An email landed in my inbox this morning announcing that it was a year since my first Parkrun. It motivated me to write about my past year in running, and to ponder on volunteer communities. I am a late convert to running, though I ran a lot in my teens (I did some cross-country for …
Category: networks
Sep 06 2018
Epson targets freelancers’ print costs
Epson’s central London pop-up shop gives visitors a space to co-work and to test their new EcoTank printers – which offers the UK’s growing population of freelances and SMEs a cost-effective alternative to ink cartridge machines. Three times (so far) in 2018 I have had to dash out to a nearby supermarket and buy expensive …
Oct 15 2017
Launching a CIPR independent PR practitioners network
Long-term readers of my PR blog will know that I have been seeking to improve CIPR provision for independent practitioners since 2014 when I chaired a CIPR roundtable of independent PR practitioners (aka freelance PRs, or solo PRs) at the institute’s Russell Square HQ. Once elected to the CIPR’s Council, I began to agitate about how the …
Jun 23 2015
#ProtectFOP or lose your marketing collateral
Proposed EU changes to national Freedom of Panorama (FoP) rights could have a profound potential impact on individuals and organisations taking photographs or videos of modern buildings and sharing them in any public media. I blogged about it yesterday, musing also on the extent to which architects and other design firms would be prepared to …
Jun 22 2015
City-Insights: hyper-local story-telling
As a construction technology blogger, I sometimes encounter tools that have wider potential including use by communications professionals. City-Insights helps ‘tell stories about places’ via mobile devices, and could be used for a host of hyper-local internal and external communication purposes. At a recent COMIT* community day, I met Tim Gardom, the founder of City-Insights, a …
Jun 21 2015
PR use of public images under FOP threat
Photographs including modern buildings and other creative works may fall foul of new European Parliament copyright proposals. New constraints on ‘freedom of panoroma’ may stop PR businesses using photos and videos taken in public places for professional purposes, including reuse on social media. Do you take photographs on your foreign holidays? Perhaps share some of …
Mar 02 2015
Tweetchat helps UK SoloPRs set agenda
A CIPR tweetchat attracting over 60 participants has helped set a direction for UK independent PR practitioners. I participated in two CIPR tweetchats last week. CIPRSM Hackday The first was run as part of the CIPR Social Media Panel‘s first PR ‘hackday’, in which the panel focused in depth on a social media issue relating …
Feb 23 2015
UKSoloPRs tweetchat on Friday 27 February
The first CIPR tweetchat focused on independent PR practitioners is scheduled for Friday 27 February, starting at 12 noon GMT and lasting approximately one hour. The main hashtag will be #CIPRchat (though I am sure one or two others might get used along the way). I am hoping we get some good participation from the …
Jan 14 2015
Mobile, PR and social media
As a member of the CIPR’s social media panel, I volunteered last year to coordinate production of a guide on “Mobile and public relations“. After persuading a few others to contribute, I wrote about half of the document, which was published on the CIPR website in November, and launched via a Tweetchat the following day. (I …
Jan 08 2015
#MicroBizMattersDay, 9 January 2015
MicroBizMattersDay is promoting self-help among the self-employed and micro-SME owners, from marketing to construction and beyond. Last year, I mentioned National Freelancers Day, and I visited several small businesses in my south-east London locality participating in Small Business Saturday in December. Today, I have been reading about another initiative aimed at SMEs and sole traders: …