IABC To Take Leadership Role with Social Media Releases
Today it was announced that the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) will take a leadership role in furthering the development and adoption of Social Media Releases.
The existing Social Media Release Working Group was a loose collection of SMR advocates, each of whom found their good intentions stymied by the enormity of the task of furthering the SMR’s evolution (i.e., they have day jobs). But the IABC is a network of communication professionals with more than 15,000 members in 70 countries and 100 chapters worldwide. Which means that they just may have the clout, commitment and connections to truly “move the ball downfield.”
According to my buddy Brian Solis:
“The SMR is a catalyst for not only providing a new tool to share news, information and content, but also creating a forum to discuss how to improve press releases in general.
“The whole point of this working group and aligning with the IABC is to create an official standard and process that the entire industry can understand and support, from creation to distribution to building stories.”
And that’s a good thing. There have been tons of examples of Big Corporations and wire services adopting the SMR, along with genuine adoption by some of the PR industry’s biggest names … but that hasn’t stilled the debate about whether SMRs are worth doing in the first place.
However, the IABC’s active advocacy of an SMR standard implies that there will BE a standard; there will BE a future. The SMR concept clearly has legs.
What does this mean to me, personally, in terms of my previously announced plans to unveil a “version 2.0” of our original template?
First off, I already have a “1.5” template that advances the current SHIFT template, but, personally I am not happy with incrementalism. I am hoping to spiff it up even more, and debut a true “2.0” version sometime this Spring. (If you are a total SMR geek and want to see the “1.5” template that now languishes on my hard drive, lemme know.)
As a part of the IABC Working Group, I will proffer these efforts to the IABC team, for consideration as part of the standard-making process. Some of the ideas will make the cut, some won’t - but given the high caliber of my fellow Working Group members (many of whom are listed in IABC’s announcement), I am cool with that.
Meanwhile, for what it’s worth, I just want to throw out a huge round of THANK YOU’s to Brian, for being one of the SMR’s most active and articulate defenders; to Chris Heuer, for keeping the fire lit; to Shel Holtz, for his wisdom and support throughout; to Shannon Whitley, for his indefatiguable good humor and technical prowess; and to Tom Foremski, for lighting a fire under our collective butts to stop doing the same ol’ thing. There are plenty of other folks that deserve thanks, but I can see a huge hook coming my way…
I know other bloggers are planning to write about this news. I’ll update this post periodically to highlight their efforts.
Continue reading here: Twitter Rule #2: Remember That You're Being Watched
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