Commentary by blog and social media consultant Josh Hallett on the use of blogs for public relations, media, marketing, communication & branding and from time-to-time the unsolicited opinion.
Update: If you've applied these tips to a conference blog, send me a link!
Having blogged a few conferences both on my own and with a team, I offer this quick 'how-to' for other groups looking to do the same. Feel free to use this to develop your conference blogging plan. Or you could just invite me to your conference :-)
At the most recent FPRA Annual Conference we had a team of four people blogging the event. Listed first are the tools we used. Following that, I'll talk some strategy.
The Tools
This is broken down into two major sections, hardware and software. As with everything, check to make sure all your tools are working ahead of time and that you know how to use them.
Hardware: Here is a list of the gear you'll need to lug around :-)
Laptop/PC/Mac - Obviously you'll need a way to post things online, laptops tend to work best at conferences :-) At this most recent event we had my PowerBook, two Dells and a ThinkPad.
Connectivity - You'll want some way to get online, either via wifi or a cellular technology such as Verizon EVDO. At the Ritz Carlton where the FPRA conference was held, there was not publicly available wifi in the conference rooms, but we had secured accounts in advance. As a back-up, one of the team had a Verizon EVDO card in his laptop.
Camera - Digital, point-and-shoot cameras work, but investing in a good DSLR will make a big difference. At FPRA I had a Nikon D70 and Chris had his Nikon D50. Make sure you have a way to easily transfer photos from the camera to your laptop.
Portable Audio Recorder - Some sort of device to record audio in digital format, MP3 is the best of course. I always carry an iRiver MP3 recorder. It features a built-in mic and a line-in jack to connect to external devices. A basic USB cable allows me to transfer the audio files.
Software: Make sure you're software is installed and ready to use. For web-based software, make sure you have an account.
Blog - Blogging a conference usually requires some sort of blog software :-) In some cases you can pick your platform, other times you'll need to work with the platform the conference is providing. For the FPRABlog we used MovableType.
Offline Blog Editor - Having an offline blog editor such as Ecto or Qumana can make a huge difference. Being able to compose your posts and then upload them in the proper format saves time. You might say, "I can use Word and then upload." Well sometimes that copy/paste from Word to the blog software can cause some formatting problems. An offline editor also helps when you have limited connectivity. At WOMMA this year we could not connect in the session rooms, but we could in the hallway. We would write our posts in Ecto, then step into the hallway to quickly post.
Flickr - If you're planning on taking more than a few pictures you'll want to use Flickr. The ability to upload, organize and include photos on your blog can't be beat.
Flickr Upload Tool - A dedicated Flickr upload tool can help speed things along. On the Mac I use the Flickr plugin for iPhoto from Connected Flow. I also have the standalone Flickr Uploadr tool installed. At the FPRA conference, our team installed the upload tool on their PCs as well.
Technorati - You'll want to use Technorati or some other blog search tool to track any conversation surrounding the conference.
Audio Editing Software - If you plan on doing any audio work you might need some tools to edit your audio files. In recent cases I have just posted the audio interviews as is without any editing. You learn to structure/format your interview in such a way that you can minimize or eliminate the need to edit your files.
FTP Software - Many blog tools have upload capabilities, but if you need to upload a large audio or video files FTP will work best. Like the Flickr Upload tools you can start a process and then move on to something else. Of course you'll need to have the proper username/password for FTP.
Strategy
The Team:
Not every organization has the luxury of having a large blogging staff (whether paid or volunteers). You might be all on your own, but having some helpers makes a big difference. If you plan to cover everything, your lowest common denominator is the maximum number of breakout sessions. For example if at some point there are four concurrent breakout sessions you'll need at least four bloggers to get the job done. For a standard 2-3 day conference here is my dream team of 3-4 folks:
Blog/Tech Guru - This person is ultimately responsible for everything that gets posted. They also provide tech support to the other bloggers. In addition they can take photos/upload them and do audio interviews as needed. In a pinch they will also write-up sessions.
Bloggers (2-3) - These are folks that can write good reviews of sessions as well as recaps of other events. It's a bonus if they can do some outreach and find other blogs or references that pertain to the conference/topic.
Photographer (Optional) - If you can swing it I would suggest having a dedicated person to handle photography. Their job is to take photos and more photos then upload them. If only we could clone Scott Beale.
Obviously knowing somebody ahead of time helps fill your roster. In other cases, do some research. Who blogs within the topic? Are they already coming to the conference? Is the organization willing to offer them a free registration in exchange for blogging? Many savvy organizations realize the benefits of conference blogs and will gladly offer free registration for bloggers.
Continue reading "How to Blog a Conference" »
You've heard it before, Google loves blogs. It's a by-product of the dynamic nature of the content and the frequency of inbound links from other blogs and web sites. Today's example? FPRABlog. Launched three days ago it's already #5 on Google for the search fpra.
The blog world is full of businesses that have jumped in with both feet, without knowing how deep the pool is. The majority of the time the mistakes are etiquette issues or just a general lack of knowledge in the space. Before you start to write a blog to promote your business here are just a few questions you need to answer/know. (perhaps these are a corollary to Jeremiah's list)
1. How long have you been reading blogs?
I don't know how many times I've said this, if you want to start a blog, start by reading other blogs first. The best answer for this question is 2-3 weeks at least. Reading blogs gives you an understanding of the tone and nature of the blogosphere. You'll also quickly learn what blogs are the authorities on certain subjects, which leads to...
2. Name the top five blogs in your industry/vertical?
I posed this question to a client today, they didn't have an answer, not good. Blogs are a conversation (getting tired of that line yet?), interaction with your readers and with other blogs is part of that dynamic. Knowing who are the key influencers and bloggers is absolutely necessary, which leads to...
3. Who writes them?
Relationships are key. You can't establish a relationship with a blog though. It's great that you know that blog X is the most influential blog in your segment but you need to know who writes it. Establish a dialog with that person. A good first start is via blog comments. But don't comment for the sake of commenting (that one's for Jeremy). Add something substantial to the conversation. By participating in the conversation you establish a relationship with the blogger, which leads to...
4. Do those five people know who you are?
If you need to communicate directly with a blogger will they immediately recognize your name on an incoming e-mail? You know how it works, in the mass of e-mail you receive you'll look at things from friends or contacts first. Having an established relationship helps with this. When you finally launch your blog and you want to 'get the word out' being able to reach out to your friends is very helpful. Case in point, the recent FPRA Blog Week event. Once we launched the blog I e-mailed a few friends and asked them to take a look and blog about it if they could. Quite a few of them have, traffic and awareness is building.
From here we can get into some of the planning and best practices for developing a blog, but that's for another day.
Update: Over at Talkshop Alexandra has some more thoughts about the planning of a business blog.
"Do you speak blog?" That's a statement I often make when speaking about blogs. To preface it, I'll do a quick blog search for a topic about a particular industry. I point out the list of blogs and bloggers that are talking about that subject (sometimes it's hundreds or thousands). Next I turn back to the audience and say here are people talking about you or your shared interests, they'd love to talk to you, but, "Do you speak blog?"
One of the few ways you can communicate with bloggers is via blogs. Sending an e-mail out of the blue can sometimes backfire. I realize there is no 'official' blog language and it can sound slightly elitist, but there is blog etiquette. For corporations, speaking blog is a difficult thing. It's especially difficult for organizations that have never really talked to their customers.
Last week I was at a client meeting, during my presentation I asked, "So when are you planning to launch X?" I received a quick response from a few members of the audience, "How do you know about X?" How do you think?
I pulled up a few blog posts that were talking about the launch of this new product. This of course shocked the client, but it happens all the time. In preparation for my meeting I had been monitoring the company name via watchlists in: PubSub, Technorati and Google News.
One new element that is appearing in my watchlists are job listings from Monster.com. Now I know what new markets they are expanding into..."Why are you hiring an account rep in X city?"
Need any more reasons to start using RSS to monitor your company/brand/client/competitor names? Many moons ago I wrote up this guide to media monitoring via RSS. It's badly in need up an update (on the to-do list), but the general information holds true.
Andrea Weckerle recently hit 99 posts on her blog. Congrats.
With this post I am at 992, but that doesn't matter. What matters is that when I look back at those first 99 posts I think, "Boy I didn't know what I was doing." Andrea's blog is good at 99, just imagine what it will be like at 999?
You learn by doing.
Greg Hoffman is learning all about spam blogs to protect his company from them.
The $300 software looks for datafeeds and automatically publishes the digests to a blog with related content so the owner can sell Google Adwords based on that content. You see, we lose money when people go to search for our company name and they are redirected to other sites with similar products. This does not make me happy. That's why I'm on this crusade.
You learn by doing.
I enjoy speaking to groups about blogs. Many times when speaking to PR professionals that lack any knowledge of the subject there are usually two basic reactions: 1. A look of horror because they fear loss of control. 2. A look of bewilderment since they're seeing all of this for the first time and can't take it all in. This is a stark contrast to speaking with PR students at various universities and colleges. They're general response is excitement. Why? Here are my thoughts.
For many students almost everything they learn in school are tools and tactics they'll use when the get a job and start to do 'real work'. There's not much of a need for press releases or media relations in the life of a college student. Blogging, however, is something they can do right now. Plus it's easy to do. They see examples of how one individual was able to impact public perception of a product/service/issue. It's a 'Hey, I can do that' moment.
Another factor is the 'prosumer' aspect of the process. A recent PEW study found that 57% of teens with internet access have created content online. They expect to be part of the process.
Of course a side benefit is the exposure they'll receive.
