How to Manage A Successful Webinar: 3 Key Elements

If your Company is evaluating the sales potential of a Webinar to promote your products or services, you must consider the following three foundational  elements in order to be successful.

1.       Compelling Content: Yes, your products are bleeding-edge and have a great reputation in their respective markets, but Webinar attendees did not want to sit through an infomercial. Before starting the process, carefully consider what content would serve your Company (and sales needs) best.  If your key audience members are generally researchers, then give them useful discussion topics with a hands-on theme. Be sure to pick general hot-button research applications, lessons learned, tricks of the trade, and how-to guides. Once you have the top-level topic in place, then you can highlight how your products and tools can facilitate and overcome these common pain points. It also helps to add dynamic photos and videos, but be sure that this multi-media content works before you conduct the Webinar.

2.       Guest Speakers: A well-known Company representative can certainly be a draw, but your guest speaker is honestly who they come to hear. A thought leader’s opinion regarding your products will not only carry more weight, but can also help demonstrate to Webinar attendees that they too can overcome the same hurdles and get positive results; usually more quickly and efficiently than the methods or tools they are currently using. Make sure that your guest speaker is carefully walked through the process, and offer as many rehearsals as needed. The more comfortable the guest speaker is with their process and presentation, the more engaging the Webinar becomes.

3.       Time, Resources and Commitment: This is the most important factor of the three. You can have the most engaging content, a renowned industry leader as your guest speaker, and an excellent pre-registration response rate, but if your Webinar is not properly broadcasted or there are severe technical problems, then attendees will promptly leave the Webinar and you won’t be able to leverage the recording for  future downloads. When it comes to Webinars, the devil is in the details. If your PR or Marketing departments cannot devote the time to thoroughly manage the process, then seriously consider not moving forward or hire an outside firm . Technology problems will always occur, but most can be avoided or worked around with a few rehearsals and frequent testing of the equipment. All speakers need to have their content ready ahead of time for practice and timing, and this preparation also includes moderator scripts, attendee polls, post-Webinar surveys, etc. It’s a lot of preparation time and more than you would anticipate.

If your Company can successfully manage these 3  elements, then a Webinar is definitely worth the effort. Webinars are a cost-effective tool that can produce significant ROI if you strike the right balance between engaging content and product promotion.  Interested in learning more about what goes into the process? You can access the Hamilton Thorne Webinar Series here and listen to our latest, and most popular, Webinar on “Advantages of Using Lasers in Embryo Biopsy Procedures” with guest speaker, Dr. Barry Behr of Stanford University.

Making Mom Proud, I am Actually Featured in an Industry Article!

For those of us in PR, you know the drill. You tell a friend, a neighbor, your family members that you are in public relations and it is always a lengthy explanation of exactly what you do. For the most part, people get it, but there are always a few who just can’t seem to grasp the nuances. My favorite person dealing with this confusion is my Mom.  She wants desperately to be proud of me, so when I tell her that I placed a great article, she goes through the same list of questions:

Question #1: “oh great, so you have a byline in the article (she was actually a journalist at one point in her career, so she is using this term in the traditional sense)”.

My answer, “No Mom, I didn’t write the article (hence no ‘byline’) and it’s also not a bylined article (ghost written by me, but would be credited to my client/executive anyway), but ‘my story’ ran in the [insert fantastic pub here]…”.

Question #2, “So you were quoted and featured in the article? Well that’s excellent news, I can’t wait to read what you said!”

My answer, “No Mom, again, I only secure articles for my clients/executives, PR people are rarely IN the article.”

Question #3, Now with a lot less enthusiasm, “Ok, so your client/executive is in the article, well that’s, um, very good.”

My Answer,  “…thanks?”

I am happy to report to you, and my Mom, that I have indeed been featured in the November/December issue of PharmaVoice’s 2012 Year in Preview, as a public relations professional (I was in a USA Today article back in 2005, but that was in regards to being a new parent, so it doesn’t count).

So without further ado, here is the PharmaVoice  article, enjoy! http://viewer.zmags.com/publication/7e0af12c#/7e0af12c/80

 

3 Reasons to Consider a Digital/Interactive Annual Report

Well, it’s been a while since my last post. I have been busy, with planning an Annual Shareholder meeting  in Toronto (which went very well), putting out Q1 earnings and launching two major products…phew!  In between, I (along with my supremely talented Marketing Director Cindy Rodzen), managed to create an interactive annual report. And look! A blog post about it is below from our blog The Cell Colony. Happy Viewing!

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It’s the end of the year and you are thinking about your upcoming annual report and how best to reflect the Company’s successes and milestones. The numbers can speak for themselves, but when engaging with a variety of audiences from investors, partners, customers, and employees, why not actually have your management team “speak” to them.   

Here are three reasons to consider a digital/interactive annual report:

1. Put a face on the management team and employees

• When it comes down to investing in a company, you certainly look at their product lines and financials, but you are also investing in the people. Showcasing personalities and passion for the work will go a long way.  

2. Leverage multi-media

•  Do you have a corporate video, broll, photos, employee testimonials, podcasts…why not use them for your annual report? Seeing employees in action is a great opportunity for outside stakeholders to understand how employees collaborate and interact with each other in the work environment.
• If you do not have multi-media in-house, you should consider making room for it in your budget for 2011. There are cost-effective ways to commission quality multi-media projects that will have a high impact.

3. Make it interesting, and dare I say, Fun?

• Pictures and video are great, but it can also come off as “talking heads” or static. Consider putting in something fun such as an interactive photo gallery where the user selects what and how they would like to view.
• You can also consider something that viewers can manipulate and engage with that could make their viewing experience fun. Our report had a user propelled 360 degree rotating view of one of our flagship products.

Come see how we did it; view Hamilton Thorne’s Interactive 2010 Annual Report!

 

From the Tooth Fairy to Stem Cell Collection; Could Your Child’s Baby Teeth Save Lives?

As I mentioned, I will be featuring my Hamilton Thorne blog posts on my personal blog as well, in order to feed the beast and keep my blog alive and well. Since many of us are parents with children having lost, or about to lose, their baby teeth, would you collect them for a stem cell bank? Would you consider it if that meant possibly saving their lives down-the-road for a potential illness? Read and discuss!  

As a Mother of a 5-year-old son, I will soon go through a parent’s rite of passage of my child losing his first baby tooth. Usually the only concern would be how much money the “tooth fairy” is going to leave him under his pillow, but maybe now I should consider donating his baby teeth to a stem cell bank. Believe it or not, this is a growing trend despite medical science not quite being able to deliver on the promise (just yet).

Here is a recent article from the Miami Herald discussing this topic, “South Florida and around the world, dentists are extracting baby teeth, wisdom teeth and even healthy adult teeth, and researchers are spinning out stem cells that they believe can be used to regrow lost teeth, someday even to repair damaged bones, hearts, pancreases, muscles and brains.”

In addition to the Miami Herald, there have been several other articles dedicated to this topic of late, as well as a feature news story even back in 2008 from GMA/ABC News: Could Baby Teeth Stem Cells Save Your Child?

So should we as parents start collecting our children’s baby teeth in order to help them fight potential life-threatening illnesses? Or in the case of ourselves, should adults have their own teeth extracted for future treatments for our own possible diseases? From the current available data, it appears that the answer to that question may be a bit premature.

According to the Miami Herald, “There are concerns. It’s expensive, costing $590 upfront plus $100 a year to store the stem cells from up to four teeth for up to 20 years. It’s speculative, with the first FDA-approved practical use of such stem cells years away.”

With that said, there have been numerous breakthroughs in 2010 in both stem cell research and regenerative medicine. The New York Times reported on the remarkable year that the industry has had in 2010, with all signs showing that the next few years will be even more exciting. So maybe banking our children’s baby teeth might be a good alternative for stem cell collection if the science continues to move full speed ahead.

Which brings me back to my original concern, just how much do you pay your child for their first lost tooth? My parents used to give me a quarter, but should I account for inflation? And if so, how would you go about calculating that amount? I bet there is an app for that, time to search the Droid store!   

Uh, Oh! I think I killed my Tamagotchi Digital Pet

Well, I started my career on the other side of the fence [I went corporate!],  and I have to say, so far, so good! It’s been non stop since I walked through the door, and in 4 months, I have managed a corporate photoshoot, a video production project, 3 investor tours (Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto), put out 6 press releases, secured 5 media interviews and gotten some nice coverage, developed the 2011 budget and communications plan, and oh yeah, I created our newly minted social media strategy!

Which leads me to the reasons why my wonderful blog, or symbolic “Tamagotchi” as the title suggests, has not gotten any love, care or feeding, and is on the verge of content death. But never fear–not that my lack of blog posts is keeping anyone up at night–with the new Hamilton Thorne blog soon to be launched, I will be posting across both blogs to take advantage of my fleeting free time.

This post should satiate my pet for a little while, but I promise to not let my proverbial Tamagotchi get so close to death again!

Maybe It is Time for Ned Ryerson to Retire? When New Business Is No Longer Essential to Your Job.

 I knew that going in-house was going to be very different, but I have to admit, I was completely unprepared with just how disoriented and lost I was going to feel at my first networking event. It was a membership event at an association that I actively participated in when I was with my prior agency. This association was a prime new business resource for me, and I have even brought in my biggest client at one of their events. I always go to these events with a game plan; I look over the room for the best prospects, hone in on them and then put on my best Ned Ryerson impersonation…sans the “Bing!”, glasses and hat, and hopefully slightly less annoying.

 But attending the membership event yesterday, I just felt off-balance. I went into the room with my usual “sell ’em” attitude and business cards in hand, but then realized, who am I targeting? What a strange sensation to no longer have to bring in clients to grow my agency. I would love to say it was liberating, but I have been so gung-ho for the last several years, it was almost painful for me not to try and sell people.

The funniest moment was when one of the organizers that knows me pretty well, tried to set me up for a new business opportunity. I stood around politely for my turn as she spoke to another person. I could sense she was annoyed with me hovering, and was probably doing her best to tolerate me until the inevitable moment when I would swoop in and make my sales pitch. When the “prospect” mentioned that she needed to increase her company’s PR, the organizer thought that was my cue and without missing a beat said, “…If you need a PR pro, well Lisa is who you need to speak with!” I politely thanked her for the kind introduction and simply stated that I only wanted to give her my new business card and wish her well. As soon as she read my business card, her mouth fell open. Not only was I not making a sales pitch, but now I had become the prospect (potential new member). I watched as she switched gears and went into her own selling mode. That, I have to say, was actually a lot of fun. I guess I could get used to becoming the prospect for once!

So I guess I have to hang up my Ned Ryerson hat for now, and ease into the fact that the shoe is now on the other foot. I just don’t know why it is so hard for me to give it up; is it because I actually sold insurance?! Maybe that’s it…Bing!

And Now For Something Completely Different; Going In-house!

 

After a decade of agency life, I am trading in my client portfolio and timeslips for the corporate world.  It will certainly be an adjustment to be “in-house”, but I am very excited to begin this new chapter in my career. I will still be focusing on media, investor relations and social media in my blog,  so stay tuned for more insights from a very different perspective.

Although I will miss the culture, energy and collective creativity of PR agencies (I have worked with some remarkable people over the last 10 years), I am eager to see what new challenges lay ahead. And as the Monty Python boys would say, “And Now For Something Completely Different.”

Wish me luck!

What Would Don Draper Do? PR Lessons Learned from Mad Men

 

Mad Men is a great show, and for people in the marketing, advertising and PR industry it is especially fun and satisfying to watch our common struggles depicted on the small screen from trying to win new business to keeping clients happy. This season has been very entertaining to watch as the new staff at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce works hard to maintain and grow their current billings and not being tied to a large anchor client (Lucky Strike in their case). Coming from large, medium and boutique agencies in my career, I can identify very strongly with many of these issues from their transition from a large agency to a new start-up that has to be a bit rogue in their tactics to survive and thrive. Of course, it is also pure fantasy to watch them drink all day and run over someone’s foot with a ride-on lawn mower.

Although it’s a scripted TV show, there are definitely some interesting lessons to be learned:

1) Choosing your clients carefully. PR Week actually ran a very interesting article on this point. Roger Sterling  refused to pitch Honda due to his traumatic war experiences in the Pacific during WWII. Now this is an extreme case, but the point is a good one. Often times, we take on clients that are not the best fit for the firm. And even if they are a good fit on paper, it is easy to determine when the relationship is not going to be advantageous for the firm. Prospects are very open about running  a chemistry check on the proposed PR team, but I don’t think firms take enough time to do the same.

2) Keeping it Modern. Don  Draper literally threw out a prospect from his office because they refused to embrace a more modern approach. Don meant modern thinking here, Mad Men’s latest and greatest technology is a Xerox machine, but we do need to get tougher on prospects that are still resistent to social media. Of course I am not suggesting that you bounce a prospect out the door for not wanting a set up a corporate blog, but we do need to stand firm that all media is important and an integrated approach to communications is the only logical way to establish a PR program.

3) Practice Your Own PR. Firms are so laser focused on their clients’ PR exposure that they do not take enough care to drive their own internal public relations programs. In the opener for Season 4, aptly titled “public relations,” Don refused to play the PR game with Advertising Age, and the resulting “non article” hurt the morale of the staff and a client even resigned their account due to the article. By the end of the episode, Don called the Wall Street Journal and gave the article that everyone wanted. In last week’s episode, Don was uncharacteristically nervous, humbled and proud to win a CLIO award. He even showed up to their new business meeting for Life Cereal by plunking down the award on the table and saying, “Need I say more!” It just goes to show that PR is equally as important for the firm as it is for the client, and don’t underestimate the power of what your own good press and award recognition could do for new business.

From eZines to Tweets–The Evolution of Digital Media; How to Change Client Persepctives from “Add ons” to Integrated Programs

 

 

Even Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer knows How to Create a LinkedIn Group

10 points to anyone who can tell me what an eZine is. 

Anyone? 

Let’s take a trip in the way back machine. In the mid 1990’s when I was an intern at Media Map, my job was to “track” a new media called eZines. I was assigned this task because  I was young and on the cutting edge of technology. I earned this reputation quickly because I was able to navigate this new internet tool called “YAHOO,” which  was a “search engine” that provided useful information by typing in “terms.” Yes folks, I was a technology maverick way back then (insert sarcastic tone here). And to answer the 10 point question, eZines were magazines that were only found “on the internet,” which at the time, was very shocking. Keep in mind, my other job at Media Map was to ask reporters their preferred method of being contacted, and a majority of them still answered by FAX. Enough said, right? 

Of course, today ALL publications are either online exclusively or have an online counterpart, and to call them eZines  now sounds ridiculous. And with the changing face of consumer and enterprise search, it now seems absurd that someone could be lauded for understanding how to use a search engine. So why today are clients still resisting social media? I guarantee you that Facebook and Twitter are as standard today as the search engine and online magazines were of yesteryear, and clients need to understand that separating social media from traditional media will (and luckily is starting to) sound ridiculous. 

Now there will always be fringe technology in the media world. I remember learning all about second life a few years ago and shared great stories with my friend who pitched a Reuters reporter at the outlet’s “second life bureau.” She started off the interview by missing the virtual chair she was offered and proceeded to sit on the floor instead. After a few tries, she did manage to make it to the chair, but then ended up walking through the glass wall while leaving the office. This was met by typed in laughter from the reporter. Yes, even avatars can get embarrassed. Now this was a surreal (literally) scenario, and from what I can see many years later, second life just didn’t translate to the business world (it does work great if you are a WOW fan–ahem, like my husband). Information sharing instead went the way of collaboration tools such as wiki pages, WebEx and free (near-free) eRooms. 

But back to digital media programs of today. I still can’t figure out why clients still insist on separate social media programs. Firms see these client requests as an opportunity for organic growth and more than happy to put together add-on programs from simple “social media search and reputation management” programs to full “blogging schedules/tweet content, video production and robust SEM” programs. I am all for growing programs, but not when the media world is shifting to these platforms regardless. 

I say take an etch-a-sketch approach and erase all notions of a typical PR plan. Break down the walls of traditional and social media and just include it all. Price out these plans to the level it deserves. You know how long it takes you or your teams to search social and traditional media and create content, whether that is a blog post, a wiki page, Facebook/LinkedIn Groups, etc.  I promise you, your clients are coming up to speed and will expect you to not only know how to do this, but to also “right price” it. And if you are not able to adapt to this approach, your clients will, especially as younger professionals are hired into the workplace and are now moving up the corporate ladder. These technologies are the millennials “Yahoo” of 1996/1997, and will soon surpass your knowledge if you don’t start treating all media equally. 

Erase All Notions of Dated "add on" Plans

 

How Do You Measure Success? Answering the #1 Question in PR and Social Media

   

"How Do You Measure PR/Social Media"

Your team gets together and brainstorms on some innovative “out of the box” ideas for a current client or prospect. You draft a comprehensive media plan that is insightful and creative, and it should succeed in delivering the desired business impact. The proposal even looks great; you spent that extra time on the slick bells and whistles to make the proposal pop.  

However, ten minutes into your dynamic and exciting presentation, the client/prospect asks the inevitable question, “sounds very impressive, but how will you measure that?”  This question was of course anticipated; your team has the typical back up data like a metrics dashboard, Website analytics and social media platform goals, but without the campaign in place yet, it is very hard for the client/prospect to connect these ideas to the promise. And you leave the meeting with that uneasy feeling that you had tried to sell them snake oil.  Sound familiar?  

Show Me, Don’t Tell Me  

Both clients and prospects have unique challenges when discussing a new or expanded media program. You can tell them detailed information about anticipated metrics and goals that they should expect, but without actual results, it will be hard to make your case.    

Clients are definitely easier since they have already worked with you before and have seen strong  results delivered by the team in another communications program. But even with a good foundation and a level of comfort that has been established with this client, a foray into something new, like social media, takes some convincing. 

Prospects are always difficult. You have never worked with them before and coming up with ideas that will yield business impact is tricky. You do the best research that you can from public sources and “insiders” like the analyst community, but often times, proposals tend to be educated guesses at best.    

Here Are Some Tips to Consider for a Measurement Program:  

• Ask questions before you put a plan into place. Often times, agencies are just happy to be invited to a pitch and are reticent to ask what the business goals are for this new program in any great detail. Most firms are satisfied with, “they need to raise visibility to secure funding,” and then start building a plan around that goal. But is that enough information? How much money do they want to raise, how many firms are they courting to join the syndicate, are they looking for a new lead investor, what media programs have they already tried (which is the best question you can ask–proposing something that they tried or didn’t want to do; like a corporate blog–isn’t going to be well received when pitched again.)
• Ask for their metrics for the dashboard. Putting arbitrary numbers into a dashboard doesn’t mean very much if those metrics haven’t been blessed by the client/prospect. You don’t want to overpromise or underpromise on expectations, so it’s best to get agreement before establishing goals.
• Don’t be too creative. Sometimes we fall into the trap of a prospect/client understanding the nuts and bolts of social media and request more advanced parameters such as, “we already have a blog, twitter account, LinkedIn and Facebook groups, analyze our Web traffic regularly and measure our SEO rankings on the top search engines…tell me something new.”  Proposing something new is great, but if it has never been tried before, you can’t really point to any past ROI. Stick to what you know and what has been successful in the past with case studies. Praise their current practices as being ahead of the curve, and save the “new” and untried ideas for the end of the discussion to showcase your creativity.
• Familiarize yourself with measurement tools, but be prepared to put them into context. You can certainly quote real stats like an increase in Website traffic, search engine rankings, new members on Facebook or LinkedIn Groups, and the number of “impressions,” pick ups and tweets on news announcements, but make sure that these numbers are connected to the desired business result (increased patient recruitment, disease awareness, sales and lead generation, fundraising, partnering opportunities, etc.)  

Measurement is certainly important, and should be  included in any proposal. The key is to make sure that the measurement portion of the plan is as well thought out as the creative ideas. If you approach metrics from agreed upon business objectives and have a good sense of what tactics they’ve already tried, then you will find yourself holding a new win contract  and not a vile of snake oil with a scent of social media promises.