Mixed Media

For years, search engine marketing was considered a black art, a dubious world of overpaying consultants to somehow get your website found in the huge and unwieldy web universe.  But much of what lies behind SEO, what really works, has been demystified.  This chart, part of MarketingSherpa 2012 Search Marketing Benchmark Report – SEO Edition clearly shows the most important components of SEO, based on the response from over 1,500 marketers.  Trying to game the search engines and their algorithms is passé and over.

What rings true in SEO is the same formula used by companies conducting effective PR for eons…the undeniable human need  to communicate meaningful information to (thirsty) audiences.

All major searches - Google, Yahoo, Bing – have continually changed and tweaked their algorithms to reflect topflight SEO practices:  1) consistently generated interesting and useful content, 2) that’s properly indexed and tagged, and 3) promoted to engage and build inbound traffic.  That’s the secret formula, which is supported by the MarketingSherpa chart below:

If you have a problem either staying awake or getting to sleep, you know how quickly presentations can induce that foggy haze akin to taking Ambien.  Considered a must-use tool, PowerPoint presos conjure hellish feelings of having to endure a yawnfest of slides packed with far too much detail -- those dull paragraph-long bullets that are repeated verbatim in monotone by the speaker, along with caricature-like clip art and animation.  But let’s not kill the messenger. PowerPoint is merely the medium. It’s all about throwing out bad, shop-worn cliche habits to build strong, compelling presentations.

A book that I ran across a couple weeks ago in Kramer Books, Slide:ology by Nancy Duarte, sets out the true art AND science behind constructing and delivering  presentations.  I thencoincidently, ran across a live webcast with Duarte, interviewed by Chris Brogan, the writer/blogger of all things marketing and communications ( co-author of bestselling Trust Agents), which revealed some great truths for today's audiences with shorter attention spans.

You can watch their 29 minute video discussion here, or read the key highlights I jotted down below.   Duarte also published a subsequent companion book, Resonate, which explains and dissects the power of storytelling in today’s communications.

BusinessInsider apparently hit their threshold of being bombarded with “STORY IDEA” and “EXPERT AVAILABLE” from PR pitches.

What Editor-in-Chief Henry Blodget says they’re looking for isn’t a preamble or teaser, but the actual goods – compelling stories and straight up quotes and outlooks on a timely topic.

Too many PR firms try get trapped into the conscious or subconscious thought process of advancing their client’s interest first. When in fact, working with the media, one serves another master and must flip that mentality upside down to have something of value to help the reporter do their job.  Today’s PR rep and client need to be prescient and quick strike enough to tap into news of the moment and trends, providing a story or quote that actually supports the reporter's coverage.

Authoritative executive bios, while nice on a website, don’t do much to hook a reporter for help with a story. Instead there should be an arsenal of quotes prepared in advance or observations and insights quickly roughed out to offer to a select group of reporters when that perfect tie-in comes about. Why a select group and not a scatter-shot blast to a large media list?  Because context matters, and stories and quotes need to be tightly tailored  to the reporter’s angle and their readers’ hot points.

So, what's Henry and his team, as well as nearly every other media outlet, looking for?

Dear Mr. CEO of Tech-Widget Corp:

No longer will you just make widgets, you will also be a publisher. With the the attrition of the news media – the closing of magazines and newspapers – you’ll find fewer remaining reporters to tell your story. In essence you’ll have an even smaller keyhole to pass through to get your story delivered. The good news is: you now also have the opportunity to take control of your own narrative – to go directly to your audiences through any number of social media channels.

Not only that, but carefully done, you can even package your content so that the remaining time-crunched media can offer it up as their own.

If anyone says that PR has died, they can be reminded of the need to create good compelling content through blogs, videos, forums and yes, even press releases. But not all of this is good as we’re reminded in an article “PR fills vacuum as media shrinks” on ProPublica. In fact, the blurred lines of where ‘news’ is originating is becoming more shady as ‘front’ organizations step out to advance their sponsors interest. But this is more a problem of political candidates and PACs, than B2B and technology companies.

Part of the lesson here is that today’s skeptical and cynical masses are becoming wary even of the press. Nor do they want to be sold or marketed to. Their mute buttons and mouses are at the ready to switch to that next web page or channel if they sniff too much corporate speak or hidden agenda.

Today, companies need to be more interesting, entertaining and informative if only to not be tuned out.

PR is still about telling, rather than selling  What will your content strategy be? In further posts we'll address different types of content - from micro-messaging on twitter to long form blog content - and how they map to different audiences.