I just read that Conan O’Brien opened a Twitter account today… the fever is going strong! I just followed him and noticed that already over 164,000 are following his one tweet of the day… something about how he interviewed a squirrel in his backyard. Clearly, this is a media personality that has impact.
That whole debacle with the Tonight Show was unbelievable from a media perspective. Yes, we know it’s all about ratings for stations. That’s why it is so sad.
Tags: coco fever, conan o'brien, tonight show
Posted in Integrated Marketing Communications, Media Relations, PR, social media | 1 Comment »
Hotels are increasingly securing a healthy presence on Facebook and Twitter - the two main social networks that make sense to be on… today (this post may be completely outdated in a month, that is how fickle social media are).
Assuming you have someone in-house, or an independent PR pro who is dedicated to monitoring, updating and overseeing your social media accounts, you should ask yourself: is that enough?
Posting one update a day may be consistent, but probably not enough to start truly engaging conversations. Determine what your goals are from your presence on social media. Then, find what makes your guests talk… if it is your restaurant’s specials, talk about them. If it is a seasonal drink at the bar, or an exciting amenity (yoga comes to mind!) reach out and get some feedback. The more you think in terms of your fans and followers, the higher the post quality on your pages.
Good pages inspire fans to create new social media groups to continue and carry on the conversation, to make it as viral as possible. Invest in the right professional to oversee your social media campaign, and have your finger on the pulse to evaluate its success.
Tags: facebook and hotels, hospitality pr, hotel pr, pr professionals, social media pr 2010, social media trends 2010, Twitter and hotels, yoga in hotels
Posted in European Destinations, Hospitality, Integrated Marketing Communications, Media Relations, PR, Top Accommodations, social media | No Comments »
An old article in INC. touched on this topic and inspired the blog post (though I keep reading about the issue in other outlets since then).
Several times throughout my career as a PR practitioner I have received inquiries from prospective clients wanting to hire me on a pay-per-placement arrangement. In such a project, the PR person and the client develop a wish list of media to land a story/mention/feature in, and depending on the success of securing that placement, PR gets paid.
The downfall is that your effort could be for nothing… you could be trying to land a story in the NY Times and the editor just won’t bite, because it’s not the right fit (even though your client thinks it is!). Or, worst -this has happened to me- the story gets pulled out at layout because of lack of space. So, you’ve wasted weeks of effort, and you’re not getting paid for your time, or your frustration. Hmm, no thank you.
I tried that approach when I first started out on my own, and stopped accepting such ridiculous projects. I work with a continuous strategy in mind, not a piecemeal messaging approach. Indeed, companies should see results from retainer-based PR professionals. However, if I’m spending 25 hours a week thinking about a business, coming up with angles, ideas, new ways to approach a message, or making shifts in the communications strategy, why on earth would I do that for free?
Perhaps there some cases where pay-for-press might make sense (e.g., a very specific type of product of service), but even those can backfire. Suppose you land the story in Newsweek as expected. Now, the client has to pay you, say, 15K for the placement. What now? What’s the next step in the PR process? How do you take that placement and move forward with the PR strategy now that it’s reached a new level? Oh, that’s right, you’re not getting paid to think about that. On the other hand, you could have been on retainer for six months with that 15K, and earned not only the Newsweek story, but lots of other placements - big or small. You could have created momentum for your client, not a one hit wonder. Not to mention, you’d have a PR plan to follow… and a predictable payment schedule.
It’s not a case of “are you a pro, or an amateur?’ It’s how you approach your business as a PR person and how you value your own effort when you service a client. And clients who pay-for-placement in many cases have high expectations (as they should), but very low budgets.
PR is a process and an important communications investment, and best not ordered à la carte.
Respect our profession. Build your own menu carefully with thought as a chef would, don’t just prep a dish.
Tags: inc. magazine, pay for placement, pr and hotels, pr practitioners pay, pr pros, pr retainers, pr strategy, small pr businesses, social media PR, strategic pr campaigns
Posted in European Destinations, Hospitality, Integrated Marketing Communications, Media Relations, PR, Top Accommodations, social media | 1 Comment »
If you had asked me as little as six months ago, I’d tell you that yoga is not for me, that I can find other ways to relax my mind and seek physical and emotional discipline. Fast forward to today, and I can’t imagine not including yoga practice in my life, even if I’m traveling.
Enter Michelle Higgins’ fabulous New York Times article on hotels offering yoga as an amenity for guests. First, it was wi-fi, then free DVD libraries, and fitness salons. Now, yoga is a sought-after amenity in hotels. Most of us who travel look up places near where we are staying so we can plan our yoga practice. However, that’s not always very conducive, so hotels have picked up on that need and are offering classes on property as part of their spa services. Of course, you can’t be particularly picky about the style of yoga offered (I can’t expect to find the hot yoga I practice in hotels), so a typical flow yoga class would fulfill the guests’ need.
There’s a big PR opportunity here for hotels to act on this emerging amenity trend. Whether it’s the frequency of the yoga classes, or the type of yoga, or even if its offered complimentary for the business traveler (I’d take yoga over free breakfast!), there is a conversation going on that hotels can successfully moderate to their advantage.
Tags: hospitality pr, hotel trends 2010, hotels and PR, luxury amenities, spa and yoga in hotels, yoga and travel, yoga hotel amenity, yoga in hotels
Posted in European Destinations, Hospitality, Integrated Marketing Communications, Media Relations, PR, Top Accommodations, social media | 4 Comments »
Last year, I wrote a post about how social media had become a part of our daily lives as PR people, and why embracing the dynamic would be crucial to our success and our clients’ success.
Just under a year later, I’m finding that social media take about 50% of my time, on average, versus traditional media relations. Since social media are so versatile they are used for other functions of IMC, such as advertising, online marketing, and other marcomm areas. Depending on the client, monitoring and working on social media (Facebook, Twitter, blogs) have become more than just part of my checklist. They are a priority since social media networks make messages viral, and it has come to PR pros to not only understand the functions of various social media, but how to work with them effectively. But, the spectrum is evolving daily. What worked a couple of months ago, won’t be as popular soon on FB. Discussions grow or are quickly abandoned on Twitter. Driving good website traffic is challenging with so much “garbage” posted out there. And now I’ve been reading more and more about Ning, www.ning.com. Hold that thought for a couple of months… perhaps this will be the new network to be on. Though I’ve been reading that Ning is not competing with FB at all.
Regardless, all of these networks are tireless monsters that must be fed often several times a day. As PR people, we constantly need to be alert and on our toes and keeping up with social media chew up a lot of time. In that effort, we’re also learning when to shy from information, and when to share it.
Sometimes I just miss writing a press release… and I fondly think of my BU professors, who kept reminding us of how many spaces we should have between the sub-headline and the main body. Wait, that was less than decade ago…so much in PR and publishing has changed since then.
Tags: ning emerging social network, ning pr, online writing PR, pr checklist social networking, social media and PR, social media writing
Posted in European Destinations, Hospitality, Integrated Marketing Communications, Media Relations, PR, Top Accommodations, social media | No Comments »
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