A.wordsmith | Portland PR & Communications

Moodboards: Feeling Your Way Through Brand Discovery

By Kris Travis | Mar 7, 2016

Once relatively exclusive to the fashion design industry, moodboards are everywhere now–design, architecture, politics, education, therapy…basically anywhere one’s brand or identity is a work in progress. I use them a lot in the design work I do, whether for a brand identity project, or to determine the mood of an internal campaign for an already […]

Dealing with Negative Social Media Comments: You Can't Just Delete

By Natalie O'Grady | Feb 24, 2016

Social media allows brands to connect with their consumers on a pretty cool, personal level. When you set up a social media account and get things rolling, it can also be a nice ego boost. Things have been going well on your company’s Facebook page – people are liking, commenting on, and sharing your posts. […]

Roundup of Top Posts

By Christy Caplan | Feb 9, 2016

It’s time to look back at our most popular content with this roundup of top posts. Some of these are from last year and some are more recent. Some of these were our most popular posts and others received a large amount of engagement across our social channels so we wanted to post a roundup as […]

Direct Mail is Not Dead — Especially Among the 18-34 Crowd

By Christine Antles | Feb 9, 2016

Despite its reputation as a waning content marketing tool, the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) reports that direct mail is still very relevant. In fact, according to a recent study referenced by the SBA, nearly two-thirds of all consumers reported they had purchased something as a result of direct mail in the past year. Among […]

Avoid Bad PR with Good Grammar

By A.wordsmith | Feb 4, 2016

There’s no shortage of articles about the enduring importance of good grammar in the modern business world. They illuminate the ways it bestows credibility on the writer, indicates professionalism, and ensures clarity and accuracy. As a grammar nut myself, I couldn’t agree more. But there’s one more thing I’d like to add to that list: bad […]

Promote Your Client’s Business with Meetup, the Antidote to Traditional Social Media

By A.wordsmith | Jan 13, 2016

A client recently asked us about using Meetup.com to expand their reach. Meetup, if you aren’t familiar, is a social network that allows users to organize real life, face-to-face events. Think of Meetup as the antidote to traditional social media. If Facebook is diluting good old-fashioned friendship and Twitter disconnects us from our neighbors, Meetup […]

Pinterest Increases Engagement for Brands

By Christy Caplan | Jan 11, 2016

In news this week is Pinterest. Both the Content Marketing Institute (CMI) and Social Media Examiner are saying that Pinterest is the fastest growing social media platform. A CMI post says that when compared to Facebook’s 6% member growth, Pinterest increases engagement for brands and experienced a huge 57% jump in members in 2014 and […]

Audience Analysis: What to Do During a Presentation for Effective Communication

By Gretchen Hoffman | Jan 7, 2016

A few weeks back, we wrote about effective audience analysis and the role it plays in effective communication. More specifically, we went into detail about the first phase: before you are speaking in front of an audience. In this post, we’ll delve a little deeper into what to do during the second phase – once […]

3 Tools for Staying on Top of News & Trends

By Natalie O'Grady | Dec 18, 2015

Working in public communications means you’ll likely spend a decent amount of time each week perusing news headlines, industry publications, and social media hashtags. In order to best represent your clients and find prime opportunities for coverage, you need to be aware of the top trends and breaking news. This includes public relations news, industry talk […]

Don't do this: the worst brand blunders of 2015

By Kelda Rericha | Dec 15, 2015

‘Tis the season for recaps of the year’s best and worst! In recent year’s past, it has been easy to blame brand blunders on social media. Fast twitch communications developed by junior-level social media staff will always be a recipe for disaster. But the worst of 2015 features a diverse blend of goof-ups, many of […]

5 Reasons PR Pros Can Be Thankful For Social Media

By Natalie O'Grady | Nov 26, 2015

As public relations professionals better understand social media metrics and analytics, we get better at proving these platforms’ worth to clients. Everyone knows social media is an integral part of a communications campaign now; even though the platforms shift and change, the need to have our clients on them remains. But necessity doesn’t mean social […]

Audience Analysis: Get the Right Message to the Right People

By Gretchen Hoffman | Nov 24, 2015

Not long ago, A.wordsmith manager Lisa Lavora-De Beule published a useful post outlining 5 steps to enhance your public speaking. Every effective speech, however, shares a common beginning, one that happens long before the speaker gets to the podium: audience analysis. Understanding one’s audience is one of the most important elements of effective communication. It […]