The course outline:

1. Basics of Online Comms
2. Developing a Communications Bible
3. Developing a Comms Philosophy
4. Working with: Blogs, Forums, Twitter etc.
5. Finding Tools – Who is talking about you online?
6. Crisis Communications

My background

As someone who makes websites for a living and spends quite a lot of her spare time online, I would consider myself fairly ‘online savvy’ already. PR, marketing and advertising are all subjects I have an interest in both from a creative and an online point of view but what knowledge or skill I think I have is purely based on readings picked up along the way. In other words, I have zero training and it has been up until recently a casual interest.

So why was I there?

Firstly, I wanted to learn. I’m becoming increasingly interested in the growth, power and influence of online PR and I wanted to see if what I have picked up along the way was right or wrong and (naturally) to learn new things. Even if I never apply such knowledge in a formal client situation through my work I think it’s knowledge you can apply to yourself as an individual with your own online presence.

Secondly (and quite bluntly), I wanted to see Damien at work so I know who I can recommend him to if and when the situation presents itself.

And last but not least, it was free. Let’s be honest, we all love a freebie especially when it’s a good one like this.

What did I think of the workshop?

As an outline online PR workshop I thought it was very good. If you have a client or if you yourself are not convinced that you need to worry about online PR then this will flip that opinion on its head and rightly so. A wide range of platforms and useful tools were covered in the presentation and some key points were communicated well through case studies. The unfortunate yet timely blip in Boards.ie last week made for a great example of crisis management, an area that online PR has huge importance whether the crisis itself is an online or an offline matter.

A lot of what was covered is up on the Mulley Comms blog and a post on building a Business Communications Bible worth casting your eye over is here.

Would I attend another Mulley Communications course/workshop?

Yes.

Would I be happy to pay for it?

Yes.

Would I hire Mulley Comms to take care of my online PR?

Yes.

Cheers Damien for an interesting day and props for getting us out of bed and somewhat alert on a Saturday morning.

Haiti - despite the media and online coverage, we still have no concept of how awful things are in Haiti at the moment. Help out my donating to Goal online – they’re out there on the ground with The Haven Project.

Via Mashable – the UN have an opening for a Social Media Editor (Internship).

Want to see a screening of Lemonade happen in Dublin? Then stick your name in the comments. What’s it about? Here’s a shpiel:

“What do people who were once paid to be creative for a living do when they’re laid off? They get creative with their own lives. Lemonade is an inspirational film about 16 advertising professionals who lost their jobs and found their calling, encouraging people to listen to that little voice inside their head that asks, “What if?”

Tom Dunne of Newstalk and Something Happens fame is on Twitter since yesterday thanks to encouragement by Graham Linehan. Check out @tomhappens on the interpipes.

Ryan Carson is over at ThinkVitamin wondering what you would like to see in an online conference. Think CSS, Frameworks, Rails, iPhone development etc. Have your say here.

Quite proud that this shot made Pix.ie’s longlist for 2009 Photo of the Year. I took it with my compact while cursing and dreaming of a Canon 450D. Hopefully that dream will become reality this year.

2FM has a new schedule and Rick is slotted in from 12 till 3. So far so good, velvety voice.

The first Irish Stew Championships hits Sligo this March as part of the ‘SÓ Sligo‘ festival.

Andy Clarke on why ignorance is bliss and continues to sing the praises of designing ‘in the browser’.

I want to learn to dance this year. Just no idea what type. Dance Ireland kick off all sorts of lessons this month.

Mr. Mulley is giving an workshop in Online PR on Jan 23.

Got a good business development and online head on you? Come work at X Communications.

It’s got me wondering if it’s some kind of stab at a “viral marketing” campaign or a hugely embarrassing spotlight on an overlooked step in the website’s ad posting process. I’m inclined to think it’s the latter and if so I can’t understand how a brand as (seemingly) big as Ben Dunne would fail to monitor or take action on such a potentially damaging situation.

I have to admit to taking some pleasure in the humour of some of the supposed ads, particularly after having endured the awkward and somewhat irritating ads on the radio for the website that were being run repeatedly before the website ever got up and running at all. It did provide some light relief from the dreaded Budget coverage online also.

How long will it take for the spam to be stopped? Is there anybody watching? One thing’s for sure, Ben is going to see quite a spike in his traffic analytics – let’s just hope he doesn’t count the extra few hundred or thousand hits as a milestone and fuel for his next radio ad.

The entire event was streamed live from Dawson St and you can catch up on the presentations and discussions of the day via the U-Stream channel page or clicking on the videos below. If you want to hit on a specific part of the day, check out the schedule here. For information on the film competition being run by Darklight & the EU, check out www.darklight.ie/democracy.

X Comms logo gets Lego treatment

X Communications (the lovely place I work) is trying to get a nice snappy URL sorted for the company Facebook page. We’ve got 65 of the 100 fans needed to be eligible so if you think you might like to help us on our way click here, log in & become a fan.

If you’re choosey about who you fan or just wonder who X Communications/X Comms are, here’s a bit about what we do…

X Communications designs & builds websites, primarily on the Kentico content management system. They’ve been doing it for nearly 15 years from Dublin city centre and have picked up a few lovely awards along the way – check it out!

Some of our latest work can be seen on the funky McDonald’s Ireland homepage (featuring some cool parallax motion effects done with JavaScript and PNGs), the new EU Matters website, the 2009 Shoreditch Festival website and the new website for the Radiological Protection Institute of Ireland (RPII).

If you want to find out a bit more about the projects, check out our blog. If you’re on Twitter, why not come say hi to us @xcommunications or drop us an email to info {at} xcomms.ie

My ideal iQ

On Monday, Toyota Ireland announced on Twitter that they were seeking “4 Irish bloggers wanted to give happy homes to 4 Toyota iQ’s for 2009“.

If you get selected you will have a lovely little Toyota iQ to drive for the next 6 months & you’ll be tweeting & blogging your experience as you go.

Last night @toyotaireland tweeted that in under 12 hours of launching the new iQ promotion, they had received in excess of 100 applications and the toyota.ie website experienced an increase of 13% in traffic. Not bad going considering @toyotaireland is still a fledgling Tweeter yet to really embrace the interaction rather than the broadcast side of Twitter.

Interested? Well you’ve got until this coming Friday to apply, which you can do here at www.toyota.ie/about/promotions/iQ-Twitter

Here’s some of the obligatory terms & conditions of the gig, the entire list can be found here:

• Each of the four participants will receive their Toyota iQ from week commencing July 20th until January 4th 2010. Usage of the iQ is non transferable and is limited to the island of Ireland.
• Provision of the iQ will require each participant to blog and tweet about their real life experiences with their iQ at least once a week. You must include a photo or short video of you and your iQ at least once a month.
• Tweets must include #toyotaiQ and the blog post must link to wwww.toyota.ie/promotions. Participants will be required to take part in some publicity which will also promote the participants blog.
• All maintenance and insurance costs for the vehicle will be covered by Toyota Ireland. To be covered on Toyota’s insurance policy you must be over 25 and have a full clean drivers licence. If you are over 21 and can insure the iQ on your policy then you can also apply.

It’s a really cool offer & I can’t wait to see how it works out for both Toyota and the participants. I’m not usually a fan of the ‘super-mini’ class of motor but this thing seems to pack a lot of punch. It scores 5 stars in the Euro NCAP safety test and Top Gear described it as “…boring Toyota’s iPod moment…” – praise indeed

If the iQ ain’t for you, earlier they put out a tweet about their plans to produce some self-help videos on general car maintenance and are looking for suggestions on what topics to cover. You can send them your ideas via Twitter to @toyotaireland.

Whatchyousayin buoy?

Yeah, lot of small random things I need to throw out into the blogosphere.

First off, happy birthday to the little sister Niamh who enters the last year of her teens today. Bless. 

So yesterday Rick kindly inducted me into the wonderful fold of contributors on Culch.ie – I really enjoy reading it with the variety of subjects and voices that all come to mix there, here’s hoping I can bring something worthwhile to the place.

Stu sees the ‘Pea rapist’ in the latest Bulmers product push that’s happening at http://www.embracethepear.com. Incidentally, www.embracethepair.com is still available for purchase. Just sayin’.

I finally called up Apple Care yesterday afternoon to sort out the long-dragging dodgy iPhone situation. I was delighted by their politeness & pro-active vibes, right down to the “oh no, I’m so sorry to hear it’s not working for you – that’s really awful”. Genuine or not (hard to tell with the lovely American tones!) a box arrived this morning from Apple with all the lovely packaging you’d expect from Apple and an express UPS bag for me to send off my iPhone to the iPhone doctor. Now here’s hoping it’s fixable coz I am totally lost without it.

I’m going to attempt organising a Tweet-up of sorts in and around or for the Siege of Ennis world record attempt next Sunday May 17th – those of you on the western seaboard, your help & presence is required! If anyone from anywhere else wants to head down, I can investigate digs either chez moi or in me lovely Ballyvaughan. Best email me in this case.

There’s a photowalk happening on Sunday in Drogheda. Shane Murphy has the skinny. Not looking like I’ll make the photowalk sadly but I’m certainly hoping to make the afters. Details later when I have em from the ‘organisers’.

Scoozi’s in Cork is still one of my favourite places on earth to eat – I was once again blown away by the service in there last weekend, never mind the delicious food on offer. Well done guys, you’ve got an often overlooked yet essential element of catering down to an art. 

There’s 2 lovely apartments up for rent in the little complex where I live in Glasnevin, you could do a lot worse than rent one of these places. Number one and number two (sexier) on daft.ie, who seem to be allowing users to list their ‘broadband options’ on ads now.

Finally, if you’re going along to the Open Cinema event in Meeting House Square tomorrow evening courtesy of Mini, be prepared for possible nasty wet weather. And if you have potatoes, well I hope you’re spraying them for blight