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10 communication mistakes that stop you winning work by tender

By George Hulbert, who has helped companies to win more than $1.1 billion in work this way: So you want to win that all-important contract that is up for tender…. but so do all of your competitors. You know that the price you offer is going to be critically important, but everyone else will have screwed their price to the floor as well. So what else do you need to do to show your intended client that you are THE company to pick for the work? Well, I'd advise you to avoid the following for a ...

Top tips for creating winning business publications

By Mikela Dennison, Senior Account Executive In recent months we've been working with several of our clients to create visually stunning, message-driven publications that cut through the noise and connect directly with the intended audience. From compelling corporate profiles that showcase services, engaging infographics that energise employees and equip stakeholders with data, to sleek corporate magazines that demonstrate connections and activity in the market, The Clarity Business makes the...

Go triangular to make the most of your message

By George Hulbert and Mikela Dennison of The Clarity Business While the circle may be the strongest shape in mathematics, the triangle is definitely the strongest tool for clear and concise message communication. Why? Because it encourages clear, simple breaks between the different elements that make up your message and allows you to put that core message - which should be at the very heart of your offer - right in the middle of it all. At a time when there is fierce competition to win busin...

'Social media' is dead - long live communications

By George Hulbert, Director of The Clarity Business: A great article on PR Daily today – 'Why we're all social media managers' – raised a question I have wondered about for a while: "Why does social media portray itself as its own niche?" The author, Kevin Allen, argues that all communicators are social media managers. "Social media is certainly not novel anymore," he says. "More PR pros, marketers, and communicators—including this author—have some variation of "social" in their job ti...

New media in the changing business world

By Mikela Dennison, Senior Account Executive @ The Clarity Business There's no doubt the business world is changing rapidly. CEOs are blogging, business news is broken first to Twitter, and companies are spending serious time and money developing their online policies for staff. Like the media environment, or the way consumers shop, there have also been some significant changes to how we work (meetings via Skype anyone?). One area that is providing practical and physical changes to the way we...

Research in business: 3 ways to add value through knowledge and data

By Mikela Dennison, Senior Account Executive @ The Clarity Business People love numbers and facts. There's something about presenting well-researched evidence that provides a hard edge, helping you to reinforce and inform your business actions and decisions. We love being able to help our clients use research to gauge their brand's position, how stakeholders perceive the organisation, and to identify areas that could be improved. Why research? From focus groups, to individual interviews, su...

LinkedIn Groups: maximising your message

By Mikela Dennison Over the past few months we have been seeing increasing interest from clients who are keen to learn more about LinkedIn Groups and how to leverage them for business growth and personal branding. There are currently over 1.5 million LinkedIn Groups - and that figure is growing daily. This post will introduce and expand on some of the key elements and benefits of LinkedIn Groups, with some tips on how you and your business can use them to maximise your message and grow your n...

Visual communication in business: thinking beyond words

At The Clarity Business, we use the written word to create clear and concise communication that helps businesses succeed – but we also offer a range of visual communication options for our clients, which can be tailored to suit different needs, environments and purposes. Increasingly, businesses are engaging with visually-hungry audiences by getting smart, message-focused communications tools out into the market, driving traffic to websites and turning awareness into interest that can become ...

Is boring the new interesting?

By Mikela Dennison, Senior Account Exec @ The Clarity Business Here at The Clarity Business, we love to write original posts about PR, business, social media and other things that take our fancy (like beer). Alongside our own content, we also make a point of sharing and recognising other writers' content - a great way to add insight, spark discussion and create opportunities to connect with other professionals. Post stirs industry discussion Last week, I shared an article from Ragan.com into...

Takeaway lessons from Shane Bradley’s Startup Grind talk

By Mikela Dennison, Senior Account Executive I attended the first ever Startup Grind event in New Zealand last week, and thought it might be useful to share some of the pearls of wisdom I gleaned from the speaker Shane Bradley (founder of online deal, directory and trading sites - GrabOne, Finda, and Sella). If you aren't familiar with Startup Grind, it's a worldwide collective of events for entrepreneurs and startups, and is powered by Google for Entrepreneurs (everyone benefits from having a...

3 compelling reasons to do business blogging

By Mikela Dennison Have you ever considered blogging for your business? Lots of people spend their working day writing reports, emails, proposals and internal communications, but fewer dedicate time to publishing original content online. This post will explore three compelling reasons to do business blogging – feel free to add any ideas or suggestions you have. 1. Hone your writing skills Blogging is a helpful habit to get into in order to improve and hone your business writing skills. St...

Churnalism: making PR message relevant

By George Hulbert In an era of shrinking news desks and increasing web-based media intensity, a new online tool has been launched in the US – Churnalism – that asks the question: "Ever wonder if the news story you're reading is a product of real journalism or just a spin-off of another story posted elsewhere?" This tool, a development of Churnalism.com, which launched in the UK two years ago, allows users to track whether content in the media stories they read has been sourced from publis...

Musings on PR and social media

By Mikela Dennison, The Clarity Business I've been in my role as Senior Account Executive here at The Clarity Business for just over a year now and I thought it might be timely to do a few shorter posts in the coming weeks, reflecting on the lessons I have learned so far and what's been helpful along the way. Social media: a brave new (professional) world? Social media can seem like a whole new world once you start engaging online professionally rather than personally. From concerns around wh...

Live-tweeting for business success

Have you thought about live-tweeting your next business event? By Mikela Dennison @mikela88 In the past two weeks I've been to several events where guests were live-tweeting the content of the talk, presentation or discussion. This post will look at some examples of live-tweeting and weigh up some of the arguments for and against this increasingly popular social media practice. Live events work best for live-tweets Guy Kawasaki's Air NZ Social Media Breakfast saw a flurry of live-tweets, wh...

Top tips for getting buff on Twitter

Twitter isn't for everyone, but increasingly we are seeing the direct benefits the micro-blogging site has for the businesses and organisations with whom we work. In this post, we offer some top tips on how you can get buff on Twitter and start reaping the benefits. From increased website traffic, insight and engagement with conversations, real time news and industry commentary, to tracking trending topics and monitoring brand sentiment, there are so many reasons for corporates and not-for-prof...

ANZAC DAY: How different is PR practice in New Zealand and Australia?

On the eve of ANZAC Day, it is a good time to think about the cooperation, connections and close relations between New Zealand and Australia – after all, recent news reports even go as far as claiming that the 23 millionth birth in Australia may well have been a Kiwi. While there is a strong degree of jostling and friendly rivalry between our two nations (mainly sports related), the fact remains that cooperation between the two countries is strong and there is no time when that kinship and b...

Brand journalism: Four tips for covering your company’s beat

By Mikela Dennison In this post, we will look at four tips for businesses to follow when creating original, interesting stories about your brand and team. 1. We are shifting towards original content creation Gone are the days when a company only communicates when it has to; the latest communication tool that is sweeping businesses across the globe is brand journalism. Just what is brand journalism you might ask? Brand journalism is when a company creates original content and shares it on i...

6 reasons Pinterest is worth considering for your business

By Mikela Dennison (mikelaprnz on Pinterest) In this post, we'll look at six reasons you should be considering Pinterest as a visually engaging and cost-effective way to communicate with your audience and drive traffic to your website. If you aren't already familiar with it, Pinterest is a visual pin board website and app that is based around users sharing images they like, and organising their images (or 'pins') onto boards. Users (or pinners as they are known) share a combination of images...

5 lessons newsletters can take from social media

By Mikela Dennison, Senior Account Exec @ The Clarity Business Newsletters. Love them or hate them, newsletters are a highly useful way to ensure that your business or organisation is in regular contact with your target audience. However, newsletters often have a bad rep for being a thing of the past, an inbox clutterer - and often the cheap piece of paper that gets thrown out with the rest of the junk mail. But done well, newsletters can be interesting, visual, easy to cast an eye over and ...

The rise of the infographic: Three reasons to use infographics to enhance your message

By Mikela Dennison There are so many compelling reasons to include infographics in your business communications. This post will explore three reasons to add this innovative and visual tool to your communications. In the last year, infographics have become increasingly popular online and are used to convey information about a huge range of subjects. Infographics get to the heart of communication and learning styles, and it is now common knowledge that the more you can reinforce content throug...