This morning I had the pleasure of giving a presentation to an engaged group of people involved with early childhood education and family services at the Augusta Civic Center. Called “Engaged Communities, Growing Small Children,” the conference focused around a book called “The Charismatic Organization, 8 Ways to Grow a Nonprofit,” by Shirley Sagawa. I tied my presentation in to Shirley’s book by talking about how organizations can engage themselves better with their communities through effective communications if they share their stories and newsworthy events on an ongoing basis. Continue Reading »

I met with a client recently who was struggling with ways to come up with ideas for their company’s blog and Facebook pages. They felt that every blog post had to be about something new and newsworthy happening at their company and every Facebook post had to have something worthy of front page news coverage.

I told them that one of the beauties of social media is that it allows public relations people like me or organizations’ representatives to show the human side of the company. I said, “don’t be afraid to share your personality, talk about what you’re doing, what you’re reading and what you find interesting.”

Of course you should post news about new hires, awards, new clients, new projects or other ‘hard’ news items. But your blog readers, or friends and fans on Facebook will also be interested in what books you are reading, what articles you find interesting, and random things happening at your company, like a visitor from out of state or a moose walking through your driveway. Social media is an act of socializing, which includes some ‘chit chat’ about yourself that helps others get to know you better.

How do you think creatively when it comes to brainstorming ideas for content on your blog, tweets on Twittter, or posts on your Facebook page? I’m interested in hearing what you have to say about this topic.

If you are looking to consistently write high quality content and optimize your web pages, then Website Magazine has a guide to help you achieve high rankings in the search engines. I encourage you to read this article.  These recommendations from author John Alexander,  include first researching your key words, writing down the bulleted points you want to make in your article, and then allowing at least 48 hours for your content to ’settle’ before you publish (just as your English teacher in high school encoruaged you to do!). Continue Reading »

Here’s an article by Sarah Fuller, who is an account executive at my agency, Nancy Marshall Communications. It was first published in “The NMC Report” which is our free bi-weekly enewsletter. Go to www.marshallpr.com to sign up to receive it by email every other week. It is loaded with articles and information on the intersection of social media and PR.

Twitter has become social media’s equivalent of the classic elevator pitch. It’s a well-known technique – if you had a prospective client, CEO or other prospect in an elevator for 30 seconds, how would you describe what your company does in an interesting and to-the-point manner? Twitter is the modern, online and mobile version of this. Continue Reading »

There’s a blog at http://www.copyblogger.com that I receive by RSS every day. I find the information to be really useful and interesting. Today’s post analyzes a landing page created for a Cost Per Click Ad Campaign for www.babynapswell.com. The information provided by copyblogger is really specific and detailed on how this landing page could be improved to increase the click-through rate from the ad to the landing page.  I encourage you to read this post if you currently engage in CPC advertising, or if you plan to dip your toe in the water.

This morning my son was leaving for a ski race in Vermont for the week, and he realized that he was nearly out of ski socks. We have a problem with an overly excitable yellow lab who chews socks when people come to visit us at our house. It’s her way of trying to get attention. So our inventory of socks diminishes quickly.  The problem with replenishing the supply is that the type of socks my boys and my husband have been wearing for the past couple of years costs $16 a pair. Continue Reading »

Ragan.com, a company that shares useful info about public relations and marketing communications, just posted an interview with Adam Brown, who is in charge of social media at Coca-Cola. I strongly encourage you to read the article and watch the video. Continue Reading »

Thanks to Ragan’s PR Daily Newsfeed for bringing this story to my attention. Usually I would not advocate saying “no comment” to a TV news reporter but it would have been better to say that than to tell a reporter that your electric company’s rate are getting higher because of the time it’s taking to research answers to the reporter’s questions.  Karen Ryan, the PR Manager for Lee County Electric Cooperative in Florida, must be feeling the stress. Watch this video for a classic case study on what ‘not to do’ when a TV reporter comes knocking at your door. 

What should Karen have done to manage this situation properly? Continue Reading »

If you’ve been following this Maine PR Maven blog for any period of time, you have read about the process we have been going through to develop a new Web site for our own agency.

And you may know the saying “The Shoemaker’s Children Have No Shoes.” I understand why the shoemaker struggled to keep his own children in shoes. I feel his pain. When you have customers who want your products, you always feel that taking care of their needs is more important than taking care of your own. Continue Reading »

People are changing the way they read books. Amazon put out a press release on Christmas Day saying that more Kindle books were sold this holiday season than ”physical”  books. 

I don’t have one yet.  I still love to curl up in my cozy bed and read a book while I  hold it in my hands. I like the feel of the paper and the heft of the book. Sometimes I like to underline and highlight things in the book.  I also like to mark my place with a bookmark or by turning the page corner over (only on paperback books, however.)

On the other hand, my brother Walter (who is six years my senior) digests books at am amazinng pace, so he loves his Kindle becsause it allows him to acquire and consume several new titles each week. And my friend Ross loves his because he likes to read the New York Times on it each morning.

I imagine I’ll get one at some point, but for now, I am going to stick with my old-fashioned paper books. Continue Reading »