My favourite Sydney PR agency Text100 have just wrapped up an Asia-Pacific survey of bloggers [pdf report], asking them what they wanted and how they preferred to be contacted. Personally, my own demands are few and quite logical: Copious bottles of Verve Cliq in order to motivate me to read any of your press releases Free business class flights and appropriate accommodation to meet with you once a quarter so you can avail me of more of your clients’ stuff Copious fawning and bowing at my feet from the most attractive female members of your staff. Having been assured by Antonia Christie at Text100 that these simple demands will be met each time we meet, I then studied the raw data and findings that Antonia ’secret squirreled’ to me. Here’s some key stuff: We want to be treated professionally, not just as an electronic deposit box for your endless releases We want to build up a long-term relationship with you, Mr/Ms Agency, therefore please start a conversation with us before you hammer our inboxes Be a part of the blogging community that you wish to engage with. If you don’t know who and what the key players and key issues are, we won’t take you seriously Be the appropriate person from your organisation to contact us — that is, the person who is actually close to this issue, not some office junior fresh out of his/her undergrad PR degree The Social Media News Release [video introduction to SMNR] is key to gaining our respect. Use it, or lose it The majority of us actually do have some ethics, and would therefore honour an embargo. You will figure out over time who won’t (and the ethical amongst us would expect you to not contact them again) Similarly, the majority of us do believe in disclaimers — that is, if you throw some kit and kaboodle our way, we will more than likely disclose that fact so there’s no hidden conflict of interest. Oh, and never request the return of products you send us for review — the vast majority (99.985%) of us do this for love, not money, and we don’t have the time and money to repackage everything and send it back to you. I guess the standout, one sentence précis of this is: It is crucial for PR people to know their target, know what they are interested in, offer them unique information, and know how they like to be engaged with There’s a whole lot more in the final report, including the stats breakdown and stuff, and even video reports. Jeremy Woolf, Text100’s Peer Media ‘lead’ (whatever that is - see note about jargon below), offers advice and tips on how to engage with bloggers following the results of the Text 100 APAC Blogger Survey, all of which are YouTube vids: Jeremy unveils why this survey interests PRs This is a unique survey to APAC Jeremy provides tips to engage with bloggers Jeremy discusses what bloggers want One interesting finding from the textual analysis (as distinct from the purely quantitative stuff) is this comment: “Those who contact me should not be lost in their own jargon” Wise words, indeed, and something we ALL as business communicators should remember! One of my very own academic colleagues, Michael Netzley in Singapore, offered the following thought about the survey: The survey showed that effective PR agencies need to make social media part of their DNA. …To succeed, PR professionals must increasingly become grounded in social media. Many thanks to the be-lurgied but assuredly still gorgeous Antonia for giving me a sneak peek at the results. You can read Text100’s news release and download the pdf report. Technorati Tags: text100, antonia christie, survey, blogging policy, blogger relations, business communication, lee hopkins Currently playing on the trusty teak-walnut laminate BetterComms radiogramme: ‘Mr Siegal’ by Tom Waits. Classic line: "How do the angels get to sleep when the Devil leaves his porch light on?" Less