Is this MY 47th Hat?

A while ago I pitched a story to Web Worker Daily for BlogTalkRadio. I got an email from writer Bob Walsh who, in addition to setting up an email with me, complimented me on my pitch. Nice to hear.

Not long after his post about BlogTalkRadio came out did he mention to me that he had a side project site, 47Hats.com, for developers and MicroISVs. He wondered if I’d author a guest post for the site on how to send a decent pitch email. Flattery gets you everywhere with me, so I agreed. The post, entitled “PR for MicroISVs from someone who knows” went up last Friday, but I was starting my vacation, so I’m only now writing about it. Bob prefaces the post with this:

[Note: I ran into Luke when I as a writer for Web Worker Daily I got his press release for BlogTalkRadio. I was so impressed with how he crafted that PR, I asked him if he’d share some of his expertise here. Be sure to check out Luke’s recommendation at the end of this post - it’s excellent.]

In addition to my article, I made sure to plug Brian Solis‘ PR Tips for Startups eBook (that’s what I think Bob’s referring to there), which I think is a fantastic foundation for online entities - actually any entity - that thinks they understand PR, because, guess what? You don’t.

Skim through it anyway, if you DID know everything in there, then you can leave me a snooty comment telling me so.

Love your thoughts, whether you agree or disagree.

The Rundown - Live from Kent State Today

The Rundown is going on the road today as I head to Kent State for the hands-on PRSA Akron event “You, Too, Social Media Boot Camp and Leadership Summit” where I’ll be teaching a session on podcasting and, of course, BlogTalkRadio.

Should be a great event, the leadership summit includes former U.S. Congressman Dennis Eckart and NEOhio PR legend David Meeker. Others include Mike Connell, CEO of New Media Communications, whose company provided the Internet strategy to the Bush-Cheney campaigns in 2000 and 2004, and Jenny Camper, president of the public affairs firm Lesic & Camper.

Other highlights include PRSA’s John Elsasser, editor in chief of PR Strategist, who will moderate the panel. Steve Shannon of BurrelleLuce will present on “Copyright Compliance in the Digital Age.”

Good boy Bill Sledzik at ToughSledding referred to me and some other locals as “big names in social-media,” which is kind. I’m looking forward to meeting Matt Dickman, director of digital marketing, Fleishman-Hillard Cleveland, who’s blog I read, Dino Baskovic, principal with Vincena, an Internet and social-media consulting firm based in Detroit and my little Twitter pal Kait Swanson. I’m also pleased to be meeting up with Sage Lewis, founder of SageRock.com for our annual run-into-each-other-at-some-event meet up.

I’m going to be broadcasting live whenever I can today during the event, so check out The Rundown Live at Kent State to listen in or catch the archives, I won’t be taking calls today, but I’m hoping to get some great interviews.

The Rundown on The Office Convention

Many moons ago I posted about a PRWeek article involving a great initiative by the city of Scranton, Pennsylvania to host The Office Convention in honor of NBC’s show The Office. At the time I was curious as to how they pulled it all off. This week I bring you Tim Holmes, director of community newspapers for Times-Shamrock Communications who helped organize the event to the show to give me The Rundown on how they pulled it off. As always, The Rundown is my LIVE Tuesday BlogTalkRadio show featuring an analysis or summary of something by a knowledgeable person - and me. (I work for BlogTalkRadio).

The Office Convention was Scranton, Pennsylvania’s capitalization on NBC’s hit show “The Office,” which is based in Scranton, PA.

Join us live this Tuesday, February 19, 2008, at 1:30pm Eastern on BlogTalkRadio to listen, to text chat or to call in at (646) 716-8329. Hope to see/hear you there.

Social Media is NOT a Free for All

For too long I feel we’ve had folks on both sides of the issue of social media. One side blindly pushing for the adoption of new media tools as tactics and even as the new order. On the other side - and it’s interesting since we don’t see them much out here - are those who flat our refuse to accept that social media and all it apparently represents has no business in, well, business.

I am oversimplifying the issue quite a bit, but you can draw a line in the sand and form sides around much of the blogosphere and certainly around business lunches, professional groups and in the C-Suites. The divide gets worse when you move geographically around our country and into certain industries.

The truth is, social media is not a free for all. Business is business. And you can’t join the two all willy nilly. So it’s nice when you see a strong advocate of social media who puts on his business hat and reframes the picture for you.

Shel Holtz wrote a strong post called Business adoption of social media: It’s not about employee rights that I will share with any communicator who will listen, social media fan or not. Business is not a democracy and organizational leaders do what is best for the company. As communicators, our jobs are to provide counsel that allows them to do that. Sometimes that advice employs tactics like social media, sometimes it doesn’t. One thing I have learned about Public Relations is that there are more publics out there than most people realize - and you have to relate to them all. What are you saying to all of your publics? Even if it’s nothing?

Shel writes:

My position on employee engagement in social media is based on my belief that doing so will produce far greater benefit—in the form of enhanced constituent relations—than risk, particularly when it is managed strategically. There are many dimensions to these benefits, some of the most important of which include the following:

• Recruiting and retention
• Employee engagement
• Increased customer satisfaction
• Improved brand experiences

And he goes into great detail. Shel also writes “There’s probably a whole book in this topic…” and he’s right. And I hope he writes it, cause I’ll buy it. I come from the academic side of Public Relations and this is not the first time Shel has echoed my thoughts and put them into words in a way that I wish I could. But I can’t, or at least didn’t, so read the post.

For Immediate Release Goes LIVE

Readers of this blog will know that one of my favorite podcasts is “For Immediate Release: The Hobson and Holtz Report.” If you’re reading this blog and not listening to FIR, stop reading right now, go to ForImmediateRelease.biz and sign up for the blog and podcast feed. Or, as an introduction you can check out this Saturday’s live episode on BlogTalkRadio.

This Saturday, February 9, at 10am PT/1pm ET/ 6pm GMT, hosts Neville Hobson and Shel Holtz will host a special live call-in edition of “For Immediate Release: The Hobson and Holtz Report” on BlogTalkRadio.

The call-in episode will focus on the blurring of the lines between internal and external communications. If you work in external PR, how do employees of your (or your client’s) company affect your communication efforts? If you work in internal communications, how does your role change in order to prepare employees for their growing role as points of contact and brand experiences in the social media sites where they participate?

It works just like my show, The Rundown. Visit the FIR BlogTalkRadio profile page to listen or call 347.324.3723 to join in the conversation, (you may also listen via phone, pressing ‘1’ to be put in the talking queue).

If you miss the live show, the audio will still come through the podcast feed, so no worries. Should be great show and I hope to hear you there.

(as per usual, I tell you that I work for BlogTalkRadio)

The Rundown with Peter Himler

This week I have Peter “The Flack” Himler on The Rundown. Peter’s an well rounded and extremely experience PR professional and one of the most interesting and knowledgeable bloggers out there. As always, The Rundown is my LIVE Tuesday BlogTalkRadio show featuring an analysis or summary of something by a knowledgeable person - and me. Peter and I will take a look at the broader picture of where traditional and PR 2.0 meet, including what competencies survive, and what new competencies are needed for success.  We’ll try to tackle such topics as how stories grow in a fragmenteed media world, and how to thwart a crisis in that fragmented media world.  We may also touch on the interesting divide between Silicon Valley and middle America - since I live in there.

Peter is founder and principal of Flatiron Communications LLC, a PR/media consulting firm in New York. He most recently served as Chief Media Officer for Edelman Worldwide, following 11 years with Burson-Marsteller as head of the agency’s U.S. corporate and strategic media team and its worldwide spokesperson.

Join us live this Tuesday, February 12, 2008 at 1:30pm Eastern on BlogTalkRadio to listen, to text chat or to call in at (646) 716-8329. Hope to see/hear you there.

The Rundown with Kami Huyse

This week I bring Kami Huyse, PR professional, APR and Blogger at Communication Overtones to the show. As always, The Rundown is my Tuesday LIVE BlogTalkRadio show featuring an analysis or summary of something by a knowledgeable person - and me. This week we analyze why the blogosphere is more volatile than nitroglycerine and as an unpredictable as a rabid dog. Not unrelated, we’ll also be discussing a recent interview she conducted with Pat Philbin over FEMA’s questionable communication practices. This is going to be a fun show, you should join us.

Kami Watson Huyse, APR, principal of My PR Pro, writes about public relations and communications. She has a background in crisis communication and reputation management, executing social media campaigns, conducting focus group research, and media relations.

Join us live this Tuesday, January 29, 2008 at 1:30pm Eastern on BlogTalkRadio to listen, to text chat or to call in at (646) 716-8329.

The Rundown with Jeremy Pepper

The Rundown is back! And we’re starting off the new year with a Pop! Jeremy Pepper, PR Blogger at POP! PR Jots and director of communications The Point, gives me The Rundown on the state of public relations. As always, The Rundown is my Tuesday LIVE BlogTalkRadio show featuring an analysis or summary of something by a knowledgeable person - and me. A little bit about Jeremy:

Jeremy Pepper, is director of communications, at The Point, an online community that helps individuals organize efficient group action, leveraging the power of the Web to solve problems and be a catalyst for change. Jeremy is responsible for traditional and social media programs, as well as community outreach and marketing. He has a decade’s worth of experience in high-technology, consumer technology and consumer public relations, and is one of the world’s earliest and well-known PR bloggers and social media strategists. His POP! PR Jots is one of the most popular PR blogs, writing on topics affecting the marketing and public relations industries.

Prior to The Point, Jeremy worked at Weber Shandwick with clients across the board on the development of social media campaigns and strategies; such companies included Cisco, BEA Systems, General Motors, MasterCard International, Verizon Wireless and VeriSign. Prior to joining Weber Shandwick, Jeremy founded POP! Public Relations in Scottsdale, AZ, worked in-house as Public Relations Manager at Ofoto, and at Shandwick International on the Eastman Kodak and Compaq teams. Jeremy’s past public relations campaigns have won the IPRA/United Nations Grand Award for outstanding achievement, the IPRA Golden Award and two Silver Anvil Awards of Excellence.

I’ll be having a live discussion with Jeremy about Jeremy, The Point, and the public relations industry. Don’t miss it or we just might change the world without your input.

Listen to the archive from BlogTalkRadio:

The Rundown airs on many Tuesdays at 1:30pm Eastern. It’s live, so just call in at (646) 716-8329. You can also email your text or audio comments to me before the show and I’ll fit them in. The archives will be available at my BlogTalkRadio host page or by subscribing to the show’s RSS feed. You can also subscribe to the show on iTunes. Also, I am the PR Coordinator for BlogTalkRadio.

8 Things You Didn’t Know About Me

It’s funny to me. I’ve seen a lot of these memes come and go and I’ve never bothered to participate before. I wonder if it’s because no one has ever tagged me. Huh. In any case, Donna Papacosta tagged me this time, so here goes.

1. I’m a musician. I write, play and record my own music. I played in a rock band for over 6 years in the late 90s called Navin - after Steve Martin’s character in The Jerk. We cut two CDs. I mostly played bass for the band and I did some freelance bass work for numerous other bands at the time. I also play guitar, drums, mandolin and can plunk out some tunes on a piano and I have a violin I played on Navin’s second CD. Thankfully, I don’t play it often. Below are a few Navin tunes for you, one of which you may recognize as my intro and outro music for The Rundown.

“Jim” by Luke Armour

“Insignificant” by Luke Armour

“Wake Up Call” by Ron Arnold

“Saying Goodbye” by Brett Devore

2. I lived in North Pole, Alaska for a year. It was totally awesome in every way and often I wished I still lived there. My dad says I’m the only person he knows who moved away from Pennsylvania because it was too hot. Well I’ll tell you, the year I was there it ranged from 100F to -57F. But it was a dry heat and cold, as if that matters. Great hockey up there, too.

3. Hockey is not only my sport of choice, it’s the only sport I pay the least bit of attention to. I started playing hockey when I was 8 because my older brother was the best wrestler, baseball and football player in town. I still play hockey once a week and am thrilled our local cable just picked up Versus.

4. I’ll do nearly anything for a laugh. If you’ve read this blog enough, you already know that. But what many of you don’t know is that once you meet me in person it gets even worse.

5. I’m a total geek. Sci-fi, fantasy, D&D, comics, gaming and mythology of any kind. Firefly is one of my favorite shows, even though FOX sabotaged it early on. I love Star Wars, comics-turned movies (with the exception of Elektra, wth was that all about?), Stargate, Smallville, Pratchett books, Tolkien, George R. R. Martin, Orson Scott Card and even Star Trek in a pinch.

6. I used to do a lot of theater. Acting, directing, light design, set construction - straight plays or musicals - I loved it all. I got bit by the bug in high school and - on certain crazy nights - thought about doing it full-time. The last few years I appeared on the stage were in a few two-man shows with my best friend; Greater Tuna and The Mystery of Irma Vep. Hilarious scripts.

7. I’m a fool for a good period-piece movie. Not sure why.

8. When I was 13, I broke my femur doing idiot teenage things like playing tag on a downhill ski slope. The femur is the largest bone in a person’s body and, as you can imagine, it hurts when it breaks. I was in traction for 3 months, which has its good points (no school) and bad points (bed pans). Yes, I managed to pass 7th grade and I still go skiing.

And there you have it. Since I’d like to know a little bit more about some of my online friends, I’m tagging Stephen Davies, Peter Himler, Katie Paine and Kevin “The Doog” Dugan.

Live Forward Podcast 12/15

I’ll be hosting Forward Podcast 37 “What Are You Doing to Address Globalization?” over at BlogTalkRadio on Saturday. We put out podcasts on the 1st and 15th so this month we’re doing a live show about globalization.

Show goes live at 7 p.m. GMT / 2 p.m. Eastern / 11 a.m. Pacific on the Forward Podcast Channel. Since it’s live, we’ll be taking your calls at US +1 (646) 716-9941.

Who: Richard Bailey, Robert French, Paull Young, Luke Armour and YOU.
What: Forward Podcast 37 Live
When: Saturday, December 15th 7 p.m. GMT / 2 p.m. Eastern / 11 a.m. Pacific
Where: Forward Podcast channel on BlogTalkRadio

Tentative topics of discussion:

• Learning of languages
• Work experience overseas and in minority communities
• Issues like trade, aid, labor, climate change and religious fundamentalism
• What are you reading and watching?
• Whatever’s on YOUR mind

Join us live or catch the archive on the Forward Podcast Channel archive or through the Forward Podcast RSS feed.

Listen to the archive from BlogTalkRadio: