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Jaggers Communications

Oct 08
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New: Endorse Your Contacts on LinkedIn

By Social Media

As a LinkedIn user, you may have noticed that you’re suddenly racking up endorsements as fast as an Olympic athlete. Since you can’t seem to recall your medal-winning athleticism, you may be wondering, what the heck is going on here?

LinkedIn launched a new feature to allow its users to “endorse” — with one click — the skills people in their network claim to have. Here’s a sample from my own account:

As a bonus, LinkedIn will e-mail you to let you know who endorsed you and for what — extra points if your employees or customers endorse you out of the blue — you’re doing a good job!

I like this feature for a couple of reasons:

  1. It doesn’t require the user to request the endorsement of their contacts.
  2. You list the skills and expertise you have and others select from your list.
  3. It provides a quick and easy way to recognize others for their capabilities — we often get hung up on the crafting of the perfect testimonial recommendation — this takes that cumbersome task out of the picture.

Endorse someone today!

Aug 09
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Social Media Success Story: Finding a Job through your Network

By Public Relations, Social Media

Our friend Kim Connolly, @cvillekim on Twitter, vice president of Marketing & Communications with United Way-Thomas Jefferson Area, wrote me an email with the subject line: My Social Media Success Story.

 

This is actually YOUR success story, too. I went to your get-together at Commonwealth Skybar in lieu of the first cancelled Meet the Media Tweetup event. While there, I struck up a conversation with a young man, John Kowalski @theoriginaljage and learned that he had just graduated from VCU with a degree in media and communications and was looking for his first real-world job to get him started on his career. There was something about him I really liked, and I wished that I had an opening for him here. I did tell him he should widen his search to include nonprofits because of the opportunity to be flexible and creative and not relegated to some cubby in a bigger organization.

I invited him to come by the United Way the next week and we talked some more. I sent him some nonprofit marketing job listings and then saw an opening at the United Way in Fredericksburg for a Communications Coordinator that listed all his skill sets. I also saw from their staff list that this position was the only purely marketing position there. I sent him the job posting and told him it would be the perfect starter position. He did apply and I called their president to encourage an interview. Coincidentally, she had his resume open on her desk when I called, and told me he was in her “maybe” pile, but based on my referral, she would include him in her first round of phone interviews. Long story, short – he got the job!

All because of Twitter, and because of your Tweetup, which started the ball rolling.

 

We LOVE success stories like this — thank you Kim and best wishes in your new job, J.J. — we’ll be staying in touch with both of you!

Jul 30
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Facebook Likes Are Back On My )@(#*$ List

By Social Media

After a blissful, serene quiet period, I have somehow started getting more and more “opportunities” to “like” one or another business on Facebook, usually in exchange for a CHANCE at some future benefit. Sometimes these opportunities are delivered in bulk, like a case of Pepsi (I’m a Coke man, myself) or doses of bad tasting cough syrup. What gives? Haven’t we already decided this is a bad idea over the long term? It feels a little smarmy, selling out the goodwill of your brand for a short little burst of happy. For we all know that these likes are fleeting, don’t we?

There are many articles on this. Here is one from ZDNet. Here is another from Fresh Networks, and yet a third from Social Media Today. They all say basically the same thing: once someone comes to your page and hits “like,” they rarely, IF EVER, come back. There is typically no reason to in their minds. 47% of potential  customers in a recent survey said that liking a page has no influence on a purchasing decision from that brand, and that 67% only liked the page to get better deals.

Facebook is a great platform for sharing the human side of a business and giving customers a glimpse of the people behind the operation. Sharing content, thoughts, and ideas with your customers in turn builds trust, which can enhance sales over the long term because we all feel better buying from trusted sources. But in order to earn and KEEP that trust, you have to be prepared to make the page a source of value EVERY DAY. If you promise one thing and deliver less, you will undo all your efforts.

So why would you undermine that trust by baiting “likes” with false or weak “deals” that will never be repeated? Moreover why would you PAY to do that?

Jul 19
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Jaggers Communications on CBS-19: More about the Reinstatement of UVA President Teresa Sullivan

By Communications, Crisis Communications, Media, Public Relations

Did you catch Rusty Speidel on CBS-19? So much of the ousting and reinstatement of UVa President Teresa Sullivan has been about the public relations efforts that accompanied the story. Rusty provides commentary on the story as the Newsplex shares the latest poll confirming Sullivan’s approval rating. Watch here.

Jul 16
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The Five Best Books that have Influenced my Business

By Communications, Social Media

I like to read. That is a huge understatement. Most of what I read is fiction and news; online content and paper. I own a Kindle and it is used every single day. I don’t often like nonfiction works; I’m not a consumer of self-help books or books that teach. When I happen to follow up on a recommendation for one of these, read it and go so far as to incorporate what I’ve learned into my business or personal life, it’s pretty much a WHOA NELLY! moment.

Here are the ONLY five books that have had a significant impact on how I do business, have influenced me to HAVE my own business and that guide me in one way or another on a daily basis.

  1. The Power of Slow.  That’s right. Slow. In world where everything moves at incredible speed, we, as human beings bound by the limits of time, are more efficient, more present and more effective when we pause, reflect and plan.
  2. The Gift of a Year. A couple of years ago a very good friend gifted me with this book. I’m not being overly dramatic when I say that it changed my life and led to the decision to start Jaggers Communications.
  3. Naked Conversations. My friend Shel Israel, one of the authors of this book, says its getting a little “long in the tooth,” but it is still an excellent resource for social media, the evolution of business and the way customer service and the demand for transparency have changed news, industry and nonprofits.
  4. The New Rules of Marketing and PR. If you’re not in PR or marketing but have even a peripheral relationship with the people who have this role, you owe to yourself to read this book. For anyone in PR and marketing, it’s required reading, as far as I’m concerned.
  5. Good to Great. Another oldie but goody — and one that’s held up over time. What I learned from the businesses profiled in this book have been lessons I keep in mind, on behalf of the clients we serve and the business I run.
I know there are thousands of others out there — leave your very best recommendation, if you have one. I’m ready for a newer book to add to the professional inspiration library.