Tech PR | Social Media Advisor | Content Strategist
Industry Analysts like Compass Intelligence's James Brehm play a vital role in the Public Relations process.
James help journalists and bloggers with insights and deep research, providing an independent view when people like me are making pitches for clients.
In this interview, James provides some great background into what an analyst does, the volume of pitches he gets, and how best to work with people like him.
A startup's blog is a great vehicle for story telling, and being found by media.
Your startup's blog is a seat at the table for journalists, bloggers and industry analysts to discover and share your insights, expertise and knowledge on the market you are creating. Photo shot at Geekdom, San Antonio.
It's also a great clue to a journalist, blogger or industry analyst that you have deep and original thinking and could be a great source for them on not just covering your company, but an industry trend that you are either creating or part of.
Here's some tips:
1. If you are going to blog, do something more that overstate the obvious with links to articles from Mashable, Read Write Web or TechCruch (unless it's about you). Journalists can find that on their own.
2. Build a story around what you are doing, not just what you are doing. Share feedback from customers, what you are finding and how you are helping.
3. Post content from conferences and trade shows you might go to. Report on what you are seeing, who you are connecting with, and how your solution or platform fits into the world at large.
4. Don't overstate the obvious. If a journalist finds you, and discovers your blog, this is your first point of entry in raising the potential of possibly gaining media coverage. Make a good impression with deep thinking and good writing.
5. Post once a week. At a minimum. If you go dark for a month or two, it shows you're out to lunch.
I work for journalists, analysts, and bloggers.
Photo by me shot somewhere in West Virginia (c) 2011
My goal is to bring them really great stories, that come from companies with great technology, platforms and products.
Behind those companies are great people who are passionate and really give a shit about delivering something disruptive, significantly better, possibly (but not not always) less expensive, that in all cases delievery a superb experience.
Yes, I work for journalists, analysts and bloggers.
My clients pay me (and the team I build) to do this.
I think like a journalist, and provide content, information, data, case studies, end user profiles, access to the client and more.
I work to help to increase the journalist, analyst, and bloggers of coverage because I've done my homework and prepared them for the best story they can cover.
When you work to serve the journalist, analyst, and blogger you get an inverse rate of success.
It goes way up.
Time for A Re-Set
Re-set your thinking to not being about you or your company, but how you can help make the journalist, analyst or blogger more successful in their work, not yours.
Application stories are a powerful medium to tell your story. It’s one thing to tout your product, platform, technology, solution, and it’s a whole other when your customers or partners can share its real world applications and benefits.
Application stories open new avenues to share and tell your story. 
Photo shot somewhere in Iceland by me (c) 2007
It’s Not About You
Make your customer / partner the hero of your story, not you. There’s tons and tons of great and way cool technology out in the world. In fact, there’s way too much of it. The way to best approach an application story strategy is to focus on how the customer applied and benefited from the application.
Find Your Internal Champion
This is generally your direct customer - the person who is in charge of a team who is deploying your technology. Best way to start is to ask. Explain that you are trying to share their story in hopes that others can benefit from your solution as they have.
Some customers won’t want to do this, as they may see your technology as a competitive weapon or having a leg up on their competition. If this is the case, find a champion customer who this won’t be an issue with.
Get Permission
Getting your champion to approve this initiative is gets you half the way there.
Publicly traded or heavily regulated companies will more than likely require approval from a legal department. Some companies require a media relations person involved.
In other cases, such as education, your mileage may vary depending on a school’s policy. Security application stories can get sticky, since it involves, well - security. You may have the best to way to keep the bad guys out of your network, but it may turn out to be an uphill battle to get your candidate story teller to share their story about how they used, and applied your solution.
Explain Your Intent
There are many applications for application stories. These could be profiles of your customers on your site, for use in the reseller channel, and of course, for possible media coverage.
Particularly when it’s for potential media coverage, get the customer involved. “We think your story belongs in ________, how about you?” Even if you think you know where they story would be a great fit, ask your customer what they read, and in ranking order, where they think the story would be a great fit. I am always amazed to see how insightful the end user’s point of view is vs. the mindset of a PR person like me.
Empower Your Customer in the Process
When you approach your customer about doing an application story, explain to them that nothing goes live, nothing gets pitched, nothing sees the day of light, unless they approve it. And even if you go through the entire process and there is a change of heart, assure them that they have a way out, and that the story simply goes away and never happened.
Shaping Your Story
Start off with the basics.... who are you, what do you do, what does your company do, what markets do you serve, where are you located, etc. Then, get into the story. What were you doing before, how did you pilot the program, who was involved, how long did the process take, what have your learned in the process, what’s made you more productive, more profitable?
Beyond the Printed Word
Grab some video. Take some photos. Think like a Life Magazine or National Geographic story teller. While your focus is on written content, support it with other media. You don’t need a videographer or professional photographer to do this. Hone in on your skills, or find someone inside the company who can help you produce the media. Even if you don’t use the content today, you might find it useful for a user conference, investor pitch, or for great feedback to your R&D team.
Disruptive Is Good
In some cases, your offering may be a positive disruptor. Maybe it helps companies transition from one way of thinking to another. Perhaps you’ve helped disrupt, reinvent and even discover new ways to do things.
Above and beyond any type of ROI or cost savings, maybe what you have to offer has helped a company enter new markets, kill off a dying market space and reinvent it as something new.
Application stories keep you honest and on track to help you tell your story from the mind’s eye of others.
In the process of meeting with various start-ups in Israel this week I'm really gaining some great insights into their needs for PR services.
Tomorrow, I will speaking at the Israel Startup Network event and sharing the stage with other PR / Communications Pros, Josh Cline, Sharon Levy-Matzkin and Enon Landenberg.
What's clear to me is that either because of budget, or where they are in the life cycle of their company, be it in Israel or the U.S., they may not need a PR firm- yet.
Here's a few things you can do on your own, or just go through the following steps in order to prepare yourself for when you are ready to start looking for the agency that is right for you.
1. What media do you think should pay attention to your company? Why?
Make a list of the print and online media (journals, news outlets, blogs, etc) and dream big. Imagine you could get in any five outlets on the planet (be realistic.) What would they be? Try writing a draft of a press release yourself. Need help? Use my template, here.
2. Start reading the media you want to be in.
If you follow the journalists that write about your space, you'll understand what they cover, their tone, and their voice.
3. Follow, wave, engage and comment on journalists work.
If there is a publication that you think you should be in, follow the journalist on twitter. Here's a list of tech journalists that could help - thank you Robert Scoble. Follow them. Wave hello on twitter and even comment on their articles if you have something to say. It's a great way to engage, seed the market and be found.
4. Think about how you can be a great client.
Come prepared. Be reasonable. Do your homework. Don't be ashamed of not having a huge budget. If you are reasonable, and pay for an allotment of time with your agency, offer to take on some of the execution yourself. If you slip and fall a few times, it's ok. As your budget grows, your agency can expand the range and depth of service.
This may seem like doing things in reverse, but as much as we are here to serve you, we are really here to help each other. We want to see you be successful, exit, and hit it out of the ballpark :)
Translation: Successful agencies / consultants are successful because they have successful clients.
5. Don't haggle on price or ask for discounts with the promise of greater fees later.
This is what I call the shuk mentality.
You're not buying commodities.
You're investing in deep expertise that can help your company beyond just getting press. If you are being led to believe that you are getting a special deal, run away. Unless you let your agency make a fair profit, they won't pay attention to you.
You may be a hot company with promises of great potential, but the reality is that by virtue of the fact that there are now volumes of new start-ups, you are not only competing in a marketplace for business, you are competing for a marketplace of expert service providers.
There's always going to be another hot company next week :).
6. Buy local in Israel when you can.
Connect with service providers like Donna Abraham, Arlene Maron, and Belinda Gerber. They can help you on writing, messaging, positioning. Need social media, WordPress and SEO expertise? Reach out to Miriam Schwab. Need help on figuring out how to master WordPress so you can do this yourself? Nadine Wildmann is a rock star. They are all in Israel. They are nice people and can service you well here- and locally. You can also check out the Divas at Digital Eve Israel - a great resource for locally based talent in PR and emerging media.
7. Consider blended services as a way to save money.
See Item 6 and invest your budget in strategy and agency outreach. Ask your agency if they would be willing to team with your local writers and other service providers. It's worth a try. Remember, you are not asking for discount. You are asking to pay your agency for specific areas of expertise.
8. Want to know what journalists are writing? Check out HARO. It's free.
PR Whiz, Peter Shankman created a very useful and free service - HARO - Help A Reporter . Journalists list requests for sources and if you check it daily, your company might have the story the journalist is working on. I've used it with great success. Thank you Peter.
9. Want to know what journalists are writing? Research editorial calendars. Check out Cision. It's free.
Go back to step 1 and pick the top five media you think you belong in. Go their site and check out their editorial calendar. Maybe there are getting ready to write on something that is specific to your space and your expertise. Go here to Cision and do your own research. It's free.
10. Need to figure out a media strategy?
Easy. See who writes about your competitors or companies peripheral to your space. Go to the company's press section on their site or just do a news.google.com search and start tracking who covers your competition or the key words in your space.
11. Thinking about briefing Industry Analysts?
Depending on where you are in your life cycle, reaching out to Industry Analysts merit consideration. Your mileage may vary, depending on where you are on this. At the very least, and much like my recommendation in following and engaging with journalists you can do likewise with Industry Analysts. Many have blogs and write free commentary. I have an article here on my blog from the perspective of an industry analyst.
12. Need a Director of Industry Analysts? Check out Barbara French's Blog. It's free.
Check out SWAY - Barbara French's approach to Industry Analyst Relations, Influencer Marketing and the Business of Influence.
Big Time Take-Away:
Prepare yourself now for coverage.
Rather than thinking you can shove your press releases down the throats of your favorite journalists, think about how you can become a trusted source of quality content. This is where I go back to my point about why I believe every company should think of themselves as a media company, a content curator, and story teller.
Even though it's still a "New Year," we're approaching the beginning of February. If you have not examined your messaging for 2011, it's time to do so - now. It's a critical element of your public relations and social media communications strategy.
It's Almost February 1. Time To Elevate and Refresh your message for 2011 if you have not done this yet.
Here's a few tips that help you help your team get this done.
1. Start with your message.
The first part in this process is to clearly articulate a relevant message based on facts and endorsed throughout the organization. Then you must develop a messaging strategy and deploy a targeted blogger, media and industry analysts outreach relations program.
Your goal, at this phase, is to build or strengthen effective relationships with bloggers, analysts and journalists who can not only help you hone your message, but also help you position your company, you technology, your products and your marketplace.
2. Make sure you’re properly positioned.
Positioning is the act of defining your place among your peers and identifying the unique value you offer within that competitive landscape. It is both a goal and a process. It is ongoing and above all, it is proactive. If you don’t position yourself, the competition and other market factors will do it for you.
Good positioning is the heart and soul of an effective public relations campaign.
If done properly, it begets effective messaging – messaging that makes sense within the larger context of the marketplace, addresses important issues within that market, and demonstrates a vision for the future. Thus, through its relevance to a given market, good positioning helps build credibility with press, analysts, investors, channel partners and customers.
3. Make sure your social media communications programs are in line with your messaging.
Often times, I recommend company's Chief Technical Officer be the lead in setting the tone and voice for the company's social media communications initiatives. Your mileage will vary, depending on your goals, your culture and your resources to execute and most of all sustain this type of outreach.
Being found can be an effective and efficient means of being discovered by journalists. Your company's social media communications strategy can be an opportunity to tell your story, allow the chance to be discovered and be a source of trusted content.
The Flatiron Building, NYC, shot by Alan Weinkrantz on January 17, 2011. Share, but please credit. I really do love this building.
The old adage that a picture tells a thousand words is an understatement in the info graphic from Brian Solis and visualization agency, Jess3. Print this out and put in somewhere that can be seen by your and your co-workers. It's just a great reminder of an unfolding universe and ecosystem of opportunity awaiting you.
I'm discovering the application of QR codes as part of my online / social identity.
My QR code is on my letterhead, email signature, and on my next round of business cards from Moo.
I want to make it as easy and flexible as possible to reach, connect and stay in touch with friends, clients, media, bloggers and analysts that I work with on behalf of the work I do.
I'm personally using the Jumpscan application which builds your free QR Code.
On my iPhone, I got the free AT&T Scanner app.
How about you? Are you planning to use QR codes as part of your social identity or PR outreach?
Chime in and leave a comment.
Related Content for Further Reading:
Mashable - How to Use QR Codes for Small Business Marketing
I've just filled out my profile for Apple's new social networking site, Ping. Let's connect, discover and share our musical tastes.
