Participation = reputation

We attended a really good conference this morning on the merging of search, social and PR. Speakers from agencies and client-side alike communicated the message that people should get on with delivering great outcomes together rather than fussing over what discipline they come from. The worlds of PR, search and social have merged and will do even more so, so get over it.

Sony Ericsson and O2 (two of the companies speaking) clearly ahead of the game when it comes to implementing integrated approaches. Impressive results from the ongoing strategies they described.

The conference inevitably had a consumer focus but nonetheless we pieced together some good tips for corporate communicators who want to implement an integrated search, social and PR strategy as part of their reputation management approach.

From search to social recommendation
Search definitely isn’t dead but it’s not as useful as it used to be (when’s the last time you got exactly what you wanted from a search?). So users are relying more and more on the recommendations they get from their social networks. Don’t stop optimizing for search but recognize that building up a community around the subjects you care about (sustainability for example) – and being active in them – is really important for building reputation around a subject.  You can’t rely on people going to your website for your input, so you have to go where they are.

The added bonus of building your social network is that activity in the social sphere is good for search results, particularly if friends in your networks promote your links.

Planning content to keep your communities/fans interested and participating
It’s a layered process and hard graft. Create a three month plan with all of your known major events. On a monthly basis create a schedule of content releases. Detail your plan every 1-2 weeks with everything that’s going on. And on a daily basis, REACT. Be prepared for your plans to change. Gone are the days of a launch, leave and review project approach. Online communication on the social web is a continuous process.

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The presentations from the conference won’t capture all the good things speakers said but worth looking at for the case studies/numbers. They’ll be available soon on Reputation Online’s Slideshare account.

http://www.slideshare.net/ReputationOnline/presentations

Favourite term picked up today ‘Link baits’ – giving people links to good content of yours they want to share. The more your links are across the web, the more search engines see them as being important and so the greater the chance of you being seen.