Is the Press Release Dead? - and other new media challenges

In the fifth session of the day - post tea with cream scones - JM's ownDeb Berman discussed moving beyond the press release - and integrating social media more seriously into any company or NGO. Which is, essentially, what JustMeans does. Among other ideas, she suggests bringing in the young people's knowledge to the top manager's boardroom. For larger companies, she suggests the answers are all in front of you: the programs tend to exist already in your company, its just a question of blowing it out of the water to an entire new level. Use competitions to bring people in - and to open up company CSR reports.

Press releases aren't exactly the most popular forms of corporate communication. Neville Hobson of WeisComm Groupdiscussed the 'social media press release' - taking the traditional press release, slicing and dicing it in different ways that are useful in an online world. That means it can easily be cut and pasted in an easy way for the recipient of the content who might decide they want to do write about it. Links to multimedia - from youtube to delicious to twitter - make it that much easier. He suggests the press release still has a role - but it is not to be done in isolation. But then again, in this 'new world' nothing should be done outside of integrated communications.

Hobson suggests that, really, its simple. It's the same old questions - what are you trying to achieve? How achieve it? Follow up, measurements and evaluations follow. social media becomes a tool in the 'how do you achieve it'. The challenges of this 'new' environment is the willingness of people to freely give of their knowledge - and thus the importance of really paying attention. As moderator Jo Confino of the Guardian said, telling the story is important - regardless. How bring difficult stories to a wider world with honesty - and that leads to a critical question: how much can you be honest before it is damaging and destructive? Hopefully, social media connects people - and that will last even past those potentially destructive moments when honesty is ugly. Because hopefully press releases aren't just about data - and they aren't just about stories. It's about knowledge (communicated via stories) that goes towards wisdom, where one company's experience can enhance another for total societal development.

This is part 5 of my series. Phew! Two more to go!