We’re looking for a ridiculously talented, super smart marketing communications pro to join the Mullen team. Even more specifically, to join my team at Mullen. Are you ridiculously talented? Super smart? Awesome! Then I have a few questions for you:

Would you want to work at an agency that was ranked #3 on Ad Age’s “Agency A-List” and named to Fast Company’s “Top 50 Innovative Companies.”

Have you helped plan and execute integrated communications plans across a range of mediums, including print, radio, direct mail and digital?

Do you have 5-8 years of experience, at least some of which was spent at an agency?

Are you a creative problem solver and eternal optimist?

Can you lead a cross-functional team of creatives, digital strategists, media planners, pr and social influence experts and analytics gurus to help drive our agency’s work on behalf of a client?

Still with me? Great! If you’re interested in sharing your resume with us for this Account Supervisor position, you can do so by clicking the link below. Otherwise, I hope you’ll consider passing this post along to someone you know who is looking for a great opportunity or sharing it with your Twitter and Facebook peeps.

Click here to learn more and submit your resume.

Thanks!

*Image by Łéł†Āķ Mă3ý.

Arik Hanson and Valerie Simon have a great idea. And I think you should know about it.

They’re tired of seeing so many great PR “free agents” looking for hard-to-find job opportunities in today’s market. People who are smart, strategic, savvy and seasoned. People well worth the attention of hiring managers. And that doesn’t take into account the many others they don’t know who are in the same boat.

Back to that great idea. It’s called “Help a PR Pro Out.” It’s a four-hour Twitter event on Feb. 19 (next Friday) from 11 a.m. – 3 p.m. EST with the goal of connecting job seekers with companies and agencies looking for great talent.

Here’s the gist, as shared by Arik:

Are you a job seeker? Prepare a creative blog post, pitching yourself to prospective employers and share it via Twitter during the event on Feb. 19 using the hashtag #HAPPO. The HAPPO “market champions” (see below) will help by retweeting and connecting you with potential employers in your specific market (or markets you’re willing to relocated to).

Are you an employer looking for talent? Follow the hashtag #HAPPO on Friday, Feb. 19 and share your openings. Market champions will do their best to connect you with talent they think matches your specific needs.

Are you a PR blogger/Twitter addict? Then share the #HAPPO tweets with your personal networks and lend your support to those in need. Help your market champion identify job seekers and pair them with potential employers. This is your chance to make a difference!

Whichever of those buckets you fall into, I’d encourage you to jump in and participate. It’s a great idea and you can feel good about helping some great folks land great jobs.

Questions? Interested in who the regional “champions” are for the effort? Check out the official HAPPO Web site.

Do you want the CMO or CEO to pay attention when you share the results of your PR efforts? Do you want to significantly increase the chances of them seeing your work as a critical piece in moving the business forward?

If yes, then I have a single, four-letter word that is left out of most PR plans and certainly out of most PR results reports, which will help you do just that – data.

I’m NOT talking about evaluating total impressions and number of placements and increase in online mentions. I’m talking about planning your efforts against actual market research and tying your results back to that.

The Bad News
Most PR and corporate communications budgets don’t provide enough money to do research.

The Good News
Within most companies’ marketing departments is a rich deposit of market research that you can use. You just have to ask for it.

Here are two ways you can use existing market research to create more meaningful PR plans by next week.

Better Targeted Geographies. Too many PR pros have a knee-jerk reaction when it comes to planning, especially within media relations. “We’ll target the top 50 markets, as well as online media and bloggers.”

Here’s my question. If the CEO and CMO place the San Francisco market as a low priority based on results of the company’s market research, how excited do you think they’re going to be when you update them on the great placements you got in the San Francisco Chronicle and on the city’s local NBC station?

Leaders within most well-run companies make decisions with a good deal of data in consideration. You should, too. Market research will help you better define the primary and secondary markets you should focus on. Spend more of your time – and your clients’ budgets – in those areas.

Better Targeted Messages. Market research can zero in on the cities, counties and states where your brand is the leader, as well as where you fall behind the competition. Group those places into buckets and tailor your proactive messages to those markets accordingly, instead of creating a one-size-fits-all “editorial calendar” of what you’ll pitch across the board for the year.

For example, you don’t need to pitch stories to the Houston Chronicle as part of a mudslinging battle of strong competitive messaging and comparative claims against your foes if your market research shows you own 85% of the Houston market. Use your time and energy there to tell a different story and act like the market leader. On the other hand, if you’re targeting areas where you trail, you may want to focus all of your efforts on competitive claims, experiential events with side-by-side comparisons, etc.

These are just two ways I’ve found that market research and data can create PR efforts with more impact – both in the eyes of your customers and in the eyes of the C-suite. What other ways would you add?

*Image by M.B.X.

The difference between success and less-than-stellar results can sometimes be a thin line. Sure, lots of things need to be in place to help ensure success – measurable goals, sound strategies, creative tactics. But why do some efforts that have this foundation still not measure up like others?

That thin dividing line? It’s called hustle.

Two different people with the same amount of smarts can take the same communications plan and derive very different results. That’s because exceeding your goals doesn’t always mean doing things that no one else can do. It often means doing the things that anyone can do, but doesn’t. That’s where hustle wins the day.

But hustle isn’t easy. It means moving faster, thinking harder, never quitting. It means you don’t see problems to complain about, but instead see opportunities to excel.

I spent all day yesterday on a long flight across the country. The young woman sitting next to me could have spent the entire five hours reading People magazine and napping. While she spent a little time doing both of those, she also took an hour or so to dig through email – sorting old emails, organizing her inbox and filling her outbox so replies would be ready to go when she landed and reconnected to the World Wide Web. That’s hustle.

Hustle has a price tag. But it also has rewards.

What helps you hustle? How do you channel that energy to excel?

*Image by Rick Harrison.

“No pressure, no diamonds.”

About an hour after I read that Thomas Carlyle quote in this blog post last week, I almost threw up. That’s because a campaign that my team and I were launching this week hit a big, unexpected roadblock. And it seemed unfixable to everyone involved – including me.

In situations like this, it’s easy to focus your energy on things like venting, wishing the problem wasn’t happening or pointing toward the person who dropped the ball that led to the problem. It’s a human reaction. For some reason, though, that Carlyle quote came to mind a couple minutes after the “bomb” dropped, probably because it was still fresh in my mind. I’m really glad it did. It made me focus my energy on a singular, positive thing – doing any and everything within my power and the power of those around me to attempt to move the roadblock.

The next 24 hours were some of the most mentally and emotionally intense hours of my professional career to date. They ended with us somehow unbelievably overcoming major odds to solve the problem. I don’t mean we came up with a less desirable alternative. We solved the problem. We hustled, scrambled and scrutinized every inch of every possible way to reclaim the day. And I can’t tell you how many times I repeated “No pressure, no diamonds” to myself during the course of it all.

The next day, I created a little sign for my office. Now, when I look up from my laptop, I see Carlyle’s words looking back at me.

It’s easy to keep moving forward when things are going smoothly. It’s facing off against incredible challenges that show you what you’re really made of, though.

What helps you stay focused on overcoming tough odds when they come your way?

*Image by Steve Jurvetson.

I admit it. Sometimes the spark that drives my creativity needs reigniting. When that happens, I usually hang out with toddlers.

Toddlers are creative geniuses. They don’t use anything for its intended purpose. They don’t color in the lines. They aren’t afraid to share their ideas or stories, no matter how ridiculous or far-fetched.

Toddlers aren’t held back by convention. They are the epitome of fresh thinking. Luckily, I’ve got two of my own who give me a refill of creativity whenever my tank is low.

What do you do when you need to rekindle the spark? What jump starts your creativity?

*Image by Brittany Randolph.

It’s hard to believe it’s been a year already. Instead of marking the occassion with words, I decided to create a short video. (Those of you reading this in email may need to click through to see the video)

For anyone who started frequenting the blog in the past six months, I’ve also shared a few of my favorite posts from the first six months. You’ll find those below the video.

As promised, here are some of my favorite posts from the first few months of this blog:

Social Media Isn’t the Second Coming
I’ve seen some suggestion recently that “traditional” PR tactics are being put to death by social media. That news releases and social media releases have no use. That pitching story ideas by Twitter will soon be the norm. I hate to burst the bubble, but social media isn’t the second coming of…well, you know who. Read the full article…

Should Marketers and Media Wield Their Power for Good?
I shared a few videos with some friends this weekend as I led a discussion on the impact media has on defining beauty and sexuality in our culture. I found myself asking “do marketers and media have actual influence over how consumers view themselves and the world around them?” I say, “yes.” That led to a bigger question. If so, do we have a responsibility to use that power for good more often? Read the full article…

Five Ways Twitter Will Make You Smarter
We’re all looking for ways to become better professionals. From conferences and webinars to books and seminars, we spend good money and give precious time to glean insights from accomplished marketers. Those are great, of course, but what if I told you that you can get smarter for free with Twitter and 20 minutes or so a day. Read the full article…

In Plain English, Please
I’m tired. And the sense I’m getting from others is that they’re tired, too. It becomes more exhausting every day to decipher what most of our fellow marketers are trying to actually say or recommend and I think I know why. Read the full article…

Should We Keep Professional and Personal Separate in Social Networking?

When it comes to social networking tools, should there be a line in the sand on whether it’s for personal contacts or professional connections? Maybe I should share with you what first made this question come to mind for me. Read the full article…

*Image by Spudballoo.

Fridays are a cause for celebration by their very nature. (Hello weekend!) So I hope you’ll grant me a little grace to go off-topic and share something worth celebrating.

I was sitting in a hotel bar last Friday evening eating dinner and watching CNN with no sound. As you can imagine, it wasn’t very productive news gathering without being able to hear what the images and video were about.

In a matter of seconds, though, that changed.

A 10-year-old girl’s reaction to a wonderful surprise captured me. I was so taken by her display of emotions, in fact, that I fought back tears. And I couldn’t wait to get back to my room and search CNN.com high and low for the video so I could get the full story.

It was also interesting to see this 10-year-old girl’s reaction juxtaposed against her toddler sister’s reaction at the beginning of the video. Though at opposite ends of the spectrum, both underscore the sacrifices families like theirs make every day – sacrifices that are easy for the rest of us to not even consider most of the time.

That’s why I think reminders like this are worth slowing down for and the pure joy of another person worth celebrating.

I made a mistake last week. It was an honest one, but a mistake nonetheless – a misunderstanding that led to an oversight. And a client was pretty upset about it.

How do you respond when a client or colleague confronts you about a mistake that’s been made? Our natural reaction is to quickly search our minds for reasons why it happened or point partial blame back on the person across from us.

What did I do?

I apologized and owned the mistake, explained where the misunderstanding happened and shared ideas for two new processes we could implement to ensure it doesn’t happen again moving forward.

What was my client’s response?

“Thanks for your candor. I have a great deal of respect for you.”

We’re so terrified of being wrong that it causes us to do crazy things sometimes – make excuses, lie, shift blame. The truth is that most of the time people know when a mistake has been made and often they know who made it. Accepting responsibility for your part has a strange way of showing your maturity and integrity and can actually build trust instead of tear it down.

Have you noticed this, too? Do you think owning a mistake is smart for business or does the admission of guilt bring more harm than good?

Let’s be honest. We all want to leave a meeting knowing that we said something smart and added value to the conversation. It feels great when we have answers. Here’s the thing I find interesting, though. Often the best thing uttered in a meeting isn’t anything said at all, but something asked.

The right question can change your strategy, shed different light on a problem, create new opportunities and empower people to challenge the status quo with new ideas. Sure, asking a question may mean you don’t know the answer offhand. But you get credit for asking the question that changed the conversation. And that feels great, too.

Arik Hanson noted on a post here a few weeks ago that he believes one of the biggest mistakes PR pros make every day is that we’re so set on telling clients what we think (read “having the answers”), that we forget to listen.

Don’t listen with the intention of responding. Listen with the intention of understanding. Doing that will lead you to smart answers and even smarter questions.

Have you noticed the power of asking the right question? What did it do for the conversation?

*Image by Esparta Palma.