Recently stories in the press have come out about the Worlds Number 1 about his personal life. He was found by his wife outside their mansion home in Florida having crashed his car in to tree leaving him with bruises, since then it has had a downward spiral as other stories about his personal life have since come to light, and all is not good for Mr Woods.

In the news it has since been revealed that he had an argument with his wife who allegedly hit him with a golf club accusing him of cheating on her, as soon as this came out numerous women have been selling their scandalous stories about his affairs with them ruining his reputation and breaking his family, Tiger shame on you!

On the Washington Post website, Sports columnist Michael Wilbon wrote ‘Certainly he isn’t the first athlete to be defeated by the temptation that is infidelity, but it seems possible now he could be the first to be undone by indiscretion’.

‘Since every day seems to be worse than the day before, it’s quite possible there are worse days to come for Woods. There are questions about painkillers and his condition when he took to the wheel well after midnight Thanksgiving night. Are there more women with more revelations, information that will send sponsors running and spike the sales of the tabloid rags for another two weeks?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/11/AR2009121104822.html

As he says, things are going from bad to worse for the sport star and since all the allegations have come out he has since announced on his website that he is taking an indefinite leave of absence from golf.

This come from the man who had the world at his fingertips and was balancing on the same level as sporting greats, Boxing legend, Muhammad Ali and Basket Ball player, Michael Jordan.

He has since lost an Accenture contract due to his infidelity as they didn’t feel he is a suitable representative for their brand. It explains on Fox News: ‘After careful consideration and analysis, the company has determined that he is no longer the right representative for its advertising,” Accenture said, adding that “it wishes only the best for Tiger Woods and his family.”

http://foxsports.foxnews.com/golf/story/10519340/Accenture-marks-1st-sponsor-to-cut-ties-with-Woods

So how, if he does, gets his life and career back on track? With the help of his PR Company they will need to work their hardest to get him back to his squeaky clean image with people not relating him to these adulterous stories.

They need to think that brands that are sponsoring him, mainly sports companies still want him fronting their products; they need to defend claims he has started to drink and is taking painkillers. They will also need to organise a press conference for him to make a speech and to set records straight about his infidelity, making the public more sympathetic toward him and hopefully save his dignity. He also could do an exclusive interview telling his side of the story which would also benefit him too, his career and reputation has had a sledge hammer smash through it making him the most talked about celebrity in the media at present, and with the help of PR this could easily be forgotten with the right strategy and tactics.

 Twitter is proving to be the latest craze, those who are unaware of its uses may need to be enlightened on what they might be missing out on, as I only discovered it recently and I am slowly but surely getting into it, what a surprise!

Twitter is more of a blogging tool, you can follow people and they can be your followers too. It’s your choice who you follow as they might follow you but it’s optional if you want to follow them in return. (You get it now?)

Your tweets can have up to 140 characters or less which is posted for your follows to read, they can reply to what you have said by clicking on the @reply button and writing a comment.

For example I ‘tweeted’, Sarah Mathers ‘Watched New Moon last night it was amazing!’ to which my friend replied, ‘Robert Pattinson in the film is HOT!’

In your tweets you can write about anything and anyone, you can also message people privately, this is a Direct Message (DM). You can ReTweet as many times you want, ( even if it is annoying for the other people receiving them on the hour every hour!)

Here is  a video of PR professional Debbie Friez providing Twitter tips, she metions she uses Twitter in many different ways, I’m a  media junkie and sometimes I don’t always find out news from the news organsations - I find it out from my friends on Twitter’ – This shows us how someone working within the PR industry benfits from using the blogging website.

But let’s remember why we are talking about Twitter in relation to PR – This is becoming popular in the workplace, blogging in general is becoming a great way of sharing knowledge. In the reading How Blogs and Social Media are Changing Public Relations and the way it is practised , Wright and Hanson (2008) they explain the change in public relations from new media such as blogging, ‘Results indicates blogs and social media have enhanced what happens in public relations and that social media and traditional mainstream media compliment each other’.

‘Findings suggest social media complement traditional news media, and that blogs and social media influence coverage in traditional news media’.

Fredrik Wacka (2005) also claims there are several reasons why employees have started blogging:

• Becoming an expert: Positioning the employee as a thought leader
• Testing ideas: The conversational and informal nature of blogs, and the ability to encourage audience feedback, makes blogging a good way to toss out ideas to see if they generate interest
• Polarizing Relationships: Employees can use blogs to personalize relationships with other employees and member of other strategic publics (customers, stockholders etc).

The above reasons he gives is a great example for my favourite online shop ASOS.com, they have been greatly successful from having their online shop and have started using Twitter to promote their latest clothes and special offers they have going on to engage more public interest in their company.And also it is free, one the biggest benefits using Twitter.

I am one of their followers on Twitter and every time I go on, they bribe me (honest) into buying something with their great deals, free postage offers and just absolutely brilliant outfits on there, I should really un tweet them, my bank account would be a lot more healthier!

This is there Twitter Page ( be warned if you are a shopaholic like moi)

http://twitter.com/ASOS

They have tweeted such things as ‘Shop sexy! Free next day delivery on party dresses for Xmas! Just for you between 12-2pm today only. Use SEXYDRESS at checkout’ and Don’t forget: order from asos.com today for your chance to win a Limited Edition motorbike with Wrangler! http://bit.ly/asosadvent ‘

How can I not resist temptation?!

This is good for people who are followers like me, as this is exclusive information about the website to which if we were not friend with them and only went on the website, we would not know about these special offers! Brilliant!

So in more ways than one Twitter is creating a phenomenon with social lives as well as the work place, both proving successful and beneficial all thanks to Twitter, will you be following the latest craze? I think so!

 Glamour model and business women, Katie Price is a great example of making PR and campaigns work to their best advantage. Since making it big as a page three model ‘Jordan’, her brand has grown with lucrative magazine deals, modelling jobs and reality TV shows, making her one the most successful businesswomen of the decade. She has brains as well as beauty, well, her PR management has!

 She has also released three autobiographies and other novels such as Angel, Crystal Angel Uncovered and Sapphire. She also has launched, hair products, perfume, horse riding clothes, bed linen, and a lingerie range to name a few, this lady sure knows how to make a statement when promoting a product, and is very good at making the campaign successful.

 To make her campaigns  effective and cost beneficial the planning, tactics and strategy behind all the glitz and glamour needs to be well thought through to make the product sell and to be recognised throughout the UK. 

For example if were to promote one of new fragrances, it would need to be visual advertising and promoting, as it cosmetic, so an image of Katie Price looking glamorous with the bottle of perfume she is promoting will have a good effect. The model has also made big entrances to book signings and other product promotions arriving in a horse drawn carriage, getting her male friends to dress up in drag and wearing daring outfits for her to fit into character of what she is promoting. This is great for media publicity as she is getting attention in what she is wearing which is promoting her new product too. Clever Pricey!

To also promote her product she would have to make sure beauty journalists in all major magazines have been sent out samples of her new fragrance so they can feature it in the magazines, telling people what it smells like, if it’s worth buying and where you can buy it from. 

 The product would be sold in all major perfumeries such as Boots and The Perfume Shop and to make the product even more popular special offers on the product will more appealing, such a vouchers being in magazines for you to get money off the fragrance, and free samples of the fragrance in the magazines as magazines will benefit from this too and the shops where its sold, but most of all the product and the PR company itself.

 In the PR handbook reading Strategy and Tactics, Gregory (2004) it explains what a strategy is ‘Strategy is the principle that will move you from where you are now to where you want to be. It is sometimes called ‘the big idea’. 

 It the goes onto say what both strategy and tactics together do together ‘strategy is how you will achieve an objective and objectives are what you will do’. 

 A good idea of making your strategy work is to brainstorm ideas of what you can do to help promote your campaign such as running competitions, contacting your local press and making leaflets. 

 Depending on what company you are promoting the type of campaign needs to have certain techniques for you to get the message across to them with enough impact so as to influence them in some way. From this I think Katie Price ticks all the boxes for making her campaigns work, she always gets great publicity from what she is promoting, always achieves her objectives and is no shrinking violet in promoting and making herself grown into a multimillion pound brand.

 In PR this a great example of making a campaign work, having a strong strategy and tactics with getting result from the objective and making it a success.

Advertisements can be used in magazines, billboards and online. I think a good example of this is the stop smoking campaign from the NHS which made an impact being on billboards and magazines through out the UK. The image is of a man looking in pain with a hook being pulled through his mouth resembling a fish being caught. I found this advert very effective as it’s quite disturbing but this is the effect they wanted to give to people.

 The Mail Online described the advert as being ‘too frightening’, and also goes on to say ‘The Advertising Standards Authority received 744 complaints about the Department of Health TV commercials and posters’.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-455106/Anti-smoking-advert-frightening.html#ixzz0Wa9mnST4

The aim of the campaign that was funded by the government was to stop being smoking, the idea was to shock people as millions of people every year die from smoking related deaths, I have myself lost family members due to smoking related illnesses, so I am shocked how people were against it and how it caused controversy but as the saying goes; there is no such thing as bad press! But in the end it made a difference and even though people said it was ‘disgusting’ it got people talking about it and got the effect it intended.

This is a good way of persuading the public to understand what message they are getting across as they described it as ‘disgusting’ and ‘inappropriate’ but this is persuading them not to smoke as once you do, you are ‘hooked’ so it’s even harder to quit. It give you the statistic on the advert; ‘The average smoker needs over five thousand cigarettes a year’. You don’t have to a doctor to realise that is a ridiculous amount of nicotine and other harmful substances that you would be putting into your body and sooner or later the effects from this will start to have an effect on your body, or putting it more blunt it slowing predicting your death.

In the reading Public Relations, Propaganda and Psychology of Persuasion , Fawkes, (2006) tells us how propaganda and PR work together and how critics say much of public relations is propaganda.

 Propa ganda played a big part in the First World War, where is recruited support for the U.S Army. The advertisement they used was the words, ‘ I want you for the U.S Army’ it also has a middle aged man pointing directly to whoever is looking at it, this was done to make you feel he was talking to you.

This is also a persuasive technique to make people apply for the position as most PR and propa ganda use this to create an effective form of communication. In the reading, Pratkanis and Aronson (2001:7) describe propaganda and PR  ’ Every day we are bombarded with one persuasive communication after another. These appeals persuade not through not through the give-and-take of argument and debate, but through the manipulation of symbols and of our most basic human emotions’.

Also in the reading it states: ‘Many Scholars who study propa ganda concentrate on its wartime applications. There are increasing number of academics, journalists and campaigners who are examining the role of public relations in civil and corporate propaganda’.

So from this we can see even years ago propaganda and PR worked well together making an impact on the public getting the message across. Whether it’s recruiting into the army or to stop smoking, PR benefits campaigns by getting them noticed where it’s most relevant and to know who to aim them at and this is why PR is so important within the media industry in backing campaigns.

I think campaigns such as the NHS Stop Smoking and the US Army campaign are effective in using persuasive techniques and getting a good response to their audience even though they are aimed at different people, this makes PR and Propa ganda work together in making great campaigns.

I’m addicted, my friends are addicted, even my mum has  jumped on the bandwagon! Yes, you love to hate it however Facebook is growing everyday with millions of people all over the world using it, making it bigger and better than ever. Using this social networking site to communicate to other people, whether it’s for work, pleasure or just curiosity Facebook has got the world hooked and it doesn’t seem to be declining in popularity for a long time to come!

Social Networking is an ever expanding development in new media with sites Facebook, Myspace and Bebo dominating the World Wide Web, which is also available in different languages for countries all over the world. This is one of the many fascinating evolvements of social networking making it the biggest break through in social communication.

Networking sites are predominately aimed for younger people and older business working individuals in there twenties. You can use networking sites for anything, most commonly it is used for people catching up with new and old friends and keeping in contact through updating your profile by adding photos writing on your status and telling them general information about yourself on your profile.

An effective way of using social networking sites is using it for promoting businesses, as most individuals using networking sites are young, so for example this is great for clubs and bars for promoting their latest offers on drinks and any special nights being held. Once you are a member of the group they can message you to inform on any new or relevant information about the group to help the business get well known and for other people to hear about them hopefully making them get a good feedback from this.

Advertising on networking sites is fast becoming a beneficial source for promoting businesses as they work out on your profile what you do and what you are into and put related adverts on you page. For example if you are a model or within that industry it will remember what you write about on your status or what applications or photos you add and put adverts on your profile such a photographers, make up cosmetics, gym memberships etc.

In the reading in the PR handbook, B.Solis (2009) he explains how Social Media and Business Marketing are great for building relationships in business, ‘Many companies are participating in social networks as a form of proactive outbound customer service with a twist of social networking’ ‘ It is breaking new ground and it’s setting new standard’

He also goes on to mention ‘In the era of social media, there are new tools and philosophies to more effectively listen and engage with customers and in turn’

• Cultivate a more significant community
• Enhance your brand
• Build relationships
• And, create evangelists along the way

He also adds; ‘Social Media is much more than a user generated content, it is driven by people in the communities where they communicate and congregate, they share and discover new content  without our help right. They’re creating vibrant and rich cultures across online networks and using social tools that we learn about each and every day to stay connected’

From all this information we can see how he is using social media and what the benefits are from using this new form of new media.

My Facebook page has an advert about Vogue magazine and a professional photography studio, they have picked up on knowing my hobbies and what I study at university and from this they know which adverts to promote to catch my attention and hopefully gain some business through using this method of advertising.

 On Facebook you can create groups; it can be about thing or anyone. Recently on the X factor comedy twins John and Edward or ‘Jedward’ as they are newly being named have had Facebook groups created with nearly a quarter of a million people who have joined. This time last year John and Edward were at school like any normal 18 year old boys would be, blissfully unaware of how a year later the public would be making groups on Facebook with having hundreds of thousands of people joining them and causing a stir from this in the media industry, the power of the media and now with social networking can make people famous overnight. Who would of though having crazy hair resembling a potato would be a style statement too! The power of Jedward!

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/group.php?v=wall&ref=search&gid=160324737982

 This shows how the connection between social networking and the media industry comes together and makes recent news and events more talked about and popular than ever before, thanks to the wonderful and exciting world of  Facebook! Hurrah!

New media is evolving throughout the world everyday, it is vastly becoming the new way of communicating to other people, which has seen a huge change in the way we interact with each other, showing how powerful new technology and new media is, which is what I will be finding out about with other topics.

The internet has been such a huge break through in new media and is taking over most sources of information such as radio, TV and newspapers. However, is this good thing to happen within the industry? Will other Media industries suffer due to the domination of the World Wide Web?

Whenever I need to know something that’s going in the world whether it be the weather, the latest celebrity gossip (yes I have to admit I am partial to a bit of celebrity culture!) or general information I will always go online to find it out. It’s quicker, reliable and is constantly being updated with new relevant information and this is why other media industries such as newspapers are being affected as younger people are using this method instead of buying a newspaper or even watching TV.

Blogging is becoming a growing phenomenon in new media; new social networking websites such as Twitter allows people to create their own page and to ‘tweet’ about what they are doing in life. Celebrities have also adopted this form of networking so fans know where they are, what they are doing and how they are feeling, which is a great way to keep people updated about their glittering lives. This is also a great source for journalists, as Twitter is an easy way to find out gossip about celebrities and keeping the public in the know by using this information they have seen on Twitter to write a story about them

Twitter has made headlines, in London, a member of staff working for the Tube was caught on a camera phone shouting and using abusive language to a pensioner in public. This was recorded on the mans mobile phone who then posted it on his Twitter page and You Tube, for other people to see and to comment. People  saw what happened, which started controversy on how the tube worker was treating the pensioner, it made the front page of The Evening Standard Paper in London, which thanks to the man recording it led to the worker being suspended.

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2009/10/going-down-tube.html

If it wasn’t for this technology being around it probably would of gone unnoticed, yet again this is a great example of new media and social networking sites making a huge impact in the media world.

A massive story to hit the headlines recently, was the tragic and sudden death of Stephen Gately. The Daily Mail journalist, Jan Moir wrote an article about the singer’s death claiming it was “More than a little sleazy” and “It strikes another blow to the happy-ever-after myth of civil partnerships,” she claimed, adding: “Whatever the cause of death is, it is not, by any yardstick, a natural one.”

This saw the most complains ever to the UK’s media watchdog.

http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/UK-News/Stephen-Gately-Daily-Mail-Article-By-Jan-Moir-Becomes-Most-Complained-About-Story-In-PCC-History/Article/200910315408942?f=rss

 This cause uproar and The Press Complaints Commission received more than 21,000 complaints about the columnist. Most of the comments were made on Twitter, in the Sky Sports website it claimed; Thousands of web users have accused the journalist of homophobia, after she suggested there was “nothing ‘natural’” about the 33-year-old’s death in Majorca.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/oct/19/jan-moir-complain-stephen-gately

From this we can see how the social networking site, Twitter caused such a large impact on public opinions with the Stephan Gately article by Jan Moir which led to action being took against her, resulting in her being suspended .All thanks to Twitter and the public for sticking together and giving their thoughts on what she has disrespectfully wrote.

Blogs are great for the public to voice there opinions and they can make a difference to society from this, I think in regard to media blogging and networking sites they will over take other platforms of media organisations in years to come as it’s a faster and more effective way for people to address problems and opinions with the problem being solved more quickly and making a difference. Younger generations are using this method of technology to get their sources of information, which recently has shown new media is rapidly becoming more and more effective in society.