Social engineering: Facebook’s subtle nudge

Yesterday, Facebook unveiled a new initiative, aimed at encouraging Facebook users to advertise their organ donor status on their Timeline. Although stating that you are an organ donor on Facebook carries no real legal weight, the Facebook team hopes that the move will peer-pressure users in to signing up to be a donor at a local registry.

Thus far, the idea seems to be working. Donate Life California, the group where California Facebook users were sent to register as donors, has reported a 1,300 percent jump in online registration and Facebook announced that they expected to exceed 100,000 declared users in the first day alone.

Mashable posted a poll yesterday asking users “will Facebook’s efforts drive up organ donor registrations?” With 308 responses, “yes, such is the power of Facebook” is leading with 59.74 percent of the vote.

But, the announcement has also prompted some snarky responses. Forbes has published articles with titles like “The Best and Worst Organs on Facebook” and “Will There Ever Be an Organ Sales Button on Facebook.” Additionally, users have taken to Twitter to discuss Facebook’s latest update:

However, comedy aside, the concept of Facebook’s latest take on social engineering is too akin to Genesis 1:27 for my liking (“So God created man in his own image”). Facebook’s greatest demographic is impressionable high school and college students who, yes, should probably understand their options regarding organ donation but who says where it stops? In 2012 it’s pressure to become an organ donor, but in 2013 it could easily become pressure to register as a certain political party or support an extremist movement.

What do you think, is Facebook’s latest feature a great example of social healthcare or a slippery social of social engineering?

Nike’s #MakeItCount video OR How to turn a fail in to a win

On April 9^th, Nike posted a video advertising their Fuel Band under the campaign slogan #MakeItCount. The video was originally slated to be shot in a studio by one of Nike’s regular directors. However, instead of arriving at the shoot location director Casey Neistat and editor Max Joseph took the production funds Nike had provided and travelled the world for 10 days. Filming their adventure along the way, Neistat told CNN that his rational was “If I could do anything in the world and make it count what would I do?” The resulting footage has turned in to a huge viral campaign for Nike’s product, garnering more than 4.2 million views in less than two weeks.

One of the most interesting parts of this video is how simply unbranded it is. The first screen shows Neistat unboxing a Fuel Band and the video is interspersed with famous quotes in Nike’s signature block font, but otherwise there’s no indication that this is Nike-sponsored. However, the implication is still there, loud and clear: buy a Fuel Band and you’ll have an adventure too. Buy a Fuel Band and your life can rock as hard as ours.

The concept of branded stories is nothing new; however there was something so organic about what Neistat and Nike have produced that it brings it to a new level. This type of end result has huge potential implications for a host of industries. And with growing consternation among consumers regarding brand bombardment, I think we’ll see a lot more branded stories in the future.

Do you think that branded stories have a place in advertisement?

Holy Pinterest, Batman!

Hi, my name is Sam and I’m addicted to Pinterest.

(Hi, Sam!)

Well now that that’s out in the open we can get down to business. Not counting my deep, personal love for social networking’s youngest darling, Pinterest is an emerging (fast emerging) tool that public relations practitioners need to be up to speed on.

Pinterest has become an invaluable tool for ideas, inspiration and self-promotion (pin your blog posts!) and with a base of 10 million and counting, it doesn’t seem to be going anywhere soon.

In an effort to spread my abiding love, I’ve shared some pros, cons and suggestions for Pinterest below.

Pros

• Contrary to popular belief, Pinterest is not only for fashion and food. The platform is great for ANY industry with a visual component. If you look at my image above, you’ll see pins from fashion and food (just because they happen to be two of my favorite Pinterest uses), but you’ll also see political advocacy, travel tips, typography and interesting products.
• A good portion of the content posted on Pinterest doesn’t lead back to sales pages; instead they are sourced from blogs and photo galleries (limiting the product push that could easily dominate the site).
• Pinterest offers a unique opportunity to showcase customers. As an example, Dunkin’ Donuts has an entire board dedicated to their fans creative interpretations of products.
• It’s easy to repurpose content you already have—pin photos you take, infographics you make and any other content you’re already putting out there.

Cons

• Copyright issues are beginning to plague Pinterest (much like excessive alliteration is plaguing this post) and, as a result, some companies are beginning to shy away from the tool.
• Pinterest is focus driven toward visual content, making it hard for certain industries to utilize*.
• There is no option yet to “verify” an account, so you never know for sure if you’re following President Obama or Fake-President Obama.

Want to get started but don’t know who to follow? My personal Pinterest Top 5 includes: The Heritage Foundation, U.S. Army, Chobani, Nina Garcia and Mike D (and, of course, you should be following me.)

For a more specific take, read about Pinterest for healthcare in my post on Health Care 3.0!

*Extreme creativity may be applied to overcome this obstacle

How to Land Your First PR Job

I wrote this post last June. (Yikes!) Time flies when you’re living the PR life. I’ve made it one of my goals to start updating this blog more, unfortunately it keeps getting pushed to the back burner. But I have been writing! Here, here, here, here and here, for example.

I thought about just deleting this post when I finally made my way back in to my blog this week, but the more I thought about it I decided it is still relevant. With college seniors everywhere getting ready to graduate and enter the work force, tips from someone who has recently been in the same position can never hurt. So, feel free to read over my ideas and comment with anything I left out.

As a side note, Roger Williams just informed me that it’s 60 days to commencement, and that makes me feel old.

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First: I’m no authority on job-hunting. But, as a recent college graduate with a degree in PR I completely understand the woes associated with applying for jobs in this industry. There is absolutely no formula for landing an interview, and every agency has different criteria. However, there are absolutely things that you can do to increase your chances of getting called back.

Personally, I sent out too many resumes and job applications to count before I even got a call back. I know how frustrating it can be. Here’s what worked for me:

1.  Find a connection within the company you’re applying to. This is probably the most important thing I found out. Cold sending out resumes and blindly calling companies will probably work. Eventually. It will also probably take three-hundred tries before you get anyone to notice you. Regardless of what Washington, DC says, the economy is still in a bad place. This means that companies are more leery of hiring, and when they do it’s much more competitive. Utilize Linkedin, Twitter, and Facebook to help. The saying ‘what a small world’ still applies to your job search—you could have a connection to someone at your dream company and not even know it. And if you don’t? Make one. I started following my top PR firms on social media and eventually made contact with an employee who passed along my resume. This showed the company that I was social media-savvy and that I was willing to go above and beyond to get my resume to them. Find someone on Twitter who works at the company you want to apply to and just ask if they would be willing to give you advice. Don’t come out of the gates asking for a job; just ask if they will speak with you on the phone or in person. Then, if it goes well, see if they will pass along your resume.
2. Make your cover letter show how interested you are in the company. Read their blogs. Follow their Twitter streams. Do research on their clients. And then, in your cover letter, express your interest in their recent blog post or in how they utilized social media to leverage x campaign. Make it clear that you are passionate about public relations, and about their company. And then proofread it. Twice. And then have someone else proofread it to. When I was applying for jobs I had made a connection with an employee, and written a really great cover letter. I never got called. When I went back to reread the cover letter? I had used “it’s” in a situation when I should have used “its”. Facepalm.
3.  Do your research. This kind of ties into number two, but if you get an interview make sure you have relevant things to talk about. If something happened in the industry, bring it up. Ask for your interviewers opinion on something, or ask about their clients. When I interviewed I happened to see that the agency had just won several awards. So I congratulated the VP on it when I met with him.
4. Be ready to think on your feet. Over the course of my interviews, I met with a total of 7 people. 7! So I definitely got a lot of questions I wasn’t expecting. But you have to have to ability to come up with an answer. It doesn’t always have to be intelligent (I was asked what movies I had seen recently and the only thing I could thing to say was “X-Men Origins—I really enjoyed learning more about Wolverine’s backstory”), but you do have to give an answer.
5. Be yourself. I know. Everyone says it. But it couldn’t be more true. Think about it this way—the company isn’t hiring someone else, they’re hiring you. So why would you want to pretend to be someone else in an interview? You have to have confidence that you have all of the skills necessary to do the job, and do it well, and you have to convey that. Tell them about how you’ve already done this at another internship, or about how you have learned a new skill quickly. Highlight what’s included in your resume, but also tell them about other aspects of internships and jobs you’ve had that are relevant. Don’t be afraid to show your personality, in the long run the interviewers know that you are going to be working with them, so they are checking to see if you’d be a good fit for the team.

Ultimately, there are so many do’s and don’ts of applying to jobs. What worked for me may not work for you. But it might. The best advice I got during my job hunt was “if you can’t do PR for yourself, who would hire you to do PR for their clients?” Show your interest in the industry and showcase your skills. It’s important not to get discouraged. Just keep trying and keep applying and keep honing your skills. You’ll get there eventually.

So I Graduated, Now What?

On Saturday I graduated from college. This has probably been one of the most conflicting times of my life. While I am undoubtedly excited to start a new stage of my life, there is something very frightening about not having a plan. For the first time of my life I’m not going back to school in the Fall and this is both strangely liberating and terrifying. I’m in the process of finding my first job which is equally exhilarating and nerve-wracking.

Although I have no set plan, after four years of college I can say that I am confident in the skills and abilities I have gained, and in the knowledge I have worked so hard to acquire. I am confident in my choice to pursue a career in public relations because I am sure that it is where my skills be put to the best use and it’s where I will be happiest. I am also confident that I will be just fine.

As college students we put so much pressure on ourselves to graduate with that elusive first job already sealed up. I will be the first to admit that I was guilty of it. I thought that my four years of college were all for naught if I didn’t have a job on May 21st. I’ve quickly realized that there are things more important than simply having a job offer. I want to make an effort to find a first job that will be a good match for me. I think that a first-job needs to be a lot of things (and different things for different people). I want a job where I can continue to grow as a professional and learn as an individual. I want a job where my knowledge and skills will be utilized. For me, these things have become more important than simply finding a job, any job.

At the beginning of the school year I posted a list of “new school-year resolutions” that I had made for myself. Well, considering my newly acquired status as a college graduate, and real person, I should probably see how I did on each of those:

1. Have our PRSSA CW campaign come in in the Top 3. This one did not happen. Unfortunately our campaign didn’t place and there were several reasons for it. In the end, we had some fun doing it and I definitely learned a lot through the process. And really, that was enough for me.
2. Figure out my thesis topic and then have it come out great, maybe even see if I can bring it to a conference. Done! I don’t know about how great it came out (I’ll be going into detail about my thesis findings in another post) but I did figure out a thesis topic, and I did bring it to a conference in Illinois!
3. Apply for internships for Spring semester. Done! I applied for internships for this past semester, and landed a great one at Regan Communications in Providence, RI. I spent the semester learning the ins-and-outs of working in a PR firm, and had an amazing time gaining invaluable skills.
4. Graduate (summa cum laude, hopefully?) Done, and done! I made it through Senior year, and I made it through will still graduating summa cum laude!
5. Get an amazing full-time paying job. I’m not going to say that this is a failure because it’s something that is going to happen. I’ve recently forced myself to stop focusing on the fact that I have to find a job now and instead focusing on pinpointing positions and companies that are perfect for me.

So. Over the next few days I plan on revamping the information on this blog (my portfolio section, resume, and references), and I also plan on posting a lot more. Now that school is done, I want to make sure that I keep writing. It’s something that is so important for PR and for myself, so I don’t want to lose my skills. Look for many more posts in the near future!

Social Media and the NFL Draft

With the NFL Draft starting tonight, it’s definitely a time to look at how the draft has changed with the emergence of social media. One of the biggest, and arguably most interesting, ways is the use of YouTube by potential draftees.

First round draft picks are typically known to fans before the draft even starts. These players have a level of visibility and recognition that is driven both by their performance and their prominence in the media. However, what happens for players who aren’t potential first round draft picks?

Some of these lesser known college players are utilizing YouTube as a way to gain more recognition. This tactic has two benefits: it creates a fan base that they otherwise would not have had and it gets NFL Scouts to look at them.

For players who go to lesser-known schools, or traditionally non-powerhouse football schools, they now have the ability to showcase their skills in an innovative way that will grab the attention of Scouts. San Jose State defensive end Jarron Gilbert posted a video of himself jumping out of a pool onto a deck with no hands. The result? He was picked up in the third round by the Chicago Bears last year.

NFL hopeful Nick Schrank has posted videos that showcase his balance and coordination. But although the videos have even been talked about in NFL.com, there is little hope that Schrank will be drafted in the near future.

I think in future years, we’re going to be seeing more and more of these videos. As it gets harder and harder to break in to the NFL, players are going to resort to using social media as a way to get noticed. For the NFL, this means that ability to notice new potential that previously may have been overlooked.

And just for fun, watch this one.

Inactivity Haiku…

This blog has been left.
Despair and anguish abound.
New post coming soon.

Job Search: Are We Hunting or Being Hunted?

With graduation a few short months away many college Seniors are embarking on a job search to end all job searches. Everyone is feeling the pressure: to graduate, to get a steady job in our field of choice, to repay our college loans, and to enter the real world as real people. Unfortunately this search is anything but easy.

As someone who has already started in on this long process, I can say from experience that there are a lot of bad job postings on the Internet. Last week I started my job search by going on Career Builder, I thought it would be a good place to start if nothing else. Immediately I found hundreds of listings from several companies touting “Entry Level Marketing and PR Positions.” Score? I immediately looked at the websites for a few of the companies, and they all looked legitimate. I couldn’t believe my luck at finding so many great entry-level jobs after searching on only one website. I submitted my resume and cover letter, impressed with myself for my hard work.

Now, I’m a night owl, so this was taking place around 11pm. After submitting my resume to one of the companies, I almost immediately received an email back from them thanking me for submitting my resume and inviting me to call or stop by their office to discuss job opportunities. I found this extremely odd, but decided I would call them the next day anyway. I never got the chance. Instead, I received a phone call at 9am from the same company thanking me again for my resume on congratulating me: I had been chosen for an interview based on my numerous qualifications.

This seemed fishy. There was the desperate college Senior in me who wanted to believe that I was actually so qualified that X Company really wanted to secure me for a position after graduation. Fortunately, my logical side took over. I thanked them for the phone call and asked if I could call them back later that day to work out a time, as I didn’t have my schedule in front of me. They agreed. As soon as I hung up the phone I began an aggressive Google search of the company. It didn’t take long to see the large number of hits that popped up as soon as I typed the word “scam” after the company. Needless to say, I never called them back.

There are a whole host of companies just like this around the country. Companies that claim to be marketing or consulting firms, but in all reality are sales organizations. The reports on this particular company stated that their employees work on a commission basis and have to go door to door to offices and ask the people working there to buy spa/sports/etc. packages. Most people who have interviewed with these companies say that they are taken away in cars to shadow employees on their first interview.

Since finding out about these “scam” employers, I have been called by several other companies that I applied to on the same night. Some have a similar Internet reputation to the company I described above, but others have nothing bad written about them on the Internet because they are simply too new (or have recently changed names). But, there are a few trademarks of companies like this that are important to keep in mind when searching for a job:

1. Avoid any jobs on general career boards (like Monster.com or CareerBuilder.com) that have the listing title “ENTRY LEVEL SPORTS/ENTERTAINMENT MARKETING/PR/ETC JOBS”. They use titles like this to catch the attention of, mostly, college students.
2. Always Google search the company name. If Google wants to fill in the word “scam” after the company name, do more research.
3. Look at the website for the company. I’ve found that most “scam” employers are very vague and tend to list no clients or job description/mission statement.
4. If all else fails, it can’t hurt to go on the interview. But just be wary when you do.

Post a Week 2011

I’ve decided that I want to blog more often. I have so many ideas going through my head, but a lot of times the thought to blog about them doesn’t occur. So, in 2011 I am pledging to post at least once per week.

Thanks to WordPress for offering encouragement to those of us who need it!

Twitter Skeptic to Full On Tweeter

I have to admit I thought Twitter was ridiculous. Although I completely and fully understood its importance for my profession, I never understood the allure. I thought it was slightly creepy and more-than-slightly representative of how digitally tied our lives are.

But, regardless of my preconceived notions, I have resolved to become a first-class Tweeter by the time graduation rolls around in May. This is tough for me for a few reasons. The first is that I feel like I’m coming to the party a bit late. The second is that I don’t have a smartphone. But, for the past few days I have been teaching myself the etiquette of Twitter, and spending time each day looking for things to Tweet about and for people to follow.

What I’ve found? I was wrong. So wrong. Twitter is actually a great tool. In the past few days of putting in minimal effort, I’ve doubled the number of people I’m following, and the number of people following me has almost tripled. I figured out all the intricacies quickly, and have already been mentioned several times.

I can definitely see how it could become addicting, and (if used incorrectly) obnoxious. But as a tool for public relations, news and information gathering, and networking, Twitter is a great way to get involved in any number of conversations.

My advice? Get on Twitter! You don’t have to Tweet something every five seconds, but if you want to become more involved in your field, Twitter is a great way to do it.