Ken Stadden\'s MacroBlog

The Great Recession plucked me from a marketing position earlier this year and flung me back into the world of freelance. This unexpected change has had its good and bad aspects; one of the good is a more flexible schedule. Thus, last week I was able to attend the fall workshop of CUPRAP*, a statewide association for college and university communicators, in Bethlehem, PA.

It gave me the opportunity to see firsthand how public relations professionals are coping with the confluence of two major events—a severe recession and the rise of social media. A perfect storm has been brewing, one of tighter budgets, leaner staffs and a steep learning curve for new media.

When one speaker asked for a show of hands, it appeared that roughly two-thirds of workshop attendees have been on the receiving end of budget cuts, forcing reassessment of every nickel, dime, and Harry in their departments.

Bethlehem, Pa: Once steel, now meetings.

For readers who may not understand what’s being squeezed out, these folks typically produce publications such as magazines and brochures for alumni, donors and students; pitch stories to media; arrange programs and events for the public and news organizations; produce videos and podcasts; handle crises and negative news stories; and perform a thousand other tasks all springing from the need to manage the organization’s image and relationships with news media, students, teachers, staff, alumni, and the community at large.

Now that we’re almost a decade into the third millennium, most institutions of higher learning have fairly large, complex Web sites; a Facebook presence; one or more blogs; YouTube channels; Twitter accounts; and other online ventures, all of which must be maintained on shrinking budgets by dwindling staffs. That’s in addition to everything they did before social media hit critical mass and took off.

It seems impossible on the face of it, but this crazy-big workload is often managed by a mere handful of people, even at the largest schools.

Diane Rankin of Mind Over Media and Ray Betzner of Temple University

Speakers at the workshop ranged from a young social media whiz newly hired by a small-town college to an experienced communications VP at a major city university. Their insights and advice will be of interest to anyone involved in PR, marketing, and social media. I’ll get to them in Part II of this series.

I’ll also reveal the answer to the question, “What is the rate of Twitter adoption among communications professionals?” Enter your guess in comments below or answer the poll at right. The answer will be based on my highly unscientific observations from the 10/12 meeting.

* CUPRAP = College and University Public Relations Association of Pennsylvania

A friend and business associate asked me what I thought of Michael Schutzler’s recent post  #twitter bullshit math? If you don’t have time to read it, here’s the abridged version:  once the novelty wears off, Twitter will be nothing more than a cool way to follow celebrities.

He asserts that amassing a high number of followers is often worthless. About the silly “rule” that you must follow anyone who follows you out of courtesy, he writes:

Of course that’s just nonsense. Nobody I have ever met can actually read more than a few dozen active twitterer’s daily feeds. I saw one activetwitterer with 14,000 followers and 14,000 people she followed. Come on. Really? You can read 14,000 people’s posts? Of course not. Nor can you read the posts of 5,000 or even 1000 people. I cannot find the data to prove my point, but I am willing to bet there are millions of people with at least 1,000 followers  and of those, most are junk followers.

While his analysis of the follow/follower relationship sounds logical, I see nothing wrong with a business following you just to get followed. For example, I just got an email from Twitter telling me that Active.com is now following me. Here are their follow/follower stats:

1751 tweets
Following 20909 people

This is how a business like Active.com gets my attention. They’re legitimate, as I’ve used  them to register for sporting events. Of course they’re not reading their tweets from almost 21,000 people, and why should I care? I’ll take a look at their tweet history and if it looks good, I’ll follow them.

I also don’t agree with his conclusion that all uses of Twitter will fade away except for celebrity tweets. Twitter is used by so many in different way that it’s easy for one user to conclude that the part of the elephant he’s touching is all there is to it. Here are some examples of Twitter uses that he leaves out:

• Local small businesses tweeting about bargains and special events.

• News organizations, both local and special interest, tweeting links to breaking stories.

• Bloggers you want to follow but don’t because an RSS reader is too much trouble to set up, too rigid and too time-consuming to scan. A tweet gives you a link to their new posts.

• Conference attendees providing real-time updates

• Reports from those unfortunate enough to witness political or natural disasters

Point is, Twitter is so fundamental in its utility, so universal, that people and organizations are using it in a great variety of ways.

I was all ready to conclude with this sentence: “Nope, as I’ve said all along, Twitter is something fundamentally different and it will continue to grow because of that difference.”

Unfortunately, I ran into a reality check here: http://mashable.com/2009/10/13/facebook-twitter-growth-stop/.

Twitter isn’t growing any more. Whether this is a temporary plateau not, who knows? It may be the beginning of Twitter’s maturity. In either case,  I remain convinced of its unique value for individuals and organizations and I’m staying aboard the bandwagon. For now.

“PEOPLE LOVE LISTS,” the gruff, cigar-chewing editor-in-chief was shouting into the spittle-flecked mouthpiece. “GIVE ‘EM LISTS.”  Ever since that ear-opener from my stinky old boss many years ago, I’ve done my best to write coherent, compelling prose without gratuitously embedding bullet points just because folks love to read ‘em.

It’s been a losing battle. After WWW started meaning something more important than Wichita Water Works, reader attention spans dwindled to near absolute zero and those with acute attention deficit disorder became the common denominator every writer was aiming down at. (”At” is such a good preposition to end a sentence with. Don’t you think?)

So today I’ll cave and provide to you a list, albeit a short one. Short but powerful. These tweeting rules have allowed me to build up an immense following on Twitter, now numbering in the double digits and not too darn far away from triple digits.

Dumb Suburban Tweeting Guy Rule number one:

Remember, they’re not that into you.

Suppress the banal stuff that causes the world to ridicule Twitter users. While reporting trivia such as the contents of your latest meal to create an “ambient awareness” among a circle of friends may work for some folks, the damage done reaches well beyond their peer group. You know how “Green Acres” episodes are already 44 light-years away from earth and there’s nothing earthlings can do to get them back? Like that.

Further, the ambient awareness thing just flat doesn’t work for dumb suburban guys who don’t have many friends. (Never mind how I know this.)

No, best put something interesting out there instead, or at least a link to something interesting. Tip: Think like a writer. Ask yourself: does this tweet pass the crusty editor’s “so what” test? Hint: Don’t tweet about the sunrise from your hotel room unless you are going to include a link to a Twitpic. AND NOT A GRAINY, DARK, FUZZY ONE FROM THAT PATHETIC 1-MEGAPIXEL CAMERA PHONE, EITHER.

DSTGR number two:

Please, oh please oh please, put up a better picture.

Here’s a negative example: Jonathan Vaughters, former pro cyclist and current directeur sportif of the Garmin-Slipstream pro cycling team, was forced to retire from the 2001 Tour de France due to a bee sting that caused his eye to swell shut. I guess he thought his swollen face would make a cute Twitter picture. Maybe as a JOKE, Jonathan, at first. But not forever.

And don’t get me started on dark, fuzzy, out-of-focus pictures, which are legion. Or pictures of cute animals, pictures of you upside down, or pictures of your car (I tried that and rejected it after about two tweets). Why, people? If you are tweeting as a human and not a faceless corporate representative, have a good picture of you.

Tip: Let us see your face clearly, or your face plus some interesting special effects, like a pair of Homestar Runner legs grafted onto your head. Hint: If you make my Tweetdeck a nicer place to visit in the morning, I’ll follow you forever.

DSTGR number three:

Capitalize. Spell. Use punctuation. Write complete sentences.

The rules are there for a reason. When you follow the rules of grammar, educated grownups will have one less reason to unfollow you in a moment of irritation over a lousy tweet.

Tip: I don’t care if you hated your sixth-grade English teacher. We all did. Write well anyway. Hint: You’re not doing this for her.