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:
Barbara Ann Lindley was born in Chicago, IL, on August 16, 1929, to Avalon and James Lindley. She spent her childhood years in Chicago. During her teen years she was involved in the Eastern Star’s Rainbow Girls and at 16 became a Worthy Advisor.
She is the proud mother of six children: Avalon Braun of Eugene, OR; Thomas Alton of Las Vegas, NV; Nancy Sanchagrin of Orlando, FL; Susan Borchini of Kissimmee, FL; James Anderson of Jacksonville, FL; and Barbara Nixon of Lakeland, FL. Barbara had 13 grandchildren ranging in age from 10 to 34 and three great grandchildren. She was predeceased by a daughter, Kathleen Lee, who died in 1964 from a premature birth.
Throughout her life, Barbara was involved in volunteer activities. In her younger years she was President of the P.T.A., our Brownie and Girl Scout Leader, President of the local Garden Club, and she also started a Mother’s Club in Niagara Falls, NY. She was a Census Taker in 1960 and with her earnings bought camping equipment that started a lifelong love for camping in the Adirondack Mountains, yearly trips to Groton State Park in Vermont and then in Arkansas. Some of our fondest memories were those camping trips.
In Livermore Falls, Maine, Barbara was a Baptist Youth Fellowship Leader, Vacation Bible School teacher and a Deaconess at the First Baptist Church. She also volunteered with the Red Cross.
In her later years, Barbara moved to Atlanta and became involved with Meals on Wheels, Northside Hospital Auxillary (Escort Service), and the Crafty Ladies Craft Group at Christ the King Lutheran Church.
Not long after moving to Atlanta she and her daughter Barbara worked in marketing research together. Her last position was a medical records clerk at the Hug Center/Healthfield in Atlanta. She was first person to retire from the Hug Center.
Barbara had a love for cooking and flowers. You could always find her whipping up a new recipe. She loved to travel and did a lot in her retirement years.
Barbara was well loved by her family and friends and all who knew her. Her sense of humor kept everyone in stitches. She had a lifetime of service to her community and was always willing to lend a helping hand. She will missed by all.
She wanted to make sure that all her friends knew how much she appreciated all the wonderful support she received during her three-year struggle with lung cancer. Her family extends a tremendous sense of gratitude for the kindnesses shown during her illness. With your support, Barbara was given the highest quality of care and love during her last days. Know that she and her family will always be thankful to you all.
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:
As of 11 a.m. on May 27, this is the listing of student blogs in my summer 2010 PRCA 2330 (Introduction to Public Relations) 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.
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):
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.
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.
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.
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.)
Write in short paragraphs. Long paragraphs are really grey and hard on the reader’s eyes.
Use photos licensed by Creative Commons to add visual impact to your blog. I recommend Compfight for finding images.
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.)
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?
Thanks to the fine folks at PR Daily, I learned about this great little video from Howcast called “How to Unlock Your World with Foursquare.” The video does a nice job explaining what Foursquare is and why someone might want to try it out.
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.
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.)
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.]
As our semester begins at Georgia Southern, students are asking me questions via e-mail about our online classes. Rather than responding individually (so only one student can benefit), I’ve created a list of FAQs so that all can benefit.
1. How do I find out when things are due? (And will you make us a calendar for all the due dates?)
The quickest, easiest way to find out due dates for assignments is to look at the Calendar feature in GeorgiaVIEW. You can also find due dates for Assignments on the Assignments tab and RATS/quizzes on the Assessments tab. [NOTE: Blog posts are the exception. Weekly blog posts are due in most classes, and they will not appear on the GeorgiaVIEW Calendar.]
2. Why do we need a headset/mic? What kind should we buy?
For the times that we’re meeting online at the same time (synchronously), you will need to be able to hear what I am saying and occasionally respond by voice. You can find inexpensive ones at Amazon, OfficeMax or Walmart.
3. What’s expected in our blogs?
See the post I’ve written about blog content for your specific course:
4. I will be out of town for a week. Will that impact my grade in this course?
Since our class is online, your engagement and participation will be evaluated by your continuous completion of assignments and blog posts. If you are out of town, just be sure that you are keeping up with due dates.
5. What’s the “Public Relations Matters” section on our GeorgiaVIEW home page for?
At the bottom of each page for our course in GeorgiaVIEW there is a section titled “Public Relations Matters.” What you will see there is an RSS feed of the last four blog posts that you find here on my blog. It’s just a quick and easy way for you to see what’s new on my blog.
6. When will we be meeting synchronously (online at the same time)?
The best answer I can give you for this is “on occasion.” Since we did not have a course time assigned in WINGS, it’s nearly impossible for us to find a time to meet at the same time. So what I will be doing is informing you when I will be online providing you information related to our course. If you can make it to GeorgiaVIEW/Wimba at that time, please do so. If you cannot (due to other courses or work), you’ll have the opportunity to view the “archive” (replay) of the session at a later time. When I schedule a synchronous session, I will always send a meeting notice to you via Google Calendar. Please either accept or decline the notice so I can know who will attend.
7. Can I use my Gmail (or other account) instead of my Georgia Southern account for e-mail?
For consistency and reliability, GeorgiaSouthern requires faculty members to use our university-provided e-mail accounts for communicating with students. What you may want to do is set up your Gmail to automatically fetch your GSU e-mail, so you’ll only have one place to look. (That’s what I do.)
8. How often should I check my e-mail?
Check your e-mail at least once a day, preferably more. For our class, I will not send you a same-day assignment; I don’t think that’s fair. But I do send occasional reminders or clarifications that could help you with assignments you are working on. I also typically will send a tweet (on Twitter) letting you know to check your e-mail.
9. How will you do your office hours?
You’ll be able to find me in a Wimba Live Classroom (found on your class’ GeorgiaVIEW home page) quite often throughout the week. My office hours are held in the room labeled Virtual Office for Prof. Nixon’s Virtual Office. When I am in there, you can ask questions via chat, audio or audio & video; I can respond using the same methods. Remind me which class you are in when you stop by my virtual office.
10. My other professors haven’t used GeorgiaVIEW as much as you are using it. Can you show me how to use it?
GeorgiaSouthern has created several tutorials on using GeorgiaVIEW. Spend some time reviewing these tutorials; it will be worth the time you invest. I also created a short overview of how I use it. It’s best to ask another classmate first, then come to me if you have further questions on GeorgiaVIEW.
For this assignment, you will choose and interview a public relations professional, and then write about this interview at your blog. This post will be a minimum of 500 words. Post your recap on your blog, and in the Assignments area in GeorgiaVIEW, you’ll need to provide me with the PR professional’s contact information (name, title & company, phone number and e-mail address).
Wondering how to find a PR professional to interview? Join PROpenMic, where there are hundreds of pros willing to help students.
Though a face-to-face interview is preferred, a phone or webcam interview is acceptable. An interview that is e-mail or text-based only is not acceptable.
Schedule your interview at least a week before this assignment is due, preferably two. PR professionals sometimes have unpredictable schedules, and it’s possible that you may need to reschedule.
Include an introductory paragraph that introduces the PR professional, including title and company, educational background, etc. Mention your connection to the professional (how you found him/her) and how you conducted the interview (face-to-face, phone or webcam).
Questions/Topics you need to include:
What’s a typical week like? (If no week is typical, then what was last week like?)
Tell me about a project you worked on that you are especially proud of.
What do you do to keep current in the PR industry?
What do you wish you would have known before starting your career in PR?
How important is writing in your career?
What three tips would you offer someone just starting out in PR?
After interviewing this person, are you (the student, not the practitioner) more or less likely to want to have a career in PR? Why?
Some questions you may wish to ask:
Did your education prepare you for working in PR? How?
What has surprised you the most about working in PR?
How has PR changed since you entered the field?
How does technology affect your daily work?
When your company is hiring for an entry-level PR position, what makes a candidate stand out?
What professional organizations are you involved in? (For example, PRSA, IABC, etc.)
Include a photo of your interviewee. (This can be a photo he or she provides or one that you take yourself.)
Link to your interviewee’s LinkedIn profile and/or blog.
Questions?
[NOTE: This must be a new informational interview that you conduct this semester. Do not “recycle” an interview that you conducted during a previous semester.]
In our PR Writing class (PRCA 3330 at Georgia Southern University) this summer, we’ll all blog about the same general topic each week during the semester. Your TOWs of 300 words or more should be posted by Saturday at noon at the end of each week.
Some weeks have more than one topic listed; choose one of the available topics on those weeks.
If you mention a website or another blog, be sure to hyperlink to the post. And consider inserting graphics to add visual interest for your readers.
If you are unsure how to get started writing these TOWs, many times you can use this three-pronged approach:
What did you learn?
What surprised you?
What do you want to know more about?
WEEK ONE
No TOW required. But if you would like to go back and write one, write about which types of social media you currently participate in (such as blogging, podcasting, social networking, etc.), which platforms you use, and why.
WEEK TWO
Visit Mignon Fogarty’s Grammar Girl’s website. Either read one of her blog posts or listen to one of her podcasts on an area of grammar that is troublesome to you. Write about what you learned (using the three-pronged approach above.)
This week, you took the NewsU Cleaning Your Copy course. There were four main topics in this course: Grammar, AP Style, Punctuation and Spelling. Using the three-pronged approach described above, describe your reactions to this course. Remember to include a hyperlink to the course, too.
WEEK THREE
Why are comments such an integral part of blogs? What advice would you offer on writing effective blog comments?
WEEK FOUR
This week, you took the NewsU The Lead Lab course. Using the three-pronged approach described above, describe your reactions to this course. Remember to include a hyperlink to the course, too.
WEEK FIVE
One Week of Twitter (NOTE: Complete the assignment during Week Four, but write about it during Week Five).
This week, you took the Five Steps to MultiMedia Storytelling course at News University. Using the three-pronged approach described above, describe your reactions to this course. Remember to include a hyperlink to the course, too.
WEEK EIGHT
Working either alone or in a group of no more than three, create a list of at least 10 ways that PR people can sometimes drive journalists crazy. After each item on the list, indicate what the PR person could/should do instead. Hyperlink to sources as needed. (If you are working with others, each of you should post to his/her own blog, and note where else it is crossposted and who the co-authors are.)
WEEK NINE
What advice would you offer PR students who are new to blogging? Come up with your own Top 10 list. (Note: This post is due on the last day of class.)
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 
As our semester begins at Georgia Southern, students are asking me questions via e-mail about our online classes. Rather than responding individually (so only one student can benefit), I’ve created a list of FAQs so that all can benefit.
