May 2010

There is an excellent piece about media relations and the Web 2.0 world on socialmediatoday.com. In it, writer Sally Falkow speaks about the changing world of journalism and how we, as communicators, need to change how we pitch media.

Things are changing drastically. The Washington Post has Newsweek up for sale. Who would have thought we’d see that happen?

There is a blurring of lines between print and broadcast. Print reporters now provide content for their website and often that means video. Broadcast reporters also have to provide content for their website and that can mean written articles to accompany video.

As communicators, it is our role to provide journalists with information in whatever medium they need – quotes, information on your senior executive, video (we used to call it “b-roll” and now it’s just video), stats and facts, etc. And they need to find it ASAP. A good newsroom on a website has this information and it is updated regularly.

Falkow’s article is worth a read. It’s also worth reviewing your website. Does it deliver what journalists need?

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While it may seem like she only left yesterday to many, Ruth has just finished two weeks of a social media campaign in New Zealand.

During the trip she was told about naked rugby and a naked motorcycle tour, went horseback riding on the beach (fully clothed), visited a Facebook Friend that looks like her, had numerous wine tastings in a single day, flirted with kiwis (birds), visited with Kiwis (New Zealanders), hiked through the forest looking for edible plants for lunch, had a spiritual/giggling moment with glowworms, was tricked into tasting bug pee, and was pushed down the side of a hill in a giant rubber ball.

And this just covered four days of her trip…

Ruth is very happy to be coming home for a rest. She will be back blogging here next week.

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I am heading into the home stretch in executing a social media campaign for Tourism New Zealand. This is the second year for the TRENZblog campaign and things are different from last year. There is a deeper interactive engagement this year. Last year, we had a similar number of overall views, but this year, our target community is more active on Twitter and in commenting on the blog. And there is a buzz at Tourism Industry Rendezvous New Zealand (TRENZ) about the blog.

It takes time for industries to adapt to change and the use of social media is a big change. There are some very interesting organizations using different components of social media and I think that next year, we will see even more innovative and creative ways for companies to connect and engage in conversations with their target markets.

Tourism is an interesting case study when it comes to social media. Consumers have jumped into the pool using sites like Trip Advisor, Cruise Critic and other review sites to share the good, the bad and the ugly. I think it is going to take some time for a lot of organizations to realize that, used well, social media starts a conversation. It is about building relationships and creating connections, not just pushing out information.

While my time here in New Zealand is drawing to a close, I think that my work in supporting Tourism New Zealand and in sharing the wonders of this beautiful country with the world through an interactive conversation is just beginning.

Kia Ora!

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caption id=”attachment_2178″ align=”aligncenter” width=”497″ caption=”Ruth ZORB Globing!”][/caption]

Ruth keeps telling us that she’s extremely busy delivering the social media campaign for our client Tourism New Zealand, but she might just be off looking in the forest for kiwi, trying to find something to eat, or perhaps ZORB globing down a hill.

We’ll have a true blog post up tomorrow.

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You have to love lists. I love this one from Brian Solis on Mashable.com for a couple of reasons:

  • It’s a great review of 21 rules for social media engagement and
  • This list lets me keep my commitment to an active blog and provides enough great content that I can now go have a coffee and catch up on emails.

Check out why I need the coffee and follow my travels through New Zealand as I blog on behalf of Tourism New Zealand here. Two more New Zealand blog posts will be up today.

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