The entire New England region was transfixed with the Market Basket drama. Like a miniseries, there was hardly a way to avoid the news coverage, protesting part-timers or the honking MB Groupies who made their opinion known about the family debacle.

This isn’t about any of them. It’s about the competition that did little to nothing to grasp the ring and take measures to try and convert the throngs of consumers who stayed away from Market Basket in a pretty remarkable demonstration of solidarity. Stores like Stop n Shop, Hannaford and Shaw’s all have significant stakes here in New England and, if given a lie detector test, the needle would definitely move if any answered, “No, we are not threatened or losing customers to Market Basket.”

So, why didn’t those big chains get proactive about marketing to the thousands of consumers who, even if begrudgingly, were now frequenting their aisles? What could they have done to make a positive impression on those new to the store or, loyal Basketers?

Here’s some thoughts, would love to hear your ideas as well:

1. Make a connection – interact with your new visitors, ask questions
2. Differentiate the difference – Talk about the quality of your produce, demonstrate the breadth of your offerings, the width of your aisles
3. Start a loyalty program – When this all started, these stores should have offered loyalty incentives
4. Lower your prices as a gesture of goodwill
5. Ramp up your collateral – Increase mailings to the community with coupons and offers, increase in-store signage and instant coupons
6. Show your support for the local community and communicate that in your stores

Now, the dust has settled as Arthur T. goes back to work. Far from losers, Market Basket not only survives this event but, it’s more likely that they come back stronger than ever.

How many brainstormers do you attend each month? Too many? Not enough? Whatever the amount, it’s so important to get the most out of them. It’s a huge ask, lots of people in the room, billable time and sometimes there’s even food!

At Matter Communications, brainstorming is an art form. Developing creative public relations campaigns means that we are always gathering together to bring fresh thinking and new ideas to our clients’ business.

To make sure you are getting the most out of it, here are some quick tips to make them as effective as possible.

Like anything worth doing, you will get the most out of your meeting being as prepared as possible. You can do that by defining roles and adding structure. And key to preparation is to make sure you give people time to prep for the meeting – meaning not 30 minutes before it starts! Tell them about the challenge or opportunity, nothing too long but, enough to give them something to think about.

Invitations are key too. Everyone likes a personalized invitation. It never hurts to tell people why they are invited – think about their skills, experience, maybe projects they have worked on.

Another way to show your creativity is to shake it up location wise. Meet outside in nice weather, in the lobby, kitchen, common area, etc. Anything to get people outside their familiarity zone.

Know Your Role. Well in advance of your meeting, make sure you meet with your team to define the objectives and review the desired takeaways. As the facilitator, you should also be prepared to set up the room with visual stimuli and to have ice breakers to help set the tone that this is a creative session. There are many great resources to help with this online including

http://humanresources.about.com/od/icebreakers/a/my-10-best-ice-breakers.htm and http://smallbusiness.chron.com/five-minute-ice-breakers-meetings-26305.html.

Lastly, your role is to also set the rules. In general those are:

• There are no bad ideas
• No bazookas!
• This is a creative endeavor, HAVE FUN!

To recap, here’s a quick checklist to help out:

• Draft and share prep materials
• Determine invitees
• Determine and secure location
• Determine facilitator
• Set up the room and ice breakers

Following the meeting, the work has just started. It’s up to you and your team to regroup and distill all the creative gold you just mined! Select the top ideas and determine next steps!

In the modern era, the consumer is king. Companies who previously walked over their customers now live in fear of the almighty user review, and rightfully so. Mobile devices, the internet and centralized user reviews now dictate whether a company survives, thrives or dies. Think I’m exaggerating?

As of August 5, 2014, Yelp, the ‘online urban guide,’ has just under 29 million unique monthly visitors. Businesses are finally noticing the power possessed by services such as Yelp, Google Reviews or Angie’s List. These days when people are looking to purchase a product or service they turn to the internet, a resource where they can find reviews, ratings and even price comparisons of just about anything. Thanks to advancements in technology, you can access the internet on your phone, tablet, wrist watch or even your refrigerator, seriously.

Take a second to think about the process you undertake before you make a significant purchase. You look at prices online, you browse multiple websites that carry the product or service you’re looking for, and you compare brands because you want to be positive that you’re getting the right product for the right price. Additionally, you may read the user reviews because you want to be informed of the pros and cons of the product or service, and you care what other people have to say about it. This is the norm for the modern consumer, it is the standard for any major purchasing decision, and today’s companies are learning to respect this process.

Some businesses have embraced the user review system with open arms, proactively asking customers to rate their experience with a product or service. Just the other day a customer service representative at a local car dealership chased me down, handed me a card containing a list of review sites and asked me to write a review based on my experience at the dealership. While this was something I had never experienced before, I realized it’s not a bad strategy – the better the reviews the dealership gets, the more likely it is that someone will purchase a car or utilize their services. Now most companies understand there’s a line between asking a customer to rate their product or service and demanding the customer give a positive review. The businesses that don’t respect this line usually end up in the media spotlight for all the wrong reasons.

Take the Union Street Guest House (USGH) for example. A few years ago when the historic Hudson, NY hotel first appeared on Yelp, it had a handful of four and five star ratings, making it a desirable location for people looking to stay in the area. But when one or two bad reviews appeared, they took drastic measures in an attempt to keep their 4+ star rating. It was recently revealed that the USGH incorporated a policy which charged guests $500 for posting a negative review of the hotel. That’s right, if you wrote a negative review about the hotel, for any reason, they would charge you or the host of your event $500. Here’s an excerpt from the policy which has since been removed from their website:

“If you have booked the Inn for a wedding or other type of event anywhere in the region and given us a deposit of any kind for guests to stay at USGH there will be a $500 fine that will be deducted from your deposit for every negative review of USGH placed on any internet site by anyone in your party and/or attending your wedding or event. If you stay here to attend a wedding anywhere in the area and leave us a negative review on any internet site you agree to a $500 fine for each negative review.” Source: TIME.com via unionstreetguesthouse.com

Unfortunately for USGH, the internet is a big place, and news travels… fast. The story about their ridiculous policy went viral and a look at their Yelp page says it all. The attempt to censor negative feedback has resulted in the once 4+ star hotel, dropping to just 1.5 stars with hundreds of one star reviews (from people who most likely have not even stayed at the hotel, never mind been to Hudson, NY) posted in the last 3 days alone. Talk about a PR nightmare!

While internet ‘trolls’ have clearly jumped on this bandwagon, it’s important to highlight some lessons that can be learned from Union Street Guest House’s mistake:

• First, respecting your customers is a must. Manipulating user reviews or comments whether it be through charging them a fee or otherwise is wrong and just bad business. If you believe your product or service deserves a high rating or good review then put the effort into making it that way in the first place.
• Secondly, you MUST be aware of the power of the internet. It is one of the world’s greatest resources and weapons at the same time, and as USGH found out, it makes or breaks companies.
• Lastly, you should have a response plan in place for when something like this happens. Regardless of whether or not you have a group of savvy PR professionals at your beck and call or just an intern who updates your social media page, you need to be ready for when “it” goes down.

The USGH story should serve as a reminder to businesses and public relations professionals everywhere; the user review can dictate whether a company survives, thrives or dies.

For those of us in the PR profession, media relations, and one of its most common tactics – “pitching” – is considered to be among our most valued skills. Yet put most of us on pitcher’s mound from 60 feet, six inches with a tightly wound ball of string covered in horsehide and we’d be hopelessly lost.

That’s why both the on-field and off-the-field accomplishments of the 30-year-old now former Red Sox ace Jon Lester are so impressive.

Put aside for a minute his three AL All-Star team nominations, two World Series rings, one no-hitter and 110 (and counting) major league wins. Let’s also avoid the rat hole of whether the Red Sox botched their recent contract negotiations with the ace lefty (they did IMHO), causing GM Ben Cherington to ship him to Oakland yesterday rather than get nothing back for him when he likely gets his well-deserved BIG money deal via free agency this winter.

Bottom line: Lester is a pretty incredible human being. The lymphoma survivor and father of two with the steely stare and “all business” attitude defines the often overused “role model” in professional sports.

He’s also a damn good communicator.

Since spring training when he went on record as saying he’d take the proverbial “home town discount” to stay with the Sox, and throughout the past five months, Lester’s approach with his many stakeholders – team management, teammates, the fans and the media – has been incredibly consistent, professional, poised, positive and “on message.” At least publicly. And I have no reason to doubt he is the same way behind closed doors or when the cameras and microphones are put away.

When talks dragged on and became a daily topic of conversation by not only the Boston-area media horde, but the national press as well, Lester was calm and composed and, as always, he took the high road. Even Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy, who could find fault with Mother Theresa, applauded Lester’s M.O. in a recent column.

Lester never let the endless (and often times mindless) media inquiries become a distraction to his team or to his pitching performance. In fact, just the opposite occurred. He put up great numbers for the last place Sox, winning ten games with a miniscule AL East ERA of 2.52.

He also never rolled his eyes while on camera, never snapped at the talk radio geeks, and never dodged the issue with the Dan Shaughnessy’s of the world. He remained hopeful that deal would get done, which of course it didn’t.

Lester also proved adept on social media channels, as recently as last night, took to his Twitter account to connect with fans by favoriting this tweet from Bill Simmons which theorizes/hopes/prays that Lester returns to Boston this winter via free agency. At the same time, mindful of his new stakeholders – the championship-starved Oakland A’s and their fans, Lester dropped this great 116-character hello: “Thanks y’all cant tell you how much your support means to me and my family! Excited to contribute to a very talented @Athletics team! #NVRQT”

Jon Lester might have well thrown his last pitch in a Red Sox uniform. But the lasting image of his flawless delivery – of his fastball on the mound or a key message shared during an interview or tweet – should remain forever in the hearts and minds of Sox fans everywhere.