Todd Defren of the bicoastal PR firm of the future, SHIFT Communications, wrote a post in his PR²Squared blog about my “You Need Doug Winfield” Facebook campaign. He mentions that multiple folks at SHIFT brought it to his attention and how the word-of-mouth generated by the campaign encouraged him to connect with me. That’s the exact set of actions that I desired. Although the ad says “Shift Should Hire Me”, my real goal was that SHIFT (and other targeted companies) should talk about me. Employees active on twitter notice the ads that address their company directly and have one of several reactions:

1. Ignore it (Not so good)
2. Click on the ad and view my Fanpage (Good)
3. See it talk to their friends and manager about it (Very good)
4. Get creeped out and send it to HR (Really Good)
5. Download my resume submit to HR and try to collect a recruitment bonus (A big win-win)

If that leads to an email, a phone call or a superb post like Todd’s; I feel like I’ve used a modern influential tool to engage a desired audience and potentially start relationships with interesting people. That’s never a bad thing.

Any problems so far? Sure there have been a couple. An earlier iteration of the campaign used company logos in the ads. A couple of companies objected, and had Facebook discontinue those ads. Quite understandable but I wish they had taken the social media approach and voiced their objections to me directly. Also a few folks have asked who am I to tell a company to hire me. The answer is:

I’m Doug Winfield. I’ve created digital and online experiences for the past 15 years and for the past 6+ years I’ve conceptualized and put into action methods for engaging audiences via social media conversations and digital content. I can confidently say that I would be a valuable member of your organization.

Does that make me sound like an egotistical wind bag? I sure hope not, but this is not the time to be coy, demure or submissive. Communicators (PR, Advertising & Marketing folks) need to make bold moves, innovate like crazy and explore new options. That’s what I’m all about. That’s why, “You Need Doug Winfield”.