Social Media & SEO

What’s ahead for social media in 2020? For starters, it appears the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) will continue to hound brands and influencers who misrepresent themselves to consumers on social. Fortunately, the FTC has re-issued its guidelines in a plain-language format. There’s even a video.

If you’re seeing purple today there’s nothing wrong with your eyes. It’s World Pancreatic Cancer Day 2019, and purple is the designated color for the awareness campaign associated with this deadliest of cancers. Hill+Knowlton managing director Larry Krutchik offers social media lessons learned during the 2018 effort.

At PRNEWS, we thought about how to utilize Slack to connect our readership and community. How could we leverage the relationships we’ve built with amazing contacts to benefit those outside of our circle, and bolster an entire community? And with that, we created the PR and Communications Pros Slack group.

South Dakota’s PR campaign around the state’s methamphetamine epidemic accomplished what it set out to do—create awareness around a state-wide health crisis. But the play on words, “Meth. We’re on it,” superimposed over pictures of… Continued

South Dakota’s PR campaign around the state’s methamphetamine epidemic accomplished what it set out to do—create awareness around a state-wide health crisis. But the play on words, “Meth. We’re on it,” superimposed over pictures of teens, farmers and older women, also ignited a debate about the high cost of quick-won awareness, and whether it’s true that “there’s no such thing as bad PR.”

As the holiday season ramps up, social platforms continue to roll out many new features that can greatly affect the performance of your big end-of-year social campaigns. Whether you’re a nonprofit tapping into the giving spirit or a retailer seeking to boost holiday sales, here are some recent features to look into, by social platform.

The media has a tendency to whack the federal government. On the other hand, when Washington does something good, and uses PR principles to do so, we feels it’s our duty to give props. That’s the case with the FTC’s clear, concise restatement of its influencer guidelines. There’s even a video.

The word “engagement” gets thrown around so often, it’s become nearly meaningless in the social media world. And, while most buzzwords come and go, real engagement is a long-term play. If you’re not seeing a lot of engagement from your Facebook posts, tweets or product pictures on Instagram, you may want to take another look at your long-term strategy. True audience engagement isn’t easy, and it takes a long time to see results.

We’re guessing the sudden and untimely death of Deadspin (no pun intended) as a purveyor of no-holds-barred sports and social commentary will provide a case study for business students in what not to do with a successful endeavor. This post, from PR pro Dave Dykes and PRNEWS staffer Nicole Schuman, argues that the incident also offers a bevy of PR lessons.

On Oct. 25 Google debuted BERT, its biggest algorithm update since RankBrain in 2015. And BERT is definitely big. Google says BERT will impact one in ten search queries. In short, BERT improves Google’s understanding of language and should benefit authentic content that addresses readers’ pain points.