Marketing Roadmaps

Susan Getgood

Roadmaps Round-up: a bit of everything

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Tonight my three seven-week old Scottie puppies have decided to WAKE UP at 9 pm. I would post pictures but they won’t pose 🙁  Maybe tomorrow.

Lot of interesting stuff this week. I’ll start with Robert Scoble’s post about bloggers clearly posting their contact details. While I draw the line at birthdate (TMI), I agree that site owners should publish contact information, whether blog, LiveJournal or  Web site. If you are worried about spam, there are enough email services (gmail, hotmail, yahoo etc) that you don’t have to expose your main email address.

I ran into this problem a lot in the last week as I started fan outreach for the HP Charity Auction. I have very specific rules about how this outreach is done: individually, and only to fansites or blogs that have recently been updated. We want to be sure that hearing about the auction truly is of interest to the site owner and readers. We also NEVER post directly to forums or bulletin boards. Which makes finding a valid email address or contact link really important. For the most part, this is pretty easy. But in some cases, I have to walk away from a site that probably would really like to know that a certain star’s photo is part of the auction because I just can’t find an email address. And that’s a shame.

The lesson for marketers? Make sure your prospects can easily find an email address on your site or blog. It’s probably the most important thing on your site.

Moving on. Fred Wilson on Web. 2.0 is an oxymoron.  Fred, as he so often does, has it dead to rights.  Calling “it” Web 2.0 implies something static (and something that can be hyped, yuck). The reality is, this “stuff” is constantly evolving. Labels just don’t work. Let’s move on.

Speaking of labels, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the latest “a-list” dust-up. You wanna know more – read Media Orchard, Naked Conversations and Beyond Madison Avenue. I am personally pretty much done with the topic. Not on it. Don’t care.

In the practical tips category, both Blog Business World and ProBlogger talked about Andy Wibbels’ blog editorial calendar. I haven’t used this particular tool, but I am a strong believer in an editorial calendar for business blogs, and most particularly group blogs. You have an objective for the effort, otherwise you wouldn’t be doing it. An editorial calendar ensures that the important topics are covered. Not as big a deal with an individual blog but I find that I follow something like a calendar anyway. In any given week, at least one post is a round-up (like this one), one is original content and the third (on a good week) is a toss-up between the two. Or I post a picture of the dogs or the kid 🙂

If you don’t already read Jay Rosen’s PressThink, you should check out this post Guest Writer Andrew Postman: Introduction to the 20th Anniversary Edition of Amusing Ourselves to Death by His Dad, Neil Postman. There is an absolutely wonderful “easter egg” in Jay’s post. (Hint: click on Andrew Postman’s name – it’s not a link to his bio). And no cheating – I’m not going to put the link here – you have to go to the original. It’s that good. And not just for the “easter egg” – read the whole thing. It will make you think.

Speaking of thinking, a blog I am enjoying (and I don’t even remember where I got the first link to it) Dave Rogers’ Groundhog Day. One recent post: Competing Messages: Getting Your Cluetrain™ Ticket Punched. He concludes the post:

“As always, I’m an authority on nothing. I make all this shit up. Do your own thinking”

Yup. That’s a philosophy I can get behind 🙂

Tags: Blogs, Blogging, Marketing, Web Marketing, Sundance

Some Serenity stuff

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Well, for a slight change of pace, a couple of things I saw this week on Whedonesque that I am compelled to share.

Mattel surely won’t approve of Firefly Barbies but I know at least one person who is probably assembling supplies to create her own Jayne doll.

And for the best review I have seen of the film, check out A guy, a cat, a fish and a movie. There’s also a direct link to the wmv file here.

Tags: Serenity, Firefly, Whedon

Sundance ends, HP charity auction begins

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Cross posted on Backstage at Sundance

Well, Sundance opened with “Friends with Money” and closed with “Alpha Dog.” There has to be a message in there somewhere – perhaps more than one. 🙂

The awards were given last night – FilmBlab has the list  and all the corporate sponsors and beautiful people are packing up and going home. Returning Park City to the residents, skiers and boarders that normally make up the winter population.

It was nice to see so many films by and about women: the afore-mentioned “Friends with Money,” “Stephanie Daley,” and “Come Early Morning” among them. And to hear about films like “Little Miss Sunshine” that almost didn’t get made…. and then hit big. I’m also looking forward to “Thank You For Smoking,” the uncut version. 🙂

Now that the film festival is over, the work on the HP Charity Auction to benefit Habitat for Humanity begins in earnest. My job, as I’ve mentioned before, is to reach out to the online fan bases of the celebrities who participated. They are, after all, pretty likely to want to bid on a signed poster and autographed photo printer of their favorite star.

UPDATE: Here’s the complete list as of January 29th.

Jennifer Aniston (pictured with Catherine Keener)
Jessica Biel
Nick Cassavettes (“Alpha Dog” group photo) **Updated**
Nick Cave
Toni Collette
Matt Dillon
Aaron Eckhart
Ben Foster (“Alpha Dog” group photo) **Updated**
Gina Gershon
Al Gore
Daryl Hannah
Josh Hartnett
Emile Hirsch (“Alpha Dog” group photo) **Updated**
Terrence Howard
Catherine Keener (pictured with Jennifer Aniston)
Lucy Liu
William H. Macy
Joel Madden of Good Charlotte
Guy Pearce
Laura Prepon
Michael Rapaport
Kevin Smith
Amber Tamblyn
Justin Timberlake (“Alpha Dog” group photo) **Updated**
Wilmer Valderrama
Rufus Wainwright
John Waters
Anton Yelchin (“Alpha Dog” group photo) **Updated**
The Beastie Boys
The Police: Sting, Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers (photo only)

The eBay auction starts February 6th.  You can see thumbnails of most of the portraits on the WireImage site , and by the time the auction begins, you’ll be able to see images of the signed posters and printers on the auction site.  We’ll also be posting some of the images on Backstage at Sundance.

So, check it out, and pass the word!

Tags: Blogs, Blogging, Charity, Sundance

Public Company PR: The issue of material disclosure

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One of the things that happens when you have a time-sensitive project like the HP Sundance blog …. You end up blogging there a lot, and “at home” not at all. And a lot of interesting stuff has been piling up in my bloglines for “when I get around to it.”

So here’s the first issue that caught my attention when I wasn’t perusing WireImage for pictures of Jennifer Aniston, Wilmer Valderrama, Amber Tamblyn and Josh Hartnett for posts about the stars in the celebrity auction.

Todd at Topaz Partners and Amy Gahran of Contentious have been discussing whether press releases (and the newswires) are really required to meet SEC disclosure requirements for public companies.

The Topaz post that indexes a series of posts on the topic: Blog series: Press releases, public companies and blogs .

Amy’s post on same: Disclosure, Press Releases, and Life Support: Can We Pull that Plug After All?

So far, their conclusion is that yes, the wires are still probably the safest bet for a public company to guarantee compliance for material disclosures, but they seem to be moving to an argument that the form of the press release could change and the company would still be in compliance.

Here are some of my thoughts on the subject.

  • Navigating the material versus non-material question is not easy, especially for smaller public companies. Sure, the financials and major corporate changes are easy. Material. New reseller. Not material. Unless it’s a major new channel for you and then it might be.  New product. Probably material. Product upgrade. Not material. Or maybe it is….if it is likely to affect your results materially. And so forth.

    There are a lot of gray lines when you get going and that’s why corporate communication directors at public companies (a job I have had more than a few times) have a tendency to treat everything with the same process as material news. It is safer, and in the total scheme of things, the fee for a release on pr newswire or business wire is WAY cheaper than the fines and damage to reputation of the firm if you’re wrong. 

    So, in order to really explore new methods for the dissemination of non-material news, we need a bit more clarity here. Until then, public companies are a bit stuck.

  • I notice they are going to touch on audience in later posts. This is key, because one of the principal audiences for public company news is the financial markets. Financial analysts are trained, and I mean trained, to watch the wire. You have to go where the audience is, and deliver the info to them in a way they will understand. And they want to go to one place for every firm – not lots of different places for different companies. So, even though RSS delivers the info to them, if everyone isn’t using the same method, it’s more work for them.
  • The press release. Anyone who does corporate communications for more than two minutes learns that the press release is almost irrelevant to the ultimate dissemination of the news. It satisfies disclosure requirements, and as I’ve written before, it has a form that we can easily decipher.

    It is important that it be well written but as far as reaching the media, the word gets out because you contact the right people with the information with the right “pitch.” And because you provide access to newsmakers, fact sheets, photos and other back-up materials that flesh out the story.

    I think we are asking an awful lot if we jettison the press release, and begin subjecting media to multiple different formats that make it harder to understand what is going on. And for some things (financials), the format is pretty well defined. For good reason. Creative approaches are generally frowned upon when it comes to financial results.

    Bottom line: we need a standard format for organizing the news. The press release works okay for me so I am in no hurry to replace it. But that doesn’t mean that it is the only thing I do to reach media (and other audiences) for clients.

  • In this context, I look at the new media as simply another way to get the word out.  A blog can be very effective, but you still need your PR person, for a variety of reasons, not just to reach out to MSM. And you need your sales force or channel partners to reach out to end user customers. And so on.

    When an announcement is definitely NOT material, it makes sense to use a blog to start getting the word out. That’s exactly what we’ve been doing with the stars in the HP charity auction I’m working on right now.  A press release about the auction went out before Sundance started, and a PR person is doing her magic at Sundance. But we’re officially announcing each participant on the blog. Another press release won’t go out until the very end of the festival summarizing everything we’ve already announced on Backstage at Sundance.

    But the blog is not sufficient in and of itself. We’re still using regular PR outreach. And we still have to reach out to fans, which is a process of online research and individual emails to fan sites and blogs to let them know that their favorite celebrity’s signed photo is in the auction. And of course, remember when you reach out to bloggers and Web sites, you had better target your audience. Know that they’ll likely be interested in what you are sending, or it’s just spam.

    It is the sum of the activity, not any one activity, no matter how cool, that gets the result.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to more of their discussion. Check it out, and join in.

Tags: Blogs, Blogging, Charity, Sundance, PR, Public Relations, Marketing

More about Sundance blog and charity auction

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HP’s Backstage at Sundance blog is progressing nicely. The bloggers are doing a great job sharing their experiences at the festival. And I am having a blast pulling WireImage pictures to accompany our posts about stars who’ve agreed to participate in the charity auction.

For me, the fact that we are announcing who is participating in the auction on the blog is pretty much the most exciting thing about the blog.

Yes, you read that right: HP is using a blog as a primary method to disseminate news. Now, granted, not news related to its core business, and definitely news well suited to online outreach. And we are also doing PR outreach in the traditional fashion.  But there won’t be a traditional press release about the auction participants until the festival is over, whereas we are releasing the names of the stars on the blog as they join.

Bottom line, in my opinion, it is a very positive step forward when a big company “gets it” in any fashion, large or small.

And the blog is about more than the auction; the HP employees who are its principal writers are on the ground in Park City as volunteers and staff for HP’s many activities throughout the festival. They are blogging about being there, who they meet, where they eat. And so on…

I particularly wanted to alert my readers to the auction. Of course, some of the stars are very well known like Jennifer Aniston and The Police (!) and their pics will probably sell for a lot (or at least they will if I do my job!). But some are less well known, if equally talented, and it is possible to get a cool picture and a cool printer for a decent price that also benefits charity. What could be better than that! Last time, I bid on (and won) the picture and HP printer signed by Alan Cumming. We love the printer and the picture is going in my son’s room (Alan Cumming was in X-Men 2.)

Check it out. Tell them I sent you 🙂

Tags: Blogs, Blogging, Charity, Sundance