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Sounds like a non-sequiter,
doesn’t it? Broad and narrow in the same sentence! The
truth is that these two terms go hand in hand. In a
recent lecture at Columbia University, Trylon President
Lloyd Trufelman explained how.
The days of the traditional
press release are long over. Sending a mass release to
hundreds of editors is like spitting into the ocean. For
years, we at Trylon have been counseling clients to
garner publicity and media attention the old-fashioned
way – by earning it.
An unprecedented opportunity
exists today to reach people of influence directly.
Using the the Internet, one can target individuals with
the precision of a marksman. More people are accessing
news from the Internet, and as that population grows,
the medium demands more attention from PR pros.
The question becomes less
how to deliver the message than who can we target to
deliver the message for us (or with us)? The ability to
reach audiences through independent news organizations
is remarkable. Could Matt Drudge have been a success if
he hadn’t had a Web site to push his information
through?
Newsletters (such as the one
you are now reading) offer a tremendous targeted outlet
for news and opinions. Literally thousands of electronic
newsletters now cover everything from ministries to tech
developments. The ability to place articles and content
in such media that reaches your exact target demographic
has never before been so close at hand.
We have often discussed
Weblogs in this newsletter. Why? Because they have
become a new information outlet. Using Weblogs properly
requires skill and care, but a potential exists that was
unknown just a year ago.
Any firm with a sound
strategic foundation is always building its database of
stakeholders. Whether through newsletter subscriptions,
a PDA contact database, your “daytimer” or index cards,
the idea of staying in touch with people who are
interested in your business is as old as business
itself. Using today’s technology to deliver timely
messages to this database increases its value
significantly.
Today’s technology offers
companies and executives the opportunity to reach their
audiences in ways never before imagined. Used in
conjunction with traditional media and feeding off of
each other, we now have the ability to reach narrow
targeted audiences using the interactive technologies of
broadband.
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