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To celebrate International Social Media Week this month there is a pretty nifty event taking place in Coventry.
The West Midlands used to be just about the best place in the world for designing and making things.
The list of famous and iconic items created in the region is almost endless and pulling together a short piece of research for this post reminded me just how prolific and important the West Midlands used to be.
As social media week looms, the Local Government Association - the LGA - have posed a few questions. They want local government to get more social. During the week and maybe in the future too. Care to join in...?
by Michelle Rea, Sian Morgan, Liz Copeland and Kristian Hibberd
Over the last few weeks the LGA’s Communications team has been putting its collective head together on how we could use Social Media Week to further stimulate the use of social media by councillors, council officers and official council accounts.
Our thinking was that if local government made enough noise about all the great stuff being achieved by embracing the channel, the collective voice would prove powerfully persuasive to opponents, sceptics and the uninitiated.
We are keen to demonstrate through practical examples from the sector that using social media in a coordinated and sensible way can help enhance the reputation of local government, improve engagement with different elements of the community and drive efficiency.
This is a great time to be in communications, a brilliant time to be doing the jobs we do.
I'll explain why in a minute, but before I go on I don't want to downplay what a tough time many of us have been through.
In hard times, communications is often the first thing to go, viewed as an expensive luxury next to the real job of providing vital services to vulnerable people.
That means many of us have seen our jobs under threat, our roles reviewed and our working practices change. Before I did this job at Newcastle, I was on a temporary contract which sometimes rolled over month-by-month, so I know all about uncertainty.
It's a common tale - not knowing what career path to choose. And its useful to remember that not everyone has go down the tried and tested path.
by Jenny Baird
I didn’t come to communications in a ‘traditional’ way. I’m not a ex-journalist, a prolific blogger, or an influential tweeter. I don’t have a degree in marketing or PR.
Like many others out there, I finished university and thought – what now?
After years of seemingly endless exams and receiving my degree in English Literature I somewhat naively assumed I would know the answer. But I didn’t. I didn’t have a clue. So I decided to leave the country.
Six months later, I landed in a cold and windy Manchester after an adventure that saw me teach primary school children in South Africa, meet the King of Swaziland, drive a 4x4 along a perfect Australian beach and jump out of a plane at 12,000 feet. I also found Nemo.
Steve Jenkins is the most influential man in music that you've never heard of. He's helped shape the careers of stars such as Kylie Minogue, Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake and others. What's the secret? Good marketing and pr.
I believe that good music will fail with bad marketing and pr.
In market research, if a hundred people were asked, I’m convinced they would all agree.
It's something I learned many years ago whilst visiting Island Records, the label owned and started by Chris Blackwell and most famous for bringing the world Bob Marley and U2 amongst many other successful artists.
Switching back on can be as hard as switching off was. But be careful with that switch...
So, hands up, how many of you took Mr Slee's advice and switched off during your summer hols?
Well done, you at the back.
Hard isn't it. It never used to be. But now it is.
But what can be just as hard is switching back on when you return to work. There are many reasons for this not least worrying what you are walking back into or what the future holds for you. And the urge to hunt out a new job following a summer holiday is possibly second only to the desire for a new challenge each January. The whole return thing can be unsettling for some.
Where are you on your social media path? Just started? Or a veteran? Here are some tips to see where you are on your journey.
Do you remember your first time? That toe-dipping moment when you tested the waters of social media?
Perhaps you watched from the shallow end to start with, learning by observing some of the ‘big fish’.
The question is – have you looked back since to evaluate your progress and maturity?
Whether you’re still progressing up the pool and wearing armbands or fully immersed in the deep end and performing the equivalent of backflips and tricks
Here's an idea. Looking for a really useful internal comms resource? You're in luck. A new one has been launched.
Do you have a quick question that you wish you could ask other internal communications - or IC - professionals for help with? Do you know who to talk to about certain aspects of Comms? Who has case studies to share on enterprise social networks or communicating with remote workers? Where can you find other internal comms professionals?
On Monday alongside fellow Comms pros and friends Jenni Wheller and Dana Leeson, I launched The IC Crowd.
Essentially it’s a community and a place for people to connect and communicate. It exists already, and alongside Jenni and Dana, I’m bringing it together. There are lots of brilliant people around, specialising in and with experience of a variety of areas including change, social media, intranets, stakeholder relationships, branding, employee engagement, strategy, union relations; the list truly is never-ending.
Our channel of choice is Twitter. The IC community is thriving there and with so many connected and inspiring comms pros around, it makes sense to be the vehicle to gather the crowd.
LinkedIn is a brilliant comms channel to talk to business. So long as it's two way. Danks Cockburn PR look after the communications for one of the largest public - private platforms in the UK - the Greater Birmingham & Solihull Local Enterprise Partnership. In this refreshing post they talk of where they are.
by Mat Danks
Before I dive headlong into this, I first offer an apology. If you’re looking for solutions and best practice here, I’m sorry. This is more of a mild tale of woe and perhaps a call to arms for local government and social media types out there.
LinkedIn and Local Enterprise Partnerships: in theory, it’s the perfect social media marriage.
On the one hand, we have the relatively new concept of LEPs, with heavy emphasis on the ‘partnership’, with an evolving network of public, private and third sector organisations.
On the other hand, we have LinkedIn, the moderately clunky, highly earnest social media platform based on an evolving network of public, private and third sector organisations.
Here we have a melting pot of everyone we want to talk to. Partners, politicians, journos, local authority staff, charities, you name ‘em, they’re likely to be there.
The Tally Vics. They're the smallest team in Britain to have a club shop with fans all over the world. They're also a brilliant digital comms case study. Not at all bad for a group of friends who play for a Glasgow Saturday morning team.
by Davie Brown
When one of our players started a Twitter feed for the club in our first season I couldn't see the point. Who would be interested in 20 guys playing for a team in the local park?
The player left shortly afterwards and the idea was forgotten until a year later. I got a phone upgrade and wandered onto Twitter myself lost as everyone is to begin with. Around Christmas time 2010 I decided to start another feed for the team to see if it might bring in some sponsorship. I soon found out he was right and I was wrong.
Twenty months down the line we have over 1,300 Twitter followers and a brand new set of strips courtesy of our new sponsor PSL Team Sports. We also have several companies as sponsorship partners and most of our players sponsored by people the length and breadth of the country.
You'd be amazed at what doors digital sklls can unlock. For one man who climbed Everest cultivating them has led to a better work-life balance.
by Mark Horrell
On 30 May 1953, James Morris of The Times struggled down the "newly oozing ice-bog" of the Khumbu Icefall during darkness. The following morning at Everest Base Camp he dispatched a runner to Namche, the nearest village with a telegraph office, with a coded message which read: 'Snow conditions bad stop advanced base abandoned yesterday stop awaiting improvement.'
Two days later while lying in his tent he tuned into his wireless and heard an English voice announce Everest had been climbed, The Times had broken the news, and Queen Elizabeth had received it on the eve of her coronation. He breathed a sigh of relief his danger-fraught communications process had worked.
One of the successes of the Olympics was the 70,000 volunteers that made the games fly. What was behind the success? Good internal comms - by as many channels as possible.
by Jo Smith
I was an Olympic volunteer – one of the poppy-and-purple Gamesmaker army who clapped and cajoled and pointed and smiled my way through shift after shift, question after question. And I loved every second.
Gamesmakers have been congratulated for their contribution to the success of the games but have you thought what kept them so chipper?
Lots of them were positioned on street corners and in railway stations, in offices or back-room locations, far from the glamour and the sporting endeavours. It wasn’t witnessing the action that kept them going, so what was it?
It’s no surprise, in my view, that keeping volunteers informed was key to keeping them motivated.
Sometimes the heart sinks when you've got a press release to write. You know deep down it's got little chance of coverage. But here's an approach that could work.
I read this blog post by Charles Arthur, the technology editor at The Guardian. It really got me bought in. He’s got a unique style, and I really agree with the subject. Charles points out, for what I’m sure he hopes will be the last time to his PR audience - the difference between ‘news’ and ‘an announcement’.
I think a lot of us, sadly, know the difference, but are sometimes pushed to release the latter under the guise of the former. It’s one of the pitfalls of being in PR – sometimes, there’s no telling people, it’s just not news. Be honest - in your earlier career years, I won’t have been the only one who forwarded on a ‘get lost’ email response from a journalist (such as Charles) in response to my feeble pitch, to a client, in order to back up my quietly mumbled perspective that the press release won’t be well received, surely?
Seen the one about the pensioner who thought she could have a crack at art restoring? You should. There's a message there for comms people.
It’s one of my favourite stories of 2012. The tale of cack-handed Spanish art ‘restorer’, Cecilia Gimenez and her attempts to tart up a century old mural of Christ in her local church, la Misericordia de Borja.
The mural had seen better days so Ms Gimenez decided to get out her paint brushes and give the century old piece a quick once-over.
You’ll be familiar with the story now, no doubt, unless you have been away on holiday and cut off from media – if so read all about it here. It’s an absolute gem.
Like a good chef’s stock, this post has been on the go for a while, but until now it just didn’t have the final finishing touch to roll it out as a menu dish. I’ll come back to this.
by Phil Jewitt
If you’ve read my blog before you’ll know that I’ve been on a journey of discovery, learning by doing; blogging; getting involved with things going on in my city; going where the conversations are; and generally exploring the boundaries of flexible working. It helps being a bit of a nosey bu**er and also being proud of my city.
How are emerging technologies changing the ways we connect and communicate?
If you’re looking for an answer, your first thought might not be York’s Theatre Royal, a gilt-and-plush delight built in 1765.
Think again. It was the setting for July’s Shift Happens conference, exploring ideas about the digital future.
The spotlight was on creativity. With Shift the brainchild of Pilot Theatre, most delegates were from theatre or arts organisations.
But a fantastic programme – with 17 very different speakers – threw down some juicy challenges for anyone working in communications.
I've always loved infographics. But are we missing a trick in not using them more often?
The first recorded infographics were early cave drawings.
And infographics have been a constant, creative and brilliantly simple medium guiding, helping and directing us ever since.
They take so many forms, from weather maps to motorway signs.
If you have been abroad this summer then you probably got around just that little bit easier because of infographics. They are universal, they are 'easy-read', they cross boundaries and language.
What's not to like.
So why don't we use them more often in our communications roles?
Yes, I know we all use use them on some level, even if it's something as simple as a graph to show an increase or a decrease in something we're measuring.
Jo Tarkowski is coming towards the end of her MSc International Public Relations course at Manchester Metropolitan University. And she needs our help, so read on...
by Jo Tarkowski
As the reading begins for my research, I can’t help but start to pre-empt what one of my key findings will be this: there is just way too much out there on the internet. If I was a practitioner that had been in the industry for years without all of these digital platforms, and it was now a necessity to learn about them, where would I start? In fact, as a new PR professional, where do I start?
Arising from this, and perhaps more importantly, is the issue of online credibility.
Due to the speed with which the internet allows ideas to be published, and how easily these ideas can be accessed, it becomes a prime source of information for people working across PR. But is this a good or bad thing?
I am going to tell you something that may shock and appall you.
There is more to the world of communications than what's in the South East.
That's right, our industry is bigger than just 'That London'.
In fact there are other regions, such as the Midlands and the North of England, as well as Scotland and Wales, which contribute heavily to our great reputation as a profession. These regions also produce some top talent.
I know, I know, I'll give you two minutes to take that in.
There was a time when you'd never admit to Googling yourself. Now it's really important that you do.
When was the last time you Googled yourself?
Oh, it's been a while then. Do you know what results it will throw up about you?
If you are looking for a new job, or if you are likely to in the future, then you need to know this information. And, wherever possible, you need to shape those results. Most of you help to manage the profile of your employers, with craft and care, so why not manage your own online profile?
