New Year, New Hope

Happy New Year!

Or in my case, Hopeful New Year.

The Chinese Year of the Ox. I'm not sure what the Chinese horoscope for "Ox"alleges, but I hope that "resilient, strong and proud" are adjectives involved. Those words describe my wife and I and the type of year we need.

I've been unemployed for two months now. The holidays may have been jolly and bright, but finances are getting scary and tight.

Somewhat to my relief (I'm still unemployed so I ain't counting any chickens), my efforts may be beginning to pay dividends. I have a nice part-time prospect in the works with a Hickory, NC marketing firm. Offering your services on a part-time basis is not a step down, but rather a form of compromise that meets mutual business needs. You need your foot in the door to get a seat at the table...

I'm also exploring freelance writing opportunities on Guru.com. I think the Guru.com service has good potential for freelance writers (work in creative writing, web copywriting, blogging, editing, articles and brochures are all posted frequently), but it's highly competitive and is limited as a free service. Naturally more money yields more options.

Finally, I'm constantly networking in Charlotte, working my way around the PR and marketing circles, scheduling networking lunches and calls to the best of my ability. It never hurts to introduce yourself and ask for advice from someone with more experience. Networking is a tree: Start with a seed and branch out, eventually it will bloom.

Parting piece of advice from the guy with no job: Persist, persist, persist! Not to be confused with "don't take 'no' for an answer." If a company tells you they're not interested, thank them for their time and get back with them later. However, if an email or voice mail goes unanswered, you'd better send another...and another.

Don't send the contact(s) the same thing each time though. It's like pitching in public relations. Introduce yourself and the reason you're contacting them first, then follow-up with a different piece of information (resume, experience highlights, tie-in with recent event of relevance).

Also, take the lead and suggest times to meet or talk versus asking the contact to do so. It's easier for them to say "OK" then "How about 2:00 Wednesday at T.G.I.F.'s on Charlotte Ave.?"

My wealth of advice and knowledge will hopefully translate into financial wealth in 2009, but until then, the journey continues...

Recession "PR"oof

The Berlin Wall falls. Five U.S. presidents in the Oval Office. U.S. national debt ratio more than doubles. Microwaves outsale range ovens. Heath Ledger is born and dies. Watergate scandal and fallout. Hank Aaron breaks Babe Ruth's home run record. More than a billion people gain access to the world wide web.

What do all of these events have in common? They all have taken place since the last time U.S. unemployment claims were as high as they are today. The economic crisis worsened further this past month as employers cut more than 500,000 jobs in November, the largest one month decline since 1974. More than a million jobs have been lost since September. With a president-elect waiting to take the nation's reigns and the government acknowleding that the country has been in a recession since late 2007, hope may still be on the horizon.

One industry's gloom can be another's gold. The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) held its 2008 Annual “Masters of Marketing” Conference in October, where attendees including client-side marketers, media and creative agencies and others were polled about their marketing and media budgets, plans and tactics going forward. The findings are encouraging for those in marketing communications. Following is a sample of the results:

• 67 percent reported they "will spend more" or "spending will be constant/no changes"
• Of that 67 percent, 26 percent plan to increase spending by more than 10 percent

Public relations in particular is and will continue to be an essential piece of the fiscal pie. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (U.S. Department of Labor) estimates that the number of "public relations specialists" will increase to nearly 300,000 by 2016, an increase of roughly 18 percent. The forecast for public relations practitioners is mirrored internally.

• Social media integration was selected as the "marketing discipline" most likely to promote growth, with 28 percent of respondents choosing it as their top choice
• Next most important: Grassroots/viral public relations (19 percent)

Chuck Werle, an Asheville, NC-based public relations professional, gives a synopsis of the difference between advertising and public relations. "Advertising is what you tell others about yourself, your products or your services. Public relations is what others tell about you."

That definition in mind, it's easy to understand the pending marriage of social media and public relations. It's as natural and fitting a match as cereal and milk. One is seemingly incomplete without the other. Sure, businesses can still post online ads on Facebook or create pop up videos where you catch the monkey and win, but as with traditional media PR has always been superior in credibility.

The opportunity is ripe for public relations professionals to integrate with social media; post podcasts, build blogs, tweet on Twitter, mingle on MySpace. Create relationships and authenticity. Help others to tell about you, your products or your services (or your clients').

The reason social media still feels refreshing and new despite its age is that the message pipeline, although growing more narrow, is nowhere near as clogged in social media as with other media. For now it's "real," and a real opportunity for PR departments and businesses.

If your business hasn't caught the wave yet, it's not too late to grab a board and get your feet wet. Social media is growing. Approximately 25 percent of the Inc. 500 reported that "social media was very important to their business/marketing strategy" in 2007, reports The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center for Marketing Research. That number increased to 44 percent in 2008. The growth is staggering even on a global scale. According to Comscore, "social networking use grew 25 percent year over year worldwide."

Think social media like Facebook and MySpace are for teens and twenty-somethings? Think again. Rapleaf report on the gender and age of social media users.

- Justin Moore

...........................

The emergence of Web 3.0 ("Semantic Web"). The electric car is revived. U.S. economic debt eliminated. Abagail Breslin wins an Oscar. Carolina Panthers win the Super Bowl. U.S. national unemployment rate dips below 3 percent. First female U.S. President.

All events transpiring during the next 34 years(?)