NYC PR
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
In the center of trends and opinions and commerce, New York City is a perfect location as a heart of business and innovation. It is also the heart of American advertising and firms dot the floors of skyscrapers and office complexes. Each one promotes new and innovative ways to spend your money and new schemes to gain the public interest. All the while, the public is becoming more skeptical of advertising tactics. New York is a central location for strategizing about how to reach the nation, although not just for advertising. There are also NYC public relations firms that are tucked in offices around the city. These firms can garner coverage and get view impressions for less money than all the advertising agencies that NYC is so well known for.
I don't understand why PR is not taken into consideration more often when looking into marketing strategies. While the news may not reach the passive audience staring at television entertainment, it will reach those watching the news or seeking out print media and engaging in the reading. This seems to be a more promising lead. It also is trusted more than advertisements that are so overtly biased. Yes, advertising is important, but it's only a small, and rather expensive, piece of that puzzle.
So yes, by all means, come to NYC and look at your marketing opportunities. Find all the qualified talent the city is known for to get your product branded and keep it in the public spotlight. But when you do this, explore all avenues, including PR and SEO. Control the public discussion on multiple levels. I contend that your marketing campaign is incomplete without it.Labels: pr, seo
posted by Jessica Ek
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The Long Tail of Search
Monday, October 24, 2005
Once again, Google posts an incredible quarter, surpassing Wall Street expectations. Go, Google! My thoughts keep going to the long tail of search, a term credited to Wired magazine, circa October, 2004. This is where, according to Wired co-founder, and author of the new book, The Search, things get interesting, and indeed profitable, with search. Towards the left of the long-tail graph, search terms get increasingly more volume over a narrower diversity of words. This is where you find terms such as Britney Spears and Pokemon. But as you travel to the right of the graph, search volume over particular word combinations, and therefore competition for the traffic, also goes down. This is where you find terms connected to particular industries and markets, where there is plenty of money to be made, but which frankly is not part of the public consciousness, or zeitgeist.
And this is where search engine marketing makes the most sense. Why would you pay for all the unqualified traffic on a search term like Pokemon if you were not selling anything having to do with it? On the other hand, if you were in the relatively small and fiercely contested space of digital signage software, every sales lead is worth its weight in gold. Why? Because in addition to winning the lead for yourself, if you respond quickly and thoroughly, you just may keep the sales prospect from continuing their Web research, thereby preventing a competitor from ever getting the lead. And the common wisdom is to just run an AdSense pay-per-click campaign. And this common wisdom has now constituted a mainstream market for search terms, and is what's driving Google to the unexpected levels of profitability. It's not only desirable for a company to come up on its keywords. You might even say it's the duty of a company to do everything it ethically can to come up on the keywords associated with its company, product and markets.
But once again, I'm taking the position that the common wisdom is wrong—at least, in part. AdSense campaigns are a must in certain situations. But would you invest in a marketing campaign at the expense of the long-term infrastructure of your company? And natural search results should be viewed as part of your company infrastructure and assets, for when a paid keyword campaigns stop, the genuine editorial results continue. The problem is that it's difficult to the point of infuriating for the average company to work their way to the top of the search results on their most important keywords. And to make matters worse, they don't necessarily even know what keywords they should be targeting for maximum return. Before you know it, you have an unwieldy marketing campaign consisting of thousands of keywords, and an unhealthy reliance on a marketing campaign for traffic that could be yours through the modern day equivalent of positive word-of-mouth and reputation.
For the secret is that the further into the long tail of search that you travel, the harder it becomes to wage an effective PPC campaign, and the easier it becomes to get the search for free. As more words that are put into the search, the more precise the search criteria become, and the less important factors like PageRank become. In some of the most lucrative industries on the planet, there may perhaps be a small market of thousands of sales prospects. And you never precisely know where on the planet they are going to come from or what terms they are going to search on. So, a company is best served by writing prolifically, and with a genuine voice on their subject-matter. This has a two-fold benefit. First, it provides a corporate blogging strategy. Second, it appeases one of the most important criteria in search optimization—the continuous release of new, relevant content. A strategy of writing and optimizing over time increases the overall footprint of your website, and casts an ever-larger net for uniquely well pre-qualified and self-directed sales prospects, who are looking for you right now.Labels: Google, seo, The Long Tail
posted by Mike Levin
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Worthwhile Blogs
Friday, October 21, 2005
Out in the blogosphere, there are many interesting blogs that are must-reads and there are also many that aren't quite worth the visit. How do you separate the ones that will highlight interesting news and offer insightful commentary from those that read more like a Live Journal? Or how do you find the funniest blogs to entertain you during your Web surfing? We, at Connors, know how hard it is to find diamonds in the rough when it comes to blogs. We focus on blogs as part of our outreach and know the space well. So what do we read to keep us in-the-know? After a little internal survey, here is a review of some of our favorite blog destinations.
News Blogs
Blogs are great places to find news, especially in niche markets, and also see current commentary on the topic. As part news site and part blog, Slate is a good site due to its insights on current events. Another site that is frequented by us at Connors is Slashdot. This is a great place to look, especially since many of our clients are technology-related and are sometimes mentioned in the blog. It is pretty much a compilation of everything cutting edge that's going on and as one Connors PR rep put it, "Slashdot always has what I'm looking for." Or, if you're looking for news that's a bit off the beaten trail, Boing Boing points out the interesting, the bizarre, and the amusing from across the Internet.
Tech Blogs
Many of our more technical people and savvy programmers keep to date by following the influential blogs on business and tech. These include avc, John Batelle Search Blog, SEW Blog, ClickZ News, iPod Hack and Wired News. Among the responses, Matt Cutts was singled out as a good insider SEO blog and the Ask Jeeves Blog was noted as becoming a more interesting read since they bought BlogLines. For the latest in industry buzz, these are some good blogs to check out. For the latest news on high tech gadgets however, Engadget and Gizmodo have great reviews on the latest products.
Fun Blogs
Blogs come in all shapes and sizes. Many are not quite so serious. When we look for amusement and entertainment on the Web, there is another whole list of blogs to recommend. An in-house Milwaukee Brewers fan checks out Brew Crew Ball and Al's Ramblings for his baseball fix. For laughs about random things that people say, Overheard in New York and Overheard at the Office are also worth a visit.
Finding Blogs
When looking for just the right blog, you need to know your options. There are some great blog search engines out there. Some of the ones we check every day for vital news and information are Technorati, Blogpulse, Feedster, Blogsearch (Google), Blogdigger, Waypath, Intelliseek and Blog Runner. Surprisingly, there isn't just one single blog search engine that has stepped ahead of the crowd and delivers all the pertinent results, but we're on the look-out for one that will fill this role.
Out of all the blogs we look at and outreach to and monitor, these are the ones that keep us coming back. So take a look and perhaps you'll find a new favorite too. The world of blogs has a lot to say, but it's all about knowing who to listen to.Labels: blog, Connors Communications, pr
posted by Jessica Ek
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When Do I Post my Blog Entries?
Thursday, October 20, 2005
Okay, so you haven't been blogging as much lately and you want to get back into the habit. Suddenly, after a flurry of typing keys, you have a list of posts just waiting to be published. Should you post them?
If you post all your pieces at once, you will have a spark of activity to spur you back into writing and woo back your traffic. Yet if it once again becomes stagnant, then how effective is a blog that only updates in fits and starts? Is putting out a great post worth as much when it's quickly buried by subsequent entries?
If you wait and post your pieces one at a time on a daily basis, you may be lulled into not writing as many posts, but at least you'll try to set up a schedule. But by delaying posts, you have valuable web content that is not available as soon as it can be. And many bloggers argue that more content is always better.
This question intrigued me, so I asked around to see what others had to say. It appears that there is no "right answer" to my dilemma. However, the adage of "content is king" spurs me on to put up valuable content as soon as it is created. Although it may be good to set up a schedule to keep writing, there's no need to hold back content just to adhere to this. And I was advised that "a little randomness is always good to shake the search engine spiders up to keep them guessing."
Therefore, I believe the best option, especially for corporate blogging, is to have an editorial calendar, yet use it at a general guide and don't be afraid to follow your inspirations and post them immediately. Happy blogging!Labels: blog
posted by Jessica Ek
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Google is the Matrix?
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
Just like in the movie that was oh so big a few years ago, before the rest of the trilogy came along and ruined it, the world is full of supercomputers creating our current reality.
Okay….maybe not. But if our world itself isn't comprised of millions of lines of data, our Internet most certainly is. And every minute of every day, people from all over the world are flocking to search engines. Their ideas and interests are visible in a stream of searches leading to sites all across the Web. The Internet is a constant flicker of activity as people jump from page to page. Think of all the hits to your website, scrolling past in a constant march of glowing green data made famous in the movie. It's a digital representation of us and our search matrix, if you will.
In fact, don't just think about it; take a look. We welcome you to the Connors Search Engine Matrix. Relax, wait a minute, and watch the page come to life with search activity and history. A steady influx of visitors leaves their mark, adding to results. Look at what has brought people here. We have harnessed the flow of information that is filtered through Google, Yahoo! and MSN and is then siphoned off to our site. And this insight drives our SEO endeavors to create more search activity in a self-feeding cycle.
Perhaps Google is not the matrix. However, it is the compilation of thoughts, wishes, queries, hobbies, interests and quandaries of a society. And it scrolls past in glowing green text.Labels: Connors Communications, Google, seo, Yahoo
posted by Jessica Ek
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Emerging Technology
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
There is a level of excitement that is exuded from our bustling, loft office here at Connors. This energy is especially apparent when a new client walks in the door with an emerging technology that is simply electrifying in its potential.
Most of all, it's the knowledge that we can really make a difference in the future of a company that drives us forward. With the whole Connors team combined, we have amassed a whole lot of experience in tech companies and their PR campaigns. We have the media contacts and know the process for introducing a new technology to analysts. We know the possible friction of getting the new innovations accepted by the general public and how to position a message that can overcome this obstacle. We have, after all, been at the cutting edge for a long time now.
Back at the dawn of retail Internet, Connors was integral in launching such companies as Amazon.com and Priceline.com. We worked with their business models, potential markets and target audiences at the ground level. Through close ties to Idealab, we helped some of the most innovative companies get off the ground, such as GoTo.com/Overture Services and Picasa. These companies were later purchased by Yahoo! and Google, respectively. Breakthroughs like these have given us a name for being right there, when it happens, as soon as it happens. This has brought us industry-leading clientele with hot new products such as Vonage, SLOOH, Cablevision and Evolution Robotics. We continue to work on media relations for the newest of the new.
Each client poses new challenges and unique opportunities. We research the industry thoroughly and take this knowledge to craft a tailored plan for each client. It's exciting to have the know-how and depth of expertise that can help make a difference. We know we can succeed; we've done it before.
That's one of the main reasons Connors attracted me in the first place. It's a company that always has something new going on, specializing in helping emerging technologies recognize their potential through public relations. A client comes in with high expectations and we help them achieve these goals. That's something worth getting excited about. It's a lot of fun to know you're on the cusp of something important and it's rewarding to see a client succeeding due in part to your efforts. I think that may be why a lot of us are here.Labels: Connors Communications, Google, pr, Yahoo
posted by Jessica Ek
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Marketing Communications
Monday, October 10, 2005
In business, the word communications can mean a lot of different things. To some it means telecom, yet we use it more to mean in the realm of marketing (sometimes called marcom). While marketing can broadly apply to both advertising and public relations, it is a field in and of itself which can lead people to be confused. As a public relations firm, Connors helps companies craft their messages to be found by reporters, consumers and analysts through our established relationships with people influential in the industry along with tools like newswires and search engines. Yet we do not do so through advertising in any medium (be it print, broadcast, or paid search). Though advertising can be effective in reinforcing your brand, to some it is more of a one-way communication vehicle. Public relations, on the other hand, is concerned with facilitating credible, two-way dialogue between experts and researchers (which could be either journalists or the general public). In essence, PR and natural search help people find what they're looking for while advertising tells them.Labels: Connors Communications, outreach, pr
posted by Adam Edwards
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Filling the Gaps: SEO Copywriting Strategy
Thursday, October 06, 2005
What do you write about when what you do write about doesn't matter?
I saw this article today. It's another piece on how to make SEO copywriting effective. Being a copywriter myself, I'm very interested in these articles and, as they come out, I jump to see if they have any insights into SEO writing that I may have missed.
http://www.mediasyndicate.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=1931
However, they all seem to be more or less the same. The title is the most important part, as well as any other short pieces of writing that stand out from the main text, such as bulleted points, the first sentence in each paragraph and any photo captions. Why? The internet is drowning in text and much of it will only be scanned and never read. I've seen plenty of advice on how to optimize the few, crucial phrases that are most likely to be read, but what about the rest? Is it merely an exercise in filling the digital page?
While the advice offered is worthwhile, I think the main text does not get nearly the attention it deserves. I would like to argue that this text is actually very important. Yes, most text gets skimmed, but some will certainly be read. Think how much you read online everyday. And even if it doesn't, this text is still important for search engines. Writing about a subject is bound to bring up more related words and these words will in turn bring in more searchers on varied phrases that you may not have thought to target. So every single word you write can become a piece of valuable market research on what your consumers are looking for. Filler text is so much more than an alternative to lorem ipsum copy. It's a chance to be relevant and interesting and experimental. Hone your craft.
Yes, we all need to have intriguing and keyword-rich titles, but there's more to it than that. After all, if all you're doing is writing to fill space between the introduction and conclusion, why would anyone take the time to read it?Labels: media, search, seo
posted by Jessica Ek
1 comments
White Hat vs. Black Hat SEO in PR
Wednesday, October 05, 2005
I found an interesting article today on the difference between white hat and black hat SEO. It provides the following chart to distinguish the differences:
SEO Criteria
White Hat Black Hat
Rules Play by the rules There are no rules
Text/technology Focus on text Heavily leverage technology
Strengths of Optimizer Marketing IT/Programming
Speed Take time/invest Get it done NOW
http://www.marketingprofs.com/5/fielding1.asp
This made a lot of sense to me. At Connors, we focus on white hat and this chart shows just how much PR is involved in white hat SEO. It's all about marketing and it takes time to build a brand and gain the trust of the consumer. Searchers are becoming very savvy and are recognizing SEO spamming techniques. This can result in a very negative backlash, with low search hits no matter where on the page you've managed to appear. The way to bring them to your site and stay there is not a win-at-all-costs campaign with only keyword stuffing and backend programming. It involves taking the time to build an online image and creating text that invokes trust. This text, in conjuction with relevant programming and linking techniques can bring you, legitimately, to the top of the results. PR involves playing by the rules of the publication and SEO involves playing by the rules of the search engines, resulting in what amounts to a third-party validation of your company. And that result is more than you could achieve with any black hat campaign.Labels: Connors Communications, pr, seo
posted by Jessica Ek
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How do you start a corporate blog?
Monday, October 03, 2005
It's time to let down your hair a bit and talk about the company. Talk about ideas, opinions, thoughts and goals. But what is the company voice and how does it become informal enough to blog? How do you take the connection that blogs have formed on the internet and use it to give your company its own representation online beyond just the formal website? How do you really let people into your head and, in a company with many people and lots of idea, whose head do you offer? I've been invited to blog here and as I begin contributing, I've been pondering these issues.
The first point to tackle would be the purpose of the blog. Some are like live journals, others are merely posting interesting news from other sites and still more are more like personal editorial columns. After blogging for a while, I've come to think that the best blogs are a mix of all three. And once you start it's even easier to add more as it comes up. Don't worry about organization, a blog is chronological and that's really all the order it really needs. So just write.
What does a company have to say at this level that is not specifically sent out in press releases and interviews? Well, muse a bit on your place in the industry. Think about where you think the industry is headed in the future. You know it better than most people do. What's going on presently in the industry? While you may be tracking this carefully, other people will not have as much insight on this specific area of current events. This opens up a wide range of interesting topics and you suddenly have more to talk about than you originally thought.
Although, a blog is also part editorial and this poses an interesting quandary. While individual opinions may be along the same lines as the company, they may not necessarily be exactly the same on every point. So to what degree do you match the company and to what degree do you right your own thoughts on the subject matter? Newspaper editorials could once be taken as the view of the newspaper's owners. But now whose view is it? The board members? The editors? With so many different opinions in the mix, today's editorials most closely reflect the individual writer's view. In blogging, this might also be the case. Blogging on interesting subjects and heartfelt opinions will nearly always be more valuable than restating company mission statements. Because what, after all, is a company if not the conglomeration of many people with many opinions. So the more people you have blogging individually about what matters to them within the business, the better a representation you will have and the more interesting a blog you will create. And blogging in the company's interest as well as blogging about your own insights are certainly not incompatible.
Finally, the most important lesson I've learned while blogging is that if it interests you, people will want to read it. Write about what you care about and it will be interesting. Put some of yourself into it and it will be intriguing. Putting a personal face on your company means that you need to be engaged with the subject matter and the audience whether or not they're talking back. Not to be cheesy, but if you write it, they will come, truly. You're here, aren't you?Labels: blog, search
posted by Jessica Ek
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