FPRA - Florida Public Relations Association Blog

Speaker Dr. Dale Brill, Chief Marketing Officer of VISIT FLORIDA, gave his presentation entitled, “Evolve or Die!” to an excited group this afternoon. The official title was “Giving Structure to the Chaos of Content.” Per Dr. Brill’s request take off your shoes and relax as you listen to this lesson in content for Web sites, aka “All the things Dr. Rayburn refuses to learn we will be talking about,” said Dr. Brill.

He begins with an excerpt from his FPRA conference presentation given 10 years ago. He pulled out what he thought was the most important points of his presentation.

THAT WAS THEN: 1997 first presentation at conference
- Content is King
- Usability is paramount
- The consumer has control

Then he continued with what he felt was key now regarding Web sites and attracting visitors.

THIS IS NOW: 2007
- Content is King
- Usability is paramount
- The consumer has control

The audience got a sneak peak at the not-yet-launched Open Florida, Web site and campaign for VISIT FLORIDA. VF’s current Web site struggles with grabbing attention and navigability. Visitors need to be able to find what they are looking for within seconds of searching. This increases the time they will spend on the Web site and ultimately encourages them to visit Florida. The current website uses static, still text and pictures and the company feels that they should move away from taxology (predetermined structure of how content is organized where you are forcing decisions to be made), into the interactive world of folksology, (the user has the ability to search how they want, creating tags along the way to help with content searches.

VF designed a decked-out Florida RV and nominated “The Crew” which will film and document Florida vacation spots and those visiting. The Web site encourages those who have had interesting vacation experiences in Florida to tell their story on the site. They are the experts to all things vacation in Florida and should be involved in the decisions that determine usability of the Web site and its content. It raises the standards of vacation spots around Florida to be the best of the best because their customers are now turned into reporters. The site will launch in November.

Dr. Brill comments that PR Professionals are uniquely suited to guide their companies/industries in this new environment of consumer content control.

Four Central Themes Define Our Philosophy
1. Offer unique perspectives
a. Consumers are looking for authenticity
b. PR/marketing copy doesn’t cut it
c. Connection Drives loyalty
d. Many distinct voices
e. Experience and area experts

2. Give power to the people
a. Why wouldn’t you let people who know contribute to content
b. People want to contribute
c. Sharing=bragging
d. Dialogue builds value-Network Effect
e. Photos, videos, journals and comments
f. Collaborative trip planning

3. Redefine what content is
a. It isn’t flat texts and photos. It’s got to move because of short attention spans (how many of you wanted to grab your BB during presentations?)
b. Broadband access=expansion of content
c. Content is more than words
d. Multiple facets deliver more information in less time
e. Saturation of rich content slide shows, animated illustrations

4. Create a Folksonomy
a. Difference between and taxonomy and Folksonomy
b. Designers have to go through taxonomy decide where piece of content belongs and hide it in the web site. Predetermined structure of how our content is organized. You are forcing decisions to be made, so you have to be clever enough to put it somewhere where visitors can find it.
c. Folksonomy is inclusive, intuitive and offers discovery

So if you take anything away from this presentation that you can apply to your company, which might not be tourism driven, I say it would be learn all you can about the new technology available to help the PR industry. Understand those mediums, utilize them to the full extent by creating content that is consumer-friendly. Step into the shoes of your clients and work to create and utilize the technology available to meet their needs. We are master communicators and need to take charge of our role in evolving technology, giving it that golden PR touch.