Awards Season 2015

by with 0 Comments

This year some of my clients are entered in awards that are new to me, as well as one that I know well, having written the submission for the very first Small Business of the Year winner, Nu-Heat, in 2011.

In the annual Express & Echo Business Awards for Exeter and beyond, I’m delighted that Robin Rea and his Ottery St Mary restaurant, Rusty Pig are finalists in two categories; Entrepreneur of the Year and Creative Business. Robin has already won at the Live Love Eat Awards this year – Platinum Award and Regional Champion.

Then there are the Tile Association Awards, which I discovered when trawling for potential awards for my South London client Diespeker & Co. Diespeker has also been shortlisted in two categories; Manufacturer of the Year and Best Use of Tile in Hospitality or Leisure.

I was also asked to enter a legal exec in for the CILEx (Chartered institute of Legal Executives) President’s Award. More of that soon.

It is always exciting to learn that a client is a finalist in an awards event and I wish them all the best of luck. I’ll be at the Express & Echo Awards myself – with some trepidation having learnt that Katie Hopkins is the guest speaker!

Outsourcing social media management – hints and tips!

by with 0 Comments

Although part of what I do is termed ‘social media management’, I still find it fascinating just how many companies outsource this work. I understand the reasons, as I know first-hand what a time-consuming job it can be.

There’s nothing wrong with outsourcing, as long as you find the right person for the task. This will be someone who’s prepared to get beneath the skin of your business, achieve the right tone of voice and find the right accounts for you to connect to. (I managed one account for a while which was taken over by a dedicated sociasocial media management 1l media business. I went back some months later to have a peek, and was dismayed to discover that the business’s Twitter followers had grown tremendously, but on closer look all the followers were spam accounts. Where’s the value in that?).

How many times recently have you heard someone say there’s a clue in the phrase ‘social’ media. Here’s a good definition of social: ‘relating to activities in which you meet and spend time with other people’. On social media, people want to interact with a real person, not an automated tweet. There’s no life in that, and no long-term benefit.

In truth, most social media managers will mix and match scheduled and real time tweets and posts – it’s a tough call to avoid scheduling completely. However, it’s bad practice to schedule a tweet then forget about it as it disappears into the Twitter ether. Similarly on Facebook if someone asks a question about a post, they are much happier if they are answered quickly. Your social media manager must be on the ball to respond quickly should someone engage on one of your social media sites.

By the way, if you outsource social media management, don’t think that you don’t have to do anything. A good social media manager will need to communicate with you from time to time – for example if one of your customers has a question social media management 3needing an immediate answer that only you can give.

Although this blog discusses Facebook and Twitter management, your social media manager could also run Pinterest, Google+, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube – whatever works best for your business, as long as they do it well!

The power of a good story

by with 0 Comments

A couple of weeks ago I was chatting away on social media when a company called Barrel Top Wagons (great name) came up in my Twitter feed. They were very excited to have won a Theo Paphitis #SBS (Small Business Saturday) Award and wanted to make some noise about it. Last year, Lyme Bay Cabins had the same success and I’d helped them out with a press release and distribution which resulted in some local coverage and a piece in Devon Life. Lyme Bay Cabins’ owner Gary started tweeting at Barrel Top Wagons to talk to me.

I am always willing to help out a small business ‒ after all I am one – so I talked with Jo Henderson, who co-owns Barrel Top Wagons. She put together some information for me, which was a great starting point, and I tweaked this into a press release.

Barrel Top Wagons Theo Paphitis smlWhen the picture of Jo with Theo Paphitis at a winners’ event came through a few days’ later, we were set fair. I sent the story to my contacts in the regional press and I’m delighted to say the response was brilliant. Western Morning News popped it straight up online and featured the story in the Sunday edition, while Tom at the Okehampton Times took the trouble to email me to say it would be in the next issue. I spotted it in the Express & Echo Monday edition, too, and Jo at Barrel Tops said it was included in the North Devon Journal. (So that’s a ‘yay’ as I’m not yet immune to the thrill of achieving such extensive coverage!).

In truth, this news item was a gift for any PR; the story behind the company is genuinely interesting (read it here) and Jo had given me enough background to make it easy to write a press release that could grab attention. Match the story up with a photo of Jo and the former Dragons’ Den entrepreneur Theo and – well it’s not rocket science is it?

Good luck to the inspirational and ethical Barrel Top Wagons!

We’re not gossiping, we’re networking!

by with 0 Comments

Attending a networking group for the first time can be daunting. Despite Networking 3working in PR, a sector associated with people who are brimming with confidence and know how to talk the talk, my personal style is somewhat less ‘in your face’. I will even admit to being quite shy. For me, walking into a room full of strangers is a challenge.

If you’re the same, the answer is not to hit the bottle for a confidence boost (that would be frowned on at a breakfast meeting anyway!) but to keep a clear head and remember that everyone is in a similar position.

People who frequently go to the same group have the advantage of knowing other regulars, which obviously gives them a head start. On the other hand, fresh blood is always welcome, and most people will be happy to talk to you – after all, there may be something in it for them! That may sound a little cynical, but, at the end of the day, this is the reason that most people network.

Networking 2In my humble opinion, however, it is not always wise to go to a networking group simply to hunt for business. I believe a better approach is to go along to meet new people, share business experiences, learn something and have a bit of fun. If you are sociable, natural and likeable, other networkers will enjoy talking to you and finding out more about what you do. Then if they need the service you provide, you will pop into their heads and bingo!

Once you’re comfortable in a group, you could offer to give a presentation. Most networking groups like to include a talk, so why not take advantage? Keep it short and snappy, and don’t drone on about how marvellous your services are. Impart useful information and advice around your services that people will remember. Again, should they find they need those services, you’ll spring to mind.

During my year of networking I’ve changed from shy, retiring wallflower to someone who will approach the newbie in the room and ask them about themselves.. I’ve given a presentation myself with another PR, which went down very well – and we picked up some new business as a result.

If you aren’t yet networking, take a look around. Chat to people who do, ask them for suggestions. Go along with someone you know to a group that they regularly attend. If you’re a woman, might you enjoy a women in business networking group? Is there a specific group for your type of work – if you’re a crafter, a craft network, for example. Be proactive and put your head above the parapet.

Which type of networking is going to work for you is a matter of trial and error:

• Breakfast meetings are useful as less of the working day is taken up
• Late morning meetings are particularly good for working mums who can’t do early mornings
• Lunchtime networking is great for socialising, but be careful that they don’t result in a less productive afternoon
• Evening meetings can be ideal, as long as you don’t have teenagers to ferry about or babies to get to bed.

It’s a juggle, so choose whatever suits you best, or mix and match. You don’t have to go every month. Bear in mind, though, that some groups have annual fees so you may need to weigh up if you will be able to attend regularly. Others are pay as you go, which could prove more cost-effective and practical.

In truth, networking has changed my business. I have new clients, and new friends. There’s been a lot of laughter and I’ve learned some great tips from other local business people. And I know more, much more, about how everything interacts in my business community – which is proving to be pretty useful. Good luck!

Networking 4

Mrs-Do-As-You-Would-Be-Done-By

by with 0 Comments

I’m going to be honest here. I’ve never been much good at the ruthless side of business. The cut-throat behaviour, the fierce competitiveness, the power dressing. Okay, I wore shoulder pads in the 80s but I looked more like an air-hostess than someone who should be in Alan Sugar’s boardroom.

I have often worked with the ‘dog-eat-dog’, ambitious folk of this world, and I am full of admiration and sometimes envy. They have flash cars, wear the right labels and dine at the top table.

The Water BabiesUnfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, as a child I read Charles Kingsley’s ‘The Water Babies’ and the character of Mrs-Do-As-You-Would-Be-Done-By has stuck with me into adulthood. Well, maybe not the character but the inference of the name. Treat people as you would like to be treated, and expect to receive the same treatment back.

It strikes me that working in the creative world of PR, copywriting and social media is not just about making a living, although that helps, of course. It’s about building relationships, going the extra mile for clients, lending a hand where you can and enjoying what you do. Oh, and laughing quite a bit because hard work has never suffered from a giggle or two.

And as we move into a new year and as my business grows, I’m not going to change. You see, Mrs-Do-As-You-Would-Be-Done-By was ‘nice, soft, fat’ and cuddly. Her sister, Mrs Be-Done-By-As-You-Did was ‘gnarly and horny and scaly and prickly’. There’s no contest, in my book. There wasn’t in Charles Kingsley’s, either!

Have a great New Year!

Mind the Pot Plant!

by with 0 Comments

I finally bit the bullet and agreed to give a presentation with Sharon Goble of If…Media to one of the networking groups I attend, the Exeter and East Devon Business Club. Now, although I have a background in drama (nay, a degree in the subject!) I have always preferred to be behind the scenes, having worked both as a video producer and a stage director. Getting up in front of a crowd is not something I particularly enjoy, which may seem odd given that I work in PR (for me the whole point is usually to PR my clients, not myself)!

However, Sharon convinced me, and came up with a great topic, PR – is it magic? She was keen to talk about the power of images and targeting stories for the right media. I wanted to explore the connections between PR and social media, and how businesses should make sure they don’t let great PR stories get away.

Come the day, and off to the Deer Park Hotel for lunch before the presentation. I put my nerves to the back of my mind, deciding not to indulge in a glass of wine – I thought Dutch courage could prove my downfall!

Sharon and I got ready to start our presentation, which is when I got up close and personal with a pot plant. The layout of the room meant that I was standing under the leaves of the plant and could barely see the people in the room.

After attempting to talk from behind the foliage I decided to twist it round to get the leaves out of my face. The audience gasped as the plant toppled and I dived to stop it from falling. General hilarity ensued – talk about an ice breaker!

Of course, my nerves dissipated and I (almost) enjoyed the experience. Sharon has offered the presentation to another networking group we are members of. My only request is that there is a pot plant in the room….

Thanks to Fluffy of New Tricks for capturing the moment.

The Biker Boys

by with 0 Comments

Well I know the Hairy Bikers have been in town, but there’s another group of bikers, not so hairy, that I’ve been involved with for a while. In fact, it struck me this week that I’ve been working with the Devon Freewheelers charity for almost a year.

I first heard of the charity in 2015 when I read about the launch of the first Honitonfestival pig Sausage & Cider Festival. I offered to help with PR for the event, which was being held partly to raise funds for the Devon Freewheelers.

I met with Daniel Lavery, who founded the charity, and we talked about all things motorbike. Not one of my areas of expertise, but there you go, I learn quickly. In fact, the Devon Freewheelers offer an out-of-hours courier service to the NHS free of charge. Yes, I’ll say that again, free of charge, throughout the night and for 24 hours on Saturdays, Sundays, and Bank Holidays.

Devon Freewheelers courierThey transport urgent medical supplies like blood, tissue for transplant and breast milk. They also deliver and collect patient notes when asked. If they didn’t do these things, a taxi or ambulance would be used, costing the NHS a lot of money and calling on scarce resources. I’m full of admiration for these volunteers, who include the riders, operations support and fundraisers. No-one gets paid.

Over the year I’ve written hundreds of press releases, taken photos, spoken to fundraisers, supporters and journalists, met the Wurzels (well I stood next to them BssssloodBike-Matt-Austin-3backstage at the Sausage & Cider Festival), persuaded Matt Austin to take photos of one of the riders for Devon Life, shaken hands with local MP Neil Parish who has been incredibly supportive of the charity, encouraged the team to find their first patron (Mark ‘Flymo’ Hayes), negotiated radio interviews with the BBC and Heart FM and generally done what I could to help raise the profile of the Devon Freewheelers.

The riders are out every night in the dark hours, journeying carefully across Devon’s road network, often on their way to save someone’s life. They are unsung heros as the patients they help never know they’ve been there.

It’s been a fascinating year – I’ve learned so much and continue to be full of admiration for the team. And yes, a second Sausage & Cider Festival is scheduled for 2015!

And finally, there’s some exciting news to come for the Devon Freewheelers, so watch this space – the press release will have my name on it!

Devon-Freewheelers-600-600

A picture paints a thousand words

by with 0 Comments

I have never been a natural in front of the camera – preferring to remain on the other side of the lens. In school group photos I always snuck to the back, and in family photos the one pulling the face, yes you’ve guessed it, that was me. When I worked in video production as a producer and scriptwriter, I occasionally appeared in shot, but only the back of my head as I filled in as an extra.

Obviously with the rise of social media a photo is a necessity – but from my point of view an evil one. So when someone mentioned every photo of me on the Internet was the same, a picture of me positioned ‘casually’ in front of a bush, I decided it was time to ‘go professional’ with local photographer Matt Austin from Lyme Regis.

Matt is just brilliant at portrait photography, so I made the booking and wonderedSueCade-Matt-Austin-30 what he’d manage to make of my slightly careworn face. I was terribly nervous and afterwards my jaw ached from smiling, but when the photos arrived in my Dropbox, I was speechless – and impressed.

I posted a photo on Facebook, just to test the reaction. Around 90 likes later it seemed that everyone loved the new look me – and there weren’t too many rude comments about Photoshop and kind lighting.

I’d also recommended Matt to a theatre group, and the shoot he did for their show, The Voyage of the Viqueens, resulted in some stunning images. They may not be a professional group, but they certainly look it in the photos. And I’d thoroughly recommend going to see the show at The Beehive in Honiton in November.

Viqueens-Matt-Austin-8 (3696 x 2460)

Now all I have to do is live up to my new photos, which luckily include shots of me in wellies with one of my dogs, which is pretty close to the norm.

Don’t hide your light under a bushel!

by with 0 Comments

PR is all about good news (most of the time). In Devon, we love to celebrate positive stories, and the county is full of people doing fantastic things in business, community and charity. However, sometimes people don’t realise they’re sitting on a great story!

Two of my clients in East Devon almost missed the opportunity for a shout out this summer, not realising the PR gold they were sitting on. Luckily, social media did its thing, and I was alerted to both stories by comments on Facebook and Twitter.

In the first instance, Otter Nurseries received an SOS call from celebrity gardener, Alan Titchmarsh who was in desperate need of coastal plants for a garden makeover in North Devon he was doing for his programme, Love Your Garden.

alan titchmarshThe makeover was for a man who had lost his sight after an aneurism, and Sir Alan had been let down by a supplier. He had rung garden centres across Devon before calling Otter Nurseries. Carla, the young lady who took his call, couldn’t believe it was him at first! Alan was delighted when Otter Nurseries was able to fulfil his requirement and sent his production team to collect the plants. When they arrived, they also had a wish list for lots of other supplies, which staff managed to get together for them in record time. A great good news story, I thought – and local press agreed. Read it here.

I recently learned that I’d missed another lovely story from Otter Nurseries, where a female member of staff grabbed her tools and fixed a customer’s car right there in the garden centre’s car park!

Over in Ottery town centre, I’ve recently started working with chef Robin Rea of the Rusty Pig. Robin has a great business, combining an exclusive dining experience with a specialist butchers shop selling fantastic air-dried charcuterie. I noticed on GoldFacebook that Robin had been awarded Gold in the Taste of the West awards. When I asked him if he’d created any publicity around it, he said that he’d put it on social media…. A couple of hours and one press release later, the local papers again were delighted to print the story of his success. Read about it here.

The moral of this blog is to tell your PR agency whenever something good happens. I’ve lectured (in the nicest possible way) both the above clients not to dismiss anything, but get in touch asap. After all, it’s my job to get their good news out there and there’s nothing I like better!

Twitter followers – quantity or quality?

by with 0 Comments

Do you ever look at the number of Twitter followers you have and wonder if more is better? Do you peek at an account that boasts 30,000 followers and wonder where you’re going wrong with your 583?

Well, the chances are you’re not going wrong. The chances are you’re talking to the people you want to talk to. If an account has thousands upon thousands of followers, take a look at who they follow and who follows them – it can be very illuminating.

There are, of course, reasons why some accounts have a multitude of followers. Take our very own #DevonHour, the Twitter account that gets businesses across Devon talking to each other. It makes sense that this account has approaching 13,000 followers – because there are that many businesses in Devon! Likewise accounts belonging to celebrities, supermarkets and the BBC –it’s pretty obvious why they have so many followers.

I always become a little suspicious when a smaller business has tens of thousands of followers. Are they purchasing followers, I wonder. In recent months I’ve been offered the chance to do just that to boost the numbers of followers on my account. Similar offers are being made to accounts I help run for clients. ‘Get 10,000 new followers instantly!’ Er, why?

Cartoon

I like to earn my followers. I prefer to know that someone likes what I’m saying, or wants to know more about my business. I follow accounts that have some relevance to me and my business, others that look like they could do with support, some for news and one or two simply because they make me laugh.

Running Twitter (and Facebook) accounts for clients may seem a simple task, but to do it well you need to engage the right audience and find new followers who are interested in what the client is doing and what they have to say. Why would a vintage shop in Devon want to follow a pizzeria in Glasgow (unless they’re friends with the owners), or a lacemaker in Honiton follow an energy specialist in Florida? (Of course the vintage shop and the lacemaker really should be following each other!)

At the end of the day, it’s not about how many followers you have, it’s about the relationships and relevance. It’s good to have a healthy number of followers, but it’s not so good to have thousands of followers you really don’t have anything in common with. So be content with your 583 followers – as long as they are the right ones then you’re doing well.