so this is mass communication?

At the Edelman Digital Bootcamp, I presented a number of social media assignments that I have worked into my traditional PR classes. This assignment is one of those assignments.

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This assignment is ideal for PR Writing or capstone Campaigns courses.

In this assignment, students experiment with engaging bloggers (or pitching to bloggers, though they don’t like that term!). Engaging bloggers must be personal, transparent and is often better received when you’re not even pitching anything from your company at all. Many social media PR practitioners suggest that instead of pitching bloggers to write about their companies, they instead build relationships with bloggers & talk to them about the industry or send them links to information that blogger might be interested in. Some practitioners never even mention their own company or product – if the blogger is interested, then the blogger will ask. Until then, it is just pure relationship building with one’s publics. This is a great opportunity to widen the student’s understanding of media relations. While bloggers may not have a large reach, they represent a specific niche that might be very interested in your organization and engagement could reap great benefits. NASA and U.S. Central Command both have well-known blogger engagement program, which have been known to lead to credentialing of bloggers and treating this group more like traditional media outlets.

If this assignment is used in a writing class, professors could ask students to write a proposed e-mail message to an appropriate blogger that deals with the assigned or selected client. The student would write the e-mail text and submit it to the professor as a graded assignment (not actually send it to the blogger!). If this assignment is used in a capstone campaigns class, students could be encouraged to engage bloggers as appropriate as a campaign tactic aimed building communities and informing publics on the campaign or a particular event. If this is the case, it is strongly recommended that the professor and client approve the engagement text prior to students engaging the blogger.

Warning: Engaging can be tricky, so it is recommended that professors and students read through all of the resources below before beginning this assignment. Bloggers are known to copy and paste an entire e-mail message (both good & bad pitches) to post them on their blogs. Additionally, transparency is a must: practitioners must practice ethical public relations at all times and identify one’s self as a practitioner for the organization. See the Word of Mouth Marketing Association’s code of ethics for more on this.

Directions to student: Compose an e-mail message “pitch” to engage a blogger. The communication to the blogger should be personal and show that you know who he/she, have read the blog and understand what interests the blogger. One would never send a “form letter” type pitch to a blogger. Offer up information or resources – have a reason for e-mailing the blogger. The voice of this e-mail message should be informal but the content should be informative. The e-mail message should include at least one hyperlink and not appear too over-the-top regarding advertising or public relations. Use this as a personal platform to begin an unmediated, direct conversation with your publics. You may use the in-class resources provided, notes or the Internet for tips on writing a good blogger “pitch.”

> Learning objectives

• Practice relationship-building with publics
• Apply Web-writing composition techniques
• Diversifying “pitch”/outreach/engagement skill set to include non-traditional media sources

> Layout and content recommendations

• Indicate your organization’s name at the top of the page
• Before starting the e-mail pitch, provide a 1-2 sentence intro to instructor explaining the blog you chose to engage and why (this is not part of the pitch “e-mail” but provides context)
• Have a subject line for the e-mail message. Subjects should be short, yet informative. Make it relevant to what you talk about in the e-mail message (avoid “Question” or “Your Blog” as subject lines)
• Limit e-mail text to no more than 150 words (excludes intro statement, subject and URLs – this limit is ONLY on blog pitch e-mail text)
• Contain at least one hyperlink properly placed in the message. Note that many bloggers like to see the hyperlink first and so it is recommended that the first line of the e-mail contain any hyperlinks you may talk about later in the text.

> Tips and resources

• Clearly identify yourself as a practitioner from your organization, read Word of Mouth Marketing Association ethics
• Show the blogger you know who he/she is by referring to past posts or general interests of the blogger
• Provide useful information or suggest a resource (it doesn’t always have to be about your company)
• Write it from a first-person perspective and make it conversational
• Try to humanize the organization
• Don’t PITCH — ENGAGE!
• Never ask the blogger to lie or misrepresent information or the practitioner as a source of information
• Compose well-written and properly formatted e-mail message
• See these resources for additional tips
  • http://marshallk.com/5-pr-pitches-the-good-and-bad
  • http://www.ensight.org/archives/2005/02/10/how-to-pitch-bloggers
  • http://www.ryanablock.com/archive/2006/12/how-not-to-pitch-a-blogger
  • http://mobhappy.typepad.com/russell_buckleys_mobhappy/2005/07/pr_solutions.html
  • http://www.globalprblogweek.com/archives/the_pr_lessons_of_a_.php
  • http://www.womma.org/blogger
  • http://badpitch.blogspot.com
  • http://hyku.com/blog/archives/001531.html
  • http://blogsurvey.backbonemedia.com/archives/2006/04/clicktv_pitch_p.html
  • http://dring.wordpress.com/2007/03/07/good-organization-bad-bad-pitch

> Grading rubric

When grading the blog engagement e-mail, ask if it looks or feels like a “normal pitch” that went to a group of people (without any personalization). If the answer is yes, then it is a very bad e-mail engagement (e.g., D or C for a letter grade). Frankly, what makes a bad pitch in traditional media relations also makes a bad pitch in blogger relations. Additionally, practitioners must identify themselves (their company), never ask someone to lie or hide anything & behave ethically at all times. If the blogger e-mail fails to adhere to these ethical standards, the student should be marked down. However, if it includes hyperlinks to third-party independent resources, talks about something the blogger has said on his/her blog and seems to be a very personal e-mail offering up information or helpful resources the blogger may want access to then it is likely excellent (e.g., A or B for a letter grade). Blog pitches have to be personal – you can’t write one and then send it to 10 people. It is highly recommended that prior to grading the blog pitches, you read over the recourses in the tips section above because it shows examples of pitches gone wrong and those well done.

At the Edelman Digital Bootcamp, I presented a number of social media assignments that I have worked into my traditional PR classes. This assignment is one of those assignments.

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This assignment is ideal for PR Research, PR Cases Studies, Administration and to use for the research function of capstone Campaigns courses.

In this assignment, students monitor the online conversation occurring about an organization on posted by that organization’s publics (i.e., environmental scanning of blogs for discussion of company issues). Adoption trends show that the number of people reading blogs jumps each six months and more than half of journalists turn to blogs for sources, story ideas and to “break scandals.” Academic research finds that people who read blogs cite them as credible sources of information and there are several notable anecdotes about stories jumping from blogs to the mainstream media. As such, it is important for public relations students to learn how to monitor blog and other social media content in a systematic way that provides the same insight that more traditional environmental scanning methods do. Remember though, these scans are good only if they include the entire online world — don’t just look at blogs but include microblogging sites like Twitter, and multimedia sites like YouTube or Flickr.

Directions to students: Many people will discuss your organization and its products/services on their own Web sites, outside of traditional media. Just as it is important for you to know what the media and your community are saying about your issues and organization, it is important to know what is being said in social media sites like blogs and message boards. In this assignment you will listen to the “cyberchatter” about an assigned client for one week. During this time you will (1) monitor social media sites, (2) assess the importance/impact of each site that discusses your organization and (3) write a short analysis of the week’s conversation. Additionally, you may make suggestions for action or engagement based on this analysis.

> Learning objectives

• Apply environmental scanning and issues management approaches to non-traditional information sources
• Practice research skills in diverse information environments
• Connect environmental scanning practices with emergent technology
• Familiarize yourself with potentially powerful, persuasive and relevant conversations occurring about your organization outside the mainstream media

> Layout and content recommendations

• Assign a client to students or allow them to pick their own clients (suggest large Fortune 500 companies)
• Identify key search terms with students for their client. Don’t just rely on the organization’s name. Include CEO, product names, issues and common misspellings for associated organizational terms.
• Demonstrate key word searches on various blog search engines like IceRocket, Technorati, blogsearch.google.com
• Show students how to set up Google alerts on key words
• Explain RSS feeds, how to identify them, subscriptions & readers such as BlogLines or Google Reader (note: you can do an initial search on the blog search engines & then subscribe to that search to make life a little easier)
• Explain tags (often used on blogs, Flickr, YouTube, etc)
• Explain that blog site importance/impact can sometimes be determined through reading the “about” page of the blogger and reading the comments on posts

> Tips

• Monitor inbound links to the company’s Web site through Technorati or IceRocket and by typing link:url (with url being your company’s URL) into Google
• Do Web searches on the company name (including common misspellings) and products/services
• Start with quality search terms
• Follow key words on Twitter
• Always follow links in a blog post – the link may contain all of the meaning
• Always read all of the comments on a blog post – the post may appear neutral then the comments might contain a heated discussion
• See these resources for additional tips
  • http://redcouch.typepad.com/weblog/2006/01/blog_monitoring.html
  • http://www.globalprblogweek.com/2005/09/21/wyman-reputation-management/
  • http://hyku.com/blog/archives/001728.html
  • http://hyku.com/blog/archives/000189.html
  • http://technorati.com/weblog/2007/05/354.html
  • http://radiofreeblogistan.com/2005/04/29/assessing_blog_authority.html

> Grading rubric

When grading the online conversation monitoring report, treat it much like you would any traditional environmental scanning report. The only difference here is that the net for area to be monitored is cast much wider. The best thing a student can come away from this assignment understanding is that one is always monitoring one’s organization – and it is important to add social media sites to this list of sites monitored. Once systems are in place (e-mail alerts, etc.) the work is streamlined and much easier.

Here is the question I raise … is it really such a coup when a blogger wins a big investigative journalism award but it turns out he is a very well-known & respected freelance journalist?

Not to diminish the work of Talking Points Memo’s Joshua Micah Marshall or his recent honor of the Polk Award for excellence in investigative journalism (because I really do think it is great) — but I just find it interesting that a blogger that wins such an award is actually a “real journalist” anyway.

I found out about this story the old-fashioned way. I was making copies at work & my colleague Dr. Hugh Martin, a journalism professor, came up to tell me about this. Hugh gave me a run-down on the history of the award & its importance in the journalism community. When he told me a blogger won this year — & the story about how that blogger had basically employed his army of readers to sift through public record materials to get to the bottom of a story — I was not as amazed at the story of bloggers & readers uncovering a story as I was of the journalistic community actually embracing it! Not *that* was news!

Then Hugh told me the name of the blogger & I realized: False alarm. This wasn’t the earth shattering event I had thought it was. They had picked the “safest bet,” one of their own if you will.

Is this what some have called “a landmark day for a certain kind of journalism?” Ehhh. Not so much.

Don’t mistake me, I really am thrilled about the award & marvel at the ingenuity of a blogger to use his readers to help get to the bottom of a story. But is a “blogger” who wins an important investigative journalism award the coup I thought it was? Not when that bloggger was already a card-carrying member of the industry already.

Thanks to: Dr. Hugh Martin for telling me the story & socialmedia.biz for blogging about it this morning to prompt this post I had planned.

A piece from my disseration (man, was it that long ago?) was just published:

Sweetser, K.D., & Kaid, L.L. “Stealth Soapboxes: Political Information Efficacy, Cynicism, and Uses of Celebrity Weblogs Among Readers.” New Media & Society, 10, 67-91.

This study tests the effects of personalized and `stealth’ political discourse on weblogs (or blogs) and the repercussions on levels of political trust, information efficacy and political uses/gratifications. By surveying readers of three different blogs (N=1838), this study identified significant effects as a result of exposure to political statements on blogs. Indeed, there were differences in the levels of political cynicism depending on how political statements were communicated. Readers of non-political blogs were more confident in their level of political information and their ability to participate in politics. Finally, political uses/approaches and avoidances were examined, as were differences based on gender and age.

Keywords: blog, celebrity, cynicism, Internet, online, political information efficacy, uses and gratifications

My univerisity doesn’t have acces to the journal online so I can’t download the PDF. If someone out there can & would be willing to send me the PDF then I would greatly appreciate it!

I tried something new with my PR Research class last semester. In addition to having the students write a press release about their research projects (which I’ve always done), I recorded the audio of their presentations then put that with a group picture up in my Facebook. So now future PR Research students can see what previous student groups researched & well … more than just 20 people get to “experience” their class project.

Slowly but surely the press releases are being posted on the Grady College Web site … so far you can find out about the party school experiment or how the candidates used dialogic communication in the primaries on their blogs.

If you can’t wait to find out more about the other 3 projects, check out my Facebook:

• Atlanta-based PR pracititioners’ use of social media
• dialogic analysis of primary candidates’ blogs
• experiment testing credibility of crisis alert systems at a university
• impact of “party school” image on a university’s image
• uses and grats examination of media (video, music) downloading

Enjoy their research!

I love Target. But man oh man, they are making it hard on me.

After the big “Target Rounders” scandal which blew up in December, it seems Target doesn’t see the irony in their PR policy like I do.

According to this New York Times article from yesterday, Target claims they don’t respond to queries from bloggers because they need to focus their efforts on traditional media that reaches a larger audience. Ha! But they have no qualms about unethical word of mouth marketing practices in social media spaces.

Will poor Target ever get it right?

What a week - another publication hits the streets.

This article is a part of the mega-collaboration I did with my wonderful colleagues Lance Porter at LSU, Deborah Kim at University of Kentucky & Eunsoeng Kim at Eastern Illinois University. Lance & I were the PR folks while Deborah & Eunseong are on the journalism side of the house.

Chung, D., Kim, E., Trammell, K.D., & Porter, L.V. (2007). Uses and Perceptions of Blogs: A Report on Professional Journalists and Journalism Educators. Journalism & Mass Communication Educator, 62(3), 305-22.

Abstract: As journalism educators prepare their students to succeed professionally, whether professional journalists and educators see eye-to-eye on emerging trends that influence current journalism practice is worth examining. A national online survey of journalism professionals and educators found that professionals use blogs significantly more than educators. Educators had similar views of blogs, but professional journalists’ uses and perceptions of blogs varied depending on type of organization they worked for and occupational position in their news organizations. Educators are quick to catch on to national trends in journalism even though they do not routinely use blogs, as they are trained to assess the impact of critical trends in the discipline.

Another piece from this mega-survey was on blog power & published earlier this year in Public Relations Review.

A collaboration of mine with Dr. Stephen Banning at Bradley University was just published:

Banning, S., & Sweetser, K.D. (2007). “How much do they think it affects them and whom do they believe?: Comparing third-person effect and credibility of blogs and traditional media.” Communication Quarterly, 55(4), 451-466.

Using an experimental design, this study investigated third-person effect and media credibility as a result of media attribution. Specifically, we compared third-person effect across four media sources: personal blogs, media blogs, online news, and print newspaper. Overall, participants exhibited third-person effects equally across the media. Third- person effect regressed with credibility.

Keywords: Attribution Theory; Blogs; Credibility; Internet; New Media; Third-Person Effect

Enjoy!

Everyone wants to know who is reading their site. Here are some resources for understanding some of the metrics.

In addition the other sites I’ll list, Google has some great videos on YouTube about how to understand & use Google Analytics. Tip: before you start diving into your analytics report,  take a few moments to watch the flash product  demo/tour first.

Conversation analysis
There are several ways to do a conversation analysis. Some people look at the comment-to-post ratio (are your readers interacting as much as much/more than you are posting). Other look at in-bound links under the logic that if someone is linking to your post/content then it is continuing the conversation on another site. A great site for checking out who is linking to your site is Technorati.

Bounce rate
When people come to your site - do they immediately leave? Bounce rate tells you that: it is the percentage of people who come to our site & immediately leave without getting any deeper. You want a low number for bounce rate - in general, a 40% rate is pretty good. Watch the video to learn more.

Understanding visitors
Who cares about averages — we should care about distribution. Who are your loyal visitors and what are they doing on your site? Learn about those people who repeatedly visit your site, when the last time the visitor came, how long that person stayed on the site. Go a step further - segment the data (twitter, for example): of those who came via twitter, how long do they stay and how many times have they visited? This will give a better indication as to how “successful” that particular referrer was (& for companies using ads it will help determine where you should keep buying ads & what you should drop). Watch the video to learn more.

Track feed subscriptions
Google Analytics doesn’t track how many people are subscribed to your RSS feed. But you still  want to know how many read the site through feeds - especially because many times the RSS reader might not ever click through to the site. Google suggests using feedburner to get this information. It will tell you: how many readers, what are feed tools are they using & all sorts of podcast metrics.  Tip: set up your feedburner feed before you start marketing your site because if you do it midstream on a blogspot blog then you’ll have to change your feed URL (& readers might not take the time to update their subscription to your feed).  Watch the video (jump to 11:32, end 15:38) to learn more.

Optimizing your content
Now this one is just really cool: After you’ve looked over your analytics & you have a good baseline of how your site is doing you might be ready to test ways to improve your site. What if I put a picture of a person with my product on the page? What if I use certain words? Heck, which layout for your site works the best? The Google Web Site Optimizer will let you set up experiments where people randomly get your page with one thing different on it each time - the data (very nicely laid out in a Google’y way btw) tells you what works the best on that page. This is the killer app made simple for usability design, if you ask me. You would use this when you’re trying to improve your visitors experience & reach whatever goal you set (like get to a certain page). Watch the video to learn more.

Thinking about search
There are some things that Google Analytics doesn’t do … check out the Google Webmaster Tools. Find out what mobile devices are accessing to your site, the last time Google crawled your site & a little about Google SEO.  Watch the video (jump to 7:50, end 11:32) to learn more.

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There are more videos, but they are more geared toward making money so I won’t go into them but you can view them all in the Conversion University section of the Google YouTube channel.

The key is that reporting is not analyzing — don’t just report numbers, interpret that data & tell people what it means about how people are using the site. Don’t just look at one number, understand as much as possible about what is going on in your site. A single metric will not give you what you need to make quality decisions from your analytics reports.

This post was cross-posted at my ADPR 5990 social media class blog.

Atlanta-based Arketi Group released the results of their recent Web watch survey where they looked at how business journalists are using social media tools like blogs.

We’re seeing the same trend in their data as we see in similar surveys:

• blogs make journalists’ jobs easier (25%), get story ideas from blogs (54%) & believe blogs are equally credible to activist sites (41%)

• if an org is in crisis & the journalist can’t reach you, he’s likely to turn to industry blogs as a secondary source

• only 2% said they would never report on stories starting from a blog but the rest either were using them with varying attributions (72%) or open to it in the future (21%)

An interesting finding is the use of instant messenger: 18% say it makes their job easier & 25% prefer it when working with known sources.

Request the full report of the national survey here.