Archive for May, 2009
Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on May 26th, 2009
There is a very interesting article by Adam Broitman on iMedia Connection on “Social Media: Whose Job Is It Anyway?” It is a question that is often asked by a range of professionals from front line staff that want to participate, to the communicators, to the CEO and board of directors. One of the key points we make when answering it—and the answer is a little different each time because the organization is different—is that if it is everyone’s job, it will end up being no one’s job. There has to be someone within the organization…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on May 25th, 2009
There was an interesting article in BusinessWeek last week about Web 2.0 and managing corporate reputations. I am often asked about the challenges that come with the open conversations created by social media. It’s a valid concern for organizations and one that should be taken seriously.
Some organizations choose to block employee access to social networking sites. That seems to be old paradigm thinking to me and it is a bit like locking the barn door after the horse has already walked out. There are all sorts of ways around being blocked. Think about how many staff members have an iPhone…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on May 22nd, 2009
There is an interesting article in the New York Times about one of the “hot new jobs” – the social media specialist. Social media, emerging media, interactive media or online communication is becoming more and more mainstream. Communication has changed and organizations that want to engage with their stakeholders and community need to understand that and include social media in their strategic planning.
One of the key points that isn’t included in this article is where the social media specialist “lives” in an organization. Is he/she in the communications department, marketing, or sales? And how is social media being integrated…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on May 20th, 2009
It seems the head of communications for the Vatican has embraced social media. In a news release issued yesterday by the Catholics Communications Network, Fr Federico Lombardi SJ, Director of the Holy See’s press office, encouraged communicators to meet the challenge of using the Internet to engage positively to further the Gospel message of the Church.
This followed Pope Benedict XVI’s call for the Church to speak to “the digital generation” – and from what we can tell, pretty much the only way to do that is through technology. Now, full disclosure – I am not Catholic and…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on May 15th, 2009
Paul Chaney of MarketingProfs has an excellent blog post entitled “Seven Social Media Mindset Markers.” He points out that many marketers – and, I would add communicators and PR people – have adopted social media tools without understanding the philosophy of social media.
The world is a different place because of online communication. We have struggled in finding the right “name” for social media – online communication, interactive PR, digital communication…it’s a challenge because by naming it something other than “communication,” we isolate it from traditional or classic communication, and that shouldn’t happen.
One of the key points…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on May 13th, 2009
Common Knowledge is an excellent resource for not-for-profits (and organizations) that wants to leverage the Internet and create conversations with stakeholders. While it does focus on not-for-profits, it has solid business applications for online tools and the site is worth a browse.
There is a very interesting blog post by Joel Bush on the site entitled “You Don’t Know Chuck,” which focuses on the actions of fans that want so stop NBC from cancelling the show Chuck. It seems the fans are focusing on the show’s sponsor Subway and buying up six-inch turkey and…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on May 12th, 2009
Apparently there is an issue brewing on Twitter about Mother’s Day. It seems that some moms didn’t receive the flowers that their loving children ordered from FTD.
The smart people at TechCrunch are all over this and have a great blog post about the issue. They also did a sentiment analysis of the issue using twendz. According to the TechCrunch post, FTD has sent emails to people affected by this and offered them a discount on their purchase.
1800flowers also appears to have had an issue with delivering last weekend. The difference…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on May 11th, 2009
Valeria Maltoni of Conversation Agent has a great blog post today about answering the social phone. The blog shows a presentation by David Alston of Radian6 that looks first at the worries and objections that people have using social media.
Valeria does an excellent job of building on what Alston notes in his presentation about what conversations you need to listen for in social media.
In this post Valeria points out that there are common questions being asked about what to listen to and where to listen. I hear these same questions at speaking engagements, during…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on May 04th, 2009
There is a great post on Todd Defren’s blog, it is written by Paula Drum, VP of Marketing at H&R Block. Ms. Drum saw the value of social media early and she is well-known as an innovator. It turns out she is leaving her current position to lead a to-be-announced e-commerce site. She cross-posts her final H&R Block post on PR-Squared (Defren’s blog) and it’s worth a read. It’s really worth a read.
In fact, Della Smith of QUAY Strategies and I are presenting a Social Media MasterClass today and as one of our going off script and…
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