Right words make voices resound, and so do wrong words.
Menu
Search
Author: Anchal Nayyar
Anchal Nayyarhttps://anchalnayyar.wordpress.comHello everyone,
I am an M.S. in Public Relations and Corporate Communications candidate at New York University. I hold a Master's degree in Journalism and Mass Communication from Panjab University, India.
Diverse internships have made my journey in the field of communications a memorable one. Some organizations where I interned include CNN-IBN, CorePR, and Straightline.
I have free-lanced various events, conferences, and other PR projects as event coordinator and emcee.
My passion for writing provokes me to start this blog to connect with like-minded, and even not like-minded people, to see the evolving field of PR from multiple angles.
Thank you for visiting my page and sharing your views.
Stay warm.
Anchal Nayyar
Saying “no comments” might have worked in the past, but now it increases the storm all the more. And what about saying something to media “off the record”? Try once and you, most likely, will see that one “off the record” statement blaring in your face the next day. It’s like giving out the secret and expecting others to still keep it.
Why don’t these statements work?
Let’s discuss about “no comments” first. Why is it an ineffective way to respond in crisis? Because employees label it unofficial termination, public perceives it as inactivity, media calls it ignorance, government calls it negligence, and the shareholders call it a doom. Want to know more? Read on.
Brands crave to stay in buzz and “no comments” does give them this, but in the most dreaded form. It converts their dream into a nightmare. Consumers, and even competitors, begin talking about the brand, or we may say begin criticizing the brand. This statement can lead the brand to lose reputation, and even die. Brands might never get a chance soon to restore the damage done due to these two little words.
Now let’s move on to the other juicy statement, “off the record”. Some people just can’t control their tongue. They get trapped when the media flatters them and end up leaking truths off the record. But there’s a spin to this.
Sometimes interviewees intentionally say this statement to add importance to something that they want others to know and don’t want it to get lost in the usual conversation. Isn’t that a very strategic way?
There may be times when saying nothing is the best decision, but any such decision needs careful contemplation. And for this media training is a must. Although effective speaking is an innate talent, media training can go a long way in saving blunders that occur on camera.
What are your opinions about the use of these statements in the present times? Do you think they can help organizations in any way? Or do you think such statements fuel crises?
Blogging is a great way to interact with others and exchange thoughts and ideas. Blogs lead to broadening the horizons of knowledge. But how do we make our blogs popular and increase engagement on them? There are some websites that can be used to attract followers. Some of them are paid. You may or may not get genuine followers, but you do get them.
Bloggers always look for creative ways to enhance visibility and engagement. My blog is still in a nascent stage, but once I publish more posts on it, I would definitely make a move to increase its visibility. How? I scratched my mind for some creative and genuine ways to increase blog visibility and engagement and I am sharing my thoughts with you. Some of these ways you might have heard, some not.
Blog Name: Some considerations for choosing the blog name and URL are:
+ If the blogger is not someone very popular, then it is better to keep a name that might be more popular. You can keep the name of the blog pertaining to the industry or topics you write. The key is using words that are more popular when searched through organic search. This means the name must comprise of simple words.
+ Keep the name easy, memorable, and without too many characters. Too many characters might confuse the readers. Imagine someone who wants to recommend your blog to others, but is unable to do so just because he/she forgot the right character that was to be inserted.
+ Try keeping a name that’s easily distinguishable from other blog names, lest people end up engaging on someone else’s blog.
Blog Content: It is important to understand that content reigns. You might beat trumpets about your blog leading people to land on your page once, but what keeps them coming back is only what you write. To increase interest in reading, it is necessary to break the monotony by using different colors, splitting into paragraphs with sub-heads, bullets, and even quotes. You may also add graphics and infographics to make your data presentation interactive. Adding videos is an interesting way as it saves the labor of reading the post if the viewer is not in a mood to read. Categorization and tags are a must to make the blog look organized and also facilitate discovery through search. If you see that there are views but not many comments, then probably you are just telling the readers, and not asking for their opinions. To engage and compel them to write, you can ask a question or two at the end of the post. This will prompt them to share their views.
Social Media Profiles: The blogger can use his/her social media profiles to enhance blog visibility. He/she can ask a trigger question to excite and increase interest in a particular topic. Then give the link of the blog where the social media reader can go and get an answer to the posed query.
Self-Promotion: There are two ways the blogger can promote his/her blog without sounding arrogant.
+ Strategically embed links of your other relevant posts in the content of the newer posts. This will save repetition on the blog, save words in the post, and also promote other posts.
+ Mention about your blog in your CV and resume. Many young bloggers forget that in the present time of social media, recruiters do like to see how you write on social media.
Commenting: Communication is a two-way process and completes only when your receiver responds. Two ways to engage via comments are:
+ Regularly check your blog to see if there are any comments due for approval. If people write, they want to see it published. If the comments are not published, then they may not comment again. Also, if comments cannot be approved due to a specific valid reason, then the blogger must make it a point to contact the commenter and reason why it wasn’t approved.
+ Comment on blogs of others from your blog ID is a great way to show that you are interested in someone’s writing. It is important to write appropriately on others’ blogs; otherwise they might not approve your comments or even block or defame you in any way. If you comment on others’ blogs appropriately, they might visit your page out of curiosity to see what your blog is about and also comment on your posts.
Personalized Emails: Many people might not know that you have written about something that interests them. They might not be very active on social media. But they might be really interested in a particular topic. The blogger can send personalized emails and messages to invite people to view the blog and share their views. A thank you note after they have visited is a must if you want to keep them in the loop.
Studies show that even journalists check blogs for gauging sentiment about issues related to the public. Brands also make use of blogs to increase the flow of two-way communication internally and externally. But if interest is not driven to read the blog, no one will bother about it. These are some personal thoughts on blog engagement. Do you think it is important to take an initiative to increase visibility or not? What are your views on blog engagement?
Last week, a friend of mine asked me if I could help her explore some creative ways to gather funds for one of the non-profit organizations she is working with. We got down to research to find potential markets, audiences, and creative ways that have been used in the past. We found that some ways which were once popular are no longer effective for grabbing attention to a cause. For example, the method of distributing a crushed and rolled paper instead of a brochure or sending emails or messages to raise awareness for the organization leading to money contribution. Of course, these methods are not outright wrong, it’s just that with the passage of time, people are getting accustomed to such gimmicks and these do not surprise the audiences any more. In order to get attention, it is most important to develop creative surprises to arouse curiosity and then satisfy it.
Although the creative fundraising events can best be designed knowing the organizational goals, yet there are some common activities that we can do in the present times to gain fame for our organization. Here are some tips:
+ Follow hashtags of events and news that align with the aims of your organization. This can be called news jacking in which you tie the organization’s name for promotion to another event. This is quite similar to what the journalists do when they write their features or specials. They have a news peg to attract audiences toward their news.
+ Collaborate with another famous non-profit organization. This is like cross-promoting your events or organization. An average salaried person will not usually take the initiative to donate in many organizations, if he donates at all. When people choose an organization to which they will donate, they usually close their minds to other organizations, thinking they have chosen one and obviously they can’t spend all the money in funding charities. If your non-profit collaborates with another non-profit for mutual benefits, then you will be able to target a wider audience base. You will be able to educate these prospective donators without consuming their extra time. This will position your organization in their minds by aligning it with their existing knowledge and also get you the required funds.
+ Visit schools and educate children about your organization. Children can be the best motivators of their families. They can be the ambassadors of the organization’s messages. If they feel excited about something, they will speak about it, and through children their families will gain awareness about the organization. Children can be given interesting materials to read and through them these materials will reach so many households which otherwise could have been forgotten or difficult to target.
+ Have a blog and promote it through your social media pages. This blog should contain event lists, names of sponsors, pictures, videos, and interesting information about your organization. It should also allow people to ask questions and have their queries resolved through the members of the organization.
+ Develop badges in soft copy for the sponsors, volunteers, members, and other people that are aligned with the organization. These badges can be given to them to be promoted through their individual social media networks. It should be made a completely voluntary task. They should be encouraged that demonstrating that they endorse a non-profit would boost their reputation.
Due to increase in media vehicles and media awareness, promotion has become easy, but persuasive creativity is needed. These were some tips that came to my mind for boosting the awareness of non-profit organizations so that people donate more funds to them. For more ideas, please check the video below that I just found on YouTube. Do you also have any tips to offer? How would you creatively generate funds for non-profits? Please share your views and contribute to the creativity thread.
Why are there some brands that survive more than 100 years old and some that fail within months? Does this mean that the brand initiators of the less surviving brands are not dedicated? Probably they are. Then does this mean that they have less money to dive into expensive gimmicks? But if the product or service is satisfactory, then less expensive gimmicks can compensate. Then what is the reason?
Amongst the “more than 100-year old brands”, some top rated include Coca-Cola, Johnson and Johnson, Kellogg’s, and General Electric. They have not just survived, but excelled in their industries.
By the way, do you know that The Coca-Cola Company and Johnson and Johnson started in the same year? Yes, both these brands came to life in 1886. I am working on an academic project for these companies and I had the opportunity to interview some of my friends who are loyal brand endorsers of Coca-Cola and Johnson and Johnson.
I was keenly looking for answers… I was searching for variety in responses… But at the same time I was searching for sameness. What is common in the two that keeps them going? Some interesting interview responses uncovered thee similarities:
+ Consistency: Humans like predictability. If we have tasted or used some product or service and we like it, we are more likely to choose it over and over again if we derive the same feel out of it. For example: same taste, same aroma, same comfort, same smoothness, and so on.
+ Adaptability: Brand that fail to meet the changing needs of their customers lose their scope of surviving. This does not meet brands compromise on consistency. Brands need to modify their products/services or need to revive their approach to reach their target audience so that they always remain alive. For example: brand packaging, cost modification according to competition, and so on.
+ Availability: A brand that is not easily available and accessible, especially in the early years of its life, can lose out on competitors who are more readily available and better established. Brands may choose to stay in niche markets, but it is important to show readiness to serve consumers.
+ Brand recall: It is important to understand for brands that colors, visuals, name, taglines, characters, and other verbal and nonverbal elements play a crucial role in brand recall. A good brand recall means that the product/service is at the top of the mind of the consumer and he/she will remember the brand’s identity and make the purchase.
+ Memories: It takes time to create memories related to brand, because this aspect goes with brand history. But brands that believe in the above factors are bound to create memories. Brand credibility is enhanced if a brand was used by grandparents, parents, and then children. But memories can also be created if a brand does not have a detailed history. Brands can be associated with memories related to parties, birthdays, anniversaries, and so on. Memories lead to development of emotional connections with the brands that ultimately leads to better brand recall and increase in brand ambassadors.
We are born with brands, they surround us. As we grow in years, some of them stay with us, some wither away, and some even outlive us. Only brands that innovate to adapt to the changing times can mark the benchmarks of brand longevity.
Are you a loyal consumer of any brand? Which one is it and why do you endorse it? What is most important aspect of a brand that compels you to buy it? Share your views and contribute to the pool of thought.
Companies are now learning to believe that employees are not just a stakeholder group. Employees are the company itself. They are the key people who define a company’s success graph. When companies frame communications only for the external publics, they fail to realize that it is internal culture that drives external reputation. Gallup’s 2013 State of the Workforce Study points out that only 30 percent of the U.S. workforce is engaged. And do you know how much does employee disengagement cost? An estimate USD of 450 billion to 550 billion!
Interestingly, there are three categories of employee engagement according to Gallup. They are:
+ Engaged: Employees work with passion and feel emotionally connected to the organization. They create and develop, and are the initiators of innovation to drive the organization ahead.
+ Not Engaged: Employees are basically in a “checked out” mode. They are like sleepwalking through their workday and lack passion and energy. They invest time in their jobs because they have to, but not because they want to.
+ Actively Disengaged: Employees are unhappy and also loudly claim their unhappiness. They lead to bad word of mouth publicity. They undermine the efforts that the engaged employees make to improve the company. They are the toughest to be motivated.
It is a challenge not just to move the disengaged employees upward, that is, into the engaged category, but also to sustain the engagement levels of the employees already engaged. Gallup’s Q12 survey is a great way to find the percentage of employees in an organization that fall into each category.
How to Engage Employees?
Many communication professionals by now know and offer many innovative solutions for employee engagement. To add to that list, I have a few to offer.
+ Crowdsourcing Contests: Companies can conduct social media property audits to assess the company’s existing social media landscape and analyze the discussions that take place on each platform. The key issues identified on each platform can be documented and the internal platforms can be used to crowdsource solutions to the problems. Crowdsourcing refers to throwing out questions to the employees and involving them to generate solutions. It leads to collaborative brainstorming. There may be contests where the best contributors of innovative ideas can win prizes.
+ Soft (copy) Badges: Companies can introduce excellence badges in soft copy forms and provide them to the employees and suppliers who can place these on their social media pages. This technique will enable them connect with the brand even when they are not in the internal corporate setup. Excellence badges can be given on a quarterly basis to employees who contribute innovative ideas or exhibit special skills. Pictures of these employees can be uploaded on the company’s social media platforms as well, like Twitter and Facebook using hashtags.
+ Innovative Day-Off: Employees in each department can be given a paid innovative day-off on a quarterly basis. They may be asked to come to office on these days (but work only on an innovative idea) or stay at home, but contribute to the company’s growth a great idea. These days can be called “great idea days” and the employees can be asked to contribute a valid idea with a one-page proposal stating why they feel an idea would work. This technique can work in cycles, wherein a company may ask the employees to contribute individual ideas one time and work in teams at another time. The best contributions in each cycle and annually can be awarded.
+ Snowball Surveys and Coalitions: Organizations can conduct snowball surveys to find out the most trusted persons by the employees for receiving company information. The most popular and trustworthy sources of information in each department can be identified and their coalition can be formed at each facility. Then organizations can use these coalitions to disseminate messages and expect a higher receptivity of the messages. Coalitions communicate internally through informal channels like lunch or water cooler discussions. These surveys can also be administered in the supply chains and a supply chain coalition can be formed.
Adequate employee engagement through consistent communication is not just the right of the employees, but also the need of the company to achieve greater success. Does your company take the initiative to engage you? If yes, how? Or do you, as an employer, take steps to engage your employees?
References:
The IABC Handbook of Organizational Communication, edited by Tamara L. Gillis
The Credible Company, Communicating with Today’s Skeptical Workforce, by Roger D’Aprix
“Employee Engagement, What’s Your Engagement Ratio” report by Gallup Consulting
This week I met a friend who was updating her Twitter profile because she wanted to make it more interesting. I asked, “Why?” She replied that someone wanted to pay her for tweeting. Now because she wants to sell tweets at a higher price, she was updating her Twitter page. My first reaction: How unethical! What if someday you genuinely support something, but people do not believe in you or your tweet’s authenticity? My second reaction: Influencer marketing! So common, yet so secretive.
The concept of influencer marketing was uncovered in 1940s in the Two-Step Flow Model of Communication by Lazarsfeld. He probably didn’t think how one day a social media kind of thing would take it to different heights. The public relations professionals try to gain influence, ideally, through unpaid influencers. The marketers go a step forward and pay them. If I comment more about payment and non-payment here, I would be reemphasizing that PR and marketing professionals are in a love-hate relationship. (Please refer to my blog post for further detail on this: “PR and Marketing: Competing or Completing?”)
Popular social media tools to determine influencers include Twitalyzer, TweetStats, and PeerAnalytics. I recently explored these and some more. I found Twitalyzer a really effective one. It is more of a quantitative tool, that is, you get numbers, but this makes the data easy to measure and quick to use. Thinking whether you are an influencer or not? Go ahead. Go to the home page of any tool you wish to and just type in your name. This may make you happy to see how popular you are. Then even you may want to sell your tweets! Easy business…is it really? I suggest, think before you endorse.
These quick, and mostly free, databases allow the communication professionals to tap on the inherent power of influencers. Once discovered, an influencer can be turned into the brand’s unofficial mouthpiece. This practice is on the rise and might take some time to reach its saturation point because in real lives these unofficial influencers are great friends, helpers, activists, or simply charming persons that others love to follow or even ape. Human nature makes us look up to people whom we perceive are better than us, our wish to be close to them makes us follow them, and finally our desire to be exactly like them makes us do things that are done by them. This implies that influencer marketing is tied to the basic nature of humans to grow, or look, better. So we can say that this concept is, at least, as eternal as the human race.
Cheers to the discoverer and cheers to all those who contributed to its successful use through social media. Businesses now have something to cling on to even if they are on weak legs.
What is your opinion on this concept? Have you been approached by any brand to be their influencer or do you, in your profession, approach others to be influencers for your brand?
Engagement through social media, or e-engagement, as we may call it, is not just a way to build new contacts now, but also a way to voice your opinions in a time when people want to know your thoughts, but do not have the time to stand and share them with you.
Social contact, through social media or real relationships, is essential for a healthy living. A new study by John Cacioppo, psychology professor at the University of Chicago, reveals that social contact and regular exercise contribute to healthy aging, and also increase life span.
A blaring question here is that social contact now is dominated by social media. And when virtual life dominates the real one, how do you maintain moderation? On the other hand, internet addiction disorder (IAD) is on the rise. North America’s first inpatient clinic for Internet Addiction opened last year at Bradford Regional Medical Center in Pennsylvania. Social media is encompassing everything, but like other technologies, this exciting tool is slowly revealing its dark side.
Saying “I am very social” today has a different connotation from what it had, may be, 10 years ago. At that time “social” meant meeting in-person and sharing physical space. It included enlivening all five sensory functions of our body: touch, smell, sight, and hearing. The “new social” still lacks touch and smell. (I am not counting taste so significantly because I believe this sensory feeling still has personal boundaries to it.)
The social media space is growing each day and posing threats to real relationships. But are these really threats? May be yes, if we forget moderation. If it’s forgotten, we may slowly slip under the IAD scanner. But I fail to understand at times, how should an active social media person draw the line? Is it really a one-person effort?
Once we start using social media, we cannot avoid it. And even if we don’t want to start using it, there are many influencers to get us started. It’s addictive. No wonder why IAD is on the rise. The bottom-line is everyone has to set his/her own personal limits. We need to distinguish the “new social” from “real social”, we need to share physical space, and we need to exercise moderation.
You remember we teach kids about moderation when eating junk? Now we ourselves need to refrain from eating junk: the internet junk. It’s time to re-plan our days with more time for real people.
Let’s get somewhat real! Let’s take out time for the real social. Will you also take out the time to get real or do you prefer sticking to the “new social”? Or will you, like me, try to get, at least, somewhat real?
Public relations and marketing professionals are in a love-hate relationship since ever. With the growth of IMC, the hatred seems to boil down every now and then. If we compare the definitions, the theoretical base, of both the professions, we see an obvious overlap.
The Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) defines PR as: “A strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics.”
The key here is relationship-building.
The American Marketing Association (AMA) defines marketing as: “Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.”
And what can be a similar key here? It’s the exchange of valuable offerings.
There is a hint of commonness in both these definitions. We can join the two keys and say that relationship building occurs when there is an exchange of something that is valuable for the giver as well as the taker.
So how do the two complete each other?
PR and marketing lie on the same continuum, they complete each other. While marketers fulfill the needs of the consumers by offering services and products, the PR professionals communicate to build brand credibility that motivates using or buying those services or products. While marketers give the company measured figures of sales, the PR professionals work on the intangible aspects that account for generation of tangible data that is used by marketing. And while marketers load the social media with exciting ads and product-deals, the PR professionals gather third-party reviews to add authenticity to those deals.
Whose method is it?
It is interesting to note how similar some of the methods that PR and marketing professionals use are. For example, PROs use third-party spokespersons, while marketers use paid endorsers, and PROs use publicity events, while marketers use trade shows.
It might take years for all the academic curriculums to realize that they cannot teach PR or marketing alone. But in the real world, the changing market demands this. The lines between the roles and responsibilities of the two fields are blurring. With multiple periods of recessions and growth in economies, now the companies strive to reach out and make a mark in every possible way. Even if the conflicting PR and marketing teams pass each other with only a grin, in most cases they now realize that it’s not possible without each other.
These are just my views, but what do you believe? Do you think that marketing and PR are shunning borders? Are lines between the two fields blurring, or do they still fall into clearly defined silos?
Word-Voice 
