Category: For Immediate Release

Three PR agency thought leaders were on the panel: Gerry Corbett, Phil Gomes, and Joe Thornley. Our topics included…

• A couple brands — Ford and Skittles — had a chance to market themselves in real time when their names were invoked during the presidential campaign. Both declined, sticking strictly with public affairs messages. Is real-time marketing over? (And how did Ford and the UAW do when they responded to allegations claimed during the first debate?)
• Sir Martin Sorrell, CEO of WPP, thinks the future of PR is integration with other disciplines, focused on digital and data. Is he a visionary or just catching up? And what’s the future of traditional PR?
• Who would want to be part of the communications team at Wells Fargo these days? The panel looks at everything that the bank has done wrong from a crisis communication perspective.
• Scientific American ran an expose into practices by the U.S. FDA and other government agencies and scientific organizations designed to control the press and prevent publication of interviews with people who might have opposing points of view. One practice, the “close-hold embargo,” was new to everyone on the panel. But would they advise clients to give it a try?
• Dan York reports on the expiration of the IANA contract and the politically-motivated opposition that demonstrated a remarkable lack of understanding of just what was really happening. Internet Society employees who supported their employer’s point of view were trolled. How can other companies prepare their employees for some truly vile backlash to their efforts to advocate on behalf of their employer?
• Moz’s founder wrote a post that was a model of transparency and detail in the wake of layoffs and a repositioning of its offerings. In the process, he shared some disdain for the idea of “inbound marketing.”

Connect with our panelists on Twitter at @gerardcorbett, @philgomes, and @thornley.

Links to the source material for this episode are on Contentle.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

About today’s panel:

Gerard Corbett is Chair and CEO of strategic communications consulting firm Redphlag LLC., Founder and Partner of Wise Counsel, and CMO of real estate tech startup Producers Forum, Inc. in Palo Alto. He also is an award-winning career coach, blogger and Past Chair & CEO of the 32,000 member Public Relations Society of America, having served as Chair and CEO in 2012. Gerry is a versatile branding, marketing, public relations and communications executive and coach having served four decades in senior marketing and communications roles at Global Fortune 100 firms and earlier in his career in aerospace engineering and information technology with Silicon Valley firms and NASA.

Phil Gomes is senior vice president at Edelman, working in U.S. B2B Digital, advanced community engagement and special situations, a role he developed that focuses on preparing clients for advanced issues and special situations regarding online corporate reputation and emerging technologies. Phil has been with Edelman since 2005; before that he was with Dryden Marketing Group working as a media programs manager. Phil co-founded CREWE – Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Engagement, and he’s a founding fellow of the Society for New Communications Research. Phil was a recent FIR Interviews guest talking about blockchains and their potential role in communications, a topic that will come up again in today’s show.

Joseph Thornley Joseph Thornley is CEO of Thornley Fallis Communications, which comprises several well-known brands:

• Thornley Fallis Communications, a digital engagement and communications consultancy,
• 76design, a digital design and software development studio
• 76engage, an online public participation platform,
• 76insights, an analytics tool focusing on the resonance of social objects and gestures, and
• 76BrandFilms, a video studio.

Joe recognized early the power of social media to change extend and transform our relationships to one another and the institutions in our society. He actively uses social media to explore the evolution of those relationships. Since 2005, he has blogged a ProPr.ca, and is co-host with Gini Dietrich and Martin Waxman of the Inside PR podcast, which, since its launch in March 2006, is now the second longest continuously running public relations podcast. (Shel Holtz’s FIR For Immediate Release podcast is the longest continuously running PR podcast.). He is @thornley on Twitter, thornley10 on YouTube and Joseph Thornley on Google+ and Facebook.

The post FIR #55: Beating Back the Trolls appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Employee engagement was a constant theme in this week’s conversation with iCology founder Chuck Gose, internal communication measurement thought leader Angela Sinickas, and BBVA’s global head of employee communication, Peter Vogt. (Don’t worry; if you’re not involved with employee communication, there’s plenty to sink your teeth into in this episode for you, too.) Our topics included…

• A Harvard Business Review article suggests there’s a dark side to engagement.
• Internal communication departments are not adopting mobile solutions.
• There’s your corporate brand, your product brand, and your employer brand. Is that enough, or do you also need a talent brand?
• Can employer branding improve your internal communications?
• The best places to work seem to get engagement right.
• Millennials increasingly drive employee culture, particularly as they move into management.
• Company missions aren’t resonating with employees, according to Gallup.
• Starbucks’ “Upstanders” program was suggested by an employee during a town hall meeting.
• Dan York’s tech report focuses on messaging.

Connect with our panelists on Twitter at @chuckgose, @sinickasa, and @plvchicago.

Links to the source material for this episode are on Contentle.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

About today’s panel:

Chuck Gose is the founder of ICology, a resource dedicated to “interesting people doing interesting things in the world of internal communications.” As part of iCology, Chuck hosts the ICology podcast, which features practitioners and experts sharing their advice and insights. As the Corporate Communication Practice Leader and Sales Director at BroadSign, Chuck knows software isn’t the end-all solution and takes a very hands-on approach with clients to ensure they develop a solid digital internal communication strategy. Chuck works directly with clients to ensure any new technology maximizes its impact through consultation and a solid strategy.

Angela Sinickas is the founder of Sinickas Communications, which has worked with companies, organizations and governments in 32 countries on six continents. Her clients include 25% of the Forbes Top 100 largest global companies. Before starting her own consulting firm, she held positions from editor to vice president in for-profit and government organizations, and worked as a senior consultant and practice leader at Hewitt and Mercer. She is author of a manual, How to Measure Your Communication Programs (now in its third edition),and chapters in several books. Her 50+ articles in professional journals can be found on her website,www.sinicom.com. Her work has been recognized with 20 international-level Gold Quill Awards from IABC, plus her firm was named IABC Boutique Agency of the Year in 2015. She holds a BS degree in Journalism from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and an MS in Leadership from Northeastern University.

Peter Vogt  is helping drive BBVA’s cultural transformation through the creation of its Employee Value Proposition, defining an end to end employee experience, and driving an exceptional conversation with our people everywhere. There’s nothing better than creating a company of 138,000 brand advocates who truly believe in the power of the company’s purpose. Before joining BBVA (and moving to Madrid), Vogt was CEO of Keystone Richmond Communications, based in San Francisco. He was also vice president of Employment Brand for Visa and senior director of Employee Brand Strategy for eBay (where he progressed through several employee-focused positions). Peter was Internal Communications Director at Microsoft and the Asia Pacific Communication Practice Leader for Watson Wyatt.

The post FIR #54: Our most engaging episode appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

We recorded on Talk Like a Pirate Day, so I used a pirate name generator to give each of our panelists a pirate name. Today’s panel features Owner Media Group CEO Chris Brogan (Samson “Commodore Chops” Drinkwater, “The Drunkard of Ghost Lake!”), MarketingProfs Chief Content Officer Ann Handley (Mary “Jolly Brute” Quick, “The Plunderer of Crocodile Islet!”), and Scott Monty (Edwin “Soft Heart” Penwith, “The Jewel of Alligator Bight!”) of Scott Monty Strategies. Our topics included…

• Twitter — lots and lots of Twitter. The first broadcast of the NFL’s Thursday Night Football on Twitter, a deal with Cheddar to broadcast a live close-of-market video wrap-up, the introduction of Twitter apps for viewing live video on TV screens (no Roku app, sadly), the roll-out of new features (including ways to cram more into your 140 characters) and some features to make your customer service effort more prominent, and the Economist’s view that Twitter’s window for becoming a major player in social media has closed.
• The shift from big-name celebrity influencers to niche influencers, as characterized by the number of Muslim women sought by influencers to reach Generation M, young, affluent Muslim Millennials.
• YouTube’s accommodation of advertisers who don’t want their adds attached to videos their customers might find offensive and how it has alienated a lot of YouTube creators. We also discussed the launch of “Community,” which lets YouTube creators engage in real time with their subscribers.
• MarketingProfs published a story reporting on research about the kinds of subject lines journalists like to see in email pitches from PR people.
• Ikea has joined the small group of advertisers that touch on unpleasant topics (divorce, in this case).
• Organic reach may be dead on Facebook, but 97% of the top brands still rely on it.
• Instagram has introduced comment filtering.
• Instagram was also the most engaged-with social channel when it came to back-to-school. (And the brands that got the most engagement weren’t the ones that posted the most.)

Connect with our panelists on Twitter at @chrisbrogan, @annhandley, and @scottmonty.

Links to the source material for this episode are on Contentle.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

About today’s panel:

Chris Brogan is CEO of Owner Media Group. He’s also the New York Times bestselling author of nine books and counting. His latest is Find Your Writing Voice. Chris has spoken for or consulted with the biggest brands you know, including Disney, Coke, Google, GM, Microsoft, Coldwell Banker, Titleist, Scotts, Humana Health, Cisco, Sony USA, and many more. He has appeared on the Dr. Phil Show, interviewed Richard Branson for a cover story for Success magazine, and even presented to a Princess once. Forbes listed Chris as one of the “Must Follow Marketing Minds of 2014,” plus listed his website as one of the 100 best websites for entrepreneurs. Statsocial rated him the #3 power influencer online.

Ann Handley speaks and writes about how you can rethink the way your business markets. Cited in Forbes as the most influential woman in social media and recognized by ForbesWoman as one of the top 20 women bloggers, Ann Handley is the Chief Content Officer of MarketingProfs, a training and education company with the largest community of marketers in its category. Her book, Everybody Writes: Your Go-to Guide to Creating Ridiculously Good Content (Wiley), is a Wall Street Journal bestseller. She is a former monthly columnist for Entrepreneur magazine, a member of the LinkedIn Influencer program , and co-author of the best-selling book on content marketing, Content Rules: How to Create Killer Blogs, Podcasts, Videos, Ebooks, Webinars (and More) That Engage Customers and Ignite Your Business. She currently has 350,000 followers on Twitter and writes about content, marketing and life here at AnnHandley.com. A pioneer in digital marketing, Ann is the co-founder of ClickZ.com, which was one of the first sources of interactive marketing news and commentary.

Scott Monty is an internationally recognized leader in digital communications, digital transformation, social media and marketing. As principal of Scott Monty Strategies, he counsels brands and agencies on strategy, executive communications, influencer management, the customer experience, and digital initiatives. Scott spent six years at Ford Motor Company, as a strategic advisor on crisis communications, influencer relations, digital customer service, innovative product launches and more. He is a board member of the American Marketing Association and an advisor for RPM Ventures,My Dealer Service, and Crowd Companies. He writes about the changing landscape of business, technology, communications, marketing and leadership at ScottMonty.com and is the executive editor and co-host of the Sherlock Holmes website and podcast I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere.

The post FIR #53: PewDiePie is not happy appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Today’s panel features social media and communications consultant Richard Binhammer, Zoetica Media CEO Kami Huyse, and Little Bird co-founder and board chairman Marshall Kirkpatrick. Our topics included…

• The “Social Contract with Patients” published by Allergan’s CEO that outlined the company’s commitment to restrict price increases for its drugs; the post also referred to those who boost their drug prices “outliers” who threaten the ecosystem.
• eMarketer’s projection that Snapchat will earn almost $1 billion in ad revenue next year and how communicators should start taking advantage of the service
• Ford Motor Company’s move into businesses other than making cars for individuals to buy (because they’ve seen the writing on the wall for individual car ownership) and what it means for communicators when the vehicles people ride in become moving entertainment systems
• The state of influencer marketing
• Why the presidential candidates aren’t making use of some of the newer social media channels
• The sorry state of social media engagement (and whether Google rewards high social share counts)
• Dan York talks about the misunderstanding that has become a political issue over the U.S. “giving up control of the Internet” (it’s not)

Connect with our panelists on Twitter at @rbinhammer, @KamiChat, and @marshallk.

Links to the source material for this episode are on Contentle.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

About today’s panel:

Richard Binhammer is one of the first adopters of social media for business. In 2006, he became active in social media by engaging with bloggers who were using their new-found influence to impact brands and corporate reputations. From these beginnings of monitoring blogs through simple web searches, he became an early adopter of Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and Pinterest, leading to strategic adoption of social networks for business purposes. He currently consults on social media strategies, skills assessments/training programs and corporate communications efforts. From 2006-2012, he was a widely acclaimed corporate leader in experimenting, adopting, analyzing and deploying social media as a tool to help business be social and do better business. As director on Dell’s Social Media and Community team, he was also responsible for communications, social relations and training while continuing to be active in Dell’s social media outreach and overall adoption across the company. Before Dell, he worked with several communications consulting agencies in St. Louis and New York and worked in Canada as a political aide to senior cabinet ministers.

Kami Huyse founded Zoetica Media. She writes an award-winning blog, Zoetica Talks, on the topic of public relations and social media strategy. Kami is a national leader in the use of social media for public relations. She speaks at social media events and conferences all over the country and her work in social media has earned her the SNCR’s 2008 Reputation Management award and IABC’s 2009 Gold Quill of Excellence Award. Kami was a 2010 fellow of the Society for New Communications Research where she pursued a study on how cause marketing in social communities can benefit companies. She is also the co-founder and organizer of the Social Media Breakfast Houston.

After a successful career blazing trails in new media as one of the top tech bloggers in the world (first hired writer at TechCrunch, co-editor of ReadWriteWeb), Marshall Kirkpatrick now leads the Little Bird team building software for enterprise marketers to do research, real-time market intelligence and marketing amplification. It’s for influencer marketing, content marketing, and research.

The post FIR #52: All About Influence appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Today’s panel features Jen McClure, who founded the Society for New Communication research; business blogging pioneer Lionel Menchaca; and PR agency president Sherrilynne Starkie. Our topics included…

• Whether the Epi-Pen crisis would ever have happened without social media and how companies now need to think about “business as usual”
• The value of some kinds of hashtags (or lack thereof)
• AT&T’s self-righteous post reacting to Google’s fiber decision
• Mattel’s Barbie is now a paid Instagram influencer
• How times have changed! Four out of five journalists rely on social engagement
• Kimberly-Clark’s hit YouTube series based on a 17th-century vampire novel
• A consortium of tech companies is exploring ethics for Artifical Intelligence, which is bound to be used by communicators sooner than you may think
• Dan York’s report look at two Facebook announcements: Messenger now lets you share video while you’re texting and Facebook says your site must be mobile-friendly or your ads will suffer

Connect with our panelists on Twitter at @jenmcclure_JEM, @lionelgeek, and @sherrilynne.

Links to the source material for this episode are on Contentle.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

About today’s panel:

Jen McClure is CEO of JEM Consulting & Advisory Services. Prior to founding JEM, Jen was Vice President of Digital & Social Media and the head of the Digital Center of Excellence at Thomson Reuters. In 2005, Ms. McClure founded the Society for New Communications Research, a nonprofit research and education foundation and think tank and was President of the Board of Directors from 2005-2016, when the organization merged with The Conference Board. She now chairs the Advisory Board of the new organization.

Lionel Menchaca serves as director of Corporate & Strategy for W2O Group. In this role, he helps clients of all sizes to develop content and engagement strategies so they can connect directly with customers. He’s worked extensively on social media training for organizations and on helping organizations build and launch employee advocacy programs. He also works with teams of developers to build tools companies need to manage an increasingly complex flow of content. Before W2O, Lionel worked at Dell for 18 years and was the founder and chief blogger of Direct2Dell, Dell’s main corporate blog. Over the last 7 years, Lionel authored hundreds of posts on behalf of Dell. He helped expand it into several continues to extend Dell’s global presence. Before the blog, Lionel was one of the main architects behind Dell’s blog monitoring process begun in April 2006. He was Dell’s first full time employee paid to handle social media efforts.

For more than 20 years, Sherrilynne Starkie has been providing communications consulting and services to blue-chip organizations in Britain, Canada and the United States. She focuses on helping clients leverage digital and social media to achieve organizational objectives.  As President at Thornley Fallis, Sherrilynne is responsible for the profitable operation of the communications business including client strategy overview, business development, HR, quality assurance, marketing and team development. She is a blogger, an occasional contributor and is very active on social media. Recently, she’s been a speaker at the IABC World Conference, SXSWi, WTC and the UA Canada National Conference.  She is an active volunteer with IABC Ottawa has volunteered with many other organizations.

The post FIR #51: A real plastic influencer appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Welcome to episode #13 of For Immediate Release. This week’s panel includes Paul Gillin, a speaker, author, and consultant specializing in social media for B2B companies; Phil Gomes, senior vice president at Edelman working in B2B Digital, advanced community engagement, and special situations; and Heidi Miller, a content marketing specialist and chief conversation officer at Spoken Communications, a cloud-based contact-center-as-a-service provider.

In today’s episode, we covered these topics:

• In the season when predictions for the new year are as plentiful as food photos, we take a look at five social media trends from Hootsuite CEO Ryan Holmes
• Our panelists share their top predictions for 2016
• A quick look at some video trends for the new year
• In texting, punctuation conveys different emotions; ending a sentence with a period is viewed as insincere, according to research.
• Reuters has banned freelance photographers from submitting RAW images, citing speed and ethics.
• Does the fact that someone liked Donald Trump’s Facebook page mean they like the candidate — and would you unfriend someone over that?
• A year-end review of the best native advertising demonstrates how these kinds of ads can be effective and ethical.
• Dan York reports on WordPress 4.4, Matt Mullenweg’s annual State of the Word post, and WSIS +10 (a meeting that could shape how the Internet is governed for the next decade)
• There’s a new Content Marketing Handbook dedicated to helping content marketers write about data
• Periscope is Apple’s iPhone App of the Year. What does that say about the future of live video streaming?
• Why are social causes easy to launch in social media but difficult to sustain?
• Should robots take over contact center jobs?

Connect with this week’s panelists on twitter at @pgillin, @philgomes, and @heidimiller.

Links to the source material for this episode are on Delicious.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

About this week’s panel

Paul Gillin writes, speaks, and trains marketers and corporate executives to think like publishers as part of Profitecture. He specializes in social media for B2B companies – in fact, he co-wrote Social Marketing to the Business Customer with Eric Schwartzman (who was an FIR panelist last week) and currently co-hosts FIR B2B with Eric. Paul has written four other books, including Attack of the Customers, his most recent book. He co-authored The Joy of Geocaching with his wife, Dana. Before striking out on his own, Paul worked for TechTarget and, before that, was editor-in-chief and executive editor of Computerworld Magazine.

Phil Gomes is senior vice president at Edelman, working in U.S. B2B Digital, advanced community engagement and special situations, a role he developed that focuses on preparing clients for advanced issues and special situations regarding online corporate reputation and emerging technologies. Phil has been with Edelman since 2005; before that he was with Dryden Marketing Group working as a media programs manager. Phil co-founded CREWE – Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Engagement, and he’s a founding fellow of the Society for New Communications Research. Phil was a recent FIR Interviews guest talking about blockchains and their potential role in communications, a topic that will come up again in today’s show.

Heidi Miller is Chief Conversation Officer at Spoken Communications, a provider of a Contact Center as a Service cloud platform. Heidi is a Content marketing specialist who helps organizations achieve strategized communication and marketing goals by engaging online and offline communities. She is a frequent speaker and is the author of the blog, Talk It Up. Heidi is also a very early podcaster, hosting Diary of a Shameless Self Promoter back in the earliest days of podcasting.

The post FIR #13: The robots are coming appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Welcome to episode #12 of For Immediate Release. This week’s panel includes Deirdre Breakridge, CEO of Pure Performance Communications, speaker, and author of multiple books; Neville Hobson, former co-host of this very podcast, blogger, and independent consultant; and Eric Schwartzman, CEO of Comply Socially, podcaster, and consultant.

In today’s episode, we covered these topics:

• Lewis PR has dropped “PR” from the company name; it’s just Lewis. The firm asserts it’s because they offer a broader scope of communication services, although PR remains “core” to its services. Is there an underlying belief that “PR” is confusing or limiting as part of an agency’s name?
• The fourth annual Creativity in Public Relations report is out, showing that clients are turning to PR agencies far more these days for creativity and agencies are investing more in its creative capabilities. Nobody seems quite sure, though, just what “creativity’ means.
• Three online (and printed) PR initiatives worth discussing: Futureproof, a collaborative book dubbed “the biggest conversation ever about the future of public relations,” #PRTech, an online resource addressing the intersection of public relations and technology, and #PRStack, a series of case studies now in its second edition.
• What books should communicators read during the holidays?
• Should brands podcast? GE is, and it has nabbed the top spot on iTunes. But is it a good idea for every brand? (Hint: It depends.)
• Dan York reports on GitBook, Twitter’s new look for photos, telcos’ attempts to eliminate the FCC’s Net Neutrality rules, and Snapchat’s reporting on last week’s shootings in San Bernadino, California.
• KMPG is dropping employee engagement surveys in a pilot test because (they claim) engagement is poorly defined and metrics aren’t useful. Really?
• How should brands decide whether to invest their time in Instagram versus Snapchat?

Connect with this week’s panelists on twitter at @dbreakenridge, @jangles, and @ericschwartzman.

Links to the source material for this episode are on Delicious.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

About this week’s panel

Deirdre Breakridge has been in PR and marketing for more than 25 years helping senior executives in mid-to-large organizations communicate to their stakeholders. She’s currently CEO of Pure Performance Communications, which she started in 2011. Pure Performance specializes in integrated marketing strategy, training, and workshops. Before that, she was president of Mangol Marketing, and was an adjunct professor at NYU. She co-authored Putting the Public Back in Public Relations with Brian Solis – and appeared with Brian in an FIR interview about the book back in 2009. She also wrote Social Media and Public Relations: Eight New Practices for the PR Professional.

Neville Hobson co-hosted this show for 10 years and 8 months, up just a few months ago. Neville is based in Bracknell, outside of London in England where he analyzes trends, behaviors and practices in digital communication. As an independent consultant for the last 11 years, he’s focused on social business, the collaborative economy, wearable technologies, and the professionalism of PR. He also held a position with WCG as head of social media for Europe, and was VP of Corporate Communication for Scala Business Solutions in Amsterdam.

Eric Schwartzman is the co-host of FIR B2B here on the FIR Podcast Network. He was the host of a terrific early-days podcast called On the Record Online – Neville and I were both religious listeners — and he was a regular contributor of reports to FIR. When we first met, Eric was director of Promotions for Rogers & Cowan, a Hollywood-focused agency. He went on to found iPressroom, one of the early online newsroom offerings, and currently is running ComplySocially, which offers a library of self-paced elarning courses to help organizations manage online employee advocacy campaigns and ecommerce functionality.

The post FIR #12: Is PR a bad word? appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Welcome to episode #11 of For Immediate Release. This week’s panel includes Chris Brogan, CEO of Owner Media Group, speaker, and bestselling author; Chris Christensen, CEO of BloggerBridge.com and host of The Amateur Traveler podcast; and Christine Perkett, CEO of PerkettPR and SeeDepth, an analytics tool for measuring the effectiveness of public relations.

In this episode, we covered these topics:

• “Growth-hacking” content strategies as one of the major trends that will rewrite the PR playbook. (Others include deeper customer insights and the need to analyze multiple data sources, measurement and metrics, and social purpose and brand activism.)
• How brands are using Periscope despite its uncertainties, what they like about it, and why perhaps some of them shouldn’t be rushing to adopt it. (Hint: It’s a lot like older tools we don’t use much anymore.)
• Has print’s demise been overhyped? Book sales are rising as e-book sales decline. What does this mean for the use of print in organizational communications?
• A report suggests TechCrunch isn’t making good on its promise to produce articles to winners of its SiriusXM radio show, Pitch-Off. There are ethical implications for journalists offering articles in exchange for anything, and even more when they don’t deliver on their promises.
• Aer Lingus has given social media responsibilities to an employee who is suing the company. What does this say about how carefully organizations consider to whom they’re handing their microphones?
• There’s no question the lines are blurring between PR, marketing, advertising, SEO, and content marketing. This doesn’t spell the end for public relations, but it does suggest the direction of PR’s evolution.
• Dan York reports on the latest hack of customer data and companies’ need to have a plan in place to address it when it happens to you, a Facebook post from Jeremiah Owyang that suggests Facebook is taking over pretty much everything people want to do online, and a new WordPress interface and Mac app (and whether we need to embrace tools like this to prevent walled gardens from killing the free and open web).
• The panel launched into a discussion about Dan’s last item — do walled gardens like Facebook spell doom for the free and open web?
• Small companies are using audio to build the brands. Podcasts are great, but is there value in sharing music playlists?

Connect with this week’s panelists on Twitter at @missusP, @chris2x, and @chrisbrogan.

Links to the source material for this episode are on Delicious.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

Join us next week for our 11th episode. Joining host Shel Holtz are Deirdre Breakenridge, CEO of Pure Performance Communications; Eric Schwartzman, co-host of FIR B2B and founder of Comply Socially; and (fanfare, please), returning to FIR for the first time since his departure from podcasting in October, Neville Hobson, co-founder of For Immediate Release, 10-year-plus co-host of The Hobson & Holtz Report, and London-based independent communication consultant.

About this week’s panel

Chris Brogan is CEO of Owner Media Group, which provides business systems for personal leadership. He is also a professional speaker and the New York Times bestselling author of eight books and counting, including his forthcoming book, Insider: Strategies and Secrets for Business Growth in the Age of Distractions. Forbes listed Chris as one of the Must Follow Marketing Minds of 2014, plus listed his website as one of the 100 best websites for entrepreneurs. Statsocial rated Chris the #3 power influencer online.

Chris Christensen is the CEO at BloggerBridge.com, a website that helps connect companies with relevant bloggers, writers, podcasters, videographers, and other content creators. He’s also the host of the Amateur Traveler Podcast, which he’s been producing almost as long as this show, since June 2005. Chris is also a coder; he was a director of Engineering for TripAdvisor, Executive VP of Engineering and Operations for LiveWorld, and a manager at Apple, designing and programming server solutions.

Christine Perkett founded PerkettPR in 1998 and SeeDepth, a PR analytics platform, in 2013. She has been named one of the ‘Top 25 Authorities Moving PR Forward’ in a recent industry study, and is routinely recognized as one of the most social media-savvy CEOs – currently ranked as one of the 100 Most Powerful Women on Twitter (by Hubspot), a “Top Influential Woman in Tech on Twitter” (by Google’s Don Dodge, alongside such greats as Marissa Mayer, WSJ’s Kara Swisher, Huffington Post’s Arianna Huffington, and others), and featured two consecutive years in BusinessWeek’s Social Media Special Report (keeping company of notable CEOs from Zappos, Virgin, Digg, HDNet, Mint and more). Christine was also awarded “Best Communications, IR or PR Executive” by the American Business Awards.

The post FIR #11: Succeeding (or not bothering) with Periscope appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

Welcome to episode #10 of For Immediate Release. This week’s panel includes Philippe Borremans, an independent communications consultant from Brussels and host of the PR-focused podcast, Wag the Dog; Glenn Gaudet, founder and president of GaggleAMP and host of the podcast, AMP Up Your Social Media; and Donna Papacosta, principal of Trafalgar Communications and co-author of the book, The Business of Podcasting: How to Take Your Podcasting Passion from the Personal to the Professional.

In this episode, we covered these topics:

• A follow-up to last week’s discussion of social media and the Paris terrorist attacks, including the Belgian response to a request — and the hashtag #BrusselsLockdown — to avoid sharing pictures of official activity on the streets of Brussels by sharing cat pictures instead; a hashtag that gained traction in Toronto letting worried Muslims that #IllRideWithYou; the use of social media to spread hoaxes, and disinformation. Philippe also discussed his work with the Emergency 2.0 wiki.
• Google+ has redesigned to load faster and emphasize common interests via Communities and Collections. Is it still a worthwhile investment of time for brands?
• If engagement is the new metric, how important is it for employees to serve as brand ambassadors in their social networks?
• Listener comments on the terrorist attacks, Millennial’s desire for training from their employers, and teens struggling to differentiate Google ads from organic results.
• Dan York’s report on Google+, his search for a WordPress plugin, Google’s streaming of apps, and app indexing for search
• Podcast advertising as the next big thing for marketers
• A new trend of companies targeting journalists with paid Facebook ads
• Insights from the Belgian PR Summit
• Instagram captions becoming a new tool for blogging
• A new New York Times feature that lets readers “Follow This Story,” opting in to email updates on a given story

Connect with this week’s panelists at @DonnaPapacosta, @GlennG, and @HoratioNelson.

Links to the source material for this episode are on Delicious.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

Join us next week for our 11th episode. Joining me are three panelists named Chris: Chris Brogan, CEO of Media Group and bestselling author of Trust Agents, among other books; Chris Christensen, host of the Amateur Traveler podcast and CEO of BloggerBridge; and Christine Perkett, CEO of PerkettPR and SeeDepth.

About this week’s panel

Philippe Borremans is a multi-lingual corporate communications professional with more than 20 years experience in both internal and external communications, crisis communications, online reputation management and media relations.  His career started at Porter Novelli in Brussels and continued at IBM for about 10 years. Both functions gave him extensive experience in European Media Relations and Public Relations. A specialist in press relations, issues management and communication campaigns, he is currently an independent communications consultant. Every week beginning in January 2015, Philippe interviews thought leaders and curates PR news on his podcast show, Wag the Dog.

Glenn Gaudet founded and leads GaggleAMP, which helps companies get the most out of their social media efforts with solutions that help amplify and analyze their efforts. He also wrote the book, “Connection, Community & Conversation: Making Social Media Work for Business.” Glenn is passionate about sharing business growth insights with our clients and prospects. One of the ways I do this is through a weekly podcast called AMP Up Your Social Media. He also advise startups on how to bring their products to market, bootstrapping and increasing market influence.

Donna Papacosta is a writer, speaker, podcaster and consultant, operating Trafalgar Communications in Toronto. In addition to leading workshops on social media and communications topics, Donna teaches Digital Communications Strategy and Social Media at the University of Toronto School of Continuing Studies. In 2005 Donna launched Trafcom News, one of the first business podcasts in Canada. Since then she has expanded her expertise in both social media and multimedia, and helps people integrate these tools into their communications. She is the co-author, with Steve Lubetkin, of the recently launched book, The Business of Podcasting, and the author of The Podcast Scripting Book. A dual U.S.-Canadian citizen, Donna holds a Masters degree in Public Administration from New York University and a Certificate in Magazine Journalism from Ryerson University.

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