As dealers struggle to rebound during these challenging economic times, Caster has developed a Dealer PR Initiative package which allows dealers around the country to promote themselves through public relations, social media, promotional activities, events, and supportive activities. Programs can be paired with Caster clients including companies like Control4, Runco, Paradigm, Surgex and more to maximize regional benefits from products launched by national manufacturers. If you are an intergator who sells home automation, home theater, speakers, remote controls or is adding energy mangement solutions to your offerings, we cnahelp you tell you story.

This program allows for a reasonable budget to help you create the local marketing campaign to message your business to your target market.

1. Development of regional press list
   1. The media is how you can tell your story to your customers.
   2. Media lists will be built using Caster’s proprietary database targeting media in your regional working area.
2. Website review
   1. Caster will review your website and provide suggestions, guidance and even copy writing support to make sure your site is on message and maximizing your searchability through the use of key word optimization
   2. Adding links to key industry and design/home sites
   3. Adding links for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Flickr, YouTube
3. Press Releases
   1. One press release per quarter either on projects you are undertaking or in cooperation with one of your key manufacturers. As they launch a product, with their permission, modifying the release to invite media to see it in your area, adding a quote and contact information to localize the press.
   2. Caster will draft all copy, edit, gain approvals and even work with manufacturer partners to streamline this process for maximum success.
   3. Distribute this release to regional list. Distribution cost are an addition $.20 per contact.
4. Award Entries
   1. Local, regional, national, or industry awards ranging from CEDIA Lifestyles to Mark of Excellence.
   2. Caster will work with you to draft, coordinate customer releases, photos, budgets, etc.
5. Case Studies
   1. Your portfolio sells your work and is the best way to tell your story. Caster will draft one new case study per quarter and pitch the case study for media coverage to regional and national media.
   2. Caster can also create case study templates for you to use to show customers.
6. Social Media
   1. Caster will provide you and your staff a session on what social media is, how to use it to talk with your customers, your reps, your vendors and key media influencers.
   2. We will help you find your voice.
   3. We will help you understand who to follow and how to get followers (or Fans/Likes)
   4. We will help your create dialogue
   5. We will manage and implement your program.
7. Media Outreach
   1. Caster will work with  the media to offer you as an industry and regional expert.
   2. We will provide media training
   3. We will draft a bio for pitching you.
   4. We will implement media outreach to find opportunities for company mentions, quotes, photos and general opportunities.

Our PR approach is not about a single vehicle communication strategy. We have learned that every market is comprised of many niche markets. Customers congregate around highly personalized special interests which are their communities.  Our process will include community building through varying degrees of social media, grass roots, viral, and traditional PR tools. Our goal will be to generate a strategic campaign and implement tactical elements that build real results for dealers in their local areas.

Contact Kimberly Lancaster [ klancaster {at} castercomm.com ] at Caster Communications for more information.

If you didn’t know, Toyota recently recalled 2.3 million vehicles due to an issue with the accelerator-pedal sticking. In response to this recall they launched a heavy public relations campaign through print, TV and social-media.

Advertising Age explained how Toyota is using their Facebook page to post videos from Jim Lentz, the President and Chief Operating Officer for Toyota, talking about the recall. The article goes on to describe how after a just a few of hours there were over 150 people that “liked” the video and 70 positive comments. In addition, when you first pull up the Toyota Facebook page there is a news and information section beneath their picture that includes a link to the recall information page on the Toyota website.

The Recall Information page is full of information that explains what Toyota is doing, including links to a video and a letter from Jim Lentz.  You can also access the Recall Information page through links on the Toyota website and on Toyota’s Twitter page.

The Toyota Twitter page is full of comments, along with questions from Toyota customers and responses from Toyota company members about the recall.  Here is one recent response, “@HannahElliott difficult to answer now. It will be measured in months not weeks. We begin repairs this week & have a better idea then #lentz”.

Aside from social media Toyota has used traditional media to help mitigate the public negative reaction from the recall. Toyota bought full page print ads in 20 of the nation’s largest newspapers and sent Jim Lentz on the Today Show to talk about the recall. 

This PR campaign is a prime example of how social media today is a great help in spreading information quickly and widely to the public. Traditional media , like newspaper ads, articles and TV, are definitely still a necessity but having social media is an extra way for companies like Toyota to reach out to the public. Social media also allows customers to leave comments and sometimes get direct responses from Toyota team members.

Toyota needs to be doing everything they can to reach out to their customers at this time and using social media is a great additional way to make sure of it.

Posted by Megan/Follow me on Twitter

There are those of us (not me) who are excellent artists – like those people on cop shows that can draw a perfect rendition of the face of someone they have never met based on a description given by someone who was standing 100 yards away (“he had a nose… hair, it might have been brown – or black – maybe dark blonde.  Glasses, I think – but definitely eyes”).   There are those that are great writers – Shakespeare, Mark Twain, Perez Hilton (ok – maybe not so much with Perez – but he’s funny… usually).  And now, there is a new breed of greatness developing.   Those who are social-media mavens.  They can use Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to do ridiculously amazing things, whereas I can only use them for what they were initially designed for – a way to keep in touch with friends and family.  There are those among us who are making a huge impact on the world we live in with 140 characters and the click of a button… comparatively, by the end of this sentence it will have taken me 196 words to get to the main point of this blog – and so, without further ado – I bring to you… the #TWITPITCH!

Kind of.  But first – a history lesson.

About a year ago, a journalist named Stowe Boyd decided that he no longer wanted to be pitched stories through the traditional means of e-mail and phone calls.  He preferred the 140 character method of Twitter.  By being able to pitch an idea in 140 characters (or less!) a PR professional should, ideally, be able to convey their entire message quickly and concisely.  According to the article from PR Daily, at least 2  other journalists have picked up on the trend, and encourage PR professionals to pitch them only via Twitter.

Taking a different approach – many companies are now turning to social-media to promote their brands; many companies are posting YouTube demonstrations of their products, almost every company has a Facebook “fan” page ( apparently I am a “fan” of a lot of things – including some things that have no relevance to my life what-so-ever), and lots of companies are taking up residence in the Twitterverse (which I tried to link to a definition, but apparently it doesn’t have an official one).  By using Twitter, companies are essentially able to pitch their new products and announcements directly to consumers, rather than just to reporters and editors.

And now, some real life application.

I had already started writing this blog when I was assigned the task of creating “10-15″ twitpitches for one of our clients.  This particular client has one of their products in use in a very public place,  the plan is to blast a couple tweets out to the Twitterverse saying basically “hey if you’re here, check it out!”.   Perfect, I thought.  I am already ”researching” twitpitches -  I’ll use this for my blog!  I figured that the assignment couldn’t be too hard – a couple quick short announcements of a fact.  EASY! Orrr not.

Here is what I have found (… well, decided).

Coming up with 140 characters of information is hard.  140 characters of “Hey I bought new shoes” is simple – see, I just did it!  But actually getting a message across takes some skill.  It took me about an hour to come up with 8 very different, but still informative and (hopefully) attention-grabbing tweets all focused around the same thing.  When you’re limited to 140 characters and you have to use the same basic words at least once in each tweet (obviously I had to mention the product and location each time, so those took up at least 20 of my characters) being creative is tough.

In theory, the twitpitch is great.  In practice – it’s astounding.  It costs nothing and assuming you’ve got a lot of followers, which a lot of companies do, you’re able to get your message out to lots of people.  Efficiency is key, however.  Telling the Twitterverse you’ve got a new product is cool, but linking to it is essential – and those links take up characters.  Making sure people know where they can find a product is important, but don’t forget to include the hashtags (ex: “#caster” – hashtags make words easily searchable through twitter).  Being able to tweet your product in 140 characters or less and have it be memorable and informative is practically an art form.  Do not take twitpitching lightly.  If you’re doing a great job of it, and using it sparingly – they could prove to be invaluable to your company.  If you are just bombarding your followers with links and “buy this now!” types of messages, you may find that you’re “unfollowed” pretty quickly.

Just for reference, below is an example of how long a 140 character tweet it.

DogWiggles has just released their most innovative dog leash yet and its only $40.  Buy it now at http://bit.ly/3jhP30 and have a happy pup.

(The link is fake – I made up a webaddress [I think] to show a shortened Twitter link, which people tend to use, rather than lengthy URLs.)

Notice that I didn’t include any hashtags, and it isnt exactly interesting.  But it’s all I could come up with in 140 characters and a fake product/company.

Posted by Courtney | Follow me on Twitter