A few days ago, I read NYU journalism professorJay Rosen’s inaugural lecture to the fresh crop of future journalists at Sciences Pos School of Journalism in Paris. I’m not going to recap the historically rich (and lengthy) address, but will borrow a piece or two for the purpose of discussion here. (Note: his post can be found here if you’d like to read it in its entirety.) This address was directed to future journalists, but I think public relations practitioners that deal in media relations, can learn from it just as well.
Rosen began with a clip from the 1976 movie Network, which is about a TV news anchor who begins to act out on the air. I realize this was before many of you were born, but please take a few minutes to watch what is probably the most well-known scene in the film.
Rosen believes the filmmakers are “showing us what the mass audience was: a particular way of arranging and connecting people in space. Viewers are connected ‘up’ to the big spectacle, but they are disconnected from one another.” He explains, “But Howard Beale does what no television person ever does: he uses television to tell its viewers to stop watching television. When they disconnect from TV and go to their windows, they are turning away from Big Media and turning toward one another. And as their shouts echo across an empty public square they discover just how many other people had been ‘out there,’ watching television” – concurrently yet disconnectedly.
I agree with Rosen’s belief that this clip clearly demonstrates the great event we are living through today: the breakup of the mass audience and the shift in power that goes with it. What if today’s TV personality acted like Howard Beale? Rosen answers: “Immediately people who happened to be watching would alert their followers on Twitter. Someone would post a clip the same day on YouTube. The social networks would light up before the incident was over. Bloggers would be commenting on it well before professional critics had their chance.”
Rosen goes on to explain, “The media world today is a shifted space. People are connected horizontally to one another as effectively as they are connected up to Big Media; and they have the powers of production in their hands.”
The digital revolution changes the equation, according to Rosen. “It brings forward a new balance of forces, putting the tools of production and the powers of distribution in the hands of the people…”.
From my media relations standpoint, this means the days of blasting out a press release to every big (or small) media outlet are rapidly coming to an end. NO, I’m not saying big media is dead, nor is the press release (sheez, don’t get me started!)
What I am saying is that PR agencies, public relations practitioners, branding/marketing folks, small business owners, etc. now, more than ever, have additional opportunities to reach out to their publics in multiple ways – connecting with their individual audience(s) – and each other wherever they hang out. Big media and small media alike are still very much part of that equation, but now there are even more possibilities.
That’s my takeaway from Rosen’s speech and the clip. What is yours?
Retargeting – when online targeted advertising is delivered to consumers based on previous Internet actions that did not result in a past conversion – has become more importunate (persistent) as we continue to increasingly use the Internet to shop, order food, book travel, monitor the news or for pretty much anything you want to do without leaving the house.
It is also becoming more widely used within the advertising arena. With so many similar brands in the market it is hard to differentiation yourself from the other guy, and this form of remarketing can help to successfully convert those lost opportunities.
Oddly enough, after reading Learmonth’s post I was having dinner with my friend Nancy who was “weirded out” by a similiar experience. Ever since she booked a room at Loews Hotel ads for the hotel began appearing on every website that she visited. She is a sales trader so PPC (pay-per-click), Twitter, retargeting, and cookies are not really in her vocabulary. So I thought it would be interesting to research if retargeting is as effective as marketing and advertising professionals believe and how it actually works.
According to Criteo, a company that specializes in scalable personalized retargeting, more than 90 percent of website visitors leave before converting (i.e., making a purchase, downloading a white paper, etc.) Other research has shown that it can take at least seven follow-up emails or phone calls with prospects to actual convert them to a sale. If we are only tracking those visitors that convert on our physical websites, we are simply losing out on a possible sale down the road. Websites these days are optimized for search and have the technology to place cookies on each visitor’s computers to measure the site’s true audience size, but that is only capturing IP addresses most of the time. Then they have us, until we remove all our cookies and empty our cache.
So how do these retargeting customized ads work? When a prospect/client browses your website they become tagged with a snippet of code, which tracks which products they have shown interest in. When they leave the website and begin visiting other pages that’s when the retargeting begins. Banner ads customized to their search on your site start appearing on sites all over the web, from news, social networks, blogs, etc.
Companies that are using retargeting firms, such as Fetchback, in their marketing strategy have seen a 592 percent increase in ROI and conversions up by 94 percent. There are many other benefits to this form of behavioral marketing. It helps streamline all of your campaigns and the frequency of the ads helps keep your brand on the top of prospects minds. (Most services have an integrated feature that allows you to place a limit on the frequency at which the ads appear, so you don’t bomb your potential clients and “creep” them out because everywhere they go they see you.)
Plus, your ads are not static on a particular site related to your industry, which usually does not yield a lot of traffic because that market is already saturated and are either already your clients or know who you are. With retargeting your ads you are only reengaging with new prospects that have already shown interest in your brand; you can focus on what their needs are and manage your ROI.
In short, retargeting helps build your brand and online presence, while increasing the chances of reengaging your audience. It is not going to convert all on its own and has to be used with traditional marketing tactics to be effective. So don’t eliminate your current strategies. It is also important to measure the effectiveness of your retargeting campaigns, ensuring it is worth the investment and that your conversion rates are higher.
This article from Inc. Magazine highlights a retargeting success story involving Scottevest and its partnership with firm AdRoll.
There is one downside to the growing popularity for converting leads more efficiently via retargeting and that is the possibility that people may have the choice to opt-out (a do not call list for the Internet) of all behavioral targeting ads. What does that do for brands that are following the rules and not hunting down prospects on the web? We lose the opportunity to generate qualified leads for our sales team and revenue for the company. If you do use retargeting make sure you limit your reach frequency because when people begin to feel harassed and stalked by brands they will opt-out; I would.
Is your organization taking on the strategy of retargeting advertising? If so, how successful have you been with campaigns and reengaging lost prospects? Do you think we should have the right to opt-out of all behavioral targeting ad campaigns or just the irritating ones? Please share your thoughts and ideas with me and the BurrellesLuceFresh Ideas readers.
Last week, I attended a webinar by Sally Falkow, APR, and Rebecca Lieb, on how Internet technology and social networking affects news media and as a result, the public relations and media relations practitioner.
For those of you who attended last year’s PRSA International conference and heard Arianna Huffington open the keynote address with, “The press release is dead…” or those who read Tom Forenski’s rant a few years ago, “Die! Press Release! Die! Die! Die!,” may be surprised to learn the press release, like traditional media, is NOT dead. Falkow told us the news has changed, but journalists still want information. The way that journalists work is evolving so we need to provide this information in different ways.
Lieb quoted some statistics on how journalists work today:
91 percent of journalists search Google to do their job (“expert” is a common search term)
89 percent use blogs
64 percent are using social networks
In addition, Lieb went on to say that over 75 percent of reporters view blogs as helpful in providing story ideas, story angles and insight into the tone of an issue. And, almost half of reporters say they are “lurkers” on social networking sites.
So, what do journalists really want and need from PR?
They want the news in easy-to-identify, digestible sections.
They are looking for images, quotes, video, backgrounders, fact sheets.
Tag the information so it’s easily found.
Give them the full embed code for multimedia.
Put your news in a feed.
Make it available on social sites.
Aggregate your news/social content in one place.
She says, “Deconstruct the press release into special sections and tag the information. By using news tags, a newspaper or news site could pull together larger numbers of news stories and the PR industry would be helping news publishers to gather the facts and present them in a near-publishable format.”
Bottom line: if you aren’t telling your story, then someone’s telling it for you. If the media can’t find the information they need from you, they will find it elsewhere – and you may not like what they find!
The media in general is expected to provide more than just a print story, or just a video clip – it’s also on the web. What is your organization doing to feed the media’s hunger for content?
In the field of public relations, as within any other industry, “stars” emerge. Those who offer value and receive exposure gain attention. And while in the field of PR it is usually our clients who take center stage, Christine’s presentation highlighted tastemakers such as fashion PR maven Kelly Cutrone and social media experts such as Brian Solis who have become influencers in their own right. She encouraged those seeking to become influencers to share; write a book, offer quotes for a book, blog and tweet. Christine also cautioned that while sharing and participating in social media is essential, equally important is the need to offer value. Consider everything you put out there especially in writing, and what value it offers to others.
Following the session, Christine shared a few thoughts with me for young PR practitioners who seek to become influencers.
So here is my question to BurrellesLuce readers: What are your thoughts on PR experts as influencers? Is it the role of the PR practitioner to stay behind the brand, or do those PR influencers who are able to emerge as veritable tastemakers offer an added value to both clients and their community?
Recently, I was listed in a post entitled, “10 Communications Professionals Who Deserve More Twitter Followers.” After being number one (since I had the least followers) I received a slew of new invitations from individuals looking to connect with me via Twitter. Wow, I was totally flattered. But, with this new popularity (over 200 followers now!) came “tweeps” following me – presumably in anticipation of some good content and building a rapport with me – which raised a number of questions.
While I am connecting with new people at a quick rate, how do I maintain these new relationships and how close will they become?What is the expectation of a follower?How engaged will we become with those we follow? Maybe my new followers are looking to engage one-on-one and with a few I have already done this. I have even met some of my followers in real-life, at a recent tweetup. But how many followers can I actively engage with?
My colleague at BurrellesLuce, Valerie Simon (@valeriesimon) recently guest posted on the PR 2.0 Strategies blog, regarding the limits to the number of people with whom one can maintain social relationships. She mentioned the works of Robin Dunbar, an anthropologist who devised a formula to determine how many friends a human can emotionally interact with. The “Dunbar Number” is a figure of approximately 150 people with whom we can maintain meaningful relationships.
I know of people on Twitter who have thousands of followers and are following thousands, so surely this figure must have increased in the “online world that we all now live in” …right? Wrong. According to Dunbar: Facebook, Twitter, and social networking sites can definitely help us stay in touch. However, social media sites do not increase the number of relationships we can maintain. In the past, without these types of social sites, a relationship with an old pal from kindergarten would have died. In truth, according to Dunbar, we really must “get together” to make the relationship work.
The Internet and social networking sites, in particular, have created a sense of mass intimacy, but realistically anything over 150 friends is just too much according to Dunbar – a point not lost on social media users. In fact, some are even discussing “putting a cap on Twitter followers.” Personally, I am not anticipating that most of my followers will become dear friends, but I do want to learn from them and engage on a “social networking” basis. I enjoy their posts and comments and I think we have a lot to offer each other, even if we don’t make it to each other’s top 150.
What are your thoughts? How are you managing to connect and engage with your followers and the people you follow in meaningful ways? Are you considering or have you already limited the number of people you connect with in social media?
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*Bio: Colleen Flood has been a sales consultant with BurrellesLuce for over 12 years and is eager to become a more integrated part of the social-public relations community. She primarily handles agency relations in the New York and New Jersey metro-area. She is not only passionate about work, but also about family, friends, and the Jersey Shore. Twitter: @cgflood LinkedIn: Colleen Flood Facebook: BurrellesLuce
brands in the market it is hard to differentiation yourself from the other guy, and this form of remarketing can help to successfully convert those lost opportunities.
press release is dead…” or those who read 
Big Media, Mass Media, New Media – Oh My!
Friday, September 10th, 2010A few days ago, I read NYU journalism professor Jay Rosen’s inaugural lecture to the fresh crop of future journalists at Sciences Pos School of Journalism in Paris. I’m not going to recap the historically rich (and lengthy) address, but will borrow a piece or two for the purpose of discussion here. (Note: his post can be found here if you’d like to read it in its entirety.) This address was directed to future journalists, but I think public relations practitioners that deal in media relations, can learn from it just as well.
Rosen began with a clip from the 1976 movie Network, which is about a TV news anchor who begins to act out on the air. I realize this was before many of you were born, but please take a few minutes to watch what is probably the most well-known scene in the film.
Rosen believes the filmmakers are “showing us what the mass audience was: a particular way of arranging and connecting people in space. Viewers are connected ‘up’ to the big spectacle, but they are disconnected from one another.” He explains, “But Howard Beale does what no television person ever does: he uses television to tell its viewers to stop watching television. When they disconnect from TV and go to their windows, they are turning away from Big Media and turning toward one another. And as their shouts echo across an empty public square they discover just how many other people had been ‘out there,’ watching television” – concurrently yet disconnectedly.
I agree with Rosen’s belief that this clip clearly demonstrates the great event we are living through today: the breakup of the mass audience and the shift in power that goes with it. What if today’s TV personality acted like Howard Beale? Rosen answers: “Immediately people who happened to be watching would alert their followers on Twitter. Someone would post a clip the same day on YouTube. The social networks would light up before the incident was over. Bloggers would be commenting on it well before professional critics had their chance.”
Cases of where citizens beat journalists to the punch are numerous but a few off the top of my head are: the Mumbai attacks, the Hudson River plane landing, or more recently the Discovery Channel hostage situation.
Rosen goes on to explain, “The media world today is a shifted space. People are connected horizontally to one another as effectively as they are connected up to Big Media; and they have the powers of production in their hands.”
The digital revolution changes the equation, according to Rosen. “It brings forward a new balance of forces, putting the tools of production and the powers of distribution in the hands of the people…”.
From my media relations standpoint, this means the days of blasting out a press release to every big (or small) media outlet are rapidly coming to an end. NO, I’m not saying big media is dead, nor is the press release (sheez, don’t get me started!)
What I am saying is that PR agencies, public relations practitioners, branding/marketing folks, small business owners, etc. now, more than ever, have additional opportunities to reach out to their publics in multiple ways – connecting with their individual audience(s) – and each other wherever they hang out. Big media and small media alike are still very much part of that equation, but now there are even more possibilities.
That’s my takeaway from Rosen’s speech and the clip. What is yours?
Tags: audience, Big Media, big spectacle, bloggers, branding, BurrellesLuce, citizens, clip, commenting, connecting, critics, digital, disconnected, Discovery Channel hostage, distribution, followers, Fresh Ideas, Howard Beale, Hudson River plane landing, Jay Rosen, journalism, journalists, marketing, mass, media, Mumbai attacks, network, news, NYU, opportunities, Paris, people, personality, power, PR agencies, press releases, production, professional, public, Public Relations, reach out, revolution, Sciences Po's School of Journalism, shifted, small business owners, Social Media, Social Networks, television, tools, Tressa Robbins, TV, Twitter, Viewers, world, YouTube
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