Contently Managed - Social Media in Scotland, strategy & digital engagement » PR Issues

In a BrewDog age, does every firm need a blog?

Craig — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 12:49:07 +0000

If you’ve read more than 140 characters on social media, you’ll know that many people like myself, Chris Brogan and others advocate a blog as being a main part of your social media strategy. Unlike Facebook, Twitter and other sites, what’s on your site (like your blog) is yours and all yours alone with the benefits – SEO and otherwise – that it brings. Another great thing about a blog is that you can write as much as you want – useful in a crisis and you want to get your words across. After all, there’s no guarantee that the local press will pick up your release or use a lot of it.

Which brings us to BrewDog, a young brewing and pub company from Scotland (disclaimer: I’ve done work for them in the past but not at the moment). There’s been grumblings of late from some customers about problems with deliveries from their mail order.

So James Watt and BrewDog decided not only to do something about it, but tell the world exactly what happened and do so at length in this blog post.

Now, I think it’s a fantastic piece of customer information and service update – including a discount voucher at the end – and I think that while they criticise others, they stress time and time again that the key decision(s) in all of this were taken by BrewDog.

Now, will BrewDog have told the others mentioned in the article – My Brewery Tap, Yodel, Expect, UK Mail- that they are going to be blogged about? I don’t know. They are under no obligation to do so. And what will those firms make of the blog post?

But – as Mike Ritchie points out on Twitter: “How do you think the others will respond?” Do they take what has been said on the chin? Do the try and deny it? Do they say they are being used as scapegoats? Do they even monitor what it said about them online? Because this is quite a serious boot for those involved. It’s not one disgruntled person, it’s a disgruntled firm – and a firm with a vocal and active fan base (more than 5700 fans invested £2.2million in a recent share issuing) who will remember these firms and avoid them where possible.

So how do you handle that?

Handling negative comments in a blog post

First off, you do have monitoring in place so you can see what’s being said about you, don’t you?

Judge the issue of complaint – is it one person, a company, more than one firm? How influential are they?
Be frank with yourself about your level of fault/blame
Have platforms in which you can reach out to people and tell your side of the story – blog, Facebook, Twitter, press (if need be)
Leave comments wherever someone mentions this situation
Be adult. Look at how BrewDog do this one. They point out where the weaknesses in the supply chain have been – while reminding people that they are to blame as well. Learn the thin line between criticism and blame
If the fault is yours, own up – and tell people what you’ve done/are going to do to bring in change and improve matters.
Show people on a regular basis how much you’ve changed and improved

So, in a BrewDog age does every firm need a blog? Yes, but before BrewDog were founded every company should have had a blog anyway. It should be a core and key part of any social media engagement strategy.

(As an aside, there’s nothing in the BrewDog blog that constitutes a crisis for any of the firms mentioned in it. Any of them could be on the road to setting things straight within 24 hours.)

Should Liverpool Council dump local press and go online only after CIPR, PRCA row?

Craig — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 13:09:03 +0000

There’s an interesting story over at The Drum about a row having broken out between Liverpool City Councillors and the local press. In short, the council is banning their press officers from speaking to the papers. As you would expect, the CIPR and PRCA have condemned this, calling it daft.

But when you look at circulation and online presence, the council could go online and reach more people than they can through the traditional press. They’d also be more in control of the message. And this is the shape of things to come.
According to Facebook, 433,260 people are on the site and live within 16km of Liverpool. On Twitter, there’s at least 15,000 accounts registered in the city. Now that’s before we look at traffic to the council website, YouTube or other platforms. But it’s fair to say that a lot of people in the area are online.

Let’s look at the sales of the main papers. The Liverpool Echo does around 85,000 copies and The Liverpool Daily Post does around 9,000 copies. So, on the one hand Twitter wallops The Post but The Echo trumps that – though Facebook thumps them all.

The lesson for businesses, councils and press

The day is coming when an organisation in the UK will decide ‘sod it’ and stop speaking to a paper because they are fed up with a perceived lack of balance in articles or not getting their own viewpoint across properly and they’ll look at their own web traffic and platforms like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter and go “We can get our message out there to people. If we write it well and share it well, we can reach more people in our target groups than through the press. We might even be in more control of the content.”

And once the regional press is seen as useless for content, it’s not long after that it will be seen as useless for advertising, impacting on paper revenues and hastening a downward spiral.

But the press aren’t going away…

“The local papers will never vanish” people say. And for the short-term (next ten years) they are probably right. But there will be more cuts, more reporters out of work, less reporting carried out. And again, circulations, will fall and readers will discover that they can get more news by going online and following certain channels.

The other argument is that of “By doing it digitally you don’t reach everyone.” True. But look at the figures above. By using the traditional press you reach a hell of a lot less people.

The other lesson in digital engagement here…

That doesn’t mean councils and organisations should just jump on and push out press releases. Using digital right – and getting the high viewing figures or hits – means being more open and sharing issues, being more involved with your community and stakeholders. It’s the organisations who do that who will be the real winners online.

Announcing Iain Hepburn as first Director of Brand Journalism in Scotland

Craig — Mon, 04 Jul 2011 11:25:14 +0000

I am utterly delighted to be announcing ex-Digital Editor of the Daily Record and STV Local Editor Iain Hepburn has joined Contently Managed as the country’s first Director of Brand Journalism allowing us to add to our social media package to businesses in Scotland.

This, as they say, is exciting times folks…

I’ve known Iain as a journalist since his early days at the Press and Journal, kept in touch as he headed south to show them how digital was done at SFX and the Daily Mirror before he returned home to take the Daily Record website to award-winning levels – and even having CNN nick some of his videos. And despite throwing in long hours at his work, he still found time to get involved in digital aspects for hobbies like MMA and launch Scotland’s second-best (but most swearing laden) movie and TV podcast The Thumbcast.

But that’s not the question you’re asking

Why Iain?

A couple of reasons – the man is a grafter, through and through. For those starting out in any aspect of comms who think doing digital is easy, ask the likes of Iain and Allan Barr – it isn’t. It’s long hours to do it right. Iain has never shirked in the long hours, doing what it takes to make something perfect.

More to the point, Iain shares the Contently vision – that Scotland still needs a lot of help in embracing digital (go read this blog post he did at the weekend about broadband take up in Scotland) and no-one will be served by digital chancers thinking that because social media is new then they can charge £3,000 a month to blog and tweet. Iain’s ethos has always been that digital should be inclusive and by being affordable Contently wants to bring more people to the digital table (so to speak), so we share a worldview there.

Even more to the point, Iain talks as it is. If you know the big man you know he doesn’t hide behind waffle. He’s always helpful – perhaps bluntly sometimes but he’s always trying to be helpful – but can’t stand bullshit. At Contently we like plain talk – again, if you’re hiding behind jargon then you’re probably up to something.

But if Why Iain wasn’t the question you were asking, it was probably…

What the hell is brand journalism?

That’s quite simple. If you were at Napier University’s journalism course, it’s the style of journalism advocated by course leader Diana Brand.

Actually it’s not, but it does have something in common with what that course taught – it’s all about content. So let’s have a quick FAQ on Brand Journalism.

What the hell is brand journalism?

Brand Journalism is where companies – or their representatives – are doing the journalism. They are creating the content and publishing it. Some companies go as far as to hire reporters who then file back to papers, others just publish the information themselves and let media pick it up. Sports have been doing it since 2008.

Who’s doing it?

Cisco is the biggest name doing it at the moment. And if it’s good enough for Cisco, it’s good enough for businesses in Scotland. Also, if David Meerman Scott thinks it’s important, then it probably is.

Why do brands need to do this?

A couple of reasons – people no longer go direct to newspapers for information, they go to Google/Bing/Facebook/Twitter so companies need to have their sites (and Apps if they have them) up to date with relevant information – that’s information that can be used by staff, potential staff, investors, customers.

In days gone by, if the traditional media didn’t use your stuff, you were screwed. Now, you are the publisher.

Also, most websites now get better traffic than the majority of newspapers in Scotland.

Surely this isn’t that important?

Yes, you’re right – fresh content isn’t that important. People want to read what your company was like in 1999 when you set up your web page. Think about it – people go online for nothing but fresh content – fresh discounts, fresh information from their friends, fresh things to play. People want new and engaging content. If you don’t provide it, your competitors will – and guess where people/investors will spend their money.

Surely it’s just PR?

No, it can be issued by the PR team in a firm if they want but the role of the brand journalist is to make a package that can be picked up and used by media without the need for editing. The brand journalist creates, the PR distributes to their network – both equally important jobs.

It’s just PR

Really? When was the last time you saw a press release also give you options for the full video and audio that you could use/embed? Yes, there are Social Media Newsrooms and releases but so far, the take up of them in Scotland has been poor.

So is brand journalism part of PR or marketing or something else?

Depending on the organisation, it can be all of these, some of them or none of them.

So what comes with brand journalism?

Anything you want. It can be news that goes on your site as text or video/audio, it can be a podcast. It’s however you choose to deliver news to your audience. What it has to be though is strong, engaging content. Not fluff.

The key words here are good and content.

Can we do this in-house?

Yes, it doesn’t need to be carried out outhouse.

We aren’t the size of Cisco. In fact I’m a cornershop with four staff. Is this for me?

Yes. Good content scales to every business.

Why can’t PRs do this?

Last time I checked most PRs were up to their eyes in existing workloads without taking on more. Besides, you wouldn’t ask a PR to clean your toilet would you? If you’re serious, you get the right tools for the right job. Journalists can spot and tell a story in a sharper way than most PRs. They can also execute quicker. This isn’t a dig at PRs – many of whom are hard working and have great news skills – but in 2011 the role of the average PR is way past that of just spotting a story.

Besides, do you have time to learn the new Final Cut Pro?

How would this work for our business?

Get in touch – our details are at the top – and we’ll tell you…

Politicians unprofessional in using Hotmail/Gmail in Scottish Elections

Craig — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 01:17:20 +0000

For years, business types have been told – time and time again – to make sure they have their own domain names and professional looking email addresses. It’s a basic thing. It inspires confidence in who you are dealing with and you’re going to feel better dealing with a pro than someome with a Gmail, Yahoo or Hotmail account as their primary work address.

Which begs the question: why are so many politicians not being professional? Don’t they see how bad it makes them look when they hand out tacky-named Gmail, Yahoo or Hotmail addresses?

Sadly, the answer to that last part is probably “no”. We’re many years past when having a Hotmail or a Gmail account was considered cutting edge (I still remember when people were all trying to get Gmail invites) but you wouldn’t know it looking at the leaflets falling through the doors of Scotland in the build-up to the Scottish Elections.

Of course, digital/technology in Scotland has historically had a raw deal – by the press, by certain parts of the country and by the politicians of all parties – but surely it’s not too much to ask that electoral candidates – or their press minders – have enough savvy to be buying URLs. After all, if they don’t grab them what’s to stop others doing so on election night as the winners are announced?

And while I can almost – almost – understand the independents like Hugh O’Donnell not having full-on email setups, are we to believe that Labour, the SNP and others are so skint that they can’t buy a few URLs? And before anyone points it out, yes I know that Scottish Parliament addresses can’t be used but there’s no such rule or convention for party email addresses AFAIK.

I think this has to be the worst one yet: tomforhamiltonlarkhallandstonehouse@hotmail.co.uk but if you know of any better ones, feel free to leave it below in the comments box. Similarly, who’s coming across in their literature as the most digitally savvy?

Having said that, at least the likes of Tom above have put email addresses on material. I’ve received tons with no details of anything even as basic as email or a website never mind social media or web 2.0 communication tools like Facebook, Twitter, blogs or other items (so much for this being the election of social media).

Free social media workshop downloads for PRs/marketeers/businesses

Craig — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 11:26:37 +0000

I do a fair chunk of speaking and social media workshops and while I enjoy them, I’ve noticed lately that I’m relying too much on PowerPoint and Keynote and being a bit lazy. On top of that, in Scotland – a country where for many in the media ‘digital’ (never mind ‘customer engagement’) is still a dirty word – could do with raising its game a bit, so this is my efforts at trying to raise the baseline.

To that end, below there’s a link to a series of social media presentations I’ve done – free to you – over the last year or so, covering social media successes, social media in a crisis, social media basic advice and some semi-advanced (for Scotland) social media advice. There’s versions for iPods and computers as well as the plain PDFs. (And yes, some parts may be a little out of date, but the general material is sound.)

If you’ve ever been curious about social media, wondered about how authors, lawyers, accountant, hotels, bars, general businesses can make social media/digital engagement work, then these are the podcasts for you.

Now, as I’m Scottish and miserable, there’s a limit to the number of downloads – probably around 500 – so if you are in a large organisation, please just download the once, put it on your intranet and tell your colleagues about it instead of sending everyone the link and saying “go get!”.
Here’s some details of what you’re getting – and the suggested listening/viewing order.

Why am I doing this? I’ve already said but feel free to consider it an Easter present – after all, I can’t give you all an egg can I?

Social Media Successes

A look at some social media success stories as well as ideas for numerous industries and what they can do to make social media work for them. 35 minutes long.

Social Media in a Crisis

A look at some relevant case studies (to which I would add this post from yesterday showing how teens shouldn’t use social media) ending with general points talking about what social media can do for anyone in a communications or customer relations crisis. 17 minutes long.

Social Media Basics

Moving on from the case studies and ideas and a look at each platform, what may work and what may not. 42 minutes long.

Social Media Semi-advanced

Taking the ideas from the basics further and developing them, offering some fresh ideas and insight. 38 minutes long.

Now that runs to around just under three hours in terms of content. Listening and reading to it all won’t make you a social media guru or social media braveheart – a tag you should avoid at all costs – but it will give you a grounding for the basics and how to carry activities out.

And of course if anyone has any queries, feel free to get in touch or leave a comment below.

Download free social media presentations here.

(Note, that takes you to a list of files – please only download the ones you need so everyone gets a chance to get something from the giveaway. For example, if you only want the PDFs, please don’t download the iPod or Quicktime versions.)

And of course, if anyone has anything to add, I’d love to see/hear it!

Should the Scottish Government buy sectarian keywords in PPC effort to minimise negative PR after bomb threats?

Craig — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 12:51:53 +0000

A thought just occured to me after my previous post. Just as BP bought nearly $1million worth of Google ads over a variety of keywords at the Deepwater Horizon incident should the Scottish Government, Glasgow City Council, Celtic, Rangers or some other organisation buy up domain names and keywords associated with the issue?

That way, if someone was going by words like ‘bomb threat’, ‘sectarian’ and so on, they would see links to pages showing that Scotland isn’t as bad as it was (or whatever the person who bought the ads wanted them to see – they could easily portray the opposite if they wanted).

Or would buying the domains/adwords be seen as an admittance of a problem instead of a proactive PR approach using SEO and PPC? (Though with news of the bombs now all over the UK-wide press, it’s not really time for putting heads in the sand.)

(Thanks to Clarke Duncan and Attacat Ben for a clarification)

Celtic fans go on the PR offensive over “Old Firm” sectarian issues – should the club?

Craig — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 11:35:47 +0000

In Glasgow, Scotland just now there is one story dominating the headlines and that’s of the three bombs sent to prominent Celtic fans. Now, as always, it’s being tarred as a problem of the “Old Firm” but from where most people are sitting, there’s only one group being targetted by this.

Which begs the question, should Celtic now go on the offensive and refuse to be tarred as part of the “Old Firm sectarian problem”? As this G40 Celtic site shows, the fans certainly have – naming and shaming anything they see, including a captain of Berwick Rangers football team.

Before anyone gets accused of sweeping generalisations, let’s make one thing clear: both sides have die-hards, both sides have bampots and there are some for whom the football is nothing more than an excuse to indulge in hatred of others. For some, it’s not even about the football, just the hatred (“They’re sick” as Rangers manager-to-be Ally McCoist puts it so accurately here in an audio chat).

Having said that, the current situation seems to be attacks solely on Celtic-linked/supporting individuals, but in the press it’s still treated as “the Old Firm problem” when the individuals involved have done nothing to warrant this level of hatred and there’s little – if any – mention of Rangers management or supporters being treated in a similar manner, either now or historically.

From a brand management and PR point of view, it can’t be doing Celtic any good so could they step away from it? Yes, they could, but even for a club like Celtic – which goes for the jugular when it goes on the offensive – it would involve burning a lot of bridges.

Just as Portakabin objects to wrong uses of their name, Celtic could respond to every mention of “the Old Firm problem” by pointing out that they’ve done nothing wrong and neither have their fans. They could ask Strathclyde Police for figures on crime surrounding their fans at Old Firm games and publish them, they could swamp social media and the traditional press by responding to every allegation, every mention.

But what would the cost be? It wouldn’t cost them any football fans but it could inflame an already tense situation – and that could make matters far worse.

Which then begs the question? Does Celtic say nothing to try and keep the peace?

From a communicator’s point of view, it’s an interesting conundrum. Your brand is being portrayed (or rather co-portrayed with Rangers) in a negative light. The traditional response would be to respond, engage and try to turn the negatives. But in this case, nothing is done? Why? For the above reason? Or – as I am sure someone will point out or ask in the comments – is it an admission that the club itself (or some aspect of) is part of the problem?

And to be fair, could Rangers go on a similar PR offensive – or do something different – to try and get rid of the idiots that are tarnishing the club and earning them UEFA fines?

(As an aside: I always remember a chat with a Sunday newspaper editor back when I worked in newspapers and he pointed something out to me “you print a bad news story about a Celtic player and everyone buys it, there’s a sales spike. However print a similar story about someone at Rangers and sales go down. Rangers fans don’t buy bad news stories about their club, Celtic fans do.”)

There’s also some good writing on this whole issue here and here.

How do you do positive PR for songs like The Sash, Hello Hello, Boys of the Old Brigade or The Soldiers Song?

Craig — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 00:32:02 +0000

PR professionals, sport fans and others in the West Coast of Scotland will have seen the recent efforts by the powers-that-be to clamp down more on sectarianism in Scottish football and UEFA’s recent ruling against Rangers.

So here’s a question: if given the brief, how would you create positive PR for the likes of The Sash and Hello Hello if given a brief to that end by a Ranger’s minded organisation. Would you say that they are just songs, 90 minute ditties which have no lasting impact or effect in the real world? Would you argue that if Celtic can keep all their songs, why should Rangers be picked on?

If tasked by Celtic to defend The Boys of the old Brigade or The Soldiers’ Song would you maintain that these aren’t sectarian songs but are political (a difference many don’t seem to notice in today’s climate) or that they’re just songs, nothing more?

This isn’t a troll post. I’m genuinely curious to see what people could come up with in the same way many PR practitioners enjoy seeing other creative PR work or hypotheticals.

(Disclaimers: There is no real-world brief behind this, I am Celtic fan (but haven’t been to a game in years) and wrote about sectarianism for my book Football Inc nine years ago.)

And for those who want, yes, posting is allowed anonymously for this one.

So who decides the hashtags for the Scottish elections?

Craig — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 02:11:47 +0000

Great post by Edinburgh City Council PR supremo Stewart Argo over on the social media business networking site LinkedIn that raises an interesting question about the upcoming Scottish elections – but also elections in general: who decides what the official hashtag is? Not just for the main event, but at a more local constituency level?

(Don’t have time to read this? Get this social media blog delivered as audio via iTunes or RSS)

If we leave it to the wisdom of the crowds it’ll be a free for all with various hashtags popping up, coming and going, some sticking, some not – and all probably at the last minute. But that will make it hard for anyone wanting to follow all the action from one place.

So who decides then? Local authorities? Scottish Government? The media? Would they need a committee? Would it be able to meet in time? Would people abide by what they say? Should it be two hashtags? a generic #scotelect followed by constituency or should it just be one to prevent people seeing stuff they don’t want #orkneyelect #glaspollockelect and so on?

It’s a cracker of a question to pose – but is there an answer?

Feel free to discuss the article in the comments section below or drop Craig McGill an email about social media.

Social Media, PR & Marketing Experts: when do you catch up on your social media?

Craig — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 14:03:33 +0000

It might sound like a daft question but social media can be very time intensive, even in a passive, consuming form – reading Twitter lists, checking up on accounts, reading blogs, checking RSS feeds, commenting, Facebooking, listening/watching podcasts – and that’s just for clients before you actually consider your own social media footprint/activities.

So the question is this: how long per day do you spend consuming social media and how to do you manage it round your other activites? We’ll put our details in the comments below later on but we were wondering how/what others do after a tweet chat involving Allan Barr, Dan Frydman, Mike McGrail and Michelle Rodger.