on electronic media for communications, we have tossed aside some tried and true tactics that should be part of our “go-to” tools. Let’s talk about the value of Guerrilla Marketing – getting publicity through local unconventional marketing activities to make people sit up and take notice. Jay Conrad Levinson, author of the 1984 book Guerrilla Marketing and creator of term, describes the soul and essence of guerrilla marketing as “achieving conventional goals, such as profits and joy, with unconventional methods, such as investing energy instead of money.” Guerrilla marketing can make a far more valuable impression than traditional forms of advertising and marketing. This is because most guerrilla marketing campaigns aim to strike the audience at a more personal and memorable level.
Here’s ten easy to execute guerrilla marketing ideas to try right now:
1. Of course old fashion PR always works! If it didn’t, we’d all be unemployed. But times have changed from just picking up the phone and pitching to every journalist. It’s about developing mutually respectful relationships so that when you do need them to pick up the phone, they will. So do your research. Follow them on Twitter. Read their stories and blogs. Learn the types of stories each journalists covers so you are pitching the right angle to the right person.
2. Create an event. It can be a high-end launch party where you invite local media to mix and mingle. It can be a public BBQ. It can be a flash mob. It can be a street team. Just do something!
3. Find a champion to promote your message. Charities, which are usually challenged with low budgets, use this tactic all the time. Find an important influencer in your sector or local celebrity and leverage their fame, endorsement and connections to get noticed.
4. Network. This one is terrifying to some people. But trust me, people still do it because it works. So leave your desk, grab a wing man and start going to local events.
5. Contests! And you can blend old and new by using social media to run it.
6. Write your website in chalk on streets and parkades outside major related events.
7. Brand your vehicle with a decal or removable magnet.
8. Do posters on street poles still work? Yes! Yes they do. Modernize by adding QR codes.
9. Be your own billboard with temporary tattoos or t-shirts. One of my fav’s was a wedding photographer’s shirt that said ‘I Shoot Brides’.
10. Swag. Chachkas. Tchotchkes. Promo items. Whatever you all them, people love them.
We’ve just dipped our toe into the ocean of ideas. The limit is really our imagination. Guerrilla marketing is more about hard work and creativity than dollars spent.
My introduction to marketing and branding came at an age when I didn’t even know what that meant. It all started with Madonna and her 1984 hit “Like a Virgin” that propelled her to global recognition after topping the Billboard Hot 100 chart for six consecutive weeks. The song created a huge controversy with complains that it promoted premarital sex and undermined family values; and Madonna’s attitudes and opinions on sex, nudity, style and sexuality forced the public to sit up and take notice. I did; and became an immediate fan. I sang her songs into my ‘microphone’ hairbrush, dressed like her and even dressed the family dog like her.
Madonna’s rise to fame came at a pivotal time in the music industry. MTV had just been launched and as a result artists with strong ‘visual appeal’ (read: good looking) were pushed into the spotlight. Early on Madonna recognized that she could use music videos and MTV to establish her popularity.
Lesson #1: Utilize communications tools faster and better than anyone else.
Madonna’s use of shocking sexual imagery kept her in the media forefront, from risque music videos to her elaborate performances on stage. At the first MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs), she stunned audiences by performing ‘Like a Virgin’ on top of a giant wedding cake while wearing a wedding dress and white gloves, which MTV rated as one of the most iconic performances in VMA history.
Lesson #2: Don’t be afraid to break the rules when needed. What have you done lately to stand out?
Madonna consistently uses her music and image to influence the masses into believing that she is the authoritative knowledge on trends. Right from the beginning of her career, she expertly combined her fashion style, performances and videos to influence audiences. Her style became one of the top female fashion trends of the 1980s with lace tops, skirts over Capri pants, fishnet stockings, crucifixes, arm loads of bracelets and bleached hair.
Lesson #3: Know your brand. Work your brand.
Known for continuously reinventing both her music and image to remain relevant, Madonna is not ‘just another pop star’. Her continual reinvention is one of her key cultural achievements. By working with upcoming talented producers and new artists, she successfully remains at the center of media attention. Her’s approach to music was far from the “find a winning formula and stick to it” approach. Her musical career has been a continuous experimentation. Madonna has never rested on her laurels. And neither should you.
Lesson #4: Evolution is necessary for survival. Don’t do what you’ve always done, just because it’s what you’ve always done. What works today, might not work tomorrow… And we’re back to the Will Rogers quote: “Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.”
Madonna is iconic. She is attributed to providing the creative freedom that today’s female pop stars enjoy thanks to the trail she blazed in the early 80s. It’s hard to imagine today, but there was a time when Madonna was seen as an inauthentic product of pop culture and an artistic lightweight. If you were to believe all the talk in the mid-‘80s, Madonna would not have lasted beyond her “Like A Virgin” era. However, the career she carved out for herself made it possible for virtually every other female pop singer to follow and in doing so, she redefined the parameters of pop music.
Lesson #5: Know what you stand for. Be original. Carve out your own path.
You may argue that Madonna is not the greatest performer/singer/dancer in the world. But her staying power, appeal and influence can’t be denied. She is a successful musician and a businesswoman. Her creative approach to marketing has always been bold leaps rather than baby steps.
As Madonna once said, “[It’s] better to live one year as a tiger, than a hundred as a sheep…”
PR is a highly credible form of promotion. One of its key points of power is establishing credibility for a product, company or person in the minds of targeted customer groups by capitalizing on the influence of a third-party – the media. Hiring a professional communicator to conduct your PR is always money well spent, as we know how to target information to have the most impact with the press and the public.
However, the perception as to the amount of influence that we have is sometimes greater than reality. While we excel at promotion and yield high results, I’m sad to have to burst our reputation bubble. PR professionals are not magicians. We don’t have magic wands that we can wave to make stories magically appear the night after you hire us. The reality is, no matter how compelling the story, we can’t make a reporter write about your company, product, and/or event. Frustrating isn’t it? After all, you hired us to make the magic happen.
So let’s talk about what PR pros can do…
We can provide an outside, objective perspective, which can help to identify new angles and opportunities that might have been missed. We can help find, and define, your story/message and finesse it so that it’s told in the right way to the right people. We focus on media outlets that speak to a client’s core demographic rather than sending press releases to every publication under the sun. We use social media every single day to get the word out about clients, to communicate with customers and to respond to questions or problems.
But results take time. Unless you’ve partnered with Facebook or Google on a new venture or have discovered the cure for Cancer, chances are that reporters will not be chomping at the bit when your story is pitched. But fear not! If done right, there will be some nuggets that will perk up a reporter’s ears – but it takes time for most stories and opportunities to reach fruition.
PR is the result of hard work by skilled professionals – not a parlor trick.
If you’ve ever watch the TV show Gilmour Girls, you’ve already understood what I’m saying here. For those of you who have never watched it, you missed out on Lorelai Gilmore’s great phrase to express your frustration at any given situation: Oi with the poodles already!
We all have THOSE DAYS. You know which ones I’m talking about. Those days where you wake up on the wrong side of the bed, can’t get your butt in gear despite circling around the proverbial airport because you, ironically, also can’t seem to sit still.
Oi with the poodles already!!
On days such as this, here’s what I do to attempt to refocus myself:
1. If you can’t focus on the task at hand, take a break from it. Do something else…. anything else that will make you feel productive. Vacuum, wash your floors, wash your windows. Give your pet a bath. Now check it off the to-do list that you haven’t written.
2. Write the to-do list. Pick another task and check it off. BTW, checking your Facebook account doesn’t count.
3. Go back to your original task and focus on it for 15 minutes. Hopefully, that 15 minutes will turn into however long it takes to get the job done. But if at the 15 minute mark you are mentally spent. Well then, you’re done for the day. Move onto something else… like a glass of wine.
If there is one thing that can generate a discussion, it is asking someone about their television viewing habits. The typical knee-jerk response is that they don’t watch much at all. As the discussion continues, it is only then that their true viewing habits are revealed: “I don’t watch much TV at all… except for this show and that show…” Love it or hate it. I know you watch TV. I do too. Statistics show that the average Canadian watches 16.9 hours of television a week. Although television remains the predominant mass communications device worldwide, consumption patterns have changed as new technologies have entered the market. Apparently, we are still watching our favorite shows. But how we watch them is changing.
Let me start with this: I have a love-hate relationship with television. I love watching it, but I hate watching it. For six years I worked at a television station doing their PR. I had a television in my office so that I could monitor our channel. So for eight hours a day, I watched TV. I watched it on-air. I watched it being created in the studio. I watch it from the control room as the director called out camera shots to the crew. I watched the product placement, the scripting and a slew of other technical and creative aspects. I watched how a show came to life. I watched how the producer determined the content of a live show. I watched how the director lead a team of cameramen, floor directors, production assistants, audio, video and graphics teams to fulfill the creative vision.
When my workday was done, I went home… and watched more TV.
Television shows were an obvious choice for water cooler discussions. Whether you work at a TV station or not, one can agree that discussing TV shows is an easy way to bond with new people as you get to know one another. In fact, one of my close friends and I met, and instantly bonded, over our love for Buffy The Vampire Slayer. However watching all this TV came at a price. I wasn’t reading as many books. I wasn’t practicing my violin. And, if I’m being honest here, I wasn’t really using my brain as much. Like many people, I like to watch TV to “zone out” when I’m feeling drained after a long workweek. I want to spend time with my “friends” on CSI solving cases. I want to explore freakish events as part of the Fringe team. And although I am solving these cases alongside these characters, television is still remains a passive medium. It doesn’t ask me to do anything other than to turn it on. But too much television viewing made me sluggish. It was time to shut it off.
After conducting what I’m sure were many costly studies, broadcasters realized that during the summer months, people watch less TV. So the traditional viewing season now ends as the warm weather beckons us out to play. I noticed that during these summer months, I am a happier person. The effects from the added Vitamin D aside, I recognized that this was in part because I was watching less television. I read more books. I socialized with friends more. I had more ‘free time’ as I was not tied to a broadcast schedule.
Over the years my personal viewing habits have evolved as technology has evolved. The creation of the DVR/PVR has freed us from the traditional broadcast schedule and allows me to watch my shows when I want. My time has become my own again… and I feel liberated. As newer options to view content are growing, audiences, such as myself, are now able to choose how, when and where we receive content. I now have the option to watch show on my iPad, phone or laptop. I can get programming through Netflix and iTunes. I rarely, if ever, watch live television.
For me, my love-hate relationship with television comes down to finding balance. It’s about watching my favourite shows – guilt free – by ensuring that my viewing habits do not cannibalize other aspects of my life. It’s about the freedom to choose when I watch these shows.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to watch True Blood.
The Publicist Diaries 