InsidEPR

A New and Improved Press Release?

By Becky Caudill

Over the last several months, there has been a push within the industry toward a new style of press release (read about it here, here, and especially here) that addresses emerging trends in social media (including search engine optimization). It is also intended to make it easier for a journalist to put together an article summarizing a client's news.  This “new and improved” release should include links to important information from the company, multimedia content mapping to a client’s specific technology or an industry trend, links to archived Webinars, and trackbacks to company and/or industry expert blog posts, to name a few. 

Entering Uncharted Territory

By Neila Matheny

When you work in public relations it’s easy to assume that all types of PR efforts are fundamentally the same across different markets.  However, Engage PR recently expanded into consumer PR, and it’s been quite a learning experience for me. 

One of the luxuries of focusing on networking and telecom companies is being able to leverage existing information and your deep knowledge of the inner workings of various publications across multiple clients; instead, with our new consumer client, we were starting from scratch.  Most of the publications were new to us, as were the target customers. This meant we had to change our whole way of thinking - stop strategizing messages for an IT manager, and start focusing on what would resonate with kids and their parents.

Men in PR

By Johnny Truong

Each morning I walk into the office, drop my belongings off at my desk, and make my way to the kitchen for my morning tea.  Along the way, I say hello to Kevin and Kyle, and goooood morning to the nineteen lovely ladies that I share my weekdays with.  Nervous? No. Intimidated?  Nope. Every man’s dream? Probably.

It’s the twenty-first century and you’d think there’d be absolutely no reason for me to bring up the issue of gender roles in the workplace. But wait, I just did, so maybe there is.

PR is a female-laden industry (and believe me, that’s not why I got into this business). I’m one of the newbies at Engage—two months and going strong—and the main reason I joined this agency is because of all the experienced women that make this organization what it is. Based on careful analysis of my previous employers, I determined that if I expected to become a skilled PR executive and squeeze every last bit of knowledge from an industry, I would have to be nurtured by women. 

I'll tell you what I want, what I really really want

By Becky Caudill

In my last post I talked about attending industry events devoted to social media and how to harness the power of blogging for the good of all mankind.  At the end of my post, I said I’d be back to discuss the topics I would be interested in hearing about and the type of event I would gladly attend.  Now, lo and behold, I’ve received an invite from Six Apart - parent company of TypePad (which powers this blog), Live Journal (the tool I use for personal blogging), and a new service called VOX - for a business blogging seminar taking place in San Francisco in a couple of weeks.

Optimizing Client-Agency Relations

By Molly Miller

Like any service business, PR has its ups and downs.  I feel my week is a success if all the clients are happy when they leave work for the weekend.  Engage PR is lucky to have great clients altogether, but I believe we work best in these cases:

• Clients treat us as part of their team—Some corporate cultures seem to have a split view of the “agency” and the “marketing team.”  But the tighter the integration of the two, the higher the understanding, energy, and drive, in my opinion.  When we all work together, we also have a lot more fun.
• Clients tell us the unvarnished realities—It’s tough for PR companies to give sage advice if they don’t have all the facts.  After launching more than 35 companies, and representing many more than that, we have learned to expect that anything can happen.  Our counsel is often most important when the unexpected arises.
• Clients help us to understand the sales process and any sales barriers—If the ultimate goal of PR is to increase sales, the more we can understand—and even visualize—the customer and his or her values, the better we can communicate to them. 
• Clients challenge us—Engage PR prides itself on the creative results it garners for clients, and we like to work with clients toward developing aggressive, measurable goals.  Clients who challenge us to new directions keep our jobs interesting.

There are definitely other ingredients required for program success—most notably a sound product offering, effective management team, and happy customers!  But when we have strong relationships with clients, our collective marketing abilities become much more powerful.