The Old Spice campaign has proven to be one of the most memorable creative marketing and advertising concepts ever executed.

It has longevity and endurance that has been achieved through a mix of several reiterations as well as using online and offline marketing, social media and PR that has kept the original content bubbling across the Web.

Wieden + Kennedy created the original ad for the Super Bowl for their client Procter and Gamble the owners of the iconic Old Spice brand.

The ad featured former NFL athlete Isaiah Mustafa and was a a video centric marketing campaign that combined both traditional and social media.

The Old Spice Campaign Facts and Figures

Here are some of the numbers that were the result of the continuous marketing campaign.

• The number one most viewed sponsored channel on YouTube
• 236 million YouTube Views
• 80,000 Twitter followers in 2 days
• Facebook Interaction increased 800% with the personalized videos (Fans now total over 1.5 million)
• Sales figures increased by 107 %

At the end of the day you can have all the noise, buzz and viral success you like but if you don’t increase sales you might as well pack up and go home. The Old Spice campaign achieved both.

11 Social Media Marketing Lessons from the Old Spice Campaign

1. Keep Your Videos Short and Snappy

Originally one of the rules of thumb for on-line videos was that they shouldn’t be any longer than two minutes but the Old Spice YouTube videos were mostly less than a minute and as short as 17 seconds. They have taken “snappy” to a new level.

2. Turn Your Advertising into “Content” that is Easy to Share

A traditional offline video is hard to share, so making your ad into a YouTube video enables it to be shared and the distribution crowd sourced.

3. Make you Marketing Content Searchable

I don’t know about you but sometimes you see a funny ad on TV and you have to wait for it to be replayed to view it again. Publishing on-line as well as off-line makes it searchable and  able to be viewed on demand.

Click here to view the embedded video.

4. Be Everywhere

Marketing on as many appropriate multi-channel and multi-media marketing channels using social media ensures that broadest possible distribution is achieved by tapping into viewers media and platform preferences. The agency participated and promoted across many social media channels and networks including Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. The campaign wasn’t just published on social media channels but also the promoted using social media marketing to spread the brand message.

5. Respond in Real Time

In 24 hours the old spice guy responded to Tweets (including a marriage proposal) with 116  YouTube videos (The crew was given 7 minutes to record each video including the writing and the shooting with only one or two takes). This princilple of real time response can include responding to comments on Facebook and tweets on Twitter  to keep the conversation rolling.

6.  Use Other People’s and other Media’s Networks (for free)

The Wieden + Kennedy campaign decided to respond to Tweets with YouTube video responses and when the “Old Spice” guy responded to “The Ellen Show” tweet with a YouTube video then of course this was broadcast to millions on her shows network. Individuals with large on-line influence such as Guy Kawasaki and Perez Hilton had video responses which tapped into their large personal brand audiences globally. Tap into large networks by giving them the attention they want and crave and they will spread it for free to their distribution networks whether that be Facebook, television or Twitter.

Click here to view the embedded video.

7. Use Social Media to Activate Mass Media

This then leads us to another lesson. If your social media marketing is good enough, mass media will pick it up, especially if it has humour and entertainment value and will advertise it for free to millions of their viewers and readers.

8. Keep the Content Pumping

Savvy bloggers know this marketing secret and that is to keep the content pumping. The “Old Spice” campaign which was video centric managed to produce 100′s of videos led by a team of 4 writers, a camera crew and a half naked actor. The approach was certainly quantity over quality which social media advocates will recognise. Don’t wait for your post to be perfect before hitting the publish button because it never will be.

9. Drive Engagement through Personalization

One of the writers behind the Old Spice campaign Jason Bagley said. “No one expects to ask a question and then be responded to. I think that’s where we broke through.” The marketing team responded personally to tweets with custom YouTube videos, this both surprised and amazed the global audience.

10. If it Works Keep Repeating a Proven Formula

The old saying “when your on to a good thing stick to it” applies very much to this marketing success which initially started with the Super Bowl YouTube video which received 100,000 views every few hours has been repeated twice with a new angle every time. The second  time was a 2 day marathon of high quality personalized video responses to questions asked by fans on Twitter and YouTube. The latests reiteration was last month with a rival introduced called Fabio (an ageing male super model) and cleverly called the “New Old Spice Guy”

Click here to view the embedded video.

11. Add a Negative Twist

The creators of the campaign decided  to add a negative twist to rejuvenate the campaign by introducing a rival “Fabio” the “New Old Spice Guy” and had the viewers vote on who they preferred . This produced a lot of “Buzz” online and negative comment (viewers “loved” Isaiah Mustafa the original old spice guy) that continued to drive the viral conversation with the original “Old Spice Guy of course winning the competition. I have found negative headlines to produce much better responses than the positive angle eg “30 Things You Should Not Share on Social Media”

What impressed you about this campaign?

More Reading

• The 10 Best Facebook Campaigns
• The 10 Best Social Media Campaigns
• 50 Social Media Marketing Tips and Tactics
• 9 Secrets of an Online Video Marketing Strategy

Image by houbi

Social media is embedding itself in the human DNA as we connect and interact globally in an increasingly mobile social web. We have it wherever we go, on our iPhone, iPad or laptop.  If we aren’t connected we feel isolated, not in touch and feel like we are missing out. We are are social and the companies that we work for are social and there is a growing awareness that we need to weave the social media DNA into the fabric of the corporation.

The benefits include

• Crowdsourcing of  technical assistance with customers providing  answers to questions from other customers on forums and blogs.
• Leverage of your brand name through your content being shared on social media channels like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube
• Product development ideas provided on blogs by customers for free
• Becoming aware of  issues before they become PR disasters

Companies that are operating like islands are missing out on opportunities to connect with their customers, increase sales, provide superior customer service and educate their customers with blogs, forums and online video.

One company that is integrating social media into its corporate DNA with great results is Dell which is weaving social media into its business in the following areas.

1. Customer Service – Monitoring of online conversations and responding in real time. In 2005 Dell had a customer service issue that turned into PR disaster  and is still known today as “Dell Hell“. After this debacle Dell started weaving the social web into its DNA with online listening tools like Visible Technologies and Radian6.
2. Customer Engagement – It initiated forums  and corporate blogs that have now grown to six in total including healthcare and education that are targeted at their core vertical customer demographics and that fix problems before they turn into a firestorm such as happened with Dell Hell
3. Marketing – It has many Twitter channels including Dell Outlet on  Twitter (with sales approaching $6.5 million in 2009). Dell has also woven social media into the corporate website with share, comments and reviews permeating the website from the homepage to the product pages. Dell has created active advocate engagement through its Customer Advisory Panel that engages with power bloggers and influential online personalities.
4. Public Relations – The public relations is better managed through its online monitoring and its active participation on Twitter and forums
5. Product Development – Dell started a  blog style website called Ideastorm where they capture ideas from their customers and rank them and then implement the ones that make sense.

So how can you integrate social media into your company?

Image by kevindooley

Public relations professionals are some of the early adopters, innovators and users of social media in a rapidly changing web landscape and Twitter is a social media channel that can promote your message to a large group of people in real time so in essence it is instant PR.

You will find that within companies that the PR team is generally the group responsible for the brands social media activities.

I stumbled across this list painstakingly compiled by Liliana Dumitru-Steffens from the Everything PR blog which lists the top 100 PR companies and individuals who are on Twitter and as it provides a valuable source of potential resources I had to share it.

She used Twitaholic, Twittercounter and WeFollow. The rankings are based based on the number of users following back these PR experts (or PR companies/ publications), and not on their professional skills.

The ranking doesn’t aim to demonstrate how influential they are on Twitter and you could rank this list many ways in terms of their digital influence and that could include

• How many Twitter lists they are on
• How many Retweets their followers put back onto Twitter
• How many comments are on their blog posts
• How many Facebook friends they have
• The number of views on their YouTube channel
• The quantity of views on  their Slideshare channel
• How many search engine results do they receive when you enter them into a search engine
• What is their ranking in Google
• How much traffic does their website receive
• The number of inbound links to their blogs and websites

What a recent survey by Exact Target has shown is that Twitter power users are very influential online and so need to be taken seriously by brands.

So this list is only one measure of their own public relations success on behalf of their own brand on one social media channel. So go and visit their Twitter feeds and check out their content you are sure to learn something from these PR Twitter power users!!

Who do you think is the most influential and how could you measure that?

1. MagicSauceMedia – Renee Blodgett PR – 100,270 followers
2. PublicityGuru – Bill Stoller – Editor & Founder, Free Publicity Newsletter. For a Free Sample Issue click here – 89,432 followers
3. petershankman – Founder of HARO – 88,603 followers
4. JonathanCheban – 86,236 followers
5. peoplesrev – Kelly Cutrone – 84,000 followers
6. SocialMedia411 – Social Media Insider – 73,655 followers
7. briansolis – 65,542 followers
8. prsarahevans – Sarah Evans – 50,117 followers
9. Steve Rubel – 45,568 followers
10. Steveology – Steve Farnsworth – 40,815 followers
11. WeAreSocial – 39,212 followers
12. Alexander Blom – 39,161 followers
13. PRNewswire – Vicky, PR Newswire’s Director of Audience Development & team – 38,619 followers
14. MattSingley – 36,032 followers
15. PRwise – Roger S. Johnson – 31,450 followers
16. JessicaNow – Jessica Smith – 31,369
17. Collin Douma – 29,764 followers
18. MarvetBritto – 28,556 followers
19. ereleases – PR Distribution – 28,034 followers
20. Rochelle Veturis – 25,362 followers
21. DougH – Doug Haslam – 25,089 followers
22. DannyBrown – 23,175 followers
23. leeodden – 22,732 followers
24. Kathy_Johnson – Co-founder of PR/social media firm Consort Partners – 21,980 followers
25. chrisabraham – Chris Abraham is THE expert in social media and digital PR – 21,590 followers
26. missusP – Christine Perkett – 20,988 followers
27. Mark Ragan – 20,586 followers
28. Giovanni Gallucci – 20,453 followers
29. fishmark – 18,464 followers
30. prblog – Kevin Dugan – 17,875 followers
31. PR_Couture – Crosby/PR Couture – 17,801 followers
32. RealYaverbaum – eric yaverbaum – 17,711 followers
33. Lizz Harmon – 17,396 followers
34. SteveKayser – Biz Writer, Editor, Publisher, PR/Marketing – 16,704 followers
35. TDefren – 16,592 followers
36. karasmamedia – Kara Smith – 16,413 followers
37. PublicityHound – Joan Stewart – 16,290 followers
38. Shannon Paul – 15,826 followers
39. luisete – Luis Rodriguez – 15,627 followers
40. David Alston – 15,428 followers
41. DenverPR – Maggie Holben – 14,872 followers
42. juliebonnheath – JBH PR & Marketing – 14,706 followers
43. Doug Mummert – 14,337 followers
44. PressAbout – Free Press Release Distribution – 14,153 followers
45. sagefrog – Mark Schmukler – 13,659 followers
46. Michelle Blanc – 13,653 followers
47. jimcaruso – CEO & Chairman at MediaFirst PR – Atlanta – 13,579 followers
48. Flack_Me – The PR Professional’s Blog. – 13,057 followers
49. Marsha Friedman – 13,045 followers
50. ProfNet – Maria Perez – 12,925 followers
51. PRjobs – Lindsay Olson – 11,957 followers
52. jasonkintzler – 11,650 followers
53. laermer – Richard Laermer – 11,530 followers
54. HowellMarketing – 11,414 followers
55. CXN_Inc – 11,020 followers
56. John Digles – 11,016 followers
57. TracyHNguyen – 10,983 followers
58. LisaHoffmann – 10,920 followers
59. LizzieGrubman – 10,873 followers
60. davefleet – 10,580 followers
61. justinkistner – 10,354 followers
62. gothamc – 10,286 followers
63. walshpr – 10,153 followers
64. richquigley – 10,102 followers
65. dbreakenridge – 9,821
66. pheadrick – Parry Headrick – 9,687 followers
67. CathyWebSavvyPR – Cathy Larkin PR – 9,663
68. kdpaine – Katie Delahaye Paine – 9,652 followers
69. TiloBonow – 9,540 followers
70. BusinessWire – Monika Maeckle, Vice President, New Media Business Wire – 9,373
71. IdeaGrove – Scott Baradell – 9,370 followers
72. Spin_Thicket – 9,352 followers
73. pressreleases – Press releases distributed by Journalism.co.uk – 9,170 followers
74. Rachel Kay – 8,996 followers
75. Bill Rice – 8,709 followers
76. LuxuryPRGal – Christine Kirk – 8,636 followers
77. India PR Blog – 8,598 followers
78. tacanderson – VP of Digital Strategies at Waggener Edstrom – 8,514 followers
79. SourceBottle – 8,276 followers
80. Stefan Keuchel – 7,995 followers
81. Shonali Burke – 7,949 followers
82. Nigel_Morgan – 7,943 followers
83. SocialNicole – Nicole Harrison – 7,902 followers
84. ecofashionista – Kelly Drennan – 7,839 followers
85. George Affleck – 7,816 followers
86. J Public Relations – 7,790 followers
87. GetPubRelatJobs – 7,705 followers
88. CelebritizeYou – Marsha Friedman – 7,677 followers
89. Kellye Crane – 7,632 followers
90. waxgirl333 – 7,589 followers
91. Stuart Foster – 7,553 followers
92. SaurabhSaggi – 7,507 followers
93. GemmaWent – Red Cube Marketing – 7,451 followers
94. Brian Crouch – 7,432 followers
95. BarbaraJones – 7,418 followers
96. Len Kendall – 7,397 followers
97. PR4YOU – 7,377 followers
98. Yann Ropars – 7,373 followers
99. JenerationPR – Jennifer Berson – 7,273 followers
100. David Burrows – 7,244 followers

Image by monkeyworks illustration

I was discussing the changing landscape of the public relations market over coffee the other day with a couple of PR professionals and we got to chatting about how social media is changing their industry.

One key point that they made is that with traditional print media the advertising and the message has to be booked months in advance.  The challenge for marketers and PR is that in that time the message they want to put out could change because their competitors and the economy could have evolved drastically.

What they liked was the ability of social media to get the message out in real time or tomorrow not months later.

A real life example of how a company has adapted to this is Vail Resorts (A skiing resort conglomerate with sales of over $1 billion a year) where Rob Katz (CEO) and his team have taken control of its own public relations, advertising and Marketing in real time through social media. Why did they do it?

Here is Vail Resorts, CEO Rob Katz and why they pulled 80% of their traditional print media advertising budget  and moved heavily into social media marketing. (for those of you who would prefer a brief text summary I have done that for you below)

Click here to view the embedded video.

They noticed that planning for a a vacation used to be 6-8 months in the making but with 2 major paradigm shifts with the GFC and the explosion of social media that booking windows were dropping to 2-3 weeks instead of 6 months and room occupancy rates  were jumping from 50% to 80%, 2 weeks before Christmas.

They believe that real time decision making is not going to go away and because everyone is making their choices much quicker they had to change their advertising, marketing and PR strategies and tactics.

Also for the Vail Resorts video is one of the best ways to get people excited about skiing is video which now can be posted on YouTube and Facebook so social media enabled them to add online video to the marketing mix, something they couldn’t do years earlier.

They talked to their traditional print media channels such as “Outside” and “Mens Health” magazines about the 4 -6 month lead times and decided that they couldn’t do business the same way, not because of the readership target market but because they needed to move to more real time marketing.

Social media’s key ability is that it enables you to get your message to your guests and consumers that was right for that week out into the market… Now!

A traditional print message booked months earlier might not be the right message today as competitors and the economy change.

Decision?…they pulled 80% of their traditional print budget!!

Social media has compressed the executive decision making time to mobilize your messages to your target market.

Rob took his PR group, traditional advertising group and the social media team and had them work hand in glove and they almost work within a week by week messaging calendar.

He said “it is almost like a political campaign” watching what’s on around you and what their competitors are doing constantly changing their message and putting it out in a coordinated effort. They are also putting out their message to non traditional channels such as Mashable and other digital channels.

They also send out

• Social Media messages
• Newspaper advertising which are still very close to real time
• Search engine marketing

They used to live in an industry that would book advertising months in advance and then live with that message for the entire season.

Long lead time traditional media is struggling and all companies want is a good medium to advertise.

Is this the start of a paradigm shift?  How is real time social media marketing affecting your industry?

I was reading and skimming through my Google Reader the other day and  was more than pleased to find a blog post from Social Media Today that Ford had Won a PR Week Award for “Best Use Of Social Media”. (View Scott Monty’s Video on How Ford Use Social Media)

The PR Week awards are touted by PR Week as the Oscars of PR, so I was keen to find out more.

The post linked to the original post at Social Media Group, both articles were quite brief. Below is the original post

Ford wins PR Week Award for Best Use of Social Media!

maggiefox, March 13 2010

“We’d like to extend our sincere congratulations to our client Ford Motor Company for this week’s win at the PR Week Awards! This past Thursday in New York (where we were all very dressed up, including Ford Digital Communications Manager Scott Monty in black tie) the team took home a very prestigious and competitive award – Best Use of Social/Digital Media (some of the other nominees included the Queensland Department of Tourism and their “Best Job in the World” campaign).

When we started working with Ford in 2007, their social media activity consisted of a lone (unauthorized) YouTube channel. It has been incredibly gratifying to be a part of such an amazing evolution and to watch our client grow and master these new and emerging tools and ways of communicating, and be recognized by their peers for doing so.

Congratulations! We are so proud!”

I have recently taken an interest in Ford and social media competitions and have written several articles about Ford including “The 7 Secrets to Ford’s Social Media Marketing Success” and its best practice of social media marketing with its Ford Fiesta Competition. So I did a search on Google and found that there was a very little information about the awards.

I was starting to feel some frustration about not being able to obtain more in depth articles or blogs and to find out why Ford had won the award, not just a short PR announcement.

I then proceeded to enter a search into Twitter to see of there were any Tweets with any links to more in depth reports or analysis of the PR Week awards but to no avail, just tweets. Here are a couple of Tweets from the very deserving Scott Monty and Maggie Fox who were obviously very excited about the awards.

The next step was to go to the PR Week website and blogs and there I found a page listing the different awards. Below is a a snippet from the page

I then clicked on the link and found a page with a very brief introduction and they then asked me for $9.95 to read the rest of their award news.

I don’t know if I am just not skilled at Google search or navigating the PR Week website, but I was just wanting to write an article about the awards and Ford,because it was such an achievement and this was all I could discover.

So it is buried behind a paid wall and I am sorry PR Week but I am not paying $9.95 to read a news article, so you missed out on some free PR on a social media blog. The news will eventually surface on some elses blog or news item and someone else will steal your PR because it will not be behind a paid subscriber fort.

Am I being too sensitive? Shouldn’t this type of information be freely available? What do you think of PR Weeks strategy of a pay wall garden for its news?

I have seen this headline circulating over the last week on Twitter and the blogs and so I decided that  I would have a closer look at it.

 “Twitter Study Reveals Interesting results about Usage..40% are Pointless Babble” by Pear Analytics

Well this is my take on this “Headline” and its eye catching  emotive perspective. (by the way it is a good headline.. and it received a lot of attention and achieved great traction in social media mentions)

Guess what ..sounds like a normal share of typical “conversations” we have as human beings everyday.. some are deep and meaningful.. we pass some information along, we have some news to share and we also talk a bit about nothing in particular”

Like!

• “Honey.. I am taking the dog for a walk”
• “Hey..just popping down to the shop to get a paper”
• “Went to gym tonite”
• “Watched a great movie on the weekend”
• Does my bum look big in this?

Isn’t Web 2.0 about 2 way conversations?.. comments.. passing on information, some news and hey maybe a bit of self promotion slips into the conversation from time to time.

So here are the statistics from the Twitter Pear Study, August 2009 

• Total News 3.6%
• Total Spam 3.75%
• Total Self Promotion 5.75%
• Total Pointless Babble 40.55%
• Total Conversational 37.55%
• Total Pass along Value 8.7%

Note: Notice the use of “Total”  why not use “News” instead of “Total News” It must have been written by marketing .. or was  it the PR Department?

So if we add together… News, Conversational, Pass Along and a bit of Self Promotion we have 56% of normal interesting and typical conversations on “Twitter” that would seem to closely parallel what we as normal human beings experience everyday.

What do you think?  ”Is Twitter Dysfunctional?” or does it just reflect and mirror what we as humans experience as normal everyday?

I thought I knew who was in charge of Social Media in corporations until I came across this survey conducted by ipressroom.com with support by the PRSA which interviewed 278 public relations, marketing and human resources professionals to identify trends regarding their approach to social media. The breakdown of the companies surveyed by revenue was as follows

• 14% of the companies had revenue in excess of $1 Billion,  
• 5% had revenues between $500 Million and $1 Billion 
• 36% with revenues from $5 Million to $500 Million
• 45% with revenues under $5 Million

The survey asked a variety of questions including the following.

1. Which online communications channels are most important?
2. Which ones should organizations deploy first?
3. Which channels are critical for employees to learn to use to do their jobs effectively in a networked world?

So what were six insights from this survey and who really is running the “Social Media Show” ? 

Insight One: Social Media Is Prioritized and Utilized More Than  Managing the Company’s  Website Content…  despite the fact that an annual survey in 20 countries of 4,475 Opinion leaders called the “Edelman Trust Barometer,” revealed a company’s own website is seen as more credible than business blogs, personal blogs, social networking sites and advertising…… “Most organizations deem it more important to utilise social networks and micro-blogging services than devote more time to managing and updating content on their website”.

Note: Is this because “Social Media” is seen as trendy and new? 

Insight Two: Ease of Use Drives Adoption.. therefore not surprisingly, micro-blogging has grown slightly bigger than blogging, 62% versus 59%, demonstrating that lowering the barrier to entry — the “140-character news cycle” as Shel Holtz puts it — drives social media adoption by making it easier for people to participate.

 Insight Three: Small to medium-sized enterprises lead the way in Social Networking and Twitter.  Small to medium-sized enterprises are significantly ahead of larger organizations when it comes to adopting Twitter (64% versus 47%) and social networking (74% adoption versus 38%) but not in blogging which is now squarely in the large organization’s repertoire. But larger organizations are managing the content on their web sites more actively than small to medium-sized enterprises. 

Insight Four:  Public Relations is leading the social media revolution inside organizations of all types and sizes

• PR leads marketing in the management of all social media communications channels. Marketing leads PR in managing only email marketing and SEO.
• In 51% of organizations, PR lead digital communications compared to 40.5% by marketing.
• PR is responsible for blogging at 49% of all organizations. Marketing is responsible for blogging at 22% of all organizations.
• PR is responsible for social networking at 48% of all organizations. Marketing is responsible for social networking at 27% of all organizations.
• PR is responsible for micro-blogging at 52% of all organizations. Marketing is responsible for micro-blogging at 22% of all organizations.

Note: So there you have it Public Relations Professionals, you are running the Social Media Show… in most cases. 

Insight Five:  Among those responsible for hiring PR and marketing employees which Digital Skills were seen as most important and how did they rank?

A: Companies With Turnover Under $1B

1. Social Networking
2. Blogging
3. Micro-Blogging
4. SEO
5. Email Marketing
6. Web Content Management
7. Social Bookmarking

B: Companies With Sales Over $1B

1. Blogging
2. Social Networking
3. Micro-Blogging
4. Web Content Management
5. SEO
6. Email Marketing
7. Social Bookmarking

Note: So if you want a job in PR or Marketing it seems some experience with Social Media wouldn’t go astray

Insight Six: Social Media is growing in importance as a communications approach…with the majority of organizations considering hiring a specialist. This demonstrates that social media is no longer just something to do in your spare time, but rather a core discipline to be maintained by a dedicated resource.

• 26% are definitely interested in hiring dedicated resources to maintain some degree of social media engagement, while
• 48% of all organizations are considering adding dedicated staff that specialize in this area.
• Interest in adding dedicated social media specialists to the workforce is markedly higher among organizations with $1bn+ in annual revenue (43%) that it is at small to medium-sized enterprises (23%).

So there we have it, The 2009 Digital Readiness Report, a study conducted by iPressroom and PRSA, found that public relations professionals are firmly in the lead when it comes to managing an organization’s use of social media communications channels. And you thought it was going to be the marketing department didn’t you.

So who should be in charge of Social Media? Like to hear your thoughts

Public Relations

A survey of 1,900 business technology marketers by MarketingSherpa rated the optimized press release the most effective emerging market channel. Tad Clarke, Editorial Director of MarketingSherpa, has called the service SEO-PR has pioneered “the tactic known as SEO PR.” Optimizing press releases for news search engines.

As I am in the middle of revamping my company’s marketing strategy, and realise the importance of PR in SEO, I am looking closely at how we implement our PR, due to its importance in “”Being Found”.

David Meerman Scott has written a book that I would recommend that you read  (The New Rules of Marketing & PR) and I am using strategies from this great book in assisting me in developing our marketing plan. I also advise my clients about what they need to do to get found Online and PR is certainly a part of that strategy.

In this article I have taken an excerpt of David Meerman Scott’s insights and how the “New Rules of Marketing” apply to your business and especially how this applies to your companies PR.

David says “The Web has transformed the rules and you must transform your releases to make the most of the Web-enabled marketplace of ideas. In the old days, a press release was – shockingly – actually a release to the press. Before the Web, everybody knew that the only reason you issued a press release was to get the media to write about you.

What are  ” The Old Press Release Rules”?

• Nobody saw the actual press release except a handful of reporters and editors.
• You had to have significant news before you were allowed to write a press release.
• A release had to include quotes from third parties, such as customers, analysts and experts.
• The only way your buyers would learn about the press release’s content was if the media wrote a story about it.
• The only way to measure the effectiveness of press releases was through “clip books,” which collected every time the media deigned to pick up your release.

The new rules of PR in a Web 2.0 World

How to create a press release strategy for reaching buyers directly. The Web has changed the rules for press releases. The thing is, most old-line PR professionals just don’t know it yet. Because the rules for relating to the public have changed so slowly over the past ten years (since the Web has allowed people to read press releases directly), practitioners who learned based on the old rules have been equally slow to change. In fact, most old-school experts have refused to change altogether. It is time to step it up and consider the promise Web 2.0 public relations holds.

• Do you want to reach your buyers directly?
• Do you want to drive traffic to your Web site?
• Do you want to achieve high rankings on the search engines?
• Do you want to attract buyers who are looking for what you have to offer?
• Do you want to move people into and through the sales process?
• Do you want to compete more effectively?

Why you need to learn the new rules? Today, savvy marketing professionals use press releases to reach buyers directly. While many marketing and PR people understand that press releases sent over the wires appear in near real-time on services like Google News, very few understand the implications for how they must dramatically alter their press release strategy in order to maximize the effectiveness of the press release as a direct consumer-communication channel. The media has been disintermediated. The Web has changed the rules. Buyers read your press releases directly and you need to be talking their language. This is not to suggest that media relations are no longer important; mainstream media and the trade press must be part of an overall communications strategy. In some businesses, mainstream media and the trade press remain critically important and, of course, the media till derives some of its content from press releases. But your primary audience is no longer just a handful of journalists. Your audience is millions of people with Internet connections and access to search engines and RSS readers.

Every organization possesses particular expertise that has value in the new e-marketplace of ideas. The Web has made it easy for organizations to publish that expertise in various forms, including press releases, which allows companies, institutions, and non-profits to function much like traditional publishers. Organizations gain credibility and loyalty with customers, employees, investors, and suppliers through content and smart Web marketers now think and act like publishers in order to create and deliver content targeted directly at their audience. As organizations of all types begin to behave like publishers, many are adapting to the rigors of the publishing business and learning the editorial process. At the same time, new rules are emerging as online publishing continues to mature. In an increasingly competitive marketplace, all organizations are searching for the elusive key to success. Well, look no further: Content ( Like Blogs), even in the form of a “mere” press release, will unlock success in almost any product category, even in highly competitive industries where smaller players are beset upon by larger, better-funded competitors.

Reach your buyers directly. Under the old rules, the only way to get “published” was to have your press release “picked up” by the media. We’ve come a long way. The Web has turned all kinds of companies, non-profits, and even rock bands and political campaigners into just-in-time and just-right publishers. Organizations – the new publishers – create press releases that deliver useful information directly onto the screens of their buyers. Until recently, nobody ever thought of companies as publishers; newspapers and magazines published the news. But that’s all changing. Self-publishing Web-style has moved into the mainstream and organizations large and small are doing the publishing… via press releases. As you are making this fundamental shift, what should you write press releases about? Big news is great, but don’t wait.

Write about just about anything that your organization is doing: Like

• CEO speaking at a conference? Write a release.
• Win an award? Write a release.
• Have a new take on an old problem? Write a release.
• Add a product feature? Write a release.
• Win a new customer? Write a release.
• Publish a white paper? Write a release.
• Get out of bed this morning? Okay, maybe not…
• but you are thinking the right way now!

To bypass the media this is what you need to do to apply the “10 New Rules of PR”

1. Think like they do: In order to implement a successful press release strategy, think like a publisher. Marketers at the most enlightened organizations recognize the fact that they are now purveyors of information and they manage content as a valuable asset with the care a publishing company does. One of the most important things that publishers do is start with a content strategy and then focus on the mechanics and design of delivering that content. Publishers carefully identify and define target audiences and consider what content is required in order to meet their needs. Publishers consider questions like: Who are my readers? How do I reach them? What are their motivations? What are the problems I can help them solve? How can I entertain them and inform them at the same time? What content will compel them to purchase what I have to offer?

2. Publish your press releases through a distribution service: Publishers also recognize that simply creating compelling content is not enough; it has to reach interested readers. The best way to publish press releases is to simultaneously post a release to your own Web site and send it to one of the press release wires. There are a number of options for wire distribution of press releases. The benefit of using a press release distribution service is that your release will be sent to the online news services such as Yahoo!, Google, Lycos, and many others. Many press release distribution services reach trade and industry Web sites as well. In fact, you can reach hundredsof Web sites with a single press release. Take a look at the various services and compare them yourself.

A Selection of the Larger Press Release Distribution Services

• BusinessWire www.businesswire.com
• PRWeb www.prweb.com
• PRNewswire www.prnewswire.com
• Market Wire  www.marketwire.com

In order to get your press releases to appear on the online news services, you just have to get your release onto a basic press release “circuit” offered by a press release distribution service. The services also have many value-added options for you to consider. Compare options and in making your choice, remember that when your goal of sending press releases is search engine marketing. Thus, the newsroom and geographical reach offered by a service is less important than ensuring that your releases are included on major online news sites.

3. RSS feeds from online news sites display your press release content. Many press release distribution services also offer RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds of their press releases, which they make available to other sites, blogs and individuals. What this means is that each time you publish a press release with them, the press release is seen by thousands of people who have subscribed to the RSS content feeds. And online news services such as Google News have RSS feed capability too, allowing people to receive feeds based on keywords and phrases. So each time your release includes a word or phrase of importance, people will receive your press releases directly and in near real-time.

4. Simultaneously, publish your press releases to your Web site. Post your press releases to an appropriate and readily findable section of your Web site. Many organizations have a media room or press section of the Web site, which is ideal. The press release should be kept live for as long as the content is appropriate, perhaps for years. For many organizations, the press release section of the Web site is one of the most frequently visited parts of the site. Check out your Web site statistics. You may be amazed at how many visitors are already reading your press releases. When the press release is posted on your site, search engine crawlers will find the content, index it, and rank it based on words and phrases and other factors. To achieve high rankings, pay attention not only to the words and phrases, but also to other search engine optimization factors such as the URL used, the words in the headline and first paragraph of the release, the title tag, and metatags. Don’t use image files for text, as the words cannot be read by search engine crawlers. You should also create your own RSS feeds of your news stories on your site. Use a standard off-the-shelf RSS feed generator so that interested visitors will be able to subscribe to your press release feed directly. [For much more detailed information on the specifics of search engine marketing techniques, check out Search Engine Watch.

5. Optimize your press releases for searching and for browsing. At the broadest level, there are two ways to use and deploy content on the Web and smart organizations understand both angles and optimize press releases accordingly. The first way that people use content is to answer questions (through search engines), thus organizations must optimize content to be found by searchers. This will attract people who are looking for what your organization has to offer. The second way that people use content is that they want to be told something that they do not already know. This is why browseability is so important; it allows users to “stumble” across useful information they didn’t know they were looking for. While many Web savvy marketers understand the importance of search-engine optimization, they often forget that sites must be designed for browsing too. You should deploy site navigational design in a way that provides valuable information visitors might not have thought to ask for in addition to answering any questions they may have. To illustrate this concept, consider one of the Web’s best known sites, Google, which in its purest form exists only to answer questions. With a site or content product organized only around answering questions, users must already know what they want before proceeding. But people also look to sites to tell them something. Contrast Google with another famous site, Drudge Report. Drudge Report doesn’t exist to answer questions; rather, it tells visitors stuff they didn’t think to ask. While it does provide search functionality (far down the home page), Drudge Report provides content that’s meant to be browsed and, when you are creating content for your site, you should too. Press release pages are among the most popular parts of many Web sites based on visitor counts because many people browse these pages as they research topics. Consider organizing your press release section using multiple ways to browse. Maybe create links to releases based on buyer profile (maybe by vertical market or some other factor appropriate to your organization), by product, by geography, and the like, in addition to providing a prominent homepage link to a media center or newsroom. You might also divide releases by different “solutions” or market-target landing pages to help users drill to areas of interest. People who are searching for your release will still find them by searching with keywords and phrases, but people who do their own research and consider a decision over a period of time often browse releases to learn about an organization. They may also need to print them out to present research to others in their organization, so consider providing easy ways to print releases (in PDF format as well as HTML)

6. The importance of links in your press releases, particularly because your releases may be delivered by feeds or on news services and various sites other than your own, creating links from your press releases to content on your Web site is very important. These links, which might point to a specific offer or to a landing page with more information, allow your buyers to link from the press release content into specific Web site content on your site that will then drive them into the sales process. However, there is another enormous added benefit to including links in press releases. Each time your press release is posted on another site, such as an online news site, the inbound link from the online news site to your Web site helps to increase the ranking of your site. This is because the search engines use inbound links as one of the important criteria for the page ranking algorithms. So when your press release has a link to your site, you actually increase the ranking of the pages that you link to – yours.

7.  Focus on the keywords and phrases that your buyers use.  One thing successful publishers do, which Web marketers should emulate, is understanding the audience first and then set about to satisfy their informational needs. A great way to start thinking like a publisher and to create press releases that drive action is to focus on your customer’s problems and then create and deliver content accordingly. Use the words and phrases that your buyers do. Think about how the people you want to reach are searching and develop press release content that include those words and phrases. Too often, press release content simply describes what an organization or a product does. While simple information about your organization and products might be valuable to a subset of your buyers, what many really want from your site is content that first describes the issues and problems they face and then provides details on how to solve the problems. Particularly when your buyers search, they use the words and phrases important to them. Once you’ve built an online relationship, you can sell into the needs and potential solutions that have been defined, but you need to help them find you first. First, determine who your target audience is and figure out how they should be sliced into distinct buying segments. Once this exercise is complete, identify the situations in which each target audience may find themselves. What are their problems? What keeps them awake at night? What do they want to know? What words and phrases do they use to describe these problems? The answers, by the way, may be very different from the way you would label them. Don’t get trapped by your own jargon; think, speak, and write like your customers do.

8. Your Buyers Don’t Want Gobbledygook. Though you may have a well-developed lexicon for your products and services, they don’t necessarily mean much to your potential customers. As you write press releases, focus on the words and phrases that your buyers use. As a search engine marketing tool, press releases are only as valuable as the keywords and phrases that are contained in them. Avoid words like flexible, scalable, groundbreaking, industry standard, or cutting-edge, and other forms of what I call gobbledygook. The worst gobbledygook offenders seem to be B2B technology companies. For some reason, technology marketing people have a particularly tough time explaining how products solve customer problems. Because they are a bit fuzzy, they cover by explaining myriad nuances of how the product works (peppered with industry jargon that sounds vaguely impressive). What ends up in press releases is a bunch of “industry-leading” solutions that purport to help companies “streamline business process,” “achieve business objectives,” or “conserve organizational resources.” Huh? Your buyers (and the media that covers your company) want to know which specific problems your product solves and proof that it works as advertised – in plain language. Your marketing and PR is meant to be the beginning of a relationship with buyers and to drive action (such as generating sales leads), which requires a focus on buyer problems. Your buyers want to hear this in their own words. Every time you write, yes, even in press releases, you have an opportunity to communicate. At each stage of the sales process, well-written materials combined with effective marketing programs will lead your buyers to understand how you (specifically) help them.

9. Content Drives Action. An effective press release strategy, artfully executed, drives action. Companies that understand the new rules of press releases have a clearly defined goal – to sell products, generate leads, secure contributions, or get people to join – and deliver content that directly contributes to reaching that goal. At successful organizations, press releases draw visitors into the sales-consideration cycle, then funnels them towards the place where action occurs. The action mechanism is not hidden nor is the organization’s goal a secret. When content effectively drives action, the end of the sales process – an ecommerce company’s “buy” button, the B2B corporation’s “please contact us” form, or non-profit’s “donate” link – are found in logical places, based on content that leads people there. For many companies, Web content also has a powerful, less tangible effect. On the best sites, content does more than just sell product – it directly contributes to an organization’s positive reputation by showing thought-leadership in the marketplace of ideas. Many people view a well executed series of press releases as highly influential, with regards to a company that they are considering doing business with. Press releases mean your company is “busy” and a lack of press releases can indicate that you are not moving forward. In the new world of marketing, consistent quality press release content brands a company or a non-profit as an expert and as a trusted resource to turn to again and again. Press releases are often considered as an important buying criteria, especially in a complex B2B sales process.

10. Drive people into the sales process with press releases. Savvy marketing professionals understand that sales and marketing must work together to move prospects into the sales pipeline. This is especially important in a complex B2B sale that has long decision making cycles and multiple buyers that need to be influenced. The good news is that press release content drives people into and shortens the sales cycle for any product or service, especially ones that have many steps and take months or years to complete. Here’s how you can make this happen:

• Understand your sales process in detail. All sales processes are definable, repeatable and understandable and effective marketers use the Web to move people into and through the process. You need to get together with salespeople, sales management and product managers to understand exactly what happens in the sales cycle. You should answer questions such as: How do people initially find your company or product? What words and phrases do they use? Understanding the process in detail allows you to understand how in the process press releases can be used.
• Segment your prospects. Consider press releases based on the buyer persona, perhaps by job title or by industry. A prospect is much more likely to enter the sales cycle by clicking a press release that talks about solving her problems.
• Create thought leadership content to sit at the top of the sales funnel. People in the early stages of the sales cycle need basic information on the product category, especially “thought leadership” pieces. Don’t just write press releases about your company and your products; be thought leaders and write about the industry and higher-level strategic issues surrounding your product or service. When doing initial research, people don’t want to hear about you and your company; they want information about them and their problems.
• Provide content that is compelling enough to get people to “raise their hand.” In your press releases, deliver something of value that you can trade for a registration form. A link from your press release to an informative white paper, online event (such as a Webinar), or online demo will help move your prospect further down the sales process – and, in exchange for the right content, she will happily “raise her hand” to express interest by filling out a form. Remember, you’re still not ready to sell a product or service (yet); you are still relationshipbuilding. (By the way, these links will also help raise the search engine ranking of the pages you point to.)
• Measure and Improve. Measure what content is being used and how. Understand through Web metrics what’s working and constantly tweak the content to make it better. Meet regularly with salespeople to gain insights into the sales cycle and how your press release content helps, and can better assist, the process. The Web is iterative – you can and should make adjustments on the fly.

The “New” News Cycle: The news cycle has changed, and with it, so must many of the rules of the game. With Web-based access to information, consumers have real choices for how they learn about the world around them – alternatives to the filter of mainstream media. Not too long ago, the only way for corporations to influence news was for their PR people to issue a press release (intended for media only) and then hit the phones to talk up journalists. Editors and reporters were in a power position as the filter between organizations and the public. With the old news cycle, all PR people knew the rules: The ultimate goal was to get some magazine or newspaper to write a positive story that would appear weeks or months later. Then the happy corporate flack would put the media hit into a clip book to prove their value to the organization. No more. Information control is decentralized. The best PR and marketing pros know that Web-based communication delivered directly to their constituents is highly effective. Now, press releases circumvent the media and appear in real time on millions of desktops. Bloggers almost instantly comment on product announcements, and smart communications pros treat these “new journalists” with respect. Of course, magazines and newspapers are still vitally important, but in the new news cycle, the value of the media has shifted to adding context to the news and identifying trends. Marketers are beginning to understand what the new news cycle means to their communications efforts and are harnessing the power for their organizations’ benefit.”