As a company, we recently gathered and combined all of the frequently asked questions about new media PR and social media we are commonly asked and composed the answers.

We have found there is a lot of confusion among companies on the use of social media, what the ROI is and how a company can effectively leverage these tools as a strategy to improve their bottom-line.

Here are the answers to the questions - http://www.richter10point2.com/faq/

If you have any questions or would like to discuss how we can help develop a new media PR strategy for your company, please get in touch anytime.

Now is the time to step up the attention your company is getting and attract interest to build reach and sales. A comprehensive new media PR strategy that is well coordinated and executed will out-perform any other option out there. We look forward to hearing from you.

-Richter10.2 Media Group

Currently the marketing, PR and advertising world is experiencing one of the most dramatic evolutions over the past 100 – 200 years in what traditionally were “tried and true” methods.

I am not sure too many people and professionals fully understand this. I deal with many companies, CEO’s and CMO’s on a daily basis and across the board there seems to be some level of awkwardness and discomfort with the rapid changes.

Over the past 100 to 200 years there have been very workable and fundamental ideas related to how marketing, PR and advertising basically worked and reached a specific audience. There were specific rules and methods to execute strategies that had workable formulas such as positioning, how to write ad copy, how to grab attention via posters, billboards and TV commercials etc. Basic marketing fundamentals like what the typical percent of response will be from a marketing campaign via direct mail, etc.

While all these methodologies worked extremely well all the way up to close to now, unbelievably…. they no longer do. These methods and ideas have run their course and have essentially gone through the stages of infancy from the beginning idea to maturity to dated and now obsolete. It’s incredible to even think about and seasoned professionals clearly seem uncomfortable about it. Speaking to an experienced CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) who wants to still work off of, and hang on to, these old ideas can be rather frustrating as they try to apply something that is obsolete to a new way of thinking.

So what is relevant?

With New Media (social media, etc.) the way to communicate and engage an audience is different. It’s a conversation. It’s on-going and most of how the audience wants to be reached or is receptive to is being decided by the audience – not the marketing, advertising or PR firm. This is a very authentic and transparent approach. We aren’t trying to “spin” a story, we aren’t trying to scream a message and button at the audience to get a response and we aren’t trying to have the audience see a message 7-9 times so they will “act” So what are we trying to do?

We are focused on using new media tools (social media) as a platform to communicate with a specific target audience geared toward your company and use PR to build relations (relationships) with that target audience in order to spark conversations, increase word of mouth, generate buzz and result in interest and reach for the companies’ products or services via acceptance from that target audience.

We are authentically reaching out to get involved with the audience and make a company known to them to build awareness, brand loyalty and stay on the target audiences radar to in turn increase the sales and revenue.

I am sure you would agree that people are more inclined to do business with companies they:

1. Know
2. Like
3. Feel Comfortable With
4. Trust
5. Have a Relationship

Think this through for a second; think of a company you do business with or a person you do business with and then think about why? I am betting it’s because you know them or have a relationship with them or you personally like them or trust them. These ideas are the very essence of why new media (social media) is so powerful. It aligns with the basic way people buy and how sales typically occur.

Now I am not at all talking about spamming people on social media sites or being the “salesperson” that annoys everyone on Facebook! The idea here is to make it natural and in a PR way encompasses engagement, conversations, building new connections, making yourself known and ultimately building real relationships from a given target audience that is desirable to your company that will result in interest in reach for the company and therefore sales and revenue.

It’s not easy. It takes time and knowhow, but, when done correctly, it’s the most effective strategy you, or your company, could possibly apply in today’s market – just ask the audience!

The value of personal contact in this day and age is incredibly high. So many businesses have automated processes and have lost touch with people, relationships and what clients, consumers and customers really want or need.

Yes – it’s a little time consuming to add a personal touch. I can’t tell you how many “out of the office” email replies I get, automated phone messages and thank you for contacting our company auto messages. It seems most businesses have lost sight of what PR, relationships and ultimately sales is all about – people and personal contact with those people

If you are looking to grab someone’s attention, take the time to find out a little about them and make your message personal. As an example, I went to San Francisco this past week and went to a small niche cupcake boutique called “Kara’s Cupcakes”, it is a fantastic cupcake shop and so I grabbed a business card. When I came home I made a point to send them a simple introduction message to introduce our agency to them and in the message the first line read something like this – “I spent the last week in San Francisco and stopped by your store in Ghiradelli Square, I loved your cupcakes and wanted to introduce our agency to you…..

Personal attention and contact gets’s noticed and stands out more than anything else. It also get’s a far better response!

This requires someone who understands PR and how to make relations with companies and people. PR and relationships are the powerful foundations that can dramatically improve your sales. Try this the next time you are prospecting another company or person and figure out how to add a level of personal touch to make your communication authentic.

-Robert Cornish

Find out what we do … http://richter10point2.com

This is absolutely a personal decision and will vary depending on who you are and who you are trying to reach. For instance, a band and a stock broker could equally benefit from Social Media, but would use different sites and methods to do so.

The first key point in choosing which sites to use is deciding exactly what you want to share and who you want to share it with.

Next, you should think with comprehensive profiles and the four main types of content you will be sharing: video, photo, status messages and blog posts. Ideally, you would incorporate each of these regularly into your Social Media presence and plan to have a presence on at least one site that specializes in each. Following this, a simple yet extremely effective strategy would be to have a Facebook, LinkedIn, Flickr, YouTube and Twitter account, as well as a blog, in your Social Media Campaign.

Lastly, you have to know how much time you can allot to your Social Media efforts.

It is vital to plan the size of your Social Media presence according to what you can comfortably maintain. It is exponentially better to have some key sites always up-to-date than many that are outdated.

Although it is the case that sometimes updating your network can fall to the bottom of the to-do list, in order to be successful at all, you have to keep your profiles up-to-date. Therefore, it is a great idea to make Social Media part of your daily routine, just like checking your emails. If you can only allot 15 minutes each day, realize that 40 different profiles to update is not for you.

So, with a little research and following the three simple points above, you can choose the correct sites that will give you the greatest chance of success.

This week I was interviewed for a press release that is going out about our agency and while I was being interviewed I thought of the fundamental difference between successful use of a new media PR strategy using social media and every other approach such as traditional media, web marketing, banner ads and on and on which I will go over in a second.

First I wanted to discuss sales. I deal with companies both large and small every single day and have found uniformly that sales is a weak area for those companies. Many companies have been trying to create sales using tricky marketing, smartly targeted advertisements, funny or witty campaigns to hopefully grab attention etc. However, sales is and always has been and will always be about relationships. You have to reach out to the target public (audience) that you want to sell to, make yourself and company known to them and build a relationship somehow to then develop into a sale once you have authentically discovered what that person or company truly needs.

I see time and time again that companies and people are being sold on widgets, marketing ploys etc to hopefully stay fresh in their prospective clients minds and then hopefully that will do the trick and they will magically buy from them. While some of these methods may work to grab attention, there is no avoiding the fact that if you want to sell any person or company, you must 1. truly understand that company or person to understand how revenue flows, what the problems are and how to solve them and 2. you must build a relationship with the person or company that is authentic and built around trust.

Sales happens to be one of our strong suits as a company and I can attest that I follow these actions:

1. Seek the target market I am going after to make a connection somehow

2. Make some kind of introduction to work toward creating a relationship and starting a conversation

3. Really address the prospects needs and wants and work to learn about the prospects company to understand how they make income, what works, what doesn’t etc. Typically by the time I am done this step I feel the prospects company could hire me for sales the next day and I would smoothly start selling for them. Know them that well and you will close them.

4. Build the relationship – be authentic (in other words, be yourself) and work to maintain a very open communication with the prospect. Don’t just jam your ideas down their throat, listen and engage in a lot of back and forth conversation.

5. Address the problems accurately and propose the solution to work toward agreement both ways. Once you can come to an agreement based on what is being proposed, you can then comfortably ask for the sale.

Our agency works on these points everyday and because of this we can deliver our services to our clients far better than most creative agencies due to the fundamental difference that we don’t just create smart campaigns or pretty graphics for our clients, we intimately understand their companies, how the revenue flows, how they make sales and what the key problems are. From there we can cater entirely to them using new media as a platform to attain their goals and objectives with a clearly laid out strategy that is built around real world practicality – sales. We know that the reason any company invests in any PR, marketing or advertising strategy is to boost sales and revenue which would be impossible to attain unless their was a crystal clear understanding of how they sell and how revenue is created for that company.

But the secret behind sales is relationships. You can’t make a sale if you haven’t first made relations with a target public. It’s not an overnight thing, building relations is authentic, it’s transparent and it takes time. Go and try this out to fine tune your sales strategy and you will see for yourself that if you 1. identify a target public you would like to go after and 2. make relations with them and build your pipeline making relations with people and companies developing these relationships into sales one by one, you will see your income dramatically improve.

If you have any questions about how to build relations with a target public, feel welcome to contact me directly http://whywebpr.com/robertcornish

As you may have already figured out, I am a strong believer of social media in business. I use Twitter and Facebook and blogs every day in my job, and you can too. Here are a few tips and tools to getting yourself started in the social media world.

Social Media for Business Resources

http://courtspencer.wordpress.com/2009/07/22/twitter-is-time-well-spent-not-money-well-spent/ <– Twitter is time well spent, not money.

http://enovapr2.wordpress.com/2009/07/14/its-the-law-2-0/<–Web 2 .0, social media guide.

http://blog.neoco.com/2009/07/22/a-z-of-social-media-this-is-actually-pretty-good/ <– the A-Z of Social Media

http://jeffbullas.com/2009/07/22/5-steps-to-optimize-your-email-for-social-media/ <– 5 steps to Optimize your email with Social Media

http://www.richter10point2.com/buildyourown <– Build your own WebPR campaign!

http://www.whywebpr.com/alimagnano <– My Social Media Press Kit

Ali Magnano
Director of PR
Richter10.2 Media Group
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After a little research, I found the 5 perfect snacks for you to munch on during the workday, and to get you going. Because who doesn’t get hungry while sitting at their desk all day? It’s inevitable. So you might as well be a little prepared! But these snacks, over other unhealthier snacks like chips and candy, will keep you alert and feeling great.

1)Hard – Boiled Eggs
Rich in protein and will help raise your energy level to get you going!

2)String Cheese
Tasty and easy to eat while you’re at work.

3)Yogurt or Cottage Cheese
Something about yogurt or cottage cheese is very filling, and its also good for you! You can get little to-go cups of either of these at the grocery store.

4)Animal Crackers
These little crackers are the solution to your sweet tooth, and are lower in calories than most other treats.

5)Mixed Nuts
Cashews, almonds, peanuts, walnuts, or all of them! Throw in some dried fruit and raisins to add a little something extra, and this can be munched on all day.

Ali Magnano
Director of PR
Richter10.2 Media Group
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Obama and Social Media

Internet Usage in United States

Facebook
Obama: 2,379,102 supporters
McCain: 620,359 supporters
Obama has 380% more supporters than McCain

MySpace
Obama: Friends: 833,161
McCain: Friends: 217,811
Obama has 380% more supporters than McCain

YouTube
Obama: 1792 videos uploaded since Nov 2006, Subscribers: 114,559 (uploads about 4 a day), Channel Views: 18,413,110
McCain: 329 videos uploaded since Feb 2007 (uploads about 2 a day), Subscribers: 28,419, Channel Views: 2,032,993
Obama has 403% more subscribers than McCainObama has 905% more viewers than McCain

Internet Usage in United States

United States Population: 303,824,646
Internet Usage: 220,141,969
Growth from 2000-2008: 130.9%
Stats from Internet WorldStats (Census, Nielson)

Facebook
Obama: 2,379,102 supporters
McCain: 620,359 supporters
Obama has 380% more supporters than McCain

MySpace
Obama: Friends: 833,161
McCain: Friends: 217,811
Obama has 380% more supporters than McCain

YouTube
Obama: 1792 videos uploaded since Nov 2006, Subscribers: 114,559 (uploads about 4 a day), Channel Views: 18,413,110
McCain: 329 videos uploaded since Feb 2007 (uploads about 2 a day), Subscribers: 28,419, Channel Views: 2,032,993
Obama has 403% more subscribers than McCain
Obama has 905% more viewers than McCain

Twitter
Obama: @barackobama has 112,474 followers
McCain: @JohnMcCain (is it real?) 4,603 followers
Obama has 240 times more followers in Twitter than McCain

It is clear that Obama has dominated social media activity. Enough said

Check out how to build your own Web PR campaign at www.richter10point2.com/buildyourown.

Ali Magnano
Director of PR
Richter10.2 Media Group

I recently visited my hometown, Chicago, for a family wedding. While en route back to Tampa, I did the inexcusably, unbelievably silly thing of leaving my laptop on the plane.

Of course I had a sleepless night when I returned home and discovered that I didn’t have my laptop. Of course I called the Lost and Found departments of all three airports I had been to that day, only to discover they were all closed and I would need to call back in the morning.

The next morning I woke up dreading how I was going to tastefully inform my bosses that I wouldn’t be able to go into the office that day (no laptop = no work to do). After many internal debates, I decided to say it – plain and simple. My bosses were very understanding and wished me the best of luck on my laptop hunt.

However the stars aligned when I received a voicemail message at home from an American Airlines flight attendant named John Stewart letting me know that he had my laptop and would be keeping it safe until he heard from me. I immediately called him back and thanked him profusely! I asked what he wanted in return and he adamantly told me that he didn’t want anything, maybe just for me to something nice for someone else if the opportunity arose. I had my laptop shipped overnight, thanks to Mr. Stewart calling me when he had arrived to the UPS store to ask which shipping method I preferred. My computer arrived the next day and all was golden.

When all of the dust settled from this ordeal, I realized that there are a lot of WONDERFUL people out there in the world we live in. Despite the bad news we constantly hear about the failing economy, crime and terrorism, there is still much more good in people than bad.

I then asked myself, “What can I do to pay it forward?” Of course, I will be on the lookout next time I travel for stray laptops in need of their owners, but there is a bigger thing that I can offer: SOCIAL MEDIA EXPERTISE. The company I work for, Richter10.2 Media Group, specializes in helping businesses expand using social media such as Facebook, Twitter, etc. If your business could use some help getting up and running in this new day and age of Web technology, then we’re your people.

We have lots of free tools, articles, blogs and links on the subject that can help demystify social media and how you can use it to expand your business.

To learn more click here.

Julia Jaquillard

Richter10.2 Media Group

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