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Author: Janet Gershen-Siegel

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InMaps – Visualize Your Network on LinkedIn

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on July 21, 2016

A Look at InMaps – Visualize Your Network on LinkedIn

InMaps were cool. But alas, they are no more. LinkedIn, like other social media sites, is a lot more about advertising these days.

Let’s say you’ve got a nice, growing network on LinkedIn.

Hurray! Now let’s say that it’s large enough that you’re unsure of how it’s all trending. After all, what if your network is mainly people who used to work at Fidelity but you want to get into Prudential instead? How can you see how things are shaking out?

Or maybe you want to get a handle on job titles that you’re seeing – what if most of your network consists of tradespeople in your area, rather than people who might actually be able to find you something?

If you’re an accountant, a network full of hairdressers and landscape contractors is lovely but it might not be really doing it for you, eh?

Here’s where InMaps came in.

What InMaps Did

Essentially, what LinkedIn was doing is, instead of geographically mapping your connections, they were mapping other meaningful relationships among all of those people. So instead you could see things like job titles that frequently come up, and other connections. These included who used to work where.

If you’d worked in several places (like I have) you might have seen one former employer dominate, particularly if you’d just left a particular role.

After all, when Hachette Book Group and I parted ways, suddenly I connected to the other seventeen or so people who were being outsourced. There was a bit of urgency to getting connections, and we wanted to maintain friendships. I’d had to dig a bit in order to find former colleagues further back in my career.

And, by the way, FYI, this does behoove one to try to make connections. These connections would be both during employment and to reach back to older connections. This is because the natural push to connect might not come about if you’re thinking about a job you held twenty years ago, long before the existence of LinkedIn.

The Downside

It would take a while for LinkedIn to generate an InMap. Particularly if you’ve got a lot of connections. This was a feature that never really got out of Beta, so that was totally understandable.

But here was the InMap for a woman named Leslie Gotch Zarelli. So this should give something of an idea about how the overall pattern looked. Her InMap (I would have posted mine, but LinkedIn never generated one) was dominated by general areas like Legal. Plus she had probably a former employer or two, and what appeared to be some job duties.

More information was on LinkedIn. LinkedIn discontinued the service in 2015 and never really found a replacement for it. So your contacts now are static. A pity, as it was a great idea. LinkedIn – people want this! Get mappin’!

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SEO, Continued

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on June 28, 2016

SEO Continued – (Search Engine Optimization) Strategy)

So, yesterday I put together more of an SEO strategy. Er, SEO continued, that is.

The Mechanics

I started with tabs and tabs of an Excel spreadsheet as I began to think about what I really want to do with all of this.

So, it’s becoming more obvious is that I’ve got major ambitions and there aren’t enough hours in a day in which I can accomplish them.

To really make a good site, a beautifully designed one with awesome SEO and kick-bun content, means engaging something like 50 people to do it.

Egad. I’m organized and I’m energetic and I’ve got time these days, but I’m not 50 people.

How Did I Get SEO Continued and Working for Me?

This is a source of a bit of stress, to be sure, but it’s also a challenge. How can I leverage what I’ve already got? So, how can I use my organizational skills to make things easier on myself? And how can I set up some things which will run on their own, thereby saving me time? So, what’s the timing of, well, of all of it?

I’m very excited about this whole venture. Plus, I actually got a little Google traffic yesterday! Yay!

I’ve only been on Google for maybe 3 days. Holy cow. This stuff really works.

I have a billion things to do. Oh and I’m running in a 5K in a week. If I could do web development while running, I would.

Eight Years Later, More SEO Continued

Well, the truth is, this stuff never, ever stops. And that even includes what I am doing right now, which is fixing SEO on older blog posts and organizing them better. Yet every year, I learn more. Hell, every day. It also helps a lot to be working with someone who knows their way around SEO. So, I can see what’s working. And how to fix whatever isn’t.

Onward and sideways.

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Responding to Facebook’s Organic Reach Decline

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on May 26, 2016

Responding to Facebook’s Organic Reach Decline

Are you responding to Facebook’s organic reach decline? Facebook’s organic reach is going down. That is, fewer people are seeing your posts (unless you cough up some dough. So, what’s a writer or social media marketer to do?

Social Media Today’s Pam Dyer has the scoop on how to respond.

Then in 2012, Facebook restricted brand content reach to around 16%. But in 2014, the figure plummeted to just about a dismal 6%.

Per Dyer

So, according to Dyer, “No one really knows for sure how Facebook decides what appears in news feeds, but some elements are well known as weighting factors:

Post types that receive the most user interaction
Posts that users hide or report as spam
How a user interacts with Facebook ads
The device that is used to access Facebook and the speed of its connection”

EdgeRank

EdgeRank has less importance than it had. But it’s not quite absent from the mix. So, it consists of –

“Affinity: The closeness of the relationship between the user and the content/source
Weight: The action that was taken on the content
Decay: The freshness of the content”

Responding to Facebook’s Organic Reach Decline: Four Steps

Dyer lays out four steps.

Optimize Facebook content. Test what’s working, and what isn’t. What are people clicking on? And are they clicking through to your site? Look at Google Analytics 4 for your site, and determine which content is the source for your Facebook-generated traffic.
Create incentives for sharing content. Whether that’s offers, contents, or just can-you-believe-this types of posts, create the kind of content that people want to spread to their peers.
Work a multi-network campaign strategy. Use hashtags; they show up in all sorts of places, and not necessarily on Facebook. Also, put your hashtag in all of your promotions, e. g. blogs, television commercials, literature, etc.
Track data, and act on it accordingly! What’s happening with your links? Where is your audience coming from? Dovetailing with step #1, be the company that knows where your traffic is really coming from. Know where your audience is clicking.

Knowledge is power.

Seven Years Later, Organic Reach Decline is Even Worse

But that’s probably something to expect. The number of Facebook users continues to rise exponentially.

Per Hootsuite, Facebook is flirting with 2 billion daily users. Yes, you read that right. But also —

About 15% of Facebook Feed content is recommended by AI from non-followed accounts

Mark Zuckerberg has said that he expects that percentage to more than double by the end of 2023. That’s loads of potential for brands to get in front of new audiences organically. All the more reason to stay on top of the latest changes in the Facebook algorithm.

This is heartening. Maybe Meta has listened to advertisers. After all, that’s how they make their money. If advertisers aren’t selling, then they will go someplace where they will. That place may be TikTok, Instagram (another Meta property), LinkedIn, or the like. Or it may be a bit more outside the box, like Twitch, Quora, or Google ads.

If Facebook doesn’t want its competition to eat its lunch, then Facebook has to make it possible for advertisers to do well on its platform.

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Quinnipiac Assignment 11 – ICM 527 – Continuing Program Evaluation

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on November 12, 2015

A Look at Quinnipiac Assignment 11 – ICM 527 – Continuing Program Evaluation

This week, we continued studying the evaluation of public relations campaigns as a continuing program evaluation.

Ethical Issues Regarding Evaluation

As is true for any presentation of numbers, there are ways to spin findings which can lead a reader to believe one thing or another. You can use numbers to make a case. And some numbers, if suppressed or deemphasized or just plain omitted, could alter organizational decision-making. This only gets into telling the truth with numbers.

All bets are off if a strategic planner or any sort of analyst out and out alters the figures they have to present,. Or if they didn’t get accurate or truthful numbers to begin with.

Cans Get You Cooking

But even if the analyst is completely honest about results and figures, there are still issues with emphasis and language. For the Cans Get You Cooking campaign, the initial purpose had to have been to increase the sale of canned goods. Instead, they labeled the campaign as a success for leading to an increase in awareness of canned foods.

Awareness is a perfectly legitimate (and objective) goal for a campaign. But they seem to have swept the goal of increased sales under the rug. This was in favor of the one, demonstrable, favorable outcome – a boost in awareness.

On page 125, Place notes

“The role of ethics in public relations evaluation was described by participants as inherently associated with truth and fairness. For some professionals, this meant conveying evaluation data accurately and truthfully to organizational leadership or clients. For other professionals, this meant measuring whether the most accurate story or brand image reached an organization’s publics.”

Upshot

Professionals, fortunately, realize that others can misinterpret their words, even if they are reporting accurately on the numbers. If a campaign increases, say, signups for a class by five over an initial figure of five, then how do they report that?

Is it a report of a new five signups, or does the professional state that signups have doubled? Both are mathematically correct, but there is an exciting spin to the latter which may be making it look more significant than it truly is.

The Real Warriors and Okay 2 Talk Campaigns

A review of both campaigns revealed good attention to detail. Both campaigns seemed to be rather carefully planned.

The Real Warriors Campaign was designed to encourage active armed services personnel and veterans of recent American military campaigns (since 9/11) to seek psychological counseling and other help for post-traumatic stress disorder, e. g. ‘invisible wounds’. Primary research included focus groups and key informant interviews. All of the campaign’s goals were awareness-based.

The goal was to decrease stigma felt by veterans seeking mental health assistance.

Measurements

The measurement of the effectiveness of the campaign included the distribution of campaign materials, website visitors, and social media interactions, plus news stories. This is good for an awareness campaign, but where are the actions? Where are the increased numbers of veterans seeking help?

A far more germane measurement would be to show an increase in personnel hours for armed forces mental health professionals.

Or perhaps there could be a measurement of the hiring of more counselors, or agreements with more civilian counselors. Without naming names or otherwise violating privacy, the number of patients in treatment is easy to tally. So can the number of appointments made, even if some of the appointments were never kept. Another objective measurement of success would be a decrease in suicides and fewer calls by veterans to suicide prevention hotlines. The campaign shows none of that.

OK 2 Talk

As for the OK 2 Talk Campaign, that campaign’s goals were to create awareness and also to launch a safe social media space. Tumblr was their chosen platform as it allowed for anonymity. It seems to have also been chosen for a demographic match although that is not spelled out.

Metrics

The measurement of the effectiveness of that campaign was a lot more closely aligned with its initial goals than the Real Warriors report showed. For example, the OK 2 Talk report gave objective figures regarding engagement on OK2Talk.org. The page views are not necessarily indicative of much. It is the content submissions which seem to better reflect engagement.

On the Tumblr blog, they encourage visitors to anonymously post about how they are feeling. The blog makes it clear that they will not post everyone’s writing.

However, there are several well-written or illustrated posts showcasing various viewpoints. OK 2 Talk intelligently shows all kinds of posts. This is even those where the writers clearly need help or are just reblogging messages put together by creative professionals.

The Continuing Program Evaluation Campaign

The campaign report shows the number of content submissions and the number of clickthroughs to a ‘get help’ screen. There is also a statement regarding ‘thousands’ of comments but no specifics. They could have shown this more clearly. But that does not truly matter.

Showing the number of clickthroughs to the ‘get help’ screen was an objective and direct measurement of how the campaign is going. It answers the question, ‘did it work, or was it just a colorful and fancy waste of time?’ with ‘yes, it did’, and far more effectively than the distribution of materials ever could.

Smith Says…

As Smith notes on page 335

“Guesses aren’t good enough; Hard work and cost aren’t measures of effectiveness; Creativity isn’t, either; Dissemination doesn’t equal communication; Knowledge doesn’t always lead to acceptance; and Behavior is the ultimate measure.”

In particular, Real Warriors should have remembered that dissemination does not equal communication. After all, the distributed campaign materials could have gone right into the trash. Yes, the campaign’s stated goal was awareness. But the campaign can only really measure it with some form of observable action. Without some demonstrated actions, Real Warriors seems more like a lot of paper redistribution.

The two campaigns have similar goals, and both have the valiant ideal of helping the mentally ill. But it’s only OK 2 Talk which is showing objective and relevant results.

Relating it all back to the ILSC

For the Institute for Life Sciences Collaboration, deciding what to measure, and to make sure it is being accurately measured, are important steps to take. It is pretty easy to count website visitors using Google Analytics or the like. But a better measurement is actual engagement like blog comments, Facebook comments and shares, and LinkedIn comments. This will tie directly to awareness objectives.

For objectives on adding high schools to the Small World Initiative, good measurements include the number of times that educators click through to a ‘get information’ page. The ILSC should add one to a revamped website. They can also expect such inquiries in the comments and messaging sections of a possible future ILSC Facebook group.

A similar vehicle for obtaining such inquiries could be a possible future LinkedIn group for the ILSC, and its topics.

Measurements of the campaign reaching donors could be a look at the number of visits to a donations page. It would also be the percentages of site visitors who went all the way through the online donations funnel. Knowing where they stop (if a visit does not lead to a donation) would be extremely helpful information to have.

More About the Continuing Program Evaluation

For the website, Google Analytics should be used to tie back to visitor acquisition. If Facebook turns out to be the most popular place for visitors to come from, then the ILSC should concentrate there. A surprisingly small amount of money (e. g. $20.00 or so) can boost a post and reach even more people.

This measurement is useful for all types of objectives, as it helps to define where to best concentrate the ILSC’s social media time. There is little use in devoting substantial time to LinkedIn if the publics don’t come to the website and don’t donate any funds.

Awareness needs to be related to action, for it is action that will get the SWI out of its funding gap and help keep the ILSC going for years to come.

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Quinnipiac Assignment 10 – ICM 527 – Program Evaluation

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on November 5, 2015

Quinnipiac Assignment 10 – ICM 527 – Program Evaluation

Let’s do a program evaluation. This week’s readings were about evaluating a strategic plan and program.

Key Concepts

As Smith said, on (Page 331), “Program evaluation is the systematic measurement of the outcomes of a project, program or campaign based on the extent to which stated objectives are achieved.”

With a plan in place and measurable, clear objectives included in it, the next question is whether anything is working. This comes from figuring out how to measure results and what’s ‘good’ or at least adequate.

In Module 8, we studied Cans Get You Cooking, where the idea was to increase awareness of cans’ use in cooking via cooking shows and blogs. However, another objective was increased sales (after all, why bother with such a campaign if sales don’t increase?), and in that respect the plan was unsuccessful. According to Companies and Markets, the purchase of canned goods declines because of improvements in the economy.

When consumers have more discretionary income to spend on foodstuffs, they purchase fewer canned goods – no matter how well-crafted a campaign is. There was increased awareness, yes, and under that criterion, the campaign worked. But under the criterion of increased sales, it did not.

The Case of the Traveling Goalposts

It seemed a little as if the goalposts were moved in that campaign, that increased sales became a less attainable goal. Awareness was a far more readily attainable goal, and so they presented awareness as the premise behind the campaign.

These moved goalposts are the difference between what Smith refers to as awareness and action objectives, on pages 332 – 335, with the third type of objective, acceptance, straddling a line between both of the others. For the Cans Get You Cooking campaign, it seems as if the attainment of the awareness objective was the only cause for celebration.

Smith makes a compelling case on page 334, that creativity, effort, and cost don’t count as measures of effectiveness. All of those facets of a campaign are on the side of the organization. But measures of awareness, acceptance, and action are all effects felt (and acted upon) by publics. By definition, creativity, etc. should not have anything to do with the effectiveness of a campaign.

The Eight-Step AMEC Social Media Measurement Process

Jeffrey (Page 4) outlines, “The Eight-Step Social Media Measurement Process

Identify organizational and departmental goals.
Research stakeholders for each and prioritize.
Set specific objectives for each prioritized stakeholder group.
Set social media Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) against each stakeholder objective.
Choose tools and benchmark (using the AMEC Matrix).
- Public Relations Activity
- Intermediary Effects
- Target Audience Effects
Analyze the results and compare to costs.
Present to management.
Measure continuously and improve performance.”

Quinnipiac Assignment 10 - ICM 527 - Program Evaluation — Avinash Kaushik, author of Web Analytics 2.0

What’s it Like?

This process compares favorably to methodologies learned in ICM 524 – Social Media Analytics. In that class, we read Web Analytics 2.0 by Avinash Kaushik. On pages 29 – 32, Kaushik outlined his Step 3 – Identifying Your Web Analytics Soul Mate (How to Run an Effective Tool Pilot) (average time: 2 years) Evaluate the following –

Usability
Functionality
Technical
Response
Total cost of ownership

Also –

Get enough time
Be fair
Ask about data sampling
Segment like crazy
Ask about search analytics
Test site content grouping
Bring on the interns (or the VPs!)
Test support quality
Reconcile the numbers (they won’t add up, but it’s fun!)
Check the daily/normal stuff
Sweat the TCO (total cost of ownership)

What Kaushik said, and what Jeffrey said, are similar. Because measurement is an objective activity. This is why objectives need to be clear and measurable. Five percent is measurable; better exposure (in general) is not.

For both authors, the idea is to have specific objectives and then act on them, whether those objectives are to launch a strategic campaign or select a web analytics vendor. Then, once they choose the vendor, get the yardstick in place, and use it.

Kaushik further reminds us that, while our intention may be to select a vendor and essentially ‘marry’ it, we still need to be evaluating the evaluator. If it’s not performing up to our reasonable specifications, then it’s time for vendor divorce court.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

On page 7 of Jeffrey, it says, “Shel Holtz, principal of Holtz Communication + Technology (www.holtz.com) defined a KPI as a ‘quantifiable measurement, agreed to beforehand, that reflect the critical success factors of one’s effort.’”

This puts KPIs on a par with what we have been calling objectives. Wanting to ‘get better’ is one thing. But it’s vague and subject to weaseling.

Wanting to improve recognition of the Institute for Life Sciences Collaboration (ILSC) and its missions by 5% as is measured by surveys taken during the second quarter of 2016 is a measurable key performance indicator. Therefore, anyone who can read numbers will be able to determine whether the KPI has been met.

Program Evaluation Re: Applicability to the ILSC

Beyond just recognition measurements, there are any numbers of KPIs to measured. These include the number of schools served by the Small World Initiative by a certain date, or increasing donations by a particular amount, subject to a clear deadline.

The ILSC

Currently, the ILSC website in particular seems to be just something people threw together. But it’s without any sense of how to deal with technological and design changes, or scalability. Keeping measurements out of the mix means the ILSC website can be started and then forgotten about. And it seems a lot like that’s exactly what happened.

However, a website cannot be a flash in the pan, as that can cause the publics to feel the organization behind it is also fly by night. Particularly when asking for money, an organization needs to give forth the impression of trustworthiness and solidity.

Adding Key Performance Indicators and measurements means there needs to be a sea change in how the ILSC views the website. It isn’t just something you throw together in an afternoon, for some temp hired for a few weeks to handle and then never see again. Instead, it needs to be an integral part of the organization.

Program Evaluation: Takeaways

While the organization’s work is (generally) offline, there still needs to be room for the website in the minds of the organization’s board members. One facet of their thinking has to include how to best use the website and social media, to better communication the ILSC’s mission and goals, and to communicate with its publics.

The website has got to have a place in those conversations, and it currently does not. That has to change.

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Quinnipiac Assignment 08 – ICM 527 – Communication Tactics

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on October 22, 2015

Quinnipiac Assignment 08 – ICM 527 – Communication Tactics

Let’s start with key concepts for communication tactics.

As Smith says on page 227, “A communication tactic is the visible element of a strategic plan.”

Smith mainly talks about more traditional means of communicating with publics, dividing the methodologies and strategic communication tactics into working with organizational media, the news media, or utilizing advertising and promotional media. Some of this applies pretty seamlessly to social media, whereas other aspects do not.

Organized Media and Communication Tactics

With organizational media, the questions are of the type of organizational control and ties, e. g. is the media internal like a company newsletter, and is it controlled? Is it for a targeted media (targeted buyer personae) or the mass media? Is the communication via popular media (e. g. The New York Times) or trade media (Variety)?

Do the communications go only one way, or are they interactive (the hallmark of social media)? Is the media publicly or privately owned, and what type is it, e. g. print, electronic, or digital?

The question of popular versus trade media applies well to social media. Is a message intended for Google or a mainstream blog, or is it being disseminated in a closed forum or a specialty Facebook group?

Smith goes on to bring up planning and various events for communications, such as special events (an art exhibition’s opening, for example) or contests. Planning involves putting together print publications such as press kits, electronic communications like podcasts, digital media like websites, and social media, like blogs or wikis.

Special Mention

One tactic deserving of special mention is creating a ready to broadcast bit of media for a news outlet, such as a news fact sheet or a video B-roll. Smith explains, on page 276,“One of the most frequently used categories of news media tactics is direct information subsidy – information that is presented to the media more or less ready for use.”

For news producers facing deadline pressure and needing to fill a ravenous 24 hour news cycle, ready-made media is most welcome.

Applying These Communication Tactics to the ILSC

Putting together ready-made press information would be a great way for the Institute for Life Sciences Collaboration to get more positive press. A reporter looking to prepare a piece on the HIV crisis in Ghana is not necessarily going to have the time to gather the best images.

They may not be able to find the most articulate patients for a story focusing on the ILSC.

Maybe the ILSC just provides names and contact information. Even so, that can make the difference between a story not being written at all, versus one that is not only written, but shows the ILSC in the best possible light.

The same is true for the Small World Initiative. Rather than making a reporter dig to find the contact information for educators, why not provide it for them? It’s up to the reporter, of course, to decide whether to pursue the story at all. But why not lower one of the hurdles?

Case Study Tactics

We looked at three case studies this week, “Giving Tuesday”, “Cans Get You Cooking”, and “Search for Amazing Women”.

Giving Tuesday

Giving Tuesday was all about a campaign to take advantage of the spending momentum that annually swirls around Black Friday and Cyber Monday. It dovetailed well with increased giving impulses. These tend to coincide with the holiday season and the end of the calendar year.

The 92^nd Street Y and the United Nations Foundation found the following from their research: (Page 2).

“Our initial secondary research showed us that in 2011, Americans gave almost $300 billion to favorite causes, but total dollars donated had yet to rebound to pre-recession levels. People were spending, though: Holiday retail sales were increasing at a rate of 3.3 percent a year. And we know that people are willing to give if asked.”

Social Media

The campaign, which was communications on social media which spread the word, was a success. According to the case study, “on #GivingTuesday, nonprofits raised amounts up 63 percent over 2013 on five major donation-processing platforms.

Based on initial results from Blackbaud, U.S. online giving was up 36 percent among its clients, compared with #GivingTuesday 2013 (to $26.1 million), and it saw a 15 percent increase in the number of nonprofits that processed online donations.”

Cans Get You Cooking

For Cans Get You Cooking, the idea was to increase awareness of cans’ use in cooking via cooking shows and blogs.

It was a well-coordinated online marketing campaign in particular, which (Page 3) “implemented campaign’s Search Engine Marketing initiative, targeting consumers on Google already searching for ‘what to make for dinner’ or ‘easy recipes,’ among hundreds of other key word/phrase triggers, driving them to CansGetYouCooking.com, where they were exposed to campaign messages, the 30-minute special with Kelsey Nixon, canned foods recipes and much more.”

After reading the case study a few times, the thing I could not find was anything about sales. There was more interest in buying canned goods, but there’s nothing in the study about any actual increase in purchases.

I was able to find a survey online (A Look Inside America’s Cantry) but still nothing about dollar figures.

Older Surveys

I was also able to find a survey about the sales of canned fruit from 2011 through 2014 inclusive, and the numbers did not fluctuate significantly. And according to Companies and Markets, the purchase of canned goods declines because of improvements in the economy.

When consumers have more discretionary income to spend on foodstuffs, they steer away from canned goods. This is true no matter how well-crafted a campaign is, or how companies use said campaign. It seems that Cans Get You Cooking was least effective where it really counted.

The Search for Amazing Women

The Search for Amazing Women was an effort to draw a defunct competitor’s customers to Christopher & Banks; a clothing store catering to women aged 40 – 60. The campaign included using Facebook to target key demographics (age and gender). These included military wives and professions traditionally dominated by women. For example, nursing, teaching, and dental hygienists.

Competitors were also targeted, as were mentions of breast cancer (men can get breast cancer, too, but women make up a good 99% of all diagnoses). A look at the Christopher & Banks website reveals that the campaign is ongoing, which fits in well with page 3 of last week’s Vocus article, which mentions creating and maintaining a steady and consistent presence and not just dabbling.

But Did These Communication Tactics Work?

Did it increase sales? According to the campaign, not only did sales go up, but the number of qualified leads increased.

On page 3, the campaign notes its results were as follows.

“Created new brand-loyal customers through the contest: 2 grand prize winners and 6 runners up were non-customers. Since being named Amazing Women, the winners have posted pictures of themselves and friends at CB stores and shared CB promotions on Facebook. • Added 4,656 qualified prospective customers to the CRM database for future marketing efforts, with the goal of converting them to active customers. With this group added prior to the critical 2014 holiday season, the company achieved their holiday sales goals.”

Unlike the Cans Get You Cooking campaign, the Search for Amazing Women showed demonstrable and actionable results.

Applications to Other Coursework

In most of our other ICM coursework, we talk about reaching buyer personae and even about identifying them, but the nuts and bolts often seem to be left out. This week’s readings were not only about plans, but how they worked out.

The Search for Amazing Women targeted its key demographics with real out of the box thinking. After all, women posting on Facebook about breast cancer might seem to be a viable market. But of course they need clothing.

The Cans Get You Cooking campaign went in a different direction. This was by working with Kelsey Nixon and adding some celebrity appeal. It added the kind of authority behind messaging mentioned in last week’s Vocus reading.

The less than successful nature of that campaign seems more to do with the improving economy. That is, versus any fault on the part of the strategic planners responsible. Sometimes a great campaign just falls flat or has unexpected results.

And the Giving Tuesday campaign piggybacked on its public’s natural generosity impulses to create a successful campaign.

Communication Tactics and Takeaways

My other courses have outlined theory. This week’s readings, in particular, demonstrated practice. The road map has arrived.

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The Five Elements of Hip-Hop Content Strategy

Content Strategy, Halvorson, Hip-Hop Content Strategy, Content Monster

The Five Elements of Hip-Hop Content Strategy

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on September 22, 2015

A Look at an Oldie: The Five Elements of Hip-Hop Content Strategy

On June 2nd, 2010, I got to attend The Five Elements of Hip-Hop Content Strategy. The speaker was Ian Alexander. Ian is down to earth, informative and fun. The meeting was hosted by Content Strategy New England. A special shout-out must go to the tireless Rick Allen.

Ian led us through a history of both hip-hop and content strategy as a discipline. Neither one sprang up overnight. So the roots are in the 1970s or so, perhaps earlier.

Then it was down to business – an outline of the Five Elements.

Hip-Hop Content Strategy – Five Elements

#1. DJ’ing – on the Content Strategy side of things, this is the technical expertise. It’s being able to understand and apply semantic categories. It is being able to interpret analytics. So a Content Strategist cannot be a Luddite. She cannot fear spreadsheets.

#2. MC’ing – on the CS end, this is the editorial expertise. Often, this is what people think of when they think of Content Strategy. It is acting as a copywriter, a librarian, a research analyst and something of an artist. The Content Strategist finds and tells the story. He or she selects the format and helps to promote the brand.

The Content Triangle

This is where Ian introduced the concept of the Content Triangle.

Building Trust

(a) The first type of content is Trust Building. This is where a company establishes its expertise. So it is also where it provides value to its clients and potential customers. Here is where the company is informative about internal and industry trends.

For a product-based company, this area should encompass approximately 30% of all of the content. For a service-oriented company, this area should be about 70% of all of the content.

Informational, Please

(b) So the second type of content is Informational. This is basic internal site information, such as the Contact Us page and the FAQ. This is for users to understand how to, for example, return a defective product.

For a product-oriented company, this area needs to be around 30+% of all content. For a service company, that figure should be around 20+%. So in either instance, start here.

Calls to Action

(c) The third and final type of content is Sales/Call to Action. Somewhat self-explanatory, here’s where you close the deal. The deal need not be a commercial one; your call to action may very well be for your reader to sign up for a newsletter.

For the product-based company, this area will have to be around about 40+% of all of the content. In the case of the service company, it’s less than 10%. So either way, this should be A/B tested.

So in all instances, analytics must drive the percentages and the content.

Hip-Hop Content Strategy – More Elements

#3. Graffiti – for the Content Strategist, this equates to design expertise. Infographics are, according to Ian, only going to continue to become more and more popular.

#4. Breaking – to the Content Strategist, this element represents Information Architecture expertise. The two are related but not identical — cousins, not twins. Yet the gist of it is the concept of movement through a site. So, what are the funnels? What kind of an experience do you want your users to have? What’s your preferred destination for them?

#5. Knowledge – this final piece of the puzzle speaks to the Content Strategist’s Project Managerment/Change Management expertise. Change concepts are disposable, iterative and proposed. It is the idea of moving from a concept to a solution.

The best solution is not the best solution, per se – it’s the best solution that you can implement. For, without a consensus (and a budget and a signed contract!), the so-called best solution is no solution at all.

But What Does it All Mean?

Content Strategy is different from Content Marketing. So the first must drive the second. One of the best ways to help the discipline to get more respect is to branch out the network. Get to know people in vastly different disciplines (say, Robotics, for instance).

So, what about helping the client? Think differently. So generate a 404 error and see what happens. Sign up for something: what kind of message does the user get? Is the message consistent with the remainder of the site’s look and feel and philosophy? Is the footer out of date?

Check sites like Compete and Tweetvolume for more information about how a company is really doing. So note: Compete does not exist any more!

So consider CMS Watch as well. Know the company’s baseline strengths and weaknesses and understand related practices and disciplines. So note: CMS Watch now redirects to Real Story Group.

Takeaways from 2010

The Content Strategist often wears a millinery’s worth of hats, not just during a particular project but in any given day. For the CS to excel, he or she needs to have an understanding of fundamentals in a lot of areas, and be able to speak knowledgeably.

Fortunately, acquiring and applying that kind of knowledge makes and keeps this discipline fresh and exciting. Plus, Ian clearly has fun every day. And who wouldn’t want a piece of that?

A Look Over 13 Years Later at Hip-Hop Content Strategy

Welp, things have changed. Big time! Ian is no longer under the above URL. So you know, it’s the one in the first paragraph. And two other sites no longer exist. Plus, the world is a lot different now. So that includes my life.

Now, as I look back on older posts like this, I can see where I did not write them too well. In addition, I can also see where older events were, can I say it?

Kinda gimmicky.

So, I get what Ian was trying to say. And a lot of his advice is still spot on. Yet now, though, I think there are other ways of saying it.

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Quinnipiac Assignment 03 – ICM 527 – SWOT and PEST Analyses

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on September 17, 2015

What are SWOT and PEST Analyses?

SWOT Analysis – Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats/PEST Analysis – Politics, Economics, Socio-Culture, and Technology

In both Smith and Williams, we learned about SWOT analysis. In our other readings, we also looked at PEST Analysis.

Key Concepts

Smith, on Pages 47 – 49, refers to the following players who are external to an organization:

• Supporters
† Competitors
• Opponent
† Advocates – you stand in the way of their goal
• • Dissident – opposition to positions you hold or actions you have taken
†† Anti – a dissident on a global scale
• • Activist – similar to anti (is also seeking change) but tactics go beyond discussion
†† Missionary – self-righteous activist
• • Zealot – single-issue activist with a missionary fervor
†† Fanatic – a zealot without any social stabilizers.

Williams, however, was more concerned with how to apply SWOT internally, particularly with reference to communications. For Williams, it’s more about looking at company goals and objectives, or at specific internal and external issues.

Then the question is about the second step of SWOT analysis, which is to apply it to how to communicate that.

E. g. if a company is applying an analysis to its overhead, its strength might be in owning a building, its weakness might be that the building is in an area that is in transition and losing its cachet, that could potentially also be an opportunity, but the threat could be that customers would not visit the building in person if they felt the neighborhood was unsafe.

Communicating those findings presents the strength of being able to quickly pinpoint the issue. It adds the weakness of perhaps not being able to act decisively until external factors play out some more. And there’s opportunity in the form of investing in an area where rents are suddenly taking a nosedive.

Whereas the threat could be that too much investment in a possibly dying area might hurt the company’s reputation.

Applicability to Current Events

The more I read about SWOT and PEST analyses, the more I realized they can apply to pretty much anything. I decided to take a look at Quinnipiac in the context of the White House’s College Scorecard, which was released on September 12^th, and is thereby current although not really an ‘event’, per se.

The scorecard puts together basic data on various collegiate characteristics, including size, location, and the programs on offer. Then the program pulls out colleges and compares them. I looked up Connecticut four-year-programs and found Quinnipiac is third-best for salary after graduation.

The program could potentially be the subject of a SWOT analysis, that Quinnipiac shows strength in how its graduates earn after they leave, but a weakness in terms of price, as it lists QU as third-most expensive.

Opportunities

Opportunities include showcasing the school as coming up better than U Conn for salary after graduation. Threats are from schools like Yale, which comes out as less expensive but with a far better graduation rate and a better salary after graduation.

The point of the exercise is that the data are mixed, as for a lot of organizations. If you dig deeply enough, most organizations will have something you can place into each of the four buckets. No organization is perfect and without threats or weaknesses.

PEST

As for a PEST analysis (politics, economics, social-cultural, and technology), the scorecard remains applicable. Politics applies because of not only how the scorecard itself was put together (deciding what to emphasize could very well have been at least partially a political decision), but also because of how public institutions are funded.

Quinnipiac is a private institution, but there can still be an affect if public universities are funded (or not) due to political dealings. This can determine whether public institutions can compete effectively with Quinnipiac.

Economics certainly applies in terms of budgeting but also due to financial decisions such as how much to charge for tuition and what to pay professors – and whether to offer more expensive full professorships or instead pay adjuncts. The social-cultural part applies as Quinnipiac is a part of Hamden itself. How the school conducts itself makes a difference in the fuller community.

Is the campus safe? Does it recycle? Are the students loud? Finally, the technological aspect applies as the school cannot adequately function without working, up to date technology. Even for students who go to the campus and attend classes in person, there is a dependence on technology for everything from interlibrary loans to how tuition is calculated and collected.

Internal versus External Environments for SWOT and PEST Analyses

I see the two as being equally important to analyze and research as an organization can feel an affect either way. For the ILSC, for example, because part of their work is done in Ghana, external threats include the possibility that the government of Ghana might not be as stable as believed.

Internal weaknesses include the fact that the organization’s website doesn’t seem to have a setup for regular updating. Both can affect the very existence of the organization. A strategic planner should be researching both kinds of problems (and positives as well) as they can decide the fate of an organization.

Organizations looking to thrive – or at least to stay in business – need to look at both. No one can afford to ignore external in favor of internal, or vice versa. And no organization can afford to ignore PEST and SWOT analyses.

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Quinnipiac Assignment 02 – ICM 527 – Strategic Planning, Formative Research, and Issues Management

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on September 10, 2015

A Look at Strategic Planning, Formative Research, and Issues Management

PR and strategic planning were top of mind for this assignment, as was formative research.

Key Concepts in Strategic Planning

During the course of this week’s readings, a lot of concepts surfaced, with several definitions. These were words that we use in common, everyday parlance, but they have special meanings in the world of public relations/strategic planning.

Smith covers increasingly difficult positions for a strategic planner to be in. First there is the fairly neutral situation, which is basically just a set of circumstances facing an organization. It neatly divides into opportunities and obstacles.

After all, when the lights went out during the 2013 Super Bowl, Oreo could have sat tight like everyone else. Instead, ‘you can still dunk in the dark’ was born. Oreo didn’t just tread water – they scored a major victory. And it all happened during a situation that could have gone either way.

Strategic Planning for Issues

A step more difficult than a situation is an issue. Now, concern to the organization is baked right into the definition. There is more potential for problems when it’s an issue. And finally the definitions move to risks and then to crises.

The job of the strategic planner is to minimize and address the risks while, at times, dealing with out of control crises.

In the Reitz reading, the ‘dialogic model’ is (Page 43) where there is “a ‘communicative give and take’, where the process is open and negotiated between an organization and its publics.” This, in a way, is the essence of social media. It’s less of organizations dictating terms and paradigms to various publics. Instead, the publics are talking back, and it’s up to the strategic planner to carefully listen.

Formative Research — Its Role

On Page 15, Smith mentions formative research, denoting three pieces of it, to analyze the situation, the organization, and the publics.

To evaluate matters intelligently, the strategic planner must take a look at what’s happening. For a financial services company, it could be anything from a worldwide sell-off to crop failures in Argentina to an employee engaging in what might be insider trading.

For a car manufacturer, it could be recalls or new safety regulations or the applicable news from the United States Patent Office.

Next Steps for Formative Research

The social media professional must assess the organization. Is there an opportunity? Is the organization vulnerable? Could this even be fatal to the organization?

When Tylenol was laced with cyanide in 1982, there was a very real possibility that the fatal dose could be to Johnson & Johnson as well as the victims of the poisonings.

Publics

As for the publics, it behooves the strategic planner to consider how receptive they will be to any actions taken (sometimes the action to take is inaction, e. g. do nothing).

For Johnson & Johnson, they were dealing with publics who were used to trusting drug manufacturers, and who felt that trust had been betrayed. If the organization had opted to do nothing, the publics might not necessarily have blamed the organization for the poisonings, but they might have saddled the organization with a reputation for not caring.

Seeing the connections between caring, purity, and trustworthiness, the organization built its response around addressing safety concerns immediately. They probably removed a lot more product from shelves than was necessary. It’s possible that some of the safety precautions added were redundant and/or unnecessary.

But the organization spent the time and the money and the brainpower and it paid off with dividends. Johnson & Johnson is still roundly praised for its response to the crisis. It’s hard to see how they could have handled it better.

Issues Management

On Pages 49 and 50, Reitz talks about issues management. On Page 49, Reitz defines issues management as quoting, “Cutlip, Center, and Broom define issues management as ‘the proactive process of anticipating, identifying, evaluating, and responding to public policy issues that affect organizations’ relationships with their publics’ (2000: 17).”

Crises

A crisis is, by definition, unpredictable, but companies can anticipate certain crises. If an organization prepares for inevitable crises, they have already won over half of the battle. Here are some instances wherein an organization should prepare

It is not a question of if, but rather when of when any of these will occur:

Automobile manufacturers and recalls
Product manufacturers and product liability claims
Maintenance companies and snow removal or trip and fall claims
Transportation carriers and lateness and accidents

If any of these organizations is unaware that such crises could happen, and that they could escalate, then those organizations might want to rethink their business plans.

Life does not come without risk. It’s a foolish organization that doesn’t at least make an effort to plan for it.

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Quinnipiac Assignment 04 – ICM 526 – The Importance of Content Marketing for Community Managers

Published by Janet Gershen-Siegel on June 9, 2015

The Importance of Content Marketing for Community Managers

Why is content marketing important for Community Managers?

It is deceptively easy for companies to ‘get on Facebook’ or ‘get a Twitter’, and start pushing content out through a firehose. Companies may even make a splash in the beginning. But it’s unsustainable. Furthermore, it’s not serving customers and potential customers terribly well.

Much like any other aspect of modern business, online content requires strategy and structure. Just having content is not enough. It has to be relevant to fans and followers, and be more than something they will just click on and read. Instead, content is for marketing; it is for getting customers and potential customers into the sales funnel and then bringing them along. This is the case whether the sale occurs online or in a brick and mortar store.

The Content Marketing Institute says –

Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly-defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.

The Numbers Say It All

As Steven MacDonald reminds in The 5 Pillars of Successful Content Marketing, the amount of data being created in two days is more than was created from the beginning of time until 2003. Certainly, that figure is only going to grow. The United States census, in 2012, released an infographic comparing 2012 data on computers and Internet usage with 1997 (when the census first began asking about Internet usage) and 1984 data.

Per the United States census, the percentage of households without Internet has fallen dramatically, from 45.3% in 2003, to 25.2% in 2012. This does not even take into account persons who might not have home access, but are using the Internet at work, school, a café or public library or other such location.

Relevancy

With all of these people online, and all of that content coming at them 24/7/365, the race is less to get any sort of content online. It’s more to get relevant and preferred content to consumers.

A potential customer is being bombarded with Instagram images of their friends’ lunches and Facebook status updates with pregnant friends’ ultrasounds. They get gossipy Tweets about celebrities and amusing Tumblr blog posts about upcoming movies. And they get Pinterest boards with recipes.

Yet somehow, some way, a company’s content has got to compete with all of that.

Buying Reach?

While companies can purchase additional reach and engagement, a more sensible ad spend is to target content more closely to customers’ and potential customers’ preferences and demographics. This is easier and more detailed and better-researched than ever before. It’s due to all of the tracking coding which is embedded in social media.

As Avinash Kaushik has said about digital marketing (a term often used interchangeably with ‘content marketing’ but a bit more general, involving the use of digital devices but not necessarily as fully integrating marketing with content types like in true content marketing) and measurement –

The root cause of failure in most digital marketing campaigns is not the lack of creativity in the banner ad or TV spot or the sexiness of the website. It is not even (often) the people involved. It is quite simply the lack of structured thinking about what the real purpose of the campaign is and a lack of an objective set of measures with which to identify success or failure.

Structured Thinking

Structured thinking and objective measurement can help marketers to create and define success. Content marketing is similar in that it’s studied and planned.

Content marketers don’t just put up any old content whenever. They study the various platforms, as Gary Vaynerchuk strongly suggests. Successful content marketers listen to their audience (there’s that idea of measuring again!). They determine what does and doesn’t work. They post their content when their customers and potential customers are online and listening.

Putting Content Marketing Together With Community Management

Community Managers often must shape conversations online. This is everything from thanking happy users to publicly addressing complaints to being the first line of communications for public relations problems. But that’s mainly reactive communications. Proactive communications from community managers can and should dovetail with company plans. These can be to market to consumers (or to businesses in a B2B organization).

Offering helpful, engaging, amusing, and informative content is the job of the community manager. It’s as much as the soothing of angry online customers is. Posting the right content, when consumers want to see it, can be the difference between a sale and no sale. Put enough of those together, and jobs and even companies can be on the line. The community manager, doing content marketing right, can bring in business. They can help a company retain its customers even in hard economic times.

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Author: Janet Gershen-Siegel

A Look at InMaps – Visualize Your Network on LinkedIn

What InMaps Did

The Downside

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SEO Continued – (Search Engine Optimization) Strategy)

The Mechanics

How Did I Get SEO Continued and Working for Me?

Eight Years Later, More SEO Continued

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Responding to Facebook’s Organic Reach Decline

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EdgeRank

Responding to Facebook’s Organic Reach Decline: Four Steps

Seven Years Later, Organic Reach Decline is Even Worse

About 15% of Facebook Feed content is recommended by AI from non-followed accounts

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A Look at Quinnipiac Assignment 11 – ICM 527 – Continuing Program Evaluation

Ethical Issues Regarding Evaluation

Cans Get You Cooking

Upshot

The Real Warriors and Okay 2 Talk Campaigns

Measurements

OK 2 Talk

Metrics

The Continuing Program Evaluation Campaign

Smith Says…

Relating it all back to the ILSC

More About the Continuing Program Evaluation

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Quinnipiac Assignment 10 – ICM 527 – Program Evaluation

Key Concepts

The Case of the Traveling Goalposts

The Eight-Step AMEC Social Media Measurement Process

What’s it Like?

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Program Evaluation Re: Applicability to the ILSC

The ILSC

Program Evaluation: Takeaways

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Quinnipiac Assignment 08 – ICM 527 – Communication Tactics

Organized Media and Communication Tactics

Special Mention

Applying These Communication Tactics to the ILSC

Case Study Tactics

Giving Tuesday

Social Media

Cans Get You Cooking

Older Surveys

The Search for Amazing Women

But Did These Communication Tactics Work?

Applications to Other Coursework

Communication Tactics and Takeaways

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A Look at an Oldie: The Five Elements of Hip-Hop Content Strategy

Hip-Hop Content Strategy – Five Elements

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Building Trust

Informational, Please

Calls to Action

Hip-Hop Content Strategy – More Elements

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Takeaways from 2010

A Look Over 13 Years Later at Hip-Hop Content Strategy

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SWOT Analysis – Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats/PEST Analysis – Politics, Economics, Socio-Culture, and Technology

Key Concepts

Applicability to Current Events

Opportunities

PEST

Internal versus External Environments for SWOT and PEST Analyses

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A Look at Strategic Planning, Formative Research, and Issues Management

Key Concepts in Strategic Planning

Strategic Planning for Issues

Formative Research — Its Role

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Publics

Issues Management

Crises