The Communicator

Blogging is a wonderful way to build relationships, showcase ideas and motivate audiences. But do blogs work in every industry and for everyone? Certainly not.  

Blogs facilitate the sharing of ideas with like-minded audiences. They can be used to motivate, inspire, educate or placate, but – at the end of the day – their value rests in their ability to communicate ideas and opinions. 

In my very first post on this blog (To Blog or Not to Blog), I suggested that certain industries and functions – in particular those that generate ideas or motivate people – had more to gain from blogs than most other sectors. Here are some examples: 

Not-for-profits: For organizations that depend on public good will, blogs provide an excellent way to motivate donors, inform volunteers and advocate for a cause. Blogs are also great vehicles for improving an organization’s profile with stakeholders, media and the general public. 

Professional Services: No industry produces more thought leadership than the professional services. For consultants and ‘rain makers’, blogs deliver a safe and certain distribution channel that can be branded and reused as business development or marketing collateral. 

Industry Associations and Unions: With a geographically dispersed membership and only the occasional formal interaction with the members themselves, blogs offer trade associations and unions a way to highlight certain issues and motivate the membership around advocacy. 

Politicians: In most democracies, the public likes to know what their elected officials are thinking, planning and doing on a daily basis. Blogs provide a transparent and approachable way for politicians to further their agendas, rally constituents, and win-over their detractors.  

CEOs: Regardless of the type of organization, blogs have a large role to play in Executive and Internal communications. It is critical – especially in times of change – that executive teams be visible, approachable and honest. Blogs can be an excellent way to provide context to corporate objectives, motivate employees around a cause or inspire innovation and collaboration.  

Just over two years ago I ended my post with the following advice for professional communicators:  

Treat blogs like you would any other communication vehicle. Evaluate their reach, impact, cost and effort against your objectives. And if it turns out that a blog makes sense, the first step should always be to ensure that you have a long-term commitment from your organization, and the right resources to ensure sustainable success.  

And – regardless of your industry – that certainly hasn’t changed.  

Want to talk about whether a blog strategy is right for your organization? Contact Peter at peter@communicationsunlimited.ca.

iPhones, iPads, PDAs, laptops, cell phones, PCs… the internet is now truly ubiquitous. No matter where you go, the web always seems to be right at your fingertips. 

But for professional communicators, the rapid proliferation of web-accessible devices can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, the public’s increased access to the internet can lead to more visitors for your website and thus a better return on your investment. On the other, the complexity of maintaining a consistent customer experience and brand identity across a growing number of platforms can quickly sap your resources and become a burden. 

For many organizations, there is no easy answer. Communicators will need to find a comfortable balance between maintaining an easily-accessible website and managing the host of other web priorities that drive their traffic and achieve their objectives. 

Regardless of your current strategy, we have noticed a few trends that we’ve picked up from leading websites: 

• Keep it simple: Don’t let your website get bogged down with long passages or huge pdf files. Remember that people may be accessing your site with different download speeds, screen colour capabilities, and data plans, so try to stick to simple text and a lot of white space to enhance ease-of-use. 
• Know your audience: While this may be a ‘no-brainer’ for most, it’s easy to get caught up in hype (or simply the desire to demonstrate your innovation to the world), and lose sight of the basic characteristics of your audience. Use your website metrics to understand how your most frequent visitors – or most valuable customers – access your site, and concentrate on improving their experience first. 
• Seek value opportunities: Regardless of their popularity, many new technologies and devices perform unique functions that can greatly enhance your message. Try gauging the added effect of incorporating tools such as interactive charts, streaming video and real-time updates to illustrate your point and add value. 
• Leverage free apps: Rather than spending too much time and money deploying video functionality or other cool applications, consider harnessing existing free sites such as YouTube or Twitter to perform some of those functions. Not only are they extremely cost-effective, but they can also gain much wider viewership than your corporate site alone. 

At the end of the day, it all comes back to the basic fundamentals of communications: know your audience, how to reach them, and what really matters to them. If you always keep that in mind, you can’t really go wrong.  

Need help adapting your communications material? Contact Peter at Peter@CommunicationsUnlimited.ca.

As communications professionals, we are often expected to defend our organizations through thick and thin, the good and the bad. In fact, frequently we’re expected not only to drink the corporate KoolAid, but to mix and distribute it too. 

This is about more than just toeing the company line – as is expected of every employee. We are also expected to be evangelists of the strategic vision, defenders of the corporate faith, and crusaders in campaigning against those who would besmirch our corporate reputation. 

For the most part, communicators embrace this role; A-types tend to relish playing the role of the gallant knight. But – all too often – we become blinded by our faith in the corporation. In the process, we lose touch with our audiences and external perspectives. We think of the world only from one perspective: the Beloved Company’s.  

Balancing between both sides of the spectrum isn’t easy. It requires us to walk a fine line between being believers and being fundamentalists. The most difficult part is that we tend not to notice that we’re jumping off that cliff until it is far too late to turn back. 

So how do professional communicators keep themselves grounded in reality without losing the faith? 

Most importantly, communicators must stay close to their audiences. Whether visiting branch plants to keep in touch with employee concerns or meeting with reporters to take the pulse of the media, we must always have line of sight on our audiences. 

In particular, make an effort to seek out detractors. Try to empathize with their perspectives and understand their biases. We don’t have to agree with them, but we do need to understand where they are coming from. 

A great way to do this is to engage in social media. These are often better than traditional media, where bias must be kept (somewhat) in check and journalists are (usually) bound by a burden of proof. As a result, social media commentators tend to be much more opinionated and often provide clearer insight into audiences’ real motivations and concerns. 

The bottom line is that, while we must still mix and distribute the corporate KoolAid, it would be advisable to maintain some perspective, and not to take as big a sip as everyone else.

Need help with your corporate communications? Contact Peter at Peter@CommunicationsUnlimited.ca.

Ever get the feeling that nobody is listening? Do you spend the better part of each day tweeting, poking and blogging, just to be met with stone-cold silence?

There is no doubt that peer-to-peer (P2P) networks and social media offer an unparalleled opportunity to engage people, but many communicators have found that maintaining audience interaction and creating real dialogue takes more than just regular participation.

While there is no magic formula, there are a number of ways for professional communicators to enhance the value of their organization’s social network:

• Content is King: It’s not enough to simply churn out new content every day. The key is to offer some value to your audience. Try to always provide actionable advice or new ideas rather than simply dissecting a problem or repeating other people’s insights.
• Stay on point: Be clear about the value – or unique perspective – that you offer, and resist the temptation to go ‘off script’ with topics irrelevant to your audience. Your followers will be more active on issues that have the greatest impact on them, and will quickly disappear if too many posts miss the mark completely. 
• It’s all in the approach: Each social networking tool has a unique characteristic that defines its value and use (i.e. YouTube for video content and LinkedIn for business networking), so make sure you are using the right media for the right purposes. A common strategy is to use one vehicle to carry the main message (in my case, this blog) and other tools (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter) to deliver the content to specific audiences, taking care to tailor the message to enhance participation and drive discussion.
• Count everything: One huge benefit of social media is the ability to gain instant feedback. Beyond the immediate comments you may (or may not) receive from your more active readers, make sure to track and use other easy-to-collect metrics, such as number of visits, re-tweets and fan data to help you monitor trends and target your content.
• Out of sight, out of mind: Most social network participants seem to suffer from Online Attention Deficit Disorder, and without consistent interaction, readers will quickly forget all about you and move on to a competitor or “You 2.0”. Each vehicle and audience is different, but once you find the right frequency, be sure you stick to your schedule and stay top of mind.  

Finally, remember that social networking can easily devour hours of time and serious resources, sometimes with few noticeable results. Be realistic about your objectives, stick to your plan and understand that social networking is a long-term strategy. Above all, don’t be disheartened if something comes along and steals your limelight… most topics simply can’t compete with the naming of a celebrity child. Seven? Really? 

Need help focusing your content? Contact Peter at Peter@CommunicationsUnlimited.ca.

The English language is full of words that have lost their meaning. Many – “awesome”, “cool” and “sick” for example – were hijacked by pop culture years ago and patiently moulded into our minds with completely new meanings. Others were usurped by the business world to metaphorically represent complex ideas to the public in simple terms (some of my personal favourites are “deliverables”, “synergize” or “utilization”). 

But there are a growing number of once-useful words whose meanings have been diluted through extreme over (and occasionally improper) use. 

A prime example is the term “innovative”. At its root, innovation is about creating something completely new. Think Thomas Edison or Alexander Cummings.  Until recently there was a high creative threshold to be crossed before you were considered innovative. Today all you need to do is install the latest software package or use social media in order to brandish this innovation badge. 

As professional communicators, we have all been complicit in the proliferation and dilution of once emotive and strong terms such as innovation… even though it’s sometimes difficult to avoid jumping on the bandwagon for fear of seeming out-of-touch or being left behind by your competition. 

However, from a marketing standpoint, innovation has become an extremely overcrowded market to compete in. Let’s be honest: any value that remains in the term innovation is being fought over by old-world leader GE and new-world upstart Apple, and I’m guessing your pockets aren’t deep enough to seriously challenge either of them. So (as Al Ries and Jack Trout would say) rather than trying to compete in a category with a behemoth incumbent, try to create a new category that you can own in your audience’s minds. 

For example, look for adjectives that are meaningful to your audiences and products, or that articulate your value to your customers and define your core brand characteristics. Try to avoid terms too popular within your industry and too metaphorical or cliché to have any real impact. It’s always best to avoid fads – unless you are the one setting the trend. 

At the end of the day, the key to success has always been to differentiate yourself from your competition. Why should your words be any different?  

Need help giving your words meaning? Contact Peter at Peter@CommunicationsUnlimited.ca or visit www.CommunicationsUnlimited.ca for more information.

Have communicators completely consigned their spelling skills to Microsoft and Apple? All too often these days, I find myself the recipient of emails rife with glaring spelling mistakes or sporting a completely out of place word. 

I’ll be the first to admit that I am often schooled by Professors Gates, Jobs et al., particularly when I’m short on time or enjoying the blessings of an (all too infrequent) brainwave. But rather than blindly right clicking and accepting the first offering that the magical red wavy line suggests, I always try to take the time to see my mistakes and learn from them. 

An even worse scourge, however, is the ever-helpful ‘auto-correct function’. This little gem has been responsible for frequent careless and often embarrassing mistakes around the office. I myself have been guilty of blaming the looming ‘pubic health crisis’ for many of society’s woes. 

Here’s the problem: as professional communicators, a basic command of spelling and grammar is a must. A disregard for spelling – and in fact for editing – only erodes your credibility as a communicator. Sure, your friends and family will forgive you the occasional mistake or misplaced word, but at the office, few will give you the benefit of the doubt. In the corporate world, spelling mistakes are indicative of two types of people: those who believe themselves to be too busy for ‘quality control’, and those that simply can’t spell. Communicators should fall into neither camp. 

Regular readers will know that I always like to provide a selection of actionable and practical advice for the challenges I raise. In this case, however, there really is only one solution: Always make the time to read what you have written. And while the importance of rereading your work should not diminish based on the length of the piece or the audience for which it is intended, communicators who have just pounded out a 30-page dissertation (or a short yet crucial quote from your CEO), will want to make sure they walk away from their drafts and return to re-read them with fresh eyes. And it’s never a bad idea to get a colleague to take a look over projects you have been staring at for a while. 

At the end of the day, communicators that do not take this simple but critical step may suddenly wake up to find that they have lost both their ability to spell and their credibility around the office. 

(Editor’s note: those with dubious sensitivities will roar in laughter at some of the ‘autocorrect’ horror stories found at http://damnyouautocorrect.com/. You may want to close your office door.) 

Looking for a professional communicator that understands the importance of good grammar and quality control? Contact Peter at Peter@CommunicationsUnlimited.ca.

These days it is virtually impossible to do a Google or Yahoo search without turning up Wikipedia. In just 10 short years, the not-for-profit encyclopaedia has grown to encompass more than 3.5 million English language articles and pulls in almost 4 million unique visitors a month. In the US, Wikipedia now outranks sites like Apple and the New York Times in terms of page views. 

Obviously, Wikipedia has an enormous reach. But it has also quickly become one of the most trusted sources for information on the internet. People frequently cite its articles in conversations; my own mother treats its pages as a form of medical triage.  

For professional communicators, Wikipedia also distinguishes itself as a pure-play PR opportunity. The site does not accept advertising and will quickly remove any entries that are seen as being overly promotional in nature. But in this arena, PR pros are the masters: we know how to walk the fine line between informing and promoting. 

But given the devout neutrality of the site, communicators will need to tread carefully or risk having their content pulled down by Wikipedia’s ‘cabal’ of editors. Even so, there are a number of ways that Wikipedia can contribute to achieving your communications goals. Here are three: 

• Post news items: Did you know that Wikipedia has built a collaborative news portal? Anyone can contribute an original story and – if it passes the editorial review – post it onto the site. And while the site hasn’t yet rivalled Reuters or Bloomberg, it will provide a growing opportunity for communications professionals who want to put some legs on their story.
• Add or edit your company: Unbiased articles and descriptions about companies and organizations are fair game on Wikipedia, so it is important that communicators closely manage their corporate entry on the site. But be warned, negative criticism and bad press from the past will invariably find its way onto your company’s entry and there is very little you can do about that (unless the entry is factually incorrect, in which case there may be some recourse).
• Update articles: Many companies today see themselves as not only product and service providers, but also ‘thought leaders’.  For these organizations, Wikipedia offers an unsurpassed opportunity for experts to share their insight and reference their research in a trusted – yet open – forum. For example, just last week, Cancer Research UK announced that their experts would update Wikipedia entries related to cancer… and got some great PR in the process.  

So while Wikipedia may not gain as much attention as its social networking cousins, professional communicators may find that it carries a lot more weight and garners a lot more attention than one-off tweet-fests or short-lived Facebook campaigns.  

Looking for a writer that knows how to write for Wikipedia? Contact Peter at Peter@CommunicationsUnlimited.ca.

iPhones, laptops, PDAs, cell phones, PCs… the internet is now truly ubiquitous. No matter where you go, the web always seems to be right at your fingertips. 

But for professional communicators, the rapid proliferation of web-accessible devices can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, the public’s increased access to the internet can lead to more visitors to your website and thus a better return on your investment. On the other, the complexity of maintaining a consistent customer experience and brand identity across a growing number of platforms can quickly sap your resources and become a cumbersome burden, especially for smaller communications teams. 

The truth is, there is no easy answer. Communicators will need to find a comfortable balance between maintaining an easily accessible website and managing the host of other web priorities that drive their traffic and achieve their objectives. 

Regardless of your current strategy, we have noticed a few trends that we’ve picked up from leading websites: 

• Keep it simple: Don’t let your website get bogged down with long passages of text or huge pdf files. Remember that people may be accessing your site with different download speeds, screen capabilities, and data plans, so try to stick to simple text and lots of white space to enhance ease-of-use. And if you are looking for some ideas for writing for the web, try this article.
• Know your audiences: While this may be a ‘no-brainer’ for most, it’s easy to get caught up in hype (or simply the desire to demonstrate your innovation to the world), and lose sight of the basic characteristics of your audiences. Use your website metrics to understand how your most frequent visitors – or most valuable customers – access your site, and concentrate on improving their experience first.
• Seek value opportunities: Many new website technologies have now proven their ability to enhance communications messages. When updating your website, consider incorporating tools such as interactive charts, streaming video and real-time updates to illustrate your point and add value. 
• Leverage free apps: And while you are thinking about it, why not consider harnessing existing free sites such as YouTube or Twitter to perform some of those functions for you. Rather than spending tons of time and money deploying video functionality or other cool applications onto your corporate site, these tools are extremely cost-effective, and can gain much wider viewership than your corporate site alone.   

At the end of the day, it all comes back to the basic fundamentals of communications: know your audiences, how to reach them, and what really matters to them. If you always keep that in mind, you can’t go wrong.

Updating your websites is one of our Top 11 Communications Issues for 2011. Next week we tackle the last issue on our list, how communicators can be reducing their organization’s environmental footprint.

Need help with website content? Contact Peter at Peter@CommunicationsUnlimited.ca.

Everybody’s talking about social media. And so they should: for almost a billion people around the world, social media has broken down geographical barriers, connected friends both new and old, and even fomented political revolution. But users of these sites are becoming increasingly cynical about the content they are being exposed to, creating a whole new set of challenges for professional communicators. 

To be sure, the commercialization of Facebook and LinkedIn was unavoidable. Even as privately-held companies, the pressure has been on these sites to demonstrate a viable business model. Goldman Sachs’ recent valuation of Facebook at $50 billion has added more pressure still. 

But this is the obvious commercialization, the kind of stuff that users can usually tolerate in exchange for access to a free service. The more dangerous side of social media commercialization comes from the (often clumsy) efforts of marketers and product managers to turn these forums into a marketing bonanza. 

Picture this: you’re sitting at a coffee shop with some friends. Right in the middle of a great discussion, a guy sidles up to the table and says “Hey, you’re drinking coffee. Would you like to buy some insurance?” Off-putting? Certainly.  Now picture this happening every time you sit down at that coffee shop. Would you go back? I’m betting no. 

The same can be said for social media. Once your audience feels that they are being constantly ‘sold to’, their cynicism will get the better of them, and they will quickly leave.  

The problem is particularly acute in organizations where marketing departments ‘own’ social media strategies. Stuck in the old paradigm where the number of impressions topped the quality of the conversation, these advertising-focused types tend to see social media in terms of numbers and opportunity. 

But for professional communicators, social media represents much more. It is an opportunity to build strong relationships, mitigate risks, solicit feedback, engage customers … and yes, also promote corporate objectives. So the challenge for professional communicators will increasingly lie in finding ways to leverage social media networks without irking their audiences. 

Overwhelmingly, this will require communicators to foster and encourage more peer-to-peer discussions. Many organizations are starting to wake up to the intrinsic value that already exists within their employees’ social networks, and are increasingly harnessing their staff as social media ambassadors (like having them re-tweet important messages or become ‘fans’ of a particular page). 

Professional communicators will also need to pay more attention to their strategies for nurturing their communities as they grow their relationships. This means that, rather than just tossing a key message into a group and hoping it sticks (i.e. the advertising method), communicators will need to engage in ongoing and valuable conversations with their groups and fans in order to demonstrate their commitment to the relationship. 

Most importantly, professional communicators will need to keep a keen eye on social media trends and demographics. One need only look to Rupert Murdoch following his purchase of MySpace for $500 million in 2005, what was once the world’s leading social networking site quickly lost ground to Facebook, which – at the time – was seen as the ‘grassroots’ and ‘non-commercial’ upstart. 

Obviously, the cycle is set to continue.  

Managing social media cynicism is one of our Top 11 Communications Issues for 2011. Next week, we’ll look at coaching executives.

Want to start more valuable social media conversations? Contact Peter at Peter@CommunicationsUnlimited.Ca

2010 was – by most accounts – a rather uneventful year. And while there were certainly a fair share of scandals (such as WikiLeaks and the BP debacle), the world pretty much got on with the task of rebuilding national, business and personal balance sheets. 

2011 will likely be much the same, as both companies and individuals take stock of their finances and reassess their strategies for the future. A slow and largely ‘jobless’ economic recovery will mean that everyone – especially professional communicators – will be expected to do a lot more with a lot less. And while companies will likely start to loosen their purse-strings (particularly for projects that demonstrate bottom-line benefits) towards the middle of the year, communicators will still need to focus on working more efficiently to meet their targets and objectives. 

So how will all this affect professional communicators? This week, we take a look at what (in our humble opinion) will be some of the top issues for our industry in 2011. And, with a nod to the mantra ‘do more with less’, this year we’re offering eleven topics rather than the usual ten. So, in no particular order, here are our Top 11 Communications Issues for 2011: 

1. Being more productive: While workloads will almost certainly increase for communicators, don’t expect to add any staff this year. Instead, most communicators will be looking for ways to work better, smarter and more efficiently to achieve their goals without killing their work-life balance. Click here for 4 tips to becoming more productive.  
2. Formalizing roles and defining responsibilities: This year, communicators will focus on the areas where they can add the most value, rather than trying to do everything at once. Look for a rise in the use of Service Level Agreements and formal role definitions.  Click here to see the 5 steps to formalizing roles and defining responsibilities.
3. Communicating with mobile audiences: It seems that almost everyone has a smart phone or e-reader these days. As consumers and audiences migrate more of their communications activities onto mobile devices, professional communicators will need to pick up new skills and strategies to make the most of these new channels. Find out what the top five challenges will be here.
4. Managing social media cynicism: The honeymoon is over. As the most popular social media sites (particularly Facebook and Twitter) slowly tip the scale from social to commercial, audiences will become more cynical, creating new challenges for communicators in this sphere. Find out what they are here.
5. Coaching executives: The past year did highlight one fact quite significantly – most executives need better crisis and communications training. Whether they ask for it or not, communicators will increasingly focus on coaching executives on how to stay cool under pressure and stick to key messages. Click here to find out how.
6. Cutting through complexity: Over the past few years – particularly as a result of the recent economic turmoil – businesses have grown increasingly complex. Communicators will have to become much more adept at breaking down complex concepts if they expect to have any real impact internally or externally. For a few quick and easy strategies, check out this article.  
7. Working with new audiences: Long gone are the simple days where communicators worried about a core group of audiences (media, customers, employees and executives). This year, plan to spend significantly more time on new and influential audiences such as environmental groups, transparency watchdogs and local influencers.
8. Getting the most from suppliers: Communicators will start to put increasing pressure on their suppliers in an effort to pass on the ‘do more with less’ approach to business. Look for pricing pressures, value guarantees and even some risk-sharing over the next year, as communicators search for the best supplier for their needs.  
9. Writing to differentiate: No matter how fast technology moves or what new devices are offered on the market, one thing always remains a constant: the written word. Indeed, with a proliferation of new communications channels, most communicators will find that their corporate writing style is about the only thing that really differentiates them from their competition.  
10. Updating websites: Now that some of the web2.0 technologies have come of age, many communications professionals will find themselves spending more time working with IT to update their website content and tailor their architecture to respond to new audiences and technologies. 
11. Reducing environmental footprints: As one of the most prolific users of paper in most offices (with the possible exceptions of Marketing and Legal), communications professionals will start to take a closer look at their environmental footprints, creating programs that both protect the environment and stand as an example to peers, customers and suppliers.  

How will communicators deal with these issues? Stay tuned over the next few months as we explore each of these issues in more depth. Each week, we’ll try to offer some insight, as well as actionable tips and tools to help communicators navigate through the challenges ahead. Coming up next week: Being more productive. 

Not confident in our predictions? See how we measured up to last year’s Top 10 for 2010 forecast. 

Need to create remarkable content this year? Contact Peter at Peter@CommunicationsUnlimited.ca.