Author Archives: Dan Slee

PRINT TRUTH: ‘Newspapers in print are clearly going away. I think you’re an idiot if you think that’s not happening.’

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Fail to understand the changing landscape and very soon you won’t have a job.

It’s something I’ve been banging on about for some time now and It’s true whether you are a journalist, comms person or a fifth generation pit prop maker in 1983.

A bright person a few weeks ago told me that there would always be newspapers because they’d always be there.

I disagree.

People thought that about coal mines once too.

There’ll always be news but there’ll always be print newspapers? Really?

As the rise of Twitter as a breaking news medium and sites like BBC that’s just not the case.

Here’s an interesting few quotes from John Paton, CEO of Digital First Ventures who own, as their website says, more than 800 print and digital products that reach 57 million customers a month.

If you aren’t taking it from me take it from a news organisation that has a $1.3 billion turnover.

They are quotes that comms people need to know about because they represent more evidence of the seismic change in the media landscape.

But why switch to Digital First as a company name?

“Digital First is my name. I’ve been saying it long before I got here. The name originally was to say very loudly — in a headline kind of way — that what we thought we did in newspapers, we had to change dramatically. And that, of course, meant digital first.

“And actually “digital first, print last.” I wanted to hammer home that this idea about the Web as something else we do was ridiculous.”

“The Web was and it should be what we do. Print is something else that we do, which happens — at this moment in time — to have almost all the revenue. But that’s not going to be our future. It was something that I named to try to hammer home that message. It’s kind of funny — I don’t think they have a “digital first” strategy at Google. They have a strategy. The name, hopefully, if we’re successful, becomes very dated.”

On paywalls and digital dimes…

“I don’t think paywalls are the answer to anything. If we’re swapping out print dollars for digital dimes, I think paywalls are a stack of pennies. We might use the pennies in transition to get where we’re going.”

On newspapers going away…

“Newspapers in print are clearly going away. I think you’re an idiot if you think that’s not happening.

“I don’t think that news organizations are dying but are newspapers going to stop running in print? Yeah. Absolutely.”

On making the shift…

“I think we still are too afraid to take the kinds of risks we need to take because there’s so much money tied up in print. We have $1.3 billion in revenue. And of $1.3 billion, $900 million is advertising and $165 million of the advertising is digital advertising. Four years ago, that was almost nothing. That $165 [million] is going to have to more than double in three years. To do that, we’re going to have to take some risks on the print side. That’s the one thing that scares the [expletive] out of everybody.

“I love newspapers. I’m a newspaperman. My father was a printer. I started off as a copyboy. I love newspapers. But they don’t love me anymore.”

You can read the whole interview here.

That’s something worth reflecting on.

Creative commons credit 

News stand http://www.flickr.com/photos/chicagogeek/3377807208/sizes/l/

Reading http://www.flickr.com/photos/maong/3588867138/sizes/o/

POINT BREAK: 16 points of the cluetrain manifesto comms people need to know

If you really want to irritate someone and show them how far from the curve they actually are point them at ‘The Cluetrain Manifesto.’

Published in 1999 as the product of a web forum the 95 points sketches out how the social web will work and what the future will look like.

It’s bold stuff. The old way of doing things are dead. Thanks to the web people can organise themselves far faster than organisations. The organisation  that fails to realise all this will be left behind.

Not all of the points have come true. But enough have to make a closer reading of the original 95-points part of your reading list. The 10 year anniversary paperback with essays around the subject is worth a punt. But the original list will do just fine.

For those on the bow wave of innovation this will be nothing new. But to comms people coming to terms with the changing landscape it’s good advice.

For me, the thing that shines through really clearly is the importance of using the human voice.

On the social web, the streams that, in the wise words of blogger Adrian Short ‘speak human’ are the ones that connect best and in times of stress have some social capital to fall back on. Social capital, by the way, is the indefinable sense of appreciation when someone talks to you like a human and even helps you out on a thing or two.

Just to whet your appetite here are 16 of them comms people need to know right here:

  • Markets are conversations.
  • Markets consist of human beings, not demographic sectors.
  • Conversations among human beings sound human. They are conducted in a human voice.
  • Whether delivering information, opinions, perspectives, dissenting arguments or humorous asides, the human voice is typically open, natural, uncontrived.
  • The Internet is enabling conversations among human beings that were simply not possible in the era of mass media.
  • In just a few more years, the current homogenized “voice” of business—the sound of mission statements and brochures—will seem as contrived and artificial as the language of the 18th century French court.
  • Companies need to lighten up and take themselves less seriously. They need to get a sense of humor.
  • Getting a sense of humor does not mean putting some jokes on the corporate web site. Rather, it requires big values, a little humility, straight talk, and a genuine point of view.
  • Companies need to come down from their Ivory Towers and talk to the people with whom they hope to create relationships.
  • Public Relations does not relate to the public. Companies are deeply afraid of their markets.
  • To speak with a human voice, companies must share the concerns of their communities.
  • You’re invited, but it’s our world. Take your shoes off at the door. If you want to barter with us, get down off that camel!
  • We want you to take 50 million of us as seriously as you take one reporter from The Wall Street Journal.
  • We know some people from your company. They’re pretty cool online. Do you have any more like that you’re hiding? Can they come out and play?
  • Our allegiance is to ourselves—our friends, our new allies and acquaintances.
  • We are waking up and linking to each other. We are watching. But we are not waiting.

Creative commons credits:

Soviet soldier http://www.flickr.com/photos/36919288@N08/3891685167/sizes/m/

Soviet badge http://www.flickr.com/photos/hugosimmelink/1468059580/sizes/l/

TELFORD LIFE: How a town is using digital to connect

This is more of a post about a town being digitally connected rather than about digital communications.

But it’s the landscape of change that all comms people need to understand.

There are some wonderful things happening in some unexpected places in Britain. In towns and villages people are using the internet to connect and build things. I’ve long thought that the best grassroots innovation is happening outside of London. That can be a remote Scottish library using Twitter brilliantly, a Welsh town converting folk knowledge to Wikipedia or local government countryside ranger building an online community. All these things play a part in their communities.

What also strikes me is that scratching the surface of a community and you’ll find the web used in imaganitive ways.

Take the borough of Telford & Wrekin, for example. It has 170,000 people and a surprisingly high number of roundabouts. It has a small town distrust of its neighbours but a pride in the communities that make up the place.

Just recently there was a brewcamp staged there. This was an informal meet-up at a café that has been staged elsewhere in the wider West Midlands. Around 20 people came. The debate was good but the ideas that emerged were as arrestingly good as the cake.

A connected town

1. Letting a blogger live stream a council meeting and use a bingo card to liven it up

A resident from the Lightmoor Life blog used an iPhone to stream a council meeting to show democracy in action. They made a note of when the items were so people could go back and see the items for themselves. You can see that here.

Marvellously, there was a bingo card where viewers were encouraged to take a drink when key politicians mentioned idiosyncratic phrases. That’s lovely.

2. Using football as a way to talk about dementia.

Telford United as a community-run club have good links with its fans. Pete Jackson and others used the idea of football to encourage people to learn more about that issue.

For the most part a football fan’s recollections are not of the goals but of the crowd, the terraces, who you went with or the long drive home from that away game.

You can see a YouTube clip that tells more about the project here.

3. Connecting people through civic pride

Telford has large parts of it built as new town built in the Sixties and Seventies.

It doesn’t always have the heritage or roots of other places but there is a pride and nostalgia for that early vision of how Telford was going to be.

Telford Live posted scanned pictures from a scrapbook that recorded those early visions.

4. A museum that tweets

Coalbrookdale is a world heritage site and deservedly so. It’s where the industrial revolution truly started. They have a Twitter stream that’s engaging and informative.

5. A campaign to save a cinema using the web

Bright residents have a vision to return the Clifton cinema in Wellington back to use as just that. A cinema. They are organising in real life but have a web resource to tell people what is happening. 

6. Wellington soup

The brilliant Wellington soup website aims to celebrate the good things and stir up some extra ones. It’s a central place where people can organise, seek help and bounce ideas. It’s brilliant and it’s here.  

As the site says:

What are the ingredients that make a town interesting; that make it bubble with activity? And whose job is it to find those ingredients and throw them into the pot? Councils and governments spend millions trying to make places work, economically, socially and culturally, and rightly so. But they can’t do it all. The small local projects that bring neighbours together; the little shops that brighten up a street; the fetes and festivals, markets and fairs, plays and concerts – most of them start a long way from council offices.

7. If you are born in Lightmoor you get a tree planted in an orchard.

Which is such a cracking idea.

That’s Telford and that’s all a bit great. If that’s happening that’s off the beaten track just imagine what’s happening elsewhere.

I’m sure that the communities of Telford and Wrekin have pockets of connectivity and areas that just aren’t on line. But they’re making broad brushes on a canvas that are connecting and informing.

As a comms person that’s a fascinating landscape.

Creative commons credit 

Cow http://www.flickr.com/photos/welshdan/3167600838/sizes/l/

SHARE: User generated content? Ask nicely…

A couple of months ago I had barbed exchange with a former colleague.

We’d talked about the old days when we were both reporters at a daily newspaper and we smiled as we reminisced at old war stories.

Then our talk turned to the future for newspapers and a dark cloud drifted over our chat.

I spoke of how newspapers needed to be digital first and think of the web ahead of print.

I spoke of how bloggers shouldn’t always be seen as the enemy but people to work with when you can.

I talked of how the bright newspaper should link back, attribute and ask for permission before using content.

I mentioned how annoyed bloggers get when their content is lifted.

“But this has always happened,” my former colleague angrily said.

“They should just stop being precious. Think about when you lifted a story from another newspaper.”

The reporter was right. In the dog-eat-dog battle between papers we’d never dream of attributing a tale to a rival paper.

But this is just the point.

Blogs are not newspapers nor do they want to be.

They’re put together often by community spirited residents. Some are good. Some are bad. Some are awful.

But treating bloggers as the enemy all the time is missing the point.

The way newspapers should deal with bloggers is the same as how they’ve always dealt with contributors whether they be the village contributor from Gnosall for the Stafford Newsletter or the U13 match report writer for the Stourbridge News.

They’re relationships to nurture and encourage.

Then a rather wonderful thing happened today which made me think of this conversation.

A Walsall Advertiser reporter Helen Draycott asked a blogger via Twitter for permission to re-use images from the Walsall night market in the Walsall Advertiser.

The blogger, Brownhills Bob, agreed for a £10 donation to charity.

That’s how we should all look to engage with residents whether they be bloggers or someone who has taken a good image that you’d like to add to your corporate website.

Ask.

Work with.

Respect.

If the answer is ‘no’ don’t take it personally.

Creative commons credit 

Placard http://www.flickr.com/photos/34817626236@N01/13407603/

TEACAKE: How to run your own brewcamp

John Peel used to say that punk was great because of the DIY ethic.

All you had to do was knock over a phone box, sell your brother’s motorbike and you had enough to record and release a 7″ single.

I quite like that.

Few things have given me greater satisfaction than a DIY project I’ve been involved with that has grown and evolved over the past three years with Si Whitehouse, Andy Mabbett, Kate Sahota, Mike Rawlins and others.

The project, called Brewcamp, brings people together to talk, learn and share in and around local government in the West Midlands. We even have a sporadically updated website here.

I’ve blogged about it before here and I’m re-posting this advice to encourage you to do something similar.

Basically, every two months we find a cafe to meet up for three sessions.

It’s very simple.

1. You find a cafe that opens in the evening and is willing to take 15 or 20 extra customers.

2. Wifi is nice but not essential.

3. You find three people to each talk about a topic.

4. You don’t allow presentations. They gets in the way.

5. You think of a name for it that means something to your area.

6. You put up an eventbrite with the location, date and time so you can issue tickets.

7. You carry it out. 

8. You learn things and enjoy.

9. If you fancy changing these rules to suit yourself you can.

10. That’s it.

If ever you fancied learning about the changing landscape, felt like learning something and think that tea, cake and conversation is a good idea you should do this.

So, what’s stopping you?

Creative commons credit 

Records http://www.flickr.com/photos/69769313@N00/5279401411/

FUTURE TACKS: Why every organisation needs a digital comms specialist

Right, I’m going to say something bold and then directly contradict myself. But just stay with me on this, okay?

We all need to be doing more of this digital communications stuff from the hard-bitten pr to the frontline officer.

There shouldn’t be a digital comms team and a traditional comms team in a different part of the building.

There should be one. Which doesn’t mind if frontline people use digital too.

But this is the tricky bit. Every organisation now needs a digital communications specialist to help make this happen.

Let me explain.

Why there shouldn’t be a divide between digital and traditional comms 

Back in 1998 the newspaper I was worked at with reluctance set-up email addresses. Our office of 12 reporters had one email platform rigged up to one machine. We gathered around like a bunch of Marconis as the first e-mail landed. “Oooooh!” we cooed as it landed and someone plucked up the courage to type a reply. When the inbox filled we didn’t know what to do.

Back then email in the office I worked in email was seen as specialist job trusted to just one person. Times change and now every new reporter there gets an email address. Which is as it should be.

When digital communications emerged to greet the social web a whole new series of skills were required. Cutting and pasting a press release didn’t work so people re-discovered conversation and informality. It became clear that the language of each platform was different to each. People’s media use splintered and people could no longer be found in one place but several.

This is something I’ve blogged about before and others have too and GCN’s Ann Kempster has written:

I don’t see how a modern press function can operate in isolation, not taking up modern communication methods and solely relying on press cuttings and column inches. The world just does not operate this way anymore. We all need to be able to operate across comms disciplines. That goes for digital too – we need to grasp marketing and press and internal comms.

And also Jeremy Bullmore in Campaign was at it in 2008:

As soon as everyone realises that digital is nothing to do with digital and all about interactivity and that interactivity allows brands and people to interact as no other medium does then trad and mod will all regroup under the same roof.

To communicate over a range of platforms needs new skills

According to Google, 90 per cent of our media consumption takes place via a screen. Sometimes several screens at once as the Newsnight TV audience contribute via their smartphones to the debate on the #newsnight Twitter hashtag, for example.

Acording to Ofcom’s annual survey, in 2012 more than 50 per cent of adults have a social networking profile with 78 per cent of those aged 15 to 24. It makes fascinating reading.

In short, if you want to communicate with people you need to use a variety of channels.

A press release is no longer your gateway to the media.

A press release, web update, a picture of a nature reserve posted to Twitter on a mobile phone, a sharable Facebook image, a Soundcloud audio clip of a politician speaking or a LinkedIn group contribution from a named officer is. But the thing is. It’s not always all of those things. Knowing the landscape means knowing which will be relevant.

Which is why we need a digital communications specialist.

But won’t a digital comms specialist mean that people think ‘oh, that’s their job?’

I’ve heard it said from people I rate that having a social media officer or a digital comms specialist means that things get chucked over to them to tweet, or whatever. That’s certainly a fair point.

But the specialist whose job it is to share the sweets, advise and train others is vital and won’t let that happen. Think about the teams you’ve worked in. If you are lucky you work with great people who come up with great ideas. But not everyone in the team is always like that. Often, you can only be as good as your least enthusiastic employee and if their grasp of digital comms is poor their delivery will mirror it.

The pace of change in technology is frightening. It’s unrealistic to think that everyone will be equally across it.

Which is why we need a digital communications specialist.

What a digital comms specialist should look like…

1. A trainer…

2. A geek…

3. A solver of problems that aren’t problems yet…

4. A horizon scanner…

5. A builder of an internal community…

6. A source of help…

7. A winner of internal arguments…

8. Someone who knows the channels. Trad and digital…

If you have someone who is already doing this full time you’re quids in. If you’re not your organisation risks falling behind.

Some great work has been done adhoc with digital communications across local government. But without mainstreaming the advances at best will be patchy.

Creative commons credits

TV logo http://www.flickr.com/photos/jvk/6701931811/sizes/l/

Talking http://www.flickr.com/photos/yooperann/7830838870/sizes/l/

Screen http://www.flickr.com/photos/mr_t_in_dc/6754500383/sizes/l/

COMMUNICATE BETTER: On putting the show on right here

It’s like a line from a Sixties ‘B’ movie: “Hey everyone, let’s get a converted banana warehouse next to a canal in the West Midlands and put on an event! With no agenda! It’ll be a sell out!”

Which is pretty much what we did with Commscamp the first unconference for communicators in and around local and central government.

Held at The Bond Company, a lovely converted warehouse in Birmingham’s creative quarter of Digbeth, we drew people from all over the country. It’s 135-capacity we could have sold four times over.

More than 170,000 saw the tweets on the day, a tweetreach survey revealed, and more than 500 joined in the debate on Twitter. More watching the sessions which were livestreamed.

People left the day fired with ideas with connections having been made with the unconference format allowing debate to flow over the tea, coffee and cake.

What is an unconference? It’s attendees deciding what gets talked about and voting with their feet to choose the break-out sessions they want. Want to crack a problem? Pitch a session and help run it yourself.

A revolutionary approach? Not really. It’s based on the success of sister events like UK Govcamp, localgovcamp, librarycamp and Hyper WM with many of them being staged in the highly networked city of Birmingham.

Why has there  been such an explosion? Simple. A perfect storm of budget cuts, new technoplogu and people excited a little by the new and better things they can do with them.

A couple of years ago I talked to Home Office press officers.

“Why would I bother with a few thousand people on Twitter when the frontpage of the Sun gets read by two million?” one asked.

A few months later the riots struck and those organisations without a Twitter presence were hopelessly exposed.

I thought of that press officer when the streets burned.

But commscamp was far more than just geeks needing to understand how the web has changed.

It was also about the real human day-to-day problems of how not just to do better for less but how to do completely different for less too.

There was the central government comms person sharing in her session how they coped when their team was cut by two thirds almost overnight.

There was the local government officer talking about how comms people should be letting go of the reins and allowing frontline staff to use social media to tell their day-to-day story.

I’m biased, but people like Morgan Bowers, Walsall Council’s tweeting countryside ranger should be revered and held up as an example to every organisation. You can connect with people with a realtime picture of a newt. Morgan does.

There was the heated debate over the future of the press release. Some thought they had just as important a role as ever. Me? I’m not so sure. Not when you see what things like Torfaen Council’s excellent singing Elvis gritter YouTube can achieve with its 300,000 views. That’s just brilliant.

There was the local government press officer who button holed me with the words: “I just didn’t know comms people could help democracy” or the central government comms person almost drunk with the ideas and possibilities they’d breathed in the asking anyone who would listen how things like commscamp could be repeated.

But the simple answer is it can. With enthusiasm, some volunteers and a smidge of sponsorship you can run your own and it was heartening to hear how others were planning their own.

The fact that it was planned by three people – two local government people myself and Darren Caveney – along with the Cabinet Office’s brilliant dynamo Ann Kempster really shows the power of a good idea, drive and some free social media platforms. The helpers who helped on the day showed that too.

The real value of unconferences is not just the lessons learned on the day and there are plenty. But it’s the connections made and the experiences shared that will still be paying back in 12 months time.

There’s no question that local government and central government have got so much in common and can learn from one another. Fire and rescue people too. And NHS. And the voluntary sector. We need to work with each other more because we face the same problems.

But the golden thread that ran through everything was a determination to do things better by sharing ideas. That, people, is just a bit exciting.

A version of this appeared on The Guardian.

#COMMSCAMP13: My 20 wishes and hopes list

So, here they are. To continue the list meme things that struck me after commscamp an unconference for pr and comms people.

I wish there was more of these.

I hope that some people who came to commscamp left as  inspired as I did when I left localgovcamp in 2009.

I wish there was more time to stop and chat with more who came.

I hope people left for London with an inkling of why the West Midlands is good at this unconference stuff. It’s three c’s: cake, curry and conversation.

I wish that I’d have got those ‘stuff your press release’ stickers made in time.

I hope that our team meetings in future also run peer training which sees colleagues show others how they did something.

I wish that not just local government and central government share ideas better but fire, police, NHS and voluntary sectors too.

I hope that other events bring people from outside the comfort zone too with the confidence to point out things like that no, we’re not brands we’re people to a room full of comms people.

I wish Mike Rawlins could have been around for the punch up on press releases. What larks would have followed.

I hope that Kate Bentham knows how much I was grateful to her for being Official Cake Monitor. She was brilliant.

I wish to accept 1/135th of credit for the good things said about the  event and deflect the rest to the other 135 who came. I’m pretty sure that Ann Kempster and Darren Caveney would say similar.

I hope that there is a localgovcamp in Brum again this year.

I wish good things to volunteers Alex, Kate, Pauline, Si, Kelly, Emma and Laura.

I hope the sponsors know how appreciative we are that the organisers don’t have to sell their cars to pay for it to Govdelivery, FutureGov, dxw, comms2point0, The Social Simulator, Claremont, NLGN, Improvement and Delivery West Midlands, PSCSF, Public i and LGA.

I wish that when people see spam on a hashtag they’ll react calmly and not click on the boob links rather than suggest we abandon the hashtag.

I hope that everyone who came did a little thing to change or innovate before they switch on their inbox every day.

I wish that people would stop thinking about traditional and digital and just think of comms.

I hope we have more people who become the organisation’s digital comms sweet sharer who scans the horizon, tries things out and encourages other less keen colleagues to come on in.

I wish people outside the sector could see that there’s real value in sessions that are about meat and potato issues. Not just horizon scanning.

I hope to do other things in the future with Ann Kempster.

I wish every event had a facilitator as good as Lloyd Davis and that I took pictures that make you smile as well as Paul Clarke.

Creative commons credits.

Microphone http://www.flickr.com/photos/paul_clarke/8510151932/sizes/l/in/photostream/

COMMSCAMP: Die Press Release! Die! Die! And six other things PR people need to know…

There was once a horror train crash that claimed the lives of 56 and changed communications forever.

In 1906, a de-railed train plunged into the icy waters close to Atlantic City railway stations. Within minutes thousands of onlookers lined the banks to witness the rescue attempts. Journalists were close behind.

As every PR student will tell you Ivy Lee of the West Jersey and Seashore Railroad Company persuaded his employers to issue a statement direct to the gathered hacks… and thus the press release was born.

But in 2013 that trusty war horse, the granddaddy of comms channels is no longer the only show in town.

Shaped for journalists often by ex-journalists it has intro, headline, quotes and notes to editors. It works best as a means of providing content for print. Cut, paste and stick it into other channels it works far less effectively. It’s like starting a telephone conversation: “Dear Sir, With reference to your letter dated June 10…” it’s the wrong language for the wrong platform.

That comms teams – can we call them Press Offices these days? – are so geared up for press releases and print has troubled me for some time. In a digital landscape where digital by default is the aim not just of newsrooms but any forward thinking organisation they appear as outdated as the idea of getting your football scores by waiting in the newsagent at Saturday tea time for the Pink football final to arrive.

All this worrying about press releases isn’t new. Former FT writer Tom Foremski wrote his seminal blog post ‘Die Press Release! Die! Die!’ in 2006. I only came across this a year or two ago but it captured perfectly an iconoclastic wish.

He wrote:

I’ve been telling the PR industry for some time now that things cannot go along as they are . . . business as usual while mainstream media goes to hell in a hand basket.

You can read the original here and I suggest strongly you do.

Now, I don’t agree with all of what is written. And yes, I think the press release still has a future. If a declining one and part of the mix rather than being the only ingredient of the mix.

At LGComms in Manchester I gave a presentation on this and six other things every press officer should know. Some of the points me or others have blogged about them. With commscamp imminent it’s high time I chucked it up onto the web for wider debate.

Six other things…

Every organisation needs a digital comms specialist – I’ve heard the theory that we should all be doing this stuff so we shouldn’t have people specialising in it. In practice, this is cobblers. To make this works every member of the team needs to be as keen and forward thinking as the keenest. Look around yours. That’s not quite true is it? Every team needs someone who is passionate about it. Whose job it is to hunt out new platforms, try them for size and then… share the sweets.

Share the sweets – Because it’s important that comms shouldn’t be the only people to be using social media. The best content comes from people in the field and at the coalface. Look at Walsall Council countryside officer Morgan Bowers, for example, and tell me that’s not brilliant, engaging and wonderful. https://twitter.com/walsallwildlife Footnote: tell the measure-all comms people that this stuff is supposed to be conversation and they can get their tape measures out for when Morgan sells out her courses using Facebook and Twitter pretty much alone.

Marry the traditional with the digital – Don’t just do one channel. Or all. Do the ones that are likely to work. A press release about a street being evacuated is just silly. A web update and a tweet isn’t. Look at Gatwick Aiport. They tweet snow disruption and post children’s stories to Soundcloud so fractious parents can keep their offspring occupied. You can see what they do here. http://www.gatwickairport.com/at-the-airport/gatwick-and-social-media/

Evaluation: Channel shift – It’s not the 100,000 people who read the press release that’s the measure. It’s the 150 who signed-up for smoke detectors as a result that’s the measurement. Even better is the £10k – or whatever the figure is – not spent on call-outs because the smoke detectors give better cover.

Be human – Sometimes comms people in their quest for evaluation forget that being human really works. Or as blogger Adrian Short says: ‘Speak Human.’

Innovate – Experiment, do things differently, see what works, look at what people are doing outside comms for ideas too. You’ll be surprised at what you’ll learn. Go to an event like commscamp. See what ideas are bouncing off people.

Lastly, a quote I love from 20-something PRO Jarrod Williams on what the new generation of comms people offer. You can read his post here: 

 “My generation of the Web 3.O PR will be a digitally native team with skills… yes there will be the specialists, but I’ll be the cost effective one, the one who will build your campaign, take the photos, make the videos, stick it on a web site, tweet about it and get your brand the press attention you want.

“The future is diverse, and the industry needs people who can adapt and change across all platforms, digital and otherwise.”

If that’s not a wake-up call to experienced comms people then for heaven’s sake what is?

The 1906 Atlantic City train crash. Pic: Wikipedia

Creative commons credit:

1906 train crash http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:1906AtlanticCityTrainWreck.jpg

YOU AND ME: Why we’ll all make #commscamp13 fly

A passion for tea, cake and sharing brilliant ideas work is what will make the first unconference for communications people work (disclaimer: I’m biased.)

It’ll be staged Bond Company in Fazeley Street, Birmingham.

This place used to be a warehouse that shipped ice to London. I mean. How cool is that?

Now it’s a meeting space and offices for Birmingham’s creative industries.

Commscam will see more than 150 people come to put their collective heads together for a barcamp around comms, pr, marketing digital stuff. You can mention the word ‘press release’ too. That’s allowed.

I’m pleased to say there’s a real mix between local government, government and people outside these fields and a mix too between unconference veterans and newbies. That’s just how it should be.

Why am I biased? Because I’m helping organise it with Ann Kempster from the Cabinet Office and Darren Caveney from Walsall Council two quite brilliant people.

Why are we doing it? Because we’ve seen enough of how unconferences work to see that they can be hugely successful and we think there’s things to be discussed and ideas to be shared in our field.

So, what’s the agenda? There isn’t one. It’s a big blank sheet of paper that those who are coming along will help to shape. That’s the beauty of an unconference. It all gets pulled together by those who are coming along. You can find out more about the event at it’s website here and if you haven’t already feel free to mention a session here. You don’t even have to have a ticket as we’ll be livestreaming some of the sessions and we’ll be tweeting too on the #commscamp13 hashtag.

So why are we doing commscamp?

Well, I can’t speak for Darren and Ann but for me… 

We need to share ideas and inspiration. In 2013 it can be tough working in comms in and around government. But those who work in the field can be a hugely passionate bunch. A good idea at the FCO could well work somewhere in local government. Without big budgets sharing the ideas can work.

You don’t have to be an unconference veteran to get something out of it. Just last week I was up in Manchester for the LGComms social media event. Rather bravely, they tried a loose unconference element. Of the 60 in a room about six had been to an unconference. Was I worried? Yes. People were only too keen to suggest the 12 sessions we had. Commscamp was roadtested and passed.

You need to plug into the West Midlands. Okay, so I’m a bit biased (but I declared that right there at the start) but there’s been a stack of good things in the West Midlands for some time around digital and innovation. Perhaps it’s the beer or the geographical closeness but there’s ideas to be had and shared.

You need to learn from people outside comms. Some of the best ideas and approaches I’ve had have come from talking to bloggers, engineers, police officers and coders. Listen. Talk. Learn. While there’s a focus on PR people there’ll be some input from those outside the sector too.

Local government people need to talk to government people once in a while. There are ideas in Shropshire that may shape what’s done by a government department to communicate to people. Vica versa too.

Our sponsors are lovely. There’s a big list of them down the side of the blog here.

If you’ve ever been told: ‘what we need is a comms plan’ and wanted to scream you’ll be in good company. There’ll be a session of primal screaming just to get over this, I’m sure.

Cake is good. Underpinning any unconference is the cake table. Baking is the first social media, I’m sure of it.

Sounding good?

Here’s your call to action right here: 

1)  If you’ve got a ticket say ‘hoorah!’ and think of something that you’d like to see cracked or maybe think of something you are proud of and would like to share. Post it here on the discussion thread.

2) If you haven’t got a ticket go to February 26 in your calender and put the date in your diary along with the words: “Dammit, I  missed a ticket but I can still follow #commscamp13 on Twitter.” There’ll be a livestream posted to this hashtag on the day too.

3) If you’ve a ticket and you can’t go tell us, say: ‘oh no!’ Tell us and we’ll release it to the frankly large waitlist.

4) Take a look at the commscamp blog here.

5) Can you help? See how you can help here and share the buzz. Or as we’re in Brum, point people where to catch the buzz. Take a look here to see how you can help.

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