MarCom Professional

Ben Cotton started a blog in his final year at Leeds Metropolitan University and recently landed an award from the European Public Relations Education and Research Association – and a job in the digital team at Edelman. Here’s his view on the benefits of blogging for communication students.

“I started blogging in 2007 during my final year at Leeds Met. However, in Oct 2009 I wanted to change tact and produce something more social media orientated, in order to try and land a social media agency role. I’m a firm believer that having a sound grasp and recorded opinion on industry issues is a great way to differentiate yourself when job hunting.”

“I also wanted a fresh start using WordPress and to get away from the student angst posts e.g.

More...

In my role as a Senior Account Manager at eModeration, I work with a lot of Facebook Fan Pages. The 'must have' social media marketing item of the moment, they can be tricky devils to moderate, and that's why I was really pleased to come across this post by Nicole Landguth of Ogilvy PR, suggesting more of a two-way engagement with the fans via a full use of the avenues available on Facebook - for example, the Info tab, perfect as a customer service gateway, and (even more soothing to my internal raving) a clear explanation of page guidelines.

1. Who is Operating the Brand Page

Is this page run by the communications department, employee volunteers, the owner, a collaborations with fans, or someone else? Who can fans contact with administrative issues? No need to provide detailed bios, emails, and addresses here but you could if you as a person are part of the brand.I think this is a great idea... More...

Here’s an article that I’ve writtent for Reputation Online based on a presentation by media litigator Gideon Benaim, partner, Schillings Lawyers, at the CIPR Reputation Management conference in Manchester last month.

Mr Benaim made the case that social media is not beyond the reach of copyright, defamation or privacy laws. He cited cases where injunctions had been served on multiple ISPs as a defensive strategy to avoid the publication of sensitive corporate material and cautioned that rapid response was crucial.

  More...

Original Artwork by @Natasha

The state and future of Twitter is passionately debated as users and industry pundits explore whether or not the platform and the relationships that connect one another are in danger of slowing or worse, regressing.  Over the last year, Twitter experienced its most phenomenal growth to date, fueled by the adoption of the communication network by highly visible and influential personalities that attracted legions of new users to establish one-to-many and ultimately many-to-many connections. But, then the meteoric ascent practically leveled-off…

HubSpot released a new report that captures the state of the Twitterverse, opening a window that instantly transforms speculation into analysis and setting the stage for informed discourse and exploration. More...

Every website needs to have a blog or news update module. A blog is an easy way to create new pages on your website easily and efficiently without hiring a content writer and stressing about what you will say. Ideally, you will use your own customer service policies, schedules, and selling points for your business to update the blog.

Essentially, each blog post is a new page on your website. Each new page is like a raffle ticket that might draw a potential customer into your sales funnel. In addition, it also shows your site visitors that you are an active business that takes the time to stay on top of their website updating. More...

I’m truly excited to share some big news with you…

You are invited to the official debut of my next book Engage at SXSW Interactive.

On Saturday, March 13th at 11 a.m., I will take the day stage along with a special guest to discuss the book and its inspiration, intentions, and aspirations. A signing will immediately follow. To RSVP, click here.

To commemorate the release of Engage, I created a special introduction for all to enjoy and hopefully share.

Looking forward to celebrating with you…

Note: For the full effect, click “More” and view in “Full Screen” mode

(The official Website will go live soon)

Connect with Brian Solis: More...

The PRCA invited me to give a short presentation for one of its series of ‘Expert Briefings’ yesterday, this time on measuring digital, hosted by Ketchum Pleon. Up in the firing line with me were Fernando Rizo, head of digital at Ketchum Pleon, and Kristin Wadge, a director at Metrica. Although the three of us have quite varied clients, we all pretty much said the same core things:

• Metrics have to have real meaning to the business: they must be things we can learn from, and feed back into the development / strategy process.


• Online measurement must tie in to offline measurement. We set audience strategies ahead of channel strategies, and the ways to reach those audiences will be online and offline.

More...