PR and Social media

Text

Social Media
Friday, 7 January 2011

Changing media

Mobile = alerts me

Internet = tells me

TV = shows me

Print = explains to me (provides context)

Youʼre living in exponential times, as you will see at the end of this lecture. The communications challenges are many (and varied). AT times, I think “better you than me”. The pace will only
get quicker.

When you get the CEO of News Limited Australia talking and thinking about new media, then you know somethingʼs happening.
John Hartigan runs Rupertʼs operations here. Harto, as heʼs known, once was a knockabout journalist carving his name in the wooden press gallery at Balmain courthouse ... similar to our
guest speaker two weeks ago. Heʼs witnessed a rapid transformation of the media landscape in his 40 years in newspapers.
He recognises, as should you, that the news cycle is changing. He summarised it thus:

• my mobile to alert me;
• the internet to tell me;
• TV to show me; and
• print to explain it, give it context and tell me what it really means

Think about ʻITʼ ...

“He might do well to take each moment as it
comes examined but unexplained. There could
perhaps be something to the idea that life’s
mystery is sweet even when it’s painful. Trying
too hard to make sense of it might be to miss
Hugh Mackay
the point.”
– From Winter Close, Hugh Mackay
In a recent newspaper article (an extract form a just-released book, Advance Australia-Where?) noted Australian social researcher and commentator Hugh Mackay, who is also a qualiﬁed
psychologist, questioned just exactly where weʼre heading with communication, or more particularly with the way we communicate. Mackay has been prodding the nationʼs conscience for
more than 25 years.
Just how we are communicating is something that has concerned me for some time. Hopefully it will concern you, as possible future communicators.
In his article, Mackay questions whether we are in fact missing out on something, despite all the methods at our disposal to impart information. Is the “humaness” being taken out of
communication?
If nothing else, over the next two weeks, I ask that you consider just what we can achieve by using the latest communication techniques. Are we simply confusing data transfer with human
communication, or are we using tools that help foster understanding and assist in the way we practice sound PR?

What is Social Media?

Socialisation of media
Monologue > dialogue
Puts ʻPublic” back into PR
Not yet developed

• The current thinking is that media is being “socialised”. By media, we are now referring to “new” media (the Internet). The Internet is now THE media. People now have control of what gets published and
broadcast. One term for it is citizen journalism. Whatever the pros and cons, it is here to stay.

As you would all be aware, the traditional media (print, radio, TV) are under threat. Established media companies the world over are rushing into Cyberspace, as witnessed by Rupert Murdoch’s recent
purchase of MySpace. We have discussed that the 2008 Beijing Olympics will have four hours a day telecast by Channel 7 on Yahoo.

So the socialisation of media is simply people are populating the Internet with information. We form social groups according to our interests. We facilitate social interaction, whether it’s by words, or pictures,
both live and recorded.

•The way communication has developed is that monologue has given way to dialog. And that’s a good thing. People are communicating both ways. Social media has created a new layer of inﬂuencers. It is
the understanding of the role people play in the process of not only reading and disseminating information, but also how they in turn, share and also create content for others to participate. This, and only this,
allows us to truly grasp the future of communications.

•Social media is about putting the “public” (or the people in society) back in Public Relations and realising that focusing on important markets and inﬂuencers will have a far greater impact than trying to reach
the masses with any one message or tool.

•The exciting thing is that this trend is only just developing, and you will be part of it. However, most people around the world have yet to embrace it and participate. Please keep in mind that when we talk
about the proliferation of all these techniques, we are talking about only those countries that have developed IT infrastructure.

See the reading by Lee Hopkins.

Are we that connected? http://www.internetworldstats.com

Well, we might be connected here in Australia and other western and ﬁrst world countries, but most of the world is still playing catch-up. You might argue that this is irrelevant and that the
web serves only those with money to spend. But itʼs important to realise things in context.

Region Usage # % population penetration

Africa 33.5 million 3.6

Asia 436.7 million 11.8

Europe 321.8 million 39.8

Middle East 19.5 million 10.1

Nth America 232.6 million 69.5

Latin America/Caribbean 110 million 19.8

Oceania/Australia 18.8 million 54.5

TOTAL 1.17 billion

For Australia, the estimate is there are just over 15 million internet users, from a population of 21 million, giving 72% population penetration. However, itʼs interesting to note that in NZ, their
penatration rate if higher at 75%.

Hong Kong 68.2
USA 69.5
Chile 42

This week (almost)
“Understanding how to leverage this
audience successfully is both a challenge
and significant opportunity.”
– Will Hodgman, Exec. VP, Aisia-Pacific.

And to demostrate how on the ball we are here. These are the latest ﬁgures (14 AUg, 2009) for social media usage in Australia..

Comscore found more than 70 percent of Internet users in Australia visited a social networking site in June, up 29 percent from the previous year.

Total visitors (000)

Jun 08 Jun 09 % change

Total Internet users 11,044 12,386 12

Social networking 6862 8857 29

Facebook 3125 6102 95

MySace 3369 3530 5

Bebo 1627 1475 -9

Twitter 13 800 6122

Table showing growth in social networking. Note Twitter - a 6000% growth in one year, from
13000 users to 800,000

Changing face of PR
Talk the lingo

Send release all the time

Appeal to target groups

Link to web site

Optimise for searching, browsing

While many marketing and PR people understand that media releases sent over the wires appear in near real-time on services like Google News, very few understand how they must
dramatically alter their media release strategy in order to maximize the effectiveness of the media release as a direct consumer-communication channel.
• The Web has changed the rules. Many “publics” read your media 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 still derives some of its content from 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. There are
some simple rules to ensure your news gets out, via the SMR:

• Donʼt just send press releases when “big news” is happening; ﬁnd good reasons to send them all the time.
• Instead of just targeting a handful of journalists, create press releases that appeal directly to your target audiences.
•Create links in releases to deliver potential customers to landing pages on your Web site.
• Optimise media release delivery for searching and browsing.

SMRs, blogs,
Twitter, facebook

We will be looking at two of the most common forms of social media, both with implications for PR - social media releases and blogs.

What is a SMR?
NEWS RELEASE –!SCHOOL OF COMMUNICATIONS AND CONTEMPORARY ARTS 12 AUGUST 2007

Media contact: Greg Smith
Phone: Work 9370 6788. Mobile: 123-456-7891
New form of media release
email: greg.smith@ecu.edu.au
web: www.scca.ecu.edu.au

University offers new e-PR courses
Edith Cowan University has taken a step into the communications future by offering a new
MOVIE: Interview with Dr Greg Smith
Todd Defren, SHIFT, 2006
approach to public relations.

The School of Communications and Contemporary Arts now offers a Masters Degree in
Public Relations. This replaces the three-year undergraduate Degree in PR, which will now
become an all-around communications degree.
in response to a blog (reading)
“The new course is a radical departure from traditional PR courses, as it will build on a more
comprehensive system of learning in the new BA Communications Degree,” said course
co-ordinator, Dr Greg Smith.

“Students will now learn additional traditional skills, such as business writing and
presentation, and will also draw on other communication disciplines such as advertising and
marketing. They will end up with a broad skill set, with the Masters Degree in PR allowing
students to develop even greater specialist skills.”
New PR Degree units
(Core units)
Special sections
• PR theory
• PR planning
• PR research

Tags information
• PR writing
• PR campaign (project)

(Optional units - choose 3)
• PR Management
• International PR
• e-PR
• PR and media (includes ethics)
• Organisational communication

MP3 PODCAST: Interview, Dr Greg Smith
Brief description
Little spin
Stock photo, Greg Smith

‘To combine theoretical LINKS:
learning with real-life School of Communications and Contemporary Arts
experiences, you will
OTHER PR MASTERS DEGREE COURSES:
hone your skills in University of Maryland
research, strategic Walden University
planning, written and Ellis College

Interactive
oral communication, Dublin Institute of
execution, and Michigan State University
New York University
evaluation.’
EDITH COWAN UNIVERSITY Mt Lawley Campus, Bradford Street, Mt Lawley 6021, Perth Western Australia www.ecu.edu.au

We’ve looked at the traditional media release and its progression to email and various other parts of the media kit.
But what is there was one form of release that fitted all? There is, and it’s called the Social Media Release.
• It’s relatively new, first appearing in 2006. The history is a little obscured. However, it’s generally acknowledged the first SMPR creator was SHIFT Communications, an independent PR company with offices
in Boston and San Francisco, US.
Todd Defren of SHIFT created the first SMPR layout as a reaction to Tom Foremski’s wave-making blog post “Die! Press Release! Die! Die! Die!”. You should have read this article.

In brief, the SMR:
• Deconstructs the press release into special sections and
• tags the information so that as a publisher, you can pre-assemble some of the news story and make the information useful.
• The SMR provides a brief description of what the announcement is, but leave the spin to the journalists. The journalists are going to go with their own spin on the story anyway, so why bother? Keep it
straightforward rather than spintastic.
• It’s designed so that anyone accessing it - whether a journalist, a potential customer or a curious onlooker - can quickly find and interact with its content.

How great?

Not a trend - a tool

Not to kill the release - to improve it

Allows “selectivity”

• The SMR is not a trend. Itʼs a tool.
• It is not there to replace or kill the traditional media release it is there to improve upon it. Itʼs not an appendage to a traditional media release layout, but includes parts of the traditional media
release formatted in a more comprehensible, simpler and ready to use manner.

• The social media release is especially beneﬁcial to reporters and bloggers because information is presented in a style that enables them to select the type and level of information they
desire – from detailed background information on the company and quotes from senior executives to graphics and photos.
For the general public, the social media release promotes greater online accessibility through search engine optimisation and linking from interactive websites such as Del.icio.us and Digg.

Elements of SNRs
Headline/sub head
Highlights/key facts
Tags/keywords
Links (URLs)
Embedded electronic files
Quotes
Organisation info.
Contact information

There are many aspects to a SNR. However, what you use will depend on the material available to you, and/or the message you want to impart. For example, you may not have any video
footage available, so you wont be able to include it.
This is not a technical lesson in how to construct a SMR. Itʼs just an overview of what goes into making them. However, you will have to be able to demonstrate in your final assignment that
you have grasped the basic design concepts. This can be achieved by using MS Word or any DTP or design program, such as Illustrator or Canvas.
Highlights / Key Facts: This is one of the major differences of the Social Media Release compared to a traditional press release. Highlights, aka key facts, are short and to the point
statements that are the important takeaways that are the reason for the release. There is no technical limit on these highlights, only practical limits of brevity.
Summary: This is intended to present the highlights of the Social Media Release in paragraph form for those who do not like reading the bullet format – it also allows more room for tonality
and perspective.
Tags / Keywords: AS is with web pages, which have meta tags (hidden keywords on pages) SNRs have these too. by specifying the most highly relevant tags / keywords for the information
contained in the Social Media Release, it will have a higher chance of being discovered by people who monitor social media for those particular keywords and phrases. In your final
assignment you can simply list these in a separate box on the page. This will demonstrate that you understand the core material you are working with. search engines like Technorati and
other services create ʻfeedsʼ for these tags that individuals and organizations use to connect to the information that most interests them. This is a very important piece of ensuring the release
gets to the right people and as widely as possible in the social media ecosystem. There is no technical limit as to how many tags can be included, but as a practical matter it is probably best
to keep it more focused than less.
Quotes: As an easily identifiable and widely used element of the traditional Press Release, calling out quotes as a unique field is an obvious requirement. This also leads to types of quotes,
which require further discussion and may in fact be left as a user defined field in the initial standard
Embedded electronic files: logos, photos, audio clips, video

Blogs

Blog = weblog

Moblogs

Blogosphere

a website, usually maintained by an individual, with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video.

"Blogs" were (up to about 2 years ago) the fastest-growing online phenomenon. Thereʼs said to be from between 12 to 35 million blogs on the web. The thing is, nobody knows.
• “Blog” is short for “web log”. It describes a website that contains an online personal journal with reﬂections, comments, and often hyperlinks provided by the writer.
• “Moblogs” (mobile phone blogs) are blogs that are regularly updated using of the text and camera facilities of mobile phones.
• The “blogosphere” refers to the universe of blogs, bloggers and blogging and is essentially an online community where information, opinions, and inﬂuence are spread by online word of
mouth.

Blog content/features

Thought and commentary

Content:
Diary, rant, notices, pictures, archives

Personal style = “citizen journalism”

Like-minded people

• Blogs are essentially online journals of thought and commentary.
• They may combine aspects of diary, rant, noticeboards, and photo galleries, and most blogs include archives of past entries, lists of other blogs favoured by the author, and a facility for
reader input.
• Blogs are characterised by a personal and conversational writing style, subjective points of view and a sense of egalitarianism and empowering the voice of the individual.
• Although on the surface blogging is about one individual putting their thoughts on the web for all to see, another fundamental aspect of blogging is its facilitation of communication and
connections between like-minded people.

Who uses them?

Increasing use by
companies
(Microsoft)

Amateurs and
professionals

Bloggers can carve
reputations (Drudge)

Originally blogs were written by individuals, but there are now a growing number of blogs being set up by companies, organisations and the mainstream media. Microsoft, for example,
encourage its employees to blog.
• As such, bloggers (the people who write blogs) are a mix of amateur and professional writers.
• As the internet is now often the ﬁrst stop for people looking for the ʻrealʼ story, successful bloggers (as measured by pageviews of their blogs) can become well-known commentators on a
particular topic to the network of people interested in that area and can therefore become very inﬂuential.

Are they practical?
Will the organisation benefit?

Exchange information

Blogs offer:
ʻnew voiceʼ, depth (?), analysis, alternative

Attract attention and cause action
(Apple batteries)

• So how practical is the social media news release? For entrepreneurs, the question boils down to: Will my organisation benefit from the increased functionality?
So far, the social media release has been used primarily by those in the tech industry, which makes sense, since reporters, bloggers and customers in the tech space are familiar with
all the release’s bells and whistles. If you have a cutting-edge company, using the new release could even be viewed as a benefit in itself--showcasing your business as a trendsetter
in your field. Other sectors that may benefit include the entertainment industry, companies that appeal to youth culture or businesses that market highly visual products.
• The objective, as always, is to facilitate the exchange of information and do so in a manner that’ll attract attention to your products, services or messages.
• These days Blogs provide a platform to introduce new voices into national or international debates on particular issues and to transmit content that doesn’t get a run in commercial
channels. The blogging community adds depth, analysis, alternative perspectives, foreign views, and occasionally first-person accounts that can contravene reports in the
mainstream press.
• Issues that start online in blogs and resonate with audiences can eventually cross over and gain coverage in the mainstream media. For example, Apple was forced to change the
battery in its iPods after two consumers started a blog to expose the fact that the batteries only lasted 18 months and could not be replaced.

Are they credible?

Legimitate form of media

Limitations:
Lack of formal training

Not subject to rules and ethics

No editing

Usually biased

Yes. They can do all that - to varying degrees. But are they credible?
• Blogs have emerged as a powerful alternative to the mainstream media; as mentioned - a new form of journalism, open to anyone who can establish and create a website. So they ARE a
form of media.
They represent a fundamental shift in power as compared to other media, because blogs enable individuals to play an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, sorting, analysing, and
disseminating news and information - a task once reserved exclusively for the media.
Blogs have been known to publish news before the traditional media reports on it and media are increasingly scanning blogs for tips, sources, story ideas, and perspectives on current issues.
• However, the concept of bloggers as the new media raises some interesting questions. On one hand, bloggers are like editorial writers or columnists since they apply the ﬁlter of opinion.
On the other hand however, bloggers may not have any formally-learnt writing skills, are not bound by a journalistic code of conduct, are not subject to an editing process, and may be
pushing a personal agenda.

PR implications
Awareness essential
Warns of issues and/or crises

Gather information

Understand target groups and media (SMH)

Reach target groups

• It is essential that communications professionals are aware of the blogs relevant to their organisations so they can monitor what is being said about their organisation and its products and
services. Blogs can:
• provide early warnings of impending issues or potential crises),
• provide competitor information (through competitor blogs),
• contribute to a better understanding of the concerns, challenges and interests of different stakeholder groups.
• Communications professionals should also note the media outlets and journalists on their target lists who have their own blogs. These can be monitored for the journalistʼs personal areas of
interest, and new stories that the journalist may be thinking of or working on. Journalistsʼ blogs can be a helpful source of background information when pitching article ideas. The Sydney
Morning Herald, for example, lists a number of journalists with blogs.
• Another implication of blogs on PR and marketing communications is the potential to be utilised as a tool by the organisation to communicate with stakeholder groups.

Practical uses
Generate interest

Build product “buzz”

Use as informal focus group

Release non-essential news

Alternative to e-mail

Target specific, hard-to-reach groups

Monitor trends, opinion, sentiment
Blogs can be used as part of an integrated communication strategy to enhance and complement the rest of an organisation’s communications activities.
Blogs provides a bottom-up, grassroots method of sharing information about organisations through the web. They can be used to:
1.

Generate interest about the company and/or its products and services among current and potential customers, partners, resellers, media, and industry influencers
2.

Build buzz and positive word of mouth promotion for the company and/or its products and services
3.

Spark informal conversations about the organisation and/or its products and services
4.

Position executives or R&D teams as thought leaders
5.

Offer an outlet for news and information not important enough, or even suitable for a press release, but still worthy of being communicated
6.

Differentiate an organisation from its competition
7.

Provide an alternative to one-to-many email broadcasts
8.

Enhance internal communication
9.

Target very specific groups - people with specific demographics, opinions, perspectives, worldviews, and interests
10.

Reach audiences that may be difficult to reach through conventional communication channels - e.g. tech-savvy audiences
11. Monitor public opinion and sentiment

Social networks

Construct profile

Build a list

View and respond to concerns

In fact, what we now have are whatʼs called social networks. This is the environment PR people have to move, and practice in.

• Boyd and Ellison (2007) define social networks as
“…web-based services that allow individuals to….
1) construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system
2) articulate a list of other users with whom they share a connection
3) view and traverse their list of connections and those made by others within the system. The nature and nomenclature of these connections may vary from site to site.”

PR people have to be able to identify social networks - those highly-specialised groups (publics) that make up the ??????

Social Networking

• Examples of social networks are Facebook, MySpace. There are many others, including those for people who have pugs as pets, and so on. We’ll look briefly at Facebook and Twitter.
• 67% of the global online population now visit a social network site, and this sector accounts for 10% of all Internet time. (Germany, Switzerland, Great Britain, and Italy are the fastest-growing segments.)
• Social networks and blogs are now the 4th most popular online category – ahead of personal Email
• Member sites now account for 1 in every 11 minutes online
• Twitter is and it isn’t a social networking site. Current research shows it is used more by professionals.
• Like all things o the internet, you have to be wary of your sources. Fake accounts abound, and this is also the case in corporate life, where these types of site have resulted in an increase in what’s known as
campaign astroturfing. The goal of such a campaign is to disguise the agenda of a client as an independent public reaction to some political entity. It’s called astroturfing because AstroTurf (artificial grass)
is a metaphor to indicate fake grassroots support. This could be regarded as pure propaganda. Like everything they are levels.

Facebook is a social networking website that was originally designed for college students, but is now open to anyone 13 years of age or older. Facebook users can create and customize their
own proﬁles with photos, videos, and information about themselves. Friends can browse the proﬁles of other friends and write messages on their pages. (TechTerms.com)
Orkut.com in Brazil (operated by Google) has the largest domestic online reach (70%) of any social network anywhere in the world, whereas Facebook has the highest average time per visitor
among the 75 most popular brands online worldwide. The amount of time spent on Facebook.com increased by more than 566% in only one year. (Nielsen, 2009)

Use academia.edu – A facebook-like application
•Use Facebook Groups – Create a class-centric group

Continuous connection

Twitter is a microblogging application that is more or less a combination of instant messaging and blogging.

Twitter is the ﬂavour of the moment, with regard to spreading on-line (and beyond) messages. I say beyond, because like so much of social media now, it is now mobile. Facebook, You
Tube, MySpace and Twitter can now be run from mobile phones, whereas only recently they were restricted to web-based applications. And when I say recently, I mean two years ago.
Despite the fact that few people from your age demographic use it, Twitter remains a tool of choice for communication among communications professionals. You will have to learn to use it if
you work in many professions.

Following brands on Twitter has its rewards, as Jetstar demonstrated (AUgust 09).

The brand – held a Twitter-only giveaway of 3000 seats on its new Melbourne Tullamarine – Sydney service. Considering that was how many followers it had at the time, those odds were
pretty good for those who moved fast before the retweetign kicked in.

And when a mainstream offer of $19 went live later in the day, the Twitter account also proved useful for the brand to apologise to punters (and blame Telstra) after the server crashed.

The Twitter giveaway is the second time Jetstar has tried that type of initiative. Earlier in the year, it offered its Twitter followers 1000 seats for 1c each.

Summary: We now live in an age where weʼre continually connected.

• One-stop “shop”
• Mail
• Video
• Blogging
• Calendar
• Photos
• Reader
• Documents
• Search
• WAVE
WHy am I mentioning Google? Hopefully, many of you have discovered what Google actually does - apart from searching.

For PR professionals Google is a one-stop communications centre, allowing you to run your ofﬁce from anywhere, without a laptop (if need be).

What began as a search engine now encompasses all of these components:
•e-mail
•video (You Tube)
•e-blogger
•calendar
•Photos (Picasa)
•Reader (RSS)
•Documents (conduct surveys)
•Search (images, scholar)
•Wave (the future)
•Everything is interlinked

The future ...

Sociology Become a listener
A mixed model Be conversational
Engage Participation

• Youʼd have to agree that Blogs and Social Media Releases are integral components of PR. However, ﬁrst understand that social media is more about sociology (how people connect) and
less about technology. Itʼs the new public mall.

• The combination of blogs and SMRs are a mixed model in that theyʼre a collection of new and traditional media that spans across advertising, PR, customer service, marketing
communications, sales, and community relations.

• In order to succeed now and in the future, is to bridge the gap between early adopters and everyone else – to engage in the use of new techniques

• Now itʼs not about telling - itʼs about talking, about conversations. And the best communicators start as the best listeners. This is about doing PR in a way that both works in a conversational
medium, though it might be in words.

Itʼs about encouraging participation. Itʼs a two-way process out there.

Conclusions
Traditional release still important

Be aware

Try different techniques

Quality still the key

Just another tool

The existing news release format has been in use for more than 50 years and is unlikely to be superseded quickly. However, the past several years have witnessed an
increased use of multimedia and interactive content in news releases. The top newswires, for their part, anticipated this trend and are fully equipped to distribute such
material. The best PR tactic for you is to be aware of what’s available and not be too cautious to try different techniques and formats. After all, these are just more tools.
• The key -- and this remains the most important factor in getting visibility for your news - - is the quality of the content in your release, regardless of the format. Writing
a strong release with newsworthy information should always be foremost in your mind. Finding the best format for your content should follow. Unless the story is really
newsworthy, journalists and bloggers won’t pay any attention to it. SMRs are just a new format and do not represent a tool that enforces a story into the news. As with
traditional press releases, you should focus on what is really important; answer the basic journalist questions, and supplement the story with ready-to-use declarations
from the CEOs and other business representatives, relevant documents and other data. This is what the new SMR puts in your hands: a tool that enables the journalist to
get to the heart of the story, fast.

In conclusion, the way we do public relations is changing. If we don’t continually adapt to (and adpot) these changes and new technology we are going to be out of the game.

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