Andy Beaupre

PR on Ulitzer Lots of companies – especially those in B2B – still talk about (or request) PR services that increasingly strike me as tired, fading or dead.   Press tours & press briefings – yes, there are still industries where the press tour is alive and well (entertainment!) but most reporters, editors and bloggers don’t have time to meet in person anymore. I always felt bad for them during the height of this practice when an endless stream of PR people with clients in tow stacked-up to get their turn updating glassy-eyed reporters.   Hits & clips – counting clips (printed editorial coverage) and putting undue weight on offline publicity to measure PR success should have died two decades ago. Ask Katie Paine, one of the leaders in communications measurement. She says “hit” stands for How Idiots Track Success.   Press kits, brochures & collateral – in this era of ... (more)

Social Media & Haiti

Haiti Earthquake on Ulitzer Thanks to social media, the word got out of ravaged Haiti immediately, people mobilized and money was raised instantly.   While this isn’t the first time it’s been a vital link in a crisis, it’s invigorating how social media has woven itself into the fabric of traditional media.   There was a time, not long ago, when major news organizations relied primarily on its own news gatherers to shape the story. Now an increasing number of media is open to – and relying on – citizen journalists to tell their tales.   With buildings crumbled, roads blocked, po... (more)

Apple iPad Reminds Us How Brands Succeed by Transforming Experiences

iPad on Ulitzer To borrow a line from Scrooge, "I'm as giddy as a drunken man." With today's Apple iPad intro, it feels like Christmas. I was glued to Engadget's live blogfeed of the announcement. Apple is leveraging its iPhone technology in a new tablet format, adding bells and whistles like unlocked, no contract, and cheap 3G data plans, a keyboard dock and the iBookstore. But once again, as we've seen in the past with Apple, the whole is larger than the sum of the parts. In the tech industry we pay homage to "innovation" as the ultimate springboard for leadership positioning ... (more)

How to create best practices programs

Getting your customers to come to you with their success stories    A best practices award program is a contest your company/organization creates, manages and orchestrates to reward customers for outstanding product/service implementations. At the end of the contest, winners are acknowledged, creating positive visibility.   In addition to pleasing winning customers – deepening your partnership with them – a best practices program has a very useful residual effect: it gives you high quality references. Because customers want to participate and win, they put in the time a... (more)

An old Day and a new way add up to a future for the trade and news media

The trade and news media need new business models to survive in the Internet age. I’m not just talking about online editions of print publications. The media has to completely remake itself. The profit motive can’t support it anymore. News and trade publishers need to be more like Consumers Union, the non-profit publisher of Consumer Reports. But can alternative business models like Consumer Union’s work on a larger scale? Two precedents, one historical and one recent, say yes.   Back in 1939, Theodore Bodenwein, owner of The Day in New London, Conn.,gave the new... (more)