mediations

Let's ban Facebook because kids like it...

People are saying horrible things about us - let's shut our eyes and put our fingers in our ears.

That seems to be the official line on social media taken by a lot of Further Education colleges. It is not, I hasten to add, the view of those who work in communications and marketing but does seem to be the prevailing attitude of those further up the foodchain.

I am analysing some useful feedback from delegates who will attend the Association of Colleges Communications Conference on Thursday. With Sunderland colleague Chris Rushton, I will be talking about Modern Media Trends and College Communications. To get us started, we did a survey, seeking to discover how college communicators used social media; the results were, let's say, ... challenging.

From the outset, I failed to anticipate that many, many colleges ban access to social media sites. One respondent tells us:

"We have a constant battle with IT over access to social media sites - in fact I had to send a staff member home to work on it - which I was then told was unacceptable in itself..."

The central theme of most replies focuses on 'policing' and 'control' - we are frightened that people will post negative comments etc. My response will be along the lines of "Live with it - they will say and are saying these things whether or not you engage with social media...."

Which is easy for me to say...

I would be very grateful for any practical advice I can hand on to communicators who are keen to contribute to social media conversations but need to persuade administrators, executives and... (heaven help us!) their IT departments that the possibility of hearing negative comments is not a good reason for missing out on a range of media channels that will go on being hugely popular - whatever FE College policy decrees.

Delivering the New PR

We presented the fifth and final University of Sunderland Delivering the New PR conference in London on Friday and if these posts are anything to go by - thanks Simon, Rob, Richard, Sarah, Lydia, Steve - I think we can say it was a success.

I am usually the warm-up man, setting the scene for Tom, Neville, Stuart, Chris and Elizabeth, but this time Elizabeth wasn't able to come, so I had two spots, the second of which built on Elizabeth's ideas on networking to look forward to what might be just over the horizon - or, to put it another way, we watched avatars dancing to Thriller and heard Neville talking about launching crayon in Second Life. It certainly got the audience talking...

Getting things under way, I looked back at what he had been saying when this series began, in Sunderland, just a year ago, when most delegates hadn't much idea about podcasting, when the ideal of YouTube being bought for extraordinary sums was fanciful, when most people were only vaguely aware of blogs as geeky 'online diaries'. The difference in engagement was dramatic, with quite a number of the audience very familiar with the emerging social media. Happily, Neville, Tom and Stuart are just a couple of strides ahead of the curve so the debate was stimulating, but it was also clear that there has been a sea change in attitudes to social media.

But what struck me, quite forcibly, was that although PR practitioners have a good grasp of what is happening, some are still struggling not only to convince clients and managers about the changes but also to really grasp what social media means to them.

The key moment was when Stuart asked who maintained a convenional 'clippings service' - hands flew up across the room. But when he asked who monitors blogs and other social medias, there was a sharp fall off. People who are employed not only to shape the reputation of organisations but also to act as its eyes and ears were apparently unaware of the need to track what people are saying about their clients or employers.

My belief us that this where PR is happening today; the axis of communication has swung through 90 degrees - it is not what we say about ourselves that matters but how good we are at influencing the conversation that swirls around us, our products and our services.

We are already planning the next wave of Delivering the New PR and is quite certain that the challenges of engaging with the conversations around organisations will feature every bit as strongly, indeed more strongly, than anything PR can attempt in its increasingly futile bid to command and control the messages that (aim to) influence reputation.

Anyway, thanks to the speakers, the excellent Don't Panic team who made everything happen, our sponsors, Indigo Red and Media Measurement, and most of all to the delegates - the best thing about Delievring the New PR are the after-match comments and this time especially they have been hugely encouraging.

See you next year for Round 2!

London: the Movie

Neville Hobson produced a podcast during our Delivering the New PR conference on Friday.I have taken a few clips from it and added pictures from the event. Click here to Watch London: the Movie.

UKFast: podcast case study

As ever, a lot of people at Delivering the New PR wanted to talk to Neville Hobson (pictured left) about podcasting. On the face of it, it is a lot easier to understand podcasting than some other apects of social software - the radio show analogy is familiar and people are getting used to downloading music on to their computers.

But that still means PRs need to do a lot of thinking before they can be sure they have an effective use for podcasting, and they also need to have the confidence (and kit!) to actually make a podcast.

So it will be interesting to see how our headline sponsor UK Fast fare with their new portable podcast studio - everything you need in a small attache case. No doubt the equipment works well, but for me the big question is what do you do with it? Although I am pretty scathing when I discuss the EuroBlog 2006 finding that suggests a key reason for organisations not blogging is a fear they won't have the content, I am a little less certain about sourcing interesting audio content. I know it is an indefensible double standard, but whereas I can pour scorn on a PR saying to a client "We can't fnd anything interesting to write about you or your product..." I really do wonder about whether I could always come up with gripping audio for some of the clients I have worked for....

It is something UK Fast has to tackle head-on - and they do...

This week UKFast communications manager Jonathan Bowers talks with Lawrence Jones about business hosting and the opportunities being missed by UK companies that are not maximising their online presence.

This podcast goes into particular detail on search engine optimisation, creating a solid infrastructure and top level domain names - the good, the bad and the unnecessary.

Give it a listen. No music, no frills but with some useful ideas.   

PS. Tom Murphy and I couldn't supress our giggles when Neville was asked about the optimum length for a podcast... On a good day it takes me about 45 minutes to drive in to work - but that might be time for a half a typical FIR; until they are easily broken down into chapters or tracks that I can skip and search, long podcasts will deter me. We both love Nev but thee hours a week is a big ask for a medium that demands your full attention...

The UKfast podcast scores by being a manageable 11 minutes but arguably, it gets more interesting as it goes along. The trick must be making sure people stay with it to the end.

Delivering the New PR: thoughts

According to Technorati, the blogosphere has doubled in size since we held our Making the News Conference in Sunderland last November, and yes, I trotted out that graph for Delivering the New PR in London yesterday. Interestingly, the size of our audience had doubled over the same period, with over 150 delegates there to hear Tom Murphy, Neville Hobson, Elizabeth Albrycht, Chris Rushton (above)  and me... 

As before I began by asking a series of questions to see who was using various forms of social softwares, and there was a clear increase in those using podcasts, photosharing and RSS from Manchester in February. At the same time, we had a significant number of delegates from major organisations and big name agencies who were still finding their bearings in what they recognised as a challenging new environment. Interestingly, we put on a blogging basics session before the conference proper and at least half the delegates were there an hour early to watch Tom and Neville give a practical demonstration.   

What struck me most about the presentations was they way everyone's thinking had moved forward, that concepts that seemed a little tenuous in November are demonstrably coming together into a more coherent framing. From the outset we have billed the conferences as explaining the New PR and then, one by one, explained why it is not a 'new' PR after all, but a way of expressing traditional PR values and techniques in a changing environment.

I began by asking delegates to listen to the presentations from a perspective that accepted markets as conversations and suggested this should be seen in terms of the fading of 'command and control' PR, and to continually relate what they heard to both external and internal communications. The changes we talked about were, in part, driven by technology, but more about the implications of sharing information, of peer recommendation and what a Stuttgart speaker termed 'branding by stars' - that today organisational reputation is increasingly expressed through star ratings driven by customers on sites ranging from Amazon to eBay. A high proportion of delegates agreed some of their purchasing decisions were based on customer recommendations, often from like-minded peers they had never met.

At the same time, when the panel was asked if launching a blog was still in itself newsworthy, although most of the team instinctively felt the answer was no, that the way to get noticed was to have exciting content, we still agreed that in some parts of the UK media, yes, just beginning to blog was indeed newsworthy.

To emphasise the point Stephen Davies and I were both interviewed about the conference for BBC Radio Newcastle, and a vox pop on the streets of Sunderland found no difficulty in finding a stream of people who hadn't a clue what a blog was...

Hidden blogs

One of the points we will be making at Delivering the New PR is that some of the most significant developments in PR blogging are happening below the radar. In particular, Stuart Bruce will be talking about UK blogs that are having a real impact on internal communications.

It was interesting to see BL Ochman making a similar point about the US in a post asking Why are companies hiding their blogs?    

London, May 12 - be there!

• 

  Thanks Eric and Comic Strip Generator

Delivering the New PR in London

The University of Sunderland's highly successful Delivering the New PR conference goes to London on May 12, bring together some of the biggest names in European PR blogging.

Presenting the latest thinking on opportunities and challenges presented by 'social software' innovations, the sessions concentrate on providing highly practical advice that can make a rapid impact PR practice.

Three speakers, Elizabeth Albrycht, Neville Hobson and Philip Young are just back from the New Communications Forum, held in Palo Alto, California (Silicon Valley) where they met with US practitioners at the leading edge of the New PR. With For Immediate Release partner Shel Holtz, Neville, a world expert on podcasting, is writing a book that will be the definitive guide to the hottest new media topic of 2006.

We will be joined by Microsoft's Tom Murphy and Stuart Bruce, an expert on how UK organisations are implementing the new technologies.

• Read posts about University of Sunderland New PR conferences in Manchester and Sunderland.

• Download the_new_pr_conference_flyer_london.pdf

• For more details and your chance to book early for London go to Don't Panic. 

United in Manchester: Delivering the New PR

Just back from Manchester and taking part in the University of Sunderland's Delivering the New PR conference. Lots of positive feedback and as ever a pleasure to be working with blogstars Elizabeth Albrycht, Stuart Bruce, Neville Hobson and Tom Murphy.

It is only three months since Making the News in Sunderland but the whole feel of the event was that things have moved on quite a way since November. More of the delegates seemed at home with blogs and it was obvious from eavesdropping on lunchtime chats that people across a wide range of disciplines are working on new and exciting ideas.

Neville was on good form - which was a good thing as podcasting was the clearly the hot topic. A show of hands suggested that about two in three delegates had listened to a podcast, and about half of them said they'd done this for the first time within the last few weeks.

Sarah Jafar told us about a very useful feature, downloadable mp3s giving first aid advice, she had added to the St John Ambulance website - here it is.

"St. John Ambulance believes that everyone should learn at least the basic First Aid techniques. You may need to use them at any time at home, at school or work or even while you're travelling. Knowing what to do can make the difference to a person's recovery, and you could even save their life.

And only a couple of days ago I discovered that another of our Sunderland delegates, Simon Collister, of CicadaPR, has launched his own blog, Simon Says.

It's Bright Idea Week!

This is Bright Idea Week. All over the country, PR account directors are meeting clients and talking about the year to come - and they know what to expect...

Even those MDs and CEOs who managed a fairly relaxing Christmas Day found their minds wandering during the Boxing Day re-run of the Great Escape or whatever it was this year. They drifted into 'blue sky' or 'rather good port' thinking. They remembered the trends for 2006 article that mentioned blogging. They had a Bright Idea and they resolved to talk to their PR people about it...

Maybe it is because of Bright Ideas Week that we have had many bookings for the Delivering the New PR: How Blogs, Podcasts and RSS can work for you conference to be held in Manchester on Wednesday February 15.

Even those who have already had this Bright Idea and realise their agency or comms dept needs to understand blogging and 'the new PR' might be surprised to realise quite how much has changed since the successful Sunderland Making the News event in November.

When France can boast 3.5m bloggers and blogging can inspire 3,404 mentions in Sweden's mainstream media, clearly something is happening that PR practitioners need to understand.

Our Manchester speakers will include Tom Murphy, of Microsoft and PR Opinions, Elizabeth Albrycht of Corporate PR and the Society for New Communications Research, Neville 'NevOn' Hobson, half of the For Immediate Release podcast team, and Stuart 'PR Guru' Bruce, as well as my University of Sunderland colleague, Chris Rushton.

Venue: Lancashire County Cricket Club, Talbot Road, Old Trafford, Manchester

Delegate tickets are £125 + Vat for CIPR Members and £145 + Vat for non-members. For further information or to book your tickets please contact Nicky Wake at Don’t Panic on 01706 828855 or by e-mail [email protected]. Tickets can also be booked on line at www.dontpanicprojects.com/booking.htm