Business, Relevance and Passion, Small Business, Social Media 4 comments

Pinterest – My New Obsession

By on January 19th, 2012

I’d done some reading, some evaluating, some equivocating… but I finally took the plunge and joined in the fun on Pinterest. Here are some things I’ve discovered:

It’s quiet and undemanding. It’s not about real-time conversation. It’s not really about conversation at all, actually. It IS about connections. It’s about inspiration, curation and obsession. Here are the things you’ll need to know to join in. (Note… it’s invite only. You can let me know you want an invite in the comments for quicker access, or you can enter your email address on the Pinterest.com homepage and one will show up in your inbox in a few days.)

Pinterest is a virtual “pin-board” not unlike the old-fashioned cork board you probably had in your bedroom as a teenager or may still have on your office wall (note image of mine). The difference is now you can have as many boards as you have diverse interests. On my account I have one for places I like to go, one for information I think is worth sharing, one for stuff that makes me smile, etc. Virtual wedding planning, home decor ideas, DIY home improvement, jewelry, crafts, fashion look books… all common boards.

But, the uses that intrigue me and make me think the now 4 million plus users of Pinterest are on to something are ones like these, posted by some of my Facebook friends when I asked them about the service:

  • It’s like being a contemporary art director of dreams. – Jennifer Luitwieler
  • “Mood Boards” for client projects. – Trisha Salas
  • Resource images for photography clients. I can add them to the collaborators on the album and both of us can add images, talk about what we like, don’t like etc. – Marty Coleman (a.k.a. The Napkin Dad)

Successful brands using Pinterest aren’t doing tons of pinning their own stuff. They’re doing lots of putting out eye-catching visuals on their websites and making it easy for users to pin them to their own boards. Each “pin” is embedded with the source link from the website, so it’s a referral engine for pins that go viral and get “re-pinned” to other user’s boards. Commenting is possible, and some people do, but the beauty of the service is, well, it’s beauty. It’s visual, visceral and always changing. You don’t have to comment or feel compelled to “keep up” with the flow. Viewing a board lets you quickly scan a wealth of content in one glance, and users can follow only select boards of others if they want to. For instance, I am not a home decor makeover freak or particularly crafty. I tend to not follow those kinds of boards though I may follow the same user’s “Books I Want to Read” board.

Ready to give it a whirl? I’ve pinned some good Pinterest articles to my Info To Share board, and I’d suggest following Collen Pence’s Pinterest info board, too.

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Don’t Be a Follower

By on January 11th, 2012

iPhone Home ScreenAfter reading some of the tech coverage of the Consumer Electronics Show happening in Las Vegas this week, one thing stood out… following is more than a trend in social media. It’s the norm for big tech companies. The reviews of Windows 8, coming sometime soon to a PC near you, has a screen of tiles that you scroll through, “similar to what you find on a smartphone or tablet.” And what launched the initial touchscreen/swiping through icons for navigation trend? An Apple product, the iPhone.

The Tulsa World’s own Robert Evatt interviewed Tara Dunion, senior director of communications of the Consumer Electronics Association, the organizing body of CES, and she told him one of the big trends for product announcements and launches at CES this year is new ultrabooks. Evatt’s article mentioned that tech experts have characterized ultrabooks as similar to the MacBook Air — a product that is as powerful as a traditional laptop yet ultra thin and light.

Full disclosure: I own an iPhone, two iMacs and a MacBookPro. I am definitely an Apple fan. But this post isn’t about praising Apple. Not really. I just wonder where the other innovators are? It’s not enough to have the best iteration of the thing people already know they want… because you’re always going to be spending time and resources on incremental improvements to a known entity and directly competing with every other company out there trying to do the same thing.

Whatever field you’re in… don’t be just a follower. Don’t be the ones out there touting the latest “improvement” to someone else’s product or idea. Spend your time and R&D resources to develop what people need, even if they don’t know they want it yet. Find the problems. Find the pinch points. Figure out a fundamentally better way. Once the product or idea or service begins to take shape, marketing and PR are the tools to help your potential audience see what’s possible, not just what’s passable.

 



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				Crisis Communications – A PR Primer for The Rest Of Us
			

		


			


					By  on November 15th, 2011
			


	


	

	


	

	


		


I’ve seen this question several times in LinkedIn and other forums: “What would you do if Penn State were your client?” It’s similar to the ones that swirled for months during the BP oil spill in the gulf and the tense posturing that followed. And the answer is the same for both questions, and any other like them: “I don’t know, exactly, because I’m not on the inside, hearing the secrets, reading the face of the guy who has to go on camera, seeing the possibilities and the problems first hand. And I don’t know, more importantly, because I haven’t spent hours and hours researching, interviewing, formulating and preparing.”


So my advice is to stop wasting your time thinking about the crisis you aren’t called to handle, the one you’ll never need to walk through, and start thinking about the ones that might become your waking nightmare tomorrow. Or later today, for that matter. There are some things every single business owner should do, right now, to help prepare for the inevitable, and believe it or not, one of them is NOT putting a PR pro on retainer.


    

  1. Develop a set of “Who We Are” statements. This need not be a formal process or an official mission statement. The value of official mission statements varies inversely with the size of the company printing them on internal posters. But knowing what you stand for, really, and knowing your employees know it, feel it, live it, is crucial to avoiding many crisis in the first place. If your statements are just hollow words… either take a harder look at who you are, even if it’s painful or you don’t like what you see (you can change it going forward), or fire some people who aren’t rowing in the same direction.
    2. 

  2. Think deeply about your business environment. Categorize risks… do your employees travel by car to locations? To client’s offices or homes? Is your company in the business of advising people on a course of action that might affect their health, wealth, enjoyment or happiness? Are there regulations that change or may change that affect how you do business? Is employee turnover high? Do you have proprietary information that could be vulnerable? Make some notes about some of the possibilities, including ones that don’t seem all that likely, such as a high-profile client claiming your employee’s errant word of advice during a chance meeting at a local restaurant caused him to lose (face, millions, a bet…whatever). If there are vulnerabilities that can be fixed or addressed, do that. Have a meeting with your employees and explain the “always representing” aspect of today’s connected marketplace. Have a social media policy in place. Make sure insurance, handbooks, regulations and information are all up to date and appropriately structured or protected. Do some research into other companies similar to yours, in the same fields, and what crisis they’ve weathered… how well, in what ways, with what tools?
    3. 

  3. Get to know some key people in your local media, trade publications, or other venues, including bloggers, social media influencers, city councilors, etc. This is not an overnight thing and following someone on Twitter or connecting on Facebook is not “getting to know them.” You need to have someone who will take your call if a storm does hit and provide you a friendly, or at least neutral, opportunity to share your side of a story. Remember… sometimes it’s not an accusation or a lawsuit. Sometimes it’s a video posted to YouTube about your business practices or showing all the bit of grass your lawn company missed the last time they serviced an irate customer’s yard.
    4. 



Take a deep breath… when that YouTube video about the missed grass hits, and someone forwards it to you in an email, what then? How do you know when, or if, you should take action? How long, how much, how far? Those are the next things we’ll cover on the blog. In the meantime… what other prep work would you recommend?


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				Coming to Oklahoma — Women’s Empowerment Series business conference
			

		


			


					By  on October 5th, 2011
			


	


	

	


	

	


		


UPDATE: This conference is still coming to OK, but will be making its debut in the Spring of 2012 with a more intensive format and open to both men and women. Watch this updates as we firm details! — Mandy


 


The name is actually misleading, I think… because the conference isn’t really about getting all fired up because Yay! We’re Women! In Business!


It’s about teaching and sharing tools, ideas, methods and collective wisdom about being better in business as a woman. Whether that’s in your own business or as a team member in someone else’s company, the WES is about going further and accomplishing more through leadership, brand and marketing management, and business/entrepreneurship core concepts. The conference is a learning module format with an accompanying workbook. Less rah-rah, more brass tacks. The kind of thing that will help close the entrepreneurship gender gap.


Want to know more? The conference website is here. Register to attend here (and email me if you want a special discount code just for my network).


Hear Deborah, me, Angela Allmond, Joan Vasquez and Aprille Franks talk about some of these issues.


And I hope to see you October 29th in Oklahoma City!


 


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				Recent Presentations
			

		


			


					By  on September 19th, 2011
			


	


	

	


	

	


		


From this past week’s Optimization Summit #optsum social media conference: How to Rock PR Coverage for Your Business or Brand. It was a two-hour workshop all about finding your stories and sharing them effectively. Enjoyed the audience’s involvement, questions and results. They were rocking their first pitchengine.com releases before the end of the workshop.






























And from this past week’s Oklahoma Municipal League‘s Annual Meeting: Using ICSC To Attract Retail for Cities. A primer for cities wanting to grow their retail base.




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				No, I’m Not Scared to Teach You What I Know
			

		


			


					By  on September 12th, 2011
			


	


	

	


	

	


		


Tomorrow afternoon I’ll be leading a two-part workshop at the 2011 Optimization Summit on How to ROCK Press Coverage for Your Business or Brand. It’s a bigger, badder and more hands-on version of an presentation I put together six months ago for the Social Media Tulsa conference and I’m thrilled I’ll get to share some good stuff about what I do & know and how to make it all work for other peoples’ businesses. One question I get asked all the time is some form of, “When you spend time telling others what you know and how to do what you do, aren’t you afraid they’ll, well, do it? Without you? Aren’t you essentially teaching people how to NOT need you?”


Leaving out the whole, “I’ve been doing this thing I do for a long, long time and all that experience can’t be shared in a two hour workshop” angle (And it’s inherently insulting, by the way, to assume I CAN share everything I know in a workshop), let’s take a look at the underlying motivation of the question. The key is “aren’t you afraid…?” and the answer is yes. Of spiders, of heights, of not being able to find good coffee when I need it, of milk in the carton (it’s a long story)…. Yes. Of teaching business owners or brand managers about New PR and how they can use it to their best advantage? Nope.


New PR is much like Old PR in that it’s driven by the story. We as humans are hardwired to retain stories, to seek meaning and context for information. A good story is the heart of any PR effort. Always has been, always will be. What I teach people is first to find their story. Not their mission/vision/goals/new product release blurb. Their story. Or, stories… :)  It’s not the easiest thing in the world to think about your business or brand from new perspectives and to figure out where your human touchpoints are as a business. So learning how to spot a good story, idea, trend or opportunity is the first thing we’ll be talking about in the workshop tomorrow. We’ll also be talking about the tools of New PR, the reasons why they matter, the long term effects of doing a good job with New PR and how to put it all together into a package that is shareable, sendable, marketable and effective. I’ve yet to meet anyone who didn’t have a story somewhere just waiting, begging sometimes, to be told. It’s in learning to see the potential and how to align it with business goals and marketing campaigns (which hopefully were conceived in partnership with the PR peeps, but I digress…) that “doing PR” becomes something much more powerful. I can’t teach everything I know in a workshop, but if I can help people learn to look at their day to day work, business environment or content in a New PR kind of way and take some steps toward implementing a strategy that works to build their brand, it will be a good day.


I’m not afraid because sharing what I know, about something I love, expands the universe of potential clients for me and potential stories for us all. And that, I think, is something to embrace, not fear. If you’re at this year’s #Optsum, I hope to connect and share some stories while we’re here.


(and my apologies… if you ever tweeted or shared a post from the site, the numbers were all lost when I changed servers. I appreciate each and every share… just don’t have who recommended, liked, tweeted, etc., anymore)


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				A Case of Nerves Before Your First TV Interview… the PR side
			

		


			


					By  on July 27th, 2011
			


	


	

	


	

	


		


Jessica Johnson of Tulsa Custom Concierge talks with Ron Terrell and Michelle Linn of Fox23 Daybreak during her segment.


NOTE: This post is by Crossroads Communications intern Brenna Wiebe. She’s been involved in several of our client projects from brainstorming to execution this summer and I asked her to share some aspect of that. This is her post. — Mandy


This week I had my first opportunity to see my work pay off on television. This interview segment was like my little baby… I watched it grow before my eyes as I saw it from pitch to production. By the time it was over, I felt like a mother sending her child off to college. Along with this sense of accomplishment came an unexpected bundle of nerves.


Once I found out that my pitch would make it on a local morning show, I was excited. Then my boss told me that she wouldn’t be there because of a doctor’s appointment. Upon hearing this, my stomach dropped. A sudden rush of nerves overcame my body. I didn’t know what to do. I had never done this before. (Mandy says: I promised her I WOULD do client prep and be there to walk her and the client in, do the initial check and prep, but would have to leave the station before the segment was scheduled to go… but I knew she would handle it well because she’s been on several on-sites with me for client prep before an interview.) The morning of the interview came and I felt somewhat more calm about the whole situation. Once my boss left for her doctor’s appointment, my real test came. I walked the client to the set and tried to have a conversation with her to get her mind off of any impending nerves she had. Thankfully the anchors were great and so when the client mentioned something to them about being nervous, they reassured her that there was no reason to be.


After the segment, I walked with the client out of the studio and reassured her that everything went well even though it was her first time on camera. (Mandy says: and it truly did… the segment was a success. I wasn’t surprised at Brenna’s competence nor Jessica’s poise on camera.) Whew…that is over. It was a big sense of relief knowing that things didn’t fall apart on my watch. But I guess the whole point of this post was to talk about some aspect of handling television. Well here is my advice after this experience: No matter how nervous you as the PR person are, never let your client see that side… It will save an on-air nervous breakdown!


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				Three Questions with Jason Connell, Founder of The United Film Festivals
			

		


			


					By  on July 21st, 2011
			


	


	

	


	

	


		






Tulsa is in good company
Tulsa is in good company


Three questions with director, producer and Tulsa native Jason Connell, founder of the United Film Festival… coming THIS WEEKEND to Tulsa. If you’ve never heard of the festival… where have you been? Started in Tulsa in 2002, it now includes New York, LA, Chicago, San Fran and London. And Tulsa. The festivals screen exceptional independent films and have gained a respectable reputation in only a few years time through Jason’s efforts to shine a light on some film wonderfulness you may not know existed. Want to know more about the festival itself? Hit their website.




Other than the fact that you’re a Tulsa native, WHY TULSA? What makes this place, and the spaces in it, the right home for the UFF? 






Being from Tulsa is a big part of the festival’s connection here. The festivals started when I was living here, with only short films. This was pre-Youtube so short films were still a novelty. It wasn’t until I moved to Los Angeles and began producing features that the festival really started to grow. I traveled the world with my first film, Strictly Background, and my appetite kept growing. As I expanded the festivals into Los Angeles and New York and I continued to believe in this brand, it was important for me to continue to grow the Tulsa festival because it was where it all started and it was still home. There is a growing arts culture here and music obviously has a rich tradition in Tulsa, so I think independent film fits into that culture and the festivals help bring more awareness to that. Alongside the other big cities in the United Film Festival umbrella, Tulsa may seem a little strange, but I think investing energy in those smaller markets is essential and the idea is to get into the community and make people aware. I think the bigger question is, why NOT Tulsa?




Biggest challenge in growing the festival or achieving your goals for it?




As I mentioned, music has a rich tradition in Tulsa and I would like to see film become a bigger part of that culture in the same way. Growing up here I remember when Francis Ford Coppola came to town and filmed The Outsiders and Rumble Fish, but that momentum for moviemaking fell off. I see no reason why Tulsa couldn’t be the next Austin in this way. We’ve seen the festival grow a lot, from a shorts only program to include features, moving to the Circle Cinema five years ago, and watching attendance rise. The hardest challenge has been getting people to buy into the concept of film festivals, which aren’t as common in Tulsa as they are in some of our other festival cities where there are literally hundreds of film festivals.




Biggest “win” to date?




It’s always gratifying to be able to showcase movies made by Tulsans. Examples from our 2010 festival include Jeffie Was Here, made by established filmmakers who had spent time in Tulsa, Biker Fox, a documentary about the infamous local Tulsan, and The Rock’n'Roll Dreams of Duncan Christopher, which was made in Tulsa and involved a lot of the community. Having screenings sell out is always a big “win.” Screening films that I have been involved with is always a highlight, and this year I hope to have another highlight with the Tulsa premiere of Holy Rollers: The True Story of Card Counting Christians, a documentary that I produced which follows the rise of arguably the largest and most well-funded blackjack team in America-made up entirely of churchgoing Christian, examining how will they manage to find a place for faith and God while taking millions from casinos.








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				Social Climbing, Social Networking, Anti-Social Behavior
			

		


			


					By  on July 7th, 2011
			


	


	

	


	

	


		


I have been using Google + for a few days now (and no, this is not a post all about Google +) and have noticed an interesting phenomenon already. Everyone wants a “do-over” on social connectivity. Much discussion is happening around posts like, “Will you build your network differently here?” And the consensus seems to be that many people want to approach the whole concept of networking differently. Either they intend to be more selective in who they follow or add or they intend to be more rigorous in the groups (“circles” in + parlance) they form or maintain.


Another common thread is the desire to return to the halcyon early days of social networks when the novelty of connecting with other people – interesting people –was the driver behind the growth of Twitter or Facebook. You know, back before brands and marketing became the main focus of those old networks. Yes, that was a tiny bit sarcastic, I admit. Google + could potentially be much larger than Twitter given its much larger reach and the opportunity for even the most casual, non-networked internet user to be exposed to it every time someone does a search. Google + will be baked in to the search experience in a very seamless way by early indications (new “share” buttons have appeared in my gmail and my Google Reader apps already).


I remember the euphoria that accompanied my early days on Twitter, now nearly three years back, when someone new followed me. I long ago turned off “new follow” notifications because the emails were swamping my inbox. But I have the “notifications” from Google + turned on and that old feeling is back…. a little rush when someone adds me or comments on a post or shares something with me. Will it last? Probably not. Google + may end up being a better tool for personal connection, but professional networkers will soon be all over that platform and newly minted Google + jedi, knights, gurus and the like will be hawking their professional help. Soon, the who is following whom will become a game of sorts… social climbing for the 21st century.


Will anything be different in two years? Won’t Google + (or whatever is next) become what the users make of it and choose to do with it? Is a “do-over” really possible if defining relevance online via social cues – really the reason Google is doing this – will continue to be driven by who you know/are connected to and who’s talking about you, your brand, your company, your last presentation, slideshare, blog post or content bit? What do you think?


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				Staring Down Millennial Stereotypes
			

		


			


					By  on June 14th, 2011
			


	


	

	


	

	


		


This is Brenna’s second post for the blog. She is interning with Crossroads Communications from OSU and has quickly become an important part of our team. — Mandy




As a part of the Millennial generation, I am constantly branded with stereotypes like I am addicted to technology, that I want to be a movie star when I am older or that I don’t know the difference between right and wrong. Well, thanks to the recent McCann Worldgroup Truth About Youth study and through my personal experiences, I hope this post will dispel some of those unjust stereotypes about my generation.









Stereotype No. 1: We are addicted to technology.


 In reality, we see technology as a time waster. I know that I personally check Facebook and Twitter multiple times a day but for me, I do it out of boredom. When I am in class along with quite a few of my classmates, phones are out of sight, out of mind. No one is that popular to where they have to constantly be on their phone. As far as Facebook goes, the more friends you have, doesn’t make you any more popular than someone with say 100 friends. A lot of people have “friends” that they don’t know personally. It is all about keeping tabs; One of the main reasons I use Facebook is to look at people’s pictures and see what they are up to. I think for a lot of people my age, Facebook is a time-waster in that people get stuck on Facebook for hours do what we call “creeping.” It’s just one thought of like, “Oh what are they up to?” so you click over to their profile. We have the ability to not constantly be on our phones. Believe it or not, we can stay focused on things other than technology, but no one ever gives us a chance to prove it.




Stereotype No. 2: We all want to be some famous celebrity when we are older.


 This is most definitely untrue. Every single person I know who is an amazing singer or dancer or has any other noteworthy talent, doesn’t give a hoot about being famous. They do what they love because they love it, not for the fame and fortune. I mean sure people my age see the perks of being famous but to us, we translate those things into our own lives. Every now and I again, a group of my friends sit down and have a somewhat scary talk about marriage and the future. In these conversations, it is always the same key points of wanting a family and being able to provide for our children. It’s never like oh what crazy thing can I do for my 15 minutes of fame. Also I don’t think a lot of famous people necessarily had it set in their minds that they wanted to be famous, but rather that they just sort of stumbled upon it.




Stereotype No. 3: We don’t know the difference between what society deems to be right and wrong.


 One part of the study showed a comparison between what the Millennials and members from older generations thought about things like illegal music downloads and whether you should give technology or a person speaking your attention. I thought this section was interesting because I definitely see where my generation thinks of downloading music illegally isn’t stealing. It’s so commonplace to get your music from sites like Limewire or YouTube that it’s not looked down upon by our peers. It’s looked down upon for buying music from places like iTunes because people think it’s crazy to pay $1.29 for a song you could get for free. As far as paying attention to someone who is speaking, I think it is rude to not give them your full attention because imagine yourself up there talking, you wouldn’t want people staring at their phones. I am the first to admit too that I do sometimes get distracted by my phone in presentations especially if I need to get something important done. But ultimately, it comes down to the fact that the person speaking worked hard on whatever they are presenting and took time out of their lives to present it. Sure it may not be the most interesting thing to listen to but it’s respectful, which is one thing that is slowly disappearing with my generation. I think the study was true in some aspects; however, I don’t think studying 7,000 Millennials worldwide is an accurate way to perceive everyone from my generation. Also I think a lot of my generation’s views are personal. What I mean by that is, I feel a lot of each person’s views were shaped by how they were raised. So before anyone tries to judge or stereotype members of my generation, take five minutes and get to know us because we aren’t all the same.


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