Hill+Knowlton Strategies

When I look at the business of PR today, I often ask both myself and my colleagues, ”when was the last time you did something truly different?”

It’s an important question because clients are looking for increasing levels of creativity in the plans and strategies we’re asked to provide. Granted, they may not act on them. But they want to know that we can think out of the box, and do so in a fashion that makes sense to their business.

Moreover, it allows consultants (particularly those new to the profession) the ability to look beyond the basics and the more traditionally-focused tactics (read ‘media’) that they learned in PR school. And when they know that they are able to expand their horizons, and do so within the context of what we’re being asked to do (meaning, with senior strategic oversight), exciting opportunities can be created.

Obviously, the best-case scenario is when our clients act on those ideas. Case in point: we’ve been privileged in recent months to work with Intel Canada on their gaming business. At the core of the strategy is Gamefaces, and driving the campaign is a focus on creating original content that we hope will resonate with gamers. And that speaks to the question I asked at the beginning of this post.  We’ve been incredibly fortunate to work with a client that get’s it – that understands the importance of “content” as table stakes. It means we now have the ability to capture and share the stuff that traditional media might not touch, but which our audiences might find both entertaining and useful, and ultimately help to re-shape perceptions. It means being able to engage real gamers in ways that might previously have never been considered in a PR context – and using the social media tools available in order to reach gamers where they go to get information.

Equally interesting, this campaign is already moving beyond Canada’s borders and – with the current Extreme Gamefaces Zero G promotion – providing the foundation for reaching audiences across North America and, potentially, globally.  

So when was the last time you did something truly different? If you haven’t, start now. Clients are asking for it.

In an earlier post, I mentioned briefly that we were working with Labatt to help build and launch their “Labatt Life” group corporate blog. I also mentioned that I wanted to focus on this project a bit more – for a few reasons.

Today’s corporations face issues that require highly targeted forms of communications – be it to investors , governments, communities, prospective and current employees, and around issues such as corporate social responsibility, corporate reputation, and so forth. Increasingly, this targeted outreach requires an organization to become significantly more strategic in the messages they wish to communicate to a particular audience, and the channels through which those messages are delivered to that audience. All pretty straightforward stuff.

Add to this, however, the evolving notion of ‘expectation’ and this scenario becomes even more challenging. Quite simply, stakeholders are increasingly setting the parameters for how they elect to receive information. And that has implications not only for what I chose to communicate but also how I chose communicate it. Previously, expectations were constrained largely by the channels themselves – specifically, the lack thereof and the high cost of utilizing those channels (that did exist) in order to reach niche audiences. 

Today, however, audiences increasingly expect:

1. communications that are more frequent (yet more targeted and relevant)
2. communications that are more direct (and unfiltered by third-parties)
3. communications that are more “substantive” and “authentic” (vs soundbites)
4. communications that are delivered via the media of their choosing (traditional or new)
5. communications that allow for both reaction and interaction

For Labatt, talent acquisition and retention is a key priority, and their management trainee program is a critical part of their recruitment strategy. At the same time, they also realized that traditional forms of communications were no longer sufficient to meet the changing expectations of this increasingly “wired” target group. Which is why the Labatt Life blog was created: to provide additional opportunities for Labatt to communicate to potential recruits in a way that allows for direct, frequent and “authentic” interaction (given that this blog is authored in part by current trainees, and provides a real, behind-the-scenes perspective), via a channel that these audiences increasingly look to for information.

That Labatt understood this changing environment made the experience of working with them even better. How they support and sustain this platform over the long term will be the real test. However, keep your eye on the site as they look to integrate cool content from across Labatt, and as they tour campuses across Canada.

Congrats to the Labatt team for making this happen.  

Over the past few years, and through the efforts of lots of people, Hill & Knowlton Canada has been positioning itself to address the growing impact that digital media is having on the business of public relations and public affairs. It’s been an interesting ride, particularly coming out of the dot.com bubble. Clients have always shown interest – though fewer were prepared to jump in than we would have liked - but it’s paid off in some interesting work… work that’s prepared us for where we are today.   

However, with social media continuing to fundamentally re-define the changing communications dynamic within which we now work – as marketers, public affairs and crisis practitioners, and corporate communicators - this positioning has taken on an added urgency. As our global CEO reinforced only a few days ago at our global digital practice meeting in Phoenix, H&K’s future success will be based largely on the extent to which our company overall becomes more digitally engaged, and on the ability of our people to advise clients of the importance of new media as an increasingly vital and strategic part of their overall communications solution. 

Which makes a ton of sense if only for the fact that in Canada (as well as in many other parts of the network I’ve learned) our clients expect it, are asking for it, and are increasingly looking to their PR agencies to deliver a more robust and relevant offering that integrates it. 

But to do this effectively, much needs to happen – not least finding the right people to help drive this focus on digital engagement and integration, and who can speak knowingly to the opportunities and issues that sit at the intersection of digital and PR. That said, finding the “right people” who do more than simply produce digital outputs in the same way we do press releases is anything but easy. Fortunately, our Canadian leadership team, like the uber-boss himself, has refused to simply pay “lip service” to the importance of digital, realizing that we can no longer continue to rely on purely conventional theory to drive growth. Which means walking the talk and building a team that can serve as catalysts for change – strategically integrating digital in ways that deliver real value to our clients. 

Which is why H&K, and the Digital Communications Practice in particular, are particularly thrilled to welcome David Jones, one of Canada’s foremost social media and digital evangelists, to Hill & Knowlton as vice president, digital. In his multi-faceted role, David will be working with me, the digital team, and our digital champions across the network to further grow our integrated offering.

In addition to his extensive PR knowledge (and you can peruse the impressive particulars here), David, as many of you know, is an early-adopter in the use social media for PR purposes. He authors a popular Canadian PR blog (prworks.ca) and co-hosts the weekly Inside PR podcast (insidepr.ca) and is a frequent speaker at communications conferences on how to use social media as an effective PR tool.

So what more is there to say about this blistering shift in the Canadian social media and PR landscape? Methinks nothing save perhaps a line from the King himself:  A little less conversation, a little more action please…

Not that 2007 hasn’t been a pretty wild year overall… October is turning out to be particularly heavy and the thought of vacation in December is already looking exceedingly attractive.

This month, H&K’s election predictor worked it’s magic again and provided an (oddly, or not) accurate outcome of the Ontario election based on the final percentages of popular vote. You can find out more in our election predictor blog. Of course, no rest for the weary here as we consider the potential of a federal election in the near future which will require us to, once again, fire up the predictor engine on a national basis.

Likewise, we’ve been helping Labatt join the exclusive but growing ranks of corporate blogs with the launch of their “Labatt Life” blog. Highly targeted, the blog is intended to provided prospective recruits of their management trainee program with a behind-the-scenes look at life working with one of Canada’s most recognized brands. I’ll be blogging about this in greater depth later.

Lastly, H&K Canada’s digital team have been enjoying the sunshine in Scottsdale, Arizona over the past few days learning about what our global colleagues are doing elsewhere in the digital sphere. You can read about what the digital crew have been up to over at Niall’s blog here.

And while this might not be all the news that’s fit to print (and there’ll be more juicy gossip to follow soon), I’m pretty much ready for a holiday… oh, wait a minute, I think I just had one.

I’ve been debating whether or not the next Ottawa Third Tuesday social media meetup deserves promotion, given that the star attraction for October is the catalyst behind my first loss at Scrabulous, and that she somehow feels she can get away with misspelling words like “lable” (Challenge!!!!)… but I guess, as a co-organizor, I don’t have much choice (he says with tongue entrenched firmly in cheek)…

Kidding aside, this is an event that folks interested in understanding the blogger-side view of being pitched by marketers in ways good, bad and ugly should not miss.

Danielle Donders (or Danigirl, as she’s known) is the author of a very popular blog “Postcards from the Mothership“. Given that she’s a mom, and that she blogs about being one, she also falls (like it or not) into that category increasingly attractive to marketers - the mom bloggers – and as a result is the recipient of many pitches, some that she’s found interesting and others less so, even from H&K. (Disclosure: Dani was a recipient of a Motorola KRZR as part of the now-concluded KRZRbloggers program).

So if you want to know what works and what doesn’t (at least for Dani), and get a behind-the-scenes peek at life as a prominent blogger (and the baggage that comes with it)… here’s the deets:

When? Monday, Oct 15, 2007, 6:00 PM

Where? Patty Bolands Irish Carvery & Pub,
             101 Clarence Street, Ottawa 

RSVP limit: Only 80 members (including guests) can RSVP ‘Yes’ or ‘Maybe’ for this Meetup.  

It’s business planning time at H&K Canada (Wooo… spreadsheets!). Although, and all joking aside, 2008 looks like it’s shaping up to be a banner year for digital (he says slapping a big Jinx on his forehead).

Without question, there’s clear momentum and things going on – billable or on the new business front – across virtually every office. What’s more, it’s become abundantly clear that when armed with the right ideas and the means to think creatively, we’re getting business that we might not have identified, or even pitched for, a year ago. To me, that speaks to a couple of things, the most important being that evangelism to the point of risking bodily harm does work, and that sustained support from the top is critical.

And while the PR straight-jacket has definitely been loosened, there’s probably a lot more we can do. Which is why the senior mucky-mucks this year surprised even me with their enthusiasm behind the notion of creating a business-planning wiki through which to solicit ideas and input from across all regions and ranks of the company. To badly paraphrase “We are the World”, the younger generation are our – meaning, the PR business’ - future, and their thoughts on how communications is changing, and will change, is vital.

Notwithstanding the few who felt a tad nervous being so open in sharing their thoughts, particularly if those thoughts were contrary to those who signed their paychecks, it’s been an interesting and, I’d suggest, relatively successful first foray into the wiki-space. We can certainly do better, and I’m looking forward to next year when perhaps we’ll all be more comfortable getting more than just our feet wet or watching from the sidelines.

Several things that have me excited for 2008:

1. The prospect of making a “big” hire that’ll clearly establish H&K Canada front and centre on the digital/social media map (finger’s crossed).
2. A bunch of minority governments going to the polls so that we can get down and dirty with H&K’s highly successful election predictor franchise.
3. Finding clients who want to partner on bringing to life cool ideas like Barrick Gold’s recently announced “Unlock the Value” campaign (and, in case I’m not being clear, Barrick is not currently a client)… a campaign that could transform both the nature of their business, and the nature of their relationships with key stakeholders.
4. Continued success in helping organizations understand the changing communications landscape… Case in point, I’m in Montreal today providing a half-day training session to a group of companies that are looking for new and innovative ways to connect with customers.
5. Engaging with more clients who recognize the importance of tightly integrating digital into their crisis preparedness programs
6. Continuing to find and encourage internal champions to see that their future success is going to be tied ever closer to their understanding of the digital environment…
7. And, as Mike Manuel, so eloquently (yet directly) put it: “If you think you’re the social media master of the universe. High five, stop blogging about it and go show the world how it’s done.”