Social Hubs & War Rooms
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Russell Goldsmith’s guests were Stuart Thompson, European Director of TINT and immediate past president of CIPR and Chief Engagement Office at Ketchum, Stephen Waddington.
The first section of the show discussed the benefits of Social Hubs like Tint. Stuart said that TINT is ‘a technology platform that allows organisations to display social feeds and port them to any digital device, anywhere in the world’.
L-R: Stuart Thompson, Russell Goldsmith & Stephen Waddington
Stuart talked through a case study of how Tint used Social Hubs in their work with the People’s Climate March in New York, which broke all sorts of records in terms of digital engagement for a charity campaign. This led to a side discussion about war rooms in PR agencies. As Stephen explained, war rooms are a way to describe people working in an integrated agile way around a table for a campaign, although they call them newsrooms at Ketchum!
TINT brings user generated content from various platforms like Facebook and Instagram etc. into one hub. This could be hosted on the brand’s website and could help to bring ownership back to the brand itself, rather than lose it to the Social Networks.
Stephen feels that it’s beholden to anyone in the PR business to jump on any new tool and try it out and explore it as part of their continuous learning.
In the second half the show, Stephen talked through the role of a Chief Engagement Officer. He then went on to discuss the findings of the CIPR’s recent State of the Profession survey, specifically around the issues related to social media. He believes that the industry is polarising between traditionalists and those at the forefront of the business. He feels strongly that members need to get to grips with digital and social media skills or face becoming irrelevant, one of a number of points he made in a recent blog post. He summarised his thoughts by saying that we need to recognise that there is a massive shift from publicity to influencer relations then branded forms of media and communities as a means of engagement. We either embrace it, or you say “no” and stick with what you’ve done traditionally.
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