This week I have really realised the value of networking. I’ve always been a firm believer in networking but never before has it mattered so much.

Am currently working on a major project that will be launched in every national school in Ireland in the next two weeks. Along the way various network contacts have made it more and more exciting and brought great value to the project. These networks come from various parts of my career and life, don’t just think networks come via work!

Keep your mind open, make contacts and above all tell them what you are doing, you just never know! Watch this space as next week I’ll keep you posted on the exciting project am working on.

To be continued……!

Dunleary's last corner shop

I was walking to my clients offices the other day and noticed this canopy over a shop. I wondered as I strolled what was the message the owners were trying to give. To me it seems a mish mash of confusion. Do we really care it’s the last “corner” shop, it that really a selling point? Its’ newness, is that really worthy of a canopy?

In our PR & marketing we need to give clear messages with something of interest. We need to be careful not just to blast out any old message just to be sending a message. The old “quality not quantity” comes to mind. Why though are we still breaking this golden rule! My last post was about Twitter and the 140 characters that will some become the way we communicate more and more of our messages out there.

Think before you write, what message is really important and what is just fluff!

I was mulling over some PR ideas I had in my head when something struck me, was I tweeting over 10 years ago? What is she on about I hear you say and yes you’re right Twitter wasn’t there. What I am talking about is the “tweeting” I was doing with members of the media when servicing them new singles & albums.

I remember being at a PR seminar in London in the mid 90’s, we had guru of music plugging the late great Scott Piering, he was talking to us cubs about giving the media what they needed not what we wanted them to have. Sitting there it hit me why on earth were we giving DJs at radio stations press releases. Can you imagine the scene a radio DJ, a box of records and a file of press releases, yeah I think not! So what did I come up with? I had to idea of putting a simple sticker on the back of every CD jewel case with a short piece of info related to the artist & release. Thankfully for me the idea worked a treat.

Anyway back to the point. Why is it that we try to kill the media with too much information, why can’t we make the important point in 140 characters or less. Think about it a short bite of relevant key information rather than an A4 page half filled with irrelevant detail. OK so sometimes a press release is needed but no always. Change is coming, in 140 characters or less!

Follow me on twitter: user-name @kathrynthemgmt

Hello,

Welcome to my new website. A massive thanks to my great friend John Williams for helping me sort the glitches – isn’t it always a setting!!!! Anyway @mcawilliams you’re a gent and Mrs Williams makes a great coffee to keep us going!

I was at a social media seminar recently given my Mr Damien Mulley, he spurred me into action to finally get the website/blog sorted. I think I was scared about what to write, yeah I know working in PR and all. Anyway he said introduce yourself…so hello! Welcome to the blog and have a look here to get a feel for who I am and what I love doing – about me

Look forward to all your comments, good and bad…I’m not precious!