Engaging a brand’s audience… Pabla Ayala (Co-founder of pFunk Media, a public relations and digital communications company) joins Pavan Bahl (OS Fashion) and Rob Sanchez (Manufacture New York / Ralph and Remington [Episode 22]) at the Open Source Fashion Freestyle Conversions Conference in Miami, Florida for a discussion about messaging, brand storytelling, media effectiveness, and harnessing technology for superior impact. Ayala touches on digital public relations, startups, getting headlines for clients, and that identifying unique company objectives requires a different approach to communications via working from “the need.” She reveals how positioning a story can make a company attractive, and the importance of focusing on strengths and new developments. Ayala discusses the role technology plays in reaching bloggers and writers, the part engaging the audience plays for the writer, why fashion content must be visual, the impact of leveraging multi-media, and how the growing use of mobile devices changes how much provided content is read. Ayala reviews the importance of managing relationships with media contacts, the effectiveness of using marketing vehicles to push out news, why brands must maintain control of the news they are disseminating, and the facts about news cycles and the effect of unexpected world events on communicating content. Plus, a lively discussion of productivity platforms and the need to integrate tasks into system. Smart City Startups Asana Trello Scrum Slack Buzzfeed GQ Men's Health Paul Mitchell Vogue Marie Claire Techcrunch Glip