Elena is the Associate Manager of Online Communications in Ketchum's New York office. Elena helps oversee Ketchum's myriad online properties and its social media presence, developing creative content and leveraging visual storytelling to bring the Ketchum brand to life online. In her spare time, Elena is an avid traveler and an aspiring marathon runner. Follow her on Twitter @elenaweinstein.
In a Fast Company article from last week, best-selling author and award-winning humorist, David Sedaris, shared takeaways on the benefits of testing out your prose by reading them aloud. In fact, Sedaris swears by performing his work in front of a live audience before he even shares the written version with his editors.
Below are some of the top reasons Sedaris believes in the merits of performing your writing before publishing it to achieve the best results:
Ketchum’s Debra Forman, Partner, Ketchum Digital, spoke with Chris Yates of Huddle Productions live from the SXSW trade show floor. In this interview, they discussed what has changed in the marketing space that is exciting, exhilarating and challenging and whether these changes in marketing have allowed for greater creativity.
Watch the video below for Deb’s thoughts on the revolution of content and the importance of authenticity.
Ketchum enjoyed many successes in 2012, the highlights of which can be found in our 2012 Ketchum Year in Review. In it you will find photos, an awards infographic and two videos, one of which looks back on Ketchum’s cornerstone news, events, and achievements of 2012, and the other of which looks forward to trends in 2013.
Two members of Ketchum, Ryan Shell, Senior Manager, Online Communications, and Sarah Unger, Managing Account Supervisor, Creative Catalyst served on a panel discussion hosted by Fashion News Workshop (FNW)/Trends last week about the ways in which new media is affecting the fashion industry and, more broadly, our news cycles, trend spotting, and cultural commentary.
Specifically, new media is drastically changing the dialogue about fashion whereby we can act upon our on-demand desire for trends and gain access to them anytime, anywhere, and on any platform. Therefore, the industry must adapt to become highly interactive and cater itself accordingly to new distribution channels.
On Monday, October 15, Ray Kotcher, chairman of Ketchum, received the Public Relations Society of America’s highest individual honor, the Gold Anvil Award.
The award was presented earlier this week at the PRSA 2012 International Conference and is the organization’s lifetime achievement award. It is given annually to an individual whose work has significantly advanced the practice and standards of public relations. Included below is Ray’s acceptance speech for the award, which also serves as a call to action for the public relations industry.
Even leaders need to brush up on their communications skills from time to time. The fifth and final trend uncovered by the European Communications Monitor (ECM) addresses leadership in communications, which can come in handy for CEOs and political leaders alike, whether it be carrying out organizational strategies, confronting a tough economic climate, or addressing a crowd.
In a study asking communications professionals about which abilities and conditions help their top executives effectively confront issues in the field, the most highly ranked aspect was involvement in strategic decision-making within the organization, closely followed by possessing the knowledge to develop appropriate strategies, plans, and messages, and providing a compelling vision for how communication can help the organization.
On the heels of Ketchum’s official KSR month in September, Room to Read, Ketchum’s global charitable partner, hosted a discussion with New York Times reporter, Nicolas Kristof and his wife, Sheryl WuDunn, on October 1st to preface the premiere of the feature documentary, Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, based on their best-selling book, Half the Sky.
The book, and subsequent filmic adaptation, features the harrowing stories of incredible adversity and abuse faced by of women and girls in developing countries who are regularly subjected to unspeakable gender-based violence ranging from sex trafficking to genital mutilation to maternal mortality. However, Kristof and WuDunn do speak about these issues and on behalf of these women, giving them a voice and working tirelessly to bring these problems to the fore.
Although the digital evolution and social media communications that were borne out of it are hardly novel concepts, this area still makes the list of top five trends that are considered to be the most important challenges by European communication professionals in 2012.
In the European Communication Monitor’s longitudinal analysis of how the burgeoning importance of social media platforms has been trending over the past five years, it is surprising to see that only online communities and online videos are considered “important” or “very important” by a majority of colleagues. While social media channels as a whole are rated increasingly important year-over-year, weblogs, podcasts, and wikis are trending below 50% on the scale of importance in 2012, while online communities and online videos are hovering between 60% and 70%.
These findings suggest that, while it is not so difficult to believe in the importance of social media, in actuality, it is a lot harder to activate the corresponding channels online. The ECM revealed a large discrepancy between the perceived importance of social media tools for communication and the actual rate of real implementation in most European organizations.
Of late, the communications field has been seeking out new rules and standards to acclimate itself to the challenges and complexities brought about from evolving ethical standards. In other words, while certain scenarios in our business may technically be legally permissible, they can simultaneously be morally or ethically questionable.
Research from the European Communications Monitor surveying PR professionals indicates that as many as six out of ten communications managers have been confronted with ethical challenges within the past twelve months. Specifically, communicators working in online communication and social media as well as those specializing in government relations, lobbying and public affairs, tend to be up against moral ambiguity more frequently.
Check out some of the most talked about and linked to stories on the Web this month and find out why members of our Social Media Group say you should take note.
Welcome to Ketchum's blog portal, where we capture the opinions and insights of several of our employees on a variety of communications topics. We are proud to participate in the sharing of thoughts and ideas about our industry. Read More.