Online Public Relations Thoughts

My colleague, Mike Millican, sent me this San Francisco Chronicle podcast because he says it is a neat idea for a newspaper. It's certainly a way for media to get even with cranks. In this case, the caller becomes ever more abusive as he speaks. One can hear bile bubbling and growing.

I don't blame the editor for putting the fellow's message online. It's a lesson in human nature. Perhaps the next time the caller will be more careful -- or he won't call again, which would make the Chronicle happy. Still, the episode got me to thinking about similar mistakes of writing to go with pilotless drone.

Rocky stone
Groaning moan
Calcified bone
Audible tone
Pointed cone
Repayable loan
Known known

...it gets addictive.

One could be near death and still know Microsoft has launched its new operating system, Vista. The news is "All Vista All the Time." Microsoft has always been an aggressive marketer, but its current campaign is verging on the ridiculous -- about half a billion worth of media spending.

One wonders whether Microsoft needs to be so noisy. It's the equivalent of a megaphone in the hands of the company that it uses to blast directly into your ear. I wonder if Microsoft trusts public relations. I suspect it doesn't, although it pays heavily for publicity.

It is this kind of ostentatious display that is off-putting to competitors who don't have the cash Microsoft has. It seems so needless as well. The company's operating system is going to go into new PCs whether one likes it or not, and few are going to run out and buy Vista to upgrade because of the stiff operating system requirements in the massive code.

So what is all the noise really about? It makes one wonder.

One habit I've never lost since the early days of the PC is playing with software. That is, buying a program that seems to fit the PR business and seeing if it does. Over the years, I've found a number of tools that way and quite a few that were not applicable as well.

Lately, I've been noodling with Project Management software that allows one to build detailed Gantt and PERT charts with manpower estimates. This is the second time I've returned to this software. I originally looked at it more than 10 years ago and found it wasn't that useful for most PR tasks. I've decided to take a second look to see if matters have changed since. I'm also playing with Microsoft Visio to see if it can add to explanations we give to clients. I've tried programs like Visio before and found them to be somewhat useful but not worth the price in the end. This time, it appears I might have found ways to use the software on a regular basis.

To those who wonder why one should bother doing this, the answer is that one learns as much from a tool as clients who see the products of it. New tools teach one new ways to think. That's valuable in PR. We've got to look at the world in many different ways to understand it better.

One knows a presidential campaign is underway as soon as character assassination appears. Still, it's tone deaf of this candidate to flaunt such a big house while maintaining he is a man of the people. It leaves an opening for his opponents to exploit, and they are doing so already. It would have been far better PR to hold off building the house until one was sure of a shot at the nomination.

This site is in German, but the typefaces are recognizable nonetheless. Apparently, an industry group met and decided on the 100 best typefaces available in the world today. They posted the rankings for all to read. This is a useful list for any type of communications production. There are quite a few I've never used yet. I suppose that gives me something to shoot for.

You've read of bathroom advertising. Now, there is bathroom internal communications. This story from Google is funny, but it appears to work. How do you get the attention of programmers who dislike software testing? Put your comments where they all have to "go" sooner or later.

I'm sure other communicators figured this out long ago, but it takes nerve to plunge ahead. The Google crowd apparently have plenty of moxie.

There is something about losing huge amounts of money that concentrates the mind. This is what Ford Motor is going through at the moment. From a PR perspective, the company is handling a prolonged crisis, but it is a crisis in which there is less argument about what to do and more urgency to get things done. This kind of pressure is exhausting but exhilarating. The reason? Actions that should have been taken years ago are moving forward. There is loss during this period. Thousands have left the company and hundreds more will go. There is gain too in shrinking to a competitive weight. What Ford must remember is its business. The company has to sell cars -- lots of them -- to recover.

What management has to do in communications during this period is to keep workers focused who might otherwise grieve for what was while losing faith in what is to be. I do hope company leaders are spending much more time communicating internally. If they aren't, the whole process can go awry.

Having grown up in a Ford family, I have a soft spot for the brand, but on the other hand, I haven't owned one of their vehicles for years. The company's quality took a dive, and I went to Japanese cars. The last Ford I owned was a pickup truck. It was faithful but paint literally flaked off of it. Ford has a journey to win back someone like me. I hope they complete the course. I would like to own one of their vehicles again some day.

One of the most important communications within any company is its budget. PR practitioners know the dreaded time of year when one prepares and submits numbers to the accounting department. No one likes doing it and often, numbers are creative as well because who can tell what will happen in the coming year? One crisis or merger can knock any communications budget out of whack.

It is amusing to read, therefore, that accounting managers still struggle in the computer age with getting line managers to do their budgets. You would think with all the computerization, networking and online assistance that this situation would be resolved. It isn't. The article gamely tries to explain why. Line managers and accountants have different points of view -- one long and the other short.

It is a story, in other words, that one finals under the heading of "some things never change."

This interview on The New York Times' continuous newsroom is worth reading because it details the future of the newspaper industry. That future looks increasingly like a wire service, such as the AP or Reuters. For PR practitioners, this means deadlines for news are continuous.

This is an interesting paper that discusses the pullback of international news bureaus among US newspapers. While the author makes good arguments for continuation of foreign news bureaus, it occurred to me that, perhaps, it isn't fatal to have fewer international bureaus among midsized newspapers in the US. Why shouldn't newspapers purchase more international news from diverse sources like Reuters and Associated Press? In fact, that is what many are doing. There is a homogeneous view that comes from buying news, but there are so many news sources it needn't be the case.

What is striking as a PR practitioner is to see the change in perspectives in news reporting once one leaves the US. It certainly wouldn't hurt to get more of an international view before the American public. As in all cultures, there is a tendency toward internal focus among US media. That tendency is largely unconscious and comes from growing up in this society. It is sometimes shocking to see what others think who have grown up outside US culture. It's a good shock, though and a reminder that there are other views, whether we like it or not.

I'm not a sports fan. I watch games now and then, but I don't root for teams. That written, I noted with disbelief that a much-traveled coach around American football leagues has retired yet again. This came just weeks after telling everyone he needed to be a coach more than ever.

Might one say this person's credibility is suffering? The least one can think is that, perhaps, this person doesn't know his own mind. My guess is he may find another coaching slot. He has been successful in his career, but what would an owner think who retains his services? This guy will leave before the end of his contract?

The coach has created a public relations problem for himself because he says one thing and does another. He may be disappointed that his team did poorly this year, but so what? Resigning for that reason would indicate a level of immaturity, an inability to stay a course.

Perhaps the rule here is that high-profile people need to assume the responsibilities of the level they have reached. The public expects it.

For those who follow law enforcement, there is an electronic control weapon that officers use called a Taser. The Taser shoots two tiny wires at a person that deliver a powerful shock which incapacitates the individual momentarily. It is designed as a method of control that delivers less harm than a bullet through a body part. Tasers have been controversial because activists claim that police officers misuse them. This has harmed sales of the device to police departments.

That is why the company's decision to provide a new camera accessory to record audio and video on the device is a good PR move. It's decision to show a realistic viral ad as part of this effort is even stronger. When one's existence is threatened by public opinion, lead with the facts, which is exactly what Taser is helping police departments do.

One hallmark of human beings is an inability to maintain an objective stance for long. That is, irrationality is part of human make-up, and there are few Spocks among us. This is why I've always thought some of the mathematical theories that drive Wall Street are inherently self-limiting. They depend too strongly on logic and not enough on emotion.

Why am I writing this? Because here is the latest example of irrationality in investing, and it has to do with a client of ours who is alarmed at the amount of money flowing into ethanol.

It has been stated frequently enough in this blog, but let me state it again. PR practitioners should cultivate the art of standing to the side and observing human action without getting swept up in it. Our credibility is fact that we bring to persuasive argument and not hype. When something like ethanol is generating hundreds of stories, and one is sure it is a bubble, stay away from the bubble. Preserve client reputation.

How easy is this to do? When the former PR practitioners of Silicon Valley stop laughing, I'll answer that. It is never easy to suggest to a client to stand back, and it is almost a guaranteed way to lose a client or a job. Jumping on trends is a requirement of much of PR work.

But one should try anyway, it seems to me.

A colleague sent me an opinion piece yesterday written by a PR practitioner who wants pay-for-performance in the PR industry. It was interesting. The author of the essay, David B. Oates, APR; Principal, Stalwart Communications, made the following statement.

PR firms will need to consider operating on a "Pay-for-Performance" rate structure as our industry continues to evolve. This model is one that aligns a significant portion of a client's fees to actual results, such as securing article placement or speaking opportunities, industry award recognition or sales lead generation.

I agree with Mr. Oates to a point, but that point isn't as far down the road as Mr. Oates might make it. My concern is based work our firm has been doing. Much of what we have been handling is crisis communications. In a crisis, one doesn't want to be rewarded for article placement and speaking opportunities but for just the opposite. How does one measure a negative?

Mr. Oates is thinking, of course, of marketing PR in which gaining awareness is the goal. Most PR activity today is marketing, but not all of it. I happen to work in a part of the field that appears to be an exception to Mr. Oates' point of view.

There is another area as well that doesn't quite fit into Mr. Oates' argument -- corporate positioning. For those who don't work in this area, corporate positioning instills and maintains a correct perspective of a company. Targets for much of this work are shareholders, present and prospective employees, governments and other influentials, including customers. In this part of the PR business, one wants publicity, but it needs to be the right kind in the right business publication, and it takes time, sometimes months, before one can build a case and persuade reporters to consider it. Think of Walmart's struggles to correct perceptions about how it operates.

PR is a broad field with many types of counseling. It's not just marketing, but in today's sales-driven environment, it is difficult to remember that.

What do you do when you're wrong about the course of events? It would be nice to fess up, but you can also twist logic into a pretzel and say you were on the right side all along. Everyone misunderstood what you were trying to say.

There is a teeny problem with credibility taking this path, however.

In this article, author Ken Auletta discusses how he is able to stay in control of information while writing. It's instructive and somewhat obsessive, but he produces lengthy and detailed reports on what is happening in the media that set the standard for other journalists.

Writers have their own ways for organizing material, but the secret is organization once one gets beyond three or four pages of finished work. I prefer a lengthy and detailed outline for long work, such as company backgrounders that run to 22 or 23 pages. My approach may not be as efficient as Auletta's. His job is harder with the number of sources he uses. On the other hand, an outline is the only way I've found to keep the logic of an article on track when detail threatens to sink it.

Some PR practitioners never write in long forms. Press releases number two or three, or at most, five pages, so they don't have to worry about gaps that suddenly show when one is on the 12th page of composition. Those who do write in long forms know the feeling of looking into a dark pit when key facts are missing and the logic of an essay is foundering. It is best not to have that happen too often.

This may be the future of persuasion -- brain studies. If so, science will put a biological foundation beneath millennia of study that yielded rules of rhetoric. It's interesting to think that future communications textbooks may have illustrations of brain scans to go with rules for unpaid persuasion. I can see it now. "Five ways to light up the nucleus accumbens."

On the other hand, even if we know the machinery behind the brain's response to persuasion, will it make much difference in how we approach rhetorical principles? Practically speaking, I don't think it will. The craft of persuasion is so old and so deeply explored that a biological explanation is one more expansion of what is known.

Still, it's an area to investigate and think about in one's work.

We learned long ago that nothing is free in life. For everything one gains, one loses something in return. That is apparently what is happening with wind energy and the environment -- the feathered environment, that is. What began as an experiment and PR exercise for alternative energy has turned into a bird killing machine. Who would have guessed that?

Iraq's politicians are as bone-headed a group there is when it comes to PR. This doesn't help. One would think that after the disaster of the ill-managed hanging of Saddam Hussein, they would know better. Apparently, they don't.

This story is not the first about individuals who identify with captors, but it raises questions about the human mind and how impressionable it is. Under duress, some individuals will do whatever they are told, and they don't seem to show conflict as a result of it. Think back to the Patty Hearst incident and to the Stockholm Syndrome.

What bothers me is how much this identification affects individuals in organizations engaging in unethical actions -- say, Enron or Worldcom? Patty Hearst went to jail for her actions, but there are those who say she didn't know what she was doing. If that contention is true, where does moral responsibility cease under pressure?

The answer appears to be that we don't know. But, as PR practitioners, we are in a "line of responsibility" if we comply with demands to perform unethical actions, such as deliberately disseminating false financial information or providing false reasons for why an executive has left a company. There is a point where "going along" goes too far.

There comes a time in public relations when one should cut off debate because argument is removed from reality. This is such a case. There may be good reasons for not showing Al Gore's movie in a classroom, but this is not one of them. Yet, committed individuals can create a fuss and slow or stop civic actions with objections removed from the realm of fact.

It seems we stretch too far at times to hear opinions from all sides. We're afraid to move, if there is the least bit of opposition. In our society, however, one must always expect opposition. The question leaders should ask is where the majority stands and go with that. Otherwise, nothing gets done.

In our little town, for example, we have a deer problem -- too many of them. This is a constant headache, at least in Northeastern states. There is really only one way to cut down on the size of herds to prevent starvation in the winter and ruined gardens, flower beds and lawns in the summer -- thinning. Thinning means shooting with arrows or bullets. Opposition to killing deer kept our town from acting for years while does and bucks wandered through backyards, on roads and in driveways. Finally, the town council funded a report that revealed deer were dying on the reservation next to the town because they lacked food. This was enough to get herd thinning started over objections. But, there are still those who would shut down thinning to "save the deer."

The town pulled a typical PR move by funding a study. They could hide behind conclusions of the report -- and are. But, would it have been better and faster had the town moved earlier rather than spending money to produce a foregone conclusion? From a political perspective, probably not. From a personal perspective, the town's leaders were not showing much leadership. On the other hand, town leaders can say they have finally solved the problem. This doesn't mean "Bambi" protesters have gone away, but their arguments no longer carry as much weight. The outcome was correct, but it took too long to get there, it seemed to me, because town leaders tried too hard to listen to all sides. There is a point where directions become obvious and one needn't look at a map any longer.

Sometimes it is worth taking a long view of a problem. Here's one. It's an incident that occurred long ago, but which we won't see until long into the future. It provides a glimpse into the immensity of the universe and just how small earth is in the scheme of things. PR challenges look like nothing by comparison, and as one person said, it is hard to grasp that it could be true.

Taking a longer view can relieve the pressure of short-term demands. Unfortunately, most clients don't look at the world that way. They want everything done now, but neither behavior nor belief systems change quickly, as we noted in earlier postings. It takes years. CEOs don't get the time they need, however. The median time a CEO is in office in the S&P 500 is just five years. Five years is barely enough time to effect one major behavioral change in a company.

With high turnover in company leadership and increased competitive pressure, it is striking that so many companies continue to thrive. What appears to be happening is that culture survives CEOs and carries on in a quiet but powerful way. Employees outlast the boss and do what they have always done. Companies that have changed successfully usually have a CEO who has stayed in office for 10 years or longer -- enough time to change behavior all the way to the point of contact with customers. The tension between short-term demands for performance and long-term change is a challenge that few master. PR practitioners need to be aware of what really happens within corporate culture versus what a CEO thinks is going on.

One of the hardest tasks is acceptance. That is, recognizing another has a different view from you and there isn't much chance of crossing a divide. The challenge is how to work together and thrive rather than remaining at loggerheads. It's a public relations issue and often, a personal issue as well. Different viewpoints usually provide for a richer environment, one in which it is harder for the ego to fashion its own little world of order.

Acceptance can be hard, cruel even, to the organization or individual committed to a path. Think of Kodak's reliance on film stock that served the company well for over a hundred years. In the digital era, Kodak has shrunk and shrunk again in an effort to change to digital. For years, the firm could not accept that bits and bytes were going to replace silver nitrates, but it is now committed to a course that is changing the company completely. Will Kodak survive? It's still hard to say, but had it not changed, it certainly would disappear.

Acceptance is probably the toughest challenge of growth and many individuals and organizations don't make the transition. On the other hand, if they do, they are more powerful and open for the experience.

This story is a wonderful example of human behavior and belief systems that PR practitioners run into regularly. A scientist has derived a new theory for the mass extinction of natives in Mexico at the time of the Spanish Explorers. The theory appears to be a better fit for the disease that swept through Indian tribes than smallpox brought by the Spanish. So what has happened? It has touched off a huge debate among academics who have based their views of history on everything evil coming with the conquistadors.

In the US, there has been a long history of belief that big corporations are too powerful and self-interested and the CEOs who run them too greedy. Critics point to the Enrons and Worldcoms and Tycos to make their case while ignoring hundreds of other companies that behave honorably. Try to make this point and one is ignored or shouted down. Facts are not allowed to get in the way of belief, as was noted yesterday

PR practitioners should be bound by facts, even when facts go against conventional wisdom. That's why we can find ourselves in minority positions. The hard part is making sure we do not pick facts to advantage and ignore others, which is easy enough to do. Many positions we are asked to promote lie in gray areas among conflicting facts, because evidence is not yet clear. This was the case, for example, in the early days of smoking studies, the early research into man-made global warming, and early pollution studies. When this happens, it is easy to be on the wrong side of an issue, but one should be willing to change in the face of new evidence. That's hard to do, as the academics of Mexico are learning.

This is a dispiriting article. It says the better informed you are, the greater your ability to select facts and confirm your position in the face of contrary evidence. That is, the smarter you are, the more biased you are. We like to think in PR that we educate individuals and in so doing, we achieve greater understanding for clients. We do to a point, but what the author of this essay notes is that we don't change minds necessarily. Those who dislike a corporation or CEO will continue to do so in spite of evidence to the contrary.

The recent departure of a major CEO was attended by bile from the media that I haven't seen for awhile. Lost in the negative reporting was the huge turnaround the CEO had achieved during his years in office. The media reported that the company was doing reasonably well, but they weren't about to give credit to the CEO for achieving that performance. Out of dozens of articles, there were maybe one or two that were balanced assessments of what the CEO had done.

In politics, that is called piling on, and it is seen often during presidential campaigns. Think of Howard Dean. While Dean wasn't much of a candidate, his campaign did adopt new strategies of reaching voters through the internet that have become standard tools. A balanced assessment would offset the famous scream video of him with acknowledgement of advances he made. You won't find that in many media reports. (For the record, I wasn't and am not a supporter of Howard Dean.)

The article supports one observation about public relations: It is a difficult business. It is easier to run paid ads and hammer name awareness and opponents. That is a reason why marketers continue to favor paid media.

I stumbled on this site yesterday, and it takes me back. I lived within a mile or two of this company town for a time while growing up. It was among the last of such 19th Century towns in the US where companies had constructed everything for employees and provided it to ensure a consistent labor supply. That was an era of different public relations. The company was father, mother, judge and jury. The CEO had complete power over one's economic existence and welfare. That was one reason for the Pullman strike.

There are a few other towns like Scotia that survive. Pullman is still there, and so is Kohler. Most have disappeared or been absorbed, but they are reminders that relationships have changed between companies and employees in America. One wonders if it has always been a change for the better.

This advice for small newspapers contains a job description that should apply to PR. Hire only those with multimedia skills. Here is a snip.

...the Internet era requires more than finding people who can snap a news photograph and write a story and lay out the front page. (snip)

My advice is to ONLY hire people whose skills cross media platforms. Look for people who not only understand and are enthusiastic about online media, but who also can serve the print edition well. If a job candidate says she has always aspired to be a newspaper reporter, and doesn't come in the door with some multimedia skills and experience such as video and audio production, frankly I'd keep looking. You might even go so far as to look skeptically at candidates who look great when it comes to new-media skills but lack the experience or motivation to work on the print side, if you simply can't afford that much specialization.

There are PR practitioners today who don't fit that job description. One wonders how much longer they will be relevant.

PR frequently gets involved in issues where one can argue for either side. This is one. It is a tale of surveillance cameras versus loss of privacy. We don't like the notion that we are being watched unless there is a crime. Then, we do. Unfortunately, there is no way to maintain privacy and surveillance at the same time. There are those who consider surveillance an example of encroaching government on the lives of citizens. There are others who feel safer because cameras are watching. Both are right.

This is an issue that reflects times and temperament. There have been periods when unwarranted surveillance was a crime. Today, post 9/11, no one thinks as much about it. Tomorrow, who knows? It is unlikely cameras will ever go away, and we will be watched more closely than ever. That seems creepy until one reads a story like this. Yet, it is easy to construct a PR campaign on either side of the surveillance issue, and there is no "meta" position I can discover.

It is not something one thinks about every day, but PR is based on the concept of Free Will -- that is, you can make choices for yourself. You are not a evolutionary program destined to follow the impulses of your brain. That is why this article is of interest. There has been a longstanding argument in science over Free Will. Some scientists reject it: Others espouse it.

Marketers would prefer to reject the idea. They dream of an ultimate combination of sensory enticements that inexorably lure consumers in. If they get all the variables just right, they will sell a million widgets. PR practitioners reject that notion -- or should, anyway. They accept that individuals are unique, and one cannot tell them what to do. They decide for themselves.

Ask yourself where you stand in this argument. You might arrive at an unexpected answer.

This column from a commentator on the Los Angeles Times expresses what several journalists feel. They don't want to relate to readers. They want to talk to readers. The idea that they should get responses back to what they have written is foreign and distasteful.

One could call this a "caveman" philosophy, but on second thought, the columnist has a point. If he has done his job, he has considered several viewpoints before writing the column and taken one that he deems to be correct. Why should he spend time rebutting viewpoints he has dismissed already? On the other hand, he fails to understand that readers like students do not always get a point delivered in a lecture. They have to wrestle with the logic before grasping what a teacher is saying.

The column was written to be offensive and to generate comment, which it has. But, the writer's point is worth thinking about. Do we always have to relate to readers in the Internet age?

It's back to work after a layoff of several days. I can't say I feel refreshed and have a new perspective. I don't. In many ways, PR is the same guidelines applied to problem sets. There are times when new problems arise that seem to violate what one knows, but rarely. The new year should be a continuation of communicating to individuals and groups. On the other hand, I would be foolish if I weren't on the lookout for something unexpected.

The largest change in my career thus far has been the democratization of communications. But, that is far along, although PR's adaptation to it has not proceeded apace. A great frustration has been the slow pace of PR's acceptance of new media. Our business seems to be contented to do the same things in most of the same ways, even as primary media vehicles change before our eyes. One wonders if the PR industry is the "spinning wheel" of the communications business dedicated to hand-crafting as automatic looms take over.

We need to understand that PR principles remain the same even as media changes. Some practitioners understand this well enough and experiment with new media. Most don't. We also have to understand that PR accepts a lack of control in media. We are not marketers who fashion every comma of a message in every medium we touch. If there is one failing of the PR business, it is that practitioners have begun to think they must control expression of a message exactly. That is wrong, and it is the reason why companies have been caught when they try to foist phony blogs and YouTube videos on the public.

I expect 2007 will be another year of struggle to make these points. One hopes that sooner or later practitioners will catch up, but it is easy to despair. One bright spot is to discover practitioners who do "get it" and to find ways to work with them. That is one reason for this blog. I would like to think that when I retire someday, I might have had a positive effect on a few practitioners. It's a dream, anyway.

I've often wondered about artificial demarcations we use in calendars. Today is supposed to be the start of a new year, but for clients with crises, it is another day in continuing events they would rather forgo. For many who work on this holiday, it isn't time off. For those who take time off, it is a day to take down Christmas decorations and to put them away. It also is a day to think about work tomorrow and what will be on the desk when one gets back to the office. O yes, there is the matter of football in the US for those who are sports addicts. Elsewhere, there may be a finding one's consciousness after a night of celebration.

I suppose it is good to have a day in which one is supposed to take stock and make resolutions, which most will forget a day later. There is a merit in ceremony. Given all that, however, it is hard to wish others a Happy New Year. Rather, I would wish them a continuation of peace, if they possess it and health, if they don't. And, I would wish them the ability to ride through the stresses that every human suffers and to enjoy the good moments too. That is a wish I make every day of the year.