Social Media and its relevance for Public Relations

Social media can be defined as any such media that can engender an interactive dialogue between people, irrespective of their geographical boundaries and time differences. Social media gains more momentum as the number of people around the world who access it increases exponentially each day. It offers the perfect meeting place for brands to communicate with their audiences, get a sense of the public's pulse and respond to their reactions in time. The video illustrates the importance of social media PR and how it can be integrated into a brand's value propositions.

Blogging for dummies

With social media garnering the importance it already has, and other plaftorms that are being generated to harness this new medium, it's impossible for a PR practitioner to ignore one of the earliest ways of connecting with an audience: the BLOG. Blogging (and push-button publishing in itself) is so simple that kids from age 8 to geriatrics in their 80s are doing it. If you bear these tips in mind, you can not only create your own blog, but gather an audience around it as well. Most importantly, you can use it to influence opinions, generate comment and develop an expertise.

1. Why are you blogging: Defining the purpose your blog not only makes it clear about what you're going to write, but also helps create a unique voice for your blog. 
2. Audience: Like the fundamentals of any communication, ask yourself who's going to read this. 
3. Tone/style: Are you an expert, sharing your observations or making a comment? Clarifying this to yourself, and then posting will help set a style and tone for the content viewers will see on your blog. #
4. Original content: There's enough content floating around on the web on practically everthing under the sun and the rock too. So, ask yourself what am I saying that's really unique. Original content draws people to web pages like moths to a flame. 
5. SEO: When you have all these moths around your flame, it's hard for Google to ignore you. But in the odd case that it does, how to get its attenion? Keyword. Use labels/tags/keywords in your posts that will help Google index your blog on searches.  

For more information on blogging:

Blogging and video workshop

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