Digital & Technology

You’ve undoubtedly seen this at concerts or other live events—an excited fan takes out a smartphone to start recording what’s happening onstage and, despite the fact that the stage is wider than it is tall, the fan records a vertical video. Working with vertical video has become a pain point for professional videographers who lament the lack of flexibility and picture quality that 9×16 dimensions provide. We spoke with Patrick Pho, lead brand marketing producer at Volkswagen, about this issue ahead of his session at PR News’ Video Workshop on March 15 at D.C.’s National Press Club. 

Podcasts have been a runaway success for businesses looking to further engage their audience. From their mobility to their relative brevity to their status as (mostly) free to users, podcasts are pulling in new listeners on a daily basis. Here are four key considerations when getting yours started.

Twitter’s marketing department got in on the fun this year, too, launching a hashtag—#BrandBowl53—and announcing the commercials that garnered the most engagement on its platform early Monday. The results of this case study demonstrate many different paths to success on the platform. Here are the grand prize winners of #BrandBowl53, and what those campaigns can teach communicators.

It’s that time of year again when your belly yearns for wings, nachos and beer—Super Bowl LIII is almost upon us. Millions will tune in to watch the Patriots and the Rams square off on Sunday, but many more will also be watching for the Super Bowl ads, the priciest block of advertising time in broadcast history that are sure to inspire brand wins and losses of their own. Between the ads, the politics that the sport has found itself engulfed in over the past year, and the huge amounts of money being spent, let’s look at some of the biggest PR touchdowns and fumbles ahead of Super Bowl LIII.

There are myriad ways brands can deliver key messages to target audiences. Yet some brands insist on taking a cookie-cutter approach to content creation. Just as the press release is evolving slowly with the addition of immersive material, branded content producers will need to take risks to earn audience engagement.

Starting on Jan. 18, YouTuber Harry Brewis, known as Hbomberguy to his fans, streamed a Twitch marathon while he played Nintendo 64’s Donkey Kong. The live gaming event raised $340,000 for a nonprofit. Here are three elements that contributed to its success—and that communicators can consider leveraging, should they choose to experiment with Twitch to reach a young audience.

Maintaining valid influencer relationships for your brand will only continue to be a crucial media relations strategy in 2019. But in this time of bots and paid followers on social, what’s the best way to make sure those relationships are on the level? How do you know you’re working with an influencer whose digital persona, and engaged followers, are legit?

We asked some influencer marketing experts to find out.

It’s the quintessential image of Santorini, Greece, that of pristine colorful structures hugging the cliffs overlooking the azure blue Aegean Sea. For one small boutique hotel, keeping its exterior a perfect shade of white is… Continued

Google, Samsung and Apple grabbed most of the headlines at CES 2019, which closes later today in Las Vegas. For communicators, though, the annual tech fest centers on spotting trends and learning about cutting-edge messaging platforms. Bell’s social media manager David Wolpert reports on three trends he saw at CES that are relevant to communicators.

While it’s tempting to call 2019 the year of trust, we’ll have to wait and see. Still, those who make sure that trust and transparency is at the core of their brand identity will likely see many happy returns. To that end, Google started the year off by announcing two features—one that just launched and one that’s rolling out in July—intended to help repair trust and improve the experience for end users. As it turns out, they’re both tremendously valuable tools for communicators, too.