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.

Jan 23
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Why I Love to Teach: Reason Number 4,365

By Public Relations

Forgive me, I’m all verklempt. I just received the following Facebook message from a student I taught in St. Louis more than seven years ago:

Got a job interview with _______________ hospital this Wednesday; second interview. It is for a Sr. PR Specialist position. Anyway, wanted to tell you because I had to draw on everything you once taught me at college in my phone interview. So thanks!

Heart; melted.

The student was one of those great students a teacher never forgets; I’ve stayed in touch with a handful of them, and this one has always stood out. His note reminded me how much I loved teaching at the college level. I taught a course in public relations to communications majors at Fontbonne University in St. Louis, Mo. I don’t teach college courses any more (although, may return to it one day). But every day I teach; here, on the blog, in client meetings, with colleagues I mentor and in workshops I deliver on behalf of organizations or under my own company umbrella.

I think a really strong education in communications and yes, even public relations is useful for every person in business for themselves. I will continue to teach in and out of classrooms, as long as I’m able — and hopefully now and again, someone will pop by to remind me why I love it so much.

Thanks “Nano,” you made this ol’ PR teacher’s night.

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Jan 23
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Paula Deen, Diabetes and the Culture of Transparency

By Communications

Paula Deen, lover of butter and oil, matriarch of a Food Network empire and now, public Type 2 diabetes patient, has pissed off a lot of people. Deen revealed her years-old diagnosis of diabetes recently, conveniently coinciding with her new deal to endorse a pharmaceutical product. Representing Novo Nordisk, Deen has launched Diabetes in a New Light.  Criticism of her cooking techniques, recipes consistently loaded with fat and sugar, has been led by Anthony Bourdain who called her “the worst, most dangerous person to America.”

As Deen made her announcement about her endorsement, she declared that Type 2 diabetes isn’t changing her life. From Paula Deen Has Type 2 Diabetes:

“And even as she reveals that she is living with Type 2 Diabetes, she says it won’t stop her from eating the way she wants.

“I was determined to share my positive approach and not let diabetes stand in the way of enjoying my life,” Deen said Tuesday in a release announcing her launch ofDiabetes in a New Light™, geared toward finding “simple ways” to manage challenges of the disease.”

The lack of up-front transparency about her disease and the message that healthy living and eating isn’t a necessary component of living with Type 2 diabetes is what’s causing Deen to lose fans, fast. The health care community is beginning to demonstrate real concern over the message delivered as well and with good reason. Someone with as much of an influential footprint as Paula Deen espousing the “eat what you want” approach to diabetes management is very dangerous indeed.

It will be very interesting to see if her messaging changes as a result of the reaction to her announcement.

I come at this from a very personal point of view: many of my family members have lived with and died from complications of Type 2 diabetes. It’s pervasive and difficult, but not impossible to manage. If you or someone you know and care about has Type 2 diabetes, learn more about it from the American Diabetes Association and other resources that help in positive, healthy ways.

 

 

 

Jan 19
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Measuring Success: What’s a Bounce Rate and Does it Matter?

By Communications, Social Media

If you’re a casual Google Analytics user, you may have noticed a mysterious statistic in your reports; the bounce rate. A lot of unmaintained, unintentional online management of your reputation can result in high bounce rates, in the neighborhood of 40-60% or (gulp!) higher.

Is that bad?

YES!

A high bounce rate means that a visitor came to your site, didn’t find what they were seeking and immediately “bounced” away. From the good people of Google:

“Bounce rate is the percentage of single-page visits or visits in which the person left your site from the entrance (landing) page. Use this metric to measure visit quality – a high bounce rate generally indicates that site entrance pages aren’t relevant to your visitors.”

If you have a new site, or a blog on which you have not yet published enough relevant content, your bounce rate might be high. It is worth taking a look at the percentage regularly and working on reducing it over time.

I’m pretty happy that I’ve gotten my bounce rate down under 6% and suspect that’s about as good as it’s going to get. 

Jan 12
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8 News Values: How to Tackle Media Relations and Keep Your Credibility

By Media, Public Relations

The media (and the world at large) would like your help. Understanding the difference between what’s news and what’s not is super important. As users of smartphones, blogs and YouTubes we are ALL the media. As consumers of news, we, through consumption, sharing and engaging, determine what’s interesting to the masses.

Ah, such responsibility!

As a business person, marketer or communications lead for a nonprofit it is critically important to fully “get” the eight news values, and to understand that your “news” must fit into one of these buckets and you must have a pretty clear understanding of how to articulate that fit. If you can’t, and keep wondering why the media “never” covers what you pitch, you might take some time to seriously consider whether what you’re sharing is really even news at all.

I’ve been using the following list to help pitch news, create client editorial calendars, teach public relations students, mentor people in my industry and keep my own public relations on message for many years. As a special bonus, I’m offering you the workshop handout, Is it News? from Jaggers Communications to download, print, post above your desk and on your refrigerator, at the end of this post.

8 News Values You Can Use

1. Proximity — is location a factor? What’s happening right in the client’s back yard?

2. Prominence — has someone famous aligned themselves with the company?

3. Significance — is this the first of its kind anywhere in the world? The biggest?

4. Timeliness — is there something happening “today only” or for a limited time?

5. Human interest — is there a story to be told about the owner of the company, its employees or its customers? There’s potential for a whole series of stories here.

6. Unusualness — what makes this story or this client really different from its competition? What is happening that rarely happens anywhere?

7. Conflict — this is not always the direction you want your news to take, but if your client has come into conflict with a customer, local authorities or a competing entity, the story may become that news rather than the news you want to share.

8. Currency (newness) — the value in news that is new lasts about two seconds in today’s speed-driven communications. It’s tricky to get in front of a story and share something that’s new, and it won’t be news unless you’re the very first to break it.

Now . . . go forth and be newsworthy!

Get the handout — Is it News? From Jaggers Communications

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