Added Value Communication's Newsletter No. 2, September 2009

Inspiration and ideas to strengthen your communication effort

Content

1. Social media are challenging corporate communication
2. Five tips when writing
3. Inauguration of The Creative House in Ringsted
4. Links to interesting communication websites

1. Social media are challenging corporate communication

How many companies have checked their profile in the social media?

It has become more demanding to have responsibility for communications. In many companies and organizations, it seems, employees create profiles on facebook and use the company logo as a catcher. Some employees upload videos from the annual company picnic on You Tube, and other employees discuss internal company relations on facebook that everyone can follow.

It can be quite problematic. Especially if you choose the defensive approach and decide not to do anything. Or even worse - if you prohibit your employees to access facebook during working hours. This is equivalent to that of 15 years ago when employees were denied access to the Internet.

I recommend that you take a constructive approach to the social media. First and foremost it is a good idea to analyze and map where, your company is mentioned. Then you should clean up your company profile. That is ensuring that the company will be mentioned correctly in the different types of social media. Your logo should have the right colours and fonts, and the number of employees and turnover should be updated etc.

It is a good idea to have a dialogue and develop guidelines for how employees refer to their on-the-job activities in their social media, like Linkedin, Facebook or FriendFeed. Consider what would happen if the staff association set up a Facebook page before the next office party. It may be a good initiative and it will motivate employees, but it would be beneficial if the company beforehand has informed the employees about how such initiatives are handled.

It is certainly no solution just not to do anything.

My advice is to reap the benefits of social media. Be present, use Facebook, Twitter, You Tube and all the others in the dialogue with customers and potential customers. Employees are important ambassadors for the company in these new communication channels.

The advantage of being present is also preventive. Should it happen that your company is mentioned negatively by former customers or employees you are better prepared and can quickly respond.

Enjoy.

Best regards,

Christian Pedersen

2. Five tips when writing

- Think about who you are addressing when you write

It is always a challenge to write an article that's is clear and useful to readers.

I recently held a a seminar in article writing for number of consulting firms. The participants, who were experienced academic writers, was given one challenge: To translate one of their collague's long and wordy article into a clear and efficient text.

As a writer you must first of all know who you write for. Who are your readers? Are there special circumstances to take into consideration? Specifically, it is important to consider what you want your readers to do.

Here are five tips for writing better texts:

1. You need a headline to summarize the text's main message. The title should be on one line.

2. Begin with a summary. Write the main points in the first paragraph in a summary. This enables readers to quickly gain an overview of the main points. This way the readers can assess whether it is appropriate to read further.

3. Write the most important things first. Reporters always start with writing the most important - for the readers - first. Knowing your audience, you can easily assess what is interesting for them.

4. Use subheadings. Subheadings in the texts give good overview. The reader can quickly get an overview of the content. A subheading must be consistent with the underlying content in the text.

5. Short and independent section.s Texts in long, solid sections should be avoided. Put the text into short paragraphs. Let each paragraph have one main message. It increases the quality of reading and comprehension. 

Contact Added Value Communcations for more info about seminars in writing articles here.