Students in my COMM 4333 Writing for PR and Advertising class have started blogging. They will be adding to their blogs weekly throughout the Spring semester.
If you are a student in this class and your name does not show up on this list, please be sure you have at least one post on your blog, then complete this Google Form; it’s a manual process to build the blogroll, so your name will not show up immediately.
Students in my PR classes have been asking the age-old question “How long does my assignment (blog posts, in this case) need to be” in the last few weeks. Though I’ve described it in class orally, and wrote about it here in my blog, it wasn’t until I made a Starbucks analogy that it finally clicked with many of them. I made a low-tech infographic with chalk (remember chalk?), and snapped a picture of it before I left class today.
So here it goes: Everything I Need to Know About Blog Post Length I Learned at Starbucks.
The Trenta is Starbucks’ newest cup size, designed for iced drinks only. It’s huge. (Well, not really. It’s 31 ounces. It’s slightly smaller than the size of a Big Gulp.) For my students’ blogs, their Topics of the Week should be the longest posts in their blogs. They need to be 300 words minimum.
Venti and Grande are Starbucks’ medium sized cups. (But don’t order a “medium” at Starbucks. The baristas will look down on you if you do. Trust me.) The PR Connections (commentary about of PR-related topic of their choosing) don’t have a specific length, but somewhere between the 300-word minimum of the Topics of the Week and the 50-word minumum of the Blog Comments is a good place to aim.
This is the Starbucks’ size that has always baffled me. In whose measuring cup is the smallest size made the “Tall”? Anyhow . . . Students will be writing comments on a variety of blogs (from their peers and from PR pros) throughout the semester. In previous classes, they didn’t like that I told them that the comments needed to be substantive. They wanted a number. So here it is: For Blog Comments to “count” for a grade in their classes, the comments need to be 50 words minimum.
So in a nutshell, or a Starbucks cup, there should be a variety of lengths of posts in my students blogs, ranging from the Trenta (Topics of the Week) to the Tall (Blog Comments), with Venti or Grande (PR Connections) snuggled nicely inbetween.
Hope this helps!
(PS — This is a Trenta-sized post, for what it’s worth.)
In COMM 4363 and SPC 4350 (Social Media for PR), we’ll all blog about the same general topic each week during the semester. Your TOWs should be posted by Saturday midnight 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 have a topic to suggest, please add it as a comment to this blog post.
If you are unsure how to get started writing these TOWs, many times you can use this three-pronged approach:
Which types of social media you currently participate in (such as blogging, podcasting, social networking, etc.), which platforms you use, and why.
Why are comments such an integral part of blogs? What advice would you offer on writing effective blog comments?
Is social media monitoring ethical? Provide commentary and discussion on both sides of the issue, and offer your personal viewpoint.
Adam Vincenzini asked on Twitter and on his blog for people to share their definitions of “social media” with him, in 140 characters or fewer. Read through the list of definitions that were shared with Adam. Pick a few that resonate with you and discuss why these definitions “work” for you. Develop your OWN 140-character definition of social media.
OR
Write a post related to your assigned chapter in Groundswell. Provide links to several of the examples mentioned in your chapter, or to new sites that relate to the chapter. See if you can find a YouTube video or SlideShare presentation and embed it in your post. (Remember to link to the book, either at Amazon.com or at the publisher’s website/blog.)
Which Super Bowl ad was either your favorite OR least favorite? And in your discussion of the ad, be sure to discuss the publics that were targeted in the ad. (Be sure your readers can tell if you liked or disliked the ad.) If you missed the ads during the big game, no worries. I will embed them in this blog when they are available.
OR
After reading Search Engine Visibility, an Edelman Insights paper by Steve Rubel and others at Edelman Digital, react to it using the three-pronged approach (discussed earlier in this blog post).
“Social Media: Friend or Foe?” :: Listen to Shel Holtz, Mark Ragan and others discuss “concerns and objections around the adoption of social media communication channel.” React to it using the three-pronged approach (discussed earlier in this blog post).
What is this Foursquare thing that we keep seeing in our Twitterstreams? How could companies benefit from it? And what are some of the potential dangers of using Foursquare (and other location-based services) for individual participants?
OR
Participate in a public relations or social media Twitter chat. Petya Georgieva provides a list of 13 possibilities at her Higher & Higher blog. (I highly recommend #PRStudChat, but you are free to chose from any of the 13 options.) Before you participate in the chat, be sure to read Shonali Burke’s tips for how to make the most of a Twitter chat. After the chat, briefly describe the purpose and intended audience of your chosen chat. React to your own participation in the chat using the three-pronged approach (discussed earlier in this blog post).
Since our focus for this week is podcasting, write this week’s TOW on something related to podcasting. Potential areas for discussion include: what would drive an organization to choose a podcast as a way of connecting with its publics, the importance of shownotes, technology you can use for podcasting or how PR majors can benefit from listening to PR podcasts.
Create a profile at PR OpenMic, a social network developed by Auburn University’s Robert French. Connect with me there as a friend so that I know you have joined (do this before Spring Break). Then for your topic of the week, describe what PR OpenMic has to offer to PR students and recent grads. Be sure to discuss at least three or four things you encounter at the site, and provide hyperlinks to the specific areas in the site for your readers.
Watch my interview with Martin Waxman. Use the three-pronged approach to react to the interview. What does Martin have to say about the need for traditional PR skills?
OR
Set up an account at Diigo, a social bookmarking site. Create social bookmarks to at least 20 sites; these could include classmates’ blogs, PR blogs, your university, your favorite musical artist or actor, etc. In your Topic of the Week, share a link to your Diigo account. Discuss how college students (especially those working in groups) could benefit from social bookmarks. Be sure to include a link to your Delicious bookmarks in your blog post. Optional: how could an association, like the Florida Public Relations Association or the International Listening Association, use social bookmarks to benefit its members?
Watch my interview with Kneale Mann. Use the three-pronged approach to react to the interview.
OR
One of this week’s readings concerned widgets and badges. After briefly describing the difference between a widget and a badge, offer suggestions on how one specific organization you are a part of (or wish to become a part of) could benefit from using widgets or badges.
Just what is it that makes a simple little video like “David After Dentist” become a Viral Video? Also, embed at least two of your favorite videos that went viral and explain why you chose them.
This week’s topic was inspired by Adam Vincenzini’s Be My Guest month: post something by a guest blogger. Connect with another blogger (it can, but doesn’t have to, be someone in your class) and exchange blog posts for the week. (You don’t have to write something new . . . share your favorite post you’ve written this semester.) In your own blog, make it really clear that the post is written by another person, and link to your guest’s blog.
Be My Guest Part 2: Post something from a different guest blogger. (See Week 14)
Just like with most publications, blogs should have Editorial Calendars. Why? Editorial calendars will do the following:
To create your calendar, use the template provided: Blog Editorial Calendar Spring 2012. Be sure to see the second tab of the calendar for an example of a few weeks of what your calendar might look like. The more detail you include in your calendar, the better. Submit the calendar using BlackBoard.
In Week 3 of my Social Media for PR classes, we’ll be discussing what PR students need to know about social media (in general), then have an overview of Section One in Groundswell by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff. The slidedecks that accompany my presentations are below.
The Assignment: Optimized News Release
As we have seen, news releases and the messages they contain increasingly end up on the Internet where they get indexed by search engines. Since these messages have become searchable, it is important to include words and phrases Internet users would use intuitively when searching for content related to that message. Having read Edelman’s position paper on the issue and having discussed search engine and message optimization in your blog, it is now your turn to take a news release and optimize it.
For this assignment, you will need to identify a set of keywords/keyword phrases for use in your optimized news release. Use free tools such as Wordtracker, Google Insights, Google Adwords, or Microsoft’s AdCenter Labs to do so, or use your Radian6 or CustonScoop account. You may also want to check Twitter Search to get a sense for the natural words and phrases people use to talk about your type of topic.
Once you’ve decided on your keywords, strategically incorporate them into your news release (see the Edelman position paper for tips on how to do so).
Deliverables (in one file):
NOTE: Many, many thanks to Corinne Weisgerber at St. Andrews University, who gave me permission to use her assignment for my class. I have made only minor tweaks to her original assignment (which appears at her Social Media for PR Class blog).
FAQ About the SEO News Release
News Release Optimization
View more presentations from Corinne Weisgerber.
One of our assignments this semester is for you to read and review a trade book on social media. In class, you’ve already been assigned to a Public Relations Trade Book. Your book review is due in class during Week 10.
Your book review will take the form of a five-minute presentation in class. For your presentation, create a professional-looking PowerPoint presentation of no more than ten slides. Rely more on images to tell your story than bullet points. (We’ll discuss more in class about how not to create a “Death by PowerPoint” slidedeck.)
Your presentation should include:
Optional:
(PS: If you prefer to listen to your book, rather than read it, you may be able to choose your title as a free option at the Audible website.)
This assignment gives you an opportunity to learn how to monitor blog and other social media content in a way that provides similar insight offered by more traditional environmental scanning methods.
Many people will discuss your client or organization and its products/services on their own web sites or on social media sites, outside of realm traditional media. Just as it is important for you to know what the media and your community are saying about your organization and its products/services, it is important to know what is being said in social media sites like blogs, social networks, and message boards. For this assignment, you will
You might find bloggers who are blogging about your client organization or brand, people who are creating Web sites about it, message board members who are discussing it in forums, Twitter users who are twittering about it, social networking users who are commenting about it, or online video producers who are posting YouTube videos about it.
Let me know by Week 4 how you choose to complete the project (individual or teams) and which organization you are choosing in class. Teams will collect much more data, but write one cohesive report. NOTE: The first person (or team) to “claim” a Fortune 500 company or large non-profit organization “gets” the company. No duplicates, please.
See these resources for advice on social media monitoring.
See the complete assignment below:
For my Social Media for PR classes (COMM 4633 and SPC 4350)
In addition to our in-class meetings, we will learn from professionals in the social media space each week this semester. Be sure to view or listen to the webinar by Saturday at midnight each week; we’ll discuss the webinars during the following week in class. For many of the weeks, the webinars dovetail nicely with our theme for the week. A vast majority of the webinars will come from Hubspot’s Inbound Marketing University.
TBA
Students in my SPC 4350 Social Media for PR & Adv course at Florida Southern College have started blogging. They will be adding to their blogs weekly throughout the Spring semester.
If you are a student in this class and your name does not show up on this list, please be sure you have at least one post on your blog, then complete this Google Form; it’s a manual process to build the blogroll, so your name will not show up immediately.
