The Social Media Release was a concept started two years ago by PR 2.0 mavens Todd Defren and Brian Solis. The form took on several iterations and has been experimented with by several marketers. It has been discussed quite frequently, has encouraged the wires to engage social media elements, yet has failed to really take off. But Ford Motor Company and its agency the Social Media Group (SMG) have taken the Social Media Release (SMR) to a new level for various products like the Ford Focus and F150.
Ford’s innovations in the SMR include a new storyboard approach, which focuses less on the possible conversation value of social media press release, and more on catalyzing content creators to take parts and develop their own content. It also assumes that some readers will want to engage in certain media forms, and not all of them. Further the revised SMR delivers “digital snippets of information.”
The resulting smorgasborg of social media creates easily digestible “snacks” that allow for readers’ choice. Rather than issuing the SMR with all of their media on the wires, Ford and SMG are leveraging existing social networks like Flickr and YouTube to ensure they provide easily access to content from a variety of ways. Ford’s social PR effort is truly liquid.
I asked Social Media Group President Maggie Fox a couple of Qs on their Digital Snippet SMR. Here’s what she had to say:
BB: Are all of elements essential? Can companies plug and play as they need to?
MF: All elements are not essential, but if the story is not something you expect to have evolve over time, and you haven’t got rich content like video or images, this platform really isn’t a good fit. I’d recommend a "regular" release.
BB: Will standards be developed, or a WP template for the SMR?
MF: Standards are in the works, and our backend development is wrapped up. We’re pretty happy with the platform, but will continue to improve and customize it to accommodate the needs of different clients. A WP template? A possibility down the road.
Last week, Todd Defren indicated SHIFT is working on a new SMR template, too. It’ll be interesting to see how the dialogue evolves. One issue that will likely be debated between the two camps is should the actual SMR be comment enabled, or just its elements. This is the storyboard versus conversation piece argument. All of this progress is good. I look forward to learning more from these great innovators.
Hey Geoff, thanks for the props – I’m looking forward to seeing the discussion continue!
Just the phrase “Social Media Press Release” is an oxymoron in and of itself. Read my review of digital snippets and SMPR here and see if you agree…
JTPRATT is referencing an old link to the Focus SMPR for his/her “review” of Digital Snippets. This is the correct one: http://www.ford.digitalsnippets.com/focus/
What would you say that maggie? That’s just not true at all. The link I used in my review to the Focus SMPR was http://ford.digitalsnippets.com/focus/ – and guess what, the URL used in your comments was also http://ford.digitalsnippets.com/focus/.
Listen folks, read my review Ford uses Wordpress and Social Media, and you’ll not only get my take on the SMPR – but I’ll also show how the Ford SMPR site has 351 pages indexed by google but only 2 pages come up in search results. That means the other 349 pages have been sent to google’s supplemental index for a duplicate content penalty because 350 of the 351 pages have the same SERP description because the meta description tags on every page in the site is blank.
What value does the SMPR have if the template and Wordpress backend doesn’t even contain basic SEO for proper listings in google??
John: I’m not going to get into the SEO argument, but I disagree with you on the oxymoron. The press release is a 20th century tool PR practitioners use to update media. The social media release (SMR) is a tool used to provide bloggers and other interested content creators diverse media elements related to corporate information. The true value of an SMR — while it should include SEO — is to deliver storyboard elements to folks who may be interested in the topic, in this case cars. It’s results should be measured first by how many stories it inspires, not Google page rank.
Well then, if the Social Media elease is a tool used to update bloggers, that is in fact my other argument. There is no interactivity that bloggers expect (or Wordpress provides), such as comments and trackbacks. If it truly is for bloggers, storyboard approach or not – it should show bloggers how to use and remix the media elements (encouraging and fostering it). It shouldn’t be measured by how many stories it inspires, it should be measure by how many are using and remixing the media assets.
Actually, JT, a blogger worth their salt doesn’t need to be “shown how to use and remix the media elements.” They already know how to take pieces of text, photos from Flickr, videos from YouTube to create posts. As to how you think usage should be measured, I believe we are at a semantical debate at this point. And the Digital Snippets SMR template has a place to show track backs.