Overview: Communications Strategy

"We get what we measure and we are measuring the wrong things... old, mass-media metrics of reach and frequency — translated into their digital equivalents: unique users and pageviews — turn out to be profoundly corrupting... attention is a much more productive measure of media value than traffic.... There is a richer set of metrics that matter…

"... infographics are often taken at face value... And it is hard to fact check infographics... Fast Company republished 10 facts from Buffer. Fact checking one of the facts in that list went like this: The fact quoted an infographic -> that quoted a blog post at Huffington Post -> which in turn quoted another infographic -> which quoted a blog…

"the whole point of digital transformation is realizing that technology fundamentally changes how you do business in just about every way. It therefore poses very difficult questions to business and technology leaders: Who best should do our work today? Where does the value come from? What do these new ways of working actually look like? How c…

"...a new ecosystem of content promotion has arisen to fill the visibility hole left by the unfulfilled promises of organic search and social media. The channels and tactics for content promotion are advancing, affecting everything from influencer outreach and media relations to native advertising and sponsored content." - The Content Marketing E…

"The story of podcasts suddenly being “back” strongly suggests, and mostly requires, that they had been big at one time and had since gone away. That New York Magazine article even cites a “bottom” time: 2010. But that never really happened." - Why podcasts are suddenly “back” – Marco.org

" Top tasks are the small set of tasks ... that matter most to your customers. Make these tasks work well, and you’ll be on the right track. Get them wrong, and chances are you’ll lose the customer. Top Tasks Management is a model that says: “Focus on what really matters (the top tasks) and defocus on what matters less (the tiny tasks).” Tiny ta…

An array of sophisticated language technologies could help ideas flow across EU borders, link national conversations together and support the EU Online Public Sphere - the demos the EU needs. But BloggingPortal is unlikely to feature them. [update (17/5/15): I finally decided to kick Medium's tyres by reposting this there, with less history. …

Great "best of times, worst of times" piece on storytelling. Not just worth a read, it's worth learning the formula. An example: "Our access to knowledge and stories has never been greater, and it’s growing every day.... "21 things only a 90s kid can appreciate” will probably get 50 times more traffic than a post about climate change or political…

"the future of marketing is screwed ... We're still taking legacy thinking and outdated value systems and applying them to this new world of innovation... all this amazing technology, all the data you can leverage ... Marketing becomes a true reflection of an always-on society by recognising that it’s not a department. Marketing is now a way of b…

"All interesting theories are an attack on the taken-for-granted... We accept beliefs that align with our biases, but reject the value of these findings. Why? Because they don’t teach us anything new. In order to grab the attention of an audience, you must make a proposition that negates an accepted one."

"Context is always key in reporting, and engaged time adds context. Pageviews are ubiquitous, but by no means do they provide a complete picture of success. Rather than attempt to replace the pageview metric, maybe we just need to focus more on where it fits alongside engagement time in our reporting strategies." - Pageviews vs. Engaged Time in w…

"a year after Russia swallowed Crimea, the EU is moving into the propaganda business in a bid to win an information war it is currently losing... the EU’s spin-team is to be largely made up of the same civil servants who have so miserably failed to convince the bloc’s own citizens of the benefits of Europe. Having worked with EU officials for alm…

"Facebook is ... aiming to be the Internet equivalent of a broadband provider — providing the means by which all media is published and accessed. Here’s what brands and publishers need to know ... - Facebook urging publishers to post their articles and videos directly to Facebook... - For publishers that use Facebook for their comments sections,…

From 360-degree to Buzzwedge, a guide for the perplexed: - 10 Content Marketing Buzzwords You'll Hear Way Too Much At SXSW

"While traditional strategy calls for rigorous analysis and critical thinking, design thinking espouses ‘thinking by doing’. The key is to find the sweet spot between the two approaches." Nice exploration of overthinking vs. underthinking: "... overthinking — aka ‘death by analysis’. An obsession with minimizing risk leads to the inability to ma…

"One of the most frustrating things about reading (or listening to) science journalism is trying to resolve contradictory claims. Coffee is good for you; no, it’s bad for you... Eating meat is good for you; no, don’t eat meat! Some people, like many of those who oppose vaccines, ease the tension by deciding that science is all relative—just a ma…

Good reading for anyone communicating on an issue like science - or indeed the EU: "The problem is that he delivered his argument by targeting the most admirable hallmark of the scientific method: uncertainty in the face of incomplete evidence. And that makes his essay a pernicious attack on science itself. Bilton’s argument follows a familiar f…

"most digital transformation deployments fall into the 'deploy and pray' category, a minority address known pain points and use cases, whilst only about 20% of projects involve a concerted organisation-wide roll-out aimed at creating a connected company. ... paradigm shift is needed to go beyond just adopting social technologies towards creating a…

"I constantly get asked the question “how are we doing?” and “how can we measure the success of our startup community.”... ... a great first crack at this with a paper that I think will be viewed as the starting point for a real discussion about long-term growth and measurement of the health of startup communities..." - Startup Revolution | Meas…

"A Content Marketing Roadmap (CMR) is a strategy and game plan for content production and publication, usually for a three-month period. Its purpose is to take the guesswork out of blogging and lead generation and to, with every piece of content written and published, be working toward a goal." - What is a Content Marketing Roadmap? | Amanda Shaw…

"many marketers have a problem getting out of the corporate-agenda mentality. Especially when it comes to producing content that will resonate with their audience and be shared by their audience. Storyboarding is a fantastic way to get to storytelling... storyboarding is likely to unveil epiphanies that lead to your storytelling... allows you t…

Nice infographic on the science behind storytelling, and how to apply it to presentations: "A story doesn’t spark agreement or disagreement but rather participation… igniting 7 parts of the brain… testament to why as humans we love stories…"

"the Internet has dismantled newspaper’s geographic monopoly & business model ... & also upended the core assumptions underlying the actual journalism ... BuzzFeed as an organization has been figuring out what works online for over eight years now, and while “The Dress” may have been unusual in its scale, its existence was no accident... BuzzFee…

An article aimed at companies, so just substitute "government communicators" for "corporate marketers", and "citizens" for "consumers", as you read: "Technology changes fast ... but consumer behavior changes more slowly. As a result, people tend to overhype new technologies and misallocate resources, especially marketers. "posts from top brands …

A typically good piece of data journalism from Guardian's Datablog: "The number of people employed on zero-hours contracts reached 697,000 in the fourth quarter of 2014. See the characteristics of people employed on zero-hours contracts in four charts " - Zero-hours contracts in four charts | News | The Guardian

"the system ... counts the number of incorrect facts within a page ... by tapping into the Knowledge Vault, the vast store of facts that Google has pulled off the internet. Facts the web unanimously agrees on are considered a reasonable proxy for truth. Web pages that contain contradictory information are bumped down the rankings." - Google wan…

Comment moderation and online community management strategies for news organisations, but relevant to government sites too: "Comments are a way for readers to connect with one another, and with the journalists and editors reporting the news. But ... can quickly turn uncivil, and news organizations often don’t have the resources or manpower to con…

"some people have the sense that data somehow makes designers less powerful, that you’re basing decisions based purely on mechanical measures rather than designer intuition and genius... data is what ... turns designers from artists into the most important decision makers in a company... prototypes can really only get you to local maxima ... the…

Good case study, concluding with observations on the role of journalists which also apply to government communicators: "An engaged journalist's role in the 21st century is not only to inform but to bring readers directly into the conversation through... real-time coverage, alternative story forms, crowdsourcing, beat blogging, user-generated co…

A whole load of recommnendations for the UK's House of Commons, including some intriguing ones - eg: "We believe the public want the opportunity to have their say in House of Commons debates; we also believe that this will provide a useful resource for MPs and help to enhance those debates. We therefore recommend a unique experiment: the use of…