Stories by Mark Renfree

As tech companies continue to invest in bot technology, automation is on the road to becoming the default way customers interact with businesses in a variety of different ways. Facebook announced that the company is set to begin a broad implementation of bots into its already incredibly popular Messenger app. With its access to more than 900 million users and 50 million businesses already on the platform, Facebook’s move could be seen as the most viable shift to bring bot technology into the communications mainstream.

Jumping on trending hashtags is something that brands should take very seriously. We’ve all seen brands haphazardly insert themselves into a trending topic only to go down in flames moments later. At times, social media is serious business and it pays to keep a close eye on the conversations happening online. But at other times, like today’s #NationalGrilledCheeseDay, jumping on trends is relatively safe and can add some fun to your branded communications.

Whatever the reason behind a need for behavioral change, people don’t want to be engulfed in negativity. Unilever’s fans didn’t need to see more pictures of overstuffed landfills and environmental damage to change the way they thought about their empty shampoo containers. Instead, Unilever and Weber Shandwick were able to use inspiration, not desperation, to secure this campaign’s success.

Veteran communicators are already comfortable navigating the ebbs and flows of a dynamic career like PR. That’s why it’s so important for young PR pros to stay on the cutting edge of the industry; not only to best serve their companies and clients, but to also secure a long and fruitful career in communications. Here are five tips that every burgeoning PR pro should keep in mind.

Snapchat just got called up to the big leagues. The unlikely social media superstar has been on the rise for a while now, but this update shows the company is ready to acquire a larger share of the market and become one of the major players in social media. With its newest update, the company added an incredible amount of depth to its messaging offerings. By launching Chat 2.0, the company developed a social experience that looks to keep users on the platform as long as possible.

Sometimes it’s best to let your audience speak for itself. Brands can get bogged down in trying to develop messaging that aligns with their targets or speaks in a similar voice. Often brands need to step back and stop speaking to their customers, and instead offer them a place to share their unique voices. With this in mind, Taco Bell Foundation and Edelman used two specific tactics to galvanize their audiences around the fight to lower high school dropout rates.

Once you’ve developed a program and set your KPIs, how exactly do you go about doing the work of measuring? The communications space is now inundated with a motley collection of tools ranging from free to prohibitively expensive. And they all promise to be the alpha and omega of your measurement needs. But PR pros looking for a little guidance on some of the tools available to communicators needn’t worry.

PR pros no longer have to try and stuff their messages into a confining 15-second window. With its decision to sort posts in a user’s feed algorithmically instead of showing them in reverse chronological order, the extension of Instagram’s video limit will give communicators more room to create content that users are sure to engage with, which will help brands secure a top spot in users’ feeds.

Any communicator who’s worked in the nonprofit space knows just how tricky it can be to stand out among the cacophony of worthy causes jockeying for donations. Havas PR and the IPLP focused on making an emotional connection with potential donors and linking up with already-existing trends to achieve their fundraising goals.

The C-suite’s time is limited and expensive—a recent estimation found that a one-hour meeting with executives at a mid-sized company would cost shareholders $30,000 per hour. These three measurement tips will help focus your PR reports to ensure they line up with executives’ priorities.