Ignition Partners with Kate Wild PR, Expands Tech PR Services

Ignition Partners with Kate Wild PR, Expands Tech PR Services

Waterloo (Ontario) CANADA, December 10, 2013 – Ignition, a Waterloo-based boutique marketing communications and public relations (PR) firm announced today a strategic alliance with Kate Wild PR – a move that will allow the firm to expand its high tech PR services and broaden its footprint in the Canadian and US technology markets.

Founded in 1992, Ignition provides a full portfolio of marketing and PR services to technology companies from start up to large enterprise.  Ignition clients include the Waterloo Accelerator Centre, Unitron, Compuware Changepoint, University of Waterloo Research + Technology Park, CloudOps, and Fresche Legacy, and the firm has provided PR advisory to a host of early stage technology start ups, helping BigRoad, BufferBox, Cream.HR, Clearpath Robotics, I Think Security and Magnet Forensics establish their brands and build awareness for their products and services.

Ignition chief marketing officer (CMO), Ellyn Winters-Robinson, is an accredited PR professional with 25+ years experience in technology marketing and PR. Prior to Ignition Ellyn was VP of Marketing for MKS (now PTC), an enterprise software company focused on the application lifecycle management (ALM) marketplace.  

Kate Wild brings more than 18 years of high tech public relations experience, including strategic communications planning and account management, writing, and media relations, to the alliance. Kate began her career at Mitel Corporation in Kanata, Ontario, and joined High Road Communications, a Toronto-based firm specializing in high tech PR, in 1996 where she was the North American account director for clients in the hardware, software, and telecom space including NEC Technologies, Avaya, and Gateway Telecom. In late 2000, Kate branched out on her own to work with clients including Sun Microsystems, Fujitsu, Logitech, Cray, Inc., Kronos, VERITAS, Avigilon and many others. Kate holds a Masters of Arts in Communications from Carleton University School of Journalism and Communication.

“I am excited to join forces with Ignition and provide clients with a broader scope of services, from brand journalism to content marketing and public relations,” said Kate Wild. “Together, we can deliver creative and engaging PR and communications programs that align with clients’ business objectives and positively impact their overall success.”

“Kate is a seasoned communicator and highly respected PR professional with deep knowledge and experience in the tech sector, and I’m thrilled to be able to partner with someone of her caliber,” says Ellyn Winters-Robinson.  “Together we will provide our clients ‘silicon valley’ style, senior-level PR representation, delivered through a creative, hands-on, client centric approach geared to achieving results.”

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For further details, please contact:

Ellyn Winters-Robinson

Ignition

519-624-2402 (office)

519-574-2196 (mobile)

ellyn@ignition.ca

@ellynjane

Are you spamming your customers and putting your business at risk?

New highly restrictive spamming laws to inflict significant financial penalty on those who do not conform.

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   Canada's anti-spam laws to make it harder for businesses to send ...

   Feb 27, 2013 ... Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation might have a more negative impact on Canadian businesses and consumers than well-in...

   

   MATTHEW BRAGA
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   New Canadian spam legislation -- among the most restrictive in the world -- is set to go into effect in 2014.  

   The legislation will enforce high financial penalty on marketers who fail to comply.  The legislation, intended to protect Canadians from spamming, hacking and spyware, will severly punish companies who engage in these activities.  Also included in the new legislation is the practice of "harvesting" where a computer system is used to collect electronic addresses without consent. Fortunately, most commercial email marketing tools, such as @mailchimp have been updated to ensure users of the system remain in compliance. But not all marketers turn to these tools - there are still many out there who run email campaigns manually. To read more about this legislation and understand what you'll need to do to comply check out: 
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   How to Comply with Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL) | Davis ...

   Mar 7, 2013 ... As outlined in our May 2011 bulletin "Are You Prepared for Canada's New Anti- Spam Law?", almost every bus...

   

   WWW.DAVIS.CA

I had the opportunity to deliver a workshop today as part of Communitech's Level Up program on brand journalism.  Here are some key takeaway's from today's presentation: 

1. The world of journalism is changing.  Declining ad revenues are causing publications to shut their doors, move online, cut staff. This has created an increased reliance on contributed content from freelancers. While this narrows the field of opportunity for traditional PR, it opens up new opportunity for brands to tell their own stories in journalistic style. 

2. Blogs and social media are a trusted channel for new. Where in the past the only way a company could have its story told was through a reporter, today companies now have the ability to by-pass traditional media to tell their own stories through their blog, social media channels and interact directly with their prospective and current customers. 

3. Stories draw people in. Audiences indicate they are more compelled by companies who communicate through stories. 

4. Brand journalism isn't repackaged PR spin. Stories need to be authentic, objective and adhere to journalistic principles or trust will not be achieved.  Strongly consider turning to trained journalist freelancers to develop your stories. 

5. Brand journalism complements and indeed can up the credibility of an organization's content marketing strategy.  It can also complement existing PR efforts.  

Are you embarking on a brand journalism strategy in your organization?  

A great formula for building your elevator pitch

Having spent many years in the enterprise software space I know this struggle well.  Companies of all shapes and sizes fight to simply, easily and succinctly describe what their business does.  The problem, is that many technology companies continue to gravitate to describing their business in terms of the technology and products they are bringing to market -- and not in terms of the business problem they are solving.  Remember, customers come looking for answers to problems. This Building an elevator pitch that works by the editor of Profit Magazine offers a great formula for building a compelling and effective elevator pitch.

Great Twitter Tips - Highly Recommended Read.

I have to give a shout out to fellow Cambridge Ontario Native, marketer and SEO maven, Dan Nedelko for these 50 tips for Twitter conversion.  It’s an awesome list and well worth sharing. 

http://dannedelko.com/internet-marketing/50-twitter-tips-for-conversion.html

How Focused Are You on Your Personal Brand?

I gave a presentation on Saturday at University of Waterloo’s Fusion conference, a gathering of 120 really bright first and second year business and science students. I was a last minute stand-in for @michaellitt of  Vidyard, who was called away to speak at SXSW in California (way to go Michael).  I chose to speak on the topic of personal branding, which has become an incredibly vital ingredient for any individual seeking to build a career for entrepreneurs who are seeking to build a business.  It still surprises me a bit when I receive push back around the use of LinkedIn (why? I’m not looking for a job) or Twitter (I just don’t get it). Both are essential tools for building brand & for achieving strong natural search engine optimization for your name.  Have you googled yourself lately?  Pays to see what others are seeing. 

Five Mistakes You Can Make in Executing Your PR Campaign

Hi all, for the next number of blog posts, I’m going to be publishing a series entitled “Five Mistakes You Can Make in Executing Your PR Campaign.”   It covers off many of the pitfalls companies make in crafting and executing a PR strategy, along with some advice on how to spot and avoid those mistakes along the way. 

Now on to the words of wisdom….

Five Mistakes You Can Make in Executing Your PR Campaign

Executing on a PR strategy is about understanding the art of relationship and in telling stories that compel journalists into action. It’s about crafting press releases and pitches that provide appropriate, relevant and comprehensive information to reporters and editors under pressure. And it’s about delivering over the top service when a story opportunity presents itself. Done right, a PR program can result in positive headlines and column inches worth of coverage. Handled with a heavy hand, however, a poorly executed PR program can turn off more people than it attracts. Below are five common mistakes companies make in their PR efforts coupled with some advice on how best to avoid them.



Mistake #1 - Fail to plan

o Invest time in building a sound PR strategy. Understand your objectives and goals. Spend time envisioning the headlines you’d like to see for your business. Be honest with yourself – you may be in love with your company’s strategy or products – but is it really news fodder for CNN?

o Research your media targets thoroughly and build a targeted media list. As I said in my opening to this post, PR is a relationship business, and you need to invest in understanding the reporters and editors you plan to target. This includes reading what they’ve written, and subscribe to any advice they offer about how best to contact them. Have they written on a competitor, or covered your field in prior articles? All of this information will help you craft a honed and personalized pitch that in turn will up the probability of your story being covered. As part of your research, also consider the social media participation of a particular journalist. Are they on Twitter? Facebook? Do they have a blog? Social media provides new and potentially more direct opportunities to personally engage.

o Don’t expect customers, partners to immediately jump on board. When working on a press release or story pitch, it is common, and indeed preferred to incorporate quotes from a customer or partner, and to provide journalists with contact information for these story sources. But realize that it is critical to seek out approval from these parties in advance. Quoting a customer in a press release without their permission can be fatal to your relationship and undermine any good work you have performed up to this point. You also need to know that customers and partners require lead time – approval cycles in a large company can be complex, involving executives, PR folk and legal, and be assured; they will work to their own timeline, not yours.

o Just because the phone rings, you don’t have to start talking. You pick up the phone and there’s a reporter on the end of the line! Of course you are excited, and in the heat of the moment might find yourself participating in an interview you are not yet ready to give. I typically advice clients to confirm the reporter’s deadline then ask if they can ring the reporter back in a few minutes. Even taking five minutes to prepare your thoughts and determine the key points you want to make can turn this opportunity into a more positive experience for all.

o Invest in media training. If you have the opportunity to invest in media training, it will never hurt and will always help. You’ll learn how to handle an aggressive line of questioning, how to remain on message and best practices for appearing on camera.

Stay tuned for PR Mistake #2 – “It’s all about me” coming to you soon…