Archive for June, 2011

Angie Fenton, managing editor for the Voice-Tribune in Louisville, won the Drake’s Charity Dart Tournament on May 24, winning a $6,000 donation to her charity of choice, St. George’s Community Center Freedom School. In total, Drake’s donated $15,000 to local charities that night.

Guthrie/Mayes pitched and worked with the Lexington Herald-Leader on a feature story about Bluegrass Hospitality Group’s expansion of the Drake’s brand into Louisville and Lexington — its first ever expansion of the Drake’s brand and its first expansion outside of Lexington. The result — a significant feature story in BHG’s hometown paper, just prior to the Nashville opening on July 12.

Guthrie/Mayes has worked closely with the Bluegrass Hospitality Group and Cornett Integrated Marketing Solutions to create buzz around the opening of Louisville’s first Drake’s. Events have included a 700-person plus grand opening party in April, which raised money for St. Joseph Children’s Home, and a celebrity dart tournament in May that raised money for 10 different charities. Participants included former University of Louisville men’s basketball coach Denny Crum; Scott Davenport, men’s basketball coach of Bellarmine University, 2011 national division II champs; and several media personalities from local TV stations and newspapers.

Combined, Drake’s has donated $28,619 to Louisville charities. Media coverage of both events and the new Drake’s has reached more than 1 million.

The 9th annual Backyard Baseball & Bar B Q fundraiser for the Alzheimer’s Association of Greater Kentucky and Southern Indiana raised more than $15,000.  Guthrie/Mayes Senior Counselor volunteered to chair the event this year, and tells us that more than 300 people attended the old-fashioned community fundraiser.

***NEWS RELEASE***

9^TH Annual Backyard Baseball Expands to Include Live Music, Cornhole, Bar B Q

 For the 9th year in a row, a dedicated group of Louisville families touched by Alzheimer’s disease are joining to hold “Backyard Baseball” to raise funds for the Greater Kentucky and Southern Indiana Chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association. To date, this event has raised more than $100,000 to help prevent Alzheimer’s and provide services to assist the more than 80,000 individuals in Kentucky, and 5.3 million nationwide, living with this disease.

This year, the event has evolved into Backyard Baseball & Bar B Q, and will feature live music by The Remedy, food from vendors including Chick-fil-A and Mark’s Feed Store, silent auction, mini corn hole tournament, dunking booth and other family-friendly activities in addition to the popular Backyard Baseball Tournament. The event is expected to draw 350 participants this year.

The 2011 sponsors are Norton Brownsboro Hospital, First Capital Bank of Kentucky, Guthrie/Mayes Public Relations, LPL Financial, Occupational Kinetics, The Benefits Firm and YUM!.Raffle and silent auction items include a hot air balloon ride; an elegant date night including limousine ride, dinner, hotel stay, and breakfast; tickets to the July 2 Taylor Swift concert, Colts pre-season game tickets, and several family-friendly packages that combine meal gift certificates at local restaurants with tickets for UofL, UK, Bellarmine University and Louisville Bats sporting events.

“In addition to funding from our generous sponsors and donations from area companies, all food and supplies for the event are being covered by donations from local companies, including Home Instead Senior Care, Wal Mart, Arden Courts and Christian Care Communities, so that every dollar we take in will go directly to the Alzheimer’s Association,” said Bonnie J. Hackbarth, chair of the 2011 event, who said she expects this year’s edition to raise more than $16,000.

Backyard Baseball was started by Louisville sisters Cathy Nagy and Susan Oswald, in honor of their mother who suffers with Alzheimer’s, and initially was held in the White Blossom neighborhood in east Louisville. Growing attendance over the years led the organizers to move the event last year to St. Thomas Episcopal Church on Westport Road.

 NOTE TO EDITORS AND REPORTERS: Colorful, action-oriented photo opportunities include teens playing baseball in team t-shirts with designs similar to major league baseball teams, silent auction packages, a dunking booth and families listening to live music.

Guthrie/Mayes Senior Counsellor Jennifer McGuire and SEO Consultant Scott Clark co-authored this article that appeared in Business Lexington.  This offers some useful tips on how to prevent an online crisis from hijacking your search results.

When Search Results and Crisis Collide 

In the good old days when a crisis hit, with a little luck and some quick thinking an organization might escape with just some bad press. But that’s so old school.  With the rise of social networking and sharing sites like Facebook and Twitter, today’s crises can take on the half-life of radioactive plutonium.  Because search engines never forget.

Whether it’s online news about a real crisis or complaints from a few unhappy customers, search engines will pick up chatter from social networking sites and serve it up on a silver platter to anyone who Googles your business. And there’s no expiration date. Think of it as a virtual picket line that customers must cross to arrive at your door. If your website becomes lost in a sea of negative comments, how many potential customers will be turned off and turn away?

But there are online reputation management (ORM) steps organizations can take now to reduce the risk of search results being hijacked by negative online chatter.

1.    Monitor and Listen

If there’s negative chatter out there about your business, you need to be the first to know. Set up free notifications through Google Alerts, which sends an email alert if your organization is mentioned in blogs, discussions or online news.  If you notice negative chatter, that brings us to the next step…

2.    Know Rules of Engagement

It is important to know in advance exactly when and if your business will engage in an online conversation with critics. Having an agreed-upon strategy or ORM checklist helps you avoid knee-jerk reactions that could drop you square in the middle of a hornet’s nest.  The U.S. Air Force’s “Rules of Engagement for Blogging” is an excellent guide for deciding if, when and how to respond.  But don’t wait.

3.    It’s All About Optimization

One of the best ways to prevent negative chatter from taking over search results is to have a properly optimized website in the first place.  When someone searches for your organization by name online, your site must be at the top of the search results. Otherwise, you’re leaving the door open for negative reviews and comments to slip in and take your place.

This is what search engine optimization (SEO) is all about. Either hire a professional skilled in SEO, research it online or pick up a book. There are plenty of resources available.

4.    Create Multiple Properties

Instead of having just one website that ranks high, have several.  Your goal is to flood the search results with positive websites, reviews and comments about your business, so anything negative is pushed out of view.  Google will only list your website two to three times on the first page of search results, so consider creating a staff blog or support pages under a different web address.  LinkedIn and Facebook fan pages for your business are no-brainers and can be done at no cost. Plus, they rank very high with search engines. Make sure to claim your page on these social media sites and populate them with information, pictures, videos — whatever you have to tell a positive story about your business.

5.    High Authority Sites

When it comes to optimizing a site, one of the most important factors is having high authority sites link to you. This can be anything from a powerful industry blog where you’ve written a guest post to a well-respected online industry journal. But these links often don’t happen automatically, so you may have to ask for them.

6.    Encourage Positive Reviews

Every business has its share of happy customers that rave about their experience, whether it’s a tasty filet mignon, great customer service or an impressive return on investment. But not every business thinks to ask those satisfied customers to write a review on social media sites like Urban Spoon, Yelp and TripAdvisor. Or even Facebook. But that’s exactly what should be done. Because positive reviews have the power to dilute negative ones.

7.    Prepare Crisis Page

Larger companies should consider preparing a crisis page or blog in advance, which can be held off-line until needed. Then, in the event of a crisis, a page is already designed and ready to go with fact sheets, images, key messages, video, personal testimonies or whatever best tells your story. Just add a statement and take the page live so you can become the primary, authentic source for journalists instead of your critics.

Finally, understand that you can’t change search results overnight after a crisis hits. Unfortunately, that’s just not how it works. But if you take steps now to bolster your search engine optimization and attract positive attention, you won’t be as vulnerable in the event of a crisis.

Paul Brophy speaks with WTVQ anchor Kristi Runyon about grants available through the UnitedHealthcare Children’s Foundation (UHCCF).