On the twelfth day of Christmas, Spin Sucks gave to you 12 of the most read guest blog posts, 11 PR Dream Team members, 10 PR pros to follow, nine phrases to ban, eight PR blogs to read, seven online courses, six PR professional development opps, five productivity tools, four PR pro gifts, three PR trends, two PR books, and one habit to change in 2018.
This is it!
The last day of our 12 Days of Christmas series.
Because this week is all about honoring the PR pro, we thought it’d be fun to take a look at the content created by you.
These are the most read guest blog posts of 2017.
But what’s fascinating is five of them are not from this year.
That, my friends, is long-tail SEO at its finest.
So let’s take a look back at the content you’ve loved the most.
Email Marketing Laws Vary By Country
Coming in at first place is a blog post from May of 2015.
Monique Goodyer continues to wow readers with her Legal and Ethical Issues in Marketing.
The section on how you disseminate information as a marketer is still valuable today.
Remember that there are laws that vary in each country so if you do international business, you have to be up-to-speed on what they are.
This includes how and when you email people on your lists.
Key Crisis Management Principles
Jeff Hunt’s Five Key Principles for Effective Crisis Management comes in at the second most read guest blog post of the year.
And it’s from November of 2016.
He covers authenticity, transparency, speed, agility, and creativity as the five key principles when faced with a crisis.
Though he focuses on those five areas, he says something really important that every communicator must remember:
For some clients we’ve prepared an entire crisis handbook, with a communications plan, holding statements, infographics, photos, and other assets in order to have high-quality content at the ready.
As you prepare for 2018, keep crisis planning in mind.
Apps and Tools, Oh My!
Speaking of planning, the number three most read guest blog post is from 2014.
Robert Morris has 10 Apps and Tools to Make Your Strategic Planning More Effective.
Funny that the top three have lived on the internet for more than a year.
But this one makes sense because the apps and tools are still relevant today.
It includes everything from Evernote to Adobe EchoSign.
If you want to make your life more efficient using technology, check this one out.
Influencer Relations Reigns Supreme
Tatiana Beale comes in fourth with her New Influencer Marketing Research Has Four Key Findings.
She is the head of content for Traackr, an influencer relations software company, so it’s apropos that her blog post is the most popular on the topic.
They released some research earlier this year that shows:
- Influencer relations is done by four or more departments in the same company.
- Those who spend big money see big results.
- Sales conversions increase when using this tactic.
- It is the key driver of digital transformation, and the enabler of customer-centricity.
Take a look at the research, particularly if you’re looking to add influencer relations to your communications plan soon.
I Want to Be Famous!
Six Things You Never Want to Hear from PR Clients by Maris Callahan lists the red flags we all seem to ignore in the prospecting phase.
Everything from “we got all of the coverage we’ve had; not our PR firm” to “we loved your proposal, but only have half of what you quoted to spend.”
We’re in a service business so it’s easy for people to negotiate with us.
But the funny thing is accountants and lawyers are also in the service business and no one negotiates with them.
We’re a special breed so it would behoove us all to pay attention to the red flags before they become clients.
When You Quit Your Job
I worked really hard to include only guest bloggers on this list, but I let Corina Manea sneak in with Find Your Replacement Before You Quit Your Job.
In it, she describes how to prepare your organization for the loss of you when you quit.
Though we may not all have this luxury, it’s interesting to think about how to take care of the people who have become family and good friends through work.
It allows you to leave on good terms and without burning a bridge.
And, in today’s hyper-connected world, that’s even more important.
Crisis Gone Wild
Oh, United Airlines.
You’d think they’d learn, but it’s one crisis after another with them.
Remember earlier this year when a passenger was dragged off a United Airlines flight?
The entire world erupted and #Flight3411 became a trending topic on Twitter.
Roland Alonzi wrote Why the United PR Black Eye Won’t Soon Be Forgotten shortly after.
In it, he describes the three things United did poorly during this time:
- There was lack of a de-escalation strategy.
- They forgot every passenger is a journalist.
- The “apology” from the CEO was lacking, at best.
Especially because of number three, United was the news story of the day for weeks.
That’s not good.
Do You Need to Be Micromanaged?
Locking in the blog post that is the oldest on this list, I’m almost embarrassed to show it to you.
It’s from 2012, which is back before we had a pretty author bio box and we hadn’t figured out image sizing.
But, hey!
People still love Two Types of People Who Need to Be Micromanaged by Monica Wofford.
Do you fit into one of these two types of people who need micromanagement?
I’d like to think none of us need that form of management, but apparently I’m wrong.
Go take a look.
Add TV to Your Digital Mix
In August, Stacy Durand wrote a great blog post called Do TV Well and All of Your Digital Marketing Boats Will Rise.
A fascinating topic, especially for the Spin Sucks audience, because we don’t do television advertising.
But the modern communicator absolutely understands how everything integrates and works together.
He or she knows which tactics to pull in at the right times.
And, sometimes, that means including TV advertising.
She offers four ways TV will help the rest of your digital communications.
It would behoove us all to listen.
Make Your Content More Intelligent
Why You Need Intelligent Content Now by Carrie Hane describes why it’s important to combine content with search engine optimization to enhance performance.
This is the process we teach in the Modern Blogging Masterclass, and Carrie nails it with this guest blog post.
While I recommend you read the entire blog post, there are three ways you can get started now:
- Start measuring what you have—assign KPIs and goals to existing content and measure the results with a tool such as ContentWRX.
- Experiment with one type of content—try transforming the process for creating and producing a single type of content which has a small number of instances.
- Use new content as the starting point—when you create a new type of content, make it structured. It takes longer and is more expensive to retrofit something than to create it with the proper structure in the first place.
Avoid Heated Debates
Even in 2017, we make annoying social media mistakes.
But Eric Sachs to the rescue!
In Top Annoying Social Media Habits PR Pros Should Avoid, he covers everything from engaging in heated debates to oversharing.
Take a look…do you do any of these things?
I’m pleased to say I do not.
Though there have been many a time I’ve had to close my laptop for fear of engaging in a heated debate or two.
Be Kind to Everyone
And speaking of social media, Paula Kiger writes How Being Generous on Social Media Will Change Your Life.
Without social media, the Spin Sucks community would not have Paula.
And that would be very sad.
Very sad, indeed.
She relays a story about an author she used to admire:
When the author I had become interested in wrote on the contact page of his website, essentially, “don’t contact me unless you can make my life more interesting,” I wanted to shake him out of his deep reverie and beg him to open himself to the unexpected rewards that come from being generous with those who you’ve impressed enough that they try to reach out to you.
Her point is that, in today’s flat world, it doesn’t make sense for any of us to shut people out.
You never know who you might meet, how they might help, or certainly how they might make your life more interesting.
Goodbye, 12 Days of Christmas
And that’s a wrap!
The 12 Days of Christmas will be back next year.
In the meantime, spend a little time checking out these guest blog posts, particularly if you missed them the first time around.
Happy Holidays!
The 30-Day Communications Challenge begins on January 3. Have you subscribed?
