I'm really excited about entering the blogosphere - and a little bit nervous about doing it, too. But, here we go ... let's talk about our audience.
I think that generally we don't spend enough time thinking about our audience. A wise person once told me that everyone has a radio station playing in their head - WIFM. WIFM stands for "What's In It for Me?" And that's the question we need to think about when we're trying to get our audience's attention. The people we're trying to market to aren't just standing around waiting to hear what we've got to say. They're playing WIFM in their head - at full volume - and we have to devise ways to get them to turn that radio station down so they can listen to our carefully crafted messages. If we don't do that, we're wasting our time and money. But how to get our customer's attention? This is what I hope we'll talk about on this blog.
Definition: ac·ci·den·tal/gov·ern·ment/mar·ket·er, noun. A federal employee who may not have formal training in communication, outreach, or public affairs, but is responsible for same.
Marci Hilt
Photo by Rosina Photography
Communications Coordinator, U.S. Department of Agriculture's Office of Communications
Marci Hilt is a communications coordinator with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Office of Communications, where she oversees special projects. She recently returned to USDA after more than three years as press secretary for agriculture for the U.S. Trade Representative. In 2006, she was program chair for the Government & Media: Perception & Reality Conference in Washington, DC. She was project manager for the Federal Communicators Network’s Communicators Guide, which is available at http://www.fcn.gov/. Over the years, Ms. Hilt has successfully managed numerous USDA communications projects, written lots of stuff, and spent several years of her life attending government meetings, by her estimation. She began her journalism career as a reporter for newspapers and radio stations in Ohio and Nebraska. She grew up on a small farm in Northwestern Ohio and received her B.A. in journalism from The Ohio State University. She lives on Capitol Hill in a rotting slum house with two worthless cats.
1 comment:
Hi Marci, Just testing. Leslie
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