The hot news out of Diffusion this week is that we’ve been hired by Stuff, the best-selling gadget magazine in the world, to implement a very exciting social media campaign that will develop an interactive online community of readers and bloggers around the title, and drive visitors to the Stuff.tv web site.

We’re really excited to be working with such a great media organisation as Haymarket, and with people who understand that just as social media allows people to consume media in a more fragmented and personalised way, their business can also benefit by using the amazing content on Stuff.tv to interact and engage with relevant communities online.

Our work is just beginning and there are a lot of very exciting, top secret digital plans. We’re going to be using a combination of digital tools and channels including blogs, forums, social networks and online video to broaden out Stuff’s reach online, and drive even more visitors through to Stuff’s brilliant site.

Being both a politics and digital PR junkie I’ve been rather spoiled and completely fascinated by the US Presidential elections. I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to record a video podcast for PR Week on both my favourite topics last week, which you can watch here. I think it’s fair to say that we are witnessing the first Social Media Election, where online platforms have become so much more than just channels for raising money but central to campaign strategy for both the McCain and Obama camps.

While the US elections have no doubt showcased the scale of what the web can achieve, there is still so much more that could be done in terms of sophistication. I touch on the issue of better campaign integration in my podcast - amplifying the power of political campaigns through intelligently linking traditional media relations, Search marketing and Social Media.  This is one of the areas I highlight where political parties in the UK, particularly the Conservatives are taking a lead and have a thing or two to teach our American cousins. The Tories live-bidding on Google for keywords spoken by Alasdair Darling as he was delivering his last budget speech is just a sign of the things to come.

Another example of integration in action, which I never managed to blog about at the time was Obama’s visit to the UK in July and his private meeting with David Cameron. Though most of the actual meeting was conducted away from the cameras, the party released a video on YouTube of Cameron discussing the encounter within an hour of it ending and then pushed this out via its press office, an email marketing shot and a sustained Google PPC campaign. The video made it into the Top 10 most popular YouTube videos that weekend, with over 20,000 hits in 48 hours, helping to ensure that the Tories at least matched the coverage given to Obama’s meeting with Brown.

As with most things Social Media we have barely scratched the surface, particularly when it comes to using the two-way communication potential of online platforms to the full. Watching how the UK parties fight the next general election online is going to be compelling viewing!

“The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself” were the reassuring words of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932 as the US faced the realities of the Great Depression. This week our own political leaders have been trying their best to reassure the  financial markets and assuage the fears of ordinary voters worried about their jobs, homes, savings and pensions.

To help get his message across Gordon Brown on Thursday launched a new series of podcasts on the economic crisis - the first discussing the government’s rescue of the British banking sector.  Hosted on the new Number 10 website and on iTunes, the podcasts are part of a concerted strategy to communicate government policy directly to voters, bypassing what remains a largely hostile media.

I can see, or rather hear, why the podcast medium is attractive for Gordon Brown.  His deep Scottish brogue works far better on radio than on TV, where his visual tics invariably distract the viewer from what he is actually saying. The live interview format also usually results in Brown reverting to repetitive and robotic stock-phrases and apart from when being interrogated by Mariella Frostrop, I’ve yet to see a TV interview where he looks genuinely comfortable.

So the pre-record of a podcast works well and his delivery is relaxed and reassuring to the listener.  I would however be tempted to experiment with different formats in addition to the standard Churchillian address.  Perhaps have Brown “in conversation with…” the types of individuals he mentions at the start of his podcast - first-time buyers after a mortgage, small business owners trying to secure bank loans or a housewife trying to balance the household budget. Why not record it at the local Lidl?  The conversations wouldn’t need to be confrontational or overtly party political, but would arguably help demonstrate how the government’s £500 billion intervention will positively impact on the day to day lives of ordinary voters.

Anyway, having listened to the Prime Minister’s podcast, my iPod immediately segued into Abba’s ‘Money, Money, Money’, which kept me amused for the rest of Black Friday at least.

‘Twas’ a pleasure to head down to Doon on Trafalgar Square last night for the inaugural Harvest Twestival – only fair as we were helping to pay for the drinks.

It was great to have the opportunity to meet the faces behind the avatars – some better looking in real life…some not…we came bearing Fray Bentos’ finest and a whole hamper of kidney beans, but were overwhelmed with the generosity of the Tweeple of London.

It was also great to see the buzz that the event created through the community with ‘Twestival’ making the Twitter trend terms blog roundup right up there with Obama and McCain. As Mike Butcher outlines in his TechCrunch article on the event, it serves as an interesting example of how an event can generate buzz and even raise some money for charity, simply by bringing likeminded people who are part of an online community together in the real world.

Well done to the Twestival team including Tim Hoang (@timhoang) Ben Matthews (@benrmatthews) Amanda Rose (@amandita) Renate Nyborg (@renatenyborg) and Diffusion’s very own Tom Malcolm (@tommalcolm) for making the event a success!

We’re looking forward to sponsoring the next one and hope the ‘raffle’ won’t be rigged in Ben Matthew’s favour again!

I’ve been watching a fascinating story unfold in the US this week charting how a mixup on Google sent the share price of United Airlines plummeting by a massive 76 per cent. The event triggered an emergency halt in trading earlier this week as automated trading systems began a mass sell-off of United Airlines stock.

It all came about after a nearly six-year-old story detailing the airline’s bankruptcy filing in 2002 on the Sun Sentinel’s web site found its way back into Google’s news cycle which in turn was picked up by Bloomberg and the rest, as they say, is history. The Tribune Company, which owns the Sun Sentinel and other US newspapers has since removed the offending article from its archives.

I read the story before it was removed and despite it being clearly dated from 2002, and was clearly related to events in 2002 it still managed to wipe $1bn of the value off the airline in a matter of minutes.

Above all this shows just how important Google has become in the communications landscape today, and its no longer enough to simply assume that as long as your profile in the traditional media is good, that you can ignore what’s happening online, and in particular what Google thinks of you.

The United Airlines example will not be the last, and for people in the communications industry arguing over the technicality of Google’s algorithms that contributed to this, and how the story got republished is missing the point in a big way. What Google thinks of your brand, and how it is represented has a massive impact on your bottom line, so it’s about time you did something about it. Just ask United.

Yahoo’s relaunch of its online ad network, which now claims to reach more than 80 per cent of the web’s population, may be good news for the investors as it tries to keep pace with Google’s relentless ad network growth, but beyond being a positive bit of PR for a company that needs it, is it actually what the online advertising market actually needs?

The latest Bellwether Report made grim reading earlier in the summer and in a tighter economic environment, while the Internet is escaping marketing budget cuts, it is being squeezed with online budgets seeing their smallest upward revision since 2003. The issue therefore is not whether Yahoo simply fight with Google and provide as broad a reach, but what is it actually going to do to bolster the online display ad market? What fresh value will it add to the market? And how will it help marketers justify continued investment?

Beyond all the obvious Yahoo-owned properties, the new ad network boasts offering space on more than 100 top comScore-rated web sites. That’s all well and good, but what difference does that really offer a market looking to make its display advertising more effective? Online display advertising can have more of an impact than simply brand building, but it involves thinking a bit more creatively about the issue than simply buying up space on the 100 most visited sites.

In fact carpet-bombing the most visited sites on the web is a nothing more than a hit and hope exercise if you’re response rates is your goal. Fortunately, some marketers and media buyers are beginning to realise that looking outside the top 100 most visited sites, they can find specific sites that offer access to energised audiences that are far more receptive and responsive. One of those smart chaps is a friend of mine in the online ad industry and he uses the example of a pet food brand advertising online, and the different response levels it would get running ads on MSN, Yahoo etc compared to investing the same budget in a handful of pet-lover web sites.

He also told me he was amazed by how many media buyers and online marketers still don’t get it, despite the pressure on their budgets. So while Yahoo can be applauded for the impressive reach and scale of its revamped network, the real question is, do marketers really need it right now and isn’t it a bit late to the game?

I was asked to contribute to a fascinating article in the National Journal, a leading US political magazine, on Friday in response to the initially surprising news that John McCain is actually outspending Barack Obama on Google. Figures released by Nielsen Online show that McCain’s campaign purchased just over 7 million impressions via Google AdWords in June, compared to just over 1 million for Obama.

However, the really interesting stats are for spend on traditional banner advertising, where Obama is trouncing McCain. Obama invested in over 80 million impressions compared to just 16 million for McCain. Nielsen’s analysis shows that Obama’s banners have been deployed on popular portals such as Yahoo! and MSN and news sites such as CNN. The campaign also bought almost 2 million impressions on allrecipes.com, perhaps in an attempt to reach more of the women who voted for Clinton.  McCain, who is still distrusted by much of the Republican base, seems to have focussed his banner spending on conservative sites such as the National Review and Lucianne.com.

As pointed out in the article, the discrepancy in the investment between banners and search advertising by the two campaigns is most likely a result of financial expediency rather than deliberate strategy.  McCain has fewer resources and is therefore focusing these on more targeted and cheaper ads on Google. It’s difficult to tell from the outside the real degree of targeting by the Obama campaign in its use of banner advertising. It could be various ad-networks are being paid millions of dollars to simply get as many eye-balls as possible.

What is true is that the Republican campaign had had to play catch-up in effectively using the Internet as a campaigning tool and is learning fast.  McCain’s recent adverts portraying Obama as both Moses and a blonde bimbo and the now famous response by Paris Hilton, has meant McCain has overtaken Obama’s lead for YouTube viewers for the first time.

Analysis from Tubemogul.com shows McCain’s videos attracted more viewers than Obama’s for seven days in a row last week, and on 11 of the previous 14 days.  Maybe it’s time for Will.i.am to pen another ditty…perhaps featuring Paris’ much under appreciated musical talents?

At Diffusion we naturally believe that Public Relations offers one of the most stimulating, rewarding and intellectually challenging career choices for graduates.  We’ll be opening applications for our 2009 Graduate Programme in December, but due to impressive client growth we have an opportunity for two exceptional graduates to join the Diffusion team this September.

So what are we looking for? Well we’re not ashamed to say our standards are very high - you will need a First or 2:1 degree from a leading University. What’s more important than what you studied is a genuine interest in communication. That means a passion for the media, for writing, for speaking and a demonstrable understanding of the PR process in the 21st Century.  As you’ll be joining an agency at the leading edge of innovation in digital communication, an enthusiastic and natural affinity to all things online is essential.

PR is an industry where people buy people, so as well as holding all these attributes you also need to be likeable, engaging, and credible, generate trust and ooze common sense and creativity. As we said, our standards are high.

So what do we offer?  Firstly a commitment to training and development.  At Diffusion you won’t spend most your time scanning coverage and writing reports. We will ensure you receive intensive education in PR practice so you can also quickly start making a genuine and satisfying contribution to the success of client campaigns.  As well as internal training from some of the leading PR practitioners in the UK, we also invest in external training in areas such as video production and web design, equipping you with the skills that are essential for pioneering PR today.

Our culture is supportive and open and we thrive on creative ideas, entrepreneurial spirit and humour. By joining a young and rapidly growing agency, you will be perfectly placed to enjoy rapid career and earnings growth.

Do you think you measure up? Then please send your CV and a covering letter to Daljit Bhurji, Managing Director, Diffusion at daljit.bhurji@diffusionpr.com.  

For more information on our Talent Management approach and benefits packages click here.
Closing date: 28 September 2008

The news last week from Paris that ICANN is about to blow open the entire domain name industry got me thinking, mainly along the lines of why on earth this would be a good idea, given that history is littered with examples that suggest it is not.

So why would opening-up the domain name market even more be a good idea? ICANN started going through a similar motion back in 2001, when it feared that the .com ‘real estate’ was quickly going to run out. After the launch of .info (which has been reasonably successful) ICANN decided it was a good idea to launch industry-specific domain suffixes. In principal you might think this makes sense, but in practice, suffixes like .museum and .travel proved to be massive flops with both consumers and brands.

When it comes to surfing the web, there is a huge disconnect between what ICANN wants and what the public’s collective consciousness is willing and able to accept. For consumers, the standard expectation remains .com, and no matter how liberalised the market becomes, brands will never stick two fingers up to .com domain and only secure their .brandname address instead. We’re too far gone for that to ever work out.

Industry-specific domains have struggled for that reason.

Country code domains such as .uk, .de, .fr etc have enjoyed success simply because they assure the person looking for a website that the information they will find will be relevant to their local market and in a language they can understand. They provide a genuinely useful filter. A .anything policy would provide a completely useless filter.

As for the threat the new plans will pose to brands -and a lot has been made of it in the press this past week - but in fact at $100,000 to set up your own domain, the price tag will remain largely prohibitive for any large-scale cybersquatting, domaining or speculator activity. Besides, and perhaps more worryingly for ICANN, brands have already shown some resistance to the never ending process of defensive registrations in response to yet-another-new-suffix-launch. You just need to see how much lower take-up of .asia was compared to .eu just a few years before, that it seems domain suffix fatigue may be setting in.

Complicating the system even further under the guise of liberalisation suggests whatever ICANN is trying to achieve, it is not going about it in the right way.

 The Daily Telegraph is making strides in implementing its online strategy after the latest ABCe figures revealed that the Mail Online had overtaken it to become the UK’s most popular national newspaper site in May, with 18.7 million unique users.

Crucially, the Telegraph isn’t just thinking that having a Facebook and Twitter presence is the key to a great digital strategy, like so many of its rivals. What the Telegraph has realised is that just as social media allows individuals to consume media in a more fragmented and personalised way, so they can actually benefit from that, by allowing individuals to follow personalised sections of Telegraph content. The dream for content owners trying to fight against falling traditional media circulations, is being able to segment and offer their content online to their audience in a completely personalised way. It’s quite an involved process to achieve that when you consider how broad a national newspaper’s coverage is, and how many segments that could be, but the Telegraph has taken a big first step on that road, and with these widgets is making an important stride into the mobile space too.

What is worth noting about the Telegraph’s approach is that six of its eight new widgets are all designed to drive traffic and engagement with Telegraph TV - the online video that’s become so important to all the major newspapers. Beyond that, there’s a breaking news widget and a toe in the water with a slightly more ‘niche’ European Championships Football widget. Apparently there are plans to launch further specific sports and business widgets shortly.

Above all this shows the Telegraph’s open approach to digital and clear understanding that it’s not just about pushing people through the Telegraph.co.uk front page, or amassing a number of fans on a Facebook page or twitter feed, but giving people direct access to the content they are really interested in, in the way they want it. We’ll just have to see in the next two or three months how big an impact that will have on the ABCe figures…