Digital marketing is becoming the most influential and representative manner in which to engage an audience, and this is down to social networking, according to a report in the NBR this afternoon.

The NBR website reported ‘Google innovationist’ Justin Baird, at the Digital Now New Zealand 2009 conference in Auckland, saying that marketing was “no longer about broadcasting your messages and then moving onto the next thing – it’s now an ongoing dialogue, which in turn is an amazing opportunity to learn from your customers via very direct feedback”.

Not a new message, but good to see it reinforced in New Zealand — and applicable, of course, for PR plays, too.  Read more from the NBR here.

Update 27 September

According to this NZ Herald article about New Zealand internet use:

* Nine out of 10 internet users participate in social networks
* More than a quarter have made a major purchase based solely on online reviews
* Ninety-seven percent research online before making a significant purchase
* Twenty-eight percent buy goods as a result of reviews they read on the web

The ability of organisations to get their message across in social media forums is now an essential and significant  part of any business communication strategy.

Anyone remember Sweetwaters?

Back in the day, it used to pretty much be the only music festival in the country. These days, outdoor summer music festivals are cropping up everywhere: from the highly lauded low-key, lo-fi Camp A Low Hum in the hills behind Wainuiomata to the increasingly mainstream sounds coming from Gisborne’s popular Rhythm and Vines and a myriad of other events of all musical flavours. Choosing your dates and saving your dollars for your favourite events must be no small decision for festival fans.

And it’s the same in the UK where the behemoth that is Glastonbury is now rivaled by a summer calendar packed full of outdoor events. Attracting the punters in such a crowded market place means concert promoters must be as adept at marketing as they are at finding the right sounds.

Which is way I like the concept of this festival – Indietracks: a mix of indie bands and steam trains, and quite possibly the mostly the most eccentric festival theme ever. I wouldn’t want to go to it but as an example of a niche product and a fund raising event (for steam train restoration) finding and connecting with an audience, I like it.

What price publicity?! A small UK design firm that has seen about half its staff made redundant recently has encouraged the rest of its staff to go naked in the office, with the managing director reported saying he thought it would be good for business.

Staff say they weren’t forced into it, but — while we can’t deny the publicity success of the stunt  — it seems that people who had just seen half their colleagues lose their jobs would be unlikely to say no to the boss!

And group nudity … it gets everyone looking I guess; but 12 years after The Full Monty (and 22 years after NZ’s own Ladies’ Night), it’s about time for a new idea.

With blogs fast becoming authoritative sources of news in their own right, the avenues you need to reach to get comprehensive publicity coverage can sometimes appear infinite. But you do need to communicate with far more than just traditional media outlets.

Spend a bit of time online researching who is writing the most authoritative and informed blogs on topics relevant to your business. You will easily be able to find the blogs you should be talking to.

People in your industry will be aware of leading blogs. The Technorati website shows who the most popular global blog sites are. Google’s Blog Search works well if you type ‘New Zealand’ after whatever topic search you are after.

What is news on a blog?

How does news develop and grow in the online age, where blogs are taking on papers in the news-breaking game and often winning? American journalist and new media expert Jeff Jarvis defines it as  “product versus process journalism.”

“Newspaper people see their articles as finished products of their work. Bloggers see their posts as part of the process of learning.”

The way blogs work  include “collaboration, transparency, letting readers into the process, and trying to say what we don’t know when we publish – as caveats – rather than afterward – as corrections,” Jarvis says.

Traditional news outlets like to project the impression that their story is the definitive version .

Whereas, as the Irish Independent reports, journalism – as practised by bloggers – exposes the workings of a scoop. “[High-profile technology blog] TechCrunch, for instance, publishes the beginnings of a story that may only be a rumour. The responses to that rumour, often from reliable sources, generate updates to the story, which is polished with the help of readers to get closer to the whole truth.”

“This is journalism as beta,” Jarvis writes. “Every time Google releases a beta, it is saying that the product is incomplete and imperfect. It’s a call to collaborate.”

And that call to collaborate is drawing millions of blog readers and comment writers. If you want your company to be where the word-of-mouth action is, you need  to be noticed in the blogosphere.

… And, lastly, just to add to the proliferation of news sources you need to pay attention to: Is Twitter the news outlet for the 21st century?

iPhone and computer company Apple has made an art out of getting huge publicity by saying nothing at all. Where others work their butt off to get their business noticed in the media, Apple has the silent, cool guy role down perfectly, getting non-stop media that other companies can only dream about.

One of the standard rules of PR is to fill an information void with your own messages before others fill it with their version of what your message might be. Apple’s skill is in embracing the void and letting PR messages find their own path.

It helps, of course, that they have absolutely world-beating products such as the iPod and iPhone; and when they do decide to advertise something their messages are as well-crafted as any-one’s; but we like them for their confidence to take on the market by saying nothing at all.

Unconventional approaches to PR can only be good in a hugely crowded market place.

The other unconventional approach to PR that we have enjoyed this year is the Unites States food-PR guy who lets the media actually choose if they want to receive information from him, rather than hammering with them with press releases and phone calls. Like Apple, he has enough confidence in his offering that he reasons people will come to him to find out more.

Could you publicise your product or service by saying … nothing at all about it?!

Seems like us Kiwis trust people with a medal. Similarly, if you can get external recognition for your products or services it can be a helpful differentiator in the market.

Though not, it seems, for much longer in the United States if you are claiming green credentials: 98% of supposedly environmentally friendly products in US supermarkets reportedly make false or confusing claims.

I often get asked, “how would you spin that?” Both by clients wanting advice and people simply having a conversation when they find out what I do for a living.

But, rather than being a spin doctor, any good PR person knows that the best results for clients lie in helping people to more clearly and transparently understand a client’s business. Knowledge = power, for everyone.  Spin simply confuses and obscures.

Below is a doctor of another kind, who definitely understands that honesty is the best marketing/PR policy. His marketing of his ‘Heart Attack Grill’ leaves no sacred cow – food-wise – untouched and he is pulling in the customers because of it.

You may find cynical the grill’s apparent mocking of obesity health issues, but it is simply a burger joint that makes no attempt to pass off its regular burger joint food as other than what it is … and, yes, warning: high-fat content!

Getting your company mentioned in the media and then having those mentions filter through the internet to be found by potential customers via search engines has, for many years, been a big part of getting company messages seen and heard.

Are those days coming to an end? Rupert Murdoch has reportedly announced today that people will have to pay to access his News Corporation’s newspapers’ websites.

News Corporation controls much of NZ’s media and has a huge influence around the world. Let’s hope a very useful channel for publicity is not shut off to the internet masses in favour only of people who can afford to pay to view.

Looking for a publicity campaign that will hit all the right targets? Probably best to stay away from a campaign like that of U.S online brokerage site Zecco who reportedly surprised its customers by giving them multi-million dollar trading balances on April Fools’ Day!

Zecco was surprised when some customers began making real trades with their newfound riches … and the company then, reportedly, further alienated customers by making them wear any losses they incurred in their trading!

A restaurant in Latvia’s capital Riga has certainly found its marketing niche.

Decorated like a hospital, Hospitalis serves food, shaped like body parts, on operating-room dishes. Syringes contain liquids to go with the meals.

And just to take their image one step further, customers are treated liked patients by waitresses in nursing uniforms. From time to time deranged patients are wheeled through the restaurant in strait-jackets.

Personally, I’ve never liked dining on gore and nurses never help me feel relaxed, but I guess the owners of this places (real doctors, apparently) are confident the dining experience will live up to the publicity generated by the medical theme.

Photos here.