Stories by Ian James Wright

As part of PR News’ Winter Awards luncheon, Dec. 6, at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., organizations and individuals notable for championing diversity in PR came together to be recognized for their efforts. The Diversity & Inclusion Awards highlighted various agencies, brands, nonprofits and individuals who are doing the important work of creating diverse and inclusive workplaces at all levels of the organization.

Kellogg Co. is between a rock and a hard place. On Nov. 29 the cereal giant announced it was pulling advertising from Breitbart, the right-wing news outlet that rocketed to wider recognition after its executive chair Steve Bannon was tapped for the position of senior counselor to president-elect Donald Trump.

Have you ever wondered why some social media posts get tons of engagement, and some get so little? As part of her article in the PR News Writer’s Guidebook, Stephanie Wight, account executive at GYMR Public Relations, analyzed one specific post by the Alzheimer’s Prevention Initiative.

In the wake of Black Friday and Cyber Monday comes Giving Tuesday, a counterpunch to consumerism started in 2012 by the 92nd Street Y and the United Nations Foundation. People around the world are encouraged to donate to worthy causes, and some noteworthy names have been leading the charge

The PR News Snapchat Boot Camp, Dec. 7 in Washington, D.C., has been programmed to unlock the possibilities and features of the platform. One of the presenters, Katie Keating, program manager for social brand strategy at IBM, has provided us with some of her favorite Snapchat tips in advance.

Donald Trump will be the first leader of the United States who is truly a creature of social media, and this is now being borne out by his YouTube channel Transition 2017. Having so far avoided a post-election news conference longer than anyone elected to the presidency in decades, Trump took his message direct to the people in a video posted to the channel Nov. 21

For a crash course in how not to communicate with millennials, take the time to visit /r/FellowKids, a “subreddit” of gigantic content-aggregation site Reddit. It’s a site dedicated to mocking examples of “advertisements and media that totally appeal to the radical youth of today. Cowabunga!”

As excited as we all are to jump into action with a brilliant new PR initiative, it’s important not to find yourself asking yourself in the aftermath “…wait, what should we have been measuring? Are the numbers we ended up with great, good, bad? Are those numbers important to my boss?” Look before you leap, and lay a foundation for what to measure and what to expect.

Chili’s restaurants served over 200,000 free meals to veterans on Veterans Day. One of those meals went very, very poorly, and now the restaurant chain is in a worse position than if it had never undertaken the effort in the first place. What went wrong? An act of kindness to veterans should have been non-controversial.

The vending machines, styled “Snapbots”—are distinctively bright yellow, with a smiling mouth and one big cartoonish eye, like a Minion without the blue overalls. Also, they are elusive: The Snapbots will only be in one place at a time, for one day only.