5 tips for building a Marketing and Communications Department

OK, so I disappeared for a while, but for a good reason! It’s been almost two months that I’ve taken a new position in communications and marketing management. I have been so swamped and have an incredible commute.

My new company didn’t even have a department set up, so basically I’ve been building a department from scratch. Being the youngest member of their senior management team, and also the only female have brought forward some new and interesting challenges, but the learning curve has been amazing. Every day I learn something new. So, here are my 5 tips for building an incredible communications and marketing department:

1. Take the time to meet with all your leadership. Learn about them, their role, their interests, what they want out of the company and talk about how you think your role and their’s might intersect. Since our department touches everything, you will always have a touch point with someone else.
1b. Listen to them. Don’t talk much, you’ll be surprised about how much you learn about the company’s culture that can impact grandiose communications and marketing initiatives you had in mind.

2. Spend time with your team. Repeat 1 and 1b. You will get a different perspective of the company from the ones who are expected to roll out the work.

3. Do not run willy nilly wild with all your social media knowledge. You need to find out whether or not the infrastructure even exits to go that route. If the company wants to implement social media but does not have a corporate culture that supports it, you can set yourself up for some serious problems. You need to understand how the culture supports communications initiaties in general, and if the support does not really exist you need to work first at looking for ways on how to change the organization’s perception of communication.

4. Be results focused. Look at ways that you can demonstrate organizational growth by the things that the department can do. Impelmenting evaluation methods that work to show effectiveness can take you a long way!

5. Be honest to who you report too. I happen to report to the CEO. I am honest and candid with him. If I’m not comfortable with something I say so, but I also provide alternative options that can acheive the same results. Do not be afraid to stand your ground – you were hired to do a job and sometimes that means disagreeing with your leadership. If you feel the disagreement is unethical and damaging to your career, then you have to make the decision that will best serve you in the long run. Easier said than done – I know. But, I strongly believe that the harder the decision the greater the reward.

Diaspora Could Be the Next Facebook!

If you haven’t heard about Diaspora, now is the time to pay attention!

4 university students in New York City have managed to raise $175,000.00 to fund their project through Kickstarter (By the way Kickstarter can you please operate with Paypal accounts or expand to being more flexible in other countries?). Originally setting a goal of $10,000 by June 1, they have clearly exceeded their goal.

They are voicing privacy first, and have been able to move strongly forward strongly as a result of all of the Facebook concerns that have arisen over the years regarding what the social networking site is doing with user data.

The data that has been so lucrative to marketing and communications people, and changed the way in which we approach our trade – now faces a different type of battle. That coupled with Quite Facebook Day set for May 31, 2010 means that Facebooks PR team should be working around the clock to prevent brand reputation issues. By my clock it’s May 20 – that means they have less than 10 days to make a move on things, and at the time this post was written, they had almost 7000 committed to leave!

4 Ways Social Media Impacts Communications Professionals

Social media has moved the world of marketing and communications in a way that is unprecedented.  The impact that it has had is enormous, so much so, that for many of us – understanding social media and being Googleable has become part of our job descriptions.

Here are some major ways that social media has impacted the communications and marketing industries, and some important things to always contemplate.

1.  Practitioners as tacticians

Social media is another tool in a communications professional tool belt.  The push for practitioners to understand how to use it can become very tactical in nature, especially because many successful social media users require a lot of time investment in the actual use of it.

The tactical nature of the usage can sometimes overshadow important things like planning and great content.   Just like a magazine or newspaper builds credibility through its’ content, so too must online activity.  That means developing plans that provide content strategy, understanding your audience and knowing how your content can be useful to them.

Ensure that your roll doesn’t get relegated to purely the function of using it. Demonstrate that your use of it is linked to a strategy that yields results, such as growing your online community based on a very specific plan.  Show them you are benchmarking results and comparing that to things like sales and website visits that convert into leads.

2. Organizational investment in professional practitioners

Yes, you can grab 16 year old bloggers for pennies and they really understand online culture and how it vary’s by social media platform. They might happily set up Facebook and Twitter pages for minimum wage and probably introduce you to some platforms you’ve never even heard of before!

However, do they understand your audience and how to write for them?  Do they have experience in developing marketing and communications strategy that align with organizational objectives to serve your bottom line? And, can they demonstrate that link between online and offline successes?  Probably not.

Yes, social media tools are certainly cost effective and when used strategically can yield unimaginable results and international recognition.  However, the talent that goes into developing that  should never be overlooked.  At the end of the day, professional marketing and communications practitioners have devoted their careers to enhancing organizations in every way!  Don’t short change them because the technology can be freely used!

3.The push for instant results and ROI

Because everything that happens in the social media world is real time, often upper management also expect immediate results that demonstrate major increases in ROI.  Like anything else, social media is part of an overall strategy and that requires research and planning and realistic goals.

Results and ROI also require offline activity with real people in the real world. Becoming entirely focused on using social media as your organization’s sole advertising and communication medium misses the mark.  I’ve heard people attribute Tweets to the reason unrelated stories got published in major media.

Your organization was placed in the media because of a journalist and the relationship they were able to develop with your communication’s team as a result of it (or vice versa).  Credit the people who worked with the journalist to provide spokespeople and relevant material!

Social media is a great tool and your organization absolutely needs to be part of the activity.  However, it also needs to be part of the real world too, and that requires offline marketing and communications, otherwise known as plain old fashioned traditional methods.

4. Pigeon Holing

The debate exists on what will happen with the world of social media and the future of marketing and communications.  Is it possible that as a practitioner, being too focused on being a social media guru can potentially blow out the wind in your career sail once the hype is all over?

At the end of the day, being a well rounded marketing or communications person will include understanding social media as much as it includes e-newsletters, web copy, media relations, media buys, writing, editing and working with agencies.  Could trying to be a social media expert mean that you could potentially become stuck there?

5 Best Practices for Social Media Strategy in Communications Departments

Social media strategy and usage in Communications departments requires a bit of a shift in traditional thinking.  Often, many organzational leaders view social media as a technological advancement – and while it is, its primary usage is often to promote/conversate/develop content/grow audience. Hmm… this is sounding like Prinicples of Communications Theory 101.

The technology aspect is working with IT people who understand things like SEO and the programing aspect of social media platforms, building apps and using apps that work best with websites etc.  (There is obviously much more, but I’m just condensing for space).

While that thinking has to shift a little, there are some things that need to be thought about the same.  You still need to run a department that has people with clearly defined roles and responsibilties.  You can decentralize who has onus on particular features, but ultimately you need to have content creators and community managers and decide where that responsibility will sit.

Here are 5 best practices for social media implementation in your communications department:

1. Role development: One of two things need to occur – either you will need to develop a new role that is responsible for overseeing and implementing your social media strategy, or you will need to look at existing roles and decide where expansion in roles should exist.
2. Roles and Responsibilities: Social media can be used by everyone in an organziation – not just communications.  However, you need to define solid roles and responsibilities – who develops content? Who manages your community and profiles? Who leads the strategy?  Will it all be one person or will it be different people? 
3. Understand the basic needs of social media in communications practice:  If you do not fully understand social media as a leader in your communications department, don’t pretend you do!  More importantly, make sure you consult others who have existing social media department models to understand how they set their’s up.  The most important need is: WHOEVER you choose to run your social media strategy NEEDS to have a communications and/or marketing background combined with a DEMONSTRATED knowledge in social media principles. 
4. Demonstrated knowledge in social media principles:  Google them.  Social media users should have a high Googleabilty factor.  More importantly, they need to be demonstrating content development, community management, social media knowledge, involvement in the social media community and of course – newest trends in social media platforms.  If they cannot demonstrate this online, then how can they really understand how its used?
5. Don’t get technology confused with communications: What you need is  a communicator that understands technology.  It is easy to become sidetracked when you don’t understand technology.

3 common mistakes:

1. Confusing IT and Technological Communications.  You need to have a person in place with a solid career in communications first!
2. Multiple personalities on one Social Media profile – ie: Corporate v.s CEO.  If the corp profile is speaking, then you need to keep it consistent.  Let it be one voice manned by one department. If you want your CEO to tweet - the most important principle - be open and transparent, don’t confuse your audience or try to repurpose your corporate account to become the CEO (unless he’s been the one developing the content on it  from the get go!)
3. Multiple users of one social media account.  Community management is essential to engaging and understanding your audience.  Too  many hands in the pot – no matter how organized or differentiated you think it might be – is never a good idea.  Can you imagine if you had several people responsbile for one e-mail account?  Yes – it will be that messy.  That is why the roles of Community Managers are essential – its a one person job – it can be 1-1 (1 community manager per 1 profile) or 1 to many (1 community manager responsbile for multiple accounts).

The Top 3 Things You Should Know about Shel

Across a crowded space (a virtual space that is), I yelled out to a Shel of a man that was at the intersection of business and technology.  That man, Shel Holtz, swong across the Twitosphere and tweeted back.  Another demonstration of Twitter in full effect.

This morning I had an amazing interview with Mr. Holtz for a report myself and group members (shout outs to Emily and Haley) are doing on best practices in internal communications.  Having opportunities to speak with individuals such as Mr. Holtz are definitely once in a lifetime moments.  It will definitely give you one of those  “the best advice I ever recieved” speeches.

So here are 3 things you need to know about him.

1. He is reachable and full of valuable knowledge

There are VERY few communicators that I have met with a schedule as jam packed as his. Even with all of the crazy things that he has on the go, he still made time to speak with me!  If that doesn’t make him one seriously cool dude, I don’t know what else to tell you. Hey Mr. Holtz, if you are ever looking for an assistant…HOLLA!!!

The best part was that he has so many valuable things to say and teach, and he is willing to impart that knowledge.  As MasterCard would say – “Priceless”.  On a scale of designer purses, I rate him an Hermes

2. He embodies the true meaning of communications

There are public relations practitioners that do the work, but don’t necessarily live up to the theory.  There are also those that have no interest in communicating with anyone except the PR “elites”.   Mr. Holtz is a walker (well he is also a talker - but he practices what he preaches).  He was so easy to talk to, and more importantly he spoke to me as an equal.  He listened to what this student was asking and thinking,  and remembered that I was an adult too.  I appreciated that.  I learned today, that later on in my career I want to be that person who creates a memorable experience for a future student in communications.

3. He writes awesome books

His book Corporate Conversations, was in fact my course text in Internal Communications Management. It was an easy read, and I didn’t follow my course syllabus for when to read the chapters. I chewed through the book in a week. He has so many excellent books, and I definitely recommend it!  I even use it at work to help develop some of the strategic communications plans I’ve been part of :)

I also noticed from his site that he will be in Toronto speaking at the WebCom conference. Awesomeness! Try to make it out – and hopefully I will be able to make it also!

Donate to Fragile X Research!

My brother Stephen as part of the Fragile X Research Foundation of Canada Website Redesign

 For those of you who know me, you know that I have a sibling with special needs.  He is the youngest of four and the only boy in the bunch.  My brother was diagnosed with Fragile X when he was three years old.

Every year my company raises money for his charity through my event.  That handsome boy in the banner is my brother!  I plan to hold a fundraiser for this organization soon, and I hope that all my tweeters and fans will help me get the word out there!

Twitter in Full Effect…

Twitter gets rid of the middle men – especially for the users that truly use it the way that it is supposed too!  I was having a social media dilemma, and seeking advice – so I thought…who better to ask that those who are leaders in the industry?  I took a chance and sent a shout out (in a very crowded room mind you, because this dude has like 10,000 followers), asking him if he had the time to get back to a sister.

That dude, happened to be none other than Mike Volpe , VP of  Inbound marketing at HubSpot. He replied in no time, seriously awesome dude who took a quick minute to give me some priceless advice. So, here is my shout out to him – Mike your wiked awesome and if you ever open a Tdot office, think of me

To add to that, Twitter’s 15th most awesomest Twitterer (with only 50,000+ followers), Scott Stratten also helped me out. He lived his tagline – and totally engaged in my dicussion!

You can follow these guys at @mvolpe and @unmarketing! They are super cool guys that really get social media. Finally! People who get it – if every day of my working life could be this way.

My Take on Reuters Social Media Policy

So, yesterday, Mashable places the most interesting post on his site entitled Reuters to Journalists: Don’t Break News on Twitter.

So….WTF???? Quoting Mashable (oh how cute is Mr. Cashmore and all the more reason to love Scottish men…):

“...journalists are advised to get manager approval before using Twitter for professional purposes, have someone double-check their tweets before posting, avoid disclosing personal biases (especially political), and to separate professional and private activity with separate accounts.

The policy as a whole is a fascinating read and exposes that Reuters, as a media organization, is torn between encouraging employees to use social media and the realization that the online behaviors of their staff put them at risk, a sentiment expressed in the comment that these tools, if misused, could “threaten our hard-earned reputation for independence and freedom from bias or our brand.”

That is crazy for me as a public relations practitioner.  I think that trying to control social media, and control how journalists use it is really probably not the best move.  This is a perfect example of how organizations lose sight of how best to be strategic in the use of social media platforms and tools.

The challenge they will face, is that news will break over Twitter and bloggers around the world will write the story first.  In the end, Reuters’ journalists will have old news sitting on their wire!  The world moves too fast my friends – we want the info now and not tomorrow.

It will be interesting to see how this all plays out – journalists and communications people around the world have their eyes glued on this – that’s for sure!

The Top 8 Reasons that I Like Twitter…

Well there are, of course, many reasons that people like using various social media platforms out in the world.  Recently I’ve been asked why I like Twitter or what would cause someone to want to use it.  So here are my top 8 reasons, and for an added treat, I will post some resources at the bottom!

1. MOBILE!!!!!!  This is the greatest thing!  You don’ t need internet access on your smart phone or anything like that – as long as you can text you can tweet.

2. You don’t get to know everything about my personal life!

3. I don’t have to pay attention to you!  Not that I’m self centered or anything, but I can choose or not choose to talk to you when I feel like it.

4.  You don’t have to get my approval to talk with me.  The thing with FB, is because it does display so much personal info, you kind of want to be able to control the people that have access to you – but really, social networking sites were meant to connect and network.  So, holla!

5. It’s short and sweet.  140 characters don’t give you much time to agonize about the details.

6. Pretty much every other site offers an integration feature for Twitter.

7. Twitter users are so helpful!  They are always sending you quality and interesting content, stuff that you wouldn’t find yourself.

8. You get to learn about news before it actually makes it to the news.

The flip side of things, and perhaps the things that I don’t like all that much about Twitter are:

-sometimes when people @me, I don’t really know about it because Twitter doesn’t alert you to that -although some of their dashboard technologies do.

-it can be overwhelming if you are following many people (especially news companies) because they are just blowing through your feed with content.

- you can only delete tweets not edit them.

There was this recent article written todayTwitter Social Media Marketing Strategy Benefits Analysis, that I found to be really interesting, which might provide some food for thought. Also you can try visiting HubSpot, they always have a ton of good information about different social media technologies. They even have some white papers!

Social Media Acuity Forum – Toronto

I’m sitting in the Social Media Acuity Forums and listening to a bit of a painful presentation on using social media for recruitment (I’m pretty certain that the lesson to be learned out of that is to know your audience). Other than that, I’ve been blown away about the amount of awesome and cool people that are both here and have presented!

Out of that I learned about Shes Connected . It is totally about women helping women, which – for those of you who read my blog – know is what makes me the most most excited and passionate about my own company. I would totally be interested in learning more about them and how I might be able to be involved with what they do.

The one thing that I would change about the presentations, is that every single one started out with the explainations of what is social media. Well, here’s the thing – we already have heard the same explanation like 800 times since we started.

Additionally, Patrick Glinksi shares my love for unicorns, and “unmarketing” and I have spent many times at Williams in Oakville without even knowing it! A how small the world is when social media is at play!