• Sweden takes on the EU presidency - challenging 6 months
  Posted 01.07.2009 by Pernilla Bäckman   add comment

  Today Sweden took over the rotating EU presidency. Observers say that this will be one of the most challenging 6 months presidencies. The financial crisis is still taking it toll on the member states and the effect is being felt amongst the people in the EU, for example through rising unemployment levels. Also the EU is facing institutional challenges. The new commission will not be in place until later this fall. The recent EU elections to the European Parliament saw a new composition of MEP’s and changes to the European party groups’ influence. On top of this the Swedish government will have to deal with the Lisbon treaty, which remains in limbo.

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• Looking for answers: Can “0” and “1” answer your questions?
  Posted 23.06.2009 by Elisabeth Totschnig   add comment

  In 2004 “googeln” (“to google”) became an official word of the German language as the renowned German dictionary Duden added this word to its edition as synonym for “searching the Internet”.

  Will “to wolframalpha” be next?

  About a month ago a new web offer was brought out which was called the Google-Killer by some media. WolframAlpha is an answer engine. not a search engine - as the developers emphasize.
  
  
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• Guidelines on client-agency relations and best practice in the pitch process
  Posted 04.06.2009 by Alfred Autischer   add comment

  The European Association of Communication Agencies (EACA) and the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) have just developed Best Practice Guidelines for relationship management between clients and agencies. The focus lies on the complex issue of the pitching process, guiding consultants through several steps from before the pitch process has started, to the core pitch process until after the pitch, when it is essential to manage the transition process properly.

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• It's official - only a year from now we’ll be spending more time on the internet than watching TV!
  Posted 02.06.2009 by Helen Standing   add comment

  This time next year, June 2010, will see people spending more time on the internet than watching broadcast television, according to recent research by Microsoft. When it comes to getting messages out there, it’s hardly surprising that ITV and other broadcasters are reporting huge drops in advertising revenues, as advertisers look to more cost effective opportunities online which will reach a much wider audience.

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• Harry is a hit stateside
  Posted 02.06.2009 by Loretta Tobin   add comment
  PR Week asked me to comment on how successful UK's Prince Harry's first official overseas engagement has been in PR terms.
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• Media Training in twenty seconds
  Posted 29.05.2009 by Hanning Kempe   add comment

  The first thing most executives will do to prepare for an interview with the media is try to remember a script that tries to answer every possible question they could get asked. What a waste of time! Here's what they should do to make a better use of the valuable opportunity.

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• In the spotlight
  Posted 20.05.2009 by Justin McKeown   add comment
  You can learn about media interview techniques by reading books. There are lots of “top tips” around that you can look up on the internet. These are good but they don’t give you the sense of excitement or terror that can grip you when you’re about to “go live” in front of millions of people
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• War Child
  Posted 13.05.2009 by Michael Murphy   add comment

  I was recently asked to provide an ‘Expert Opinion’ in the next issue of Communication Director and I was delighted to endorse the British NGO's "War Child" campaign. Who could not support a PR programme like The War Child Heroes Campaign? It is shocking for me to learn that most of the people who lose their lives in war zones are children - so anything this organisation can do to raise awareness of that issue deserves positive endorsement and action.

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• What are you doing? Big effect with only 140 characters
  Posted 30.04.2009 by Dirk Moser   1 Comment

  Twitter is a highly recognised issue on the media agenda these days – and therefore also in PR. But until now most companies are not really in touch with this new type of communication, thus it is no wonder that they do not know how to deal with this new community media. Particularly big companies are eager in implementing Twitter to gain additional access to their target groups. Companies and brands are experimenting with numerous ways of using Twitter and only time will show which of these are successful.

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• Swine Flu Highlights Importance of Comms
  Posted 28.04.2009 by Michael Murphy   add comment
  As the first case of swine flu has been confirmed in Europe, scientists, health agencies and governments are desperately trying to determine the facts about the virus.
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• State of Play
  Posted 24.04.2009 by Marta Brambilla   add comment

  On the morning of a new Congressional hearing the lead Research Assistant falls in front of a train on her way to the hearings. Old style news reporter for the Washington GlobeCal McAffrey (Russell Crowe), investigating a shooting of a petty thief thinks there may be a connection. When the Washington Globe's blogger new college graduate Della Frye (Rachel McAdams) approaches McAffrey for an opinion, she is immediately told to get lost by the old-school reporter. As Della learns how to get a story from the inside from the old pro McAffrey the story develops and exposes corruption on a much deeper level than was initially seen.

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• UK Government, car makers and environmental groups get set for three-way scrap over older cars
  Posted 22.04.2009 by Stuart Humphreys   add comment

  Today’s budget in the UK is expected to include a brief description of how a car scrappage scheme - aimed at helping the ailing UK automotive industry - might work, though Treasury officials claim the details have yet to be finalised.

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• 48th Salone Internazionale del Mobile exhibition tomorrow
  Posted 21.04.2009 by Raffaella Gerli   1 Comment
  Tomorrow in Milan is the opening day of the 48th Salone Internazionale del Mobile exhibition. 
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• In the Eye of the Puma or how picture PR works
  Posted 02.04.2009 by Alexandra Schmidhuber   add comment

  One of the challenges we face in our daily work is to find ways of telling journalists our client´s stories in a way they find attractive. An answer how this works is simple and needs no explanations: It is using pictures!

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• “It’s the perceptions, stupid!” Especially during crisis…
  Posted 26.03.2009 by Katharina Stierschneider   add comment

  Wherever you go at the moment crisis seems to be looking over your shoulder. In these times the trick is knowing how to deal with a crisis, using effective crisis communication. “It’s the perceptions, stupid” , an article written by Prof. Jesper Strömbäck paraphrases the Clinton Campaign in 1992, saying that people form their opinions on their perception of reality and not actual reality.

  For him the essence of successful crisis communication is being able to understand how people will react and making a link between images and actions to form an action-model map.

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• PR is a better brand building tool than advertising: the proof?
  Posted 25.03.2009 by Leo Exter   add comment

  Research is a beautiful thing. By using extensive amounts of statistical trickery it makes glaringly obvious the things you have always intuitively understood but struggled to prove. Not that the proof is always iron-clad… but I’m digressing

  Case at hand: I have always felt (and always put my money where my feelings were) that for many products PR is far more important brand building tool than advertising. Now, here’s the research.

  The new study by Text100 and [context] analytics looks at Interbrand’s Best Global Brands , their visibility in the press (Media Prominence) and their advertising investments to uncover the comparative impact of the two on brand value.

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• Solving life´s little problems
  Posted 23.03.2009 by Alfred Autischer   add comment

  

  iPhones new advertising promises: Solving lifes´s little problems one app at a time. No lie! For me the iphone is going to be the first fully integrated communications tool for our Social Webs life. The 15.000 applications available offer a totally new way of 1:1 communications abilities. Newspapers and magazines like the German "stern" started to offer specific applications to their customers. Stern announced 100.000 downloads within one month already. PR can use this new ways of communication. Bloggers now talk about new iPhone editions expected in summer with even more sophisticated apps. Look at it! 

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• It's your choice
  Posted 18.03.2009 by Michael Murphy   1 Comment

  Time is running out in the countdown to the European Parliament Elections, being held across Europe from 04–07 June. But it seems that Europe has only just woken up to the need for a multi-media campaign to persuade us to vote. It seems that few of the 375m citizens in 27 EU states that are eligible to vote actually know about it - and many of those that do, don’t see it as significant to them. 

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• American Democracy, bell-shaped curve and President Obama’s communications budget
  Posted 16.03.2009 by Leo Exter   add comment

  Many years ago Jim Muncy - a PhD of Marketing and Professor at Valdosta State University – explained American Democracy to me in terms of left, right, distribution of population between the two along the bell-shaped curve, and basic marketing science (verbum sapienti sat est). Took him about three minutes.

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• Small but powerful
  Posted 05.03.2009 by Kristina Börjeson   1 Comment

  They don’t have a full time job with a good salary. And they don’t have their own place yet. But they do have a strong say in what families tend to buy.

  I’m talking about the children or the young adults and their influence on their family’s purchases.

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• Bad news is no excuse for bad communications
  Posted 03.03.2009 by Michael Murphy   add comment

  We are being bombarded with bad news. The BBC UK jobs tracker shows that UK-based insurance company Royal & Sun Alliance (RSA) is to cut 1,200 jobs in the next year, Vodafone is losing 500 employees and engineering group GKN more than 550 – and the list goes on… and on. The same story is being repeated across Europe .

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• Taking a plunge on twitter
  Posted 02.03.2009 by Leo Exter   2 Comments

  An excellent article on the ''Why? and How?'' of Twitter for professionals has been published in the CIO magazine (thanks to Jeremaya Owayang's blog for the link).

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• Top ten tips for survival in the digital economy
  Posted 24.02.2009 by Rolf Hansen   add comment

  1. Keep on top of it – It’s essential that executives keep themselves informed about the latest digital developments in their area of business and the wider business environment so that you are prepared for major, sometimes disruptive, changes these developments will bring.

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• Chocolate and wine for Valentine’s, with a helping of regret on the side
  Posted 16.02.2009 by Leo Exter   add comment

  Co-marketing has long been a favourite tool of ours. From an occasional media deal (pairing up an automotive brand with a fashion retailer) to an advertisng campaign (portable GPS as a prise for a telecom’s Christmas promo), co-marketing is an excellent way for creating communicatinos with excellent ROI. However, few marketeers ever thought truly big when it came to co-marketing… until now, that is.

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