Let’s do a short public relations checkup on your business.  First, take a quick inventory of your current PR and marketing activities.  These activities may include news releases, your blog, e-books, white papers, research reports, newsletters, sales letters, Web videos, social media marketing, etc.

Of those activities:

1) What portion is dedicated to attracting new business?
2) What portion is dedicated to keeping your current customers happy?

If you answered 50-50, you’re golden!  But what if your answer was 75-25% or even 100-0%?

It is an understandable mistake to focus one’s PR efforts entirely upon the front end of the sales cycle.  After all, as a marketer, it is your job to bring in the business.  But if you are not cultivating your existing customer relationships through your PR program, you might as well be pouring water into a bucket with holes in the bottom.

A customer relations program is an essential element to your overall public relations and marketing plan.  Let’s take an example of a fictitious organization, Atlantis Credit Union, to explain this concept:

Atlantis Credit Union has invested a great deal of resources into its member leads program.  (Credit unions, in contrast to banks, have “members” not “customers.”)  But Atlantis also realizes that its members are its number one asset because if they are thrilled with its programs and services, they will refer the credit union to family and friends.  Therefore, in order to cultivate its member relationships, Atlantis has created a multi-stage “member relationship” program.

1) When members are new, they are given a personalized consultation with a financial management expert.  This expert gives them a package of resources including a short book that describes the various ways to take advantage of their services.  It is not the expert’s job to “up-sell” the member, but to listen and address her specific needs, while helping her make informed money management decisions.

2) Since this new member has a small business, she is invited to join an exclusive Facebook group made up of other Atlantis members who post questions about any topic related to managing a small business.  And since these members are local, they can assist each other with localized recommendations and referrals.  An Atlantis financial expert monitors the discussions and contributes input as needed.  Again, it is not the expert’s job to up-sell, as that would erode trust, not build it.

3) The member has been involved with Atlantis for three months.  She is invited to attend a special member-only seminar about preparing for tax season.

4) Six months later, the member receives a personal phone call from the expert she met upon first joining the credit union.  About a week ago she noticed that there was an error on her statement, but never got around to calling it in.  She brings up her concern with the expert and he fixes it immediately.  She knows Atlantis Credit Union cares about her experience and she is not just a number to them.

There are hundreds of ways you can add value to your customers’ experience.  By showing them not only do you care, but that you are also an advocate for their business, will earn you valuable trust and a potential lifetime of future business and referrals.

Please join me for my next seminar: “Public Relations: Useful Tips for Standing Out in a Tough Economy.”

REGISTER NOW

DATE:
Thursday, June 17, 2010

TIME:
9:00 – 10:30 a.m.

COST:
Free

DESCRIPTION:
When people think about the type of product or service you offer, do they think of you?

As executives, entrepreneurs and sales professionals, we all want be on the top of people’s minds when they need the type of business we offer.  But how do you get there?

It’s 2010.  Getting mentioned in the newspaper simply doesn’t cut it anymore.  But now there is a vast array of new public relations tools that can help put you on the minds of potential customers.  So the next time people need that product or service you offer, they will pick up the phone and call you.

Whether you’re new to public relations or have been doing it for years and would like to know about how new Web tools are changing the way businesses get noticed, then this seminar is for you.

By the end of this free 90 minute seminar you will know how to:

• find out where your buyers live online
• write a news release that’s search engine optimized
• drive traffic to your Web site
• use blogs, e-books and video to showcase your expertise
• develop a content strategy to keep your PR program on track throughout the year

LOCATION:
Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation
315 Iron Horse Way, Suite 101,
Providence RI

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR:
Robert Beadle is president of Northeast Public Relations, Inc. (http://www.northeastpr.com) and the 2009 recipient of the Small Business Administration Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for both Rhode Island and all of New England. Robert is also a past-president (2009) of the Southeastern New England chapter of the Public Relations Society of America. To read his blog on Social Media Marketing go to http://www.robertbeadle.com .

To register for this workshop, please complete the REGISTRATION FORM.

This workshop is being co-sponsored by Rhode Island Economic Development’s small business initiative Every Company Counts and the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce.

Do you have a specific public relations topic in mind about which you would like to learn more information? We will tailor a presentation to the needs and interests of your organization. To request a presentation, send your name, organization and topic request to seminars@northeastpr.com. We will contact you to schedule an appearance.

Please join me for my next workshop: “LinkedIn for Beginners.”

REGISTER NOW

DATE:
Wednesday, May 12, 2010

TIME:
9:00-10:30 a.m.

COST:
Free

DESCRIPTION:
In this free 90 minute workshop, attendees will learn how to use the world’s most popular business networking site, LinkedIn, to make connections and capture opportunities. This workshop is intended for people who are either new to LinkedIn or would like a refresher course on the site’s basic features. The workshop will be taught in a computer lab and attendees will have access to a PC with Internet.

This workshop will cover:

• An overview of the LinkedIn’s layout and features
• Building a 100% complete profile
• Adding and managing contacts
• Managing recommendations
• Finding jobs or recruiting
• How to use groups
• Searching for answers

LOCATION:
Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation
315 Iron Horse Way, Suite 101, Providence RI

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR:
Robert Beadle is president of Northeast Public Relations, Inc. (http://www.northeastpr.com) and the 2009 recipient of the Small Business Administration Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for both Rhode Island and all of New England. Robert is also a past-president (2009) of the Southeastern New England chapter of the Public Relations Society of America. To read his blog on Social Media Marketing go to http://www.robertbeadle.com

To register for this workshop, please complete the REGISTRATION FORM.  There are only 24 slots available and registration will close when they are filled.

This workshop is being co-sponsored by Rhode Island Economic Development’s small business initiative Every Company Counts and the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce.

Thank you to New Horizons Computer Learning Centers for providing the facility for this workshop. They are located in the same building at RIEDC with the same address.

Do you have a specific public relations topic in mind about which you would like to learn more information? We will tailor a presentation to the needs and interests of your organization. To request a presentation, send your name, organization and topic request to seminars@northeastpr.com. We will contact you to schedule an appearance.

Early Tuesday morning, I attended a panel discussion entitled “Combining SEO and Video to Drive Awareness and Lead Generation Online.”

The event was hosted by Business Wire and featured:
Tim Bradbury, President New Media, American City Business Journals
Joe Chernov, Global Director of Communications & Social Media, Eloqua
Judy Gern, Director of Conversion Marketing, Constant Contact
David Meerman Scott, Marketing Strategist and Author of The New Rules of Marketing & PR
Dave Toole, Founder & CEO, MEDIAmobz
Moderated by: Cliff Pollan, Founder, President & CEO, VisibleGains

The panelists highlighted some very interesting ideas, which companies must consider when building video into their business.  Here are some bullet points from my notes of the discussion:

• Video has many uses:
  • Public Relations
  • Marketing
  • Sales
  • Customer Support
  • News and interviews
  • Education
  • Customer reviews and testimonials
  • “Crowd Sourcing” (customer-created videos, i.e. video contest)
  • Social Responsibility
• If a video is embedded in a news release, Eloqua saw a 500% increase in views.
• The market determines which videos go “viral,” not the producer.
• Today, people are expecting video to be a built-in part of your marketing campaign.
• Do NOT put gateways (e-mail registration forms) in front of your videos and other content.
• Professional video production vs. casual video production: the decision depends on what you want your brand to represent and whether polish or authenticity is more important to your customers.  The medium becomes the message.

The Future of Web Video:

• Real-time video streaming will increase in use and popularity.
• Video will be more pervasive for small businesses.
• There will be more tools built into videos to encourage viewer interaction.
• There will be more software programs and Web sites designed to organize a video campaign.  (Facebook may be leading the charge on this front).
• Google will eventually assign more weight to Web pages which feature video content.

Here is a list of the most retweetable words and phrases:

1. you
2. Twitter
3. please
4. retweet
5. post
6. blog
7. social
8. free
9. media
10. help
11. please retweet
12. great
13. social media
14. 10
15. follow
16. how to
17. top
18. blog post
19. check out
20. new blog post

How many of your Tweets use these words?  Pepper your tweets with any of these top 20 and see if you get better results.

Source: Tactics http://www.PRSA.org

How then do we get more mileage out of our news releases?  Enter the wire service.  A wire service is a company that will distribute your news release to their extended online network of news Web sites and journalists.  But the most important benefit is that they will index your news release on the major search engines, including Google, Yahoo and Bing.  (See how to write your wire news release here). In this manner, anyone searching for the types of products, services or ideas you offer, will have a higher likelihood of finding your news release online.  Using a wire service is one way to maximize your Web site’s search engine optimization (SEO) potential.

There are a bunch of news release distribution services out there, but four prominent ones stand out from the pack: Business Wire, PR Newswire, Marketwire and PRWeb.  Each offers a range of different services and some are better suited than others depending on whether you are small business, a large corporation or somewhere in-between.  Pricing varies greatly between the four.

When reviewing my recommendations, consider that most of these wire services offer a narrower geographic news release distribution at lower prices.  So if you want the benefits of a premium service like Business Wire, but can’t afford its national distribution, you can always opt for a more localized distribution and get the same SEO and search engine indexing benefits.

Business Wire
(http://www.businesswire.com)

PROS: Business Wire is the most connected wire service on the Web with the highest number of inbound links from other sites (983,154).  Free graphic or logo with every news release.  EON service means all news releases will be hosted indefinitely on the site, a new service-wide upgrade in 2010.

CONS: It is the most expensive wire service of the big four.  In 2010, Business Wire raised its prices on most of its products by requiring all users pay for its EON: enhanced service, which used to be optional (adding $75 to all their prices).  For companies who are budget sensitive, they may elect to use a smaller distribution or switch to another wire.

BEST FOR: Large companies who want the most robust wire service available and are comfortable paying for it.

PR Newswire
(http://www.prnewswire.com)

PROS: With 679,000 pages indexed by Google, PR Newswire is the most indexed of the big four news wires.

CONS: PR Newswire is the only service of the big four that charges an annual membership fee of $195.  Additionally, it is the only service that does not automatically host news releases on its site indefinitely.  Releases are taken down after one month and put into a password protected database only visible to subscribers, which may impact your long term SEO benefits.  If you want to include graphics or logos with your releases, that will cost you a $415 per year hosting fee.

BEST FOR: Large companies who send a lot of news releases per year, but are more interested in reaching journalists and not so much concerned with long term SEO benefits.

(Update 5/6/10 – see comments below for updated PR Newswire data)

Marketwire
(http://www.marketwire.com)

PROS: Before Business Wire changed its services, Marketwire lead the pack with its SEO and social media friendliness capabilities.  Especially, for a localized release, Marketwire offers very competitive pricing.  Free graphic or logo with every news release.  Releases hosted indefinitely on the site under a more search engine friendly (clean) URL.

CONS: Marketwire does not rank the best in any of the measures we selected for this comparison, including inbound links, Alexa Traffic Rank, Google Index Pages or national distribution price.

BEST FOR: Medium to small companies who want a good balance of media distribution and social media features at more modest prices.

PRWeb
(http://www.prweb.com)

PROS: PRWeb is the most “watched” of the big four wire services with an Alexa Traffic Rank of 2,633 or the top .01% of all sites on the Internet.  It is also the most competitively priced for a national distribution.  Free graphic or logo with every news release.  Releases hosted indefinitely on the site.

CONS: Does not offer a localized state-by-state distribution option.  Does not have the same expansive journalist network of Businesswire or PRNewswire.

BEST FOR: Small or very budget sensitive companies who are more interested in the SEO benefits of sending news releases at the expense of broader media distribution.

Please join me for my next workshop: “How to Use Facebook and Twitter to Market Your Small Business”

REGISTER NOW

DATE:
Wednesday, March 31, 2010

TIME:
5:30-7:30 p.m.

COST:
Free

DESCRIPTION:
In this free two-hour workshop, attendees will learn how to use the world’s most popular social networking site, Facebook, and micro-blogging tool, Twitter, to carry out an effective marketing strategy for their small business.

The workshop will be conducted in three parts: The first part will explain why content, not technology, is the key to building connections and driving sales and how to develop a winning content strategy. The second part will cover the business uses of Facebook, including the development of a “Fan” page for an organization and promoting it. The third part will provide an overview of Twitter-for-business uses, how to set up third party Twitter management applications such as TweetDeck and provide examples of best practices.

PREREQUISITE:
This is an intermediate-advanced level workshop, which will move at a steady pace. In order to get the most out of this workshop, attendees should have at the minimum a personal Facebook account and a Twitter account (both are free) and be familiar with the basic uses of each platform. During the workshop, attendees will be accessing their accounts via a computer terminal, which will be provided for a limited number of attendees, or a personal laptop, should they choose to bring their own computer.

What will be covered:

OVERVIEW:
•    Why content is more important than the medium
•    How to develop a content strategy

FACEBOOK:
•    The difference between Facebook Profiles, Pages and Groups and when to use them
•    How to set up a Page
•    How to communicate with Fans
•    Evaluate a business Page using Facebook Insights
•    Case studies

TWITTER:
•    Overview of Twitter uses
•    Common pitfalls to avoid
•    How to discover jobs, contracts, employees
•    Best practices for CEOs, business owners
•    How to use TweetDeck
•    Searching Twitter for opportunities

LOCATION:
Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation
315 Iron Horse Way, Suite 101, Providence RI

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR:
Robert Beadle is president of Northeast Public Relations, Inc. (http://www.northeastpr.com) and the 2009 recipient of the Small Business Administration Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for both Rhode Island and all of New England. Robert is also a past-president (2009) of the Southeastern New England chapter of the Public Relations Society of America.

To register for this workshop, please complete the REGISTRATION FORM.

There are only 24 slots available and registration will close when they are filled.

This workshop is being co-sponsored by Rhode Island Economic Development’s small business initiative Every Company Counts and the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce.

Thank you to New Horizons Computer Learning Centers for providing the facility for this workshop. They are located in the same building at RIEDC with the same address.

If you’ve been watching TV lately, you may have noticed Domino’s new pizza ad campaign.  In what is to follow, I’m going to explain to you why this is a terrible idea and how you can avoid making the same missteps with your own PR and marketing programs.

The ad begins with customers on video saying the pizza crust tastes like cardboard and the sauce is like ketchup, among other disappointments.  Patrick Doyle, the president of Domino’s, comes on camera to say that the company is changing its ways and has made improvements to its pizza.

Steven Colbert lampoons Domino’s new pizza ad campaign in his “Alpha Dog of the Week” segment.

Domino’s may think it is doing the right thing by publicly apologizing for its pizza in order to promote its new line.  But the company has unintentionally violated the most important rule of public relations: never restate the negative!

What’s so bad about restating the negative?

To answer this question, let’s divide Domino’s customers into three basic groups:

1)    Customers who hate the pizza

2)    Customers who love the pizza

3)    Customers who are indifferent

By restating the negative, the company is simply reinforcing the beliefs held by group 1, the people who hate the pizza.  No big change there.  They’ve been validated.

But what about the people who love the pizza?  The company just told them they have “poor taste” and they have been eating bad pizza for the past decade.  Now they believe, “Domino’s = ketchup on cardboard.” Not a wise move.

Then you have the people who didn’t feel strongly either way.  Now, thanks to this campaign, they hold the belief that if everyone else hates the pizza, then they must hate it too.

In effect, Domino’s has taken a poor reputation and firmly planted and reinforced it into the minds of ALL their customers.

Why is stating the negative a bad thing in marketing?

Psychology plays a big factor here.  When disgraced U.S. President, Richard Nixon famously stated “I am not a crook,” what people really heard was, “I am a crook.”  The “not” didn’t resonate in our subconscious mind.  Instead the accusation became the “truth,” not the denial.

What should Nixon have said?  Anything that accentuated his positive qualities, “I am a man of ethics.”

The other psychological principle is social proof.  When people have no opinion on an issue, they will look to the behavior of others to tell them how to think or act.  So if the majority opinion is “Domino’s pizza is ketchup on cardboard” AND the company (the authority figure in this case) is saying it, then it MUST be true.

As Colbert correctly points out in his segment, Domino’s unwittingly invites another interpretation of its apology campaign; that all previous marketing claims of pizza quality were lies.  But you should forgive their lies of the past and trust them now, right?

What should Domino’s have done to address these negative customer reviews?

The solution here is simple.  Issue the newer, better pizza without first trashing the Dominos brand!

Domino’s is not the only company who has tried the “apology campaign.”  A few years back, Ford had a marketing slogan, “If you haven’t looked at Ford lately, look again.” For us, that translates to: “We are famous for our lousy cars.”

In contrast, Toyota’s marketing continues to point to the reliability of its automobiles by declaring, “80% of all Toyotas sold in the last 20 years are still on the road.”  The company often shows old, high mileage Toyotas and their happy owners in its new car commercials.

If reliability is the most important factor to you in the purchase of a new car, who are you going to choose?  The company who has struggled for decades to make a reliable car or the company who has been making reliable cars for a very long time?

The next time your are looking to create a new PR and ad campaign, remember that restating the negative will simply reinforce a bad view of your brand in your customers’ minds.  Instead, accentuate the positive!

2010 is upon us and now is the time to assess your PR and marketing goals from the past year.  Did you reach them?  Is your marketing getting results?

If you’re looking to get a jump start in the new year with some fresh PR and social media marketing ideas, here are my top five business book recommendations:

1) Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs by Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah

This one was just released in the late autumn of 2009.  I believe theory is important, but this book cuts right to the chase.  It tells you, step by step, how to optimize your Web site for Google searchability and which social media sites you should be using to maximize your reach.

2) Putting the Public Back in Public Relations: How Social Media is Reinventing the Aging Business of PR by Brian Solis and Deirdre Breakenridge

A bit more intellectual and written for strategists, this book discusses the evolution of PR from the good old days of pitching stories to journalists to how to begin engaging with online communities.  Here the authors talk about the new “Social Media Release” and its applications.

3) The New Rules of Marketing and PR: How to Use News Releases, Blogs, Podcasting, Viral Marketing & Online Media to Reach Buyers Directly by David Meerman Scott

This is the book that helped change my thinking back in 2007 when “social media” was starting to becoming part of the marketing discussion.   I saw Mr. Scott speak at the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce Expo and began integrating his ideas into my business and my clients’ businesses almost immediately.  He is an advocate of companies learning to create rich, sharable content which people will want to spread over the Internet, thus creating an inbound marketing effect. Mr. Scott is releasing a newly revised and updated version in January 2010.

4) Groundswell: Winning in a world transformed by social technologies by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff

Another one of the “classics” that every CEO or CMO should read (technology moves so quickly your book becomes a classic on my list once it’s two years old )  This book is chock full of real world case studies of how companies are using new social technologies to drive their success.  Whereas many authors place an emphasis on getting out there and experimenting with social media tools, these authors define specific objectives for social media use: listening, talking, energizing, supporting, embracing.

5) The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding: How to Build a Product of Service into a World-Class Brand by Al Ries and Laura Ries

If Groundswell is a classic, then this one is an ancient text.  So why is it on the list?  Because even though the technologies and many marketing strategies have changed, there are still many fundamental elements of branding which will always remain the same.  This book demystifies the laws of branding; how to choose a name, design, message and how to avoid catastrophic mistakes which will hurt you in the long run.

Extra Credit: Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive by Noah J. Goldstein, Steve J. Martin, and Robert B. Cialdini

For those of you who are a sponge of business knowledge like me, then be sure to pick up this little book.  It’s organized into 50 short chapters which show you how little tweaks in your marketing can make a significant difference in your results.  For example, did you know putting a handwritten sticky note on a mailed survey increases the return rate by up to 75 percent?  This book is full of these little tips.

If you can recommend other books, please put them into the comment section.  I would love to read them and I’m sure that other people reading this blog would like to hear about them too.

This evening I went up to the Wachusett Mountain Ski Resort Web site to purchase a ski pass.  As I was browsing their site, I saw that they have links to Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, as well as a blog.  Cool!  They get high marks for social media integration.  But when I clicked on the Facebook link, it took me to a “personal” profile for the ski resort… Ooops Wachusett.  Wrong!

I get this question all the time during my Facebook for Business seminars:

“When do I create a Facebook ‘fan’ page, ‘group’ page or personal profile?”

I’m glad you asked.  Let’s go through the three types of pages.

1) Personal Profile

This is used for a human being, NOT a company, organization, non-profit, etc.  When Facebook began, it was designed for college students to create profiles.  So for companies, the only alternative was to create a personal profile for their organization.  However in the past few years, Facebook has grown and now provides two options for non-human entities to exist on the network and make connections.  Those are “fan” pages and “group” pages.

So why can’t you just ignore this rule and keep your company’s personal profile? Facebook has been cracking down on misuse, deleting profiles which are set up for entities instead of people.  So if you’re going to put the time into Facebook, to build an audience and interact with them, you want to make sure your page isn’t going to be deleted one day for not following Facebook’s rules.  Also, profiles are not ideal for companies for a few more reasons: you have to manually approve of everyone who wants to connect with you and you don’t get the benefit of Facebook’s business applications and “Insights” analytics software.

2) Group Page

Group pages have been around for a while and pre-date the implementation of “fan” pages, which we will discuss in a moment.  Groups are ideal for some non-profit organizations, social groups, clubs, churches, etc.  The people who connect with a group are called “members” (in contrast to a personal profile which has “friends” and a fan page which has “fans”).     An example of a group page is our local chapter of the Public Relations Society of America.  Here we have authorized “officers” (as seen in the left column) to have administrative privileges over the content of the page.  Groups allow for more control over who participates and group administrators may restrict access to a group so new members must be approved.  Think of Groups like a private club.  Do you want to let everyone in?  Or do you want to keep the group a little smaller and more personal?

3) Fan Page

A Fan page is the newest of the three types of pages and is designed with companies or brands in mind.  An example of a fan page is the one I have created for my company, Northeast Public Relations.  Fan pages offer some powerful tools and capabilities not available in the other two categories.  For one, Fan pages are visible and accessible to everyone on the Internet whether they are a Facebook member or not and are indexed by Google.  In contrast, groups and personal profiles are not fully visible.  In Fan pages you get visitor statistics via a dashboard called “Insights.”  You also get to install applications which may help you add further capabilities to your fan page.

What if you’re in the middle?

There are some organizations that could fit into either a group page or fan page because they straddle the line between what these pages represent.  If you’ve anticipated your needs, researched your audience and still could go either way, I would suggest opting for the fan page because of the added Google visibility and “insights” tool.

So what should Wachusett do?

I did a little more digging and found out that Wachusett does have a Fan page, which is the appropriate category for a ski resort.  As of this writing, the personal profile version of Wachusett is attached to the homepage Facebook link, when it should be the Fan page instead.  I would recommend Wachusett begin the process of migrating friends into the Fan page and then shut down the personal profile version in a few months.  The link from the Wachusett homepage should be corrected immediately.  Time is money.  Why double your work by maintaining two Facebook addresses?

If you’d like to learn more…

In first quarter of 2010, I will be offering both beginner and advanced seminars on how to use Facebook for business.  If you would like to be notified of seminar dates, become a fan of my company, Northeast Public Relations, Inc.  Or if you can’t wait and want a personal consultation, send an e-mail to appointments@northeastpr.com.

UPDATE 12/23/09:

After this post was initially published, Wachusett Mountain has since updated the links on their homepage to direct visitors to their “fan” page.