by Curt Mercadante
Earlier this week, I had the pleasure of listening in on a Bulldog Reporter teleconference featuring social media/tech evangelist Robert Scoble, entitled, “2010 Tech Trends and Tactics.” (You can view the live tweets here.)
What made this teleconference so interesting is that here you had Scoble — a journalist (yes, bloggers are journalists) who is also a brand unto himself — talking to PR flaks about how best to utilize new online tools to engage the media. I say this is “interesting” because not only are many of these PR folks the same people who are pitching Scoble on their clients’ new apps and wares — Scoble is out there using these tools to build his brand.
But I digress…
The key issues that stuck out for me from the teleconference were the following:
- Know what your story is first and know how to tell it. That will determine what tools to use. As I’ve written here previously, content and message should always come before tech. Too many people worry about their “Facebook strategy” or “Twitter strategy” before thinking about their content strategy. If you don’t have a compelling story — there isn’t a tool in the world that’s going to help you. Scoble hits the nail on the head with this one.
- Blogs are still the best way to tell a story. Of course, I’m not surprised that Scoble (a blogger extraordinaire) would say this, but he’s correct. Tools like Facebook and Twitter are great — but blogs really allow you to expand the space in which you can tell your story. As Scoble pointed out, frequent, unique, compelling content on your blog is also the best way to pump up your content’s SEO value.
- The most effective PR “pitches” Scoble gets are from friends or fans recommending products, rather than press release and pitch calls. This really reinforces the idea that modern communication is about authenticity. It’s not about slick taglines. Your product has to be good. Your service has to be solid. If those two principles are in tact — your product will create buzz organically. No amount of tweets or status updates can cover up for a crappy product/service. And the buzz you create is the best PR you can generate. More so than any press release you can send to journalists like Scoble. (Could the press release really be dead?)
All in all, a worthwhile teleconference. Thanks to Bulldog for putting on the teleconference — and thanks to Scoble for participating.