New Blog at www.priscillatan.com

For those few people and friends or strangers who just happen to look at this blog, I've moved all my blog posts to www.priscillatan.com

Feel free to pop there and share some of your comments and thoughts.

cheers ~

Velvet Puffin @ MashUp

I meant to write about a social networking client of mine in more details but for now, read John P. Mello (former managing editor of the Boston Business Journal)'s comments about the cool site. The young 26 years old CEO, R. Chandrasekar is current speaking at the Mashup 2007

I shall put up more information very soon!!

Meeting Kevin, a new friend

I finally met up with Kevin for lunch yesterday. He was sweet enough to travel all the way to my office area and we had nice food at Sushi Tei along Far East Square. Actually, we had met at the last BLOGOUT event but we didn't get to introduce ourselves. I only remembered him as "the guy with the video cam".

He is known for his nice eyes (compliments from another pretty lady I believe)and I thought he has a quirky sense of humour. Very intelligent too. It was a really nice meeting as we talked about many things from social media, PR, businesses, online culture in Singapore etc etc and he shared alot of insightful thoughts. It's a pity we only get to meet up now and he is already going back to US in 11 days. Oh well, never too late to make a new friend.

It is a really interesting to meet someone like Kevin. He carried a GPS travel recorder with him, he had his video cam on while we chatted and stuff our face with food and he had all the cool gadgets everywhere (ok, that's exaggerating, but close!!).

(check out his gadgets at my LiveJournal)

I feel like a complete tech-idiot next to him but hey, I am learning new things and I made a new, nice friend! Yay for me!

Measureing PR efforts in new media

The IPRS (Institute of Public Relations Singapore) is organising a conference and workshop on the 1-2 Aug 07. The topic - Public Relations 2.0: Engaging Stake Holders in New Media Landscape.

I am looking forward to hear what some of the speakers and experts in the field are presenting, especially the workshop on How to measure PR efforts in new media. There have been many "recommendations" from experts but is there an "industry standard"?

While I am on the topic of new media, I came across an interesting blog providing some great tips on measuring PR

Brian Solis's blog (one of my favourite) has this entry about "what's wrong with social media", I have been hearing so much of the term, social media. Many people in the PR industry have been talking about it but at this point, I am still not sure what exactly one can expect when the term "social media" is used.

One of Brian's simple definition of social media in the entry - "Read. Write. Create. Share. The revolution will be socialized" - and I agree. And I started to question, if an agency is managing a "social networking" account, is it a MUST to have all the consultants in the team to at least - start "socialising" using the technologies in the new media?

I shall continue researching and reading, with the aim to understand (1) what is the fuss about "social media" (2) who, how and what defines "social media" and for PR, what is the impact and changes to the media scene and approaches that consultants can adopt to pitch, reach out to, measure etc...

Chair for the book addict

I know this is an irrelevant post to this blog but oh well, can't resist.

I was surfing around and came across this interesting blog that has this picture of a "bookshelf chair". I am so fascinated and wished I have one!

Take a look, it's amazing! Perfect for people like me who's a book addict - a comfy chair, surrounded by books

Email Etiquette

First of all, I am having a really bad sore throat and running a slight fever. It is Monday and everyone around me is grouchy. Before I start to pack my luggage (going for holiday) and go to bed to try to get rid of the fever, I am going to write this short entry on "email etiquette". It may feel like an outdated topic to be talking about but I am often thrown off by people's poor manners in emails. With today's advancing technology and more people getting into social networking, using different online tools to communicate, all the more we should have the basic understanding and practice on email/ online etiquette.

Today, my colleague complained about a client who sends his emails in CAPS. How you write an email says alot of about you. One major NO NO in writing an email is to avoid writing in uppercase letters. It looks and feels like you are shouting (rudely).

I personally hate those emails that don't even start with "HI, XXX...." and launched straight into "I WANT TO SEE UPDATES BY 5PM AND SEND THE DOCUMENT BEFORE MEETING"

Notice what's wrong with that sentence? It says alot about the sender. There is no "greetings", no "thank you", no "please", it's in ALL CAPS and the tone is demanding rather than polite request of information as what professional business people should do. Many people think that because they are not seeing you face to face, it is perfectly fine to forget all the greetings and the etiqutte.

My nose is starting to run now and I have to go to bed and continue to ponder...

Introducing Izzie...

Heya - Izzie here, one of the other 'co-authors', just dropping a note to say hi and introduce myself. Not used to blogspot cos I'm more an LJ user (gasp! conflict of interest there...) but I guess I'll get used to this.

I work with PRis the PR-incess here at a little green agency at Amoy Street as business development manager. As the name implies, my roles and responsibilities centre on bringing new business into the agency as well as looking into other creative ways in which to provide clients with newer and more innovative ways of creating brand awareness besides the usual outlets of print and broadcast - and the usual publicity stunts / press conferences / media drops that accompany them. I have to say, though, it's much more easily said than done in many respects.

Oftentimes the major headache faced by many agencies who are looking at using new media or brainstorming new ways of reaching the audiences is that clients are still by and large unsure of how to assess the success of new media coverage. As with many for-profit organisations they place a great deal of their assessment on how much a campaign is able to raise profits, or by the size of participation in a certain initiative, or turn-out at an event. They look at the size of an article and judge the advertising value equivalent, comparing PR fees with how much MORE they'd have to pay were they to have bought a similar-sized ad. Admittedly these are important benchmarks - but aren't we taking things a little too far by assessing the success of a campaign just by the cost savings of ad buys? And I'm talking strictly in terms of marketing PR here - there are a myriad of PR subcategories out there with their own respective definitions, practices, etc.

Therefore, while PRis looks at various PR trends and other exciting items in the realm of new media, I'm going out on a limb to explore the techniques and methods in which a campaign is put together - from conceptualisation to end product. It'll be pretty interesting, and sometimes frustrating, I imagine. Admittedly i am still very much a newbie, being in the industry all of 1 1/2 years - so if anyone has any insight to share on a certain issue pertaining to the formulation and execution of a campaign, even if it's to say "I agree" or "I disagree", please feel free to drop a note.

Catchyas!

Iz