CASACOM’s Top Three Communications Stories of the Week

May 23, 2014

CASACOM’s Top Three Communications Stories of the Week

What do content, in-stream advertising and vacations have in common? They are the topics of our three favourite PR and communications stories of this past week.

Content:

What’s a hot topic in business-to-business marketing? That would be “snackable” content. According to a recent post on B2B Marketing, the human attention span is becoming shorter and shorter, therefore, putting pressure on communicators to create content that is concise and to the point. There tends to be a lot of information we are asked to share and trying to communicate that in bite-size material may seem to be a difficult task because you do not want to neglect any important details. Jenny Mason, a senior account manager at Barrett Dixon Bell (BDB), a B2B global marketing communications agency, offers six suggestions on how we can create content that appeals, while including the essential information.

1. Go back to the basics
2. Be clear in your messaging
3. Keep firm in the scope of your content
4. Don’t try a one-size-fits-all approach
5. Think of your reader
6. Evaluate the results

To read more on each of these tips, please see below:

“6 tips for bite-sized technical content” (PR Daily)

In-Stream Advertising:

It was announced this week that Yahoo is introducing in-stream advertising to international markets including, Canada, France and Brazil. Yahoo’s new ad units will be visually integrated into the main content stream; similar to Facebook’s in-stream ads or Twitter’s promoted tweets.

The company will build an individualized stream for each user by using its user data and targeting capabilities, which will feature mixed editorial and ad content that match the interests of each consumer. The in-stream ads will run on both desktop and mobile devices.

To learn more about Yahoo’s in-stream advertising, see below:

“Yahoo Canada launches in-stream advertising” (Marketing Magazine)

Work Smart:

Do you use your vacation days? A 2014 Oxford Economics Assessment of Paid Time Off in the U.S. showed 42% of employees with paid time off had unused days at the end of the year. That is an average of 8.1 unused days. It’s not very surprising that people don’t use all their vacation days. Leaving for a few days or weeks can seem like a lot of time away and a large amount of work to come back to.

John Roa, a Chicago-based serial entrepreneur and founder of AKTA, a digital engagement consultancy, believes that some of his most important business ideas has come from his time away. So why take your vacation time?