A New Year means out with the old and in with the new, so where exactly does that put Facebook? Facebook has over 1 billion users, so it’s definitely here to stay. Yet, the social media mogul certainly is changing.

Our world is forever changing! Social media and digital communications completely transformed how many of us do business.

While social media may not change how we garden, it certainly changes how we talk about gardening. 

Journalism has changed immensely since the early 1900s. Now, PR professionals and those involved in garden marketing connect and engage with reporters, editors, and journalists on social media.

Wondering just how to best use social media to get your garden business in the media? Well, read on!

Whewf! Here we are amidst the true holiday shopping chaos. Black Friday and Cyber Monday have come and gone, but the holiday shopping season is just gaining momentum.

For the next month, we will all be bombarded with Christmas advertisements everywhere we go. Print, television, and digital ads galore!

But, get this: social media is the biggest influencer for customers’ holiday purchases.

Don’t spend oodles and oodles on advertisements! PR has the true impact you’re looking for.

So go ahead, put away that advertising check and invest your time and money in a public relations plan focused on social media.

We often talk about how fantastic Twitter and Facebook are for connecting with customers, but LinkedIn is best for connecting with fellow professionals.

LinkedIn is the platform for expanding professional contacts; here, you and fellow members of your garden business can make meaningful connections with fellow garden innovators.

Below are 6 quick and easy steps to maximize your garden industry connections on LinkedIn.

What is it with monstrous storms near Halloween?! Last year, our only snow storm of the season fell on Halloween, and now, we’re getting a hybrid wind, rain, and maybe snow storm.  “Sandy Frankenstorm” (gotta love that name!) appears to be getting worse by the hour. This whirlwind storm is estimated to cause one billion dollars in damage and could be the worst storm to hit the northeast in 100 years!!

When trying to get your garden business and brand exposure, you can’t rely exclusively on the tried and true methods. Yes, they work, but they’re also over done.

To be a true leader in the lawn and garden industry, you’ve got to be leading the pack—that means you’ve got to stay afoot of PR trends and garden trends. Luckily, we can help you out on both fronts!

Induated by e-mails and cold phone calls, reporters and editors at the local and national level are looking for new ways to find stories. 

Take hold of social media, and make it work for you! Using a fresh, new approach to pitching stories may be just what you need.

Below are easy ways you can bring your pitching strategies into the 21^st century.

As if the media didn’t have enough political coverage, KitchenAid wiggled their way into the spotlight as well. During the first Presidential debate, the appliance maker tweeted,

“Obamas gma even knew it was going 2 b bad! She died 3 days b4 he became president.”

The tasteless, offensive “joke” was broadcast to the company’s 25,000 Twitter followers.  Before the tweet was deleted, a few of their followers were able to retweet it.

KitchenAid needed crisis communication—and fast! Their tweet was all over the news, so they had to take action quickly. The head of the company apologized and contacted various media sources to discuss the debacle, but despite their profuse apologizes, many customers on their Facebook page have vowed to never again use KitchenAid products! If only KitchenAid had a concise public relations media plan, the crisis could have been avoided!

Ensure you and your garden business don’t make a mistake like this by creating a fool proof public relations media plan!

Below are five tips to prevent (or recover) from a social media crisis.

The Lawn and garden industry knows how to work social media; it’s free and a fantastic way to get the word out about new products and to foster a conversation with both new and loyal customers. Yet, there’s a major split on how garden businesses use social media.

Search Engine Optimization. AKA SEO. One of the most popular questions in the tech world (and gardening world for that matter) is, Is SEO dead?  In fact, Forbes wrote an entire article on the subject last month. 

“Google is in the process of making the SEO industry obsolete, SEO will be dead in 2 years.”

After reading through the article, I learned a few things.  15% of SEO is internal - which means arranging your website so it has the best chance of being ranked high on Google. The other 85% is driven from written articles, press releases, blogs, comments, and a slew of other content with built-in “backlinks” to your website and put them all over the web.

So it's the 85% that is hard to control- harder to measure and easier to lose track of.  Google wants relevant, real content on the internet that people want to read and tell other people about.

Here's a quick "85% SEO cheatsheet" to help you:

Pinterest recently became the third-most-popular social network in the world with 11-plus million users. 

You're already using SEO to drive your press releases, but how can you use Pinterest to expand your reach? Try these tips: