I have an awesome team — hands-down. MashaAllah the sisters and brothers I work with are amazing. Everyone from my marketing group to the coordinators in each of the locations I work with, are awesome.

Lately, between scheduling, confirming venues and guiding people through how to promote the classes, we’ve come up with a brand-new site called bayyinahexperience.com. If you’ve ever taken a Bayyinah class it’s kind of hard to explain. You can’t really explain the feeling you get while you’re in class learning, nor can you really explain in detail what it’s all about; it’s one of those “you just have to be there” moments. Well we can’t guarantee that this site will give you the full “Bayyinah Experience” but it will sure attempt to give you a glimpse. We decided that video blogging was the way to go. Have the students video tape the fun, random, and intriguing moments that happen during class and even during the breaks. They can share their reflections, a story that happened to them on the way to the class, or anything related to what would normally be talked about or shown at a Bayyinah class.

Each location we conduct seminars in, we ask the coordinators to get someone to be in charge of getting footage. And the result is a student-run video blog dedicated to Bayyinah — otherwise known as bayyinahexperience.com.

I’m excited to see how this site is going to catch on as we go to more and more locations and add more and more classes to our curriculum. It should be pretty fun to come back to on a regular basis, inshaAllah.

—————

I have had such little time to post thoughts, reflections, media content on Egyptian Gumbo lately because I’ve been busy with other (greater, inshaAllah) things. I want to keep EG alive inshaAllah, and inshaAllah I will be able to do so once I graduate from LSU this May.

Between school and my work, I’m trying hard to keep with setting aside some time for my own personal development. Make dua for me!
EG

Students moved by class on literary beauty of Qur’an
By Asma Ahmad, IFN Staff Reporter

LONG BEACH, Calif. – Visibly moved, students who diligently attended the first-ever seminar on the literary characteristics of the Qur’an for a non-Arabic speaking audience could not stop talking about the experience afterward. “This course completely picked up my perception of the Qur’an, shook it as an earthquake would move the earth, and smashed it back down to the ground,” wrote one student in an anonymous survey about the three-day class. “My prayer has changed, my love for the book of Allah has skyrocketed, and my faith in its divinity has been multiplied.”

About 150 people attended the class, held Feb. 13-15, at Cal State Long Beach. It was organized by the Bayyinah Institute, a national educational organization whose goals are to make learning Arabic and the Qur’an affordable and accessible.

Bayyinah founder and instructor Nouman Ali Khan took the audience on an awe-inspiring linguistic journey through the Qur’an, exposing them to its unique literary features.

These included, among others, the choice of words; integral relationship between the beginning and end of ‘surahs’ or chapters; coherence and harmony between surahs; and the use of allegorical references, metaphors, and imagery.

It is known that at the time of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), even his enemies would secretly listen to his recitation of the Qur’an in awe.

If they, too, were mesmerized by the literary beauty of the divine message, Khan said, it is unfortunate that Muslims today are so unaware of its marvel.

Attendee Jaafar Husain from Corona agreed.

“This course offers a perspective on the language of the Qur’an that most of us don’t pay attention to,” he said.

The 30-year-old instructor, previously little known in Southern California, seemed to have swept away his audience with his presentation.

“I was extremely impressed with his level of knowledge,” Husain said. “It is a gift of Allah to us that He raises amidst us such people.”

Khan, who does not come from an Arab background, formally started his Arabic studies in Chicago in 1999 with Dr. Abdus-Samie, founder and formal principal of Qur’an College in Faisalabad, Pakistan. He then supplemented with self-study from classical and contemporary texts.

The young father of four now focuses all his energies toward Bayyinah.

“The Qur’an is stunning in its beauty, captivating in its words, overpowering in its message, enchanting in its harmony and baffling in its subtlety,” Khan explained. “This treasure must be shared with all Muslims.”

Khan founded Bayyinah in 2005 in New York. The institute offers students courses around four major tracks within Arabic study; beginners, Qur’anic, standard and classical Literature taught as weekend seminars, 10-day evening sessions and online.

Next year, Bayyinah plans to offer a 10-month Arabic immersion program, which will graduate students at par with Madina or Al Azhar students, Khan said, without having to go overseas.

Bayyinah has currently partnered with the national AlMaghrib Institute, offering its students Arabic courses to fulfill their degree requirements.

The next Bayyinah seminar due to take place in Southern California this summer will focus on ‘tajweed’ or proper pronunciation and recitation of the Qur’an.

On the Web:
www.Bayyinah.com
www.Understandarabic.com
www.bayyinahsessions.com

I’ve worked for many clients before, but none compare to Bayyinah. There is a certain barakah in the organization that subhanallah draws you so deep into your work.

In a recent survey, it was discovered the, least trusted professionals between various markets were found within the media profession; this included journalists, people in advertising, public relations and marketing. Six out of ten people said they don’t trust people in these professions. Ouch.

There’s this notion out there that if you’re in one of these fields, you’ll do anything to help your client, even if it means becoming a “spin doctor, a “deceiver” or even a “liar.” It’s that idea that says a person in one of those fields will say just about anything to serve their own interests. I guess it goes triple for someone like me who is in three of the four fields listed above.

I remember an article I wrote a little while ago that was posted on Muslim Matters about Bayyinah and the “Divine Speech” class. I’m sure anyone who has taken any classes with Bayyinah attest there is something different about this organization than others; something that you can hold dear to your heart.

Someone commented by saying, “Has anyone attended one of the classes? Please honest critique, I don’t want a marketing spin. Jazakum Allah kheir.”

I’m generally not a sensitive person, but I took offense to it. Even though the brother has somewhat a point to be skeptical, I guess I was just so sincerely writing the article out of the love I have for the organization, I indeed forgot I’m the public relations specialist.

This poses a problem for me. Press releases are great, mostly because editors of newspapers take what the want from the release and use their own names to write the article. For blogs and Muslim publications it’s a little different. They usually publish the article as it was sent, and accredit it to the original author. That’s great too, but it somehow tends to put this tint on the glass when people are looking through, so to speak. People now see the articles and see that it’s written by the marketing director and automatically think it’s no good.

When I started my PR firm, Minbar Media, I did so with the intention of only servicing clients I truly believe in and clients I could be proud to help out and bring with me on the day of judgment.

I’m going to remain true to my intention, inshaAllah.

The staff is so sincere and the volunteers I work with are all amazing, subhanallah. Currently, I’m working on a campaign to better acquaint the public with our other two instructors, Sheikh AbdulNasir Jangda, an Imam in Dallas, TX and AlHafidh Wisam Sherif who is currently studying in Egypt until the end of summer.

If people knew their work/style, they would love it. So be on the lookout for that campaign, inshaAllah.

More later, bi’ithnillahi ta’ala. I’m definitely extremely busy, but I’m hoping to update my blog often.

I think I might have to watch some of the things I write from now on, now that I’m not only representing myself but others who are pretty public figures or entities. Wallahu alem.

This is a short promo video Br. Belal did for the organization. It will be showing at a special lunch tomorrow for media representatives, local “celebrities”, local millionaires/ billionaires, organization board members, and more!

I’m super excited!
+10 more for the Muslims

I LOVE working on this PR campaign.

If I haven’t been able to return your calls, answer your emails or even post very often on my blog in the past month or so, it’s because of how busy I’ve been with designing a campaign for a huge non-profit organization here in Baton Rouge called “Big Buddy Program.”

Big Buddy is like “Big Brothers, Big Sisters” in other areas, and much like “Boys and Girls Club.” They do mentoring and activities with often underprivileged kids.

There is so much to say about this campaign but I’ll save a lot of it for later posts.

Big Buddy gave me an advertising budget to work with. And I thought what better way to use some of that money than to make videos that encompass what Big Buddy really is. These videos will be going on their website (which will completely be redesigned in the coming days, my PR group all agreed it was the first thing to do since it’s baaad lol).

However, what’s even more exciting was the idea to produce PSAs (Public Service Announcements) to be broadcast on TV. Big Buddy has a very close, good relationship with all the local media, making my job as a PR person very easy; let’s just say, publicity is NOT a problem.

Big Buddy normally had someone that worked with them for doing video work. I asked to see samples, and let me tell you, it was like a cheese factory had exploded. They were the typical cheesy local commercials; low budget and overly priced.

Since working for Leechon, I’ve really come to appreciate the quality of Br. Belal Khan’s work. He makes complicated things seem pretty effortless. And the greatest example is in the video I’m about to show you.

I told the executive director of Big Buddy whom I’ve been working very closely with since the beginning of the semester of someone I have worked with who I think can do great video work for Big Buddy and for a great price. I had to convince Belal to give us a discount, and Big Buddy got him to come down and shoot some footage.

A group member and I sat there doing the interview with the kids and staff members, while Belal shot the footage. We literally came up with the idea for the PSA five minutes before shooting. I came up with a script, and read it line by line to the kids while they repeated after me. They messed up a couple of times, they were nervous at times but they were awesome. I thought editing this would probably take a lot of time and effort, but again when you see this video, Br. Belal made it look effortless.

So the following are the 4 different versions of the PSA that will be played on TV very soon. We created 4 different versions because:

1. We have an event we wanted to advertise that will take place on the 31st of October
2. Another event on November 18th
3. A general 30 second one to be played all year
4. A 15 second version to also be played all year

When you work in media you have to give TV stations every option to make their lives easier and in turn, you get the coverage you want.

Thanks, Leechon for producing these PSAs and I’ll follow up in the next couple of weeks with various aspects of this AWESOME campaign on this blog, inshaAllah.

And for the record Big Buddy went CRAZY OVER THE RESULT! THEY LOVEEEEEEDDD THE PSAs. In our meeting the executive director, Gaylynne Mack, kept telling me to replay the video, (and I was happy to do it!)

I showed my public relations professor and she said she was speechless.

___________________________________________________________________________________

****Watch them in high quality on YouTube****

Day of Mentor version of PSA:

Evening of Champions version:

30 Second- Serving Community PSA:

15 second version:

I don’t know if this link will work but I’ll try anyway:

http://www.new.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Bayyinah/27214717206?ref=ts

If not, just type in “Bayyinah” in the search box and become a “Fan.”

Spread the word and help support and raise awareness for Islamic education in the West, inshaAllah.

It’s time to offer a different type of analysis of an already huge story.

As most of you have heard, Why Islam has been under a lot of heat lately because of their attempt to do dawah on New York subways. The goal is to place ads within the subways that provoke thought with those who see the ads thus, drawing them to their website where they can learn more about Islam. The controversy? The controversy arises with the sponsors of the ads and some bigoted republican, Peter King, who is calling on the Metropolitan Transit Authority to take down the ads claiming Sheikh Siraj Wahaj, a supporter of the ads, is “linked to terrorism.”

I thought it was time for me to do my research and analyze the subway controversy.

As I was doing my research the first place I went to look for information was WhyIslam.org. To my surprise they had nothing on their Web site mentioning anything about the controversy.

This in turn, provoked me to write this post offering my advise to both Why Islam and anyone else who may be put in the situation of crisis communication (may Allah protect us from this):

1. Information on Web site*

From a public relations perspective, not having information on the website is not a very good idea. So far, it seems Why Islam has really defended themselves well, mashaAllah. However, in crisis communication you should always provide outsiders with information.

I understand that millions of people must have gone– and are still going– to the Web site. And I also understand the over all goal is to educate the public about Islam. However, know that millions of reporters are also going to the Web site looking for any information about the controversy and looking for any statements from the organization. This is perhaps the first place a reporter looks. So my advice to Why Islam is to place a section on the Web site with a statement about the controversy, and any other information debunking myths surrounding the crisis situation.

If you don’t already have a communications director get a PR person to write the pieces that will go up on your Web site. This is extremely important for the credibility of your company. The way it looks as of now is that there is something shady that no one wants to talk about.

May Allah make it easy on all those involved.

2. Get people to write letters to the editor (opinion pieces), in defense of the ads.

Get public figures to back you up and support you. I saw that the mayor was not against the ads saying that if people wanted to spread Islam, they are protected by free speech. When writing press releases or opinion pieces one should mention these big public figures and their stance with your campaign. It will build your credibility, and get you more public support.

The most important aspect of this is to get people who are well informed and preferably people from your communication/PR department to write any press releases or other statements that will be sent to major media.

3. Always have a calm and collected spokesperson.

The general image of Muslims today is that they are violent and always angry. Having a spokesperson who is both eloquent in speech but not someone who gets angry easily is the way to go. CAIR does a great job of this with their spokesperson, Ibrahim Hooper. He knows when to be tough when he needs to, but he’s also not raging with anger.

The video with Br. Azeem Khan was a great example of this as well:

4. Be proactive, not reactive. Take advantage of the media blitz.

This is hard with crisis communication, only because you have to be reactive to the issue that has just ensued. However, be prepared and minimize the possibility of the situation getting any bigger.

Be prepared for anything they might throw at you. With the media spotlight on you, do more dawah activities and work. Make pseudo events and invite media to your events, give back to the community and during Ramadan give lots of food to the poor.  This should all of course be done purely for the sake of Allah, but there is no problem using this opportunity for spreading Islam by inviting the media. This can be done in various communities sponsored by Why Islam. And each locality can invite the media of that area to attend an iftaar or any other event sponsored by Why Islam.

5. Build good relations with reporters, and get contact information.

Not all reporters are out to make you look bad. Be nice and courteous with them and exchange contact information. Let them know that if anything new happens you’ll call them to report on it. That way anytime you have a major event in the future, you build a good relationship and can have a nice story about Islam run in the paper or on the news.

6. Pray istikhara before making any moves.

This is especially important for Muslims because we may think that we will say something that will make the situation better, but wallahu alem things get turned on us very quickly and easily. Seek Allah’s help in everything that you do and put your trust in Him alone.

For anyone in a crisis communication situation, be sure to follow these few guidelines of many.

We ask Allah ‘az wa jal to make it easy on the Muslims everywhere, and to give us success in this life and the hereafter, ameen.

Wallahu ta’ala alem.

—-

*If anyone is wondering why I wrote “Web site” rather than “website”then this is because this is the way it is written in Associated Press style.

Last year, I wrote and delivered a five minute speech to my public relations class. I decided to take the easy way out of the assignment and decided to take the opportunity for dawah and picked the subject of prejudice to talk about. I chose excerpts from my past opinion columns in The Daily Reveille and made them into my speech.

After delivering the speech one girl came up to me and said, “It really does make me see how ignorant we really are. Especially seeing how it’s only the actions of few that get attributed to your religion.” Others told me it was a successful PR speech because it made them look at their own beliefs about Islam and compare them to my words. I didn’t expect that feedback. Alhamdulillah it was successful, all by the will of Allah. And only Allah has allowed me such opportunities, walhamdulillah.

Meanwhile, I was working on a media kit for Leechon and particularly the upcoming documentary, “Tufaan.” During that time, we came up with the idea of shooting public service announcement videos to put at the beginning of every documentary that Leechon would produce — especially Tufaan, since its primary target audience is non-Muslims. Hence, the idea to use my speech as a script for the PSA emerged.

So we decided to do it much like the format of the “Bear Witness” video that Br. Belal Khan had produced a while back, where every person would read two lines from the script. Here’s the Bear Witness video, which in my opinion is an really nice dawah video:

*video removed because sisters shown in video

Anyway, Br. Ahmed Eid, a brother from NJ who has been working with me and the PR team for quite a while took up the challenge of shooting and editing the video for Leechon. MashaAllah, it turned out great. Although I don’t personally know anyone in the video, I wanted to give a big jazakum Allahu Khairan katheeran for the work and effort you guys put into it. May Allah make it heavy on your scales, ameeeeen. And inshaAllah I look forward to working with you all in the future, bi’ithnillahi ta’ala.

So without further adeiu, our PSA: FREEDOM FROM FEAR

(video removed)

Lastly, in the future I would like to write dawah videos that are not on the defense. Sure there are people who hate Islam, sure there is still a lot of anti-Islamic sentiment around, but I would like to move away from being on the defense to speaking to people in general about Islam. A PSA about “Islam” why they see us prostrating on the floor when we pray, etc.

Good things to come inshaAllah. Give us your feedback and if you like it spread it around inshaAllah.

This is the last video before the launch of the first webinar on May 31st. Wallahi this is worth it. It’s no secret that I’m big on getting more Muslims in the media. It’s not only because it’s something I’m passionate about — but it’s because I know what potential is out there. This video does a good job of laying out the problem in the beginning with the 3D graphics then tells all about Message Mastery.

Registration will close I believe on June 13th. So whether you are more interested in writing, marketing or film making. Signing up for the first class is crucial because you will get into all the other ones for free. It’s really worth the money. And I hope that Allah ‘az wa jal makes it heavy on the scales of the people that register. ameen.

Remember the first session will be FREE for everyone to tune in and listen to on May 31st. So check it out and tell your Muzzzzlim friends.

Also: There is a post talking about the difficulties when making this video here.

For those of you who don’t know, I do a lot of the PR work for Message Mastery. I really only do PR work for projects I really, truly believe in. MM is one of those projects that subhanallah, not only I have full faith and support in, but sheiookh like Yusef Estes, Muhammad Alshareef and Yasir Qadhi have also all showed interest and support in.

(If you know about Message Mastery, we want to know your thoughts and/or how you heard of the program. So be sure at the end of this post to leave a comment letting us know.)

If you knew the amount of work that goes into making something like MM successful (by the Will of Allah) then subhanallah, you too would find this to be something rare and a great opportunity for all Muslims.

Some of you have seen the Message Mastery videos, some of you haven’t. I’m not going to talk about things you might already know (from the videos and the website) but rather, I’m going to tell you the “backstage” stuff that goes on; things we discuss and only insiders know and things that will be released publicly soon, but you hear it here on my blog first

But before tell you the inside stuff, here’s just a little bit about Message Mastery: It’s all about training Muslims to be well-rounded in several areas of the media; not only for the sake of their own work, but for the betterment of Islam, inshaAllah.

10 things you might or might not know:

1. Plans for the Message Mastery System:

The upcoming film making class (on May 31st) is NOT Message Mastery. That is just ONE CLASS in the Message Mastery system. The plan is that we are establishing this as the first webinar of many to come in the future. There will be other classes like marketing/viral marketing 101, photography , and surprise, surprise — a media writing/PR writing 101 class taught by none other than yours truly, inshaAllah. Those among many other classes, bi’ithnillahi ta’ala. So this really is going to be an all inclusive “getting Muslims in the media” system. Awesomeness, no?

2. Special Deals Still Under the Rug… Until Now:

Shh, word on the street is that if you sign up for the first class (film making) you’ll get into all the other future classes free. Why is this genius? It’s genius because only 200 people will get this deal. Everyone else will have to pay for every other webinar they want to take when they come out.

3. People Who Actually Make Awesome Projects/Films Will Have the Opportunity to Get Client Work in the End. There is more work being sought out then there are the Muslims with the skills to do it. We know who’s looking for promo videos, news articles, marketing for their projects/companies. And inshaAllah those people who show the best work will be given these opportunities.

4. The Awesomeness and WEIRDNESS of Our PR Team.

If there was ever an example of a “mastermind group” this would be it, mashaAllah. I must say, we have all different types of personalities on the team but somehow we all compliment each other’s ideas and thinking in the end.

We have the social members of our group — the ones who love to give input on everything (which is great) and we have the silent ones who out of no where “bust out” with their great ideas. We have the nice members of our group and we have that one sarcastic “mean” member of the group who makes us all gasp in disbelief at some of the things he says . Ahem… see (www.themanoffewwords.com and www.islamify.com.) –Oddly enough, he too, brings forth great ideas and puts his words to action… so we’re all happy to have him on the team.

5. More Weirdness:

We all make fun of each other’s grammar and spelling, we have about 30 posts for every topic we discuss and we all read them — it’s the nerdiest group you will ever come across, and I love it. Hafsa will email me all my mistakes in this post (which I love), the poor brother and sister from the UK stay up all night just for our conference calls, Manoffewwords always insults all members of the group only for all of us to end up laughing at it, despite its meanness, and several members of the group keep trying to get Belal in trouble with the authorities by suggesting project names like “Youtube Jihad.” Sorry Belal, you have bad friends.

6. Taking Over Ideas and Us Acting Like We Know What Br. Belal is Talking About:

Belal, who makes the videos, usually has a specific vision for what he wants his next videos to turn out like. He usually has it all planed out until we, his PR team, decide that he should do something completely different. And subhanallah, he doesn’t hesitate to go with our advice. He also likes to make up a lot of words — i.e. “ordinatory, UPPOPPR” — and uses them a lot, expecting we know exactly what he’s talking about.

7. If You’re Worried About the Cost, You’re Worrying Over Nothing.

I don’t work for scams. If I truly didn’t think that people would get their money’s worth, I wouldn’t be promoting it. ESPECIALLY with this first class (since you’ll get all the other ones free.) We debated and debated over the cost, and really $247 was what we came up with due to all the things we KNOW that will be provided for those who register. Trust me, people pay thousands of dollars for less than you would get with Message Mastery.

8. Most of Us Just Want to See His Little Sisters in the Videos…

…share the spotlight. All up in their “grill” like that.

9. We’re all Becoming Masters of Viral Marketing.

Seriously, we’re discovering so many secrets and techniques that will blow anyone’s socks off. We also have so many ideas that are being worked on right now with regard to viral marketing, all of which will be taught inshaAllah in one of the future Message Mastery webinars.

10. None of Our Success Could be Possible Without the Will and Help of Allah.

Walhamdulillah.

OK, this post became a little too long. If you haven’t already go ahead and check it out and TAKE the opportunity while you can, inshaAllah.

To be honest, hate using the word “opportunity.” I’ve too been jaded way too much by that term. “You have the opportunity to go to outer space! Oh, did we mention you just have to have 20 million dollars.”

However, this really is an opportunity for any Muslim with some interest in any of the areas within mass media. So I suggest you check it out at www.messagemastery.com.

P.S. before any of you label me as stupid, I wouldn’t really write a post if I knew it was something that could get me in trouble and cost me my job .

Let us know your thoughts. A new video will be coming out any day now, inshaAllah — stay tuned.