Five Musts to Build Buzz

OK, as promised, a part II blog entry. A lot of this is part of my presentation at the Northern Virginia Technology Council tomorrow morning.

Seeing as most companies cannot meet the successful news release requirements outlined in Sunday's entry, they need to get out of the old news release box and embrace newer methods. Generating press coverage and word of mouth requires marketers to do more than issue news releases; they need to strive to achieve the Five Musts of Generating Buzz:

1. Companies must Get Out of Themselves and pay attention to their target audience’s interests to succeed.
2. Companies must build value for these target audiences and disseminate the information in ways that are viral.
3. The value that companies build needs to be related to their product: Starbucks = coffee, but buzz = relaxing, hip ambience while you have coffee.
4. Companies must inspire their target audiences to believe in the company, to talk about the company, to serve as its advocates.
5. Companies must commit to regular, consistent communications. A flash in the pan does nothing to help the company long term.

If you approach tactical public relations and word of mouth marketing with the Five Musts in mind, success is yours to have. There are many ways to generate this buzz, and we suggest that clients use a complex blend of vehicles to achieve corporate communications objectives. Here's a list of some methods:

1. Traditional media relations, but focused on larger trends
2. Guerilla media relations: Exclusives, by-lines, letters to the editor
3. Internet PR
4. Blogosphere buzz
5. Speaking opportunities
6. Free content of interest (white papers, videos, podcasts)
7. Industry advocate program
8. Quality email newsletters, not corporate propaganda
9. Awards

I'd love to tell you how to best deploy these vehicles, but I can't give away the entire house, now can I? Truly, the map has been laid out, and most competent PR/communications execs and firms should be able to rise to the occasion.

Business is good. With my new employee on board, I am so used to working 14 hours a day that the free time has driven me a little batty. That's kind of sad that Only Working 10 hours would have this affect on me, a sign of how taxed I really was, but I knew what I was signing up for when I started this. So I am trying to get back to working out, and focusing on new business.

Hit a nice interview with the Washington Post, and we are getting ready to kick off the rock star publicity project this Friday. Woo hoo! The bad news is the jewelry store fell through. C'est la vie.