Author Archives | arikhanson
arikhanson - who has written 406 posts on Communications Conversations.
What’s your biggest professional accomplishment?
Share It’s a question I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. Mostly because I’ve been thinking about my legacy given I’ll be 40 next August (I’m already planning my nervous breakdown–oh, you think I’m kidding?). Not just in a professional sense, but in a larger, more worldly sense. I mean, I’ve been working in the [...]
Continue reading...Are flash mob videos the new “I have no strategy” Bat-signal?
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Share A couple weeks ago, the Carlson School of Management released a holiday flash mob “viral video” on YouTube. If you live in Minnesota, you’ve probably seen it by now. Take a gander (it’s actually featured on their home page right now). Not bad, right. Well produced. Well done. Inspirational, in fact. Kudos, CSOM. But, [...]
Continue reading...What’s behind the Pinterest craze? 15 super-users share their thoughts
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Share It may be a niche social network, but Pinterest is growing like mad. While other tools and networks like Quora, Instagram (my favorite) and Google Plus have stolen the headlines this year, Pinterest has quietly amassed a relatively huge user base–especially among young women (in my opinion). From October 2010 to October 2011 Pinterest [...]
Continue reading...PR Rock Stars: Valerie Simon
Friday, December 9, 2011
Share There are a handful of people I’ve either worked with or met in my 16-year career that I really look up to and admire. Some as mentors. Others are simply folks who I think handle adversity or tough jobs awfully well. And yet others, like Valerie Simon, I admire because, well, they’re simply wonderful [...]
Continue reading...9 pieces of career advice for tomorrow’s PR pro
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Share I’m a lucky guy. Most days I wake up I’m excited to go to work. I work with clients and people I respect and enjoy spending time with. I have creative freedom in my work. I have flexibility in my schedule. And, at the end of the day, I live and die by my [...]
Continue reading...HAPPO chat set for Dec. 15 on resume-writing tips
Monday, December 5, 2011
Share It’s been a while since we’ve held a HAPPO chat–almost a year. That’s way too long. And, with the New Year quickly approaching, we thought December would be the perfect time for the next HAPPO chat. The topic? Resume writing tips. After all, who can’t use a few pointers or pieces of advice on [...]
Continue reading...Mall of America uses QR code event to drive awareness, sales on Black Friday
Friday, December 2, 2011
Share Last Friday, I was one of the crazy people. I woke up early and trekked over to the Mall of America. Not to shop–but to work, and observe. In case you didn’t hear the Mall organized a fairly large Black Friday event centered squarely around QR codes. Wait, what? An event centered around QR [...]
Continue reading...What’s on your PR bucket list?
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Share I saw a short message from friend Heather Whaling this past weekend. It read: Turns out that bucket list item was this (congratulations, Heather!): That got me thinking. I’ve had a personal “bucket list” for years. Among the items on that list: * Living in a small, quaint villa in St. John in the [...]
Continue reading...My QR code experiment: 9 brands at the Mall of America on Black Friday
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Share I’ve long been skeptical of the QR code madness among marketers. Sure, I’ve read all sorts of numbers around QR code adoption–good and bad. But many of the studies still pin *understanding* (not adoption) of QR codes in the 30 percent range. So, I tend to think, as a rule, QR codes are pretty [...]
Continue reading...Does the smiley face have a place in the PR workplace?
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Share Does this situation sound familiar? You’re writing an email to a colleague. In the note, you discuss business, of course. But, at the tail end you make a smart ass remark–and you feel the need to use, yes, the smiley face emoticon. What do you do? Emoticons like the smiley face have made tremendous [...]
Continue reading...Is blogger outreach turning into an SEO game full of annoying conference calls?
Monday, November 21, 2011
Share OK, weird title, right? That’s because I’m taking a page out of my friend Greg Swan’s book today and running a bit of an experiment. You see, I probably get somewhere between 5-10 “pitches” a week for this blog. As someone who write about PR (and blogger outreach, specifically, at times) you’d think I’d [...]
Continue reading...PR Rock Stars: Bridget Nelson Monroe
Friday, November 18, 2011
Share I met Bridget Monroe this summer for the first time at a coffee shop near my home. I had known “of” Bridget through my friends at Beehive PR (a firm I’ve worked for in the past), where she had worked for a spell in 2010-2011. Bridget was working for herself when I met her and [...]
Continue reading...The PR pro of the today: What do employers really want?
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Share Last week, I gave a presentation at a local conference for public school communicators and PR professionals named Minn SPRA. The topic they asked me to speak about? The PR Pro of Tomorrow–a topic I’ve talked about on this blog a few times before. I’ll be sharing that presentation in a future post, but [...]
Continue reading...How to merchandise your blog content: 4 tips for corporate bloggers
Friday, November 11, 2011
Share When it comes to blogging, we put a whole lot of emphasis on creating content that gets clicked. And, eventually content that fosters loyalty (return visits), behavior change (digging deeper into the site) and action (purchase). We put time into developing editorial calendars, interviewing subject matter experts and taking photos for blog posts. [...]
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- Second Annual PR Reader's Choice Blog Awards
- What's behind the Pinterest craze? 15 super-users share their thoughts
- The PR Reader's Choice Blog Award winners
- 29 terms we obvi need to totes elims from our lexi forevs
- The 13 most fascinating people (in digital PR/marketing) in 2012
- amandalnelson: Planning is such an important part of social media...
- JaylenWatkins: Good description given in pretty understandable ap...
- Tracy Sestili: Hi Arik, great stuff. I have taught social media c...
- kmskala: Professor Hanson... I like the idea of followi...
- ryanmathre: Great syllabus Arik...you looking for TAs? :) One...
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About Arik
Interested in working with me? Have a guest post idea? Want to collaborate on a project? Interested in assisting with HAPPO or the MN Blogger Conference? Drop me a note at arik (at) arikhanson (dot) com.
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Monday, December 19, 2011
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