Image Awards - April 2010

We know that TIME FLIES and April 2010 will be here sooner then we think- so in the coming months, we will give you some handy tips to help you navigate your way through the process of preparing your Image entries.

Getting Started

• Consider every project you are working on as a potential entry. In order to enter, some part of the project must take place between January 1, 2009 and mid-March 2010 (end date will depend on the deadline to be announced).
• Write your plan now. Set your goals (broad) and objectives (precise).What are you trying to accomplish? You can have qualitative and quantitative objectives, but they must be specific and measurable.
• Organize support materials. Keep a file for notes, surveys and documentation. Start saving copies of results, proof of research, before and after samples, e-mail correspondence or feedback, media clips, letters/notes, reference materials, photos, etc. If you start now, all you need to do is “put it together” later.

Categories to Consider

Most people think of the big stuff – marketing campaigns, special events, brochures, new Web sites, etc. But there are also entire categories for a poster or calendar, news release, written speech, electronic communications, presentation, or even a unique specialty item. If you
don’t have enough elements to enter Division A, you can try parsing it out. This
may give you the leading edge and make for a winning entry.




PR Students!

Did you know you can submit an Image Entry? Its true, students can enter a written speech, newsrelease, position paper or computer-generated communication. You can also enter any other category in the other professional divisions if they have something that doesn’t fit in the student division. As you complete your school or internship projects, you may have a gem hiding right in your portfolio. Just think how great it would be to tell future interviewers that part of your body of work won an award at the local, or even state level. That would definitely set you
apart from the crowd and really help your career “take off!”

The Guidelines

Yes, they matter. In fact, failure to meet the guidelines may get your entry disqualified. After you have burned the midnight oil to crank out a future winning entry, you would hate to have be taken out of consideration for not following page or spacing guidelines. There is a certain way to
submit or present your entry, what should be included and how your presentation materials need to be formatted. As the saying goes, “the devil is in the details.”

What you need to know...

Put most of your work into the two-page summary, not the notebooks. Seventy percent of the scoring is based on the summary of your project that sets out the reason and need for development of the public relations program or tool, how it was implemented and the results. The judges then review the support materials for professionalism, innovation and design to score the remaining 30 percent of the entry.

Make sure you address five elements in the two-page summary - Research, Objectives, Implementation, Evaluation and Budget.

If you don’t follow the directions, your entry could be disqualified or at the very least, overlooked. The summary should include all the elements and everything important about your entry. And it should be clear, concise and factual – not just creative. So by following the specific directions – your flight plan – you won’t “veer off course” and you will be able to reach your final destination (a.k.a. AWARDS!!).

2010 Conference: "The Big Picture"

What will bring you to FPRA Annual Conference? There are a lot of great
things happening already with the 2010 Annual Conference, and you won’t
want to miss the “The Big Picture!”

To be a part of "The Big Picture"...

• MARK YOUR CALENDAR: August 8 – 11, 2010 at the beautiful Naples Grandein Naples, Fla. Did you know that Naples Grande Beach Resort is a certified Florida Green Lodging hotel?

• RESERVE YOUR HOTEL ROOM NOW: Reservation link is up at www.fpra.org

• REGISTER NOW: Registration forms are ready! Not sure if you’ll have the budget for Annual Conference next year? Have some money left over in your 2009 budget? Take care of it now and relax! Go to www.fpra.org to download your registration form
  

GREAT SPEAKERS CONFIRMED: Confirmed general session speakers include
Jim Lukaszewski, The Lukaszewski Group– Developing a Strategic Mindset: How
To Become a Trusted, Strategic Advisor; Lisa Malone, NASA– PR strategy around
sun setting of the Space Shuttle program; Deirdre Breckenridge, PFS
Marketwyse – Putting The Public Back In Public Relations as well as several
breakout session speakers on topics regarding:

• •Building a Strategic Plan

• Launch of the Disney Parks Blog

• How PR Pros Avoid Legal Woes

• What Your Boss REALLY Wants But Hasn’t Told You

• Polishing Your Professional Reputation

TELL US what brings you to conference: In addition to the terrific programming and professional development opportunities, great networking is at Annual Conference because of you! Please email Kathleen Taylor, APR or Pam Nulman, APR, CPRC and tell us “What will bring you to Annual Conference?” for a chance to win an FPRA prize!

Keep an eye out for updates on the FPRA website. This is FPRA’s key professional development seminar, and the focus is on great speakers, of-the-moment topics and tried-and-true
strategies of public relations. Some other things to think about:

• Do you know of potential sponsors of Annual Conference? Our sponsors help FPRA offset the cost of registration for attendees.
  

• What items could your business donate to the FPREF scholarship fundraiser? Let’s help Southwest Florida Chapter co-chairs of the fundraiser Cheryl Garn, APR and Sharon Arnold obtain some great items that will pack the house for the night full of big excitement and big success.
  

Ring in the New Year and new Calendar

With all the hustle and bustle of the holiday season we are all scrambling to keep tasks and holiday treats in order.

As a helpful reminder, Dec. 31, 2009 is the last day to renew membership without incurring an additional fee.

As we open our 2010 calendars, let us not forget...


SOCIAL MEDIA CAFÉ REPLACES THE JANUARY MEETING
Save the date and get ready for an event jam-packed with the latest in the social media market. Topics inlude:

• Social Media Ethics, Butch Ward, Poynter Institute
• Utilizing Youtube for Citzen Engagement, Michelle K. Garnder, UCF
• A social media success story, Chris Griffith, lifeinbonitasprings.com
• And More!

Friday, January 22, 2010, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Royal Palm Yacht Club in the Fort Myers River District on West First St.

REGISTRATION OPEN FOR 2010 ANNUAL CONFERENCE
The 2010 State Conference: "The Big Picture: Bringing Public Relations Strategy and Leadership into Focus" will bring four-days of education, networking and fun to the Naples Grande from Aug 8-11, 2010. Register early, reserve your room and relax!

Save the dates: August 8 - 11, 2010
Location: Naples Grande

Looking for ways to mix business and fun together at 2010 Conference? Consider:
• Lending a hand in raising funds for the Florida Public Relations Education Foundation. By either volunteering for the fund raising committee, making a personal donation, or joining in the festivities with your fellow FPRA friends at the Sunset Social you will be sure to have a blast!
• Have you been looking to take a stay-cation? Why not extend your stay after conference and bring the fam! FPRA negotiates a group hotel rate for the conference, and you can extend your stay for the same nightly rate.

Tips for Bridging the Budget Gap

As PR practitioners, whether in a good economy or bad economy, we should make the best use of our budget.

Throughout the past 25 years, Meg Geltner, General Manager for the Salvation Army of Lee County, Florida, has never seen a downturn like now. More challenging economic times have inspired some innovative public relations initiatives to generate community support. Geltner recommends:
- collaborative efforts with community partners who will also benefit, including governmental, for-profit and other non-profits;
- targeted messages and mediums for each donor group, cultivating each generation; and
- focusing on trends which will appeal to editorial boards and donors.

She also notes that with the advent of new technology and social networking, the role of the public relations staff has evolved. Even so, tried and true methods of communicating with donors, such as direct mail, should not be dismissed, and are still very effective.

As Director of Communications and Printing Services for Lee County Public Schools, Joe Donzelli is a one-man band. He faces not only the challenge of a limited budget, but also limited human resources. To counteract this, he has had to become very resourceful in locating talent within other departments in the school district to assist with technology and graphics.

Donzelli reminded us that although our metropolitan area has grown significantly, it's still considered a small market versus others such as Miami. According to Donzelli, only a small percentage of journalists actually have formal education in the field, and many reporters in our market are seeking experience in order to make a career move to a larger market. Because journalistic inexperience can sometimes cause inaccuracy, Donzelli recommends controlling your message by submitting ready-to-go materials to the media, including press releases and quotes they can use verbatim, and posting your own video messages and interviews on the web.

Dr. Charles Fornaciari presents tough ethical issues in today's Web 2.0 world

Charles Fornaciara, Ph.D joins us from Florida Gulf Coast University for this afternoon's topic on modern professional ethics.

What do we mean when we refer to Web 2.0 technology? Wikipedia says that this media promotes interactivity and sharing of information on the web. How is this different from traditional media?
1. It's interactive - traditional media was a one-way communication. This allows everyone to become part of the message.
2. Unstructured environment
3. The communication flow is uncontrolled
4. Always occurs in real time, all the time
5. Web 2.0 is all about the end user

Fornaciara asks us several questions that get our brains churning - when does technology cross the line?

Facebook and Beacon - in November 2008, Facebook announced a new service called Beacon. Facebook members who took actions at Web sites of Facebook partners would have related information posted to their page. Users would have to explicitly prevent this action from happening on the partner sites. This produced an extremely negative reaction - 14,000 Facebook users posted a petition against the partnership. Facebook finally agreed to let users opt out of this service as a result.

Google's GMail ad words technology - Google opened GMail to invited users, but did not tell anyone that a program would be looking at the e-mails people were sending to find keywords that matched ad content. Matched ads would appear on the screens of target users. Using GMail is a voluntary activity, and ad words are still being used frequently.

Fornaciari offers suggestions to combat potential Web 2.0 ethical nightmares:
-Develop a list of guidelines and stick to them.
-Slow down and think before implementing. Consider potential problems and work through the scenarios.
-Be careful and aware of permissions and privacy acts.
-An organization must truly listen to its audience, instead of reverting to the traditional one-way broadcast communication.

Thanks to Dr. Fornaciari for a thought-invoking presentation!

PRU session: Effectively Integrating Public Relations and Advertising “Drive or Crash” with Michael Goldberg

In this digital day and age, it may seem like the “wild west”: everyone is working to be at the top of their game to ensure clients and companies continue to see the value of what we do. Michael Goldberg, EVP-Chief Marketing Officer of Zimmerman Advertising, says Pivotal to our survival is a realization that it is our job to “sell stuff.” No matter what position we are in, it is important that what we do has a positive impact on the bottom line – which never lies, said Goldberg. We must continue to be valuable.

Showing our value can sometimes be one of the main difficulties for PR professionals with all the intangible benefits that we know about, but we must adapt to stay in the game. Goldberg says we are at an intersection, and we must grab the wheel and drive if we want to make it in the future communications landscape.

Part of that survival is working together effectively with other players on the field. Goldberg talked about being relentless in pursuit of clients and customers by focusing on results. “There’s a thin line between brilliance and true insanity,” Goldberg said. He believes that sometimes, it the best ideas may just be the wildest at the time, but it is important to be fearless to achieve success. He used the Crocs shoes campaign to demonstrate how to connect to customers and boost the bottom line in a brave way (using voices from both those who love and hate those croslite plastic shoes!). This was a great example of how public relations and advertising worked together.

In other Wild West territory, digital age news, Goldberg reports that Social Media has overtaken the Pornography industry as the as the top reason people go online…hmm.

High Tech - High Touch Panel Discussion

Lynn Schneider, APR, CRPC; Tina Haisman, APR, CPRC and Newt Barrett addressing several issues, and answering questions. We'll try to get them all in here!

Q: If and when should PR jump into the conversation online?
Lynn: She says "The same old PR skills still apply!" Gave a real-life example about answering a negative comment on a public forum utilizing a personal approach and PR skills. Never argue opinion, just correct factual information when appropriate.

Q. Tell us about the "Million Dollar Coupon Campaign" and strategies to use.
Tina: The goal was to create buzz, the coupon wasn't expected to "sell" the house. Initially was going to use a traditional approach, but came across PRWeb.com and decided to use the service as an experiment. When it hit the web Tina set up a Twitter account for the client and tweeted the headlines as they appeared. Tina emailed David Meerman Scott to thank him for his book "The New Rules of Marketing and PR" which inspired this approach. Scott replied and asked permission to use the project as an example on his blog and in the next edition of his book!

Q. Tell us more about how content marketing affects public relations.
Newt: Get a mental image of a book cover - "The Tale of Two Cities"..."It was the best of times, it was the worst of times". That's where we are now. Ten years ago the media controlled access to the public. Today you can go directly to the public. PR and content publishers are inextricably intertwined. Must think like publishers - discover what problems the target market is experiencing and create compelling, relevant information for them.

Other thoughts from panel?
Lynn: All of us are looking to build relationships. To do that find the affinity between you and your publics.
Tina: Some tech info - I chose the media visibility package from PRWeb because they distribute to the Associated Press.
Newt: Used a couple of examples of local folk using blogs to build a web-like internet presence, free marketing!

Lynn: For us, the number one source of quality leads is still through resident referals. Need to go back to the quantity vs. quality discussion. If I have x number of hours to devote to cultivating leads, where do I spend them?

For Newt: Once you build your blog, how do you get it "out there"?
Newt: The single most important thing is to understand who your target market is and that you market exclusively to that market. Combine timeless content with timely content, continually adding to the timely content. Be precise about what you write about. If the content is there you will be found!