✅ Monday briefing: COVID-19 PR recovery, ethical PR issues, women in PR, Tweet back, plain language, zero click searches, Facebook fake, social audio, author finder and more…
Media, industry, practice, research and insight, social media and platforms, and tools
This newsletter is crowdsourced each week from my blog and community of practice for people studying and working in marketing, media and PR. It’s a hive mind, newsroom and source of information, help and support. You’d be welcome to join.
150 people joined lively WaddCon event last Friday to hear about new research tools, the state of the PR market and SEO PR approaches. You can catch it on demand if you missed it live.
The April edition of WaddsCon will explore the state of the talent market in PR, we’ll hear from the author of a new book on purpose, and practitioners will share insights on creativity and storytelling. Follow the link for details and to sign-up.
Media
📰 WELSH NATIONAL: Newsquest has announced a national news title for Wales called The National Wales. The “pro-Wales” title launches in April and largely be digital-first. Spotted Alan Morrison.
Industry
📈 COVID-19 PR RECOVERY: PRovoke and Stickybeak have told the story of the impact of COVID-19 on the PR profession through a series of practitioner surveys. Their fourth poll explores recovery and lessons learnt. You can participate via a 60-second conversation with a Steakybeak chatbot. Source Maja Pawinska Sims.
🤧 ETHICAL PR ISSUES: The PRCA Ethics Council has published its inaugural perspective of ethical challenges facing PR practice in 2021. Artificial intelligence, paid influence, and fake news are all ethical issues identified by a group of international practitioners in a series of reflective essays. Source Stephen Waddington.
👩 WOMEN IN PR: The story of the everyday working lives of women in PR isn’t widely told. Sarah Billings and Liz Bridgen are building a body of knowledge in this area. It will be an edited collection that brings together academic articles and practitioner stories. Source Liz Bridgen.
Practice
💬 TWEET BACK: Amazon went on the offensive last week replying directly to critical tweets. @amazonnews rebutted Senator Elizabeth Warren’s call for its breakup in a nested tweet. It also rebutted claims about poor staff welfare. Spotted Stuart Bruce.
Research and insight
🥊 SOCIAL MEDIA TRANSPARENCY: A browser extension that collects data on political advertising on Facebook has been told to shut it down. Facebook claimed that it violated data privacy. It’s among a growing number of cases where social media platforms are closing down research studies. Spotted Andrew Smith.
🗣️ PLAIN LANGUAGE: Jargon is a staple of the modern workplace used as a means of asserting professional status, reinforcing cliques or a mask for insecurity. Speak and write as plainly as possible if you seek to be inclusive and widely understood. Spotted Karan Chadda.
🖱️ ZERO CLICK SEARCHES: Two-thirds of Google searches end without a click to another website in 2020 up, from around half in 2019. SimilarWeb analyzed 5.1 trillion Google searches in 2020. Rich snippets in search results and a growing use of mobile and voice search account for the trend. Spotted Andrew Smith.
Social media and platforms
🍆 ONLYFANS APPEAL: Former Love Island star and A&E doctor Dr Alex George, has joined OnlyFans in a move likely to widen the platform’s appeal. OnlyFans is among a growing number of pay to follow influencer platforms. It has previously proved popular am adult entertainment industry. Source Scott Guthrie.
👺 FACEBOOK FAKES: Facebook took down 1.3 million fake accounts between October and December 2020. It also removed more than 12 million pieces of content about COVID-19 and vaccines which global health experts flagged as misinformation. The platform has 35,000 people working on tackling misinformation. Spotted Andrew Smith.
🏷️ INSTAGRAM DUPLICATION TAG: Instagram is testing a new tag for Stories posts that have been re-posted from a users' main feed. It’s a heavy-handed response to tackling duplication. Spotted Alan Morrison.
🔊 SOCIAL AUDIO: Innovation by social media platforms seems limited to cloning features. Clubhouse launched as a social audio platform in April 2020. Then Twitter created audio Spaces. Now Facebook developing live audio meeting rooms will enable users to join and participate in broadcast. Spotted Andrew Smith.
Tools
📰 NEWS INFLUENCERS: Ground News checks your news blind spot based on the news you consume on Twitter. The tool also shows you your top three sources and political bias. Spotted Stephen Canning.
🕵🏾 AUTHOR FINDER: Hunter.io will help track down emails for bloggers and journalists. It provides an accurate result around two-thirds of the time. 25 searches per month are free. Spotted Stuart Bruce.
There’s no newsletter next week. We’re taking a break for a week.