Happy New Year!

Prowl Public Relations would like to wish everyone a happy and healthy new year! Here's to a new year full of new possibilities and new opportunities! Cheers to 2013.

What is your New Year's resolution? We want to hear!

New Year’s Resolutions for the PR Student

With the beginning of a new year comes an opportunity for changes and self-improvement.  As we prepare to ring in the New Year, it’s time to start thinking of some New Year’s Resolutions.   As PR students, we must be adaptable to change in order to be the best rising PR pros we can be.  To ensure a happier and more successful new year, consider resolving to do the following.  

• Keep a schedule: Between internships, classes and extracurricular activities, a PR student can maintain a busy schedule.  In order to keep track of what responsibilities are in store for a certain week, make sure you are diligent about using a planner.  Don’t let yourself be the victim of missing a deadline or an upcoming assignment from forgetfulness!
  
• Clean-up social media: Consider this an early spring-cleaning for the new year.  Take a hard look at your social media accounts: is the content on your pages appropriate? Questionable photos or posts can jeopardize internship opportunities and jobs down the road.  In terms of professionalism, make sure you’re putting your best Facebook forward.
  
• Look for internships NOW: It is only the beginning of 2013, but it’s never too early to start the search for summer internships. Some internships have strict  application deadlines which may be earlier than you’d expect.  Applying early shows initiative, a highly-sought trait in prospective interns.  You’ve worked hard to be considered a qualified candidate for an internship; don’t miss out because you applied too late!
  s
• Stay in the loop: Being informed of what’s happening in the news is essential in PR. This new year, resolve to become more knowledgeable of current events.  One way to do this?  Use Twitter, of course!  By following world and local news programs and top reporters, you will be instantly connected to what’s been reported.  

How To Craft The Perfect Tweet

As any aspiring PR professional knows, Twitter is an important platform to engage an audience. Social media managers are always looking to craft the perfect tweet. After all, aren't we all looking to get a retweet or a follow?

Here are some important tips in order to craft the perfect tweet for your company or your personal brand:

1. Links: Including links in your tweets is one easy way to get a retweet. Don't just tell people about something; show them!

2. Timeliness: Always make sure the tweets you are crafting deal with timely news. Tweets mentioning news are usually the most shared.

3. Technology News: If you are looking to gain more mentions and retweets, try tweeting about tech news.

4.  "You": Using "you" instead of "I" spark more retweets because it makes the tweet more universal and less personal.

5. Punctuation: Make sure to always use correct punctuation in your tweets. No one will retweet something with improper grammar!

Do you have any other tips to crafting the perfect tweet? Let us know!

Facebook Poke vs. Snapchat

Many of you are probably aware of or are currently use the Snapchat, the iPhone and Android application. Poke, is the new Facebook application that CEO and Founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerbeg has created. The application allows a user to send photos, videos and pokes for a limited and preset amount of time. Reviews are currently mixed for the product, including my own opinion, but because of user's familiarity with Facebook, the application was still able to climb its way to the top of the Apple Store downloads. However, as the popularity of SnapChat grows, there has become a decreasing interest in Poke. Below is a chart that compares the abilities of the two applications.

I personally prefer Snapchat to Facebook's Poke, how about you? Do you feel like Facebook will be able to continue to remain relevant and competitive?

6 Pet Peeves Of Social Media Managers

Waking up late and posting a few tweets or Facebook posts may seem like an easy job to some, but does not even begin to describe the difficult task of being a social media manager. Social media managers serve as the face, voice, and often the interactive arm of an organization or brand. It is our job to reach out to you, know what you're talking about, and find the best way to serve you - the consumer.

Managing any social media account, especially more than one, has to be a labor of love. Yes, social media is not a typical 9-5, and there are rarely days off! It is a craft that has to be mastered over time, and many social media gurus put a lot of work into their efforts. That being said, here are 6 things that annoy almost every social media manager:

#6. Hashtags on Facebook: Imagine someone using your well written research paper as a coaster at a party. Social media managers use hashtags to track trends and to better interact with users. Facebook does not currently have a hashtag integration, so seeing them on the site will just confuse and annoy us.

#5. Scheduled Posts: Scheduled posts can either be a life saver or a life ruiner. In the wake of recent tragedies  we've seen how schedule posts can make a brand or organization seem insensitive and out of the loop.

#4. Tweetgram: Each new social media platform offers a new and exciting way to reach and interact with your audience. Twitter gave us words, and Instagram gave us photos, never were the two meant to become one in the same.

#3. The Macro-Micro Blog: Tumblr is another great social media platform offering a microblogging solution for those who have a message to get out in a few less words. So you can imagine how we, the social media managers, feel when we scroll down a tumblr dashboard only to find a 500 character blog post.

#2. Mobile Alerts: There is nothing quite like being right in the middle of a deep sleep only to be abruptly awoken by a Twitter mention. While we can turn off alerts during certain times of the night, the alerts never really stop.

#1. SOCIAL MEDIA: Yes, ask any social media manager and they will tell you that their number one pet peeve is social media itself. Our jobs create the ultimate love hate relationship, and sometimes we feel more hate than love. While we wouldn't trade our jobs for anything, every social media manager has seen or reached his or her breaking point!

Insta-scammed!

Last week, Facebook and Twitter ignited with indignant messages against Instagram's new terms of service. The revised terms of service statement used language that made it seem like Instagram would obtain the rights to all user photos, giving them the freedom to use photos for advertisement purposes, without the user's permission. Needless to say, people per upset and many even closed their accounts.

On Wednesday, Instagram co-founder and CEO Kevin Systrom responded to the crisis via a blog post. Basically, Systrom admitted that Instagram made a mistake and jumped the gun too fast. The company failed to communicate with its audience and left users in the dark.

But the privacy issue is not the only factor that is raising heads. The updated terms of service also dictates that if a minor signs up for Instagram, then the minor is assumed to already have parental permission. Want to file a suit? Users must file an opt-out agreement within 30 days of joining Instagram, to Facebook's headquarters (Facebook bought out Instagram in April).

It is going to take a long time for Instagram to regain its users' trust after these recent discoveries. What do you think of the revised terms of service? Let us know!

Stamping A New Path Of Promotion

There is a new type of promotion that this taking over the world of branding recently, street art. I first noticed this type of advertising when I was on my way to the Temple University Tech Center. I noticed a small stamp near the bell tower on the ground in bright white chalk paint with the name of an event and a date. I couldn’t help but consider how genius this type of marketing strategy was, it was extremely simple while at the same time generating great publicity for the event. 

Upon doing some more research on this new type of promotion, I discovered that the street stamp is becoming more and more popular in cities as a way to get people interested in new brands. The main idea of the street stamp is to subtly draw attention to a brand, event, or organization by leaving a small stamp with the logo in high traffic areas such as public walkways, college campuses, and city sidewalks. The main reason that this type of branding is successful is because it draws curiosity to the brand. The first time that I saw the Temple Made Live stamp on the sidewalk I was immediately intrigued. I quickly started asking around trying to figure out what the deal was with the event. 

While posters and flyers are the typical types of promotion used to generate publicity about people or events, the street stamps are almost always more successful because they generate that curiosity. With posters and fliers, all the information you need about an event or person is automatically given to you; but with the street stamp, you are required to do your own research. This type of promotion will drive people to Google the brand or look it up on Twitter or Facebook, which ultimately is generating the brand more publicity than it would receive otherwise. 

Have you noticed any street stamp promotions around? What drew you to them and where have you seen them? Let us know!

This guest blog post was written by PRowl Public Relations staff member Lexi Drexler