Stories by Sophie Maerowitz

Each fall, PR News celebrates the top digital campaigns and initiatives of the last year at its Digital Awards luncheon. This year, the event will be held Nov. 8 at The Yale Club in New York City. Leveraging video, mobile apps, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and more, this year’s finalists have taken an unrivaled creative and tactical approach toward digital communications. Here is a list of this year’s finalists.

Google and NBC are both under fire this week for employees’ inappropriate behavior and subsequent backlash in the news cycle and on social media. Here’s a contrasting look at each company’s response, with commentary from PR professionals on how well each brand tackled its crisis communications.

“Don’t be Pepsi.” That’s a piece of advice many influencer marketing experts have shared since the soda brand’s 2017 misstep, when it cast Kendall Jenner as a champion of diversity and the Black Lives Matter movement. Here, three influencer marketing experts share the pivotal roles diversity and inclusion are playing in the field—and how brands can ensure they get multicultural influencer marketing right.

Google has announced it will be shutting down its seven-year-old social network Google+ for consumers. And while those that swear by Instagram and Snapchat are unlikely to miss the struggling platform, Google+ did get a few things right in terms of communications offerings. Here are three Google+ features that communicators might miss—and some suggestions on how to find those offerings elsewhere.

Google has the final say in what pages rank at the top of search results. So it makes sense that Google tools would be best suited for measuring the success of your website optimization efforts. In the last few months, Google has unveiled a slate of new features for better understanding website visitor behavior. Here’s a recap of each, with their communications takeaways.

Instagram has announced it would be adding the option for “select” brands to allow customers to shop via special tags on Instagram Stories. And, after piloting the feature for several months to its test group, the tap-to-buy option has been made available for all business accounts approved for Shopping. The feature is likely to pay off for brands on the platform. In March, the company published data from a survey stating that more than one in three daily Instagram users say they have become more interested in a brand after seeing it on Instagram Stories.

Human Rights Campaign’s red equality logo put the spotlight on HRC and spread awareness about the organization. Whether the logo is seen on a T-shirt or a lawmaker’s lapel, it sends a message that the Human Rights Campaign and its supporters remain vigilant in the fight for LGBTQ equality. To celebrate HRC’s induction into the 2018 Platinum Hall of Fame, PR News sat down with HRC’s senior design director Robert Villaflor to learn more about the inner workings of the campaign.

One of this year’s Hall of Fame inductees, KFC, was selected by PR News’ panel of judges for its creative reimagining of a brand icon via its “Rotating Colonel” campaign. Over the past few years, the mascot has been given several new faces—perhaps most memorably, Reba McEntire. The brand kept audiences holding their breath for the next influencer to don the signature goatee and white suit. PR News asked Staci Rawls, director, PR & internal communications at KFC U.S. to pull the curtain for a peek behind one of the most beloved campaigns in recent history.

One of this year’s Hall of Fame inductees, CVS Health, was selected for its CVS Quits campaign. In 2014, the company announced the banning of tobacco products in its stores. The brand received a slew of media accolades for its bold move in mainstream news publications, on social media and from influencers in the health space. Furthermore, it successfully established itself as a health care organization, rather than simply a pharmacy chain. In a PR News exclusive Q&A, CVS Caremark’s VP, corporate communications Carolyn Castel shared some of the communications victories of the initiative.

At a fireside chat exclusive to Platinum & Agency Elite Awards attendees, ESPN’s Hannah Storm will share her insights on visual storytelling and branded content, as well as her vision of influencer relations and the media landscape. In anticipation of the Platinum & Agency Elite Awards luncheon, which will be held Sept. 21 at the Grand Hyatt in New York City, PR News spoke with Hannah about her latest projects and her view of PR in 2018.