THE NEW RULES OF MARKETING AND PR

BY DAVID MEERMAN SCOTT

“THE NEW RULES OF MARKETING AND PR” by David Meerman Scott is the modern guide to the
future of marketing which offers step by step action plan for adopting modern marketing and PR to
communicate with buyers directly and increase sales.
It shows how large and small companies, non-profit organisation can use web based content to get
the right information to the right people for a fraction of cost of big budget campaigns. The book
opens with an example of Donald Trump how he makes use of twitter and real-time content unlike
traditional strategies which involves high cost and many times the effort. The book gives an example
of ‘Grain Surfboard’, they had a new way of explaining things to customers, they gave the customers
a choice of creating their own type of surfboard. The goal was only one “Customer Satisfaction” with
direct communication with the customers.
The traditional rules of Marketing involved Expensive Advertising, Targeting Big Mainstream Media,
Huge sale staff and many more in this world of “SOCIAL MEDIA” where buyers can be communicated
directly and understand their hidden needs. The writer quotes example of this book that how this
book got free advertising on Social Media, Bloggers wrote about this, Wall Street Journal liked his
idea, he received positive response from all over the globe.
Huge Investment in direct mail advertising don’t work whereas consumer driven forums involves
direct communication among customers which facilitates informed decision making. Looking for job
is not easy but people are not positioning themselves to be found on web, not creating content that
will help employee when company needs staff.
Advertising doesn’t just get ruled out , it makes sense for Mega brands whose marketing strategies
differ. Budweiser advertising beer in a football match does make sense as they are targeting the teen
who they want to target and not just wasting resources on one way advertising.

The writer then brings about the topic of PR where he states that “The internet has made public
relations public again after years of focus on media.” Blogs, online videos, news has let the
organisation communicate directly instead the closed room conferences and various other PR
strategies involving media. Web has transformed the rules PR strategies must be transformed to
make best use of it. Traditionally only way of PR was through media, companies used to create
significant news in order to be in headlines of media.
Marketers must shift their thinking away from short head of demand curve- mainstream marketing
to masses and towards the long tail – a strategy of targeting.
Amazon example : Whenever we search for a book go to the product page we see customers who
bought this also viewed this, a list of books. This is the way on how to reach the buyers by
establishing a direct relationship with customers and engaging them into the business.
Now, some of the new rules of marketing states
 You are what you publish.
 Marketing is not about agency winning awards its about organisation winning business.
 In our always- on world, buyers expect instant 24/7 communication.
 People want participation not propaganda.

Think Like A Publisher , The new publishing model is not about hype and spin and messages. It is
about advertising content when and where it is needed and in the process, branding you and your
organisation as a leader. Customer targeting is very important, publish you content according to
your target market. American Airlines has a twitter handle where someone posts a question and
within 15 minutes they get a reply from the company. “Create Customer value, Create Business
value” says Director of Social Media and content for the airlines.
Coming to example of Canada Tourism, They created real-time social content about travellers and
their experiences once they visit Canada. They got responses from over 100 countries’ travellers.
Social Networking drove awareness of Canada and its share increased by 21.5% among competitive
destinations. When responding to a negative comment, it is best to reply quickly, honestly and in
same medium.
THE NEW RULES OF MARKETING AND PR
BY DAVID MEERMAN SCOTT
Blogs are the tools for long term marketing success for your business and personal brand. Blogs
focus is on a single point of view different than journalist’s goal of providing a balanced prospective.
The important factors for blogs are : Monitoring what millions of people are saying about you :
Participating in conversations about your industry’s blogs. Analysing blogs becomes very important
as they help us to do a positive or negative competitive analysis of our brand. We get to know what
is going about in the market about our brand.
General Motors: Bloggers were made to test drive their new car which resulted in hundreds of blog
posts and thousand of tweets which was an automatic advertising of the product.
Talking about the video and audio tools of marketing mainly YouTube, various podcasts they
generate an emotion to tell the story that no other form can. Air New Zealand made a safety video
of their rugby team it generated millions of view due to the fun segment which was used to show a
boring concept and the timing of this video. Blacks had just beaten South Africa. Another tool here is
Podcast which is an all audio section and is free made Jon Nastors “Velocity Page” a word press
building tool boost its sales nearly by 50 %.

Viral video: Positive or Negative

If Idea takes off on web then it can profit a brand or a company to Fame and Fortune for free. For
example the Mentos COCA COLA ad, video of ‘Gangnam Style’.
Challenges for marketers is to harness the amazing power of viral. Huge amount of good luck and
perfect timing is necessary. Marketers are Alexa to figure out which sites are hot and then use the
information to make their own site better
“the whole MENTOS GYSER phenomena seems to bubble up every few years” says Pete Healy (VC of
marketing for Penfitti Van Melle, USA makers of Mentos). After positive viral explosion don't just
hang on for ride, push it along. This statement can be explained with the help of Mentos coca cola
example, after getting millions of views on this video Mentos didn't stop advertising it more where
as Coca-Cola distance itself from diet Coke which led Mentos expand the exposure and Coca-Cola
failed to do so.
Internet is a town square, communicate what is genuine. Create triggers that get millions of people
to spread your ideas and share your stories.
Worldwide rave: when people around the world are talking about you, your company and your
products . You can Trigger a WWR- create something valuable that people want to share and make it
easy for them to do so. For example
 Film producer creates waves by making free soundtracks. Both the band and the film gain
promotion.
 By this using creative commons to facilitate mashup and spread your idea.
Creative commons: non profit organisation that makes it easy for people to vote share and
build on the digital creations of others. Originators of work has legal copyright ownership. It
provides with some free licences to incorporate this works into new ones. People can create
mashups using a work and might emerge something interesting.
 Create a bunch of different things, see what hits and their nature the winners along
 Clipping coupon: for example homeowner RICH RICCAINI decided to offer potential buyers a
coupon for one dollar off the price of his 7 dollar billion for T Myers Florida home. As a result
it aired on television stations in major cities.
 There are times when organisation possesses news that is so important to the target market
they serve that they just know the news has significant viral potential. For example a huge
celebrity endorsement, deal hiring of famous CEO from another company. Its critical to have
a plan and detail timeline of when and to whom you will tell the news.
THE CONTROL RICH WEBSITE
No matter how you choose to deploy web content to reach your buyers the place that brings
everything together in a unified location is content reach website. Content is not the only king but
THE NEW RULES OF MARKETING AND PR
BY DAVID MEERMAN SCOTT
President and pope as well. For example natural resources defence counselling (NRDC) is Nations
most effective environmental action organisation. This site includes environmental news, resource
and information on topics such as clean air and energy etc. People don't want PR, they want
something that's real.

Make your site mobile friendly. As people use mobile web browsers more these days.
As many companies are recognised for different brands. The key is the connection between
different business units ,the corporate offices and the departments, “say Sarah F. Garnsey head of
marketing at Textron Inc

Creating a kind of experience that make customers feel that it was just meant according to his liking
is exactly the point of understanding buyers Persona. For example life water field designs draw on
the passion of the people who build them and reflect the personality of someone dedicated to
helping others.

MARKETING AND PR IN REAL TIME

Real time Agencies also important in customer service where organisation fix issues instantly or
companies develop products or services instantly based on feedback from customer or events in
Marketplace .Donald trump is the most successful real time communication in history. In the
emerging real time business environment size is no longer a decisive advantage, speed and agility
win the moment. If you are first to engage the market people notice and your offering gains valuable
attentions.
Monitoring tools like Google alerts and tweet deck provide up-to-the second knowledge of what
people are saying about you, your company and its products. JIM DOWD (executive director of
national media for Golin Harrison International) says digital and mainstream are literally sitting next
to each other and they are coming up with ideas and are putting media together and that is where
we have seen just terrific track.
Newsjacking is inserting your ideas into a breaking news story by writing a real time blog post or
shooting the video to interest reporters and generate coverage.

Some of the ways by which you can engage in real-time are

 Creative advertisement based on real time events
 Respond to citizens right away for example Kolkata Police
 Create a real time product for example Uber
 Donate your product to those in need for example Oakley
 Tweet thoughts to your market when they are watching. For example running commentary
on a speech in an industry event
 Comment on regulatory change in your industry
 Use a news released to react to another company announcement. For example Richard
Harrison- Amazon
 Snapchat for business example Rebecca Korn (a financial advisor)
 Crowdsourcing: it involves taking a task usually performed by one person or a few people
and distributing it among the crowd of people. Outsourcing it to a crowd via online social
networks.

To succeed on the web under the new rules of marketing and PR you need to consider your
organisational goals and then focus on your buyers first. What are your organisational goals? We
need to align marketing and PR objective with those of the organisation
 Step1: determine your business goals
 Step2: learn as much as you can about your buyers and segment them into groups so you
can reach them through your web publishing efforts. Building buyer personas is most
THE NEW RULES OF MARKETING AND PR
BY DAVID MEERMAN SCOTT
important thing. A buyer Persona is essentially a representative of a type of buyer that you
have identified as having a specific interest in your organisation or product or having a
market problem that your product or service solves
 Step3: build a buyer Persona profile consisting of their goals and aspirations, their problems,
what media do they rely on for any answer to problems etc. “a buyer Persona profile is a
short biography of the typical customer, not just a job description but a person description”
says Adele Revella (author of buyer personas). The best way to learn about buyers and bio
profiles is to interview people.

After building buyer Persona, company produces product according to that when the resulting
product is brought to the market the same by insights are used to create compelling web content to
educate and inform consumer.
What we want buyers to believe should be depicted in our ideas. For example Obama and Donald
Trump during vote campaigns. VOLVO=SAFETY. Different buyer personas have different problems for
your organisation to solve.

Seven things you can measure to find the success of new kind of marketing.
1. How many people are eager to participate in your online efforts?(by measuring your
followers on Facebook and Instagram, viewers on You tube etc)
2. How many people are downloading your stuff?( by checking how many people have
downloaded your e-books, presentation slides ,videos etc)
3. How often are bloggers writing about you and your ideas?
4. (And what are those bloggers saying?)
5. Where are you appearing in search results for important phrases?
6. How many people are engaging with you and choosing to speak to you about your offerings?
7. How are sales looking?

STOP THINKING OF CONTENT CREATION AS MARKET EXPENSES

Marketing generates attention from the many people who make up a buyer Persona. Sales content
on the other hand communicates with one potential customer at a time putting the buying process
in to content.
Many organisation create content to attract buyers but none to support the sales people. That’s a
big mistake. People don't go to the web looking for advertisement they are on a quest for the
content.
To best leverage the power of content you first need to help your site visitor find out what they
need. You need to start with site navigation that is designed and organised with your buyers in mind.
Considered what happens offline in parallel with online interactions. They two compliment Each
Other.
Steps to help your website shape in:
1. He/ she needs to find the self reflection. You must organise your site with content for each
of your distinct buyer personas. One way many organisation approach navigation is to link
to landing pages based on the problems your product or service solves.
2. Develop a site personality. For example “I am feeling lucky” says a lot about Google. As
strong focus on site personality and character pays off
3. Photos and images tell your story. Non text content: a technical note, be wary of very large
image and image sizes and of distracted multimedia content like flash graphics and
animation. Visitors want to access content quickly
4. Include interactive content tools: this may include the stock quoting and charting
applications found on financial sides and ‘email your congressmen’ tools as political
advocacy site
THE NEW RULES OF MARKETING AND PR
BY DAVID MEERMAN SCOTT
5. Make feedback loops
6. Provide ways for your customers to interact with each other example forum, Wiki
7. Make sure your site is current
8. Includes social media share buttons
9. Think about your buyers preferred media and learning styles
10. Create content that can go viral

DEVELOPING THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

To develop as a thought leader in web content, we must think as one of the buyer. The web content
will be a solution to the people’s problems and we must not mention our company or product at all.
The various forms of thought leadership content includes-
 E- books
 Email newsletters
 Webinars
 Wikis
 Research and survey reports
 Photos, Images, Graphs and charts
 Blogs
 Audio and Video content
 White Papers

The author specifies a number of guidelines while writing a thought leadership content-
1- Do not write your company and your products. Clearly specify and solve the buyer’s
problems.
2- Define goals
3- Registration mechanism
4- Title that grabs attention
5- Easy to find links

HOW TO WRITE FOR THE BUYERS

The use of jargon- laden phrases and gobbledygook words must be avoided while writing a web
content. The analysis conducted in early 2009 concluded the use of 325 gobbledygook phrases in
each release. Moreover, When we write, we should start with the buyers, not with our product.

When buyers use search engines and directories to reach your site, link to it through another site, or
respond to a marketing campaign, we have an opportunity to deliver targeted information at the
precise moment when they are looking for what we have to offer. By providing information when
they need it, we can begin a long and profitable relationship with them. We should learn as much as
possible about the buying process, focusing on issues such as how people find our site or the length
of a typical purchase cycle. The photos and videos on the website itself tell a story. Other important
elements on a website includes interactive content tools and a consumer forum or wiki where the
consumers can interact with each other. The social networking websites have taken off as an online
tool for business people to connect to communities and to customers directly.

VIDEO AND PODCASITING MADE EASY.

As per the changes in consumer behaviour we must change our marketing strategy. About a decade
ago formal video advertisement was the only option available, which is very expensive and time
consuming but now, not a single organization is willing to spend that much of money and resources
on it. In the last few years business-formal videos have been going through a change and becoming
THE NEW RULES OF MARKETING AND PR
BY DAVID MEERMAN SCOTT
more casual. More and more contents are created with much less formality. This is a good thing
because both professionals and citizen content creators now reach readers and viewers faster with
much less interference from the stuffy conventions associated with content creation.
Perhaps the tremendous rise of social networking tools has helped fuel the desire to consume
content that is less formal. Creating a business-casual video is very easy in terms of gadgets required,
the only thing you need is your mobile phone.
Facebook Live is great for real time content marketing. Images alone are powerful storytelling tools,
but live video pull your followers right along with you in the moment. It can turn anyone into a
citizen journalist. Indeed, news outlets are using Facebook Live too, allowing their reporters to
upload live videos between their more formal broadcasts or written stories.
Simplicity is best part of Facebook Live. No writing (like a blog post), no advanced preparation (as in
typical video shoot) and no complex uploading process (as with YouTube).

HOW TO USE NEWS RELEASES TO REACH BUYERS DIRECTLY

Press releases have never been exclusively for press. And since about 1995, the wide availability of
the web has meant that press releases have been available for free to anyone with an internet
connection and a web browser. Millions of people read press releases directly, unfiltered by the
media. We need to speak directly to them using their language.
The rules of this new direct-to-consumer medium are-
 Don’t send news releases just when big news is happening; find good reasons to send them
all the time.
 Instead of targeting a handful of journalists, create news releases that appeal directly to
your buyers.
 Include offers that compel consumers to respond to your release in some way.
 Place links in releases to deliver potential customers to landing pages on your website.
 Optimize news release delivery for searching and browsing.
 Point people to your news releases from your social sites.

The best way to publish news releases so they are seen by our buyers is to simultaneously post a
release to your own website and send it to one of the news release wires. The benefits of using a
news release distribution service is that you can often reach hundreds of websites with a single news
release.
Many news release distribution services also offer RSS feeds of their news release. This means that
each time we publish a news release with the service, the news release is seen by potentially
thousands of people who have subscribed to the RSS content feeds in your market category.

YOUR NEWSROOM: A FRONT DOOR FOR MORE THAN THE MEDIA

Newsroom is for buyers, not just the media. This section is a list of great deal of information
available in many different formats: audio, video, photos, news releases, background information,
financial data, and much more.
Newsroom even serves as a free tool for search engine optimization. When news releases are posted
on a site, search engine crawlers will find the content, index it, and rank it based on words, phrases,
and other factors. Because news release pages update more often than any other part of a typical
organization’s website, search engine algorithms tends to rank news release pages among the
highest on that site, driving traffic there first.
“There’s no question that a well-organized media room often has higher search results and drives
more traffic because of the way search engine works,” says Dee Rambeau, vice president of
customer engagement at PR Newswire.

NEWSJACKING YOUR WAY INTO THE MEDIA

THE NEW RULES OF MARKETING AND PR
BY DAVID MEERMAN SCOTT
The real-time web has opened a tremendous opportunity for anyone to get their brand discussed as
part of the news of the day. Our goal with newsjacking should be to get our take on a breaking news
story in front of journalists when they are looking for additional information to put in their stories.
Here are some of the ways we can make our massage stand out-
 Blog it and post it to our online media room.
 Hold a live news conference with reporters and bloggers.
 Comment on breaking news stories at online publications.
 Tweet to appropriate reporters.

For dedicated newsjackers, there is no tool more essential than Twitter. It is both a primary source of
newsjacking ideas and a powerful channel to get our message out to the media in real time.
News jacking can damage our brand too. To be successful, attempts at news jacking must have a
legitimate tie to the story, especially when the story is about a disaster, death, or any other negative
event.

SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING

This entire book is about search engine marketing. We started with learning about buyer personas,
then we built contents especially for these buyers, we delivered the content in forms they prefer
(podcasts, blogs, websites). At last this content will be indexed by the search engines.
Search engine optimization is the art and science of ensuring that the words and phrases on our
website, blog, and other online content are found by the search engines and that, once found, our
site is given the highest ranking possible in the natural search result.
Single best thing we should do to improve our search engine marketing is to focus on building great
content for buyers. Search engine marketing should not be mysterious and certainly not tricky.
It is ineffective to try to reach the buyers with board, general search terms. If we want to be found
on the web, we need a unique identity for ourselves, our product, and our company to stand out
from the crowd and rise to prominence on search engines.
One of the most common mistakes made by search engine marketers is that they don’t focus for
good amount of time at building a landing page. We need to build landing pages that have specific
content to enlighten and inform the people who just clicked over to our site from the search engine.