Phew – what a relief to be see and hear that more business are looking to consolidate their social media activities in 2012 as opposed to running themselves ragged trying to keep up with every development – and beating themselves up if they don’t.    

Social Media Examiner founder Michael Stelzner says ‘the old mantra of “Be everywhere” will quickly be replaced with “be where it matters to our business” makes for good old-fashioned business sense. This is particularly relevant in our tough climate where all organisations are expected to achieve more for less  while trying to keep sane and keep all the plates spinning.  

2011 saw an increasing number of companies harnessing and recognising the value of social media, 2012 will put the spotlight on adding value and being effective as a business – a goal we all want to aspire to.  

As an established Yorkshire  PR company which champions the  ‘joined up’ business and communications approach, we advocate the ‘Let’s get strategic with social media’ call to action which, if implemented properly, will enable companies to leapfrog their competitors.

As Seth Godin said, “No one can maximize on every engagement, every project, every customer and every opportunity. The art of it, I think, is to be rigorous about where you’re prepared to over deliver, and not get hooked on doing it for all… because then you just become another mediocrity, easily overlooked.”

And as per the adage that as some things change and some things remain the same, the importance of ensuring your marketing and communication tools and platforms are aligned with your business goals – is as relevant now as it was decades ago.     

Share with us what you’ve done to refocus your social media strategy.   

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Our guest blog post from poacher and gamekeeper Jane Cameron, who’s a working journalist and PR, sparked an interesting debate on how good ex print and broadcast reporters are in turning their hand to the world of PR.    

Over the course of our ten year development at Quest PR we’ve hired a balance of experienced PRs with ‘commercial savvy’ and former journalists who have honed their craft to ensure our clients’ stories are placed across print, digital and broadcast media.

As a former Sky TV and BBC reporter, I find the importance of speaking the same language as journalists to be critical and picked up great feedback from clients who appreciate our media expertise in getting them in front of their target media.       

Former print journalist turned PR Jenni Moulson agrees that ex reporters turn their talents well to PR. Jenni says they think like a journalist (and not like a marketing specialist), can spot a story angle intuitively and can encourage their clients to think about topics that will fire a journalist’s imagination as opposed to what the clients want to focus on. 

As we PRs are only too aware, the importance of managing client expectations is vital – irrespective of whether or not you are an ex journo. Jenni’s example centres on a client who just doesn’t get why their networking event will never make it onto national TV, and how good  PRs always manage expectations to avoid compromising both the client’s and the PR’s reputations with the media contacts. In the case of cry wolf, says Jenni, if you try to railroad such a ‘non story’ through, you’ll have the phone slammed down on you straight away and be given short sharp shrift when you go back to them with a real story!

Like Quest, Victoria Tomlinson, founder of Northern Lights PR, has employed former journalists and worked with a number on a freelance basis over the last two decades.

Victoria says the best are the ‘rounded’ ones like her colleague Carol Arthur, a trained journalist with a wealth of commerciality compared to those who’ve come straight from the media and who are great at unearthing stories and journalist liaison – but who inevitably struggle to understand the broader commercial context of PR.

Cream of the crop: Anita and Andy Gardiner (Centre) of Boozy Infusions and Tim Bilton celebrate their success with Nick Stafford (left) and Nigel Barden (right) at the deliciouslyorkshire awards.

An especially exciting week for the Quest PR team started on Monday when the flair and expertise of the region’s food industry went down a treat at the seventh annual deliciouslyorkshire awards.

As part of our role in promoting the event, we joined over 400 attendees at the glittering Rudding Park event, to celebrate the fantastic achievements of Yorkshire’s finest food companies. Top chef Tim Bilton, from The Butchers Arms in Hepworth, scoop the coveted deliciouslyorkshire Champion Award 2011-2012 for his contribution to the region’s food and drink sector. In an interview on BBC Radio Leeds Tim told Andrew Edwards how he owes his success to our eclectic and wonderful food producers.

deliciouslyorkshire champions local food and drink retailers, suppliers and producers and its chair Cath Clelland said that year on year the quality of entrants is exemplary and reinforces Yorkshire’s position as a leading force in the UK’s food and drink sector.

BBC Radio 2’s resident foodie Nigel Barden and Nick Stafford, Hambleton Ales owner and deliciouslyorkshire director, presented 20 accolades.

Barnsley-based drink producer, Boozy Infusions received the Consumers’ Choice Award – a brand new addition to this year’s event which is supported by headline sponsor Tesco. Well done to them and to all the winners listed here.  

Best Yorkshire Breakfast: Scaife Hall Farm

Best Use of Local Produce on a Menu:Black Swan at Oldstead

Best Retailer of Local Produce: Williams Farm Kitchen

Best Savoury Condiment: The Fruity Kitchen for Redcurrant Jelly

Best Drink: Boozy Infusions for Jamaica Ginger Cake Infusion

Best Fish and Seafood: Whitby Seafish for Oak Smoked Salmon

Best Sweet Preserve: Mercers of Yorkshire for  Strawberry Conserve
Best Dairy: Shepherds Purse for Monks Folly @shepherdspurse

Best Confectionery: Sciolti Chocolates for Seriously Ginger Chocolate Thins

Best Ready to Eat Product: Yorkshire Crisp Company for Lamb and Mint Crisps

Best Meat Product: Moss Valley Fine Meats for Hot Smoked Cured Pork Belly

Best Fresh Produce: Parkers Veg for Seasonal Selection

Best Fresh Meat: Swillington Organic Farm for Organic Chicken

Best Bakery Product Little Barn for Yorkshire Ale Cake

Best New Product: Raisthorpe Manor Fine Foods for Sloe Port

Outstanding Newcomer: Gareth Barlow from Howardian Hebrideans

Best Exporter of Local Produce: AL Simpkin

Best Distributor of Local Produce: Delifresh

Consumers’ Choice: Boozy Infusions for Jamaican Ginger Cake Infusion

Deliciouslyorkshire Champion 2011-2012: Tim Bilton, The Butchers Arms

With web explosion sparking a myriad online PR and internet marketing opportunities – do businesses still benefit from profile-raising through traditional media channels such as newspapers, trade and consumer magazines?       

Welcome to the first in a series of video blogs in which Sharon and Carol from Quest PR get the coffee on and respond to your frequently asked questions.

Send us your questions via Twitter and share your opinions with us.

If you want to learn how to produce your own video blogs, join our forthcoming workshops.

Just like other social media tools, Facebook can be very effective in helping businesses to communicate with their target audiences.

At Quest PR we maximise both traditional communications and social marketing tools to underpin our SME clients’ business plans. So our first piece of advice – before you think about setting up a Facebook page – is, as always, to carefully consider your key messages and the audiences you are trying to reach.

The Facebook audience is massive: there are over 30 million active users in the UK, a figure that has trebled in three years. Of that audience, the majority is female, 77 per cent of users are under 40 years old and over half are aged between 13 and 29. If this isn’t your core audience you should think seriously about whether Facebook is for you.

If you’re still convinced, the next consideration is that most people use Facebook to chat to their friends and play games. The way you communicate has to fit in with this to be effective.

This means content should be a mix of customer engagement, unique offers and articles promoting your corporate social responsibility. People don’t want the hard sell.

The key is to plan your content and tie it in with your marketing activities. Although you can’t simply recreate an ad, think of other ways to communicate, for example, how the seasons affect your business, the success of events and product launches, or a celebration of the company’s birthday.

Images are becoming increasingly vital to making an impact on Facebook. The five most recent images appear at the top of the page but can be manipulated. This creates a brand identity for your page. Some big stores like Debenhams use their page like a banner ad, giving information on sales and products, whilst others like Adidas post sporting images that match their brand.

The next layer of content is videos. Why bore your audience with a long paragraph explaining how to do something complicated when a short video can convey the same message in a much more dynamic and interesting way.

A really successful Facebook site will keep people coming back by regularly updating content and offering something of value. This might be letting people know about forthcoming events – which you can video or photograph. Transport the buzz back onto the Facebook site and complete the circle by asking people to comment on the event and what you could do differently next time.

Polls and applications can help you gather feedback or offer something extra to visitors. Although you may need to work with a developer, you can create tools that help your potential customers before they’ve even got in contact with you.

But how do you measure success? Don’t just chase ‘likes’. The link between likes and active engagement can be very tenuous: the successful celebrity pages with millions of followers show that only 0.004% of their ‘likes’ actively engage with the site.

It’s more important to focus on the number of unique users and to check whether your users are clicking through to your website. Ask yourself on an ongoing basis: how can the content help my customers get a better level of service or added value? Engaging effectively with your audience is key to them taking the next step of doing business with you.

Which companies’ Facebook sites work well? Share your thoughts with us!

Business blogs can be an extremely effective promotional tool, but can take finesse and expertise to master. Blogs are customarily a personal outlet, and as such are not restricted by rules of etiquette or strategy; business blogs are a derivative of this free form of communication, but without the freedom of expression. Because a business blog is viewed by potential clients – and probably competitors – it has to be restrained, professional, and written with an authoritative voice. 

Authority as Mystery

Using restraint in communications isn’t a Herculean task, and most people can manage at least an acceptable level of professionalism in their writing. What eludes them is an authoritative voice, as speaking with authority in a blog is not an exact science. The best blogs – the ones that tens of thousands of people follow – usually employ very different styles, and have very individual voices, but they all share that one quality that keeps readers coming back: authority.

What does it take to be an authority? How can you make your business’ blog more authoritative? The good news is that being an authority isn’t the same as holding a doctorate in business. In fact, high-minded or pretentious blogs are often alienating and condescending, which deters repeat readers. 

Authority as Insight

The real secret to an authoritative business blog is to be knowledgeable about your subject, and to communicate it confidently, charismatically and informatively. 

In some respects, speaking with authority is easy – only you know your breadth and depth of knowledge. And, while many others might know what you know, your interaction with that knowledge will be different from theirs, and will have different implications to you. So you will bring insights to the table that no one else can.

Authority as Narrative

So in relation to the above, although your experience in the field is different than anyone else’s; even if you and your competitors are telling the same story, you won’t tell it the same way.

Because ultimately that’s all you are doing: telling a story. Imagine you have a captive audience and it’s only you in the spotlight on stage. Are you going to drone on about stock trends, quoting numbers, figures, texts, news, or anything else? No. What you will do is give an engaging presentation, one that tells a complex story in simple terms that everyone can relate to, one that gives examples, directions, advice, makes arguments, examines everything, takes nothing for granted, assumes no prior knowledge, represents problems in their entirety, and offers complete solutions. 

If blogs are an answer to a question, you must at all times remember what the question is. Blog with a purpose and an answer in mind; don’t wander aimlessly or throw arguments around like dice, hoping for winning numbers. Stay relevant, stay charming, and above all else, stay accessible. If you tell the story your way, and give your audience answers, they will listen in rapture, and will keep coming back. 

Author Bio:

This is a guest post by Nadia Jones who blogs at online college about education, college, student, teacher, money saving and movie related topics. You can reach her at nadia.jones5@gmail.com.

Share your blogging tips with the Quest PR team.

We’ve had a fantastic week at Quest PR  where we’ve celebrated our 10^th Year anniversary in business as a  multi award-winning agency which  delivers ‘joined up’ PR and social media campaigns, media training,videos and video blogs.

We were joined by special guest Andrew Jones MP who made a toast and cut our cake made by Mama Doreen’s Cupcake Company  featuring coverage for clients including Fracino and Contis Group.

We’re extremely proud that some of our clients including Richard Bosworth from What If? Forums have been with us on our exciting and challenging  journey to date and thanks to Richard and valued fellow clients and business partners from organisations including AfPP, Jones Myers LLP, Emerging Real Estate, Campus PR and Clive Owen & Co LLP added to the champagne sparkle!

A very special toast to the Quest PR team for making the event very special for everyone. Cheers guys!

 Quest PR is delighted to be included in the latest edition of the fab Brand Yorkshire business-to-business magazine aimed at CEOs, MDs, professional services and owner managed businesses.

Below is our article on the importance of fusing PR and social media to turbo charge your business goals.     The seismic internet developments have revolutionised the way small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) communicate – and social media has unleashed a plethora of vibrant platforms through which businesses can engage, share and learn with existing clients, prospects, peers and business partners.

In a climate where already saturated sectors face the prospect of a double dip recession, the challenges of falling sales, low brand recognition and peer-awareness are intensified. Investing resource in integrated campaigns will facilitate the prolonged road to recovery.

With more and more contracts and referrals clinched via blogs, LinkedIn and Twitter – coupled with the ‘Facebook for Business’ online guide to stimulate business promotion via social networking – companies who bury their heads in the sand will find their social media savvy competitors stealing a proverbial march.        

Social media is most powerful as part of a ‘joined up’ communications programme which complements and drives business goals – whether they be annual targets for turnover, gross margin, costs and profitability, or a five year exit strategy in which PR and social media are integral to boosting a company’s profile and desirability to derive maximum sale value.   

All indications reinforce that companies whose social media strategies turbo charge their business plan and work in tandem with their traditional PR and marketing campaigns are best placed to enjoy business growth as well as saving time and costs.    

Quest PR, which celebrates its tenth anniversary this year, champions this approach and has trained hundreds of owner managers and entrepreneurs to adopt it – with powerful results – in regular workshops launched in April 2010.

 Achieving PR and social media stand out  

Many of us are familiar with the expression ‘Content is king’ and there many similar skills required to ensure success with marketing, PR and social media. Most crucial is compiling strong collateral to stimulate and interest your respective audiences.  

In the same way that weak storylines, overtly promotional press releases or bland comment from organisations seeking to position themselves as ‘experts’ in their sectors will not see the light of day in traditional print and broadcast outlets, businesses who push sales-led or outdated/boring content which fails to add value to their social media audiences will lose their followers and credibility.

In a relentless cyber climate where 100 million users on LinkedIn, 640 million on Facebook and 175 million on Twitter are vying for their voice to be heard – planning and rolling out interesting and provocative content to engage, share and learn with your followers is pivotal to success.

Furthermore, with 60 per cent of online content predicted to comprise video by 2013, incorporating video as part of your integrated campaign on your website and in blogs is vital. 

Rolling out content across multiple platforms

The formula below fuses marketing, PR and social media through economies of scale.

• Plan your content to avoid a ‘scattergun approach’ – what are you communicating  that is new, unusual or different to achieve stand out from your competitors? Set up a marketing, PR and social media planning template to enable you to see and follow through the joined up formula.     
• Don’t fall into the trap of ditching your traditional PR activities. As former print and broadcast journalists with organisations including Sky TV and BBC, we advocate harnessing these profile-building channels. Continue to test and measure and keep doing what works well – whether it is press releases, commissioned articles, winning awards to help secure contracts or attract top talent, or being invited on radio and TV as an industry expert. If the latter we’d advise being media trained to ensure you are invited back time and again. The increase in online media likewise presents unprecedented opportunities to boost your profile, your expertise and your search engine optimisation (SEO).    
• Listen before launching into social media – and seek out the relevant platforms to bolster the business goals. Where are your clients, prospects and partners engaging – and with who? Use tools such as Google alerts to see who is saying what about your brand, your industry and your competitors. This intelligence gathering will steer you to the appropriate tools and platforms. 
• Get close to your influencers such as your top referrers and the media. Take advantage of the proliferation of journalists on Twitter seeking stories, case studies and comment.
• After researching your target audiences, get your ‘ducks in a row’ by planning and launching your LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube profiles. Keep focused on who you are following and why – and sustain rich content to ‘feed’ these channels.
• Having developed your profiles, followers and ‘likes’ launch a blog with 3-4 posts to make it look more established. Tailor your PR material such as ‘How to’ top tips, new appointments/promotions, crystal-gazing or simplifying complex legislation into blog posts. Blogs enable reporters to better understand your business and expertise and more journalists validate interviewees after checking out their blogs and their LinkedIn credentials. Line up guest posts with key influencers with a flourishing social media following who will promote their guest contributions across their channels. Allocate time to comment on influencers’ blogs.
• Get video blogging (v’logging). Include a ‘meet the team’ v’log in your launch blog. Video’s powerful medium gives businesses a personality and vehicle to showcase their expertise and their ethos. In our experience, video is a magnet for your prospects to feel like they know you before commissioning your services. SMEs’ hunger to complement their PR and media training skills with video blogging ‘nous’ has been the catalyst for our journalist-led team to extend our training courses to include video blogging where we teach clients to write, prepare, film, present and edit video blogs. Google loves video and a video blog is 50 times more effective than a written blog in SEO terms.
• Increase your blog following via automated platforms such as Hootsuite or TweetDeck which will inform your followers across LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter when your blogs go ‘live’. These platforms enable you to schedule content in advance – an enormous benefit for time-strapped SMEs.
• Draw on PR and blog content to drive and engage in LinkedIn discussions and increase traffic. Be disciplined about the number of groups you join, and stay on track with your content. If setting up your own LinkedIn discussion group, ensure you have adequate resource to sustain it in order to keep your company at the heart of your discussions.
• Tailor your rich PR and social media content into regular e-newsletters featuring advice, forecasting, case studies and media appearances. Preview upcoming blog topics and invite recipients to join the blogging debate.
• Measure your return on engagement. As with traditional marketing and PR campaigns, establish up front what success will look and feel like. In addition to driving sales and leads, some businesses measure success via blog analytics and the number of blog comments and guest post invitations.
• Allocate a level of resource and ownership for your integrated campaign and be disciplined about adhering to it. Allow for additional set up time and stick to your planning schedule. Finally, sustain the killer content and momentum. In line with the adage that ‘enthusiasm is the electricity of business’, keep your campaign fresh and vibrant.  

For maximum impact fuse your marketing, PR and social media through a ‘Tell them, tell them you’ve told them – and tell them again’ formula as reinforced in our 12-step plan.

For example, the ‘tell them’ could, be commissioning and writing a PR article for your trade or regional press, the ’tell them you’ve told them’ can entail you adopting this article for a blog post and asking your LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter followers to comment on it. For the ‘tell them again’ you can tailor and revise the content to spark a LinkedIn discussion and also adapt the content for enewsletters.

With further tough times forecast, plummeting stock markets and major budget cuts on an unprecedented global scale, now is the time to reignite your communications strategy by maximising and fusing the old and the new. Investing time and focusing on ramping up and integrating traditional PR and marketing with social media and video will keep you ‘in sight and in mind’ when customers and prospects are ready to buy. Without a presence and voice, they may well approach your competitors who are engaging with them regularly through social media platforms.     

Share your thoughts and tips with us.

The development of native apps for mobile devices like the iPad and iPhone is often an expensive process. Many of the small-medium sized businesses I speak to are struggling to find the necessary budget to develop content for these platforms, despite the increasing significance of online mobile marketing and communications.

Unfortunately for them iPhones, Androids and tablet PCs are now almost ubiquitous on the Stockholm subway. Every day I see commuters gazing into their Facebook app, online newspaper, Twitter client or so on.

There are, of course, those commuters that prefer to while away the journey listening to music, audio books and radio.

For businesses looking to tap into the mobile market but without the budget to invest in app development, as well as those looking to bring a new flavour to their marketing and communications, audio podcasting is potentially a less expensive but equally significant tactic to get your content consumed by people on the go.

What’s more, people are increasingly listening to podcasts. According to Edison Research, for example, podcasting is doing better now than ever before. In 2010:

• 45% of all Americans were aware of podcasting
• 23% of Americans said they listen to podcasts, which has increased from 11% in 2006.

Edison Research estimated that 70 million people have listened to or viewed a podcast in the US alone!

Cost of Entry

Assuming you can cover hosting costs of approximately 15 USD a month and the necessary salary to cover a couple of hours work per episode, the cost of entry to business podcasting is relatively low compared to the thousands often required for app development.

You can get started with as little as a USB mic, computer and free audio editing software. Garageband, which ships with every Mac, is great for audio recording and editing and you’ll get great results too with Audacity, which is also free, and works on both the Mac and Window platform.

Sure, you can take your show to the next level by investing in a dynamic mic, mixing desk and digital recorder, but even this kind of set-up won’t exactly break the bank.

The Real Business Benefits

Personally, I realised the benefits of podcasting after one very short piece of audio content landed me two major consulting gigs within one day of publishing it on my website.

In the year since I started podcasting not only has the podcast I produce opened up more training and speaking opportunities, it’s helped me to grow my network, generate leads and ultimately more business.

I always ask new customers how they found Jontus Media and although most come through the website or recommendations and referrals, many tell me the the podcast persuaded them to get in touch. I’ve been told: “I felt I knew you,” on more than one occasion.

A British canine behaviourist who I make a podcast for recently had an episode of her show downloaded 4000 times in twenty-four hours.

Now this figure might pale into insignificance compared to the number of people that might glance at your glossy add in a newspaper or magazine, or even online; but a podcast enabled my client to be literally talking to each of those listeners, generating a real sense of who she is and what her skills are.

Through her podcast she was able to speak to 4000 people, and this in turn gave her the opportunity to stand out from the competition, connect more closely with her audience, and communicate directly with those that enjoy consuming audio content on the go whilst they commute, workout or go for a walk. And let’s not forget that this also gave her a great chance to build trust and belief in her skills and services.

Karen herself says: “Podcasting has opened up a direct, friendly channel to my potential clients, building trust in my brand and delivering it straight to their ears”.

Portability & Access

So if you can’t quite invest in app development to boost your mobile content marketing – and even if you can ! – you might want to look into how podcasting is a wonderful tactic to build new business relationships online.

To listen to an interview with QuestPR’s very own Sharon Cain in conversation with Jon Buscall, click over here.

As most of the savvy practitioners in the social media sphere have already been telling us, there’s a new kid in town and he’s big.

But before rushing to sign up Google+ to the team once it’s rolled out, businesses would do well to think about how and where this giant fits into the team.

The new tool is likely to be an asset but anyone who has attended a Quest PR social media seminar will know , that, in a new world, some of the old rules of the game still apply, chiefly “focus” and “integrated planning.”

As the question goes, when going after a specific target, who has the greater chances of effectiveness: the machine gunner or the sniper? The latter is focused on the target and has spent time judging the environment and preparing. The sniper knows exactly what they are going after.

The analogy applies in communications whether using the new tools, the traditional ones, or fusing both sets.

The acres of media coverage devoted to the arrival of Google+ have been numerous, stirring up a frenzy among the clickerati. But, while the jury is out for some as to whether or not the new giant will knock the incumbent titan Facebook from its lofty pedestal, we can reasonably assume that if it gets a good head of steam – Google already benefits from a huge user base harnessing a raft of free services – then, it could do it, while providing significant firepower to our business strike forces.

Whichever tools are used, the focused and planned approach will deliver the best results. The approach can be simplified into the following steps.

Where are we now?

Who are we? What do we offer? What’s the external environment telling us? What is the competitive environment telling us and how our clients and consumers behaving? What are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats we face?

Where do we want to be?

What are the aims and objectives of using our media?

How do we get there?

Who are our stakeholders (external and internal)? Do they use social media? What key messages do we want to convey to them (don’t hit them with numerous messages as this will confuse them as to who you are and what you’re about)? Which tactics will we draw upon and how do we integrate and schedule them so that they support the overall communications effort in a tightly coordinated way?

And, finally, how do we know we’ve arrived?

As the old saying goes, if it moves, measure it. Otherwise, why bother? We need to identify the best means of determining whether or not the campaign has worked? Remember that there’s a difference between being efficient and being effective. And, just as importantly, what can we learn from the execution that can feed into the next plan?

Mervin Straughan is a communications consultant and qualified life coach (www.straughanconsulting.co.uk). He edits the tourism website My Goals Buddy and the tourism and lifestyle news site Beautiful North Yorkshire.