What Were They Thinking?

Social media – how far is too far?

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on October 27th, 2011

I saw something on Facebook this morning that really made me sit back and think. I have quite a few “friendly acquaintances” on Facebook. For the purpose of this blog, I will call them “pals.” These are people I have met and like, but that I don’t connect with very much in the real world. Some I met through work, others from my personal life. Many of them I met while travelling.

I don’t hold the same political views as some of them. I have to admit, I have found some of the discussions and ideas put forward by a…

Why You Should (and Shouldn’t) Hire a PR Agency

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on June 27th, 2011

AHA Creative Strategies is a PR agency and we often get calls from individuals and organizations that are looking to work with an agency. From the moment that we started AHA more than eight years ago, we had a vision of the type of clients that we wanted to work with. It wasn’t necessarily focused on any one industry or field, but more the approach, the integrity, the character and personality of the person and the organization. We’ve been incredibly fortunate that we have been able to work with great clients that came to AHA because they were focused on…

Viral Video

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on August 25th, 2010

You may have seen the video of a woman in Britain who, for no apparent reason, picked up a friendly cat and put it in a garbage can. Links to this video were emailed all over the world, it was uploaded to Facebook and YouTube and the clip appeared on a range of broadcast news shows.

AHA TAKE

Apart from shaking our heads at the cruelty involved – the poor cat was stuck in the garbage for about 18 hours – and the seemingly randomness of this nasty act, there are a couple of…

BP’s Crisis Communications

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on June 07th, 2010

There are many discussions online and, I am sure, in offices all over the world, about what BP is doing regarding its crisis communications.  It has been a very hot topic in the AHA office as well.

One of the key points in our discussions is how much the world has changed because of social media. Technology and the online conversations happening all over the world mean that, as communicators, we have to evolve how we deal with an issue or a crisis.

There are many articles and blog posts out there about the crisis…

Happy Anniversary AHA! (No Fooling!)

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on April 01st, 2010

We are seven years old today! Since we started it has been an incredible adventure and we’re looking forward to the next seven years.

We’ve survived some challenges, we’ve grown our business and evolved our business model…and we’re proud of who we are and what we provide to our clients. AHA has a great culture, each person on the AHA crew is world-class and our clients are exceptional. We are also extremely grateful for our AHA friends—those people that recommend us to their colleagues and business associates, those that go out of their way to support us and to…

Tiger stays quiet

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on November 30th, 2009

I have to admit, when I heard about the accident over U.S. Thanksgiving weekend involving Tiger Woods, I thought “hmmmm.”  There seemed to be something missing from the story when I first heard it – what was Tiger doing leaving his house at 2:30 am on Thanksgiving, distracted enough to hit a fire hydrant and a tree?

There are lots of rumours out there right now. The thing is, Tiger isn’t talking, so the rumour mill is growing. During an issue, if you don’t give people solid information, they will speculate, discuss and even gossip.

Twitter, Facebook, blogs and mainstream…

Domino’s Delivers Charges

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on April 16th, 2009

Domino’s has created a YouTube response to the issue that they recently faced regarding what we have now heard was supposed to be a “hoax” video on YouTube. There were several videos made by the two young people who worked (past tense) at a Domino’s franchise in North Carolina. (See our previous post on this.)

Domino’s takes a very interesting approach to this issue – and in my opinion, it’s a little over the top. Depending on what kind of policy Domino’s has, maybe these young employees didn’t realize how wrong this was. Don’t get me wrong,…

Would You Like Some Cheese With That Nose Hair?

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on April 15th, 2009

There seems to be a new issue online every day. Over the weekend, there was the Amazon issue where it seemed the online bookseller had removed thousands of gay and lesbian themed books from their listings and search results. Social media guru B.L. Ochman has a very good post about this issue.

And then there is the Domino’s video that showed up on YouTube yesterday. The company quickly took it down. But you know that sneaky Internet…there is always another copy somewhere that gets put back up.

According to this piece in…

Are You Listening?

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on March 18th, 2009

There is a very interesting article in The Vancouver Sun today that cites a survey done by 6S Marketing. According to the survey, 61% of companies using social media are tracking what is being said about them while 39% don’t pay attention.

Social media is hitting critical mass – and as I mentioned in previous posts, one of the underlying themes at the Ragan Social Media Conference in Vegas last week was that social media is now a part of everyday life for the majority of people. My question is to that 39% not paying attention –…

Twitter, Ketchum, FedEx & Lessons Learned

Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on January 30th, 2009

The Ketchum/FedEx issue on Twitter  is being discussed online quite extensively. In my opinion, blogger David Henderson is covering this story very well. (David is a newly discovered online voice for me – and he has quickly become one of my favourites. His blog is definitely worth reading.)

This story has legs. And it has created some valuable discussion online about freedom of speech, the right to your own personal opinion, what’s reasonable to say out loud, how to handle a crisis online and much, much more.

For those that might not know, the basic overview…