Posts Categorized: PR
5 Reasons your Construction PR Strategy isn’t Working
5 Top Tips for working with Construction Industry Publications
What is Profile Advertising and are there any Benefits?
When faced today with yet another suggestion for one of our clients to ‘support’ an editorial piece and their loyal specifiers with profile advertising, it got me thinking…who really thinks that this is a good idea?
Does either the Specifier or the Building Product Manufacturer actually know what they are agreeing to here?
Where do Construction News readers share news stories?
Yesterday I had a look at where Construction Enquirer readers were sharing its news stories and interestingly most news stories were shared on LinkedIn and not Twitter as I thought it might have been.
So today I’m going to take a look where Construction News readers share articles. Over 40,000 pages from the website were scanned and a total of 4123 pages had been shared across social networking sites.Read More
Top tips for managing a PR crisis for construction companies
Does your construction company have a crisis management plan? Crisis planning is becoming increasingly important in our digital age, and should plot your response – or response procedure – to everything from a factory fire or flood, through to a major product failure.
If you haven’t already got a plan, the point at which your company creates a social media marketing campaign and policy, is also the point at which your crisis management plan MUST be implemented. Lack of response or a poorly considered response to a social media crisis can cause irreparable damage to your business communications, due to the speed and mass communication elements of the medium.Read More
How to manage embargoes in a digital age
Last week I used an embargo on a news story, it’s not something I do often (certainly not yet this year) and as a result it started to make me nervous that journalists didn’t respect the embargo any more… in this digital media relations age, was the ‘embargo trust pact’ dead, or alive?
What is an embargo? Well, technically it’s a ‘stop’ caveat on a piece of information that you’re sharing ahead of time with journalists, which hopes to stop sensitive material from being published before ‘full disclosure’ or a specified date.Read More
Are construction publications link policies ruining online PR campaigns?
I’m always stuck between a rock and a hard place when it comes to trying to get links included in our client online PR strategies. Trying to keep the SEO guys happy and not irritate the web editors is a juggling act – one that I’m sure many PR’s within the construction industry are struggling with at the moment too.
Essentially, all I’m after is a unique URL within a news item or feature where readers can find out more information about the story. Sometimes it’s a more in-depth blog post, or a bank of case study images; sometimes it’s a video, or even a microsite/forum hosting an industry debate. We always make certain that we create valuable content, so it’s not like we’re chasing links to homepages or sales enquiry forms. Think of it as a half-way house as the journey towards the social media news releases picks up speed.
It’s beneficial to measurement for our clients, and ultimately to the website running the coverage. For example, if we see that lots of their readers have clicked our link and watched the video or read the blog post, we will undoubtedly value the publication higher and push more editorial content their way. At the end of the day if we can measure the success of our coverage in this precise, accurate way, we’re going to prefer using these outlets in the future.Read More
Do journalists use social media to research their stories?
It’s the question on everybody’s lips at the moment – do journalists use social media to research their stories? Are you missing a trick if you’re not engaging with key editorial contacts on Twitter? Which channels should you focus on developing?
Certainly within the PR industry there is significant rumination going on at the moment – PR professionals are desperately trying to anticipate the platforms that journalists might be trialling, hoping to stay one step ahead so that they are ready and waiting should a journalist come looking for them, and yet still trying to cover all bases by email broadcasting news in the more traditional way.
I met a PR professional at an event a few weeks ago who confidently told me “Journalists always prefer me to tweet them now (rather than phone or email) – I never email anybody any more”. But how true really is this? Can we rely on our audience using Twitter alone to source their news stories, or do we need to try and spread our efforts between maintaining social media alongside more traditional communication methods?Read More
Good Things Get Done By Construction Companies Doing Good
Why marketing your construction business CSR programs through social media platforms is good for business.
Image courtesy of Fourfront Group – commercial interior specialists
Let’s not split hairs here, the majority of CSR programs are a good thing. Besides the business agenda, at the very least some ‘social or sustainable’ good is being done. However, is it really still acceptable to invest time and energy in planning and running Corporate Social Responsibility [CSR] programs if the only ‘promotional’ outcome is a flimsy report?Read More