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Publicity
UPDATE
Expose. Educate. Empower.
PUBLICITY NEWS
Public Relations
consultants are in a
spin this week as the final
countdown to the
industry’s top awards, the
annual PRISM Awards,
commences. The event,
equivalent in gravitas to
the advertising industry’s Loeries, takes place at
Vodaworld in Midrand on Wednesday evening 26
March. The PRISM Awards, now in its 11th year,
recognise excellence in the Public Relations and
Communication sector. Clicklhere
here for more.
The Institute for Public
Relations has introduced
the Essential Knowledge
Project, an online guide to
research into how
organisations build and
manage relationships with
customers, communities,
employees and other stakeholders. The free online
service, accessible through the Institute’s website,
offers authoritative summaries of relevant research
with links to the original sources for those who wish to
dig deeper. Three topics are already available: “Trust
and PR Practice” by Brad L. Rawlins, associate
department chair, Brigham Young University; “Ethics
and Public Relations” by Shannon A. Bowen, assistant
professor, University of Maryland; and “Crisis
Management and Communications” by W. Timothy
Coombs, associate professor, Eastern Illinois
University. Other topics under development include
employee communications, investor relations,
corporate social responsibility, corporate identity and
branding, and measurement and evaluation of public
relations. ClickLhere
here for more.
The Gate – South
Africa, is an
i n t e g r a t e d
communications agency
and subsidiary of Media
Square plc, which is listed on London’s Alternative
Investment Market. With an office in Johannesburg, it
is a growing international brand. In Asia, which
houses some of the most dynamic emerging
economies in the world, it has offices in Singapore,
Shanghai and Hong Kong. There are operations in
New York and Edinburgh as well as London, where
head office is based. There should soon be a presence
in Frankfurt and Berlin. Core services offered by The
Gate SA are advertising, public and media relations,
statutory communications, annual reports, events
here for more.
and digital communications. Clicklhere
newsclip
itoring
managing media intelligently
Wednesday, 25 March 2008
Wwww.publicityupdate.co.za
V e g a B r a n d
Communications
School, hosted their 2008
Graduation Ceremony at
the Sandton Convention
Centre. Nicole Hijbeek, an
Account Executive for the Consumer team at GGi
Communications, received the prestigious Brand
Communications Award presented by Andy Rice, CEO
of Yellowwood Brand Architects. Nicole Hijbeek also
received a special mention for being one of only two
Honours Graduates that received Honours with
Distinction for Brand Leadership.
NEW ACCOUNTS
2008 has been a growth year
for Teresa Settas
Communications (TSC). The
boutique communications
consultancy has recently gained
the following new accounts:
 TSC has been appointed as
the official management agency
of the Assegai Awards for the next three years. The
much anticipated awards are exceptionally well
supported after a four-year sabbatical with a total of
126 entries from agencies and corporates.
 TSC will handle the public relations requirements
for the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA),
a f t e r h av i n g s u c c e s s f u l l y c o m p l e t e d t h e
communications campaign for the 5th International
Researching Work and Learning Conference held in
South Africa with SAQA as co-host. TSC was hand
picked by SAQA's advertising and marketing agency,
Lesoba Difference to jointly present an integrated
communications and marketing strategy that
successfully leverages above and below the line
strategies.
 The Independent Education Board has appointed
TSC to grow its profile in the media and consumer
sectors.
 TSC will handle the public relations,
communications and crisis management for the Rand
Show 2008, owned by Kagiso Exhibitions and Events
(Pty) Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Kagiso Media.
 East Coast Radio has re-appointed TSC to handle
the station's PR in the Gauteng and Cape regions with
a particular emphasis on the media buyer and
consumer markets.
 The South African Association of Freight
Forwarders (SAAFF) has appointed TSC to handle the
management and fundraising for their Annual
Congress taking place on 4 and 5 June.
Fo r m o r e i n f o r m a t i o n a b o u t TSC, visit
Lwww.tscommunications.co.za
www.tscommunications.co.za.
1

A Newsclip Media Monitoring Initiative
EDITOR’S CORNER
YouTube Channels as PR tools
By Pat McClelland
YouTube was launched in
December 2005, and now
attracts over 68-million
unique users each month -
the 6th largest audience on
the Internet. It was
acquired by Google in November 2006 and is an
independent subsidiary of Google, Inc. At a recent talk
hosted by AMASA at the JSE on Wednesday, 5 March,
Google Country Manager for South Africa, Stafford
Masie announced that we can expect to see a localised
version of YouTube - YouTube.co.za - launched in South
Africa later this year.
Masie discussed the many opportunities for marketers,
advertisers and public relations agencies that have
become available through the array of Google tools,
some of which will only be introduced to South Africa
during 2008. In particular, he focused on how YouTube
is proving to be a highly effective platform for brands to
create and maintain a community with their target
market; build a positive image; provide multimedia
content for little or no cost; and divert large amounts of
traffic to the brand's official website. The platform has
already become the choice of many corporations when
it comes to product launches; showcasing product
offerings; public relations; and hosting competitions.
YouTube's 'Brand Channels' initiative has become a
popular public relations tool for brands in various
industries including the media; charity; politics; sport;
consumer; music and even royalty (the British Monarch
launched The Royal Channel in late 2007 in an effort to
reach out to the younger generation!). These Channels
allow brands to create 'brand-centric video
experiences' by customising their own YouTube page
with a unique look and feel; a 'subscriptions' feature
that notifies subscribers when a new video is uploaded;
and contest functionality allowing the brand to host
contests and let users submit video entries.
CondeNet UK used
YouTube Channels
to create brand
awareness and a
positive industry
perception of its
leading glossy
monthly magazine
brands, Vogue;
Glamour; GQ;
Conde Nast
Brides; and Easy Living. A unique channel was created for
each magazine, each containing appropriate content for
that specific magazine's audience e.g. celebrity
interviews on the Glamour Channel and fashion party
coverage for the Vogue Channel etc. CondeNet also went
a step further, and became the first British magazine
publisher to actually create its own cookery content
especially for its Easy Living channel. The Channels also
enable users to upload their own short clips as video
responses or competition entries demonstrating the
platform's ability to seamlessly blend User-Generated
Content with traditional mainstream content in an
integrated multimedia solution.
Publicity
UPDATE
During his talk, Masie highlighted the simplest reason
for a brand to establish a presence on YouTube: it is a
very effective means of deflecting large amounts of
traffic to the brand's official website. He gave the
example of when Oprah created her own channel -
her official website actually crashed due to the surge
in traffic!
Of course, the increasing influence of YouTube also
has the ability to create major PR disasters (as does
blogging; forums; and consumer-complaint
websites), but this is merely something that PRs have
had to accept with the increasing influence of the
Internet on brand reputation. Time and time again,
companies that have chosen to ignore the negative
publicity they receive on YouTube and the Internet in
general have suffered while those that have provided
prompt and appropriate responses via the same
channels have considerably dampened the potential
reputation damage. The Internet's nature has
created a demand for a more transparent relationship
between a company/brand and the public and
platforms such as YouTube make this relatively
simple and cheap to create.
With the recent
launch of YouTube
Mobile, and the soon-
to-be-launched
South African version
of YouTube, I think
we're going to see
some exciting
developments in terms of local brands' online
presence.
See you next week.
DANIEL
GET TO KNOW THE TEAM
EDITOR Daniel Munslow
DEPUTY EDITOR Pat McClelland
EDITORIAL ASSISTANT Stefanie Jason
MEDIA RESEARCHER Roane Booth
MARKETING MANAGER Vanessa Evans
Daniel Munslow is on Facebook... Visit himLhere
here.
Daniel is a member of the Public Relations Institute of
Southern Africa (PRISA) and of the Public Relations
Consultancy Chapter (PRCC).
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