Tyre tubes on YouTube

Ahead of the forthcoming 250-mile PWP 2012 charity bike ride this video sets the wheels in motion. It covers a practice ride out from Nottingham to the Vale of Belovoir and includes an awe-inspiring hill climb, a fast descent, some cows, sheep and not much else.

The ride is my personal contribution to Olympic year and my role as an official Olympic Storyteller. All funds being raised by the B2B ride are going to the Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust. For more information and how to donate please visit the fund-raising site.

CIPR PR awards shortlisting

Text from press release issued August 29:

A Nottingham-based communications consultant has been shortlisted in the 2011 awards run by the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR).

Jonathan Cross, who runs the public relations (PR) business People, Words and Pictures, is through to the finals of the Midlands regional awards for PR Freelancer of the Year.

This follows his success in 2010 when he was named the CIPR’s Midlands PR Freelancer of the Year and was a finalist in the national Xchangeteam PR Freelancer of the Year awards. Earlier this year, Jonathan was named in the top 100 creative freelancers in the UK by The Drum magazine.

The 2011 CIPR Midlands black tie awards take place at Birmingham’s Hilton Metropole Hotel on Friday 2 December.

Jonathan, of West Bridgford, is a former local and national newspaper journalist and in-house PR director who set up his freelance business in 2008. His clients include small to medium sized businesses, voluntary sector organisations and public sector organisations including the NHS. His services include copywriting, media relations, corporate communications, corporate publications, social media, marketing and strategic public relations.

One of only a handful of chartered PR practitioners in the country, Jonathan said: “It’s pleasing to be in with a chance of retaining my Midlands award and I’d like to thank all the private and public sector organisations which provided testimonials in support of my work this year.”

There were more than 1,000 entries to the regional CIPR awards this year. Commenting on the shortlist, Jane Wilson CIPR chief executive, said: “The CIPR PRide Awards celebrate the best PR and campaigns from the profession across the UK. To be shortlisted for an award demonstrates exemplary achievement, impact and value – immediately putting their work in the spotlight. Congratulations to everyone for reaching this stage.”

Client testimonial

Testimonial from recent NHS client received today:

“I have been amazed at what we have been able to achieve in such a short space of time with the professional and innovative support we received from PWP Communications. We now have a practical, step-by-step operational communications plan to help us prioritise and deliver projects. This has helped us to influence internal stakeholders and secure extra resource in order to deliver what are now regarded as key priorities in raising our profile and keeping our patients informed and engaged. We also now have branding and website strategies in place and a new image library to support these. The input from PWP has been invaluable in helping us plan communications for an emerging organisation and we have already achieved some ‘quick win’ successes within a matter of weeks. I will be using PWP for strategic and practical support again.”

For the best in Nottingham and national PR:  see www.pwpcomms.co.uk or email enquiries@pwpcomms.co.uk

10 recommended web and social media sites for communicators to check out

Want to engage in web communications and social media and not just through the usual suspects like Twitter and Facebook? Have a look at our top ten list of other sites worth taking a look at:

Quora – www.quora.com – social media based on question and answer sharing

Mailchimp – www.mailchimp.com – the best in (free) email marketing

Prezi – www.prezi.com – like PowerPoint but looks good

MorgueFile – www.morguefile.com – a stock picture library but with free images

Bitly – www.bitly.com – shorten those URLs that you send round

Plaxo – www.plaxo.com/ – online address book

TagCrowd – www.tagcrowd.com/ – visualise your words

Social Mention – www.socialmention.com/ – the Google Alerts of social media

Xtranormal – www.xtranormal.com/ – make movies by typing

Issuu – www.issuu.com/ – publish page-turning magazines and newsletters

If you’re on the web, why not connect with us and join in the conversation – you can discover more about People, Words & Pictures on Twitter, Linked In and this blog.

For the best in Nottingham and national PR, visit People, Words & Pictures.

Videos, virals and vampires

Many aspects of social media are fun and creative and help enable social conversations that support the brand presence. Corporate videos and viral videos such as Crashproof, made by the agency ST16, look great and can get over messages either explicitly or rather more covertly. But how do you measure the impact of videos in engaging audiences and changing behaviour? Ultimately you’re looking for a strong correlation between your campaign objectives and key performance indicators. ST16, at a CIPR Midlands evening event this week at the Hilton Hotel near Castle Donington, suggested a number of ways to build up your video evaluation. These include looking at ‘product sales’, web hits, online feedback, likes/dislikes, followers, ratings, the analytics available on YouTube, and industry awards won. The agency has won an IVCA and all credit to them. You can see another one of their engaging efforts with the Northamptonshire vampire dentists. Great work.

PR freelancer – banging The Drum

“UK businesses are increasingly calling on freelancers to satisfy their creative and commercial needs, gaining tailor-made, expert skills for their business in the most convenient ways.

“Unwilling (or unable) to bear the cost of full-time employees for certain key skills – or just too busy to stretch their team any further – businesses increasingly call upon the self-employed to give them creative edge.”

That’s the view of The Drum magazine, a key trade journal for the marketing and creative industry. In their latest issue, they have named their top 100 creative industry freelancers in the country, and it is pleasing to be named among this list of illustrious peers.

The Drum adds: “The lure of the freelancer is plain to see: specialist skills as and when needed; businesses remain agile and versatile in an increasingly competitive world; opportunity to tap into and learn from expert knowledge.”

The magazine then comments on its top 100 list: “Our search for the most creative and the most reliable freelancers saw the industry asked for their nominations as to who are the best freelance creatives in the market. Hundreds of nominations were received and the most highly recommended were then invited to feature in this guide.

“Explore the supplement and the personal websites of all the freelancers to discover the high quality that is on offer across the UK… Each name contained in this feature has received endorsement from either agencies or clients that they have worked with.”

That’s probably enough banging the drum now for the freelance sector and this freelance in particular. If you were interested in exploring the website of PWP “to discover the high quality that is on offer” please visit www.pwpcomms.co.uk

What is public relations?

Loving the idea that a rather dull animated robot talking in too much detail about an academic critique of public relations could attract 800 views on the People, Words & Pictures YouTube channel. The video was produced following a long day being engrossed in anglo-American theoretical discussions of PR. What is public relations? Let the robot at the bar tell you more than you ever needed, or wanted, to know.

Xchangeteam PR awards finalist

A week on Thursday (March 31) the national UK recruitment agency Xchangeteam is holding its annual Freelancer of the Year awards at The Gallery Soho in London. Perhaps following on from my title as the CIPR Midlands PR Freelancer of the Year 2010, I have been fortunate enough to be entered into the Xchangeteam awards despite having never worked for the company. Having been nominated for their awards, I have now discovered that I have made it through to the finals of “the only awards in the UK dedicated entirely to that unsung hero of marketing, media and communications – the freelancer”. During my time, many years ago now, as a journalist I suppose I could have once qualified as a potential “Freeloader of the Year” so maybe this is overdue recognition. At least these awards are free to enter or be nominated for and the cost of attending the presentation ceremony is also free which makes a change from some money-making awards ventures in the industry. All credit to Xchangeteam for setting up and running the awards and I am looking forward to meeting representatives from the company and my PR peers on the evening. I believe I’m able to take a guest too, so if any associate, colleague or other contact fancies a trip along Charing Cross Road at the end of the month for wine and canapes, just let me know.

Pre-awards drinks at CIPR Awards Midlands 2010

A blog about blogs and the top ten list

In browsing Twitter this week, I was increasingly struck by the number of ‘how to’ tweets promoting lists. It seems anyone who is anyone in the creative industries has a handy top three/five/ten ways to do something involving social media and e-marketing with links back to their respective online company offer. If only life in general was as simple… To get to the end of this working week or to enjoy a fun weekend, all I need do is tick off these five top tips and I am surely guaranteed a successful outcome. To have a great day you surely must (a) get up, (b) get dressed, (c) meet people, (d) do important stuff well, and (e) stop doing stuff, watch the news for a bit and fall asleep. Tomorrow, repeat steps ‘a’ through to ‘e’.

Not to be outdone and admittedly as someone who likes lists anyway, I have decided to join the social media top tips bandwagon and blog about blogs. Inspiration for this article has also come from a client of People, Words & Pictures with a website based on a WordPress platform which through its design places significant attention on news stories. The client was concerned that they might not be able to generate sufficient news stories of interest or frequency to do justice to the focus of the site upon their latest news. PWP were asked to provide suggestions for the kind of stories they could write to ensure a regular flow of copy throughout the year. We came up with 30 ideas. So influenced by this work, PWPComms is pleased to provide a list of news stories to consider in talking about your business, which makes this a blog about blogging, similar to people who tweet about using Twitter or who call you up to tell you how to use the phone (no, maybe that doesn’t happen).

So, if you’re stuck for inspiration, about stories to promote on your blog, your website latest news section, or via press releases, why not consider…

The PWP blog list of ten top stories, in no particular order

1.       Announce a new business service

2.       Announce a new official social media site for your business

3.       Carry out a Survey Monkey survey and comment on industry trends

4.       Record a video and build a corporate YouTube site

5.       Develop a corporate responsibility offer – discuss pro bono work with a local charity

6.       Preview your involvement at conferences/seminars

7.       Consider the key numbers – 5, 10, 20, 21 – and announce a landmark related to such an achievement, eg 20 new clients – or celebrate an anniversary of the business

8.       Offer a discount or special deal – such as the recent PWP web copy amnesty (where businesses could own up to the awful jargon on their sites in return for polished, sparkling and meaningful new words)

9.       Enter and promote your business awards wins

10.   Link your business news in to a special day – my birthday next week for example is International Women’s Day (!) and pancake day, and who knows possibly also International Women’s Pancake Day.

11.   Make what you do different. This for example is now a top 11 list. Radical.

People, Words & Pictures Ltd – for the best in Nottingham PR and national PR.

Traditional media, social media and modern PR

Following on from the last blog post, summarising key findings from the recent annual barometer survey by Edelman, it is interesting to note another key point – the increasing dominance of online media as opposed to traditional media in seeking information about corporate business. In answer to the question relating to where people go to source information on news about a company, the survey found:

• Five per cent use social media
• Seven per cent ask their friends and family
• 11% look at the company website
• 12% use TV or radio
• 15% read newspapers and magazines
• 19% use online news sources
• And the highest figure – 29% use online search engines to seek out the information.

The survey, by worldwide PR firm Edeleman, gauges attitudes about the state of trust in business, government, NGOs and media across 23 countries. It is clear that it is crucial to have your reputation working for you online and through traditional media, with corporate messages working across all media platforms. It reflects the need within the PR industry to move on from the out-dated approach of basing the success of a campaign on the weight of cuttings, to more sophisticated measures that correlate to how people behave and source news in the modern world.