InsidEPR

Taking Social Media to the Next Level

By Becky Caudill

I’ve been a blogger for a long time, but until this year I hadn’t learned how to apply what I knew to the corporate world.  That changed in March when I attended the New Communications Forum in Palo Alto, where for three days I learned about advances in new media. The event provided me with a solid foundation for exploring new media from a corporate perspective.

Since then, I’ve attended countless Webinars and luncheons devoted to “Social Media: All You Ever Need to Know!” Truthfully, those monikers are a bit misleading, as I feel the panelists are saying the same things I’ve been hearing for the past year. They are not presenting any new ideas or insight.  Maybe I’m not attending the right events, or maybe I’ve mastered the basics of social media.  All I know is that I’m left feeling disappointed and wanting more.

Four Paws for PR

By Becky Frost

Friday is Abbey’s favorite day. She walks though the doors of Engage PR and makes her regular rounds, saying hello to friends before coming in and getting straight to work...on her long nap in the office. If Abbey were an employee, this type of behavior may be cause for alarm, but as one of the dogs that participates in Engage PR’s dog-friendly Fridays, Abbey – a well-loved cocker spaniel – has made many friends and enjoys the welcoming environment.

Telecommuting: Making It Work

By Stephanie Gallagher

Telecommuting was not something I imagined myself doing until retirement, or at least semi-retirement, but when the opportunity arose to support Engage PR's (EPR) East coast office remotely from a home office in Virginia, I jumped at the chance to expand the agency’s expertise to the other side of the U.S.  EPR now has an office in Crystal City that I work out of, but there are many things I’ve learned in my one year of telecommuting that are worth sharing.  Along with some PR successes, I’ve also risen above technology challenges, endured Mother Nature, and was reminded that Maslow really did know what he was talking about in that pyramid—human contact does matter.

How to Write a Good Press Release

By Gail Farrell

Understand what your client is announcing
Rule number one - if you don’t understand the topic, you can’t write about it.  I can usually tell when someone is writing about something they don’t understand by the long, complex sentences that don’t make grammatical sense, or when I see paragraphs composed of random bits of information that don’t flow together.  Before drafting the press release, discuss the topic with your client and supervisor in advance, find out what you need to know, and read background material.  If you find you’re still missing information, ask for advice as you write the release. 

First things first
Once you understand the topic, make sure you understand what is most newsworthy about the announcement.  Use that information for the headline, subhead, and first paragraph.  Organize your material in a hierarchy of importance.  Don’t bury the news in the third paragraph of the release.  Your audience will have moved on.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

By Gail Farrell

My first job out of university was as a lowly editorial assistant in the Boston bureau of a well-known publishing company, where I split my time between two publications.  One of my jobs was to open the mail every morning, scan the huge pile of press releases, and toss them, file them, or bring them to the attention of the bureau chiefs.  I started out knowing nothing about reporting, business, or electronics, but I had a brain and I knew English, so it didn’t take me long to figure out what constituted a good release and a bad release. Occasionally I’d come across one so priceless that I’d pass it around the office for everyone to enjoy.

Was it the outstanding newsworthiness of the release that earned it such attention?  Did the release give us a deep understanding of important business or technology issues? Or was it merely that the outstanding quality of the writing caught my eye?  Heck no!  We were a bunch of skeptical reporters, and we lightened our day by passing around the releases that gave us the biggest laughs—the worst ones, the most inappropriate, or the most badly written ones.