Category: Public Relations

  • What is an Agency? Social Media and Corporate Voice

    For the last 15 years, I have spent most of my working time with agencies (PR, social media, communications). While in the PR world it was expressly the job, or so I believed, to stay in the background and “make the client famous,” the agency/client relationship has been more than that. Let me back up […]

  • The Facebook Password Conundrum, or Why I Shouldn’t be an Eagle Scout

    I have been reading lately about employers asking for job prospects’ (or even employees’) Facebook passwords as a part of the interview process. I’m not going to try to judge the legalities or ethical implications of all this, but I will put myself into the position of someone being asked to do so. What would […]

  • Finding Influencers and Collecting Data? Tools Help, But It’s Nothing Without Hard Work

    Cross-posted from Voce Nation Recently, I had a discussion with a local (Boston) technology professional about finding influencers via social media. Additionally, I constantly have discussions with clients, colleagues and peers about measurement. Why mention these two facts together? These two topics have a lot more in common than they might seem to on the […]

  • Help a PR Pro Out Day: Profiles in HAPPO (Boston)

    It has been fun being involved with Help a PR Pro Out Day, and now the day, February 19, is upon us. Be on the lookout for the “#happo” hash tag on Twitter (and the #happobo tag for Boston) particularly between 11 am and 3 pm ET, as well as a number of blog posts […]

  • Do Journalists Make Bad PR People?

    I read this short piece, “The Great Journalism Exodus,” by Jeffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic. In it, he discusses the fact that many journalists are switching over to public relations jobs. That’s nothing new, but we’re definitely seeing more of it in this economy, and with the “traditional” media changing and shedding jobs in the […]

  • Exit: Stage SHIFT, and the State of Public Relations

    First off, a piece of personal news: today marks my last day at SHIFT Communications. It has been a great ride and I am leaving some friends, particularly a great team, behind, What’s next? It is too early to tell tales, but my next move is sure to include explicit responsibilities relating to social media. I […]

  • Social Media Top 5: Goodbye, D*****bags

    BusinessWeek Editorial Layoffs; Just…Sad Let’s pretend that Bloomberg has a master plan for a leaner, stronger, BusinessWeek after buying the troubled magazine recently. They probably do, right? It still boggled the mind to see the parade of high-profile pink slips given out this week: Stephen Baker, Heather Green, Jon Fine, Robert Hof, etc. (the RaceTalk* blog from RacePoint live-blogged […]

  • SIPA Online: PR Stranger Wanders into the World of Publishers and ROI

    This was originally published on the SHIFT Communications “Slice” Blog Last week, I had the pleasure of attending the SIPA (Specialized Information Publishers Association) Marketing Conference in gorgeous Miami Beach, Florida (I know, the life of a PR flack is tough). I was asked to do a little work (the nerve) and present on social media news releases. In […]

  • Blog with Integrity Not a Shot at PR (in case you wondered)

    When marketing blogger and fellow social media Bostonian Susan Getgood alerted me to “blog With Integrity,” (www.blogwithintegrity.com), I was intrigued, for a few reasons; There has been a lot of talk among bloggers (especially but not limited to  “Mommy Bloggers”), about attempts by the government to regulate sponsored blog posts. an “Integrity” badge nominally serves […]

  • Social Media Top 5: Twankruptcy, Twitter DDoS, Paid Tweetups (You Bet!)

    Scoble Declares Twankruptcy Let’s set aside for a moment the fact that some words shouldn’t be “Twitterized with a “tw” in front; by “twankruptcy” I am talking to something akin to “RSS bankruptcy” or “inbox bankruptcy” where people xapp all their unread items because there are simply too many. Well, Robert Scoble did that to […]