Father, I’ve sinned. It has been over one month since my last blog post. Truth be told there may be something to the perception that if you have time to blog…you have too much time. Since March I have taken on a new job with a small, but rapidly growing software company known as Lumension Security.
From day one I said that we need to start the conversation and leverage social media. Easy thing to say, another thing to actually do it. So now faced with the daunting question of how one actually gets started in practicing what you what you preach, we came up with a plan that is short and very simple.
1. Get Rich Media Going. At the start of March there we’re less than 5 videos on You Tube. Now we have over 20 promoting our thought leadership. The company has so much to say about the hot topics going on in security that we needed to capture this, but in a richer format ala video. Here’s an example of one of our video’s
Here’s a tip in getting rich media going for not a lot of money. Connect with your local news channels and get in touch with some of the videographers. Most of these guys are freelance and always looking for a way to get some steady income going…you can get up and running and actually get a production quality like you paid 3x for it.
2. Start a You Tube Channel. This has got to be one of the easiest ways to open the aperture in getting the syndication and conversation started. We even branded our You Tube Channel and already have several subscribers plus triple video views.
3. Get a Facebook Page Up. You cant imagine the # of employees, and partners on Facebook. We have syndicated our events, our new rich media videos and have over 33 members of our company page. I know its not the hundreds or thousands that some have but its 33 more people in our network than we had in March. Will Facebook make us social media gurus. No, but it helps educate the management as to how communication is changing, and that is key for future initiatives. In addition Facebook in many ways is the HR intranet for small and even big companies. Use it to communicate internally as well as externally. Many times it’s your internal communications that will make you or break you.
4. Get a Linked in Page. It’s the next step and easy to do. Linked In is piloting these pages and it will undoubtedly improve. Why Linked In..it’s really one of the best places to recruit new talent from, especially if your small.
5. Get an E-Book: Folks there is no excuse not to have an e-book. I took the lead from David over at Web Ink Now and launched an ebook initiative from day 1. We’re getting ready to launch it any day now and I’ll release it here first.
6. Get A Blog. I know this should have been first but we have a few issues within our content management system and I didn’t want to delay getting other initiatives in execution. We are starting a blog in the next month and I’m excited at this opportunity. In addition we are identifying 1-2 corporate bloggers to begin an outreach and start conversations elsewhere. In addition we have also identified 10-20 of what we consider to be highly influential bloggers that we would like to engage with more frequently.
7. Social Media Release Kit: We are now going to build a social media communications release kit to provide syndicated content and outreach for bloggers and other community sites.
8. Communication Agencies. We’re reviewing our agencies at the moment to see what level of social media understanding they have and how this relates to metrics. I will say that while the lingo is great across Pr firms the metrics still are focused on production and not the measure of conversation quality. I believe that you need a PR firm in this day and age that really understands the change in how PR is done in the networked world.
9. PR-Web. Start syndicating your communications releases on PR Web. Our reads have increased, inquires from releases have gone up and hits to our web site have increased. If your not syndicating via Pr Web you’re not helping your efforts.
I know its not where we need to be but we have started a lot of initiatives in the past 90 days and I’m lucky that I have a team that’s willing to try new things. We hope to have a redesigned customer community in 2009, and even discussing how we can capture more customer driven innovation.
Why the immediate focus. I won’t bore you with how it’s the new way things are done, and all the great things to be had in starting a conversation. The reality is I don’t have a large budget and I need new ways of thinking of how we can get our message out and build closer relationships with influencers and customers. Social media is the great equalizer between big and small today.
If any of you have additional ideas, throw them my way. I need all the help and ideas I can get. Nuff said.
This is a fantastic idea. The way we do PR is changing with the introduction of social media and web 2.0 tools. It's about having that right mixture - the company's understanding of their overall vision, goals, and direction and partnering with the strategic PR partner who can help you achieve success. I believe it starts with the company first understanding what it is you're trying to accomplish and what channels you need to leverage to get there. And, constantly reinventing... great blog. It's worth the wait.
Posted by: PRSpinster1 | July 11, 2008 at 08:33 PM
Hi Ed,
This was a great post, and I found it very informative. In my last gig leading marketing for a supply chain software provider, I was also challenged with little budget to get the word out. We utilized some Web 2.0 tools including the use of multiple on-demand webcasts for customer education, as well leveraging influential bloggers. Now that I do my own blogging on an active basis, I have since discovered the power of influence this community has.
Bob Ferrari
Posted by: Bob Ferrari | July 28, 2008 at 06:14 AM