Author: Wim Coeckelbergh

Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly playing a vital role in the field of public relations, similar to its impact on various other industries. It empowers PR experts to gain insights and analyze data with unprecedented speed and effectiveness, offering numerous advantages:

• Media monitoring is a crucial application of AI in PR. PR professionals can leverage AI technologies to rapidly assess vast amounts of news and social media content. This enables companies to swiftly identify trends, sentiments, and adapt their strategies accordingly.
  
• AI proves valuable in analyzing news stories and media messages. It aids PR specialists in comprehending how specific issues are portrayed in the media, as well as identifying the most popular subjects and perspectives among the target audience.
  
• Enhanced message personalization and targeting is another benefit of AI in PR. By employing data analysis and machine learning, PR professionals can gain a deeper understanding of their target audiences. This allows them to create customized messages and content tailored to the unique needs and interests of each audience segment.
  
• AI can even predict the success or failure of news stories, assisting PR experts in refining their strategies and ensuring effective campaign delivery to the intended audiences.
  
• Automating tasks such as press release production and influencer identification is made possible through AI. Consequently, PR specialists can allocate more time to strategically important activities.
  
• AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants provide real-time customer care, enabling PR specialists to promptly address inquiries and feedback from the general public. This helps maintain their reputation and responsiveness.

Overall, AI is revolutionizing the PR sector by facilitating a data-driven approach. PR professionals gain deeper insights into the thoughts and behaviors of their target audiences, enabling them to adapt their strategies accordingly. AI empowers PR practitioners to run more successful campaigns and achieve their goals more efficiently. Undoubtedly, as the digital landscape rapidly evolves, AI will continue to shape the PR industry by equipping experts with the necessary tools to stay ahead.

Influencer events can be an effective way for lifestyle brands to enhance their visibility and connect with their desired audience. These events can generate excitement, promote user-generated content, and establish positive relationships with influencers who can help promote the brand.

Here are some steps to consider when organizing an influencer event for your lifestyle brand:

• Identify your objectives: It is essential to identify your goals for the event, whether it is to boost sales, increase brand awareness, or create user-generated content. Knowing your objectives will assist in designing an event that aligns with your goals.

• Select appropriate influencers: Choosing the right influencers is critical to the success of your event. Look for influencers who are an excellent fit for your brand, who have a following that aligns with your target audience, and who are dependable and professional. Furthermore, it is of course a perfect opportunity to get to know the influencers personally. This way you will find out what their needs are. Remember that an influencer does not always need to have a lot of followers to have a lot of engagement. Influencers with a smaller reach are often also interesting because they have more engagement.

• Plan the event: Determine the type of event you want to host, such as a product launch or pop-up shop. Consider the venue, guest list, activities, and branding elements to create an experience that attendees will remember. In addition, it is best to build excitement with the audience several weeks in advance. This can be done through small sneak peaks, for example.

• Prepare goodie bags and giveaways: Offering exclusive goodie bags and giveaways can add an extra level of excitement to your event. Ensure that the items align with your brand values and are something that attendees will appreciate.

• Encourage social media sharing: Encourage attendees to share their experience on social media during the event. Create a unique hashtag for the event and consider running a social media contest to encourage attendees to share their posts.

• Follow up after the event: Don’t forget to thank attendees after the event and maintain relationships with the influencers you partnered with. You can also repurpose content from the event to promote your brand on social media.

An example of a successful influencer event is the brunch that ABCommunication organized to launch their new beach collection. The event provided influencers with a sneak peek of the new collection before it was available for purchase.

During the brunch, influencers were able to see and try on the new collection, as well as interact with the designers and other Victoria Benelux team members. This provided them with the opportunity to establish a personal relationship with the brand and the people behind it, which could result in a long-term partnership.

In addition, influencers received a goodie bag with various items upon leaving the event. This not only gave them a lasting memory of the occasion but also gave them the opportunity to showcase the great items they received on social media.

The event was also successful on social media, with influencers sharing photos and stories from the event with their followers, who praised Victoria Benelux’s new collection.

In conclusion, Victoria Benelux’s influencer event was an effective example of how lifestyle brands can utilize influencer events to promote their brand and products, as well as establish relationships with influencers. By involving influencers with the brand in this way, they can create valuable content that increases the brand’s reach and fosters greater engagement with the target audience.

8 tips to develop thought leadership

With thought leadership you can share your expertise in a certain domain with a broad target group and you can be contacted by the media as an expert. But just because you put that label on yourself doesn’t mean you are. Even a stream of social media messages or media appearances does not make you a valuable source of information in your industry. The goal is that you discuss questions and issues that concern your target audience.

1. Stay close to yourself 

Delineate very precisely the topics that you know everything about and list why this matters to others and why it would interest them. You determine stakeholder issues and questions, the target groups and tone of voice in advance. Try to formulate a substantive answer to specific questions and bring a new insight. Because everyone can have an opinion.

2. Determine what you want to achieve with it

This can be brand awareness, more social presence and reach, answering questions from the community, media attention, increasing website traffic, more leads, …

3. The good ones are asked for advice

Intrusively introducing yourself to the media to comment on current events in your sector is not going to work. Make sure your authentic content stands out to the right people or pitch in a targeted manner at a time when the media are looking for an expert.

4. Not too much

Leaving one content post or insight on your followers one after the other will reduce the appeal and engagement over time. E.g. max 1 post per week.

5. Act first, talk later

Before you can become a thought leader, you must already have proven success. For example in business development, only if you have already helped others achieve success in real life, you can do the same via thought leadership.

6. Have regular evidence and case studies

You must have a good reputation so that you inspire confidence. Come up with original research. Prove your expertise through years of experience, strong case studies, positive statements of others about you, a podcast, webinar, research that shows results that match your statements or good connections in your network. Setting up a joint webinar or event with other experts in a different but adjacent field is also a good option.

7. The right channels and places

Being present on the right social media, at debates, seminars, … is obvious, but applying it long-term consistently requires discipline, perseverance and good planning. 

8. Keep your followers up to date on what’s going on in your industry or niche.

You will ultimately be seen as a reliable source by stakeholders. Think carefully in advance about which activities you can sustain in the long term.

There are several elements that make a story newsworthy:

1. Scale: does it appeal to a wide audience or a limited number of people? How many people will it affect? 

2. Discussion: controversy with pros and cons is an ingredient for an interesting story

3. Proximity: people prefer to read stories from their neighbourhood or relevant to their environment

4. Timing: is it happening now or about to happen fairly soon? Everything else is old news or premature.

5. Topicality: a new and groundbreaking fact attracts attention, a scoop for sure. You can also make the story more newsworthy by linking it to a particular event.

6. Human interest: a personal story, situations that touch people or are close to their hearts: everyone wants to read

7. Tapping into trends: the media are interested in change, initiatives that determine the future or remarkable evolutions. You can use market research data here.

8. Famous people: If a prominent person says something about your organisation, or better how you help people or society with your mission, that is a plus. Same if you have a link with a major event.

9. New twists: if a lot is currently being written about a topic, there is an opportunity in adding your approach, figures or vision. If you add something extra valuable to a debate, there might be a new article in it.

10. Stranger things: a different or quirky angle could potentially make your story more newsworthy.

Check the news value of your story using our test tool:
https://lnkd.in/e9ESFgzQ

• Let it be known what you stand for

Companies are expected to show more of what they stand for. Their values and standards, their attitude to social trends and not just communicate about their products and services. This includes also more communication to media about a vision and broader category / sector PR.That way you can show expertise and leadership in broader background stories in the press. Social responsibility remains one of the biggest trends in PR this year.

• Faster PR messaging

Speed and agility become even more important. PR agencies must come up with pitches and ideas in real time and be able to execute immediately. After all, news is consumed by consumers here and now. The decision-making process at commissioning companies must therefore be accelerated.

• Podcasts

Where a medium used to have one podcast, they now have several per expertise. One for culture, multimedia, politics. Every journalist is looking for good content for their weekly podcast. Make specific plans for this.

• Continuity

Do not approach the media only when there is a big announcement but develop a content plan with specific value-added interesting content.

• Influencers

For each message, identify influencers with authority and an opinion. They are usually followed by specialist journalists who monitor them to see what is trending. If your product/service is named in this, you are more likely to be noticed by mainstream media.

• Relationships

Media and PR have changed since Covid, but what remains is journalists’ need for strong stories, interpretation, and a good connection with staff within companies. At key moments where there is a lot of news, we recommend organizing small physical touch points such as informal demos or roundtables. Trusting relationships are everything in PR and that’s how you get to know better what the journalist needs and how you can help them. Media predict that face-to face talks and small informal events like PR-workshops will make a comeback. Stop over-supplying online events only and webinars. It drives journalists crazy. Either the news is important enough, then organise an event and media will come or reach for other PR tools like pitching a 1-1 story, an interview, or a review.

• Organisation

Multi skilled project teams from PR, advertising, media buying, and social media will work more and more closely together on major campaigns.

From media side, journalists will share more articles within one media group and rely on supplied articles from freelancers or foreign media.

The arrival of Web3: in this future form of the Internet, users communicate with each other in a decentralized way. All interactions are conducted without the mediation of tech companies, banks, or other intermediaries. Media, companies, and consumers will interact more directly.

• Exclusive PR content

In 2023, media will look for exclusives. They want to deliver high quality and unique content to their paying subscribers, so PR people need to capitalise on this more by doing something extra for certain media or giving them a scoop. Sending embargoed press releases is starting to get out of the picture. Journalists need to be able to write here and now online, because readers expect this too. If they have to wait, your chance is gone.

• AI in PR

AI is everywhere and the PR industry will also explore what it can do in the profession in the coming years. The biggest advantage is that technology can help identify journalists and media that may be interested in certain stories. It can also find a pattern in which stories are picked up and which are not. Based on that, AI can then write press releases that meet those criteria. While we are not at this point yet, it is useful to think about how the PR profession will evaluate and how technology can play a role. Because even on the media side, articles in the distant future will increasingly be written by AI rather than journalists.

• Influencer marketing

IM continues its path in the trend of influencers with lower reach but who are more authentic and more engaging. Their role in the PR plan is changing from general awareness creation to more direct conversations with the community and conversion. It is better to get a lot of engagement and ultimately sales with a small influencer, than a lot of reach with a big influencer who has less impact on buying behaviour. We predict (hopefully) the end of mass influencers who are richly paid for reach but do not create engaging and inspirational content.

Op 9 november bracht Sony PlayStation de game God of War Ragnarök uit voor PlayStation 5. Om de release in de kijker te zetten, bedachten wij een mysterieuze Read The Runes Benelux PR-campagne, die spectaculair overging in een afsluitende apotheose in Antwerpen-Centraal

De Read The Runes-campagne van ABCommunication trapte af met 5 indrukwekkende runestenen die verstopt werden in België en Nederland. Meer bepaald in Brussel, Luik, Amsterdam, Rotterdam en Utrecht. Op de stenen was een raadsel in runegeschrift en een tekening gekerfd. Elke steen bevatte een unieke tekening die een wereld uit de Noordse mythologie uitbeeldde en een link had met de stad: Midgard, Niflheim, Helheim, Svartalfheim, Alfheim en Muspelheim. Aan de hand van schatkaarten konden fans op zoek gaan naar de runestenen, het raadsel oplossen en kans maken op een God of War Ragnarök Jotnar Edition. De actie werd aangekondigd door influencers, cosplayers en gaming media. Daarnaast werd er teaser info gecommuniceerd via de socials van Sony PlayStation. 

Als kers op de taart werd een week later een 6de steen bekendgemaakt die deel uitmaakte van de Travel The Realms-activatie op 14 november in Antwerpen-Centraal en de actie afsloot met een indrukwekkend hoogtepunt. De wereld Svartalfheim werd nagebouwd in de centrale hal en de liften en trappen werden bekleed in de branding van de game. Cosplayers waren de blikvangers van de dag en nodigden fans en voorbijgangers uit om verkleed als een gamepersonage te komen of zich ter plaatse te laten schminken in een gamekarakter. De Travel The Realms-activatie in Antwerpen paste in de internationale communicatiecampagne waarbij stations in wereldsteden omgetoverd werden in de Noordse werelden uit de game.

De campagne had als doel om de game toegankelijker te maken voor een mainstreampubliek door de passie van de hardcoregamers te verspreiden en om het boeiende vader-en zoon verhaal te vertellen van de hoofdpersonages Kratos en Atreus. Ook de community werd nauw betrokken bij de lancering. De activatie resulteerde in heel wat media-aandacht en een hype op social media rond de release van de game. 

Een testtool voor bedrijven om zelf de nieuwswaarde van een boodschap in te schatten

Bij persberichten en PR-acties draait alles om de nieuwswaarde. Journalisten storen zich dikwijls aan de stroom aan berichten van bedrijven met nieuws dat eigenlijk geen nieuws is. Het gebeuren is al voorbij, het is te lokaal, niet relevant of te commercieel. Langs organisatiezijde wordt de nieuwswaarde van een eigen product of dienst ook weleens overschat. Daarom is het goed om de beoordeling van een nieuwsbericht te objectiveren. De ROI van PR-inspanningen wordt ook steeds belangrijker, dus wil je vooraf kunnen inschatten wat de media-impact is.

Om corporate PR-managers te helpen, heeft PR-bureau ABCommunication een model ontwikkeld om de nieuwswaarde van een boodschap te scoren. De News Value Checker bepaalt het resultaat aan de hand van 15 cruciale criteria die de nieuwswaarde beïnvloeden. Denk bijvoorbeeld aan de timing, de nabijheid, de aanwezigheid van een bekende persoon, nieuwe en opvallende cijfers van een onderzoek en afwijkende gebeurtenissen. Dit maakt de PR van een organisatie in een mum van tijd veel efficiënter en zal de ROI snel verhogen. 

De ABC News Value Checker is hier te vinden. Beantwoord 15 vragen en ontdek onmiddellijk uw score.

Imagine you are doing a good job, but because of a scandal or society trend in your sector, the entire industry is swept up in a bath of bad publicity. Consider the energy sector, public outrage about expensive medication for a particular disease in pharma, or a hygiene problem in the food sector. So how can you stand out from the bad news?

1. Show that you are a credible and reliable expert, has already addressed the problem and the necessary measures in place.

2. Highlight your awards, recognitions, qualifications and case studies through your owned channels.

3. Invite a journalist to go behind the scenes to see firsthand the extensive processes of quality and safety in full transparency.

4. Create YT-videos with your expert employees explaining how you work.

5. Inform opinion leaders in the industry to debunk certain prejudices and falsehoods that are circulating through advocacy groups who may be able to send out a joint press release.

6. Get authentic testimonials on social media from consumers who have had a good experience and can validate your good work.

7. Inform trade press with opinion articles, press releases, or place advertorials on how you will tackle sector challenges for the future and what your long-term vision is. You can share media articles that come out of it on your social media and website.

8. Streamline your communications, marketing and sales to highlight what sets you apart from others.