Ever remember handing out a bulging folder packed with all your company’s details, press releases, and bios, called a ‘press kit’? Well the good news is, no-one has to lug around those heavy folders any more.

The Digital Switchover

Since the digital age is upon us, press kits as we know them have changed immensely, moving into an online format now known as a ‘newsroom’. The beauty of this new format is that, not only can you file as much as you want in there and it will never get any heavier, but you can also keep it organised and updated with the click of a mouse, and it is the most efficient and simple way for press to get as much info as they need on your company.

It sounds like a dream come true for both PR and companies alike; however it hasn’t quite gone as planned. Without the physical boundaries you would assume the online newsrooms would be overflowing with useful content, but instead many companies are still neglecting to maintain their newsrooms, leaving them sparse and far from the resource they should be.

How does your newsroom shape up?

The following article is the second in a series which aims to highlight areas in which a newsroom should be optimised in order for it to be useful and interesting to your journalist contacts, with some examples of excellent newsroom best practices from some of the world’s largest corporate websites to demonstrate how online newsrooms should function.

Newsroom Essential: Press Releases

Unlike the days of the physical press kit when you needed to be wary of how much paper you were using and had the physical boundaries of the folder, you don’t need to be stringent when it comes to the press releases. Yes, you should still be conscious that you aren’t letting the best and most attractive releases get hidden under less relevant ones, but you don’t need to limit yourself to only putting out only the most important news.

Offering up a range of press releases about what your company has been involved in and any changes you have made might not always make headlines, but it still gives press contacts background information on your company’s development. There may come a time when a major advance happens within your business that has been the result of many smaller changes, and the press releases give a backlog of information on the smaller events leading to the main finale.

So to enable journalists to look at both new and old press releases at their own leisure, archives within categories (if applicable) are a great way to keep the older news out of the spotlight but make it easily searchable and accessible when needed. As most journalists will most likely be looking to your press releases for information on recent events, then do keep up to date press releases in a more prominent position, but make it clear there is the option to view older ones if they wish.

Coca-Cola are a fine example of an excellent system for finding press releases, whether it be by particular keywords and topics, or by date, they make it really easy for you to pinpoint what you need and even offer you some inspiration in the form of their ‘top news’ category.

Don’t get bogged down in the ‘traditional’ press release format either. Online press releases both require and allow you to be a little more creative. Offering both HTML and printer friendly versions of press releases online is a must, but there is also the option to get more creative with the format. Social media releases are a popular alternative to the traditional press release, and can include images, videos, links and more, meaning they are fast growing in popularity among media communities.

Like this article? Read the first article in this series, Online Newsroom Essentials: Media Contacts and keep an eye out for the next article in the series on including media coverage.

Gone are the days when actual physical folders called ‘press kits’ were handed to journalists by PR people, jammed full of a company’s recent press releases, bios for management teams, fact sheets, case studies, and other press related information on the company.

Instead, press kits have been streamlined and digitised, much to the pleasure of all in the news industry, making them easily accessible, searchable, environmentally friendly and comparatively lightweight.

From Page to Webpage

The modern day press kit is now referred to as the ‘online newsroom’, typically found in the press section of any corporate website. Despite the new preferred format, online newsrooms often do not match up to the traditional press kit in terms of optimisation. They don’t often have much more information than a measly list of press release PDFs and the odd links to news coverage.

When the digitisation of press kits should really have given much more room to expand the information offered without the physical size and weight boundaries of paper and folders, it would seem in reality the online newsroom only led to corporate press kits becoming somewhat lazy and incomplete.

How does your newsroom shape up?

The following article is the first in a series, which aims to highlight all the areas in which a newsroom should be optimised in order for it to be useful and interesting to your journalist contacts, with some examples of excellent newsrooms from some of the world’s largest corporate websites, to demonstrate how online newsrooms should function.  

Newsroom Essential: Media Contact Details

Unlike when physical press kits were literally handed to journalists by the PR or media contact for a company, when a journalist enters a company’s online newsroom, they most likely have no idea who the contact is regarding media enquiries. They may find everything they need from the press releases, fact sheets, company articles, etc that the online newsroom contains, but in the majority of cases a press contact will need to be dealt with in order to arrange interviews, gain statements, or be sought out for future reference.

You don’t need to list your whole PR team’s names and details, just the person who you want to deal directly with all media enquiries; typically the Head of Media Relations or someone in a similar job role. And be sure to offer different ways to contact them, including phone, email, and even social media and Skype. Be sure to keep this up to date, as it often occurs that a person leaves and the company doesn’t get round to changing their details in the newsroom for months, sometimes even years!

One company that stood out for me as having a good press contacts page was Tullow Oil Plc. They didn’t include any social media profiles, but they did include just the one main media contact and his name, telephone and fax numbers, and an email address for him.

Unfortunately, even large corporations can get it wrong on such simple things. As a journalist, I would like to be able to go straight to the contact details of the person I need to contact for media enquiries, whereas often large companies offer only a switchboard number, which I must then call and speak to 2 or 3 people before finding the person I am after. In other cases, companies often think that is helpful to give details of every PR and media team member, meaning I have to work out for myself who the correct contact is.

Journalists are on tight deadlines for stories and so having the information available quickly and easily makes their jobs much easier.

Social media from a corporate point of view is an important part of branding, customer service and online marketing. Get it right and your brand’s revenue and reputation could rocket, get it wrong and the damage could be irreparable. So it is important to know the basic etiquette of having a presence on social media, which is why I have put together some do’s and don’ts of using social media in the corporate world.

DO: Be Fast To Respond

People feel that a brand on social media is approachable, and will often post comments or send messages. It is important to respond, and in a timely manner, to ALL comments and feedback, positive or negative. This shows the customer that their opinion is important to you and their voice is being heard.

DO: Concentrate On Image

The way your brand is represented by you and interpreted by others on social media is vital to your reputation. That is why everything you post, share, comment on or respond to must be polite and censored, to ensure you are keeping up the brand’s image.

DO:  Connect With The Competition

There is nothing wrong with openly following and checking out the competition, and expect them to be doing the same to you. As long as you are all respectful of each other, there is no reason why you can’t get along, and it gives you a regular insight into what they are up to.

DO:  Help Promote Others

For a number of reasons that many people don’t realise, promoting others and their content is beneficial to your company. Not only does it give your followers something to keep them interested and break up the constant talk of YOU, making your brand appear more diverse, it also puts you in the good books with others and encourages them to do the same for you and your content, helping your reach a wider audience and get a reputation as a friendly and thoughtful brand.

DO: Be Clear and Concise

You should always aim to be understood if you want your content to be enjoyed and shared. Too many companies forget that their followers may not know as much about the company or the industry as they assume and therefore their content becomes less engaging.

DO:  Be Active

Social media never sleeps, so your company needs to be as active as possible if you want to keep your presence known. Multiple times a day is the ideal for interactions, and a minimum of one post per day will keep your company on the radar.

DO:  Be Visually Exciting

Although text is the main aspect of your social media postings, you need to maintain a level of visual stimulation to keep people interested. Having changing and stimulating profile images and header images, as well as including multimedia content such as video and images when relevant to a post will help to peak the interest of your audience.

DON’T: Constantly Push Sales

Yes, the main aim of any marketing strategy is to get people to spend money with your company, but you need to tailor your approach. Being too pushy with sales on social media is not the way to create a worthwhile presence. Instead have a steady stream of engaging content and posts that offer more subtle nudges towards sales, and include some that are purely for the audience’s benefit, no sales involved.

DON’T: Repeat The Same Responses

When someone comments positively on your brand’s post or page, it is easy to want to just say ‘thank you’, but this is impersonal and generic, not giving the brand much of a personality or giving the person commenting much gratification. Try to personal responses to show there are people behind the brand and it will encourage more people to interact.

DON’T:  Steal Digital Content

Digital content belongs to someone, whether it is tangible or not, and too many people online forget that. It is too easy to ‘borrow’ or ‘repurpose’ content or images from social media without going down the proper routes, which can cause serious problems for your brand if the owner finds out, not to mention the ethical issues.

DON’T: Go On and On About Praise

If someone compliments or praises your brand, it is easy to feel like shouting about it to everyone, but doing so can often look bad on your company. It’s nice to receive praise, but don’t share every single nice comment or mention of your brand, simply concentrate on saying thanks to the people who said it, after all not many people go out of their way to give positive comments these days, its usually only when they have a complaint they want to let everyone know!

Press releases have been the main tool of the marketing and PR trade for as long as marketing and PR have existed. Originating from the early 1900s, the press release has undergone some superficial format changes but the underlying purpose remains almost unchanged.

However, in recent years the press release as we once knew it—a paper document sent to news publications in order to promote a company’s recent achievements—has undergone a major change. As the digital age has set in and many marketers have become eager to make the break into the world of internet marketing, SMRs or Social Media Releases have become the new way to spread the word leaving the power of the original press release questioned.

But what makes an SMR so special?

The main distinguishing feature that sets SMRs apart from traditional press releases is the array of multimedia elements that can be added to give the release more depth.  You can add images and slideshows, audio and video footage, graphics, even webinars and podcasts.  SMRs are designed to be easy to distribute and re-distribute as well as be more useful to the target audiences, all of which work online (bloggers, people on social media sites, online news sites and their journalists, industry websites, etc. ) As many industries and media outlets gravitate towards online it is increasingly important to be able to provide the extras they require in order for your release to not get left behind.

So the question remains, will charming SMRs replace the comparatively dull press release? 

In my opinion there will always be a need for the traditional press release just as digital will never completely replace the need for traditional marketing methods. There is something to be said for traditional methods that have been around for years, and although some of them may be out of date and need tweaking to be brought into this century the fundamentals at their core remain important.

The reality of the situation is that PR and marketing professionals need to have a balance of both traditional and digital in terms of their releases, as there will always be people from both traditional and digital audiences, both online and offline, interested in your industry and if you don’t have that balance you will lose the attention of one or the other.

To establish which would be more beneficial to your corporation you need to determine criteria and metrics that can be measured and understood.  A good general place to start is with measuring the number of follow-up queries received and editorial mentions.

Another good criterion that people often overlook is how many syndications your release achieved.  The term syndication refers to your release being published on another website (typically a portal) with all attached multimedia and links, with no editing to the text. Although it is not editorial coverage,  it can still be extremely valuable to your company as it extends the exposure of the information to further audiences.

The bottom line is that SMRs can be a beneficial accessory to your PR efforts if used with care as part of an integrated all-round strategy.

Social media is the ever-more-popular way to market your business and if you haven’t done so already I sincerely recommend jumping on the band wagon as it is a worthwhile move. This is because when used correctly and to its maximum potential it can be one of the most powerful and cost effective marketing strategies at your disposal. That is why I have put together this guide to making the most out of corporate social media.

Patience is a virtue

The first and foremost point I must stress to you is that social media is not a quick fix for marketing. It will take time and effort to develop to its maximum potential and patience is needed. There are plenty of other—faster—fixes for your marketing needs, but the reason people choose to take their time with social media is because the relationships, communities and online presence of the brand that is built are worth much more in the long run.

Less is more

In every aspect of social media the saying ‘less is more’ can be applied. Trying to juggle too many pages and accounts on social media will show when it comes to the amount of attention and care you show to each individual page and its followers/connections. I would say even if you have a social media manager to handle all of this, a minimum of 2 pages and a maximum of 3 or 4 is essential to enable each to be properly developed and maintained.

This also goes for building relationships. Trying to follow or connect with everyone all at once will lead to your company appearing impersonal and mechanical rather than a brand with a personality. Add a few connections at a time on each page and when you gain a new connection send them a personal message or tweet them to say welcome or thanks: something that shows you appreciate every individual. They are far more likely to feel a loyalty to your brand if this is done.

Join the conversation, don’t dominate it

Social media is all about the two way conversation between brands and their customers, leads, fans, etc. But so many companies are guilty of dominating the conversation and leaving those on the other end feeling they have no voice. Giving your customers a voice is one of the great and unique aspects of social media and is why so many people like to connect with companies and brands on there. So make sure you are engaging your audience with plenty of interesting content to enjoy and opportunities to converse about it.

A great example from Adidas Running of how to get a conversation going using one of Twitter’s unique sharing features, ‘retweeting’:

Another great way to get involved in the conversation is to join in with those already going on. Google+ and Twitter are both ideal platforms for searching for current conversations relating to certain keywords.

Keep updated

Keep checking news feeds on different platforms throughout the day and try to post at least one post per day. Posting 10 posts in one day and then leaving it for a week is not the best way to handle it, but at the same time it can be difficult to cover times such as weekends and evenings.

Investing in a subscription to a social media management dashboard such as Hootsuite or Tweetdeck for scheduling posts to go out when you aren’t in the office is a great way to ensure your social pages stay active even when you aren’t. Scheduling in at least one generic post per day can cover for when you are out of office and you can also add in real-time posts depending on what is happening on the day.

Dashboards also make it easier to keep an eye on separate feeds all in one place so you can join in with conversations in real time and never miss a thing. The CEO of Mashable, Pete Cashmore, said “HootSuite is an essential tool for managing social networks by allowing teams to efficiently track conversations and measure campaign results.”

In summary: it’s not a quick fix, but focus on key outposts, build relationships…and keep at it.