White House is now on twitter, Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Vimeo…

By Pete Souza, White House

In a similar way Obama transformed political campaigns, he is now transforming the White House. Today, the administration announced on its blog that the White House is now on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter. Within minutes, thousands of people joined these new profiles. When I learned about it and joined Facebook fan page of the White House, I was 480th member. Now as I am writing this post (just one hour later), there are more than 32,000 fans. And those are not the only sites the President is using the spread his message. You can also find him on: Vimeo, YouTube, iTunes and Flickr.

Before the arrival of Obama to the White House, the President didn’t even send emails, and now he is on several social media sites. It will be interesting to see how he will be using them. These channels can help Obama spread his message, influence people and pressure legislators through their own constituents. They can also prove invaluable during an emergency, allowing the White House to reach directly and instantly millions of people (for example about the swine flu). … Continue Reading

San Francisco Mayor Enters Governor Race on twitter and Facebook

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom did not announce that he is running for the office of California Governor on Jay Leno like his predecessor. Instead, he chose to make his announcement on twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Why? He is targeting a different audience. As the San Francisco Chronicle reports, Newsom is speaking to the “millennial” voters, those born between 1982 and 2003, which is “the largest and most diverse generation in history.”

Newsom already has a pretty sizeable following on twitter (278,309 followers) and on Facebook (39,286 fans). They are helping him raise his goal of $20,000 ($3k short at the moment) and reach half a million users on the first day of his official campaign. … Continue Reading

Why BlackBerry Should Reach Out to Obama

©Joshua Wanyama | Dreamstime.com

I am sure the marketing people at Blackberry screamed in joy when they heard that Obama is addicted to his BlackBerry, doesn’t want to give it up and media won’t stop writing about it. It is an endorsement worth about $25-$50 mil., reports a recent New York Times article. Whatever products Obama uses will get a lot of attention. Just recall the report that Obama is using a Zune. A little eye-witness blog post from Philadelphia made it into the mainstream news very quickly.

But is BlackBerry’s public relations department taking an advantage of it? Not from what I have seen or at least not yet. Now it is riding the wave of interest, but it should start getting proactive soon before Obama gets his new NSA-approved device. … Continue Reading

Does PR work?

(c) Nyul at Dreamstime.com

If clients believed that PR helps to drive sales, memberships, subscriptions and visitors, wouldn’t they want to increase PR budgets? Yet, many public relations agencies are reporting slashed budgets and clients going on hiatus, PR Week is reporting. The opposite should be happening in tough economic times – it is up to PR pros to prove the value of PR and show that PR is a “must have,” not a “nice to have” department.

During a recession, PR is positioned well to survive: It delivers results comparable to those of advertising at a lower cost. When your client’s competitors cut PR budgets, it is an opportunity to increase your client’s share of media coverage. And, PR can respond to a changing environment much quicker than traditional advertising.

The following quote from Seth Godin is about advertising, but it can be easily applied to PR: “If your ads work, if you can measure them and they return more profit than they cost, why not keep buying them until they stop working?” So, why are some clients not buying? They don’t believe that it is working. Prove them wrong!

Measurement has been and will be an ongoing discussion in PR, because public relations is not easy to measure. That said, there are ways that can tell you how you are doing. Here are a few suggestions:

• Ask your clients for data on website visitors and sources of those visitors
• Measure your results against those of your competitors
• Tell your clients to ask their sales team to find out how their customers heard about them
• Do a quick survey of existing customers

And when you have all that and all the other more traditional metrics you are already using, make sure the management knows about the results. Do some PR for your PR.

Obama opens up his website change.gov for comments

Change.gov, website created by the Obama team to provide details on the transition process, now allows visitors to comment on the president-elect’s healthcare plan and participate in the discussion. “What worries you most about the healthcare system in our country?” is the question, and as of now, there are over 2,200 answers, most of which are thoughtful and relevant. VentureBeat writes that “quite likely, moderators are at work and already being kept quite busy.”

This is one of the first steps to introduce a concept of “open government.” It will be interesting to watch how Barack Obama uses the feedback he receives from the website and whether it will have any impact on his policies.

A lot of companies can learn from the way that Obama uses the Internet and social media, and they shouldn’t be scared to use it. If a brand as big as “Obama” can use social media effectively, other big brands can as well.

It doesn’t have to be absolutely perfect right from the beginning. It is a learning process, even for Obama: “Have feedback on this commenting system or want to suggest a better way to do this? Let us know.”