Media cowboys

The more I talk to media companies, NGOs, journalism colleges and PR outlets about media training the more I realise just how much I've learned through blogging and associated online publishing over the past decade. I was in the offices of a pretty well known media organisation last week to discuss training. I'd been recommended by two of their employees whom I'd trained on separate courses in the preceeding year. It looks like I'll be setting up some blog/social media/news tracking courses for them. It intrigued me that they complained about the number of cowboys they'd met working in this field. I suggested they check the 'digital footprint' of anyone cold calling before they even think of letting them throught the door. It's good to see Suw expand on that a little lot. Lots of good stuff in there, but I like Dave's quality assurance test questions for any would-be trainer recruiter,

1. Can you give me an example of social media work you’ve completed for a client recently?
2. How do you go about pitching bloggers?
3. How do you monitor what people are saying about you?
4. Where can I find you online?
5. Can you (ghost) write my blog for me?
6. How do you measure results?
7. How would you define social media?
8. Can you just pretend to be me online?

Beyond all of this, my main bugbear I've encountered too many times in this field is folk who don't know how to give a presentation, have no formal teacher training (and boy does it show) and think that knowing stuff is enough. It ain't. Alors, for what it's worth, to add to Dave and Suw's thoughts, my two practcial rules for training/talking,

Rule No.1: Never ever ever rely on wifi/technology. It will fail. Search through any of the Le Webs and wotnot and you'll see a litany of awful presentations, mumbled words and presentations that don't work simply because the idiot giving it designed it to work only if the conference/seminar/webinar/twitup wifi works properly. And it never does.

Rule No.2 Simple. Be bloody interesting. Most of this stuff is pretty dull to describe at the best of times. Don't grind your trainees into a coma with flowcharts, graphs, pie charts and slides packed with words. If social media is so much bloody fun, make it so.

If you ever happen to be at one of my talks, training sessions it's all pictures all the time. The longest piece of text you'll get on a slide of mine is about seven words. Over and out.