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10.5 Ways for PR Students to Get the Most Out of Twitter

[Originally posted February 24, 2010.]

In the two years that I’ve been using Twitter, I’ve tried my best to get my PR students using Twitter, too. Most of them dutifully complete their One Week of Twitter assignment, then fade away when it’s no longer a requirement.  One week definitely isn’t enough time to “get Twitter,” but the classes I teach aren’t Twitter 101 classes . . .  Twitter is simply a small component of the classes. And the more I make it an assignment, the less they seem to like it.

So this week, I decided to compile a list of reasons and ways PR students can get the most out of Twitter. Maybe if they (you?) see the benefits, it will encourage you to stick with it even when it’s not an assignment.

  1. Write a good 160-character bio. Mention in your bio that you are a PR student and which university you attend. If there’s room left, include some additional information to personalize your bio. I know a lot of PR pros who always follow students back, if they know they are students.
  2. Upload a profile picture. Make yourself look like a human and not a generic bot. I recommend you pick a nice square picture of yourself. When you use a rectangle, it will be cropped, and you have no control over where the crop is. Try to have a picture that looks relatively professional. And by all means, have only YOU in the photo, no significant others or pets.
  3. Help your followers (or potential followers) learn more about you. In your profile, share a link to your blog (if, and only if, you update it regularly) or LinkedIn profile. Newbie mistake: Adding a link to your Twitter profile. Um, the person is already AT your profile page, so it’s kinda superfluous.
  4. Follow PR people. I created a Twitter Starter Pack for PR Students with about 60 engaging people and organizations to follow. Read what they write. Get a feel for how tweets look.
  5. Reply to people. If someone says something thought provoking, send him or her a note back with an @ reply. Even if the person isn’t following you, he or she will see your message. (I tend to follow back more quickly when someone sends me an @barbaranixon to start a conversation with me.)
  6. Introduce yourself. Twitter isn’t like a midddle school dance. You can’t just stand around, leaning on the wall, hoping someone will “ask you to dance.” It’s okay to send tweets to PR pros. And most of them really like it when you do! Let them know you’re a PR student. You may be surprised how helpful many of them are.
  7. Share links to interesting information. I recommend using Bit.ly for shortening links. Bit.ly can change a URL from “http://barbaranixon.posterous.com/a-fordmustang-sandwich-bump-drafting-stopped” to “http://bit.ly/cLCgNG” — this is a huge help when you’re trying to share a long link but don’t want to use up most of your 140 characters with the URL. A bonus? When you sign up for a free Bit.ly account, you get some analytics for free, which means you can tell how many people clicked on your link.
  8. Ask questions. In “real life,” how do conversations work? Lots of times one person asks a question and the other person answers it. On Twitter, if you ask a question, you may be pleasantly surprised at the responses you get, both from PR pros and other followers. Tip: PR pros tend to like to offer advice to PR students.
  9. Connect Twitter to your cell phone. If you can access Twitter from anywhere, it’s more likely that you will use it more often. I have DMs (direct messages) come right to my Palm Pre. And I can send a SMS tweet to 40404, and it will update my Twitter profile automatically.
  10. Twitter isn’t Facebook. And it’s not supposed to be. Twitter is more than a series of Facebook-type status updates. If that’s what you want to do, use Facebook instead. Very few people on Twitter really care that you’re “really really tired today” or that you “just left the gym.”

And now for tip 10.5: Interested in getting more followers? Take a look at your last page of tweets on Twitter.com. Read them carefully. If you didn’t know you, would you want to follow you?

So those are my 10.5 tips. What else would you suggest?

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@BPGlobalPR Exposed! (Well, Almost. Kinda.)

If you participate in the social networking site Twitter, it’s likely that you have come across an account called BPGlobalPR, which has more than 135,000 followers. And if you’re like me, you probably have been thinking, “This account can’t be for real.” I mean, why on earth would BP’s public relations team tweet things like this? Here’s a sample tweet from the account from last week:

Sample Tweet from BPGlobalPR

ABC News’ Dan Harris (virtually) sat down with the person who runs this satirical account to get to the bottom of the story.

Warning: Some of the language in the video is PG-13 (not awful, but not what I’d want to play for my kids).

So what do you think? What should BP’s real public relations executives do about this satirical account?

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How to Annoy A TV Reporter

This morning, I learned of a video on how to annoy a TV reporter from Jeremy Pepper’s blog POP PR Jots. Though I have known Jeremy (online) for two years now, I thought there was something fishy about this video. I mean, why on earth would Marc Slavin, communications director at  Laguna Honda Hospital, be touching reporter Dan Noyes so much and getting up into Noyes’ face like he did? This had to be something staged, right? I mean, Holy Man-Handling, Batman!

So I did a little looking. And yes, this video IS real. And as they say on The People’s Court, the participants “are not actors.” This situation really happened, and it was caught on tape — and uploaded to YouTube and other sites pretty quickly.

For more stories about the altercation from this video, see:

So, if you’re Marc Slavin (the man-handling communications director), and this video has gone viral, what would you do?

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9 (More) Tips to Help You With Online Summer Classes

We’ve now into Week Two of our Summer 2010 online courses at Georgia Southern University. On a daily basis, I am receiving e-mails from students saying they’re confused about what to do and when. I know that taking online classes is new for most of you. So here are some tips that should help clarify things:

  1. Read all e-mails I send to you at your georgiasouthern.edu account. (Check your e-mail at least once a day.)
  2. If you are having problems with GeorgiaVIEW or Wimba Live Classroom, first try using a different browser. Then try a different computer. If you still have problems, please use the available tech support (GeorgiaVIEW or Wimba) to help you solve the problems. Sometimes I can answer tech support-type questions, but often I cannot.
  3. Read the 10 FAQs About My Online Classes at GSU that I originally posted prior to our first week of class.
  4. Attend the “live” sessions I host, when you can, in the Wimba Live Classroom on GeorgiaVIEW. I know some of you have classes or full-time jobs that don’t allow you much flexibility in your schedule. For that reason, I have recorded ALL of the live sessions I’ve held. However, when I look in the Tracking, I see that just a small handful of students have accessed the archives. There is information I share “live” in those sessions that you may not find elsewhere. It’s in your best interest to attend / watch / listen. (Just like if you miss class for a traditional brick & mortar class you wouldn’t expect the professor to rehash everything for you individually, you should not expect it for an online class.) If you ask me a question via e-mail that I addressed in a live session, I’ll probably refer you to the live session archives to find the answer.
  5. When I schedule a “live” online class, I always send out a meeting notice via Google Calendar. Either accept or decline the notice so I can know how many to expect. (This also lets me know that you received the notice.)
  6. Buddy up with another person in your class. Keep in touch with him/her every few days. Rely on each other to work through issues/questions before e-mailing me. You can see the Roster for your class in GeorgiaVIEW.
  7. Check GeorgiaVIEW for the “regular” (as in non-blog) assignments & assessments. Many times, the brief description of the assignment in GeorgiaVIEW will have a link to the complete description here on my blog.
  8. To know what is expected in your blog, read the Blogging Guidelines for your specific class.
  9. Finally, if you’re overwhelmed by the amount of information available at my blog (some of which may not apply to your specific class), look on the right sidebar of my blog. You’ll see a widget titled “GSU Class Links.” Click on the Category that describes your class, and up will pop ONLY the blog posts that apply to your class.

The main reason I have everything here in one blog is that I have many students who are in multiple classes with me. It makes sense to centralize the information so no one needs to remember where to go to find their information. As long as you remember to click on the Category of your class, you should find my blog easy to navigate. And who knows, you may even learn something be reading about what is going on in other classes.

If you are one of my summer PR students, please reply to this blog post with a comment so that I know that you’ve read it. Thanks!

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PRCA 3330 Student Blogs :: Summer 2010

As of 10:45 a.m. on May 27, this is the listing of student blogs in my summer 2010 PRCA 3330 (Public Relations Writing) class. If you are a student in this class and your name does not appear on the list, please be sure complete this Google Form.

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10 Blogging Tips That Will Change Your Life (or Grade, at least)

Originally published on 9 December 2009 & featured in Ragan’s PR Daily. Updated on 20 May 2010. Updates are in italics.

Over the past few semesters, I had nearly 450 of my students blogging as part of their grades in public relations courses. And this semester, I have more than 75 more. Based on their experiences and mine, here are some tips for maintaining your blog (especially when it’s graded as an assignment):

  1. Your professor may require a certain amount of posts on specific topics and perhaps even a specific length. Follow these guidelines to a T. Refer to the assignment sheet/post often to be sure you’re doing what’s needed.
  2. There may be interim deadlines for your blog posts. Keep up. Even if there aren’t interim deadlines, blog throughout the semester. If you do all your posts toward the end (or even the day they’re due), it’s not to your advantage. It will appear as though you procrastinated. Your readers will likely not read more than a post or so a day, so piling a bunch into one day actually hurts your readership.
  3. Make an editorial calendar for yourself based on the blog requirements. Consider using Google Calendar to keep track of posts you intend to write and when they should be written. (Google Calendar can even send you text message reminders.)
  4. Stuck for topics? Ask your readers at your blog what they’d like to see, or ask your followers on Twitter for help. Read Ragan’s PR Daily and listen to PR podcasts for additional ideas.
  5. Proofread. This should go without saying, but since I’m saying it, it apparently doesn’t. Misspelled words and poor grammar significantly detract from your credibility. If you know you’re not a great speller, then write your posts first in Word, where SOME misspelled words and grammar errors show up more easily. Partner with a friend and proof each others’ posts, too. (NOTE: If you write in Word first, be sure to use WordPress’ “Paste from Word” feature, or else you will end up with some really ugly formatting.)
  6. Write in short paragraphs. Long paragraphs are really grey and hard on the reader’s eyes.
  7. Use photos licensed by Creative Commons to add visual impact to your blog. I recommend Compfight for finding images.
  8. One of the best ways to become a better blogger is to read & comment on others’ blogs, too. It’s not all about you. Once you start commenting on others’ blogs, you may notice that your readership will increase (because of people clicking on your name in the comment and finding your blog.)
  9. Change the name of your blog from whatever WordPress “gave” you as the default (which may be something like Bnixon13’s Blog) to something more professional and interesting. Though you cannot change the URL for your blog, you can easily change the name. And definitely change or get rid of the default tagline “Just another WordPress weblog,” which screams N00b.

Yikes! I promised you 10 tips, and I only gave you 9! I need your help. What’s one more tip you’d provide to round out this top ten list?

barbara_is_listening

.

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Accessing Archived Recordings in Wimba Live Classroom

From time to time throughout the semester, I will host “live” sessions in Wimba Live Classroon in GeorgiaVIEW. Attend the “live” sessions I host, when you can, in the Wimba Live Classroom. When you attend live, you have the opportunity to ask questions for immediate clarification.

I know some of you have classes or full-time jobs that don’t allow you much flexibility in your schedule. For that reason, I have recorded ALL of the live sessions I’ve held. However, when I look in the Tracking, I see that just a small handful of students have accessed the archives. Not listening to the archives is the equivalent of missing class.

Here’s how to access the archives.

View on screencast.com »

There is information I share “live” in those sessions that you may not find elsewhere. It’s in your best interest to attend / watch / listen. (Just like if you miss class for a traditional brick & mortar class you wouldn’t expect the professor to rehash everything for you individually, you should not expect it for an online class.) If you ask me a question via e-mail that I addressed in a live session, I’ll probably refer you to the live session archives to find the answer.

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Poynter’s NewsU Courses Benefit PR Writers

For fall semester’s PR Writing courses that I’m teaching for Southeastern University & Georgia Southern University, I am again augmenting my own content and our textbook with several courses offered by Poynter’s NewsU.

Here are the courses we’ll be using:

When you have finished with each course, be sure to send me your Course Report. The short screencast below shows you now.  Have the report come to my university e-mail address. (NOTE: This screencast was recorded earlier this year, so some of the dates are old, though the process remains the same.)

View on screencast.com »

For some courses, you’ll blog about what you learned as a Topic of the Week. For the ones that are not required as TOWs, you can choose to have them be PR Connections, if you wish.

[NOTE: Complete the NewsU quiz for the course & submit your Course Report by Saturday midnight during the week it’s assigned.]

Questions?

barbara_is_listening.

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Tracking Your Blog Comments, Fall Semester

When you blog, you become a part of a community. And as a member of a community, you’re responsible for encouraging conversation. Commenting on others’ blogs is a great way to further conversations.

In addition to writing your own blog posts, you will also comment on others’ blogs; these comments will count as 25% of your grade on your blog. Aim to comment on two blog posts each week; you will need 25 comments before the end of the semester.

Aim to include a variety of blogs that you comment on, ranging from your classmates’ blogs to those of PR professionals. (For a great way to find new and interesting PR blog posts to comment on, subscribe to Ragan’s PR Daily. Or, visit my social bookmarks for PR blogs.)

To track your comments so that I can easily find them, create (and keep adding to) one blog post where you will include

  • Comment # (keep a running list)
  • Title of blog post you commented on, followed by the author’s name
  • Hyperlink to the blog post
  • Date of your comment
  • Your complete comment (copy and paste)

See Lisa McLaughlin’s blog and Marie Walker Ervin’s blog for some great examples of how to track your comments.

NOTE: In order for the comment to “count” as part of your grade for this course, it needs to be at least 100 words long. You are welcome (and even encouraged) to write comments of varying lengths, but for class credit, 100 words is the shortest I’ll accept.

And whatever you do, make sure your blog comments aren’t whack.