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Visibility, Credibility, and Growth.

From media strategy to reputation management, we explore the trends shaping public perception and share the approaches that drive measurable results for growing brands.

Four Tips to Maximize your LinkedIn Profile

Today, there are many different social media sites available. So what makes LinkedIn more appealing to professionals? Having just recently joined the one hundred million other users, I wanted to learn more about the site and discover the advantages LinkedIn offers to working professionals over other social media sites. In addition, after reading Jennifer’s blog post on “The Value of LinkedIn vs. Other Social Media Networks,” I became even more curious about the overall success strategy on the site.

Just about every businessperson knows that joining LinkedIn is a prudent decision, but what they may not know is how to manage it effectively. So, after posting a photo and some basic information, what is the next step a person should take in order to maximize the network’s value? Here are four tips to keep in mind:

 

  • Establish yourself. In order to be a successful LinkedIn user, establishing yourself among other users is an extremely important step. After setting up a profile, the next step is to gain connections. The more followers you have, the more potential opportunities you will have. With LinkedIn, you can reach out to people beyond just colleagues and employers. Don’t be shy about seeking out old friends and acquaintances. You never know what opportunities await and you might as well reach out to as many people as you can. Another helpful way to meet new people is to join groups. If you find someone you don’t know but want to connect with, find a group they are in and join it yourself or request that a mutual connection provide an introduction. In addition, an underlying advantage to gaining followers is that the more people who click on your profile, the higher up you will rank in online searches, which further enhances your networking power.

 

  • Remain active. Once you are established with friends and networks, that doesn’t mean the work is over! The next task is to keep information current. The more changes that take place on a LinkedIn account, the more circulation your name will have on other people’s accounts. This action will ultimately earn you a place in someone else’s mind when they are searching for a new business partner or employee. Just like Facebook and Twitter, LinkedIn also makes it possible for its users to post a status update. Any status has the potential to appear on your followers’ news feeds, and it is a great way for your name to pop up and remind others of who you are and the work that you are doing. That being said, don’t post “fluff,” and don’t overuse this tool. While it can be a very beneficial way to share new information or ask a question of your networks, overusing it can make others irritated by your excessive commentary.

 

  • Maximize use of the event section. Also similar to Facebook, LinkedIn provides users with an event page. If you click on the event “attending” list, then you will be able to see all of the people attending the event. This allows you to prepare yourself for networking conversations well in advance. Furthermore, it is a great tool for advertising and organizing an event you are planning.

 

  • Learn about your competition. LinkedIn is an excellent source to discover who you are competing against and what others are posting about to separate themselves from the crowd. Take advantage of this opportunity and use it to help gauge who you are competing against in a job interview, or how competing companies are recruiting new employees. Although your competition might be hesitant to add you if you request them out of the blue, try joining groups they are likely to be a part of and try connecting in the group first by engaging when they share content. In addition, research current employees within organizations you might be interested in joining. Discover what qualities they possess, and then try to meet these qualities to make yourself a more competitive and well-qualified candidate.

 

Unlike other social media networks, the primary purpose of LinkedIn is to facilitate business connections and relationships.  Although other social media alternatives may also be capable of facilitating business development, there are so many other uses that the business aspects can often be drowned out. LinkedIn is an invaluable reference tool for individuals and companies, and it is important that anyone working in today’s business world is knowledgeable about how to best manage their account.

For more information, visit www.linkedlin.com

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Three Guidelines to Establish Your Personal Brand

As PR pros, we’re invariably asked by clients to help them establish, protect and/or enhance their brands, but how often do we pause to ensure our personal brands receive the same treatment? Personal brands can help garner new business, pique the interest of new talent for recruiting purposes and even land you a new job.

 

I recently read an article, “Three Tips to Take Your Personal Brand to the Next Level,” and while it’s helpful, I think it’s more of a Personal Branding 201 level course.  If you need the Personal Branding 101 level course, you’ve come to the right place.

 

Below are three guidelines to help you establish your personal brand:

 

  1. Determine messaging. Once you figure out what you want to say, it will be easier to craft content for your profile(s) and create your elevator speech. Ideally, your messaging will tell people who you are, the skills you have and what separates you from others in your field. To develop your messaging, consider your objectives for doing so. Looking for a new job will require significantly different messaging than acquiring new business. Regardless of objectives, your messaging needs to be authentic – you must be honest and believe in what you are saying – and be able to convey both. Having proof points available will help you with this. Once you develop your messaging and supporting points, practice what you will say with your friends, family and mentors. Listen to their feedback and make adjustments as necessary.
  2. Digital presence. One of the easiest and cheapest ways to build awareness of your personal brand is to develop your digital presence. Outlets such as Twitter and LinkedIn are perfect for this since both are well-suited for professional discussions and networking. A previous Communiqué PR blog post covered the values of social media channels, including LinkedIn. Additionally, this Beginner’s Guide from Mashable is a good resource to get started. Once your social media profiles are established, begin following people (on Twitter) and making connections (on LinkedIn). Participate in conversations, share interesting and relevant articles and make sure to respond to outreach directed at you.
  3. Network, network, network. In addition to networking online via Twitter and LinkedIn, as noted above, there are additional opportunities offline as well. If you’re a PR pro, the Public Relations Society of America is a good place to start, especially the Puget Sound chapter if you’re in the Seattle area. There are other groups for various industries, including: International Association of Business Communicators, Society of Professional Journalists, Social Media Club, Washington Technology Industry Association, MIT Enterprise Forum of the Northwest and many others!

 

By following the above guidelines, you’ll be able to speak consistently about your personal brand, increase awareness and make new connections. Ultimately, this will help you generate new business or partnerships, recruit when your company is looking to hire, or find a new job when it’s time for the next step in your career. What else have you found effective?

 

 

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Building (and Maintaining) a Sense of Passion in Small Business Settings

The CEO and founder of OtterBox, Curt Richards, recently posted a byline article for Inc. Magazine about maintaining workforce passion in a small business. Since many of our clients are start-up companies that are growing, and as a small-but-growing business ourselves, we thought we would share a few of Curt’s key findings to ensure that the start-up mentality of scrappiness and passion becomes a part of the company’s long term culture.

Curt recommends the following four tips for building and maintaining a passionate workforce:

  1. “From the top down.” First and foremost, passion needs to come from the leadership. If the leadership isn’t reflecting an attitude of enthusiasm and vigor, how can they expect their workers to demonstrate these qualities? Business leaders set the tone for the rest of the company – their attitudes set a precedent for how their employees should act. If you’re in a leadership position, this is an important tip to keep in mind.
  2. “From the bottom up.” Just as the business leaders set the tone for a workplace’s passion and culture, every employee should take responsibility for that tone as well. Particularly in a small company, each individual truly adds something to the culture and personality of the workforce. Even during stressful or hectic times, employees should take it upon themselves the exude positivity and excitement about their work – it’s infectious to the other workers around them.
  3. “To the farthest reaches.” Even small companies can have a distributed presence. Many of our clients, while small in size, have people who work remotely from other areas of the nation or have regional sales offices to ensure customers throughout the nation are getting some face time. Passion needs to stem from headquarters and flow through other locations for your company – both near and far – much like your heart pumps blood to your extremities. Your other locations can play a big role in the growth and success of your company, so make sure you’re investing time and resources to build passion with remote or disparate workers.
  4. “In everything we do.” If you build a sense of passion in your workforce, ask them to prove it. Go full-throttle on all of your projects, and go the extra mile for customers. Demonstrate that passion by letting it play a role in your day-to-day work. Not only will it continue to build internal excitement, it will also build passion in customers and other key players in your industry.

What are some of the other ways you instill a sense of passion in your workforce, and what are your best practices for maintaining that quality?

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6 Collaborative Tools for the Office

Here at Communique PR, we know that collaboration is key. In fact, collaboration is one of the Core Values of Communique PR. Collaboration and team work are essential to a successful office environment, and there are a few great technology solutions out there to help make office collaboration seamless and efficient. At Communique, we love Smartsheet (see Smartsheet: a Collaboration Tool for PR Teams). However, there are several effective and popular collaboration tools worth looking into for your office environment.

  • Dropbox

Extremely popular for both personal and business use, Dropbox is a simple way to share files in the cloud, offering 2 GB of free storage per user, and 50GB for $9.99/ month. The service is available from their website, or from a downloaded desktop application.

  • Google Docs & Drive

Google Docs is a classic, but remains popular. Free for your first 5GB, Google Docs allows the user to create documents, spread sheets, and presentations, sharing with any number of contacts. Creators are allowed to invite viewers, other administrators, or other editors, all with varying capabilities. This famous service will soon convert to Google Drive.

Google Drive is the online giant’s version of Dropbox, offering 5GB of free space. Google Drive functions similarly to Google Docs, a plus if users are already familiar with the service.  However, pay close attention to the Terms of Use; you may want to avoid putting your private or important files on this service.

  • Yammer



Yammer will look familiar to Facebook users: it mimics the social network, but your ”friends” are now your coworkers. The online service has become quite popular, spurring a recent purchase by Microsoft. Users must use their work email to login, and can post and read others comments on different conversations. Additionally, Yammer allows the user to follow certain conversations. Groups can be distinguished in order to have discussions in different departments. Yammer also allows users to upload documents and edit them together, within the cloud. Yammer desktop and mobile applications that sync with the online service are available.

  • 37 Signals

37 Signals offers three products: Basecamp, Highrise, and Campfire. Basecamp is a collaboration tool for projects, and it offers a 45-day free trial of the service. Highrise allows you to not only manage contacts in the cloud, but record email conversations and set notifications for follow ups. Campfire is real time group chatting with visibility of images, conversation archives, conference calling abilities, and access to Basecamp if you so choose. Both Highrise and Campfire are available for 30-day free trials.

  • Zoho

Zoho provides a multitude of collaboration applications. Its “Chat” allows for real-time group discussions; its “Docs” application permits documents to be shared, managed, and edited, fully integrated with MS Office. Zoho exists in the cloud, and thus an organization can use its wide range of apps from anywhere. Prices for collaboration tools vary from free to charging per user; check out their Collaboration Applications page for more information.

  • Microsoft Office 365

Microsoft Office 365 offers an online, collaborative version of its popular office tools, including calendar, email, spreadsheets, word processing, presentations, and OneNote. Microsoft provides a free trial, but the full package will range from $4 to $20 per user per month.

For additional information on collaboration tools, check out the following blog posts:

While collaboration tools can be great for involving staff and staying on top of projects, they are only effective when your whole team uses them. At CPR, we love Smartsheet because it is minimal, efficient, and fits our needs perfectly. Think carefully about your team’s needs and uses when selecting a collaborative platform—there are plenty from which to choose!

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Weaving Together Moving Parts: OmniPlan for iPad Launch

Executing on a successful launch requires careful planning and integrating a lot of moving parts. By leveraging a variety of platforms and creating a rolling thunder type of buzz, a product launch will likely make more of a splash than simply distributing a press release.

Recently, we partnered with the Omni Group to launch OmniPlan for iPad, the last of the company’s five productivity tools to come to the iPad. First, we coordinated meetings at Macworld in January to give journalists a preview of OmniPlan for iPad and let them know the app would launch in Q2. This created initial interest and enabled the Omni Group to speak broadly about its product roadmap and what those journalists could expect to see from the company in the future.

About a week prior to the launch, the Omni Group posted a teaser video, which heightened interest and generated a number of media inquiries about the launch. Additionally, Ken Case (@kcase), CEO of the Omni Group, tweeted about OmniPlan for iPad prior to the release. This helped to continue the excitement from consumers and build demand. The day the app was available, we distributed a press release to media, fielded inquiries and facilitated interviews, and provided access to a reviewer’s guide and supporting materials.

By building buzz through preview meetings, placing video and social media teasers, as well as reaching out to media with the official announcement and reviewer’s guide, we helped the Omni Group secure more than 22 pieces of unique coverage. This coverage helped to continue to build awareness and drive sales. OmniPlan for iPad reached the number two spot of the top business grossing app in iTunes.

We have included some of the coverage highlights below.

 

 

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Five Key Differences Between Working at Large PR Agencies and Boutique PR Firms

As a recent addition to the Communiqué PR staff, I thought my first post here would be well-suited to cover the differences in PR agency culture when transitioning from a large agency to a boutique firm. I experienced a minor culture shock when making the switch, but I’m quickly assimilating and loving the change!

I’ve outlined five of the biggest differences below:

  1. Individualism versus conglomeration. My previous employers operated out of large, corporate buildings full of suits, jargon and nameless faces. I welcomed Communiqué PR’s fresh environment: a converted home on Queen Anne. The building is still filled with big thinking, smart solutions and creative ideas, but it has all the charm you’d expect from a historic piece of Seattle. I open a window and hear birds chirping and children laughing; I don’t hear a steady hum of traffic, bleating horns and sirens from emergency vehicles. Quick aside: The fact that I can even open a window, let alone hear a myriad of pleasant sounds, is quite a draw.
  2. Deep relationships and speedier integration. Because Communiqué PR is a small business, there’s an ability to make strong personal connections with your boss and coworkers from day one. When you work alongside more than 100 other people, it’s really challenging to even get on a first-name basis with people. Forging relationships early on helps you integrate seamlessly and quickly, allowing you to focus on what matters: doing quality work and delivering results for clients.
  3. Magnified strengths and weaknesses. In a smaller setting, your work tends to speak for itself. Your talents don’t get buried in a heap with everyone else’s and the people participating in decision-making about your growth have direct insight into your skills. However, this means they also see your weaknesses, so you can’t hide – you have to step up your game.
  4. Charting a path. In a setting like Communiqué PR, you have an ability to chart your growth, as well as the company’s, in a truly unique way. In partnership with the business owners, you can outline your interests, seek work on projects that speak to you and grow your skillset rapidly. You also have the opportunity to participate in pitching new business, help out on other accounts if you’re feeling a bit stale, or focus on agency culture (ice cream social, anyone?!).
  5. Wearer of many hats. At a large company, processes and roles tend to get specifically designed to increase efficiency but this also diminishes an employee’s chance to work on diverse activities. It also means that the large agency can’t be as flexible with clients’ needs. In a single workday at Communiqué PR, I may shift from tech support to story crafter to admin to communications plan writer. I love being able to challenge my brain on different projects or solve problems and Communiqué PR absolutely allows me to do that.

There are many things to love about both larger and smaller firms. In the end, you need to decide which aspects are most important to you and go from there. If Communiqué PR sounds like a fit for you, check out our careers page!

 

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