JCOM 2300: Three Techniques for generating publicity

Mary Gormandy White Highlights three basic ways to generate publicity for your business, and they can be implemented at any budget.

Special Events- There is no better way to attract media then to hold an event that everyone wants to attend. Ribbon cutting ceremonies, galleries, and product launches. No matter what it needs to have a definite purpose and the media needs to know about it.

Public Speaking Engagements- Many comapanies use a public speaker. It is even better when you can personalize with them. Allow there face to be the epitome of your companies purpose. Make sure their talking points are defined and researched.

Cause Marketing- White talks about choosing your favorite non-profit organization and doing something to support them. Not only does this attract media, but it also allows the comunity to see the potential and vision your business has to reach out to the community.

JCOM 2300: How to Communicate More Effectively

In this article Dr. Thomas Klipstine shares his 3 fundamental rules to more effective communication. Klipstine says you need to decrease written material by 50 percent. He says that people read slower when the information is presented on a screen so to basically just get the gold nuggets of information out, and be done.
He also says not to use large chunks of text, no one likes to skim through huge word piles. So he said the paragraphs should not exceed 50 words.
Then the final tid bit he gave was to use hypertext, links, and so forth. Electronic writing rarely gets read word for word, so be reader friendly and help them get the information you want them to have.

I Love this article! It is so concise to the point and there is nothing more valueable to a PR rep than to communicate to their clients effectively.

JCOM 2300: Social Media is going to Kill PR?

This article was written by Charles Cooper. It is such a compelling argument, basically because it is such a huge issue for PR specialists these days. My answer is a huge resounding NO! I believe it is just altering the scene for PR representatives. Obviously letting everyone give information on their own is going to alter the way we do our job, but there is no replacement for the sheer guts, and strategy PR screams a need for. Plus, when Jane Doe Screws her image up, there has to be a PR rep to save the day.

JCOM 2300: Companies capitolize on the election

NEW YORK: Diverse consumer-facing companies, ranging from Tropicana to Liberty Mutual, sought to tap the excitement running up to the presidential election by creating accompanying PR efforts. - The above sentance was the lede to a story featured in PR week. So many companies aligned their product campaigns with the election. Such as GE, Liberty Mutual, Tropicana, and even Baskin Robbins. What a PR scheme the year that everyone is involved in the elctions, partner up your product with a cause we can all get behind. Very good move.

JCOM 2300: GENERATION O

It is interesting, how the media have coined the term "Generation O." I found this article in the New York Times. This term is used to identify the hoards of younger folk who voted Barack Obama into the Presidency. They believe the amount of people who voted this year was a record number. Why? PR BAby!!! THis was the election year, people who haven't voted in years felt compelled to vote. It was on the tongues of youth all over campus and the second it was decided, there was a hush before a sudden outcry that hit Logan. The extreme conservative views that dictate this wonderful State we live in were completely shook at the foundation. My cell phone flooded with Racist texts from people I am ashamed to call friends. I know this election was sick important to the future of our future and our economy. But the best way to put it is we are screwed however we pick. It is just down to the decision of picking the lesser of two evils. I don't think anyone really knows if the right man was chosen. Either way he is our new fearless leader and I pray he can help drag the country to a new light.

JCOM 2300: FACES in ADvertisements

I watched a commercial today about an asthmatic drug that is supposed to take away the symptoms even before you experience them. Or something along those lines. I would probably know more of the details if I could focus on the words being said. However the spokeswoman on the commercial was going throughout her day to day life, and you could see everything except her silouette was blacked out. I couldn't understand for the life of me why they would black out her face and appearance. I felt no connection to the character at all. I think they may have been going for the edgy artistic appeal, and the fact that it effects everyone, not just the pretty girls or something. Regardless it made me think, how much do our clients know about us? How much do we know abou them? How much more likely are people to respond when they can give a face to their preoduct or service? I didn't like it at all. Do I need to widen my persective? Perhaps they should use a focus group...

JCOM 2300: Social Media as PR

So this Post may relate to my last post, but only for the sake of the sanity of the internet. I have seen some of the most horrid displays of disrespect, popping up on websites and blogs everywhere. Of course it is written as though it is the truth but the fact that there is a maniacal mad man, behing some of the ravings on these social mediums is a little disconcerning. I understand that we are moving into the 20th century and the social media is where we are forced to find many of our stories, because that is simply the way that information is getting passed along, but at the same time I can't help but think please spare us, your words are an obscene waste of my time, and bandwidth space. Yes, this entire blog is a complete contradiction of the afore mentioned statement, but that is how I really feel about the subject.

JCOM 2300: Mormons for Proposition 8

I can't even fathom what is going through peoples heads right now. Proposition 8 did pass when the elections occurred. What a battle it was. There were lists given out of every mormon that resided in California, and there were people picketing outside their houses. The really intelligent part is the fact that there are more religions than just the Mormon church who had part in the preposition 8 battles. Regardless, the fight is not over. Apparently there are a lot of nasty articles and Blogs coming out about the need for dismantling the Mormon church. I don't know if you are aware of their doctrine, but these battles were forseen long before the preposition 8 battles occured.

JCOM 2300 PR Does it win hearts and minds even in the face of a great recession?

PR fuel recently wrote an article stating that PR Doesn't win wars, but it also highlights the use of silence. There was a comment about how much of the time Silence speaks louder than outcries from PR Reps. This was a very interesting view. I can see where it is true, but I can also see where it can be false. The journalist said it can be good becaue it means the gov. is working in the problem, which much of the time we hope is the case. Yet, given the recent situation and how the american public didn't make a move to pay attention to the little whispers of problems, those little whispers have turned into screams of pain from the American piggy bank. Many people blaming Bush which as discussed earlier has made some less than sensible choices, with his second term of power. But the main money crisis was given to us by none other than our favorite president, Clinton. Regardless, whether silence has helped or hurt our economy for now I do hope that PR can help to uplift the hearts and minds of the American people. After all that is the job of a PR person isn't it? To uplift the hearts of man to buying into the right idea? We are givers of thought, not sellers of goods!

The Market is a huge PR Move all the time

I don't think people are as aware of the power of the media as they should be. The P.R. people and spokesperson for all these companies could be using all the flowery words they can think of but the very next day they can either declare bankruptcy or do a complete turn about. A lot of it is based on their word choice alone. If there is one slip of the tongue it could mean your companies either bleak opening day in the market or the turn around you have been hoping for. With the Current AIG and Lehman problems, I think a lot of underhanded things are happening behind the scenes to keep the American people at bay while the company executives bail out with a fat check. Just recently Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson Jr. told the public that he didn't want the government to endanger tax payers money to bail out the company, then just days later he brokered a deal to give an $85 billion dollar loan to AIG. This loan of course funded by the American Taxpayers money. Decisions are being made in haste to try and just fix what has gone so wrong. All these hasty decisions are going to get the country more screwed uo then we already are. Lets think about it guys!

JCOM 2300: Presidential candidates - What a joke

One cannot possibly find the perfect presidential article to attack. They come in so many different colors and sizes, tones and highlights, jeez are we even talking about the issues anymore? This election's P.R. stopped being for the American people a long time ago. The importance of this election is understood across the board. I mean nobody is pointing fingers but the condition of the American Economy is in desperate need of attention. This is a direct result of our great leader, but there again I don't completely disagree. After all 75% of Americans were on his side when the hearts were still freshly broken. However, when the years started passing, the wallets thinning, and the continued heart ache caused by the continued killings fell upon the American people, the man in charge became the one to point the finger at. Now he stands as a joke, while americans pursue a new hero to save us from this economic slump. After a series of popularity contests based on the surface stuff like sex and age we are down to two main candidates, who by the way don't exactly stir my heart to vote for either one. And in the end I will find myself voting for the least sucky of the two. May we think seriously before filling in those bubbles this year...

JCOM 2300: Teach for America helps in poverty

There was an article that just came out in the Student Newspaper at my University. The story is about the teach for America program offered to all students who have obtained a Bachelor's degree in any field. It requires a commitment of 3 years and pays very little. The main selling points are first the positioning advantage after the program, and second the saving of all the underpriviledged students' education. I think it would be an awesome opportunity. I truly think it is important to help the young minds on our own soil, but I find it interesting that the PR Idea centered on the fact that it looks so dang good on a resume. Hmm maybe someday people will start doing things because it is the right thing to do, and not for personal gain.

Ethics and Principles

Ethics started as the logical means to a good life. Treating people in a fair and honest way was the best way to gain true happiness, back in the days of Socrates. Though there are many people who make it through the filter, clawing and biting the whole way, the "American Dream" ideals like to award the honest hard working person over those who use un-ethical means to reach their goals. The ethical scale is one of the most important tools a Public Relations representative will ever use. It would be unethical to convince people, using your promotional training, to invest in a company that you know to be failing, or know to be dishonest would always be completely un ethical.
The principles we personally place forth are how we rank our Ethics scale. We organize principles, and it is by these principles, we dictate every move we make from that point forward. Therefore to understand ethics you must understand principles, but they are not one and the same entity.