All posts by Sebastian

So please, please, please (tell me a story)

Talking to your customers, Talking to your employees

The Christmas John Lewis advert is creating lots of interest
at the moment…which I suppose is what you get if you mix a touch of the
Smiths, with a heart rending tale of familial selflessness.

Whether you like it or not – I’m on the fence – it does seem to be the best of a rather dismal collection of Christmas ads from the big stores. The big difference is it tells a story; sugar coated admittedly, but a story nonetheless. Without sounding too simplistic, it has a beginning, a middle, and an end with a nice twist (to reward people for watching).

Are you sitting comfortably?
People like stories; they hold interest; stories are how we learnt to read and write; it’s why millions like watching Downton Abbey of a Sunday evening.

So how about some more story telling in your communications? Good
times for a change…

Slaying the media beast: PR professionals should be pleased, there is competition in the jungle

Social media, Talking to your customers, Talking to your employees, Working with the media

There was a time when the media pretty much dominated the world of public relations. Want to reach that particular client segment? Try the trade press. What about those potential investors? The business press. Looking for mass exposure? A good piece in a national should do it.

The big beast
It is fair to say that the media was the apex predator; the big beast which every PR practitioner would have to wrestle with, sometimes playfully, sometimes not, and usually on a daily basis. The good news, for PR people anyway, is that the media in all its print or online forms no longer has the jungle to itself (stretched that metaphor enough yet?).

The Chartered Institute of Public Relations defines PR as being:

“…the planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain goodwill and mutual understanding between an organisation and its publics.”

That last word – ‘publics’ – whether it’s your clients, suppliers, investors or employees, is critical in that social media has upset the old order and provided PR professionals with a whole new set of tools and channels to communicate with their publics in an increasingly targeted and segmented way. And best of all, you can actually have a two-way conversation…I think that helps that bit about mutual understanding.

Let Hercules do what he may…
That’s not to say that media relations has had its day, but when you’re considering your next communications project, the media relations element should arguably take its turn and queue up to have its merits considered like everyone else – of course, you shouldn’t expect journalists to sit down and take it. They can still be wild (sorry, I couldn’t resist it) but gone are the days when they dominated, which can only be a good thing for PR professionals and the businesses they promote.

Let’s get engaged (five top ‘old school’ tips to any employee engagement plan)

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No, it’s not a proposal, but have you noticed how ‘employee engagement’ is all the rage? Internal communications? Deary me, how very last season…

It might be a little ‘jargony’ but the sentiment behind it is good. Internal communications is all about getting your employees ‘engaged’ with the business; understanding the strategy; supporting the brand; helping them to do their job and generally getting everyone pulling together, in the right direction and with no little enthusiasm.

Simples
And the modern day communications professional has all sorts of shiny tools at their disposal to help communication throughout the business whether it’s that spanking new intranet, video conferencing, online newsletters, or the CEO’s blog. These are all great and have their place, but have we lost sight of some of the simplest (and most cost effective) ways of promoting employee engagement?

Top five ‘old school’ internal communications tips
So, without further ado, here are my top five ‘old school’ additions to any employee engagement plan:

 

  • The CEO walkabout: it’s amazing how inspiring it can be if the CEO leaves his/her executive bunker for a regular, unscheduled walkabout and casual chat with the ‘workers’. How often does it happen in your business?
  • Team hug: hold weekly team meetings, make sure you stick to them and hold them away from your immediate office environment if possible – good excuse for a Starbucks
  • Post it: got an important message for the business? Think of the most regular physical ‘touch’ points around the office(s) such as the lifts, stairwells, reception, even the loos, and grab that captive audience with inventive poster campaigns
  • Talk is cheap: so why not have an email free day and encourage your business to ban all internal emailing for a day. People might actually need to speak to each other…there’s a thought
  • And your name is: funny how the practice of having your name on your desk seems to have disappeared. Why not reintroduce it?

A headline alone can’t hack it

Talking to your customers, Talking to your employees

I was reading a national newspaper the other day – it’s an occupational hazard – when I was struck by the paper’s complete absence of sub-headers (it was the Guardian if you must know). There’s the headline in all its attention grabbing glory, but what happened to all its little brothers and sisters scattered strategically throughout the piece to help the reader navigate the article and keep them interested?

A barren landscape (there’s a sub for you)
There was a big investigative story that looked interesting, but confronted by the acres of news print, I couldn’t quite face the read. It all looked a little daunting.

One click and you’ve lost it (make them engaging…)
Writing for the web for instance demands that you write less; break it up into manageable chunks; have clear signposting in place; and basically do all you can to keep a tenacious hold of the reader’s digitally shortened attention span. One click and you’ve lost it.

Now I know writing in newsprint gives you a bit more of that reader’s attention span, but just how much? Would you have an article without pictures?  I would say that good sub-headers are just as important.

Free money (…but keep them relevant)
So when you’re next writing a piece whether it’s online or print, an internal newsletter or an article for external publication, think what you can do to the layout to make it as engaging and as easy to read as possible.

It doesn’t matter how well crafted your words are if no one bothers to read them.

Foul! Setting restrictive rules for the media plays a dangerous game

Communicating in a crisis, Working with the media

Whether you love the beautiful game, or think the goal posts in your local park are there simply for the convenience of dog walkers and their piddling pooches, football often provides a useful source of case studies for good and bad media management.

Here, in my view, is a particularly bad case of media management:

It’s my ball and I won’t play
The Carlos Tevez affair – and for those who don’t follow the game, ‘famous footballer refuses to take off tracksuit and play football’ sums it up quite neatly – threw up an interesting press conference where Manchester City’s Head of Communications apparently announced that any questions surrounding Tevez would immediately end the press conference.

What do Man City think will happen if they refuse to take questions about Tevez at a press conference? That journalists will simply shrug their shoulders and write about Mancini’s (the manager) terrific hair; or whether they’ll line up a 4:3:3 formation at the next home game.

Of course they won’t. And this piece in the Guardian sums up a journalist’s attitude very well to this piece of heavy handed media dealing http://bit.ly/rbXrpf

Don’t duck the issue
As ever, don’t duck the issue. If there are legal reasons why a particular matter can’t be discussed, employment contracts for instance, then say so when asked the question. But to simply refuse to ask questions about the hottest issue of the day seems to me to belong to an era of media management that should have long since disappeared.