Loss of control is a major objection faced by most social media advocates. For many senior-level executives, losing control is their biggest fear. This shouldn’t come as a big surprise, as their ability to control people, situations, and outcomes is how they landed the top job in the first place. To give up this sense of control by putting themselves and their company into an unregulated, unfamiliar environment is scary. This fear is further exaggerated as they hear stories of social media blunders from their peers. Why on earth would they want to risk it?
Engaging with new media is not about throwing yourself into uncharted waters. It is about listening to what is going on, finding out what people think about you and your brand, and pinpointing your biggest fans and haters. For anyone in the c-suite, this actually INCREASES the level of control you have both internally and externally. Becoming engaged allows companies to gather intelligence on people posting comments on blogs, Twitter, Facebook, discussion boards, and other social networking sites. It allows you to monitor not only the discussion, but also the entire online environment for your industry. You can become that elusive fly on the wall, predict when tides are turning, and take appropriate and necessary action immediately, before the sh*t hits the fan. This is not a loss of control or throwing caution to the wind. It is understanding your industry, followers and market on a deeper, more intimate level. Your ability to control the situation and the outcome actually goes up.
Engaging in social media doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to be shouting your product, company or service to the world. But it will let you know when people are shouting at your product, company or service. I recently heard the line “You have two ears and one mouth, use them proportionately”. I think this applies tenfold when engaging online and conversing with your market.
Some free social media monitoring tools that help keep your ear a little closer to the ground include:
1. Addict-o-matic: Aggregates one search term from a number of different social media sites, video sites and blogs.
2. Google Trends is probably the most popular site to monitor and graph online trends. Trendrr and Trendpedia are also good tools to track and compare search terms.
3. BoardTracker: Monitors discussion boards. Allows you to set up alerts for ongoing searches.
4. Alexa: Allows you to track website traffic (and compare against other sites).
5. Backtype: Monitors comments on blogs and social networks.
6. Twitter Search: I find search.twitter.com is the best for searching Twitter. You can also use the search feature on Tweetdeck to keep running tabs on Twitter topics and users.
More free tracking tools are listed on Andy Beal’s “8 Essential Free Social Media Monitoring Tools” and Rob Gonda’s “Free Social Media Monitoring Tools“.
Alice and Kev is one of the most fascinating blogs I’ve read in a while. Robin Burkinshaw, a student of games design/development at Anglia Ruskin University, is playing the Sims 3 with two homeless characters. He moved them in to a place made to look like an abandoned park, removed all of their remaining money, and then attempted to help them survive without taking any job promotions or easy cash routes.
Kev, the father, is mean-spirited, quick to anger, and inappropriate. He also dislikes children and he’s insane. He’s basically the worst dad in the world. His daughter Alice has a kind heart, but suffers from clumsiness and low self-esteem. Her best friend in life is her teddy.
The blog is divided into different episodes whose story is dictated by the game’s rules. Once I started reading, I was hooked. I was curious what the game had in place for the two and how its assumptions about life would shape their path. A new, strangely engrossing form of fiction developed right in front of my eyes: Burkinshaw made some decisions, the rest was “told” by the game. (Spoilers ahead.)
Alice hungry, tired, and stressed, struggles at school and gets into arguments with her father. She gets a job at the supermarket.
When her shift ends… that evening, she has 100 hard-earned simoleons, but she is as exhausted as it is possible to be. She wobbles slightly after walking out the door, and only just manages to stop herself from losing consciousness there and then.
(…)
She takes all of the money she has just earned, places it into an envelope, writes the name of a charity on the front, and puts it into a mailbox.
You might think that Alice has the worst life in the world, but she doesn’t believe that’s true. She will turn down the chance to improve her life in order to give others the opportunity to improve theirs.
What does it mean when a character you’ve created makes you re-examine your own life through their astonishing selflessness?
It means that rules can have an emotional impact after all.
Of course one could start the same experiment with other games; yet the Sims is about life itself and not about Super Mutants (”Today I killed five locusts”), something we can easily relate to. This is why the game has the potential to make us re-evaluate our lives and tell us about ourselves (or rather, the designers’ assumptions about our lives).
It also makes you wonder which path Alice would have taken if the game received a less commercially oriented rating on account of its drastic rules. How would the story have evolved if the game was designated Adults Only and included drugs and prostitution?
At the same time, Alice and Kev is a great example of how a future could look like; a piece of art utilising screenshots and gameplay videos to be consumed on platforms like the iPhone or Kindle. Kev and Alice can even be downloaded to be put in one’s own game, everyone can live their lives, make different choices and tell their own story: instant, touching art created by play (or rather, the recounting of play).
-Jens
Its been a while since we last posted on BlogCampaigning, and I know that a lot of our readers are wondering what happened: PR message boards have been flooded with rumours and speculation, and Jens and I have been getting emails and phone calls at all hours from fans. Everyone has been wondering what happened to BlogCampaigning.
The short answer is that we don’t really know.
The long answer is that the site got messed up and that I’ve been super-busy with real life (work, soccer and summer drinking). Thanks to Tommy Vallier at Wordpress by the Minute, we were able to get rid of the spammy links and Javascript that had pervaded our RSS feed (if you need any blog work done, I highly recommend his services).
I haven’t been writing much for the site because I was working on a product launch for CNW Group (more on that in an upcoming post), Jens hasn’t been writing much because he’s been “working on his thesis” (which I equate to playing Xbox), and Heather has probably just been busy with her own blog, Toronto Uncovered.
We still don’t know where Espen is, but we hope you like the BlogCampaigning redesign and that you’ll continue to read our thoughts about Public Relations, Video Games, Technology and whatever we feel like.
But don’t spend too much time reading BlogCampaigning—get out there and enjoy the summer weather.
-Parker
A few weeks ago, I commented on ZDNet post by Serena Ehrlich about Social Media Releases.
I left a comment, but only because I really wanted to.
The process to sign up to leave a comment was incredibly lengthy. In the screenshot (below), you can see all the fields that one is required to fill out in order to register.
While I’m sure that someone in the Marketing Department of ZDNet is patting himself on the back over the amount of data he’s getting, someone else must be pulling out there hair over the fact that fewer people are commenting since the registration process was implemented. Do they really need to know how many people work for my company and what my postal code is?
As soon as you make it difficult or lengthy for your users to do something, the less likely they are to do it.
As Serena writes in the post about Social Media Releases, it should be free and easy for anyone to access your content. The easier you make it (by using formats and sites they may already be familiar with), the more likely they are to use it.
I think that this is one of the reasons that Twitter has triumphed whereas RSS hasn’t really caught on. RSS is an incredible tool for getting new information, and it really is quite simple. However, explaining it to someone and going throught the steps needed to set up and RSS reader and start subscribing to feeds sounds and is complicated. However, most people instantly grasp the concept of “following” one of their friends, and thus
One of the things I’m proud about BlogCampaigning is that it is relatively easy to login and leave a comment (maybe “proud” is too strong a word here, but you get the idea).
I’m also working at implementing the Facebook Connect plugin for this blog so that people can easily comment using their Facebook profile (it doesn’t seem to be working for Wordpress 2.7 yet – let me know if you’ve got it figured out!).
-Parker
One year ago yesterday I wrote my first post on my music blog. A few months after that, it got listed on both The Hype Machine and Elbo.ws (two music blog aggregators), both of which deliver considerable amounts of traffic. While the number of RSS subscribers to my music blog doesn’t really compare to that of BlogCampaigning, I attribute that more to the fact that people interested in music don’t care about RSS as much as people interested in social media and PR.
In the year that I’ve been blogging there, I’ve written almost 100 posts. While they aren’t as lengthy as the ones you often see here, they require just as much thought and time to put together. Just as each post here is written about something I’m passionate about, so too with my music blog.
So what is a “music blog”?
I don’t think there is anyone one definition, but I’d probably describe a music blog as one that exists primarily to talk about and share music. Some examples can be found at Discobelle or Soundtrack2. They are essentially individual radio stations of the 21st century.
According to my understanding, most music blogs are probably illegal under today’s copyright law because of the way they allow you to download mp3 files. However, I think that we are due for a shift in the way that copyright law is viewed and the entire model of the music industry. I’m happy to contribute to the acceleration of this shift.
I view what I do as contributing to the promotion of the artists, and subscribe to a Masnickian theory of economics that emphasizes the difference between infinite and scarce goods. The short of it is that mp3 files can be copied for free, and doing so doesn’t equate to stealing the track. Each track shared doesn’t result in one less sale for the artist, but rather has the potential to create one more fan. These fans will gladly pay money to see their favorite artists in concert or buy merchandise related to that artist (both scarce goods).
I’ve written previously about my beliefs on this topic in the posts “The New Music Industry” and “On Piracy and The Future of the Entertainment Industry.” While I post a combination of music that artists send in to me and stuff that I find on my own, I do it out of the love of the music, and sincerely think that I’m benefiting them by making their music available for all.
What have I learned through my music blog?
I’ve learned at least as much about PR and social media in 12 months of music blogging as I have in three years of being part of the PR echo chamber with BlogCampaigning. As both independent artists and record labels constantly pitch me to write about their music, I see the side of PR and blogger relations that many in the field might not (I also get to fill my iPod up with tons of cool new music that I would have otherwise never heard about). I’m sure that Eden Spodek’s work at Bargainista has helped her understand the other side of the communications fence, and similarly, Keith MacArthur’s background as a journalist has surely helped him develop media-friendly stories while at Com.motion or Rogers.
I’ve also learned a ton about Wordpress. As I’ve often told people, stop learning about social media and start using it. Maintaining two Wordpress blogs and experimenting with plugins and design has taught me a ton of the technical stuff that I don’t think I would have learned anywhere else.
Lastly, I’ve learned that maintaining two blogs is a lot of work. When you’re torn between contributing to one or the other, often contributing to neither is the end result. (Summer weather, online Halo 3 and Trinity Bellwoods around the corner from me aren’t helping the after-work blogging productivity, either.)
So where is my other blog? Well, you can probably figure it out if you’ve been a particularly attentive reader of BlogCampaigning. Or I might have told you about it. Otherwise, maybe you’ll stumble across it one day and wonder if that’s me in one of the photos on it or just a Parker Mason Doppleganger, as one reader thought.
My parting advice to you is to not worry about blogging about something immediately relevant to the Public Relations/Communications industry. I’ve said it before, but you’ll learn just as much (and maybe more) blogging about something else. As Gary Vaynerchuck once famously said, “I promize you can monetize that shit. If you love ALF, start an ALF blog. You like Smurfs? Smurf it up!” I don’t necessarily think you’ll be able to monetize that blog by selling ad space on it, but you’ll learn a lot. And isn’t knowledge worth more than money?
Do you read any music blogs? How do you feel about sharing music online?
-Parker
CNW Group "Newsmakers" Celebrate Winning the TMX Cup
Every year, CNW Group and a number of “top corporations from Bay Street’s financial, legal, technology and accounting sectors” competed in a Scrabble competition for a chance to win the TMX Cup. The competition is in support of Frontier College, an organization with the goal of helping people improve their literacy skills.
I was pleased to hear that on Wednesday, March 11th, the “Newsmakers,” a team representing my employer CNW Group, won the TMX Cup. I was pleased about this news, but not surprised. I’ve seen some of the CNW team play Scrabble before, and they’re pretty good. Reportedly one of the members on the team played the word “Footage” on a triple-word score for 98 points.
Great work, Newsmakers.
And congratulations to the other winners, as well as TMX Group and Frontier College for organizing another successful Scrabble contest.
In related news, Futility Closet reports that if you combine all 100 scrabble tiles you can spell:
COUNTRYMEN, I AM TO BURY, NOT EULOGIZE, CAESAR; IF EVIL LIVES ON, BEQUEATHING INJURY, GOOD OFT EXPIRES: A PALSIED, AWKWARD DEATH!
A few weeks ago, I told Jens and Heather that I didn’t want them to write any more posts about Twitter (”its been done to death”) so I’m breaking my own rule here.
Over the weekend, I started thinking about how Twitter is becoming a primary way for people to get their information. Then I started wondering why we aren’t seeing any journalists covering stories exclusively on Twitter. I imagine it would work much the same way that we sometimes see television or radio journalists covering breaking stories: they stay on the scene, and provide constant updates whenever they get additional information. Much of their reporting is observational, but other information comes in by way of eyewitnesses and official reports.
It looks like Mark MacKinnon had the same idea – he’s been Tweeting live from Bangkok as the city “disintegrates.”
Since he works for Canada’s Globe & Mail newspaper, I doubt that Twitter will be the sole way that he’ll report his story. However, I’m sure that people who have been following his updates on Twitter will most certainly read any in-depth story he writes about the situation for the Globe & Mail. The text of some of his tweets will also probably make it into any final copy he writes, and I’m sure that he’ll be aided by other Twitter users on the ground providing him with additional information.
In all, it sounds like a win-win situation.
Are there any other examples of journalists using Twitter as their primary way to report on one story?
-Parker
Even though I’ve heard that E is the most commonally used letter in the English language, I’d say that the letter J might be the key that is used most often on my keyboard, and that has to do with the fact that it is the shortcut for Google Reader that allows you to quickly jump to the next post.
I check the RSS Feeds that I subscribe to a couple of times a day, and using the J key (and occasionally the K key to backtrack when I go too fast) I can get through a hundred of feeds in a couple of minutes as I scan the headlines and text for something that interests me.
The other day, as I was looking actually visiting a blog, I automatically went for the J key to scan to the next post. It obviously didn’t work, but it gave me an idea:
How neat would it be if there was a browswer plugin that would allow you to quickly navigate a blog or website using only a few keys in much the same way Google Reader works? I imagine the pluggin as working so that it would automatically recognize a Headline or new section and jump to it.
On a blog, it would work relatively easily. On a site with a more complex website, I think it could work as well. Rather than scrolling all over the place though, it would just move onto the next section and highlight it for you.
What do you think? Does this idea have merit?
-Parker
Have you ever noticed how some websites display little icons in the browser next to their name or URL?
Blogger blogs display the that orange B, Wordpress blogs have the Wordpress W, Google has its Mondrian-inspired g, Collin Douma’s Radical Trust blog has a hand
, the UK’s Guardian newspaper has a lower case g that looks remarkably similar to Google’s and so on.
This is called a Favicon, and it is a 16×16 pixel image that you can easily create to give your blog or website a bit more style and identity. In order for it to work across all browsers, the image needs to be in the .ico format, although I’ve heard that some browsers also accept .png files for the favicon.
To create one for your site, use a tool like Degraeve’s Favicon creator. I uploaded an image of BlogCampaigning founder Espen Skoland to use as our favicon, and the online tool did the rest of the work.
Once you’ve got your little favicon created and stored on your computer, upload it to your websites root directory (for example, BlogCampaigning.com/* is our root directory) and it should appear on people’s browswers when they look at your site.
For more on how to do all of this, check out How To Create a Favicon by The Site Wizard.
These days, people expect to get things for free.
They expect to things for free because they should be getting them for free.
I’m not talking about hard goods like cars and clothing, but rather information. Mp3s, video files, newspaper articles: all of these things are nothing more than information that are processed in different ways by the end user. It costs nothing to reproduce them.
However, it costs something to initially produce them. Musicians need to buy instruments and recording equipment, and they spend long hours writing and crafting their songs.
The recent public support for the four founders of The Pirate Bay shows that people aren’t going to give up their ability to get free content that easily (swelling membership in Sweden’s Pirate Party supports this as well). As Mike Masnick has demonstrated time and time again on Techdirt, this kind of model is also capable of supporting musicians (but maybe not the record labels).
Jeremy Wright also spoke about this at the recent Third Tuesday Toronto event. When commenting on the future of advertising, he mentioned that there will probably be more examples of “great content, great conversation” brought to you by a corporate sponsor, rather than “sponsored” posts written by that sponsor. (I’m writing this from memory, so please correct me if I’m wrong about what he said or what he meant).
In the same way that corporation’s might have the opportunity to sponsor “great conversation” in an online environment like Jeremy Wright’s blog network, I think we’ll start to see examples of corporations sponsoring music and other types of art. Fans and the general public will be able to get the music for free, while the artist doesn’t starve to death. Its really a win-win situation.
I think that some people will frown upon this model, and will see it as another way that corporations are manipulating our culture for their own benefit. If that is the case, then these same people
I, however, don’t see this model of corporate sponsorship or patronage as a bad thing at all. I think it will create all kinds of new opportunities for artists in many different mediums to create art.
What are your thoughts on corporate sponsorship?
-Parker Mason
