Out-of-the-box thinking from MNPR

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Public Relations

Making up for lost time (and money)

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I looked at 2021 and had one thing on my mind – how can I make up for what happened to my business in 2020? I’ve owned my own PR firm for almost 19 years now and NO surprise, 2020 was the worst year yet.

I didn’t really mind a little less stress at work as clients dropped like flies during the start of the COVID-19 outbreak because I was finishing my master’s degree and set to graduate in May 2020. But as the year dragged on, I set out to do whatever I needed to do to make up for the lost client work in the following year.

I was ready to be “on the clock.” And boy did I take that to heart.

When 2021 came along, I wasn’t the only one wanting to make up for lost time. It seems my clients were ready to do the same. Everyone wanted to throw a party, host a fundraiser, step up their PR planning and efforts and plan the grandest of grand openings. I couldn’t bring myself to say no to a single potential client and thus I found myself buried, overwhelmed and busier than I’ve ever been in the nearly two decades I’ve been in this business.

Oh COVID, how you’ve helped us learn many life lessons! (yes, I’m blaming COVID for this. How could someone my age continue to make mistakes?)

So, what do you do when this happens? Luckily, I was able to lean on experience and draw from good ole’ fashion common sense, but here’s a few suggestions I’ll share now that I can look back (and now that I have some breathing room) might be helpful as we go into 2022.

Set a plan.
Monthly, weekly and daily. Heck, hourly if you need to. Prioritize what needs to get done and create an action plan with a focus. It’s the only way to get through this period in your life. And look for the light at the end of the tunnel. Mine didn’t come until after Christmas, but it made my vegging on the couch that much sweeter.

Delegate.
Find reliable team members who you can meet with periodically and who do not need a tremendous amount of hand holding. This is not the time for new employees or interns. You need tried and true staffers who know you and you know them so you can get the job done. I’m forever grateful for my team during this time.

Busier = more organized.
I hate to even utter these words, but sometimes I get more done when I’m busier. Now, I never want to be as crazy as I was last year because I know I had to eliminate things that were important to me, but I also recognize that I am able to buckle down and be efficient when deadlines are looming. Remember, it turns out that the more you put something off, the less likely you’re going to do it at all.

Happy hour anyone?
I can’t say that I had a healthy work-life balance during the past 12 months, but I made time to have some fun, see friends on occasion and hang out with my husband and kids. This downtime is one of the only things that helps me to recharge and stop thinking about my to-do list. And when you’ve been working from home for as long as I have, you know you have to switch it off because there’s no physical distance between the office and home.

Never say never.
Oh boy this is a hard one! Repeat: I will not take on too much work ever again. This is a promise I have made to myself, and I must keep it. It is so important to my business, my current clients, my family and my health. That’s very dramatic, but let’s just say I need to do a better job of managing my workload.

And especially as we start the new year, I want 2022 to be a positive year for MNPR with a goal of actually achieving a work-life balance – ok, I realize I must set realistic expectations, but at least get a little closer to balance. Because I tend to be a bit of a workaholic (a hazard of being a business owner who truly loves her work), I have to constantly remind myself to find other passions.

My goals for this year are:

  1. Learn how to say no
  2. Get closer to nature. We have a new puppy who LOVES her walks!
  3. Make time for myself!
  4. Focus! Make sure I’m productive when I’m in my workspace

So cheers! Here’s to a fabulous 2022! I’m working to reclaim control this year! Wish me luck.

Communication during COVID-19

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Extraordinary times. Unprecedented times. We must pivot our marketing, PR and social media strategies. These are all things we’ve heard repeatedly during the past few weeks throughout this COVID-19 health crisis.

What can we do right now? What I would recommend to my clients right now is to communicate sensitively, remain optimistic and be present. It’s important to be authentic to our internal and external audiences because our company’s brand voice has a character, and it must continue during this time. We don’t want to be absent or go completely dark during a crisis. In fact, I’d argue it’s even more important to be there for our audiences as many of us are on the Internet a lot more right now with the isolation order.

What this means for businesses:

  • Revamping all of the scheduled social media posts and starting from scratch
  • Rescheduling or canceling planned events and announcing new dates to audiences
  • Developing relevant webinars
  • Writing helpful blog posts
  • Continuing with pertinent updates to websites, e-newsletters and social marketing
  • Looking for possible news angles to share useful information with the local media

How we recover? I’ve owned my business for nearly 17 years assisting clients with media relations, marketing, social media and crisis communication. What is happening today is unique, but it is also what we plan for every time we talk about crisis and business planning.

Recovering from this means we need to think beyond the crisis. Which is one of the hardest things to do! The uncertainty surrounding the timing of the end of our isolation order as well as the uncertainty surrounding the end of the spread of the virus is causing fear for a lot of us. I would suggest that we thoughtfully look at our communication strategies for 2020, and re-adjust based on this new normal.

My recommendations for how we come back: build credibility, engage on a deeper level, communicate empathy and demonstrate competence.

Why messaging is important? I love thinking about the importance of communication specifically during THIS crisis. When it comes to beating this pandemic, it is all about spreading the message to #flattenthecurve. Without concerted messaging from politicians, businesses, civic leaders and eventually trickling down to all of the rest of us, this virus would have serious and possibly grave effects on humanity.

During a crisis, good communicators understand the importance of:

  • building trust
  • explaining the risks without creating panic
  • demonstrating that leadership has a plan and is taking action
  • conveying instructions appropriately
  • welcoming feedback and working to engage with audiences
  • maintaining focus and sharing positivity when appropriate

There’s been a lot of jokes on TV and social media, including on The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon, about the abundance of businesses communicating about COVID-19, mostly emails flooding our in-boxes from every business we’ve patronized… ever. I don’t mind these jokes. This is good communication business policy. This means that businesses are mindful and responding to their customers appropriately.

When the dust settles (and I know it will), I hope and pray we’ll all be safe and back to our new marketing strategies of best practices of communication, messaging, PR and social media.

Inspiration for a recharge

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My senior college photo at K-State (1993). Time to go back to college!

I really love my job, and I’ve been doing it a long time. I believe there are seasons in life when it’s time for a refresh. This is the longest I’ve ever worked in the same position and I’m ready for something new.

I was thrilled when I was selected to be on a National Advisory Council at K-State. https://jmc.k-state.edu/advisory/index.html  We meet quarterly in Manhattan to culminate expertise from a variety of backgrounds to advise our alma mater, the AQ Miller School of Journalism and Mass Communication. And THIS was the motivation I needed to kick off my master’s degree (which will also be in journalism) at that “other” Kansas University.   🙂

I guess I’ll have to get used to saying that I’m a Wildcat first, and hopefully soon I’ll be a Jayhawk grad too in a couple of years.

I’m not quitting what I do now. Instead I’m enhancing it. I’ve taken stock of my life, and I’m simply looking to recharge. I think the master’s degree is just what I need.

When I meet with new college graduates as part of a mentoring program or internship, I explain that their first job is only a stepping stone to the next and then the next… and sometimes not even in the same career field. Two generations ago, it was common to select a career and then you retired 50ish years later from that same career. Thank God that’s changed. I just think that would have been so boring!

Today, my life consists of two teenagers (who want to spend no time with me), a husband and an elderly mom who lives nearby. Most of my focus is on my business. I knew I wanted to sprinkle in something new. I’ve had this dream in the back of my mind for a decade, and 2018 is the year!

Working with college students or having interns has been important to me since I started my own PR firm in 2003. I’ve always considered mentorship as a growth opportunity, not just for the mentee. Darn it when I actually learn more from them than they do from me!

So when I was selected to help on this advisory council I decided that the time was right to jump in with both feet.

Ultimately, I want to find a teaching job in Kansas City where I can work in the areas I’m most passionate about: public relations, journalism, social marketing, communications or the combination. I believe one stepping stone has lead me to the next and finally to my destination, which is mentoring and educating college students. In the meantime, you will find me with a backpack, a laptop and a book, because I will BE the college student.

 

 

Success with Collaboration

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Photo caption: PR girls should know better than to do a photoshoot on the hottest day of the summer! What were we thinking?

I’ve had my own company for 14 years and it took me the first five years to figure out how to categorize it. I started by saying I was a freelancer or a subcontractor. But as I grew and got more clients and even my own subcontractors, things began to change.

My elevator speech morphed into: Hi, I own my own boutique PR agency. But we were a unique model. Today, I don’t believe we are. We are collaborators who work virtually rather than a traditional PR firm. Most of the people I work with have their own business cards and have successful marketing, writing, graphic design or social media freelance companies of their own. I have longstanding relationships with: Ashley Cleveland, Erica Cohen, Laurie Morrissey, Kari D’Amato, Nancy Besa, Angela Presnell, Suze Parker, Robyn Caulfield, Jenny Kincaid, Melanie Deardorff, Elaine Symanski, Kerry O’Connor, Jenny Wheat and more. We exchange ideas, business leads and referrals and most importantly collaborate on client work!

I spoke to an agency owner in 2004 who had been doing marketing and PR this way in San Francisco for more than a decade. He described his business model and to this day I’ve patterned my company after his. Through Kansas City International Association of Business Communicators, I’ve met many other small/boutique PR firms and other communicators who have similar businesses set up very much the same. I knew this was the model I wanted to continue for my business.

I love working from home (at least most days I do when the kids and pets aren’t driving me crazy), and I love having the flexibility of subcontractors.

But I think the best part of this model is being able to take advantage of the collaboration of experts in the industry. When my clients have a complex challenge, it makes sense for my business to capitalize on specific individuals who I’m confident will be successful for specific strategies.

How have we been successful? Communication is paramount. Facilitating information flow across clients and the team through weekly status meetings, daily emails and other tools is just one of the ways we support each other.

What does this look like for the future? Even more collaboration! As a boutique PR firm handling social media, grassroots marketing, media outreach, influencer relations and community events, we have already been working collaboratively with larger advertising agencies and digital firms as their “PR department.” I predict that trend will continue as the industry evolves.

When working with these larger agencies, it has been so exciting to be a part of a team servicing a big client and a more comprehensive agency team. I’ve learned a few things as an “agency collaborator” and it’s been a rewarding challenge.

  • We’re collaborators not competitors.
  • Egos are checked at the door.
  • We must prove collaborative results and be willing to work cross agency.

Like all industries, this one continues to evolve and I’m excited about the future of collaboration and continued industry networking.

New Year’s Rear View Mirror

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megan and EricaLast year I made resolutions. It’s not often that we are willing to talk about our resolutions from last year. Why? Because that means accountability and no one likes that word.

2014 was not a good year for me, and I knew that I wanted 2015 to “be my year!” So on New Year’s Eve I set some goals (I’ve been told that resolutions are lame because they usually fizzle out and that instead you should “set goals.”)
These were mine:
 
1.     Invest in professional development – Despite the expense, I’ve wanted to go to PRSA’s Counselors Academy Spring Conference for a decade. And it turned out to be exactly what I needed. The professional experience was excellent and the comradery with old friends was even better. I needed a few days away to soak up my industry, remember why I do what I do and drink wine until midnight with an old friend I haven’t seen in 12 years. I wish I could go every year.
 
2.     Be inspired on a mission trip – I reviewed my work calendar and found a short-term trip in October to Haiti with my church, Life Mission Church. It was an incredible 10 days to an orphanage with 100 children. I will be forever changed. I went on this adventure not knowing a single person in the group and ended with some great friends. How can I and my family be so blessed to have been born in this country? How can I help my children wake up every day knowing how fortunate they are? How can those amazing little children and teens be so lovely when they are suffering? I pray that I can do another trip or take my kids on a trip someday.
 
As I reflect this New Year’s Eve, I see a few things in my rear view mirror including inspiration for new goals for 2016. 
 
Professionally: I want to continue to emphasize “communication for the good” for my business and my clients. I met a lot of very smart people at the Counselors Academy conference including one who coincidentally was a young woman from Overland Park but who now lives and works in Portland, Oregon at Prichard Communications – specializing in “communication for a better world.” I’m fascinated with that concept for my clients. At MNPR, we have some non-profit clients and work to implement savvy cause marketing campaigns for all of our clients. 
 
Personally, my goal is simple: my family! They believe I’m a work-a-holic. So, I’d like to get better at balance and fun. I’m going to set specific goals for fun. (does that take the fun out of it? I hope not!) Easy things like dinners, movies, date nights, bowling, staycations.

Let’s see if a year from now I’m brave enough to look in the rear view mirror as we embark on 2017!

Happy New Year!

Millennials – Thanks for collaborating! Now, please stop texting.

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poetry book family photo

(I’m not pictured yet in this photo. I’m still yet to come! I was number 5.)

I’m a gen-Xer. I’m kinda jealous of my millennial little bros and sisters. I feel like I’m the middle child; mad that the youngest is getting all of the attention.

As the baby in my own family, I remember my brothers and sisters say things like:

  • She got a car, we didn’t!
  • Her curfew is later!
  • She gets to go on a spring break trip, we stayed home!

Today, I feel like I keep hearing the same messaging: We must cater to the millennials.

I realize in marketing and PR, I have to pay very close attention to the millennials preferences because of their incredible buying power in the marketplace. Things like:

  • How they like to place their orders for food,
  • Online shopping preferences,
  • Facebook, Twitter and Instagram views,
  • How they communicate, and
  • How they consume the news.

As applicants and employees, millennials seem confident but sometimes lack in good old-fashioned persistent. We usually hire interns who don’t just send an email, but followup with a phone call because a tenacious young professional is the kind of intern that we’re looking for.

Some of the best learning experiences for new professionals in the workforce is to collaborate. I think it is important for all of us Gen-Xers and beyond to mentor (good learning experience for us too!), help motivate and show our appreciation.

I try to offer constructive criticism to interns and mentees from time to time, but something I’ve seen a few times recently in client meetings is an unconscious use of cell phones.

My advice: GET OFF YOUR PHONE.

Find something for your hands to do without it. Do not bring it to a meeting or if you do, put it away, do not text during a meeting, do not check your Instagram and do not have it out on the table. Without your phone, you might be able to:

  1. be engaged
  2. offer input
  3. live your life in the moment and truly learn from us old folks some times

In fact, I learn every day from working with young professionals, and I plan to continue my education by surrounding myself with bright young minds.

Do I have to?

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Learning new things at my age has become common place. I thought that after college and by my 20s and even my 30s, I would become a “seasoned” professional (just read my bio, because it says I’m “seasoned”); and wouldn’t have to spend my days learning. Instead, I would sit back and counsel all of the less smart people of the world with my intelligence. Of course, I would get paid millions of dollars for this amazing “counsel.”

Well, for anyone who isn’t past their 30s… lucky you, first of all! And, secondly, you’re not done learning. Not by a long shot.

I’ve considered going back to school to get a master’s degree. I’d like to re-career some day and teach college. (Maybe if I become a college professor I’d finally be done learning!) But going to school is not the kind of traditional classroom learning I’m talking about.

I’m talking about the daily lessons I get from real world experiences. Things like:

  • younger professionals who school me on how to use the new technology in a meaningful way to reach target audiences.
  • online professional resources – I have a few favorites on vocabulary and grammar. (I know… I’m weird)
  • incredible professional organizations such as the Master’s and Independent Communicator’s groups within KC/IABC as well as the monthly meetings. These face-to-face meetings are a tremendous resource. I have truly benefited from learning lessons from these groups and still draw on these individuals when I have questions.
  • a new lesson from someone outside of my industry who is more than happy to tell me all of his or her secrets over coffee that I can use at my PR firm. (I’ve learned to do ad buying, fundraising, graphic design, websites and much more from these experts)

I was blown away yesterday when I sat down with a longtime friend who took more than hour out of her schedule to walk me through her decades of industry knowledge for a small client of mine. In exchange: a promise to help her out sometime and an inexpensive lunch. Obviously, I can’t become an expert like her in an hour but I was writing furiously to try to capture just a little of her vast knowledge to share with my client.

In turn, I try to always do the same for others. When I meet with small businesses who are looking for PR help, I offer them a short tutorial and even share my media list, knowing they may not have the resources to hire a PR firm or consultant. Why not offer them a lesson and pay it forward? After all, it has become clear to me… learning never stops.

One decade in business. A few lessons I’ve learned.

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natalies-born-9-3-03-150x150

My favorite photo of the day Natalie was born ten years ago. It looks like she’s smiling at her dad!

This is my tenth year owning my own PR firm. You learn working in PR that no one “in the biz” really celebrates anniversaries. I would have trouble even remembering the date except for one very significant reminder. I started my business just a few months before my daughter was born. So big and pregnant… I opened my laptop, cell phone in hand, on the couch of my parent’s house and started a PR consultancy company. We had just moved to town from Scottsdale and hadn’t even bought a house yet. This probably isn’t exactly part of the ideal business plan when you go to the SBA or the Kauffman Foundation’s entrepreneurship program. But it worked for me.

Like with a lot of small businesses, it takes time to work through the first few years. Things like: learning the art of prioritization and delegation; how to say no; do I REALLY have to file taxes EVERY year; and so on.

In addition to the tedious things every new business owner has to learn about taxes and technology, I’ve put together a list of “First Decade New Business Lessons Learned” by Megan Neher. I plan to read this 10 years from today and get a good laugh. Hopefully I’ll have a whole new list of new lessons learned by then!

1. FIO. Anyone who knows me will understand this acronym. I had hoped it would catch on like LOL or OMG. It stands for “Figure It Out,” and it’s something I tell every new intern or college student I’m advising. I think back to when I started as a newspaper reporter. At 23 years old, driving around the city with a folded paper map, not a GPS, figuring out how to get from one place to the next without Google. I had a written calendar, no cell phone and did research the old fashioned way. I’m not suggesting we go back to that; I just think we need to allow people to figure things out on their own.

2. Breathe. This lesson took me nearly ten years to learn. It’s basically my way of saying “don’t sweat the small stuff.” As I look around at clients and colleagues, I’m observing similar professionals my age going through the same growing pains. I guess this is something we all do! Start out rigid, and as we grow and mature in our professions, we become more flexible. We begin to understand that it is the gray area where progress happens.

3. My bra is not the only support I need! I’ve enjoyed being a part of KC/IABC but especially the entrepreneurs (support) group now called independent communicators. We meet monthly to talk about a variety of topics including things like clients, taxes, technology, websites, workload and more. It’s been my best support group, my best resources for subcontractors and a wonderful place to meet friends.

4. Don’t underestimate follow-up. This has become my secret to maintaining happy clients. (don’t tell my competitors!)

5. Mistakes aren’t for newbies… unfortunately. I wanted to get my mistakes out of the way early on and be done with them, but guess what? I’m still making them, and I’ve come to the realization that learning lessons the hard way is sometimes the only way we’ll learn.

6. Faith. I have a unrelenting faith in people. I can’t get rid of it. I am a terrible judge of character and instead of becoming a skeptic, I’ve decided to embrace it and continue to believe in people even when they let me down. I’m constantly surprised by them when they disappoint me, but at least I’m optimistic. And, by the grace of God, I haven’t been hurt by anyone too terribly bad, so perhaps my faith in people isn’t misplaced after all!

7. Home sweet home. As much as I’d like to be “more professional” with a real office, receptionist, fake plant, logo hanging on the wall… all of those things will never outweigh the ease of having a home office. I can roll out of bed, make coffee in my slippers and get two hours of work done before 8 a.m. or squeeze in three hours of work after the kids go to bed. (Of course the home office challenges my work-life balance from time to time, but it’s been remarkable how clients and others have understood kids and dogs in the office!)

8. Solitary confinement. I can’t do this job alone, nor do I want to. I loved working at the advertising agency in Arizona because of the close friendships I made. I quickly turned my “sole proprietorship” into a boutique PR shop so I could bring in some seasoned experts to learn from, share ideas and collaborate. I wouldn’t have it any other way. Ashley Cleveland has worked with me for about seven years and she’s been a gift from heaven. I’ve partnered with other colleagues along the way too, including Nancy Besa. We share a lot of laughs as well as ideas!

So those are some of the lessons I’ve learned. And, trust me… there are many, many others.

After 10 years, what do the next 10 years have in store – who knows? More figuring it out; mistakes and faith! I do hope to breathe a little more and maybe even change the company’s name. What a boring name! Got any ideas?

Kill them with kindness… even in business

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I just finished a call with a potential client who is getting hammered through social media and online comments because of a very public scandal. She was seeking a publicist. I was happy to offer some counsel, although in the end I wasn’t the right person for the job. She and I went back and forth throughout a weekend over the phone with ideas on how to combat this attack.

She paid me the ultimate compliment. She said I was kind, and that very few people are kind to her because of the scandal and the mis-communication that it has caused.

That reminded me of a promise I made to myself 20 years ago.

I was cowering behind a cubicle wall at a very large public company where I worked in the finance department where they had unwisely hidden the small PR team. The president of the company had stormed up to our group at 6 p.m. to rant and rave about a speech I had written and inadvertently had left revisions that had been made in a previous edit. My boss at the time stood up tall and took the blows. He never once said, Megan wrote the speech. She’s the one to blame. She’s the dummy who didn’t make the right edits. Meanwhile, this idiot making six-figures was hollering every word in the book at the top of his lungs so that anyone in finance, real estate, marketing and even down in IT could hear his slurs.

I promised myself at that very moment. No matter how important success became to me, I would not act like THAT. I would not become unkind. And, I would not treat people disrespectfully.

I do not hold myself up as unique. Recently, I was in a meeting of communication professionals for KC/IABC at our monthly Independent Communicators luncheon. Our discussion topic turned to this very issue – with a slight twist. Can a woman gain success in the business world while maintaining a kind demeanor? And we all agreed she can!

Kindness and respect in the workplace was significant to every single person in the group (mostly women). And although it had been challenged throughout the years for us, and we’d definitely seen women and men who had climbed the ladder more quickly or furiously because of their lack of kindness, it wasn’t something we were willing to sacrifice.

Stay true to your promises. Go Kindness!   :)

I love grammer, I mean… grammar!

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Some people think I’m sick. I love grammar. I like to edit things. I scour for errors. I’m not unlike many of you out there. I cringe when my husband says, “where’s it at?” or I get a newsletter from school that says “Event Tonite!”

I come from a long line of freaky editor types. My grandmother was born in 1901 and was the editor of The Kansan at the University of Kansas in 1920. She also worked on the yearbook, as did my mother. I went to K-State, but was an editor at both the college newspaper and the yearbook. Maybe grammar is in our blood.

“It’s lie, dear,” my grandmother would say when I would say that I was going to go lay down for a nap. Ouch, that’s even hard to type those words now.

In today’s world, young people don’t care about grammar. Yes, they have to for English class. But otherwise there’s no pride. And, I’m not just talking about texting. It’s not just young people. I think because people are consuming media differently, there’s a general lax. Very few of my adult friends subscribe to the newspaper, nor do they read it. So how are they to learn/be reminded of good grammar if they aren’t consistantly consuming quality written media?

One example. I upload my clients’ press releases to an online service on the Kansas City Star’s website. (I’m not sure why I do this because I don’t think anyone reads this site or cares about it, but at least it’s on there.) Anyway, while I’m on the site, I’ll read some of the other press releases. Most are very professional. A few appear to be written by second-graders. I’m shocked by the disregard of the rules of sentence structure, punctuation, spelling and grammar.

There’s been a lot in the media about texting and how it is ruining the youth’s writing skills. I agree. Hopefully most young people can see the difference between a text and true writing.

What scares me is going beyond that. For the past… errrr… I don’t know… 10 years or so… I was one of the few former journalist-turned-something-else who believed the newspaper would never die. I’m over that. I believe in the next five years or so there will be no newspaper in my driveway every morning, and that makes me very sad. I love opening it up. I love spreading it out. I love touching it.

So, here’s my question: will college students study print journalism? Why would they? That won’t even exist. Will every college student who wants to be a “journalistic writer” get a degree in online journalism? Is that writing different? It shouldn’t be. I don’t want online journalism or writing for online in general to be considered so temporary that we can be sloppy.

Some may think they don’t have to really care about grammar or rules because it is just for “online” or just a blog. Some blog writing is atrocious. I suppose that’s OK if a grandma is simply chronicling her soup recipe or a mom is writing about her son’s first year, but there should be a difference between the paid professional who studied for four years to become a… journalistic blog writer?

I would hope that there are college professors meeting right now and developing curriculum for this next generation of writers. I would ask them to please require each student to purchase a printed copy of the AP Stylebook and to READ it cover to cover as I did – twice. Along with many other good books on grammar. These books should be studied and these students should be tested on the rules of grammar.

Finally, for those who uncover good writing online and ferret out some bloggers or online journalists who truly care about the written word – whether it appears on a screen or on a printed page, let’s applaud them… for they may be an endangered species.

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