All Posts By

Marijean

Marijean Oldham (Jaggers), a social media specialist and public relations professional, is president and CEO of Jaggers Communications LLC, a strategic communications firm based in Charlottesville, Va.

Jul 11
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Truffles, and Social Media in Education, on the Air with Coy Barefoot

By Communications, Crisis Communications, Social Media

Coy Barefoot asked me what my last, best meal was. I had to tell him all about the amazing dish I had while in Croatia; pasta with delicious truffles. That’s it, there on the left. It was incredible!

Other than that, Coy and I talked about education and social media, online learning programs and more, on Charlottesville: Right Now! You can listen, here.

The inspiration for the conversation was the Education and Social Media Roundtable discussion hosted by Jaggers Communications this week. We gathered communications directors and school leadership to discuss how social media is being used by schools themselves, and by the students and parents who represent each school’s community.

It’s interesting to learn what challenges schools face that are different from businesses or nonprofit organizations, and to tackle the role social platforms play when the school is dealing with a crisis situation.

The discussion was interesting and great connections were made between individuals in those roles in the greater Charlottesville community — it’s always exciting for us to facilitate those relationships.

Something that came out of the Roundtable was the concept of fostering good digital citizenship. We’re fascinated by this and how we can assist schools in creating the programs that support it.

We’d love to host more Roundtable discussions in our community on a variety of topics. What industries or topics would you like to see in a Roundtable series?

 

 

Jul 09
Love0

Jaggers Communications has a New Home

By Jaggers Communications News

Do you like games? Let’s play a game!

We spent the last week or so moving into a new office in Charlottesville. It took us awhile to find just the right spot, and we’re slowly acquiring furniture and settling in. Lucky for us Blue Ridge Internetworks already had fiber in our new building so we were up and running immediately (thanks Tommy!).

On to the game . . . this is a quick snapshot view from my office window.

Can you tell me where the new Jaggers Communications World Headquarters is?

Jun 27
Love0

Filtering the Firehose

By Social Media

When a company begins to think about monitoring the social web for mentions of their brand, news of the industry or other content relevant to their business, they sometimes pause. It’s overwhelming, the idea of how MUCH content there might be to absorb. How much of it will be worthwhile? How much will be a waste of time?

It IS a struggle, at first, to set up the right way to filter the noise. There can be a firehose stream at first, but learning to filter it, to prioritize and strategically exclude, to scan, bookmark and manage so that the best of what’s coming through is found and absorbed.

We’ve had a lot of practice at this and often provide the first set of eyes on client feeds. Our role in setting up what we call the “listening infrastructure” is often supported with the next stage: reviewing and creating a “Readers’ Digest” of the best content around the web in the industry category, mentions worth reacting and responding to, and content worth sharing forward to customers and prospects.

Even if your internal team is pretty good at managing the reading, a second (or third, or fourth) pair of eyes on what’s available helps capture more of what’s valuable.

Sometimes the overwhelming feeling is so strong companies shy away from even beginning to pay attention; this is a mistake of devastating proportions. Companies MUST know what is being said about their brands and what news in their industry impacts their business. Since the tools exist to make this possible and in fact, easy, there are no acceptable excuses for ignoring the content. It is the expectation of the world at large that you, as a business, are interested in paying attention to your customers.

Jun 22
Love0

Better Business in Charlottesville

By Communications, Marketing, Public Relations

Teri Kent is my hero. Truly. Teri started Better World Betty as a resource for all things green in our community. Then, she took it to the next level, creating, managing and executing the Better Business Challenge.

Last night, the Jaggers Communications team was delighted to be present as friends of the firm walked away with awards they earned by converting to a paperless system, reducing waste, increasing recycling efforts and reducing energy consumption. It was a fine display of environmental stewardship and we were proud to be applauding fans of the effort.

Teri has been at the forefront of the whole effort. She’s professional, efficient, inspiring and enthusiastic. When I grow up, I want to be just like her.

We’re also so proud to be affiliated with, neighbors and friends of participating organizations including Rebecca’s Natural Food, Woodard Properties, Beer Run, Camp Holiday Trails, Center for Nonprofit Excellence, the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce, C’ville Coffee, Eppie’s, GreenBlue, Jean Theory:, and Relay Foods. Congratulations to all the winners and, indeed, to all the participants; this effort is just another reason we’re so proud to be part of the Charlottesville community.

 

 

 

Jun 21
Love0

Forget about the Tools: What’s Your Reason to be There?

By Communications, Social Media

We have a lot of initial conversations with client prospects that get hung up on tools. We don’t need to talk about Facebook or LinkedIn or Twitter — the specific tools aren’t any more critical to name in developing communication strategy than defining that we might use phones, or, say, a laptop.

The problem with talking about specific tools is that each person has their individual experience with that specific tool, and it may not be in a business context at all. There are still many business people who hear the word “blog” and think of ranting online diaries in which people air their dirty laundry. OF COURSE that’s not what we’re talking about, but certain words (Facebook, blog, Twitter, e-mail marketing, YouTube) really set people off on a tangent.

We like to derail that conversation by focusing on what message the client is trying to deliver. We talk more about providing content in places where intended audiences ALREADY ARE and will find what the client wants them to find. We try to steer clear of specific tool-driven strategy (tools change; the content and the reasons to use them do not).

What’s useful is defining the best possible outcomes of communicating about your business. Keep focused on that; don’t get distracted by the platforms.