That Solo Life: The Solo PR Pro Podcast

Breaking Up the Band – Becoming Solo Again

There are seasons in every solo PR pro’s career. If you’ve built a successful virtual or micro agency but you’re feeling burnt out and considering paring down your practice to a solo endeavor, this is an episode you don’t want to miss.

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:03):

Thank you for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with VoiceMatters, and my wonderful co-host, Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. Hi Karen. How you doing?

Karen Swim, APR (00:19):

I am grateful, Michelle, grateful to be here, grateful for a new year, all of the things. How are you?

Michelle Kane (00:26):

I think that is wonderful. I too am even though, yeah, I feel like so far my theme has been discombobulation, but I think that's because everyone's back and just trying to get things organized for the weeks to come. So out of the perceived chaos, clarity, just work in the list. It's all we can do.

Karen Swim, APR (00:50):

I think we're all feeling discombobulated. And that's a nice segue into our topic today.

Michelle Kane (00:59):

Yes, it is. Yes. Today we're going to talk about, we often talk about solos who set up their shops as virtual agencies and really micro agencies, but what if you'd just rather prefer either making that shift or you just like working as a straight up solo? We haven't talked about that too much lately, and I think that's a lot of, that's where many of us sit. I know that's where I sit. I'll pull people onto a team, but I gratefully both consciously and just the way I have designed my business, I don't have people at the ready depending on my plate of work for theirs. It's just they're fellow solos I guess I would say. And we just try to work together.

Karen Swim, APR (01:55):

And so there are seasons in every solo's career. I think sometimes we forget that. We forget that just as in a corporate career, our careers will not always look the same year after year after year. There's nothing wrong with running a small agency. I do the same thing. However, I've had periods where it's less stressful to just do the work and to be on your own and as you said, to tap into help when you need help with something or to have somebody like an administrative person that can help with reports and help with some of the administrative tasks. And so I think that this topic arose because last year, so many solos and people, period, just professionals, people that were working were not happy in their jobs. And I want to speak to those people who have built that agency, have a team of people, but you are feeling the weight of it and you are burned out. You're not sure if you even want to continue this job. Here is another option if you're not quite ready to pivot out of PR and do something completely different.

Michelle Kane (03:24):

Right, right. I think in many cases, working as a pure solo gives you a little more fluidity.

Karen Swim, APR (03:32):

It does

Michelle Kane (03:33):

The direction that you can take your work.

Karen Swim, APR (03:37):

It definitely does. I feel like when it's just you and I've had those periods, it can be beautiful because in a weird way, you feel like you have more control over your time because you can do things exactly when you want them exactly the way that you want to. And so there's a freedom that comes with it being just you, just you and the work. I will also say for me personally, in those periods when it's just been me, it's allowed me to once again touch and feel all of the work and reconnecting with that, even if it doesn't all go as planned initially, as you streamline down to just yourself, there is something satisfying about that. And it allows you to spot things that you can improve. Because when you take your hands off of the day-to-Day and the tactical, and you step into that role of leader full on, you do, and you have to become disconnected from the day-to-Day work out of necessity because your role changes. So going back to that can not only be fulfilling, but it can be a great thing for your business.

Michelle Kane (04:54):

Yeah, that's so true. And I think too, it really helps you sharpen your tools because it's just you. And I know when I say that, your listeners might be thinking, oh, stop saying that. It's so scary. But honestly, it allows you to do certain types of work, types of work where, I mean, here's the deal right now I've got a plate where I'm in charge and there are some things where I am not in charge. And it's a nice mix I have to say. It gives that part of your brain of rest and it does allow you to get in, do the work, experience it in the midst of the new AI tools and everything, and it just keeps you in the game a little bit. And I think in a way it's kind of wise because it keeps you prepared no matter which way you decide to go.

If you decide to ramp up and build out your business again, to have an active team that's with you all the time, great, it makes you that much better for it. But if you just want to pare down, if you decide to say, you know what? I've had it. I just want to write. That's all I want to do. I don't want to do strategy. I don't want to think about those things for a while. I just want to seek out writing projects. Okay, totally do that because you know what I would think in many cases, you're going to at the very least brush up against fellow professionals and you're still going to get to glean things from them. You're still going to have some level of interaction. So it's not like you're holding up somewhere and just hiding. You're not. You're just doing your work in a different way. And if that feels better for you in this moment, I say go for it.

Karen Swim, APR (06:44):

100% agree. I would also say that when you pare down and you decide to go as a solo, I think one of the scarier things for people doing that is that they're worried about their income levels. So here's where you have to be strategic with your own business. Sometimes we're strategic with our client work, but we forget to be strategic with our business. Sit down and do a little bit of math. When you have a team of people and you're paying people and you're paying higher taxes and you're doing this and you're adding up your time, what is your true income to yourself? To yourself, not revenue for the business, but to yourself. So those big numbers can be deceiving. Now sit down and think about if I had a couple of accounts that were small accounts, 10,000 a month say, and I had fewer accounts and it was just me, how much is my income?

You might surprise yourself in discovering that you know what if you hair down to what you can really handle on your own? And remember, you can also add other income streams because you can have multiple income streams working that produce a little here, a little there. With your main business being your client accounts, you could make more and maybe relieve yourself of some stress. I saw a story on social media this week, and it was from a woman founder who had handed over the reins of her company to a different leader after seven years. And she described the final meeting where she was handing over the reins via Zoom. And by her own words, she said she cried through the entire meeting, but she didn't cry because she was sad. She didn't cry because she felt she had fell. She cried because she felt the weight lifting from her shoulders of carrying the people, carrying the organization, carrying the cause.

Some of you right now are feeling that burden and we don't often talk the other side of running an agency, particularly in these tumultuous times that we have lived through that responsibility for other people's income. The responsibility for setting the tone and keeping everyone upbeat and enthusiastic, the responsibility for overseeing all of the work. Leadership has such great joys. I enjoy it. But it also comes with responsibilities. Let's be honest about that. And sometimes we need a break from it. We need a break from that. We need to step back and recharge ourselves. And I don't want anyone to feel that you failed. If that's your decision today, it's not a failure, it's just another step in your journey. And I want to encourage you to be brave enough to take that step if that's what you need to do. And as I said, it can be so freeing.

It can feel so good to just let it be about you and the work, there's a weird peace that comes. It's just like a peaceful way to work. It's like it's just you and it's like, I'm going to work a couple hours and then I'm going to go walk my dog or do a little laundry, or I'm going to cook myself a really nice lunch and sit down and actually enjoy it. I mean, whatever moves you because you can structure your workday the way that you want because for once, you're only in charge of yourself. And if you haven't experienced this in a long time, I'm telling you, it can be really beautiful. Now, if you're humming along and you are happy leading a team and doing the things, then this is of course not for you. Tuck it away for the day that may come in your future where it will be for you.

Michelle Kane (10:40):

Yeah, I agree. And I think sometimes we put too much pressure on ourselves. I know that's a shock, but not just in this profession because I have friends and colleagues in other professions that feel like, oh no, I should have a buzzing office, or I should have a lot of people working in my business. And I ask them the question, well, what do you like to do? If you were able to make enough money to support yourself either way, would you rather be managing people and cultivating people or would you rather be doing the work that brings you joy? And there's no wrong answer there. That's the beauty of it. There really is no wrong answer. But if you're definitely, you're seeking a little peace and a little just ability to not be in charge all the time, then it could be time to just be a pure solo for a while. That's okay. It doesn't mean you're not going to pick up work that involves a team along the way. No, I think that's what comes down to it, right? The way we run our businesses is because we want to structure them in the way that best suits us at any given time.

Karen Swim, APR (11:52):

I love that you said a mouthful, and you're right. And I feel that we're in this time where we are, the past couple of years, all of us collectively, the collective we of human beings that work have really began to take a deep look at how we work, why we work, what really brings us satisfaction and fulfillment in our careers. And so we've pushed back against some of those old narratives that were pushed on us. Thank God. We've seen death to the hustle culture. We've seen grinding go out of fashion. I never liked that. I don't think that. Why are we grinding as human beings, grinding ourselves down to a stump? And that's really what we did. And really we've reclaimed our desire and our hunger for having more in our life than just work and striking a different balance. So I feel like in this season, it is a good time for us to consider why we're building and scaling in that way.

Is it because we were on that train of build, build, build, and I got to have more and more and more because sometimes less truly is more and less can give you the freedom to explore some avenues of your business that you might be missing now that you really enjoy. And I will say that the older I get, the more this message resonates with me, that life is truly too short to not be fulfilled in your work, to wake up every day dreading what you do and to carrying around burdens and weights that you don't have to. So if you need to free yourself, free yourself, and guess what? There's so many clients out there that actually want to work with a solo, especially in these times. They want you, so don't be afraid to do it.

Michelle Kane (13:56):

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And I think that's what we've been speaking to as well. Life changes whether you're raising a family. And so as your children get older and age out and maybe you just want to work differently, and that's totally okay. And I think yes, the business landscape is speaking to that. Companies don't, even if you say, oh, it's a micro agency, or it's a small agency that may still, who knows some people that may still scare them away. But if you just say, no, I'm your comms pro, I'm your marketing department, you don't have one, now you do. It's me. And I think you can still have a very fulfilling, fulfilling career. And I encourage everyone just sit back and take stock. I think it's so easy for all of us to just steam ahead, okay, this is what I do.

This is what I do this month. This is what I do this time of year. And just take a minute and think, check in with yourself. Alright, how does this feel? Does this still feel good to me? Am I still doing this out of necessity or am I doing it because I want to? So there's all of our challenges. I'm talking to me too. Well, we hope you've gotten something out of our time together today. If you do, please do share this episode around. We would so appreciate that. Pop in a review here and there, and always be on the lookout. Sign up for news@celloprpro.com because as we announced last week, the doors will soon be opening for membership. So until next time, thanks for listening to That Solo Life.

 

Let the Good Times Roll…And Roll

Did you start the new year determined to keep a calm and purposeful pace? How’s that going so far? In this episode, Karen and Michelle talk about how it is – really, it is – possible to be as productive as ever and stay off the hamster wheel.

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:03):

Thank you for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves. People like me, Michelle Kane with VoiceMatters, and my wonderful co-host, Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. I don't know, maybe I'm working on a theme song for you.

Karen Swim, APR (00:25):

I love a good theme song. I think we should all have a theme song.

Michelle Kane (00:30):

My friends and I used to joke about that. What would be your walkup song? Of course, I don't have a good idea at the moment, but

Karen Swim, APR (00:36):

Yeah, when you're a speaker, you have those songs. I have songs that get me going, and sometimes I have a few that I have on rotation like, okay, I need my song. It's mine. But I mean personalized custom theme song. I think we should all have one.

Michelle Kane (00:53):

Yeah, absolutely. All right, well, that's something for all of us to think about and hit us up at soloprpro.com if you have some of them ready. But that kind of aligns with our topic today, since we are likely around mid-January by now, and the newness of the year might be the luster might be falling off and fading. So we want to talk about all the ways that we can keep ourselves motivated and keep ourselves shiny and just ready for this year, ready to make it as best a year as we can. And if that's a walkup song, awesome.

Karen Swim, APR (01:37):

I love it.

We all know what happens in January, bright shiny new year and we're ready for it, blank slate. And we're all full of, we're coming off that holidays where we celebrate it, although this year we're exhausted, but January's a good month. It's fresh, and we have these resolutions or these goals that we set collectively not just as solos, and then somewhere around mid-month, a lot of stuff starts to fall away because reality hits. Yet you come back to an inbox that's overflowing and your clients want stuff and the dog threw up and the kids got kicked out of school. There's projects due. There's too many athletic events. Your mother-in-law's is being a pain, whatever it is, life intervenes and suddenly those goals you miss a day, then another day, then another day, and then it's just a memory.

Michelle Kane (02:41):

Right. Then you're back on the hamster wheel.

Karen Swim, APR (02:44):

Yeah, you're on the hamster wheel. So what today we want to just talk about some of the ways that we can keep that positive momentum that comes in January going through the rest of the year.

Michelle Kane (02:59):

Yeah. I think one way that I'm really trying to be conscious of is to just take a pause when you sense that steamroll mentality or when that steamroll activity is about to set off and it does help, I think for nothing else, the primary point of I do have the power to take even 30 seconds and say, okay, what's next? And I think if you allow yourself those moments, even if it's just once a day, I think you'll see that your sticktoitiveness is definitely helpful. Yeah. Let's face it, by the time this time of year hits, we've blown through all the Christmas chocolates, so our sugar cravings are kicking in and we're like, what do you mean? I only have rice cakes and maybe you've finally taken down the holiday lights, which I am always sad about. I'm thinking leave them up through February. Winter is bleak enough. But I think just taking whatever time you need to reset yourself as often as you need to, I think is one helpful way.

Karen Swim, APR (04:23):

I also think getting in the habit of gratitude, so we know that gratitude journals or writing something you're thankful for on a piece of paper, putting it in a jar, so now you have a jar that you're collecting that you just pull out. But something that I've gone back to doing this year that I had gotten away from is at the end of every week, I just take a couple minutes and I already have a physical planner and I already have little blocks set up. I write down what went well this week and then what I need to improve. So if I am working on a goal and I didn't hit the goal every day, that's okay. What can I do to make sure that next week I'm getting better at it? And I always keep this mantra that has stayed with me for years progress, not perfection.

I think sometimes when we set out, we think that we have to be perfect at things, and then when we become imperfect, we let it go. I don't do that. I just look at, hey, this is my baseline and you're not going to start out something and be perfect. That's what the whole goal is about, and the whole journey is about, it's learning to get better at it. And so taking that time every week to just be honest about, okay, what could I have improved this week? And then write that down so that next week I have a plan to handle those little stumbles. And then what went well? What were the wins? Because what I find is that if you don't write it down where you can look at it, you forget about all the things that went really well because something goes well, and then 10 million things come at you and you forget and you're running to the next thing and you're doing the next thing, and it's like you forget, Hey, my client sent me this really nice email that said how great I was. Or Wow, this campaign went off flawlessly or, wow, this media hit that I've been chasing finally came through. We forget. And when you write it down, you have this nice little record from week to week. And I think that that keeps your positive energy going when you reflect on that routinely and you're not sucked into of it all.

Michelle Kane (06:43):

Yeah, I mean, it definitely gives you reminders of what you have accomplished. Not that accomplishment is the be all end all, but they're nice little pick me ups, little, little sunshine notes of, Hey, it's okay. And I think all too often we do not celebrate our successes enough. We don't celebrate our wins. And I think it probably has a lot to do with the fact that we're sitting at our desk by ourselves. I'm like, do I high five myself? I do. I might let out a little woo. But I think it is important to document those, and I think that's a great idea to keep track

Karen Swim, APR (07:21):

Yeah. I think also, I love what you just said about celebrating ourselves when you're working on a goal, they always have you build in a reward for yourself when you hit your goal, there's a reward, but I think that we should build in rewards for ourself, period. As so will PR pros, why not just reward that you're doing the work and that you are working towards something? It doesn't have to be fully formed for you to celebrate your progress and what you're learning along the way. And so treat yourself, maybe it's a once a month or a once a quarter thing that you do. Doesn't have to be something big, but write down a list of rewards that would really motivate you personally and build them into your year. Write them in your calendar when you're going to give yourself that reward and sit down right now and plan out the next three, six, or even the rest of the year with your rewards because that again, is a way to keep your energy levels high and to be positive.

Michelle Kane (08:28):

Yeah. I think too, especially coming off a holiday season where you may or may not have gotten the quality time off you thought you would, and I just mean that, hey, let's face it, it's buying gifts…it's so tough for some of us, it's cooking more, right? We're doing holiday meals and they are special things to us and we're glad we do it, but it may not have been actual time off. And a wise person once said to me that I should at least once a quarter have a three day weekend and have I done this? No, I have not. But this year I'm thinking, yeah, I probably need to do that. And when you plan for it, it's easier to actually have it. And I know this sounds so basic and probably borderline silly, but I have a feeling many of you are nodding your heads of like, yeah,

Karen Swim, APR (09:23):

Put it in your calendar. Last year I had marked off three days off the week after next, they were in my calendar. So guess what? Nothing got scheduled. It was already on my calendar. I made an appointment with myself to give myself three days off. And I don't know why I picked those days last year, but I'm glad that I have this practice of looking ahead and just looking at some days and blocking them off. Now, you also should block off time for, obviously you want to plan longer vacations for yourself or go away, but don't neglect to plan out those days where you're just off. And whatever you choose to do with those days, if you choose to go away for a weekend where you choose to stay home, whatever, just have the time off already planned for yourself. And don't give in to somebody saying, oh, well, can you meet on that day? No, I'm going to be off.

Michelle Kane (10:20):

Yeah, yeah. It's so easy to succumb to, oh, I can catch up on this or that. I mean, I have a friend who, she's had an ample break over the holiday and that's wonderful. And she's like, oh, I'm going to clean out my cupboards and we'd wipe this down. I'm like, wow, deep cleaning. That's awesome. I think, when would I ever time to do that? I'm like, oh, right, you have time off.

Karen Swim, APR (10:49):

You have time off. But there's something to be said for time off, really being time off too and a break and not doing any of those things that feel like work. Cleaning and organizing is my happy place, but I've also learned that there is something special about not doing those things and actually having a day off where you just are resting or reading a book or seeing a movie and not doing work-like things, things that are productive and adult

Michelle Kane (11:24):

Well, and isn't that the key? Right? Don't feel like you always have to be productive. Having a work ethic is a wonderful thing, but I think all too often we can use it as a bludgeon on ourselves of, well, I can't just sit here. I can't just sit here and stare at infomercials all day, even though sometimes that's what you need. You just need to disengage. But don't raise the bar so high all the time. It's okay to just not try and think of what would a perfect day look like if you could do whatever you wanted to do. And I'm not saying take the private jet that you don't have somewhere. I mean, realistically, what would you do? Would it be a novel thing to get your nail, go have a nail appointment at 2:00 PM on a Thursday? Probably do it. It's those little things that'll get you through.

Karen Swim, APR (12:22):

Yeah, but plan it. Write it down. I think that's the key to staying positive this year. And it doesn't mean that we're not going to have those days and have your go-to things that lift your mood. Maybe it's a playlist. Maybe it's a friend or a colleague. Maybe it's a particular book that always lifts your spirits, have your go-tos so that again, focus on remaining joyful and upbeat and positive this year because there's a lot of things around us out in the wild, in the natural environment that are trying to bring us down. And while we live in this world and we need to participate in it, you don't have to let it drain your mood. And so we want to make sure that you keep your energy level stable this year and that your enthusiasm for living your best life remains high all year long.

Michelle Kane (13:19):

Couldn't have said it any better myself, and doing this for yourself will only make you better at your business. Well, we thank you for listening. We thank you for taking this time with us, and until next time, thanks for listening to That Solo Life.

 

The Problems and Opportunities of 2024

The data indicates the U.S. economy closed 2023 in a much healthier state than anticipated. So why do so many feel the opposite? Will this perception continue into 2024 and what can each of us do to remain resilient?

 

Reference links:

Weekly Workforce Newsletter

Kyla Scanlon Instagram

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:17):

Thank you for joining us for That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with VoiceMatters, my ever-steady co-host, Karen Swim with Solo PR Pro. Hi Karen, how are you today?

Karen Swim, APR (00:32):

Hello, Michelle. I'm so excited. We are now. When our listeners hear this podcast, it will be 2024. So excited for a brand new year.

Michelle Kane (00:43):

Yeah, for real. It's really 2024 this time. Listeners. I know the last one that dropped on New Year's Day. We kind of did that before the whole new year thing happened, but we're here, we made it. We made it to January, 2024. And I know we spent a little time looking back last episode, but of course we're going to do the looking forward thing and just kind of taking stock really of what's been happening, what people have said is happening and is going to happen, and maybe do a little reality check against some of those things.

Karen Swim, APR (01:19):

I love it.

Michelle Kane (01:21):

Which is a good start. I know you looked up some great data just talking about how we spent a year, again, doom scrolling, being told a recession was on the horizon and oh, the sky is falling and hey, given the past few years we're kind of like, yeah, probably. Okay, why not? But according to reports, it's not exactly, it's not exactly been the case numbers, year-end numbers were far more cheerful than, well, at least as we in the public have been told to anticipate, if that makes sense. I know there's an economist on Instagram that I follow that, forgive me, I cannot remember your handle, but she brought up this amazing point about the actual economy versus the vibe economy and how that kind of predicates where we are.

Karen Swim, APR (02:18):

I love that because you know what? It doesn't matter what the numbers say, it matters how you feel, period. And I think we saw that in 2023, economically, it doesn't matter. That actual statistics now show that in many cases headcounts remain the same. It matters how you felt when layoffs were happening and how companies felt. Did they pull back and stop hiring because of the layoff news looming so large? Did PR pros perceive that there was less opportunity because there were cutbacks? So I think that's great that this economist calls out what's being recorded and then what the reality is, but most importantly, how people feel because the economy can be good, but if people don't feel confident, they're not going to spend period data be darned. We had so many people last year saying, we're going to have a recession, we're going to have a recession, and then we did not have a recession during the holidays. People spent more spending was up. And it's weird that that happened, but people felt either they were doing a little retail therapy or they thought this trash year is almost over and I'm going to buy gifts for everybody and celebrate because I deserve this. I mean, I don't know. But again, feelings do play into what really happens in the economy.

Michelle Kane (03:44):

Yeah, that's very true. And let's not discount that corporate greed still reigns. So some of our grocery prices are still a little bit up there, and that puts some of your restaurant prices up. And I know it has been, I've seen, at least in my region, it's been a very tough year end for some of those smaller entities and I totally get it and empathize with them. So here's my little shout out. Go to a locally owned place this week, just buy the coffee. Don't do as Susie Orman says, buy the coffee.

Karen Swim, APR (04:20):

100%. So one of the trends that we think that we're looking at for this year is that the economy, there's going to still be uncertainty, but for our PR pros, we say that uncertainty is where we thrive. I think that it's easy for us to allow this weight, and now experts are calling this in the workforce space. They're saying that we're now in the great gloom. People are just depressed about their jobs. I can confirm I was among those people last year as many of our audience members were too, where you just are like, Ugh, do I even want to do this or anything anymore? We were not very happy. However, I believe that all of this presents opportunities for us, but it's very important for us to first take care of our own mindset. We can't control everything that goes on in the environment and we never could, but we can impact the environment on behalf of clients.

So it's important for us to remember our value. Write it down. Have your value points somewhere where you can look at them frequently as well so that you remind to tell people, clients, potential clients, what it is that you offer. Let's remember that no matter how the world wants to just shove us into that media only niche that we offer far more. What can you do with internal communications? What can you do with all the new global opportunities? One of the trends that's happening is that there is still some remote work while people are still being called to the office, but there's some remote work. So that has spurred a trend of more diverse workforces and that diversity extends to global diversity because if you don't have to be in the office every day, then you can actually tap into talent from all parts of the world.

Well, many of our PR pros have global experience. Many of our PR pros have experience working with global teams and understand how to navigate things. That's a selling point for you. So I think look at the problems of the world and say, you know what? Problems really are an opportunity. Problems are how products get created. Products are how new innovations come about because somebody looks at that problem and goes, how can I solve that? And so I want our audience to do the same thing, look at these trends, look at the problems that we're having and say, how can I fix that? How can I be a small part of this solution? You don't have to fix the whole thing. We're not asking you to fix our US economy, although if you can please do, but there are parts of it that you truly can't impact.

Michelle Kane (07:13):

That's so true. A couple points that you said. I mean, it's never a problem, always an opportunity. And I first heard that take on it from the former manager of my favorite band in the world, Squeeze, when we had the good luck to be in their company and they were, I forget what the situation even was. And he said, oh, never a problem, always an opportunity. And that stuck with me. So I'd love that you bring that up. And really, what are PR pros other than problem solvers? That's what we are.

Karen Swim, APR (07:44):

We are,

Michelle Kane (07:45):

We're like a Sherpa. I mean, we've seen all kinds of businesses, we've seen so many different kinds of businesses. So we have all of that institutional knowledge as seasoned pros and we can offer counsel, no, are we attorneys slash MBA slash this, that, and the other one, not by degree, but by experience. You betcha. We bring a whole lot to the table as far as counsel. So I think it's so important. Like you say, oh my gosh, forget the vision boards. Remember your value and write it down and put it in front of you. I'd much rather stare at that than some picture of a beach somewhere that I maybe might forget to schedule.

Karen Swim, APR (08:30):

I feel like every PR pro should have that written and prominent and look at it daily because it's one of the things that I believe that we forget about ourselves and we take ourselves for granted. And if you're taking yourself for granted, it's going to impact who you target. It's going to impact your confidence going into sales meetings and it's going to affect your business. And so again, we're dealing with our own mind and how we think and how we show up in the world. And we've allowed other people in 2023, a lot of us to dim our light. Let's not do that in 2024. Let's go into the year. And when you look at these problems and you say, it's only a problem when I make it a problem, but you pick something that you're particularly passionate about, guess that's where your excitement comes back.

And when you're excited about something, think about how different your attitude is and how you work differently. We deserve to love our jobs again in 2024. I don't care that everybody else is in the great gloom. I'm not going to be gloomy. I'm not going to hate my job. I'm going to get rid of the things that I do not care for. I'm going to get rid of the types of people that I don't care to work with. I'm just going to keep saying no to the wrong types of clients. I'm not going to be driven by my bank account because I'm not driven by that anyway. I know that if I choose the right clients that allow me to do my best work, everything is going to work out. And I feel like we all deserve that. We should work with the people that energize us, that give us joy, that give us the types of work that make us happy. There's always going to be problem clients. There's always going to be times that work feels like work, but it shouldn't be drudgery day in day out. We don't have time for that.

Michelle Kane (10:22):

No, no. And I think, look, we're all realistic. Just because the calendar page turned to a different number of a year doesn't mean that everything is magic. However, coming off the holiday time when things might've slowed down, ha did not. But it was still a bit of a mental pause in many ways. And I know for myself as I'm doing my own reentry, whereas the last month or two, I would just hit it hard in the morning, okay, what do I have? We have to prove and not stopping to think, okay, why are you alarming yourself, Michelle, address this email and then move on. And yes, even take 15 minutes to just kind of check in with yourself and go, okay, what are my priorities today? We can slow ourselves down because rare is the time when something is 10 seconds from going to press or it's not. And I'm so guilty of that because you just want to keep going, keep going, keep going. Oh yeah, yeah, I got to think about that. Alright, okay, well one of these days and you end up being in the middle of that avalanche snowball going down the hill. And we don't want that. I don't want that for myself. So I'm trying very hard and I may still be in that reentry disillusionment bubble that it's possible, but darn it, I'm going to try.

Karen Swim, APR (11:50):

Another thing that's really been coming up is obviously AI and its continued role, and I can't say this enough, watch those trends, but be quick about making your own pivots and deepening your knowledge about the use of AI and thinking about different problems that AI uses are bringing up. Because again, where the problems are, there's opportunities for us as PR people. We're seeing that journalists are concerned when we look back at the challenges that they faced last year, I think it was a cision study, a big study on the journalist. One of the things was misinformation, but also accuracy of content. And AI plays into that. We're also seeing media companies suing AI companies for training on their content. So there's going to be a lot of battling, a lot of backlash, a lot of competitors springing up. And as always, we PR pros need to remember that a tool is a tool, is a tool.

Doesn't matter if it's the latest sexy technology. Where our value lies is in being strategic, understanding the appropriate use cases, watching out for ethical considerations, watching out for all of the nuances that AI models cannot handle, such as language around DEI and inclusivity. It's important. Those things are things that you as an expert in a professional can do. What about when you serve markets that are global, watching for those language nuances? AI can't necessarily do all of that. It can be a tool to help you with ideation and even with some content creation, but it still is going to require human oversight. There're more and more jobs calling for people in ai, AI script writers, people that are good at chat prompts. I find that with it being so new to the general public that many people are already stepping up and proclaiming themselves to be expert when it's very much an evolving field. But whatever I'm going to ask you.

Michelle Kane (14:03):

Yeah, right. We've seen it before. Social media gurus.

Karen Swim, APR (14:07):

Definitely. Definitely. So yeah.

Michelle Kane (14:11):

Yeah, I agree. I mean, we've long said it's a tool. It's here. There's no denying it. So rather than run away, it's best to be savvy about it, know about it, get good at it, get good at using it. You may just learn to like it a little bit, but just be aware of, yeah. I mean some of the shakeups it's going to be that are bound to happen. But I think most anything else, things do level off. It's just learning how to master yet another technology. And I think I found we tend, PR pros tend to be at the forefront of that. Honestly, we do. Because I've talked about it in some circles. I mean in some circles they think, oh, this will just do everything for me. I'm like, yeah, check the quality. I think you'll find that you'll be disappointed. And the others are like, what?

Karen Swim, APR (15:00):

Yeah. Well, in every profession there are those that will try to take the shortcut weight out. And those are not the true professionals and that's not our audience. I feel like our audience is the best of the best. The profession.

Michelle Kane (15:14):

You betcha.

Karen Swim, APR (15:15):

So one more stat that I want to say is I'm sure that you're all familiar with this longevity report. It's been 85 years studying this population of people. And one of the key predictors of long life and high quality of life are connections. And so personal plug, we know that these past few years have just been so different, but they're so much easier when you don't go it alone. So while you may be the founder, the CEO, the boss, while you might be a true solo or micro agency this year, please make this the year that you surround yourself with community because you do not have to do this journey on your own. It makes a huge difference when you can tap into your peer network with the highs, the lows, your questions, when you can be supportive to other people because that regenerates us as well.

The doors of Solo PR Pro will be opening back up probably next week. I was supposed to do in December, but I did not. I encourage you to watch on social media. If you subscribe to our newsletters, please watch our newsletters because I'll make the announcement. But join this community of talented people so that you don't give in to the great gloom that's consuming other people because it is more depressing when you are on your own. And just because you're a solo doesn't mean that you can't have community network and a virtual office of colleagues that will be supportive to you. And yes, this is a personal plug, which we don't do very often in this way. And I'm offering it up because I don't know that I would've lasted in this profession without this community myself. My personal testimony, this community has been life, life-giving to me. And it continues to be a place unlike many other places on the internet. It's a place where there's trust, where there's genuine love for one another and care for one another. And I just don't find that same mix everywhere else. And so I think that we're pretty special and would like you to take advantage of that as well this year.

Michelle Kane (17:46):

I concur. I can vouch for that. Solo PR Pro was the first organization that I found when I was starting my business that led me to believe, oh, I can do this because look at all these other smart, successful people who have been doing it. And every word you say is true. It is a place of trust, compassion, care, smarts. I mean, I only almost feels like every time I go in the group, I feel like I might be. It's as if you're walking down the hall of the office and you stop in the doorway of a colleague and say, Hey, got a minute. I'm facing this thing and I really don't know what to do. And instead of just one person's feedback, you'll have dozens coming at you and saying like, oh, me too. Or, well, yeah, this happened to me once. Here's what I did.

Or maybe try this. It's really an incredible place and I agree. I have not found or seen anything remotely similar to it. Not that other groups have their pros and cons. Of course they all do, but I've not seen something that even gets close to the value that it brings. So yeah, when the door's open, I can't say strongly enough to check it out. Well, on that note, we hope you've gotten something out of this today. We hope we've helped you to deserve, know that you deserve to have a year without gloom. We're going to kick out the gloom this year. Please share this episode around we would've really appreciate that. Shoot up some reviews about us. That would be kind of awesome. And until next time, yeah, and until next time, thanks for listening to That Solo Life.

 

 

The PR Forecast for 2024

This episode was inspired by a recent blog post on SoloPRPro.com – The PR Forecast for 2024. What can we expect in – and from – our industry? How can solos get the most out of our businesses this year and beyond? Let’s find out together.

Transcript

 

Michelle Kane (00:17):

Thank you for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, and my ever steady co-host, Karen Swim of the hive of PR, the fabulousness of Solo PR Pro, and I should say, Karen, officially Happy New Year.

Karen Swim, APR (00:40):

Yay. Yes. By the time this episode hits, it will be 2024. So hello and Happy New Year, Michelle.

Michelle Kane (00:48):

Can you believe it's, we made it out of 2023. Hopefully

Karen Swim, APR (00:56):

Got out by the seat of our pants

Michelle Kane (01:00):

New year. Let's hope it's not a new dumpster fire.

Karen Swim, APR (01:04):

Let us hope, because 2023 was just a year.

Michelle Kane (01:10):

It definitely had a lot of moments, but we're not going to look back. We're going to look ahead. We are going to address some of the things covered in a recent blog at soloprpro.com, and I encourage you all to head over there and read it. The PR Forecast for 2024, who would we be if we didn't kick off the year just taking a look at what we think is to come? And there were some excellent points that you made, Karen, as always one. Of course, the big thing, and we seem to be talking about this a lot, of course, because it has become a part of our PR lives, is AI. In fact, you say it's raining AI. Yeah. Okay. No, I won't sing it.

Karen Swim, APR (01:58):

It's true. And sometimes I feel like, oh my God, AI again. But the reason that we're talking about it is because it's evolving so quickly. It's being adopted in so many ways in the workplace. And here's the thing that I think PR people need to really watch for, is that there are errors along the way as we're all learning to use the technology. And so we see companies quickly adopting it and feeling like it can replace human beings. It can never do that. And we're seeing this shakeup of people wanting to use this technology and harness the good things that it can do, become more efficient, streamline as everybody's looking to save dollars. So it does create this tension where there's this shakeup towards the end of 2023, we really saw content people being affected by AI and losing work because writing is being done quicker and faster. The AI tool, however, we also see things that are coming out that are not good. We see agencies that are getting pushback from clients because they're using AI to write everything. So we can't lean on the tool too heavily still. I think that the big story in 2024 for us should be the story that we should be writing is AI is a wonderful tool when used ethically, responsibly, and as a tool, not as the replacement. This is not Megan. This is not body in the firm of

Michelle Kane (03:36):

Yeah, no, I completely agree. It is definitely just a tool, a wonderful tool,

Karen Swim, APR (03:42):

A wonderful tool.

Michelle Kane (03:43):

But the fears of replacement, those that use it that way, well do it at your own peril because it is not perfect. I don't care how good it's getting. It's never going to replace the human touch. It's never going to replace, and I'm saying it - never. Just the experience and the depth and the layers that a person can bring. Does it help us? Absolutely. Does it help unpack parts of our brain? Because honestly, I love to write, and yet sometimes depending what I'm writing as I'm loving it, it so it drains you, right? But having this little bit of a help is great, but only you know how to finesse a sentence. Only you know how to make it sing. I forget, I saw it was one of those Facebook posts that goes around, but talking about writing and having a cadence and a rhythm and how that's important to the way your brain receives it, and it's just not there. And I know we were joking off before we started recording, and I won't mention it or read it, but I saw a social media post last night that was so glaringly AI written thanks to the flowery prose that did not sound natural or even it was just bad. I thought, oh, tell me you had ai write your social media posts without telling me you had ai. Write your social media posts.

Karen Swim, APR (05:10):

And let's face it, AI is being integrated into almost every single tool that we're already using media databases to our signature stamps. The world has gone AI crazy. And you know what? In some channels, in some instances, AI completely 100% AI written content may be just fine. It may pass. It's not very good, and it's not very good because for the people who are utilizing AI in that way, because there's plenty of social media platforms that now have an AI component, and yes, they'll generate your posts and generate your visuals. Inherently, there's nothing wrong with that as a starting point or as an ideation point. But again, what happens is that AI should not treated like another member of your team. So you don't want to do away with your marketing team and replace it with AI or you're going to be in trouble. And the laziness, like all laziness in the work setting, you're only going to be able to ride that train for a little while. It's going to stop at some point because people, your audience deserves more and they're going to want better from you.

But the scary part for I think communications people is that you will have these companies, we saw it in 2023 in a way that I have not seen in a long time with a lot of people not believing in PR anymore. They just don't see the value. Big companies, you have groups of CMOs who no longer see the value. And so for those people, they think AI is fine. We will just AI our press releases. We'll AI the stuff, we'll do everything on our own. We'll have marketing handle it because we can draw a straight line and AI will take the place. So I feel like there'll be a little bit of tumult, but I do believe that there will be backlash to anyone who is misusing AI in this way pretty quickly.

Michelle Kane (07:18):

Definitely. Because the people who are receiving these messages, they don't want fake, they don't want glossy, they don't want stuff that's churned out whether they're realizing it or not. Eventually, there will be a backlash. And I mean, think of it this way, as a company, do you do anything without reviewing it first? Do you put anything out there without taking a look at it? Because for those that just rely solely on AI as anything but a tool within your processes, really. Okay, good luck with that.

Karen Swim, APR (07:59):

Yeah, for sure.

Michelle Kane (08:01):

We'll be here to help you pick up the pieces. But yeah, and that is another thing that you did mention in this blog about just the value of PR and how yeah, it really does matter. And like you say, PR has always had a PR problem, haven't we? We're so busy singing the praises of clients and doing client work that all too often we ignore ourselves and our industry and how important.

Karen Swim, APR (08:29):

And I think that we've allowed, unfortunately, everyone else to write our story. We're not the best as an industry at owning our narrative. And it's unfortunate because we get reduced to being media hits and you're only as good as your last media hit. There are PR people, as we all know, that don't even offer media relations services, and there are some that specialize in that. I'm not diminishing the value of media relations. However, the people that specialize in media relations are far from what the public believes they are. They are strategic, they are aligning with the organizational goals. They are providing counseling much more than just, Hey, they're pitching all day. That's all they do. That's not what they do at all. And I believe that a big part of the public really doesn't understand the depth of things that we do as practitioners and the value that we bring to an organization. Unfortunately, what that means is because they don't see the value. We did see a lot of cuts in 2023, but I would like to say that I do believe that particularly for solos and small agencies, don't allow the negative news, the layoffs, and the cuts to drive your 2024 strategy.

Michelle Kane (10:00):

Agree,

Karen Swim, APR (10:01):

There is opportunity in 2024. You have to be willing to innovate the way that you approach things. You have to be willing to take a step back and look as a whole and see the gaps that you can fill and understand. And we did a blog post on this too, what your secret sauce really is, and lean into that because I'm telling you that those who differentiate themselves, those who are willing to modernize their approach, you are going to win in 2024. If you are so busy trying to make yourself look like the traditional agency, you're going to get lost in the mix because there are a lot of companies that would prefer to work with agile, non-traditional agencies. And again, I'm not bashing the traditional agency model. I'm saying don't try to be like them. Stand out and be who you are and lean even further into that special ingredient that is really unique to you and market the heck out of it because there's a place for us. But you have to own that place. You have to step up. You have to be bold, you have to be willing to do your branding. You have to be willing to do your business development outreach. But there is business on the table. This is a huge opportunity for people like us, and I do not want you to miss it in 2024.

Michelle Kane (11:25):

I love what you said. Lean into your secret sauce. And it's so true because all of us as solos at the very outset, our clients are getting advisement from a senior professional. And you're just not getting that elsewhere. And again, again, right? Not to bash agencies, of course not. But if someone needs someone who can come in, assess the situation, get things rolling without having to wait a week for 60 different approvals with the processes, again, that's fine for some. But if there are clients out there who don't necessarily need all that, not that we're not careful, I am the most paranoid, uptight, careful person in the world. But you, you're getting, as Liam Neeson would say, a special set of skills when you go with a solo. And we haven't said this in a very long time, and I am talking to myself again, but yes, put yourself on your client roster this year for 2024. I know I need to get back on that horse. I have not mostly, and I'm sure it's to my detriment, it feels good. It feels comfortable and safe to just serve our clients.

Karen Swim, APR (12:37):

Yes.

Michelle Kane (12:38):

But it's important that we put ourselves out there. We have to poke our heads up and go, “Hey, here I am. This is what I can do for you. This is how I can help you.” And I think getting back to what we were saying about what you were saying about the value of PR, everything we do, everything a company does, everything a brand does tells a story about itself, and PR professionals are the ultimate storytellers. We are the ones who can even look at a customer service interaction and help advise. We can advise on so many levels. Our consultancy is not merely, let's get you in the paper. It is. Okay, so the way that that transaction was handled, that's telling this kind of story. If we make these small changes, it's going to tell a different kind of story, and you're going to walk away with a heavier customer. This is how we affect the bottom line. And again, no, is it widget based? Not always. And that makes it difficult to prove your worth. But we do bring so much to the table at a senior advisory level and as solos, that's what we're bringing.

Karen Swim, APR (13:46):

I also want to speak to a troubling trend that I'm seeing, and that's fewer people accepting less than your market value. My desire is for everyone to have the practice that you want. And so I am not going to be that person that says, if you are not making millions, you're a failure. You are not because you have your own set of income levels and your own goals, but I want you to have what you want to have, not what I want you to have, but what you should have and what you desire. And I want you to have the lifestyle that you want. So we all know that all of us we're experienced, and if we were working in corporate America, we might be making $500-650,000, a million dollars a year, getting bonuses. But that would also come with another price tag. It would mean less flexibility.

It would mean that if you have kids that you couldn't always be home for dinner, that you would miss out on key moments. It mean that you couldn't take off and take three day weekend. So that price comes with another price. So consider all of that, because I know that 2023 was really hard on our industry and hard on us as individuals. We saw lots of talk and lots of attention paid to the mental health of solo PR pros or PR pros in general because PR is very stressful. And many solos really came to a moment of wondering if they wanted to even continue as a solo or if they wanted to go back into corporate America. Sometimes I think that we do look at salaries and benefits and paid vacations, and there are times in all of our careers, and it can happen multiple times where you're like, yeah, that looks pretty good compared to what I'm doing now to work where I want.

But in 2024, I really want you to be really strategic about the services you offer, how you package them, and the price points that you offer. And again, I'm not telling you to aim for a specific number because that's so tailored and so individual, but what I will say to you is, if you're somebody that's looking and saying that, Hey, the salary over here looks really good, I want you to make sure that you do the math that you should be doing, and look at what does that salary really mean? What is it taking to get there? How many hours are they putting in? And make a comparison that actually equates to what you're doing as a solo. And if that number is your goal, I promise you, you can get that number as a solo, whatever that number is, yes, you can get it as a solo.

And if that's your goal, then I want you to be more strategic in achieving your own goals because number one, you don't have to go it alone. I think all solos know that, that we can team up, that we can join forces. You can join forces as a true partnership, or you can join forces as just a consortium of solos. Working together on specific projects can offer a whole different set of services. I love the way that our solos are getting smarter about productizing things and realizing that, Hey, I can have my own little side hustle within my practice by packaging this up and offering this separately. We can all do that. I love that. Yeah. Strategy needs to reign at the top of our list for our own business. We are strategic for our clients. But now I need you in 2024 to make the trend that you're strategic for yourself and how you approach your business and how you offer your services and how you price your services. There is no reason that you should feel like you are struggling in the ghetto of the PR industry while your peers in corporate are thriving in middle and upper middle class status. That line does not have to be drawn. It's up to you. So I want you to be happy, and I want you to be successful because you have what you need that is going to make you feel satisfied.

Michelle Kane (18:07):

Absolutely. Well, with that, you've inspired me. Darn. I'm ready to go. Let's go until we stop recording and my to-do list takes over. But yeah, you know what? Let's promise ourselves, this is a promise that we can make to ourselves as PR pros. And why not start right now with this year? Well, we hope that this has been valuable to you. We hope this is giving you a juicy start to 2024. We will put the link to this particular blog in the show notes, and if you hey, inspire others, share this around, we would love that. And until next time, thank you for listening to That Solo Life.

 

Navigating the PR Pro/Journalist Relationship: Finding Grace in Communication

PR pros and journalists share a lot of common ground, including stress levels. Sometimes communication breaks down. Sometimes, whether it’s beyond our control or not, we can’t give the other what they want or need. But what we can do is continue to do our best to work together.

Let us know what you think of today’s episode at soloprpro.com.

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:02):

Thank you for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with VoiceMatters and my wonderful co-host, Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. Hi Karen, how are you today?

Karen Swim, APR (00:19):

Hi. I am doing so great, Michelle. How are you?

Michelle Kane (00:22):

I'm doing well. Not bad. For a Monday. Monday, Monday. Isn't that how it goes in the wrestling ring or I think dirt track races. Anyway. Yeah, not bad for a Monday. We're in the midst of the holiday season, but we thought we talked today about something kind of, well, it's kind of funny, we saw, but it also is all too real in our world. A little bit of a PR/Journo SmackDown

Karen Swim, APR (00:48):

And the smacks went both ways. Yes,

Michelle Kane (00:51):

Would you say about me?

Karen Swim, APR (00:54):

But

Michelle Kane (00:55):

Yeah, it happens. It happens. We all get frustrated with each other and wonder why we do the things we do the way we do them.

Karen Swim, APR (01:07):

That's so true. But my favorite smack downs always come with a caveat from a journalist that said that they used to be in PR and as justifies or that they know all, and maybe it was 20 years ago, and we all know that the world has changed dramatically since that time. So that would be like any of us pulling out an old job and going, yeah, I did that job, but did you do it this year?

Michelle Kane (01:38):

This year especially.

Karen Swim, APR (01:40):

This year especially. I'm just asking for a friend because there are, and I think that goes both ways. There are plenty of PR people that started on the journalism side, and if they did that 15 years ago, the world is vastly different for our journalist friends as well. So it is funny, but that they add that in as though like, well, I know, and that somehow gives me the authority to be completely icky to you and criticize your entire profession based on the actions of one person who may be new to the job untrained or completely stressed out and about to jump over a cliff and probably has the mental health hotline on hold as they're trying to hold it all together long enough to get to the end of the seer,

Michelle Kane (02:30):

Right? Because a lot of the times the issue is, oh, you reach out to us, you don't get back to us. We don't hear from you. And all the while not really realizing, well, we're herding our own cats over here. Our clients are equally busy and stretched out. So sometimes it is difficult to get them when the opportunity arises because they're not fully cognizant of the notion that when the opportunity hits, they have to be ready and not just, of course they can be mentally prepared, but no, you have to be available now. And sometimes that just doesn't get conveyed.

Karen Swim, APR (03:12):

And so in this particular latest SmackDown, it happened in a private forum which was so much nicer than it happening on X or happening on one of the open social media platforms because that's usually where you see it. And I will say that while we joke about this because, and we can laugh about the things that are said as a professional, whether you're a journalist or a PR person, it is so demoralizing to go to your feed and see something that is belittling your entire profession. And I think that there's a few things happening. One is that we do have multi-generations in the workforce, and I think we all have to stop and think about that and that every generation does not work in the same way that another generation works. And I don't mean that. I'm not saying that one generation is superior, has a different or a better work ethic.

What I'm saying is that some of the things that we assumed early on in our career are not true for every generation. And so we either have to come to a place where, and I do feel some of this is on employers to get everybody aligned on the same page. You need to teach people. Do not make these assumptions. If you are running a PR team, then you need to set the expectation, here's how you follow up with journalists. Here's the information that you provide in emails. Here's when you use email, here's when you use Slack. Here's when you make text and phone numbers available so that your entire team is operating from the same playbook. Don't just send them out into the world and expect that everybody is going to do this job The same way we have a generation of digital natives. We have actually more than one generation now, digital natives.

They do not use the phone to make phone calls. They really do not making a phone call seems invasive, and so they don't do it. And by the way, it's not natural to them to provide a phone number in a signature when people just don't use phones like that anymore. They use email, they use text messaging. And so I think it's unfair when you say there's no phone number in your email signature because not everybody does that anymore. And to be honest, a lot of people have been warned against doing that because phone numbers aren't an identifier and there's so much fraud out there. We're all trying to protect as much of our information as possible. I get that there are workarounds, believe it or not, everyone knows about those workarounds and not everybody wants those rounds.

Michelle Kane (05:57):

Right? Right. And I think one of the key things that you honed in on there was establishing systems. If you have the systems in place, then everyone can at least be on the same page. So much as just from the thinking of, okay, all of us might have to step a direction outside of our usual comfort level or patterns for following the systems for press follow up or press contact. I think that's one way to work around it, but you're still not going to fulfill everyone's expectations just for you and your team. That's not for every single journalist out there journal. And there are particular proclivities.

Karen Swim, APR (06:37):

It's interesting that you brought that up because we all probably devour those how to pitch. One pitch does this, how to pitch, so-and-so it's X publication. Those are great. However, the way that one person likes to be pitched is not the way another person likes to be pitched. Sometimes you'll go on track and there are notes like, I only want to be pitched in the morning from nine to noon in my time zone. I will not answer you if I'm interested. You'll just have to wait.

I point out that as a PR professional, we are doing outreach to so many journalists. It is impossible to follow everybody's rules to the letter all the time. Sometimes you're just going to blow it sometimes with good reason. Sometimes you're needing to pitch a set of journalists on something that is time sensitive and you are trying to get your work done and serve your client. So you may send an email that comes at 1230 rather than by the new cutoff. God forbid. I personally try to adhere to all those rules, but I'm saying it's really unfair and unrealistic to burden PR people do the best. Always be respectful, make sure that you're pitching on target that it's relevant to that journalist. But outside of that, there are just some things that we may not get perfectly. Please do not burn us at the stake if we miss one of your particular rules.

If we use three sentences instead of two, or if our word count is five words over your maximum, please do not berate a poor PR person for that because they're not trying to be disrespectful. They're not trying to ruin your day. And I would say the same if journalists turn that around and you have to memorize all the rules for working with the PR people that you work with, you would go insane and you already have enough on your plate. We honestly are trying to make your jobs easier and we're also trying to get our jobs done. And by the way, sometimes the people that we work with and are working on behalf, they're not being the easiest. So give us a break.

Michelle Kane (09:05):

Yeah, I think what you hit on there is that, look, we're all doing our best and sometimes if someone's best doesn't measure up to your best, well give it some grace. Just count to five, scream, write the scathing post and delete it. But sure, are there absolute buffoons in any profession? Absolutely. What are you going to do? But don't always go from zero to you are the worst. I'm going to scream about it somewhere,

Karen Swim, APR (09:37):

And I mean this one particular rant was about a journalist and a PR pro that were working together and then one couldn't find the other. The communications weren't being answered. I want to tell you that that happens on a daily basis in media relations for every PR pro that I know, at least the solos. I don't know what's going on, but I can tell you every solo PR pro, 100% of us experience this routinely. Sometimes it's just because the journalist is just overwhelmed. It can't answer everybody when you're already establishing working together, because I promise you, every single time, even when there's a yes, even when there's interest, even when you're happy that we brought you information, even when you're in the middle of writing, sometimes you guys go away and we don't hear from you. Even when we've recorded something or done an interview and you tell us to do something and we come back immediately, we don't always hear from you right away and we get it.

Life is overwhelming right now for everyone. God forbid though, that the tables are turned and it's you who can't get in touch with a PR pro. Now I will say, I don't think that that's ever professional. I'm sorry if there's a problem, speak up. But here's the thing that I've noticed, people don't know how to communicate and they don't like to communicate bad news. They don't like to communicate. If you're a PR pro, we have a younger generation that just does not know how to speak up and say, Hey, I'm working really hard to get the response back from my client and they are not answering me. I'm so sorry. I know this is frustrating. They don't understand the value of protecting the relationship with the journalist. You're not throwing your client under the bus, but your tackle in how you're managing it, they just say nothing because they're just not comfortable with it.

I mean, have you ever gone into a store and watched how people don't even want to say hello because it's like this foreign thing now and it's sad to me. Of course, and I do think that if you're in PR that we need to do a better job of training our incoming PR people on soft skills as well as the heart skills. But Michelle, I love that you use the word grace. It's so appropriate. We just need to all give each other some grace and yes, it's frustrating. It makes everyone's job so frustrating, and we've all had those moments where you want to scream into a pillow or go throw axes after work because can I just get my job done?

Michelle Kane (12:17):

Yeah, no, it's so true. And what you said about communication is so important. It's like we're reluctant to give an update that maybe isn't ideal, but I always tell people, I would rather you tell me the same information two and three times, then not at all. Just hit me with it. I know how to hit the delete key if I don't want it to hear it again. It's really not that hard to do and it is true. So almost used to this passive means of communication that we just don't want to do it. It's like, oh, do I have to do that? It's like, yeah, just do it. We've all seen the different memes or the comics of that feeling when I did that task that took 10 seconds that I've been dreading for 10 weeks. Just do it.

Karen Swim, APR (13:07):

I mean, it's part of being in business and being a professional, and we really do need to get back to training people how to talk to one another and how to handle difficult conversations because I feel like this is becoming a loss art, and it's playing out not only in the workforce, it's playing out in families. How many parents are just not having hard conversations with their kids or teachers are dealing with parents when they tell them something that's not favorable in the nicest way possible. The parents are going off on the teachers. We are going to become a society where we just don't want to talk to anyone and we never address anything, and that's just not a good place to be. And so what we're not defending the actions of a PR person or a journalist who just drops out of communication with you unless they're sick or something else is going on.

And that's the other thing. You never know what people are dealing with in their personal lives. Sometimes people are working through illness, sometimes they are grieving and they just really are not themselves. Maybe they're dealing with pressures at work that just are overwhelming, and so we do have to take a step back. But even with those hard things, if you really are just not yourself, you don't have to disclose all of your personal information, but if it's about communicating and letting people know, at least like, Hey, I got your email. I'm so sorry. I have some things going on and I'm really behind. Here's where we are. Yeah,

Michelle Kane (14:46):

Exactly. Just to check in. Hey, I'm sorry if I've been unavailable to you. I really apologize. Apologize. Here's the latest status. That's it. It doesn't have to be a big deal, even if the other person's making it a big deal. You don't have to answer at that level. You don't have to meet them at the same volume or level of annoyance you can just sail on. That's the beauty of email. You don't have to just respond like that in the same tone,

Karen Swim, APR (15:14):

But please be available by a channel that you have set. Don't just ignore that channel.

Michelle Kane (15:21):

Exactly. Yeah. That's all we ask. Have some grace. Don't ignore it. It really won't hurt. Let's just keep each other updated. Let's help us do what we do because goodness knows there's enough going on around us to add to our stress, so we don't want to do that. But we hope you've gotten some value out of our time together today. If you do, please share it around. Please hit us up with your best stories at soloprpro.com. We would love to hear that. And until next time, thanks for listening to That Solo Life.

 

Holiday Hacks

In this episode, Karen and Michelle provide some holiday hacks – from navigating client gifts to reducing stress, let’s make the most of this holiday season.

Share your favorite holiday hack with us at soloprpro.com.

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:03):

Thank you for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with VoiceMatters, and my wonderful co-host, Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. How are you, Karen?

Karen Swim, APR (00:19):

Hi, Michelle. I'm doing really good. I am ready for the end of this year. Yes.

Michelle Kane (00:27):

And how by the time this hits, I'm sure we're going to be in full on scurry mode, getting everything done. And you may be thinking, how is this going to come together in the next week or so? And that is why we're going to bring you some holiday hacks today, or at least some giggles at the least, hopefully. Who knows?

Karen Swim, APR (00:51):

Yeah, for sure. For sure.

Michelle Kane (00:53):

We know how it is. It's like, oh, client gifts. What do I get them this year? Oh my goodness. Did I get, oh, there's a white elephant I have to do. Oh my goodness. Are we doing cards? I don't know. Are we doing cards? Who's buying stamps? What's happening? When is that store open? Especially post pandemic, those stores that you might be relying on having been open until 10 or 11 or goodness, even 9:00 PM What do you mean you're closing at 8:00 PM So let's just all take a moment, grab the nearest scented candle, take a nice inhale. Let's try and get through these last couple of weeks of the year together.

Karen Swim, APR (01:30):

Yeah, and I think, I don't know about anybody else, but I always, I overthink, so I overthink.

Michelle Kane (01:41):

I don't do that at all. Haha. All the time.

Karen Swim, APR (01:44):

So one of the holiday hacks is don't overthink it and stop doing the most. There are things that you can do that are still thoughtful without just going over the top. So for example, client gifts. There are sites like SugarWish and Snack Magic that you can just go online. You can buy the credits and they'll send a nice email link and to your clients and they can choose from treats, from all kinds of stuff, and they can pick out their own gift and have it shipped wherever they want. So if they're traveling over the holidays, they can have it shipped somewhere else. Perfect gift. All you need is an email address. So you don't have to go through all the stress of like, and if you have different client contacts, you can just go in and do the same amount of credit for each of the contacts and let them pick their own thing and call it a day. It's thoughtful, you're thinking of them. It's not. It's the thought that really counts. And I think we forget that. Or places like Pack for a Purpose. If you want to ship something to a bigger group, they have nice gift funnels in every single has a purpose. It supports some type of a nonprofit. So it's a definite feel good gift. So take the stress out of the holiday gift giving part by making it easier on yourself. Few clicks of the mouse and you're done.

Michelle Kane (03:15):

Exactly. So, so true. And if you're like me who has, well, they're not business contacts, but they're personal contacts who are out of the country. I like to try and shop local, but not a lot of businesses will have gift cards. You can just have a gift card emailed to the recipient and boom, there you go. Gift is given. For my locals, I like to try and shop local. There is a beautiful popcorn factory type place literally right up the street from me. So I usually go in with my little client list and I'm like boom, boom, boom. Everybody gets a can. And then of course I always make sure that the business card is on top. I don't want them to think they're getting that Walmart junk. You're getting real popcorn people.

Karen Swim, APR (04:08):

Yes. Well, and I love that you pick a place locally and just shop for all of your clients here again, we PR people sometimes are like, I'm going to customize each gift. And to admit in years past I've done that too. But it's stressful. You're adding the whole stress of this holiday season. Another hack is with your family, pick a day that's not the holidays. If you have lots of family and you traditionally maybe hop around a lot, don't do that. Just give yourself the time. This year, pick a day. I'm doing a sister brunch with my sisters and it's like 10 days before the holiday so that I see them. I'm probably not going to see them for Christmas and I don't feel bad about that. We're doing something separate. It's low key, it's a brunch, there's no gifts involved, there's nothing. But it's fun. It's holidays and we get to just spend time together. So we have to, especially these days because I don't think they feel so much harder.

Michelle Kane (05:12):

It really does. It really, really does. And I think another hack might be to let go of some of the things that you used to always do because you always did it. I know I used to be a fierce cookie baker and I still like to bake cookies, but I'm not going to make myself do it just to say, well, I usually do this, will I bake? A little bit? Probably. But it's like I don't want to, I'm over killing myself to say I holidayed in a certain way. And I think what you said is so important to give yourself that gift of time. And I'm not saying it's easy because sometimes when then I have that what I think is extra time, which is actually just plain old time, you get a little nervous. You think, oh, should I be doing something? What do I do with this? Sit your butt down and watch a Christmas movie. That's what you should do with this.

Karen Swim, APR (06:10):

It's a beautiful idea. And I mean even when it comes to client work, not saying coast, but we're saying focus on what's really important this year does. And this year especially, it feels like people have already checked out and we're at the very beginning of December. It's very, very quiet. So this is a good time for planning, a good time for strategy, a good time for going ahead and wrapping up those. If you do monthly type reports, start gathering all the information. I try to have my reports done weekly, even for a monthly so that when the last day comes in, I've already got the information all in place and I really just have to polish it and send it off. It does take a lot of the stress out. If you are responsible for content for clients, instead of writing new content, repurpose stuff, do roundups for their blogs, look at their LinkedIn newsletters and grab some stuff and do kind of a best of mix for the end of year because people are not paying that much attention anyway.

And sometimes we fall victim to our incredible work ethic and we just want to keep going, going, going, going. But it's a good time to just take it down a notch and not put the pressure on yourself to be Mr. Or Mrs. Perfect PR at the end of the year. It's okay. It really is. Okay. You can ease up on content, you can ease up on some of the activities with our clients. We set expectations around media relations. And it's not that we don't still have things to do, it's just that nobody's around and they're not answering stuff, they're over it. Right,

Michelle Kane (07:53):

Right. No, it's true. And I feel like that's, especially it's subtly I can't talk today, it's becoming a bit of the norm, I think. Yes. Are there some projects that are fast paced, full on, get it done? But I think for some of the more regular work that we might've been a little extra about in modern times, especially the last decade or so, I feel a little easing there, of, okay, yeah, we'll get it done. Alright, it's not on fire. It'll still happen. And I think too at the same time, because I know just attention spans of the people receiving our information, they can only take so much. So I think it all tends to balance out. So yeah, please do give yourself that time. This is the first year that I actually took purposely said, I am not going to officially work the Friday after Thanksgiving.

Now, did I end up doing a little work? Yes, I did. It was okay. It kept things moving, but it wasn't like, oh, here I go, I have to go sit at my desk. And I didn't want to. It was just, all right, let me handle that and then that'll take care of, so start now is a good time. Well actually when this airs, it's not a great time. Hopefully you've already planned it in when this is hitting your, hitting your ears. But if you're still struggling with whether or not you're going to take an extra day or so, please try to do it because if you don't do it now, when are you going to do it?

Karen Swim, APR (09:25):

And it's quiet, lean into the quiet. And on the client side, I know many of us do shut down the last two weeks or the last week of the year, and it only makes sense. And if you are feeling like there's some more client hours that you want to get in there, you can do things like go ahead and hold thought leadership calls, hold some quick thought leadership calls with your CEOs, your executives, and get content now and have it transcribed so that you have things ready to go in January when things restart. So you put the hours in this month, but it's not a heavy lift to just have those thought leadership questions done, do your agenda and have quick calls to get their thinking on things for next year. And now you're a step ahead for content and for trends and for ideas that you can be working on. But don't make things overly hard for yourself. Just try to find ways to do what you need to do. Do it well. But don't forget to enjoy this time of the year because it's one of those rare times in the year and we have Hanukkah, we have Christmas, we have New Year's celebrations. People really are taking off. And it would be a team to put pressure on yourself during a time when you legitimately can just take a breath because everyone is taking a breath.

Michelle Kane (10:51):

And like you said earlier, we are overthinkers, we are people who, it's in our nature. We want to dazzle. And I don't mean in a vapid way, we we're always striving to do the best work possible. And it's okay if you just again, just kind of relax a little bit and really, I don't think we can say this enough in this and maybe we're talking to ourselves, take that time to enjoy. And I can even feel it in my body right now as I'm saying it. It's going to feel uncomfortable. It's kind of like when I go to those every once in a while, my yoga studio will have a two hour, a special class where you really are deep relaxation and I am horrible at it. Okay, we're going to stay here in this pose for four minutes. And I'm like, okay, great. Halfway through. I'm like, are we done? Are we done now? Is this okay? Are we good? So don't be me,

Karen Swim, APR (12:01):

Don't be Michelle. No, enjoy the holidays. And on that note, we want to wish you all happy holidays. Whatever you celebrate during this time of year, we hope that it really is a joyous time. And for those of you who may be struggling during this time of year, we have you in our hearts and our thoughts and hope that you are surrounded by supportive people. And we just ask wherever you are, whatever you're celebrating, whatever you are going through, good or bad, just know that you're not alone. And we are sending our audience lots of love.

Michelle Kane (12:39):

Yes, indeed, we are. And to our friends who have celebrated Hanukkah by the time this comes around, we hope it was a really joyous occasion. We know this year hits a little different for many reasons, and we hold you in our hearts as well. But we hope just as we all move forward toward a brand new year, which I'm so excited for, we just want you to all be well and we care about you. And thanks for listening to us. We hope you get something out of hearing us jabber every week about the business that we so love. And until next time, thanks for listening to That Solo Life.

 

Everyone is Amazing! Does Your PR Biz Need Personal Branding?

You make sure your clients are developing and working on their personal and corporate brands but when it comes to you and your solo practice, well, do as we say, not as we do. Does this sound like you? In today’s episode we dig in on personal branding and its value.

Let us know what you think at soloprpro.com.

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:02):

Thank you for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with VoiceMatters and my ever steady co-host, Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. We're all the savvy smarties gather. Hi Karen, how are you?

Karen Swim, APR (00:23):

Hey, Michelle. I'm doing great. How are you doing?

Michelle Kane (00:26):

I’m doing well. Can't complain. Can't complain. Here we are. By the time this episode airs, we will be in December. Oh my gosh.

Karen Swim, APR (00:34):

Yeah, that's a little scary. It's that time of year. It is that time of year.

Michelle Kane (00:39):

Yes. All the dates kind of cascaded upon each other and oh my goodness. We all have just an extra layer of things on our minds as we're trying to wrap up work and make sure we don't miss any holidays. And there's always family members and people with birthdays in December too. I don't know how they allow that, but

Karen Swim, APR (01:00):

I know

Michelle Kane (01:01):

It's okay

Karen Swim, APR (01:02):

Not to mention the layers of extra clothing and extra tasks for those of us who live where it rudely snows. So yeah, there's all the things and it's all happening so fast, and I just want to make like a bear and hibernate.

Michelle Kane (01:21):

So while December is being all extra, we're going to talk a little bit about the extra of personal branding today. How's that for a segue way? It's important. I was just skimming an article from Forbes saying that yes, you needed to stand out, and I think it's the Gen Xer in me, or I don't know, the introvert, whatever. It's like, oh, do I have to? And the answer is, yeah, you kind of have to.

Karen Swim, APR (01:48):

Yeah, we've all, for many of us, we obviously we're in public relations, and so we believe in personal branding as well as corporate branding. We have probably helped many executive in our careers to ensure that their executive brand was as polished and as thorough as the corporate brand. And we build thought leadership programs to support and amplify that. But when it comes to us and looking at our colleagues and our peers, I know for me it's easy sometimes to become jaded when you've been doing this job for a long time. It's like the way that we feel about email marketing. We know that it works, we know the right way to do it, but we don't want to do it ourselves because we struggle with inboxes that are constantly overflowing because we have to, as per our job, we have to have a lot of information coming at us.

So sometimes when I look at personal brands, I do, I'm like, “Ugh, everybody's perfect. Everybody's smart, everybody's winning, and you feel a little exhausted.” So I guess what we want to look at today is looking past our own fatigue at what's really working in personal branding, and is it really effective anymore? It seems like everybody has a brand. I mean, 10 year olds have a brand, they're adhering to their own brand guidelines and everybody's got perfectly polished Instagram worthy photos, and everybody seems to have a platform and they've all got their stuff. And in a world where personal branding is super accessible in terms of the visual look and feel, and even with content these days, which used to be the differentiator, everyone has access to be able to create content that aligns with their personal brand, is it all worth it? How do we stand out? Do we want to stand out? Do we care?

Michelle Kane (04:03):

No, I know what you mean. And I think it's especially difficult for us because we work in branding people and places and things that we can see it a mile away. We can see it when it's so shiny. And not that there's anything wrong with that necessarily, but I almost feel like we are all craving, audiences are craving a lot more authenticity. And I know that buzzword’s been around for a while, but I mean real, keep it real, because we've all seen the templates and we all know sure have the photo shoot, that's great, but I feel like we're at poised on this next layer of personal branding of, no, I really want to know what you're about. I want to know what truly makes you different. Not just, oh, well, oh, she's lit really well. Oh, okay. Everything's saying all the right things. And I think the additional differentiator is going to be letting more of yourself show, if that makes sense. I want to know what makes you tick what you're about. If it's a situation where I'm looking to work with someone, show me the warts, I don't necessarily need to see the sheen.

Karen Swim, APR (05:30):

Yeah, I think we've always talked about this in public relations and in marketing. We've talked about transparency, and we understand that you're never fully transparent because that's not a smart move to make. But we've talked about authenticity a lot over the years, and I think I agree with you that being the personal branding today, in a lot of ways, it's missing personality. So it's shiny and it's bright and it's happy and it's beautiful and it's visually appealing, and the aesthetics are amazing, but sometimes a little grit, a little of you really does help to stand out because at the end of the day, we know that today more than ever, people want to connect with people. They connect with corporations often even because of the people side of it, because of how that company shows up in the world and what they stand for. And that doesn't always have to mean social values or political viewpoints.

It can sometimes mean a brand that's true to being funny and they bring humor, they're light or a brand that cares about issues. It can be issues driven, but that they're true to who they are, and that you see something that says, yeah, that's that brand. And we talk about Patagonia a lot. That's a great example. Even Apple's a great example of a tech company that's really true to who they are. They are who they are. They make no apologies for it. With the personal branding, sometimes it does feel like everybody's interchangeable. It's like, okay, you're great. You're smart, you're winning another award. Good for you. Yay. You. What a beautiful picture. And you, sometimes I want to know, I want to see the grit. I want to see behind that shine. I want to know, how did you really get there? I want to hear some of the reality, because we know that your story, what you're sharing, your expertise didn't come without some bumps along the road. And you don't have to bear awe, but it's nice when people are honest about what it really takes.

Michelle Kane (07:59):

Yeah, I can think of people that I follow on Instagram both professionally and just for fun, and yeah, they have their polished brand, but they'll also just pop on. They'll just shoot a quick video, whether it's sitting at their desk or in their car and just talk about something quickly and just be relatable. It's not like, oh, I have my ring. Like, oh, wait, oh, oh, oh. And they're like, okay, now they just say, Hey, you know what? This crossed my path today and I'm dealing with feeling like an imposter, and sometimes I feel like that, blah, blah, blah. And it's just these little moments of relatability. And I think, yes, thank you. Exactly. And that doesn't take away from the professional expertise that they offer, not one bit. So I think, and I'm not saying that that's a new thing, it's not, but I think that's a way to go a little deeper with your personal branding.

Karen Swim, APR (09:07):

And I think you hit on something that's really key. It's not really all the shiny aesthetics. That's great because I look at those and I'm learning because I do videos and I am a hot mess. I don't have it all together. I don't have all the tools and all the shiny stuff. So I'm an example of somebody that's like, if you want to see a hot mess, but I am who I am, and probably still to a degree going to be kind of a hot mess. It's not that. I think what you said as communicators, we really know this and we drive this into the companies that we work with. Far too often people hide behind their playbook, and executives do this all the time. It's corporate jargon and sometimes it feels like pulling teeth to just get them to communicate. Talk to me like I'm a human being.

So I think what you said is really key. It's focusing more on connecting with your audience in a real way, by using words that are relatable and understandable and not defaulting to your industry playbook, whatever industry you might be in. And being so concerned with sounding smart to your audience that you lose them because you're not relatable. That to me is one way to stand out and understanding the reality. And it's interesting. I feel like companies have really had to grasp this with the tension between work, from home, return to office. They finally figured out, look, we got multi-generations and the workforce. We have a diverse group of people that we're working with, with diverse opinions, with diverse preferences. We ain't going to satisfy everybody, so we got to just do what we got to do. And some people are going to be unhappy, and we just have to live with that. And I feel like more of us need to adopt that attitude, realizing we are never going to be able to satisfy all of the people all of the time, and that should never be our goal. So be yourself. It's funny because I even feel like sometimes that when we think we're sharing a bit of ourselves with people, that too just becomes so sanitized. It's like, oh, I am the yoga wearing meditating PR professional, and it's so pretty and perfect. So now you're just incorporated fitness influencer into your brand, and it's annoying. I don't look that good in my yoga pants. I'm sorry. No,

Michelle Kane (11:49):

No, no.

Karen Swim, APR (11:51):

Five minutes to meditate. So it just, it's not, but that's okay. That person probably is not for me, and I'm being a little facetious. I'm not attacking people. Please don't take that away. I really am being a little facetious. But the point is, we should be relatable. Just communicate down a notch. You're still winning. You're still beautiful, wonderful, smart and shiny, but just make sure that you talk to people in a way that's real. Be your true self as a communicator.

Michelle Kane (12:26):

Yeah. Well, and it's important what you said, because not everybody is going to be for everybody, and that's okay. And to your point about those that stick to their playbook and the jargon, and flip that around, because if that's all you're doing and it's like you have a really difficult time being relatable, that's almost going to make me question your credibility. Because if it feels like you're just being stilted all the time and reciting the right things, I'm thinking, gosh, is if I don't have any other evidence of it, or is this all just a bit of a show? So that's something to think about. Don't be afraid to be yourself. I'm not saying be Rodney Dangerfield and Caddy Shack, although there's people for that persona too.

Karen Swim, APR (13:23):

But I mean, it's funny that you could lose people even when you're being creative. I read this funny Buzzfeed article, it actually, it was kind of funny, but a Buzzfeed article that was asking people, what movie did you see? And you thought, what the heck did I just watch? So we all can name a movie that we watch. Movies are entertainment, therefore, your enjoyment, your pleasure. And sometimes the writers, the people behind the movie are so busy being clever and different that they lose you. And you do, you sit through the movie and you go, what was that?

Michelle Kane (14:08):

What just happened?

Karen Swim, APR (14:12):

I can't get that two hours of my life back. And so don't be that. Don't be the movie The Circle, which was horrid. I promise you. I sort of got what they were trying to say and do. But that was one of the recent movies in history where I was like, what did I just watch? Because that was pretty bad.

Michelle Kane (14:35):

Oh man. Yeah. I'm trying to think. Nothing's coming to mind super quickly. Of what?

Karen Swim, APR (14:42):

Yeah.

Michelle Kane (14:44):

Well, and it's harder when you can see it, right? You can see them trying so hard and it's almost painful, and you think, no, no. Yes.

Karen Swim, APR (14:54):

So even if you're funny comedian, you're entertaining. That's part of your personal brand. Make sure that you're not too clever for your audience or it won't land, right?

Michelle Kane (15:06):

Right. So what we're really saying is what, keep it as natural as you can be yourself. Don't be afraid to show parts of your personality and your branding. Honestly, at the end of it all, it's really a way to let people get to know you. And there's that know, like, and trust factor of people wanting those three items fulfilled to do business with you. So we hope this chat today has been helpful as we enter what some call the silly season. We hope you're keeping your wits about you, and if you did get value from this, please do share it around. We would really appreciate that. That would be the best gift you could give us this year. And until next time, thanks for listening to That Solo Life.

AI Shake-Ups, Solutions and Ethical Standards

In this episode we cover the turmoil at OpenAI, AI vetting PR pitches, and the newly-released Guidelines, Tips, and Best Practices for using AI from PRSA. Let us know what you think at soloprpro.com.

 

Transcript

Karen Swim (00:04):

Thank you for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with VoiceMatters and my wonderful co-host, Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. Hi, Karen, how are you?

Karen Swim, APR (00:20):

Hello, Michelle. I'm doing great. How are you doing?

Michelle Kane (00:24):

Doing well, doing well. We're coming on this episode after Thanksgiving, so we hope all of you had a really terrific holiday with your family and friends and got to relax a little bit and are easing your way into the return to the workplace.

 

Karen Swim, APR

Except this year, was it really Thanksgiving or was it just pre-Christmas? Because in my neighborhood, people skipped right to Christmas before Halloween was even over. So I am surrounded by lit up subdivisions and Christmas lights. Not that they set it all up because the weather was nice, which would be smart, but they actually just pulled the trigger some people in as well. The weather was good. They just go ahead and set up all the outside stuff and then turn it on for Thanksgiving. No, no, no, not this year. We have full on Christmas here in Michigan, and that was before Thanksgiving, long before Thanksgiving. So I'm thinking Thanksgiving is, it's really losing its way.

Michelle Kane (01:35):

Yeah, it is. I mean, thankfully we have parades in football to keep us in check, but it is strange because I consider myself a pretty flexible Gen Xer, but there are certain societal cues that I need and some that I miss. So you have to have, the stuffing has to digest before I pull out the red and the green and the yellow and the blue and all that stuff. Back in the day, the Jerry Lewis telethon final tote had to happen before I would set foot back in my school. None of that happens anymore. It's

Karen Swim, APR (02:09):

Anything happens anymore, and I'm feeling like Thanksgiving is, it's going to go the way of Pluto. It's going to get demoted,

Michelle Kane (02:17):

Although

Karen Swim, APR (02:17):

It's going to come to be known not as Thanksgiving, but as carb loading for Black Friday. I don't know.

Michelle Kane (02:24):

Yeah, yeah. Well, yeah, I think everything's faster. I mean, we've seen the online sales early Black Friday, but in a way that's good. I am seeing, I can't give you the list, but it's nice to see that some big box stores are having sanity, sanity has prevailed. They're either not opening on Thanksgiving or they're having relatively, I don't want to say decent, but their hours aren't too wild. But yeah, it's weird days. Weird days. Maybe it speaks to our general anxiety as a society. Let's just get it done.

Karen Swim, APR (03:01):

This could be, was the thought sparked by the great toilet paper raid of 2020? I don't know. Is that where it all started to turn?

Michelle Kane (03:10):

Hey, I don't know. I don't know but that would speak to my inner Girl Scout. Be prepared.

Karen Swim, APR (03:16):

This is true. So why not have Black Friday four weeks ahead of schedule so that the planners and the preppers could make sure that they got everything that they need on sale.

Michelle Kane (03:28):

That's right.

Karen Swim, APR (03:29):

Someone else, before it's all gone.

Michelle Kane (03:31):

I will say if you are still eating your tuna fish from 1999, please don’t.

Well, in the name of prepping, I don't know if this segue is terrible, but there's been some activity. I know this is shocking in the world of AI, artificial intelligence, especially as it touches upon our profession, by the time this hits your podcast queue, not sure where the situation with OpenAI is going to be because it seems to be every day there's something new happening. But recently, the board ousted the chair, and now some of the board, the employees are signing petitions to bring him back. And as someone pointed out on the news today, such an influential change-making organization in the hands of the number of people you can count on two hands, not a great thing.

Karen Swim, APR (04:40):

Well, it's interesting from so many perspectives, it is huge in the world of AI because when there's that type of a shakeup, so Sam Altman, the CEO was ousted, as you said by the board, but then some other key members, I guess left and then they appointed an interim, and then Microsoft hired Sam, but then there was a push to bring Sam back, and Sam I think was part of that push. And the whole thing is just weird.

For users of OpenAI. It does make you take a step back because first of all, when the CEO is ousted by the board, sometimes those are due to concerns that don't speak to the product or the quality, but it does make you pause and wonder if you can trust the product. When there's this level of turmoil at that level, it really does make you think about that. Is this really something that I should continue to use? Can I have faith in it? And AI is so, it's growing so fast and things are changing so quickly, and so it brings a level of hesitancy that I don't think that the company really needed, and who that heck knows where it's all going from here. It's been a day-to-day drama.

Michelle Kane (06:03):

Yeah, it really has. Well, for me, it seemed to come out of nowhere because I'm not exactly paying attention to that company 24/7, but I thought, wait, what? What? Yeah, and what will that mean for the future of AI? But we have also learned that PRSA has a little something to say about the future of AI, at least in our practice. They have released a document on the ethics of using AI in your writing within our industry of public relations, which is a nice thing to have.

Karen Swim, APR (06:39):

That is a great thing to have.

By the way, again, this could change again, but OpenAI named three interim CEOs in three days. So I'm feeling like if you have solely been relying on ChatGPT, you might want to just add some other tools to the mix because this is not giving stability vibes.

Michelle Kane (07:05):

No, no, it is not. But yeah, if you have been wondering or concerned about the ethical use of AI in your everyday practice or as a whole, we will put the link in our show notes. But please do head over to PRSA.org. It is a 10-page document and just lays out potential risks, ethical challenges. Like I said, we're going to put it in our show notes, but it really does lay out the ethical risks and best practices, which is what we all need, because let's face it, this tool is here to stay in so many ways. And as we've said many times on this podcast, it's best to get to know it, get good at it in an ethical manner, because it's really going to help you to not only stand out, but to be competitive as we move forward.

Karen Swim, APR (08:15):

And shout out to Michelle Egan, who is the 2023 PRSA chair, and Mark Dewar, who is the best man ever, I adore Mark and have had the pleasure of serving with Mark. They headed up this effort, and I know that the people behind this are so thoughtful, and it's cool that it doesn't look like you have to log into PRSA. So even if you are not a PRSA member, you should be able to grab this resource, which I think is a thing we do need to pay attention to. And a nice resource, thank you so much PRSA for providing that, for leaving the way as well as to other organizations who have really taken this seriously and outlined some guidelines for communication professionals.

Michelle Kane (09:12):

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And then there's the other blip on the radar of AI, which is pretty significant. I know, Karen, you had discovered there's some developments regarding AI in pitching stories.

Karen Swim, APR (09:30):

Yeah, apparently. So, AI, not human beings, may be reading your pitches, which is a little demoralizing considering how hard we all work to craft those personalized targeted pitches. And so media relations is really becoming very different these days. You even have resources that used to be great for aligning sources and reporters that are now not even being vetted and verified, and I'll go ahead and call them out. It's HARO specifically.

Michelle Kane (10:15):

So that's a thing.

Karen Swim, APR (10:15):

It really has kind of become, I've not really paid attention to HARO's in quite some time because they don't verify the sources. And you do see a lot of content shops and SEO specialists -  nothing wrong with SEO specialists. However, when you are working on behalf of clients, you're looking for something different. You're using HARO as a source to really support your thought leadership efforts. And so some of these publications are not always that, and so you're looking for more editorial. And so that's really, it's just an interesting and somewhat concerning use of AI when you don't have humanity involved in these decisions. But at the same time, I'm seeing a lot of journalists move over to the content side because let's face it, journalists are not really being paid the amount of money that they should for their talent. And I still, I don't know about you, but I still get so excited when I read a piece by a journalist in a publication that really allows them to exercise their craft.

And the writing is so sharp, and sometimes the things are so beautifully written and so deeply investigated and researched that it just still makes me excited. I am also sad that there's not more of that, that is no longer the norm, but it is really exciting when you have journalists at a publication who really get to do what they do best, which is right. Investigate, really present all sides of an issue. I love that. I love it. Whether it's about a societal problem or politics, I just really still enjoy good old fashioned, great writing, and I don't want to see that disappear.

Michelle Kane (12:02):

Right? And it's our loss as a society that is not valued. And I don't know, there's so many moving parts these days and people's lives, we just whizz along. And I don't think people, it's not to say they're ignoring it or that they're making a wrong decision, but guys, well, I know preaching to the choir, but people in general have got to value our journalists and demand it. Demand it. So that's why we say things like, subscribe to your  paper. You may not appreciate it, but then when you realize you don't know what's going on in your community, oh, who used to do that? Oh, that boring old paper that I used to slag off on.

Karen Swim, APR (12:51):

So very true. And journalists are continuing to be under attack, which in 2023, moreso for being truthful, but we need them. We need unbiased professional reporting. But you know what? We also need journalists outside of that realm of really holding us accountable of telling our stories and writing history. They're so good at that. Even I read a journalist tribute to Matthew Perry following his death, and it stuck with me. And I thought, wow, we need people who have this gift, who have this talent, who love this job that they do, who to speak these words in a way that not everyone can speak them. And I don't want to lose that. I'm sorry. And thank God for the Hollywood writers fighting for their right to exist with ai. They're not eliminating ai, but they also were able to bring out their role and fight for their rights and get what they wanted. We can coexist with ai, but I don't want AI to take over.

Michelle Kane (14:13):

Agree, agree. We need to maintain the humanity of it, because if that's lost, what's really, what's the point of our existence? Was it Winston Churchill? Back in World War II. He said, if we don't keep the arts and things alive, then what are we fighting for? So definitely, and we'll put sports writers in there. I’ve got to tell you, sometimes a beautifully written article, like if it's a championship or something, sports writers can make me cry. There is a special romance to sports writing that is often underappreciated.

Karen Swim, APR (15:00):

Completely agree. Completely agree with you. We are not talking about sports broadcasters though, however, who may up their sideline commentary. Can we not talk about that?

Michelle Kane (15:11):

Yes. No, we are not talking about that. No. No, we are not.

Karen Swim, APR (15:17):

We don't talk about Bruno, and we're not talking about sports broadcasters today, but maybe on another day we will address that

Michelle Kane (15:24):

Issue. Agree? Yes. Yes. Keep it real people. You know what? We're going to find out

Karen Swim, APR (15:32):

100%.

Michelle Kane (15:34):

We always, oh my goodness. Well, we wanted to let this digest along with your holiday meals, so we kept it short and sweet today, and we hope you got some value out of this. And if you did, please share it. I was going to see if you did not, what if you did, please do share it around and hit us up at soloprpro.com. Let us know what you want us to talk about. What can we dig into and talk about in a future podcast? But until next time, thanks for listening to That Solo Life.

 

Building a More Inclusive Future: Conversations with Bernadette Davis

There are many challenges faced by DE&I practitioners in today's landscape, including the backlash against DE&I efforts. In this episode, we are joined by an expert in the field of DE&I communications, Bernadette Davis of Bernadette Davis Communications. Listen to hear her valuable insights on how communicators can navigate these challenges, emphasizing the need for inclusivity to be woven into the company's culture.

Stay in touch with Bernadette on LinkedIn and at her website, bdaviscomm.com.

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:02):

Thank you for joining us for this episode of That Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane with VoiceMatters and of course Karen Swim of Solo PR Pro. But we are most excited - we love when we have guests – today we have a guest!You're in for a treat today. We welcome Bernadette Davis. Bernadette is an accredited public relations professional and founder of Bernadette Davis Communications. She and her team use their depth of expertise in media relations, executive communications, internal employee communications, diversity, equity and inclusion, and corporate editorial to support clients. So that sounds marvelous and we are so happy, Bernadette, that you're with us today. We're lucky.

Bernadette Davis, APR (00:52):

Thank you for having me.

Michelle Kane (00:55):

No, this is phenomenal. So tell us about your work in DEI communications because it's very important work.

Bernadette Davis, APR (01:01):

Okay, so again, thank you both for having me on. Today I lead a small but mighty team. I started the company though as a solo in 2014 and have transitioned into a boutique agency. And one of our areas of expertise is in DE&I communications. So before I started this agency, the last job that I had, traditional role was at Walt Disney World Resort, which I loved. And I worked on a team, the public affairs team, and we had internal clients. Two of my internal clients at that time were the DE&I team and the supplier diversity team. And while I worked with a lot of clients while I was there, I did learn a lot from those two teams. Little did I realize when I was doing that work as an employee there that 2, 3, 4 years later, I would end up starting an agency and using that expertise to then serve clients.

So that's how that journey started with me, specifically with DE&I communications, bringing that knowledge together with my communications experience. And so my team operates very well as an extension of corporate comms teams because we do have design capabilities, communication strategy, content development. So we can really be almost like their in-house agency as an external partner. And we apply that to DE&I work as well. So for example, when we work with a chief diversity officer or with a communications team that wants some more DE&I experience, we might write for senior level executives who are giving speeches and presentations where they have an inclusive component. We would do design work for them DE&I reports, and even internal and external communication strategy. So how are you talking to your employees about the inclusive work that the company does? And we help to amplify those stories, figure out what are the right stories to, to reach their audiences and even developing that messaging.

Karen Swim, APR (03:11):

Thank you so much for that rich explanation because I think for people that may not be involved in DEI and B work that you may underestimate the amount of activities that get poured into helping companies to really have an inclusive culture because that is, that's a full breadth of public relations services dedicated to a very specific part of the company and then weaving that into the overall messaging as well. So that was really helpful. I'm really interested, some of the things that I'm seeing beyond, not with my own clients, but just when talking with people that do this work is that we've seen this year be a little bit tumultuous, a little bit economically challenged, and we're used to seeing things like marketing and PR being cut back. But it seems like some DEI programs are also being cut back or departments are being merged into other pieces of the company, which is disturbing because there's so much work to do. What trends are you seeing in your work with your clients or just in talking with other colleagues that are also in this space?

Bernadette Davis, APR (04:35):

So Karen, I think first of all, it's interesting, A little bit tumultuous. Yes, more than a little bit and more than a year. The trends that I see, and this is coming from other communicators as well as DE&I, practitioners that I know and some that we've worked with. The landscape around DE&I is very challenging right now. And some people really position it as DE&I work, diversity, equity and inclusion work is under attack. And anytime you have a team or content that's under attack in that way, there can be a concern around that. How do we continue to do this work? So you see things like repositioning the work, naming it differently, for instance, adding the concept of belonging or referring to it as belonging work that's been going on for a couple of years, that transition. So you'll see some teams that are DEI and belonging, bringing it back into HR teams if it was ever pulled out of HR, bringing it back into HR, talking about company culture, which I think is really positive because inclusion should be a part of your company culture.

So I think some of these transitions are helpful because inclusion should not sit off to the side of your business. Your people, leaders, financial leaders, your operations leaders, employees at every part of the company should be thinking about their work and how it can be more inclusive. We also see some companies and organizations that are truly becoming concerned enough that they're likely stopping the work or they want to stop talking about the work that they're doing because they don't want to draw fire over that work. So that's concerning. And I think our role as communicators is to work through that with them and to bring to bear what's messaging that does work, what are the questions we can ask that help us find the right story to tell and to explore what the work really is that we're not making assumptions based on external factors and that we are disusing people of those assumptions. So I think as communicators we do have a more integrated role to play rather than just being task takers to help the organization and help leaders think through the work that they're doing, are you really going to stop doing inclusive work? Because to me, I'm always challenged by that idea because companies don't want to include fewer employees. That's not a smart thing to do.

So those are the things that we're seeing,

Michelle Kane (07:23):

Right, and it just doesn't make sense because it should be at the forefront of how companies cast their vision and develop their values and their culture.

Bernadette Davis, APR (07:36):

Exactly. It's about taking care of the people in your company, taking care of the people you do business with and your customers. And it's also about reputation, risk and opportunity. So when you think about how people perceive DE&I and DE&I work, there was a PEW research study shared earlier this year that said most workers around 56% say focusing on increasing DE&I at work is mainly a good thing. That's more than half of your audience. So you have to be very cautious about not doing the work, not talking about the work. No one wants to lose half their audience.

Michelle Kane (08:21):

No, no, they do not.

Karen Swim, APR (08:24):

I believe it also, let's just call it out. It is good for your bottom line profitability. Often leaders, the language that they speak are dollars and there are so many studies that support that When you have an organization that is inclusive, it's good for the bottom line, inclusivity gives you varying points of view that are really important and makes your business more robust. It leads to greater innovation. There's just so many benefits to it. I'm not somebody who's in that space. I don't think that I could do that day in and day out. However, I do advocate with my clients that DEI is not something that is something that should be off to the side just like ethics. And I believe the DEI is part of ethics as well and I beat that drum all the time. This is something that needs to be woven into your culture and it needs to be not just something that you do as a checklist.

It really needs to be something that is lived period throughout the entire organization for every single human being that works there, full stop. It's sometimes hard to get people to see that. And it's interesting that you mentioned the backlash because it blows my mind that we live in a culture that is so firmly planted in their factions of life. Everything is for or against. It's like if you like the color blue, then there's a group of people that says that you're wrong. And purple is really the color. We fight about everything. And if you believe in inclusivity, which to me is believing in humanity, then somehow you are woke in the wrong way. And you're right, companies can then receive the backlash for being aware that all human beings are not the same, which is such a sad shame. So what are some tips that you can give to other communicators that are faced with this toxicity in our culture and the pressure on practitioners and trying to figure it out? What are some strategies that you've utilized to keep this at the forefront and to keep momentum going?

Bernadette Davis, APR (10:52):

So one of the key strategies and reminders for communicators and for our clients and for your partners is that, again, DE&I shouldn't be separate from your overall business. So are you communicating about policy changes that affect employees? You need to think through those policy changes and what are the inclusive aspects of those, just the policy itself and then how do you communicate that in a way? Does that policy affect your company's approach to accessibility? For example, you should be thinking about that. So it may be a policy that's done by a completely different part of the organization, not DE&I, but all of your employees are going to be impacted. So how do you think about inclusion when it comes to that? So that's the first thing. It should not be separate from the other parts of the business. And you can ask that question and that's a bottom line question because the rest of your business is operating, are you being inclusive?

I'll give an example of something that was released this week. Deloitte released a study with, I think it's associated with the NYU law school, about the concept of covering when people are working to hide parts of their known identity, parts of their identity that are disfavored or seen or perceived as unfavorable. About 60% of the people that they surveyed say that they do some covering at work. And so when you think about that in terms of DE&I and the company, that's a financial issue because if people aren't comfortable at work and they're in an environment where they feel like they need to cover, I would imagine that that plays into them moving around company to company. And we know there's a cost associated with that every time that you need to deal with that. As a business owner, a corporation, there's a cost associated with that.

But if you address that and create an environment where people do not feel like they have to cover as many people, fewer people feel like they have to cover and there's all kinds of covering. So there's covering mothers covering in the workplace, not talking about their children. If they perceive that to be a challenge, people covering based on their faith, based on their orientation, their LGBTQIA identity. And so that's affecting a lot of people. So that's another reminder that it affects a lot of people. So that's another thing to say to business leaders to keep the momentum going. If we aren't going to do this work, how do we address these very real concerns that our employees have brought up and are mentioning and that we need to ask them about? So another way to keep the momentum going is to look at your employee engagement and what your employees are saying in your surveys and making sure that you're asking questions that get to the heart of whether or not inclusion is an opportunity or what your inclusion opportunities are. There probably isn't an organization on the planet that's perfect from an inclusive standpoint. It's a question of whether or not your organization is making the effort, making progress and staying on top of what the people need, your consumers and the people who work there in order to adjust to meet their needs.

Michelle Kane (14:19):

That's so true. And much like Karen said that leaders speak in dollars, they also speak in metrics. Show me the goods, prove it to me. So what kind of metrics do your clients find most impactful to make sure that they stay on the right track with these initiatives,

Bernadette Davis, APR (14:38):

Those employee engagement scores, the surveys, and sometimes even doing internal focus groups to hear what employees are saying. Those are important metrics. So if you want to get data that's to do, and you can build this into your surveys, most companies do survey the employees, they even survey job candidates, build in the questions to find out what their thoughts are around inclusion. And then there are some other information that you can get from employee resource groups, which tend to be very active and vocal and have the pulse of what employees are thinking, who are members of different dimensions. So what do they have to say, how do they respond? And some companies will go to them directly to ask them to engage on that and then it can be a part of a company's overall reputation strategy. So when you look at reputation, however your company is measuring reputation or keeping tabs on that, how does your work on inclusion affect your reputation? How does it affect those measures?

Karen Swim, APR (15:47):

Do you find that companies, we work with some clients that in my agency that deal with neurodivergence and the statistics on that are pretty sad too that employers under count their employees who are neurodivergent because they haven't self-identified for fear of backlash. That's a huge problem because you're handicapping people from really being the best employee because you're not giving them an environment in which to succeed. So do you find that companies pigeonhole, DEI to a specific group or group of people and missed the global picture of what inclusivity really means?

Bernadette Davis, APR (16:34):

I think that's happening less now. I think one of the challenges there, whether they intend to do this or not, is that certain dimensions of diversity are tracked more easily. And so you mentioned self-identification. It's difficult for them to address challenges if everyone doesn't self-identify and you aren't required to self-identify. So they may not really know what their numbers are. But I do think there's an opportunity here. I like to think about things being designed for the best for everyone. So if you think about this, and this will be a very tactile, I guess example, when you think about restaurants and stores and even apartment buildings being designed, we often don't think, in my opinion about design for mobility challenges until we have that mobility challenge. However, many of the things that you can do to make a location more accessible would in fact be better for everyone.

And you don't know that you need it until you need it. But what if every place that you went into, every workplace, every store, every apartment building, every hotel was accessible Because we tend to do that design. There will be just a few hotel rooms in a hotel building that are accessible rooms,

But what if they were all accessible? And so I think that's the kind of thinking that we need. Even if your numbers don't indicate that you have whatever your percentages, you think threshold of employees who are neurodivergent or who have a mental till illness or any other disability, maybe your numbers are not that high, but if you built an environment where you were accessible to everyone, then when they apply for a job, there it is, it's ready for them. And I do notice different things. We dined at a location this weekend and I noticed it was very accessible. I also noticed that I saw different people there. People go where they have access and so if you design it for everyone, everyone will come. That's how I like to think about it.

Karen Swim, APR (19:02):

I love that.

Michelle Kane (19:03):

That's fantastic.

Karen Swim, APR (19:05):

Yeah,

Michelle Kane (19:06):

Yeah. It's such a no brainer too. It's like, well of course we should. My goodness. Why do we keep doing things the hard way? It's just so bizarre to me. So I know we touched on this a little bit as far as the state of DEI, but what do you think is ahead for DEI communications in 2024?

Bernadette Davis, APR (19:29):

I've been looking at that and I've actually been to at least one session talking about DE&I in the current landscape. And I would say the first thing is to stay the course

Michelle Kane (19:41):

Good.

Bernadette Davis, APR (19:42):

Turning it on and off like a faucet doesn't make sense and people see that, employees see that job candidates see that even the organizations you work with see that decide that you're going to do the work and do the work for communicators. I think it's an opportunity for us to continue to strengthen our collaboration with DE&I practitioners who are our colleagues and with the organizations that do this work. I think communications professionals have room to grow in terms of learning this work and it really has the opportunity to influence all of your communications content and tactics. So continue to build those relationships so that we can be partners and even advocates for this work. And then I think we are often making the case for things when we are telling a client or a partner, Hey, we really think this is the right strategy and here's why.

Just as we would pull research, look at existing coverage and trending topics when we're talking about other work, do the same for DE&I and bring those statistics to the table just so that whatever the decision makers decide, we can't control for that outcome, but at least we will know that we have presented what's available in terms of the research, the facts, what people's perspectives are. So if a client or an organization that you're working with decides, we see that Gen Z almost 30% identifies as a member of the L-G-B-T-Q-I-A community and another, I think it's 20 to 30% of their generation advocates for their friends and family in that community. So now we're looking at about 60% of the generation that cares about this topic and is very passionate about it. If that's not something your company or organization wants to engage in, that's fine, but do understand what you're talking about for today and for the future.

Michelle Kane (21:49):

So true. That is so true and so important too. Incredibly important.

Karen Swim, APR (21:56):

Completely agree. I know that you are an expert in not only doing the work but reporting on the work. So I want to hear about what you're doing in terms of reporting your efforts and what tips you might have as we all are starting our year in reports and sharing with clients those details.

Bernadette Davis, APR (22:19):

Thank you. This is exactly the time of year where people are either writing their DE&I reports or starting to pull that information together from all of the work they've done in the previous year. We've worked with multiple clients where we work with them either on the strategy and the outline for their report. Sometimes we write the entire report and do the design as well. So we've touched all facets of that process right now. I think it's considering your audiences spending more time thinking about the audiences. A lot of DE&I reports tend to be longer and I don't think I know, we know we see this, that people don't read those longer documents the way they might have in the past. So I think thinking through your audiences and how do you create a report document where you can pull out what you need for audiences and that it's a useful document for your team.

I think that's one of the best pieces of advice that we can provide. Thinking about what part of this is attractive to job candidates, what part of this do we need to share with external stakeholders? What part of this matters to employees? And using that as a guideline for how you develop the report and making it very concise. We look at about 40 different DE&I reports from companies every year for our edification and we pull that a report around the insights and trends that we get from that. And so that's a benchmarking study we've done two years now and share with clients and that really helps us see what's trending with reports and how they're changing. And that can be something very helpful as we do this work and we're able to share that with potential clients and clients and they've all found it very useful.

Karen Swim, APR (24:08):

That sounds like an amazing report. Are those insights something that you package up and offer to other colleagues as well or is that something that you're thinking about doing? Because that sounds amazing.

Michelle Kane (24:22):

Yeah,

Bernadette Davis, APR (24:23):

Every year we do share it out and we are getting ready to do our end of year newsletter, so we'll be sharing it out in that newsletter. And I think I've shared it in the past with solos in the member group, but definitely can do that this year. It's just a great way when you have to do a report like this, whether it's ACSR DE&I report, you know what we're going to do? We're going to go look at five in our industry, five more from another industry so that we have that as benchmarking and we've done a lot of that legwork.

Michelle Kane (24:52):

Oh, that's wonderful. So I know we all want to know where can we find you? How can solos look you up so they can make sure that that might hit their inbox?

Bernadette Davis, APR (25:02):

Thank you. The best way is our website baviscomm.com. So that's bdaviscomm.com. And I'm very available on LinkedIn and our company page - bdaviscomm.com - is very active there. We have a great team that keeps us in front of people.

Michelle Kane (25:19):

Fantastic. And there was one thing you said at the start of our conversation was that the work that you were doing at Disney prepared you for the work that you do as a solo. And I think that is such a commonality amongst us that we, many of us who are solos didn't really set out to be solos necessarily, but we can all look back and say, oh, I served in this specific role because that prepared me to be able to be a solo, right? I mean that

Bernadette Davis, APR (25:52):

Exactly. I started my career as a newspaper reporter, print newspaper. I ended up working on a website that was in support of an ABC affiliate in Orlando in the early two thousands. So web development, I worked PR for an ad agency, I did communications for an HBCU law school. So all of those pieces, and never along that path did I think, oh, this will be helpful when I start my own business. But it all worked out just fine. This is the beginning of our 10th year in operation.

Michelle Kane (26:26):

That's fantastic!

Karen Swim, APR (26:27):

Congratulations.

 

Bernadette Davis, APR

Yes, thank you.

Karen Swim, APR (26:30):

And I do want to remind our listeners that we will have Bernadette's information in the show notes and I encourage you to follow her because the content that you share publicly is so phenomenal. You're such a superstar. So for people like you who not only do the work but live it externally because you advocate for inclusion in everything you do, it's not just client work that you do, this is who you are. And I'm always inspired by that and I look to people like yourself to stay abreast of the things that I should know. But I applaud you. I mean, I can't say this enough. I believe that this work is so hard. It can be really hard. It can really drain you, particularly when you are a person of color and you're having to remove your biases and you're having to step into this role of educating people sometimes to the point of frustration. So thank you so much for hanging in there for doing the work and shining the light for the rest of us. I can't say enough good things about you. I'm just super thankful that you came here today and talked to us about this and I'm looking forward to seeing your report. That is just such a fantastic resource and we appreciate you, Bernadette.

Michelle Kane (27:53):

We do. We really do.

Bernadette Davis, APR (27:54):

It's thank you. I've been a long time member of Solo PR, many people, and it's been so helpful in building my business in the quiet times when it was just me and I didn't know what I was doing. So many things that I do, I'm like, yeah, someone in solo PR said, use this tool. I'm using it. So the feeling is absolutely mutual.

Michelle Kane (28:18):

Oh, that's wonderful. We are lucky to know you, Bernadette. We are. Thank you so much for spending this time with us today and we hope to do it again soon. To our listeners, again, please connect with Bernadette on LinkedIn if you found this episode of value, and of course you did, come on now. Please do share it around. And if you have any questions or comments, hit us up at solopro.com. And until next time, thanks for listening to That Solo Life.

 

 

Where Do We Go from Here? Social Media for 2024

The social media landscape has changed drastically over the course of this year. What does that mean for our clients as we plan for 2024?

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:03):

Thank you for joining us for another episode of That's Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with VoiceMatters and my ever steady co-host, Karen Swim with Solo PR Pro. Hi Karen. How are you doing today?

Karen Swim, APR (00:21):

Hey, Michelle. I am very chilly, which is why I am wearing my comfy little coat during this broadcast because we're in the thirties here in Michigan, but other than that, good. How are you doing today?

Michelle Kane (00:37):

I am doing well. We are not quite that chilly here in the Philly burbs, but there's that beautiful fall crispness in the air that even though I'm not thrilled about the temperature plunges to come, I will take it. It adds a little snap to or step.

Karen Swim, APR (00:56):

We're just going to call this fall crisp with a little bit of rain. That's what we're going to call it. We're going to call it fall crisp because it's still technically fall, and I am determined to enjoy fall until the very last day. I refuse to accept that it's over because it's not technical.

Michelle Kane (01:18):

No, no. In fact, I saw a hysterical Instagram reel from Michelle Stafford. She's a soap actress, Nina General Hospital, everyone. But the whole point of the reel was that her young son was very disturbed that we were skipping Thanksgiving. We were hopping right from Halloween to Christmas, and you hear him in the backseat of her car going, “Where's Thanksgiving?” And so they go to Home Goods and they're shopping around and they found fall on a clearance table and the little boy says, “The boss here mustn't do Thanksgiving.”

Karen Swim, APR (01:59):

That is adorable and so sad. Help the children do not just push you all to the side. Do not push Thanksgiving away. I mean, listen, no matter what you feel about the pilgrims. Let's not rush it to Christmas.

Michelle Kane (02:15):

No, let's let our Thanksgiving meal digest properly. We don't want to get acid reflux as we hurl into the holidays. But she did end up buying some holiday items and she said, “I'm not proud.” And he goes, “I'm not proud either.” So check out Michelle Stafford's Instagram. It's very funny and not that we want to rush things, but speaking of social media and how fun it can be and how it can still be effective today, we're going to go on a little bit about social media planning for 2024. It's been a while since we stopped to sort of take stock and see what's going on out there. Where are our clients' audiences spending their time, what is still worth our time to use it as organizations and corporations? So we're going to talk about that a little bit.

Karen Swim, APR (03:09):

Yeah, honestly, Michelle, it's amazing to me that in this past 10 months how dramatically the social media landscape has changed, and maybe it's just me, but I feel like the changes have been as rapid as when social media really started to take off many, many years ago. I've not seen this dramatic of a shift in such a short period of time, all driven of course by the social media site formerly known as Twitter. It really just led to a deluge of changes and it's definitely well worth it to take a hard look at strategies and understand audit for your audiences again and make decisions about how you advise your clients or how you as a brand advise your company on what to do in the coming year.

Michelle Kane (04:07):

Yeah, that's so true, especially with regard to that channel. I know many have full on abandoned it for very good reasons because just of who has the hate speech and the things that have been allowed to take place. I mean, I still do find it a fair resource for journalists that are still hanging in there and trying to, it's for better or for worse, still a place where you might find up-to-date information. With yesterday being election day, it certainly wasn't like the good old days, but I thought, oh, okay, I can still get up to the moment information. But for the rest of it, if I were advising a client, a fresh new client today about using it, I would not, because it's almost like when you take your clients to lunch, do you want to take them to a nice place or a place with questionable actors?

Karen Swim, APR (05:01):

Yeah, it's really, I thought in all of the movement and all of the things that have happened on X this year, I was certain at some points that it would be gone by now. I really thought it would be gone or that it would have lost every shred of usefulness. Now, for some people, it really has. The interesting thing to me is that there were some media companies that made a wholesale decision that we refuse to be on this platform and support the ethics and the morals that are coming from the top, from the leadership and the tone and the environment and how it is has just become a bastion of not only hate speech but mis- and disinformation.

But I have found, as you said, that there are still many journalists who continue to use the platform. So for communicators, it is probably worthwhile depending on the reporters that you interact with, to at least keep your eye on your reporters there. It doesn't mean that you have to spend time on the platform. Definitely doesn't mean that you have to buy a blue check mark, none of those things, but as long as you have free access to the platform, there are journalists that very much engage there, which is helpful for our work, for my own clients across the board, many of them use it, but it's more of a broadcast channel. They just broadcast stuff out.

Some of them have, many people have penned posts that have a post, and then it talks about the other places that you can find them, but they just use it as a broadcast channel, not as an interactive channel. I think the other thing though, and Michelle, I'd love to hear your take on this, is that it feels like the tone of all of the channels has changed. So at one point where you had multiple channels for quote unquote business, I feel like there are some channels have become much more personalized. For me, Threads is not really a business channel. I see where it could be, but it really feels more of a take off your blazer, sit down and really connect with people around personal interest and your personal branding. Whereas LinkedIn has risen from the ashes in some ways to become the de facto business channel that all of my clients care about. That's where they're spending their money. Are you seeing the same thing?

Michelle Kane (07:43):

Yes. And I wonder if that's because Threads feels more like a, or is a derivative of Instagram or it's more aligned with Instagram. Now I have clients who use Instagram of course, being the retail facing the public facing. But even so there's a different vibe and a tone on Instagram. It's always been more casual. It feels unnatural if you're scrolling through your feed of Instagram and something very formal comes in. No, so that makes sense. And it is nice to see LinkedIn swaying away from what felt like a, I don't know, like a stilted Facebook light or something. I was like, no, no, no, I don't come here for this. I come here for business information to get to know colleagues better, of course. But to stay in that professional lane I think is a good thing that that is happening there.

Karen Swim, APR (08:42):

And algorithmic changes are also impacting the work that we do. So it has become more challenging because even if your audience is there, you're not guaranteed to reach them organically. So I think as we really evaluate how to advise clients in the coming year, we really want to make sure that we have a seat at the table to talk about those paid models as well. What's the budget for paid in the coming year? And make some recommendations about slices of the pie and how that should be allocated to some PR efforts as well. Don't leave yourself out of that paid discussion because there are things that as PR professionals, and I just had this discussion with a client yesterday where we want to use every slice, every piece of the pie, including paid. So we're making recommendations on that budget as well. So don't forget to do that because as you said, Instagram still remains as of today a channel where brands can engage, especially with consumer facing, brands can engage their audiences and get their attention, but you obviously can't be all buttoned up. It has to be visually appealing, you have to share information. So far it seems like people are still using influencers, although there's sort of a shift away from that word and the influencers, and then the Instagram algorithm has changed. It's made it harder to view people and they keep changing. So I mean these all factor into our decisions of where do we tell our clients to spend their time and research? If you're b2b, it's LinkedIn and you can pretty much close your eyes to everything else if you choose to.

Michelle Kane (10:35):

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, and even from the beginning of using social media for business, I've always advised clients to be discerning, you don't have to be everywhere. Just make sure that way you are, you're doing it as best you can with what you have. And that's different things to different people. And there are some clients where I can just say, again, thinking more of the consumer facing look, if your budget is X and you just have one special you want to put out on Facebook, then fine. We put a fair chunk of money that makes sense behind that and make sure the people that you want to see it, see it. Even though certainly Facebook ad buying has changed so much and it's definitely not as targeted as it used to be. You can still get there. But I think the bottom line too is if you want to be seen, you have to pay you

Karen Swim, APR (11:28):

So true. And so then drives into having those hard conversations with your clients about their ethical considerations as well. Because let's face it, a lot of people left Facebook in droves because there are concerns around privacy, their concerns about the company's ethics, the missile and disinformation, understandable. I am not going to slam anybody for making those decisions. Many people left X for the same exact reason, and Facebook, Instagram and threads are also meta. It's the same company. So again, we're left with view choices. I know that there are many other emerging apps like Blue Sky and Spill,

But again, what's happened is that this is so divided. Our publics, they're not en masse in one place anymore as it was in the past. And then you also as a company have to make these decisions about what really is right for your business. Where are the right places to show up and who do you really want to spend money with? For me, this brings home the point that we, communicators marketers have always said from day one, do not put all of your eggs into a basket that is owned by somebody else. This is why your websites, your email marketing strategies still need to be strong and you need to be driving place people to your home rather than always hosting at somebody else's house basically.

Michelle Kane (13:11):

I say that all the time, and I think even more so these days. Social media is certainly a capable tool for some things, but it's not as much in the forefront as it used to be. I encourage all of us to think about our clients and the way that we're helping them get known and get seen and get their stories told is to just rethink all of that. Because what is the main thing we're trying to do? We're trying to get their stories told. And that could be a literal story or it could be your oil change special of the month. Where can that be seen? And that's not always primarily social media. I think. I mean, I know my clients, a lot of companies do use their email marketing in a robust way, but I think there are also a fair amount of companies out there who are not using it in the way they used to. And I could venture to guess why is it because so many of us when we receive the emails, we're like, ah, delete, delete, delete, delete. But that's okay. I mean, again, I say this all the time to my clients. Your perfect ideal customer has to be ready for you to engage. So you may hit them with a message 20 times and the 21st time is the time that particular person is ready. The beautiful thing is there are so many people out there that you're talking to. It's,

Karen Swim, APR (14:52):

It's funny that you said that because for me, I'm one of those people who email is, it's just a constant annoyance as it is for everyone in the communication industry. And for many of us who lit our work is integrally tied to email as a communication channel. But I was having a conversation with somebody that I know the other day who was checking their email and he was like, oh, I have eight emails and just in the past, that's your 10 minute volume, right? It's like eight. And he was actually excited about getting an email from a brand that he had bought from and really liked the product and was excited to get the email about the sell. So again, I think you're right, Michelle, that we have to remember to that what we're sick of and what seems so commonplace to us, because it's our job from Inside View, we have to really put ourselves in the shoes of our public and understand maybe they're not overwhelmed with emails because that's not part of their day-to-day job, and they're not getting 22,000 emails in their inbox. Maybe they have five and maybe they're really happy to receive information from brands that they support, that they learn from. And so don't shy away from a toll just because in your mind you're over it, you're sick of it because not everybody is in that same space.

Michelle Kane (16:29):

We have to check ourselves and our jaded notions. And also too, I mean, hey, if check read industry blogs and make sure, because every once in a while, say maybe a couple times a year, I check and say, okay, is email still a very good tried and true way? And sure enough, it is.

Karen Swim, APR (16:55):

I think it's also important for brands to going into 2024 to be realistic not only in where you are on a social media platform, but what your goal is there. Because for so many years in the early days, we talked about community, community engagement, engagement, engagement. It's all about building a community. Can we be really honest? You're not going to build community around your toilet paper. You're just a topic that is really going to draw people that are so passionate about your brand of toilet paper that it's going to form a community. But is it to continue to keep your brand name in front of people as they're making buying decisions? Are there other things that you can expand into as a brand? Are there things that you support? So if you're a toilet paper brand, and can you remind people about prostate screenings? Are there things that are adjacent that you can share information about? I, so I think it's very important to re-look at your strategy, and sometimes PR professionals are not managing the day-to-Day social media, but we can at least educate and collaborate on the content that's going forward to help those teams to think about why are you really here and what are the goals and what are the expectations? Because the strategies really have changed. In my mind, they have, it's not because the tools have changed. And so I think it is important to take a fresh look at it as I'm sure that we're doing every year, but I feel like this year is more important than ever, and keeping in mind that we are entering election year, so that means a lot of noise. It means a lot of mis- and mal- and disinformation. Let's just face it. On top of the studies, there was a Pew study that just showed that people are turning away from the news in droves in that demographic, particularly of 30 to 49 years old. So if your publics factor into that, that's another thing that you need to weigh as a professional. Not that, oh my God, no one's paying attention, so we shouldn't do earned media. But what's the most effective way to leverage earned media to reach an audience that's become quite jaded about anything that comes out of a news organization?

Michelle Kane (19:26):

Yeah, and I love that you bring up the toilet paper idea of prostate cancer screenings. I mean, that really answers just the core. What's going to grab someone that they core or before they can outthink it of, oh, right, my health, how to make my day better, how to make my life better, how can I save money? Those kinds of narratives that really help someone in their day to day I think is a great place to focus on as we move into 2024. How can you be, not a partner, but just a key connection in someone's life, which is not quite the same as like you said at the outside of social. It's like, let's build a community. We thought that might happen, and then we realized what,

Karen Swim, APR (20:21):

Yeah, nobody's rallying it. I got an email today from Hiscock Insurance, shout out to Hiscock, which many of our solos utilize, and there was an article in their newsletter about reducing business expenses. And I clicked right through and I read that entire article. And again, this is somebody that provides insurance, but this was, they're in the business of supporting business owners. And everything in the newsletter was really helpful, but this was a topic that immediately caught my eye because we're all looking for ways to stretch our dollars as business people with everything going up so high. This was so timely, and it's smart. I don't get a ton of emails from them, but it was one that as I'm going through my 1700 emails, I actually did click through. I read this article, I remembered it, and now I'm talking about them on the podcast here. So don't diminish the value of showing up where people live on your, it's your list. No one can take that away from you using the things that you really do own and have a little bit more control of. And then maybe using social media as a way to amplify or to further drive people to your own properties.

Michelle Kane (21:41):

Exactly. I mean, I think that continues to be the name of the game, and I think sometimes we can move away from that. We can drift, but I think honing back on that and really telling what's your story, what do you need people to know and being helpful is still the way to go. So while we hope that we've been of help to you today with this bit of content that we are amplifying through our channels, and we hope that if it is helpful that you amplify it through your channels, please do share this around. We would really, really appreciate that. And if you have any suggestions or feedback, hit us up at solopro.com. And until next time, thank you for joining us on That Solo Life.