PR Blogger of the Year?

When I found out I was a finalist for PR News' PR Blogger of the Year 2009, I emailed my boss and said, "surely there must be some mistake."

He replied, quickly: "I double checked."

Seriously, it's an honor to be mentioned in the same sentence as Brian Solis of FutureWorks and Tim Haran of Usana Health Sciences. Many thanks to the good people at PR News.

Brian has done an outstanding job promoting the profession and I've been reading his blog regularly for some time now. His latest book, Putting the Public Back in Public Relations, is a valuable tool for people who want to do this right. He was talking about social media as more sociology than technology before it was cool.

To be honest I hadn't read Tim's blog before I learned he was a finalist, but I've taken a look and it's clear his enthusiasm for his company's activities is contagious. He does a great job keeping so many people engaged and excited.

PR News has an interesting group here of three fairly different blogs. Brian is using his blog to talk with fellow communicators. He's relentlessly focused on sharing best practices, identifying trends, and so on. Tim is using his blog to show the personal side of a company and its people, to grow and enhance a social network. I'm using my blog as a tool to engage specific online communities and have issues-based discussions.

It brings me back to a question Karen Russell asked when I was speaking with her class about what division of a company should we place social media - PR, marketing, corporate communications, or somewhere else. I said you shouldn't get tripped up by categorization or nomenclature - social media is what it is, it serves different functions for different people, and may not belong in the same place for every company. Brian, Tim, and I are all practicing public relations at our jobs and with our blogs, yet it's clear we're all doing it very differently. I don't worry about definitions. I do care about communities, relationships, conversations and results.

Warmest congratulations to Brian and Tim, and I hope I get the chance to meet both of you soon.