Author and Human Business Works president Chris Brogan had one goal in mind as he addressed PRSA Conference attendees during his keynote speech—to force public relations practitioners to recognize that visibility and leverage with fans is the most important currency. Communicators and brands should be focusing on human conversations, and telling stories in which the customer is the hero.
Brogan said that PR pros should accept the fact that they are in sales and use social networks and blogs as a way to tell stories about their customers and, above all, be useful and use a human voice. And it's not the numbers of followers that matter, it's the dedication and passion your followers have for what you offer them.
"Be vicious, be bold, be daring on social media," Brogan said, warming up to one his more hyperbolic statements. "It's more useful to have a smaller following on social media that would die for you than to have a large following of people who are lukewarm about you."
To increase earn leverage with your audiences, Brogan recommended the following steps: share your stage with others; devote yourself to one or two causes; improve your blogger relations by doing real research on their areas of interest and by building better, deeper contact databases; record and post more video (but keep the videos very brief); listen more and listen harder; and focus on your customers, not your products.
"It all starts with 'what's in it for me,'" Brogan said. "That's what people always want to know. If you want to increase your leverage with your followers, put deposits into your community before you ask for anything. Spend time getting to know the people you want to influence. The more times you can promote other people’s great successes the more they’re going to support you. Find jobs for other people. Be at the elbow of deals and conversations without getting something obvious out of it."
His final word of advice: Do what other people don’t do. If everyone is talking about flash mobs, it’s too late to do it.