Twitter Chatter

In the 90's, we had chat rooms. You might have assigned a time, a date, and users would congregate, virtually, to discuss a topic of their choosing. To this end, we still have forums and message boards, the best example demonstrated on Martin Lewis' Money Saving Expert website.

Now, through Twitter chats, Twitter has taken this desire for finding like-minded people who share a passion or similar interest, and consolidated it onto one platform. And so we have the simplest of concepts, which allows Joe Public to converse with industry experts and opinion leaders, to exchange engaging content, whilst at the same time increasing their professional network and establishing brand expertise.

One of the earliest examples that I can remember of a Twitter chat is the Beauty Bloggers chat, run every Sunday evening at 8pm GMT under the hashtag #bbloggers. The chat was set up by established beauty blogger Fee, who blogs at www.makeupsavvy.co.uk, and brings together other bloggers from both the fashion and beauty worlds to discuss topics they find interesting; often, the topics are subject-specific, such as favourite mascaras or Autumn trends, but occasionally the chats focus on the blogosphere and allows users to exchange tips on making their blog successful or best practice in dealing with PR's who often approach bloggers to review their products.

Each Twitter chat has its own personality and core group of participants, and as you might expect, there are a range of chats that happen daily that would be useful for any practitioner to take heed of. #CommsChat is the home of Europe's most popular communications conversation which takes place twice weekly, and looks at all aspects of communications including PR, marketing, digital and reputation management. The website publishes a brief prior to the chat, outlining the main discussion points, and transcripts of previous broadcasts are available should you need to catch up on any missed content.

For aspiring practitioners, playing voyeur and observing a Twitter chat is a great way of building knowledge on a brand or simply understanding who the big movers and shakers are; but by participating, practitioners are able to create equity and credibility for themselves within their industry, building on their own personal brand (which we all know is vital in the current media landscape). It's useful for making contacts, and whilst the virtual nature of the chat means you can't have post-discussion coffee and biscuits, there's no reason why you can't go on to have a thoughtful, informal discussion with a key journalist now they know who you are (and you've got some credibility).

Twitter chats are just beginning, and soon we will see businesses leveraging the benefits for sales and ROI.

I've found my blogging mojo

Imagine my surprise when, in a break from writing a 2500 word essay on Clay Shirky's The Cognitive Surplus (read: procrastination), I stumbled across Behind the Spin's top 10 ranking of Social Students, to find yours truly at joint 8th position.

http://www.behindthespin.com/news/introducing-our-socialstudent-leaders

Having had the pleasure of Behind the Spin's editor Richard Bailey lecturing us during our second year of university, I was familiar with his magazine-style site, which caters for PR students and those starting out in the industry. I'd even seen his tweet the day before requesting BTS's readers to put forward their Klout and Peerindex scores in order that he could compile the Social Student rankings. I didn't give it a second thought - my fellow peers tweet, blog, write, debate, broadcast, argue, Facebook and G+ til the cows come home. Since I'd lost my blogging mojo and abandoned The Details in the Fabric, my fashion and beauty blog, in my placement year, and given that I've never been brave enough to publically put forward my arbitrary views on public relations on the Internet, I was sure I wouldn't stand a chance against the PR heavyweights that are the Leeds Met students, who seem to have made blogging a national past time.

I don't doubt for a minute that my 500+ Twitter followers isn't unrelated to the fact that I worked for the world's biggest car manufacturer on my placement year, or that at least a quarter of my followers are spam-sending companies vying for my attention. And I'm sure a further 150 of my followers are part of the fast-evolving cult that is beauty blogging, itself a small community of like-minded individuals who blog about their passions and are single-handedly changing the face of fashion and beauty PR as we know it.

However, my appearance amongst a list of pure PR talent has given me the confidence to believe that I do have a voice; that the range of channels available to us in which to express our thoughts on academia, on celebrity gossip, on last night's dinner and on Made in Chelsea is so rich and exciting that to ignore those 500 followers would be a bad move. Building relationships is fundamental in public relations, and engaging those who take the time to listen to you is even more crucial. My ideas might not be correct, nor agreeable to everybody that reads them, but becoming part of the conversation presents an unparalleled opportunity to develop these further whilst cementing relationships with potential future employers, even future employees.

"I don't need an introduction to you through someone else, and you no longer need one to me. We are all a click (or a pixel) away from one another. This means that building relationships and turning those relationships into an online community is more powerful and more important than ever before." (Mitch Joel, 2009)

Being the only student in the rankings without an active blog made me sit up and think - here's an opportunity - why aren't I seizing it? I think I may have my blogging mojo back. Watch this space.