Archive
Opinions
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When Is Too Much News Too Much?
September 11, 2014
In my job, the answer to the question posed above is never… usually. News is our business. If we do our jobs right, our clients own a bit more space in the news today than they did yesterday. But this the Oscar trial and coverage thereof has bordered on the ridiculous. If I were Oscar Pistorious’ communications person, I’d be pretty bored right about now. In fact, I’d probably be somewhere very warm and extremely...
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Tell a Complete Story
September 9, 2014
There are two sides to every brand’s story; one is that of the company’s products and services while the other relates to its behaviour and social impact. According to FleishmanHillard’s Authenticity Study 2014, 48% of consumers across the globe indicated that their perceptions of a company are shaped by the qualities related to its products and services. The remaining 52%’s perceptions are based on management behaviour and the company’s social responsibility and impact...
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Projecting South Africa’s Future – What Will S.A. Look Like in Twenty Years?
July 18, 2014
I recently attended a conference - Projecting the Future: Two Decades Ahead – South Africa in 2034 - I was particularly excited about attending, as it spoke to my academic background and first love of international relations and economic development. However, in the days leading up to my attending, I really started to wonder what South Africa’s economic forecast would look like in twenty years and I couldn’t help but start to feel a little...
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Why Saying Less is More Important Than Ever
July 14, 2014
During a creative writing class a lecturer asked his students to write an essay containing four different elements, namely: religion, royalty, sex and a mystery. The prize-winning essay read: “My God,” exclaimed the princess: “I am pregnant! I wonder who the father is?” This long-standing trend of utilising concise, creative messaging within the marketing and advertising space is more crucial for companies in today’s technology-filled world. Consumers wake up and reach for their smartphone to...
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Be as You Wish to be Seen
June 24, 2014
Have we ever stopped to consider that the way we portray ourselves as individuals or organisations does not necessarily match up to how we wish to be seen? It seems quite obvious, doesn’t it, that you would act in exactly the manner you want people to perceive you as? However many brands or high profile individuals experience this disconnect...
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Getting the Most Out of Shrinking Newsrooms
June 18, 2014
I recently attended a PR Net breakfast at the Innovation Hub in Pretoria. The guest speaker was Virginia Keppler, Beeld Pretoria’s News Editor, who gave us insights into the impact of shrinking news rooms. In 2013, the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) recorded that South African newspapers remain under intense pressure, with figures for the second quarter of 2013 indicating that newspapers recorded an overall average circulation decline of 3.2%. The year-on-year drop from the...
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Media as the Fourth Estate
May 29, 2014
On Wednesday, 21 May, I attended the Standard Bank Sikuvile Journalism Awards, hosted by the Print and Digital Media South Africa (PDMSA). This year the awards were special, over and above celebrating great journalism and journalists, they were celebrating 20 Years of Press Freedom – which came with 20 years of South Africa’s democracy...
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Another Shuffle At the Department of Communications
May 27, 2014
President Jacob Zuma’s decision to replace communications minister, Yunus Carrim, with the controversial Siyabonga Cwele, has certainly raised a few eyebrows. Cwele is the former minister of state security and an advocate of the contentious Protection of State Information Bill (aka Secrecy Bill). His former wife, Sheryl Cwele, was convicted three years ago of dealing in drugs...
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Twitter Removes Barriers for Advertisers
May 20, 2014
Twitter has opened up its advertising offering to small businesses and the man on the street. Up until a few weeks ago, if you wanted to advertise on Twitter, you were expected to invest a minimum spend of R150, 000. Twitter is first choice when it comes to generating instant traffic and user engagement which is pivotal for any online strategy. The traditional way of promoting your brand through Twitter (without selling the farm) was...
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Malaysia Airline MH370 Missing Plane Crisis Escalates to Another Crisis
May 15, 2014
“What really happened to the missing Malaysia Airline plane?” This the alarming question faced by authorities at the moment. I mean an aircraft cannot just disappear and not be found even after two months of intense searching. The quest to find the plane that vanished on 8 March 2014 on its way to Beijing, from Kuala Lumpur, has involved a search of nearly 4.64 million square kilometers of sea and utilized more than 33 search...