Online spending is now expected to reach over £50bn for the whole year - beating predictions made by the IMRG earlier this year. Last year's total was £30.2bn.
If the public can spend £750,000 online every minute why am I not getting daily emails from the PR industry Associations telling me that my membership will cancelled if I do not attend at least one Social Media workshop by 21 March 2008?
How long can a whole industry ignore the richest high street ever?
Its not just about a swanky web site its about reputation, trust, relationships and zillions of online publics. THAT sounds like PR or are all these things the industry talks about just spin.
First, where is the list of accredited degree courses that do NOT have a one year compulsory digital module - that will show how seriously the institutions are taking £50bn in the context of accreditation? Second, where are the workshops, interest groups and specialist trainers to show how well these organisations are preparing members for £70bn next year.... I could go on.
Its time to elect leaders for the PR institutions that are going to lead.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
XBRL - How the accountants stuffed the PR's
Neville Hobson blog about the first companies to use the eXensible Markup Language designed for the financial sector, the eXtensible Business Markup Language (XBRL).
Some years ago, with a forward looking groups I was privileged to be involved with a similar initiative for the PR industry (XPRL) and wrote the vision document for it.
One of its objectives was to offer the means by which computers could understand the elements of financial reporting - the PR bits as opposed to the accountancy bits, a point I have made in the past.
Not a single in-house financial PR department or major financial PR agency would get involved but that does not mean companies are not taking the matter seriously:
Curt Anderson, senior director of Investor Relations for Microsoft. “As more companies make their financial statements available in XBRL format, key financial information will be more easily and quickly comparable and analyzed across industries and companies.”
It would seem that this is not so much a matter for PR then.
Except, of course the media wants it:
Michael Porch, senior vice president, News Capabilities Group, Reuters says "XBRL gives the financial community a standard way of digitally publishing, extracting and exchanging company financial reports and associated information. Reuters is interested in exploiting the power of XBRL to bring value to our customers."
Some our traditional media see XML as the way forward for which the PR industry is simply ill prepared.
Business Wire XBRL offering, has gone it alone with a proprietary scheme that enables wide earnings table displays, bulleted highlight lists, text hyperlinks and other style options. They say that Business Wire provides the most advanced XBRL systems and tools and I bet they charge the rate that goes with beggar thy neighbour - that is the PR industry that does not have a sector-wide capability.
XBRL, got the prize and locked out the PR industry. Industry will have to adopt these standards soon. It is to be a requirement in the UK. If we want to issue a trading statement, add more words, graphs, pictures or stream video of the AGM, we have to go through a range of proprietors systems AND go cap in hand to the accountants to integrate PR content into XBRL.
So far, the PR industry has made a muck of the whole exercise and there is no logic that will get the PR industry to come out of its stupor.
Now, CIPR, IABC, PRCA, and the other Global Alliance members as well as ICO will have to negotiate bits into the XBRL schema if the PR industry is going to have much say in the content that can used in future machine readable content. Without XPRL, or an institution like it, they don't have a leg to stand on.
In an era when 700,000 thirteen to sixteen year olds in the UK regularly use virtual environments it is time that someone among the leaders of the PR industry showed some visionary leadership by understanding that today a range of 'publics' use media with a reach three times greater than the print edition of the FT. Its just not unusual - its already commonplace and its digital.
XBRL is an emerging XML-based standard that permits the automatic exchange and reliable extraction of financial information across all software formats and technologies. It enhances the usability and transparency of financial information reported under existing accounting standards by reducing the need to manually key information, thereby minimizing the risk of data entry error.
Some years ago, with a forward looking groups I was privileged to be involved with a similar initiative for the PR industry (XPRL) and wrote the vision document for it.
One of its objectives was to offer the means by which computers could understand the elements of financial reporting - the PR bits as opposed to the accountancy bits, a point I have made in the past.
Not a single in-house financial PR department or major financial PR agency would get involved but that does not mean companies are not taking the matter seriously:
Curt Anderson, senior director of Investor Relations for Microsoft. “As more companies make their financial statements available in XBRL format, key financial information will be more easily and quickly comparable and analyzed across industries and companies.”
It would seem that this is not so much a matter for PR then.
Except, of course the media wants it:
Michael Porch, senior vice president, News Capabilities Group, Reuters says "XBRL gives the financial community a standard way of digitally publishing, extracting and exchanging company financial reports and associated information. Reuters is interested in exploiting the power of XBRL to bring value to our customers."
Some our traditional media see XML as the way forward for which the PR industry is simply ill prepared.
Business Wire XBRL offering, has gone it alone with a proprietary scheme that enables wide earnings table displays, bulleted highlight lists, text hyperlinks and other style options. They say that Business Wire provides the most advanced XBRL systems and tools and I bet they charge the rate that goes with beggar thy neighbour - that is the PR industry that does not have a sector-wide capability.
XBRL, got the prize and locked out the PR industry. Industry will have to adopt these standards soon. It is to be a requirement in the UK. If we want to issue a trading statement, add more words, graphs, pictures or stream video of the AGM, we have to go through a range of proprietors systems AND go cap in hand to the accountants to integrate PR content into XBRL.
So far, the PR industry has made a muck of the whole exercise and there is no logic that will get the PR industry to come out of its stupor.
Now, CIPR, IABC, PRCA, and the other Global Alliance members as well as ICO will have to negotiate bits into the XBRL schema if the PR industry is going to have much say in the content that can used in future machine readable content. Without XPRL, or an institution like it, they don't have a leg to stand on.
In an era when 700,000 thirteen to sixteen year olds in the UK regularly use virtual environments it is time that someone among the leaders of the PR industry showed some visionary leadership by understanding that today a range of 'publics' use media with a reach three times greater than the print edition of the FT. Its just not unusual - its already commonplace and its digital.
Monday, December 10, 2007
The nature of modern PR
Neville Hobson alerted me to Eric Schwartzman’s interview with Colin Farrington in the On The Record Online podcast.
Neville's point is that:
By chance, I have been involved in an exchange with Simon Wakeman discussing the role of Public Relations and made the following points:
The point at issue is where we stand in the post-Bernays era and my contention is that PR practice operates in and with the widest understanding of the social domain in which values are germane as a key to human relationships and Public Relations. I put my case thus:
Command, control, de-humanised, 'one value system fits all' approaches legitimise propaganda and the suppression of diversity in the of human state. Today, because of ubiquitous interactive communication, a process that has been gaining ground for 50 years (telephone, multiple broadcast channels, fax, email, social media are drivers) , there are apologists for the practice of public relations as an extension of propaganda. Among them Kevin Maloney at Bournemouth University.
These apologists suggest that because PR practitioners (by this they mean political and business PR practice) are countering each other's propaganda, then there is a legitimate form of practice which Colin gave voice to in his interview with Eric.
The concept is flawed.
It suggests that the citizen is to be controlled in every sphere of life by an everlasting all powerful elite. In all history, this has never been the case (if so, what was IX Hispana, the Roman 9th Legion, doing in Briton 900 years ago and how come there are foreign soldiers in Iraq) Omnipotence is fleeting and all the more so with the democratising and social reconstructionism brought about through ubiquitous communication.
The difference between the people 'who get it' and those that don't is in understanding the human voice which, as it is liberated, emerges from the shadow of the propaganda veneer and its associated counterpart propagandists (scream) advertising. In post World War society, applying mass psychology to the masses was once effective. Once the masses become individuals and can see, join, create and interact with networks of social groups, the power of the elite is changed in direction from control to engagement.
Today, an elitist view of the diversity of mankind, expounded by Colin a year ago is an example of the Bernasion view of PR which suggests that blogs are the:
Progress towards ubiquitous interactive communication which briefly gave 20th century propagandist tools for suppression, is, contrary to Colin's assertion, influencing the very fabric of life. To pick one medium (a global news magazines or blogging) is to miss the bigger picture. People do affect political and commercial outcomes (do we already forget 'The Battle for Seattle', the first mass political activist programme driven by the internet?).
The 20th century practice of PR as a form of competitive propaganda war waged through to pages of the monoculture we called 'The Press', is no longer possible. The very institution 'The Press' is now heavily mediated by other forms of public human voice (including blogs).
The lobby practice of PR, and I think of investor relations as well as politics, depends on a well researched persuasive voice. To believe that an elite to elite conversation is not mediated by the biggest (and publicly available) knowledge repository ever known (the internet) suggests an elite that cannot respond by way of engagement. 'Let them eat cake' is not a good practitioner approach for public relations or lobbying.
For these and many other reasons, I refute Colin's version of effective PR and the PR practitioners who continue to subscribe exclusively to Bernasian PR.
All I can suggest to the CIPR, of which I am a Fellow, is raise the sights for your profession. Look to a vision of PR that is able to contribute to engagement and aspirational values systems or, with the people you support, you will cede to the likes of the Taliban.
Neville's point is that:
Colin Farrington, the director general of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR), simply does not understand the role of social media in public relations.
By chance, I have been involved in an exchange with Simon Wakeman discussing the role of Public Relations and made the following points:
I do not hold with the idea that PR is a 20th century practice. Even Press Agentry combined with lobbying and celebrity was practised by Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire in the 18th century but PR goes much further back in forms of diplomacy.
It is not that this is a new idea. I assembled some of the roots of relationship management as a PR practice in ‘Towards Relationship Management’ (2006 Volume: 10 Issue: 2 Page: 211 - 226).
The problem is that we have very little to guide us as to the nature of relationship (which I touch on in the paper) but there is light at the end of the tunnel (as in ‘watch this space’).
It does mean that when we look at relationships and the practice of acquiring, developing and optimising effective and affective relationships, we discover that without relationships the client counts for naught.
PR then becomes the (diverse) pivotal practice ( in the mould of medicine, another very broad range of practice) in delivering, sustaining, ensuring health and vigour of the organisation.
That then is our business and is different from the amateur practitioner (e.g. the CEO) because we have (or should have) the expertise, or reach to specialists, who can deliver such benefits.
The point at issue is where we stand in the post-Bernays era and my contention is that PR practice operates in and with the widest understanding of the social domain in which values are germane as a key to human relationships and Public Relations. I put my case thus:
There is a body of work that examines value systems and organisations have a number of values systems. They might include the values associated with optimising investor returns; they may also include employee related values systems, product, customer, environment values etc. In each case there is a domain of PR practice that encompass and operates among such values.The contribution made by Colin Farrington to Eric Schwartzman is perfectly legitimate for a Bernasian practitioner rooted in 20th century PR. The PR that gave us the proto Bernasian mass media manipulation with consequence manifest in Nazism, Communism.Public relations management which deploys all these PR domains of practice using a range of tools (including most notably, but not exclusively, communication in its execution) is the practice of Public Relations in its highest form.
I accept that most practitioners are specialist and work almost exclusively in a domain of practice often with no more than a communication facilities role, but that need not distract us from the true nature of PR.
That the institutions like the CIPR, the Universities teaching PR and other institutions choose to exclusively grub around in the undergrowth, does not mean that we should not enjoy ambition among the stars with a wider view of the significance of relationships which is fundamental to the social nature of humanity.
From that perspective, we can better understand the significance of the social media revolution and not be constrained by the narrow view given to us by 20th century agents and propagandists.
If we choose to remain in the undergrowth, our view of ubiquitous interactive communication will be that it is but a channel for communication (to be controlled and channelled). If we choose the higher calling, we unleash the interactive, creative human spirit with the wider human state for each to elect to be of, or contribute to, the nexus of their personal social networks.
For me, that is the vision for Public Relations.
Command, control, de-humanised, 'one value system fits all' approaches legitimise propaganda and the suppression of diversity in the of human state. Today, because of ubiquitous interactive communication, a process that has been gaining ground for 50 years (telephone, multiple broadcast channels, fax, email, social media are drivers) , there are apologists for the practice of public relations as an extension of propaganda. Among them Kevin Maloney at Bournemouth University.
These apologists suggest that because PR practitioners (by this they mean political and business PR practice) are countering each other's propaganda, then there is a legitimate form of practice which Colin gave voice to in his interview with Eric.
The concept is flawed.
It suggests that the citizen is to be controlled in every sphere of life by an everlasting all powerful elite. In all history, this has never been the case (if so, what was IX Hispana, the Roman 9th Legion, doing in Briton 900 years ago and how come there are foreign soldiers in Iraq) Omnipotence is fleeting and all the more so with the democratising and social reconstructionism brought about through ubiquitous communication.
The difference between the people 'who get it' and those that don't is in understanding the human voice which, as it is liberated, emerges from the shadow of the propaganda veneer and its associated counterpart propagandists (scream) advertising. In post World War society, applying mass psychology to the masses was once effective. Once the masses become individuals and can see, join, create and interact with networks of social groups, the power of the elite is changed in direction from control to engagement.
Today, an elitist view of the diversity of mankind, expounded by Colin a year ago is an example of the Bernasion view of PR which suggests that blogs are the:
...... ill-informed, rambling descriptions of the tedious details of life or half-baked comments on political, sporting or professional issues They read like a mixture of the ramblings of the eponymous Pub Landlord and the first draft of a second rate newspaper column. The concern of some public relations people as they worry about this new media for consumer comment, engagement and reputation destruction is a bit overdone.He missed the point.
Progress towards ubiquitous interactive communication which briefly gave 20th century propagandist tools for suppression, is, contrary to Colin's assertion, influencing the very fabric of life. To pick one medium (a global news magazines or blogging) is to miss the bigger picture. People do affect political and commercial outcomes (do we already forget 'The Battle for Seattle', the first mass political activist programme driven by the internet?).
The 20th century practice of PR as a form of competitive propaganda war waged through to pages of the monoculture we called 'The Press', is no longer possible. The very institution 'The Press' is now heavily mediated by other forms of public human voice (including blogs).
The lobby practice of PR, and I think of investor relations as well as politics, depends on a well researched persuasive voice. To believe that an elite to elite conversation is not mediated by the biggest (and publicly available) knowledge repository ever known (the internet) suggests an elite that cannot respond by way of engagement. 'Let them eat cake' is not a good practitioner approach for public relations or lobbying.
For these and many other reasons, I refute Colin's version of effective PR and the PR practitioners who continue to subscribe exclusively to Bernasian PR.
All I can suggest to the CIPR, of which I am a Fellow, is raise the sights for your profession. Look to a vision of PR that is able to contribute to engagement and aspirational values systems or, with the people you support, you will cede to the likes of the Taliban.
Tuesday, December 04, 2007
Make the message simple - stupid
Chip Heath in an interview in McKinsey Quarterly (free subscription), offers a lot of very useful and well researched, tips on how to make messages compelling.
One of the insights I liked a lot is:
As one who does this a lot, Its a very helpful idea.
A recommended read because of the quality of research behind his thinking and a lesson for everyone in PR.
One of the insights I liked a lot is:
When messages are abstract, it’s frequently because a leader is suffering from the “curse of knowledge.” Psychologists and behavioral economists have shown that when we know a lot about a field it becomes really tough for us to imagine what it’s like not to know what we know—that’s the curse of knowledge. If you’ve ever had a conversation with your IT person about what’s wrong with your computer, you’ve been on the other side of the curse of knowledge. The IT person knows so much that he or she can’t imagine knowing as little as the rest of us. And we’re all like that IT person in our own domain of expertise: prone to be overly complex and abstract.
As one who does this a lot, Its a very helpful idea.
A recommended read because of the quality of research behind his thinking and a lesson for everyone in PR.
Monday, December 03, 2007
Xbox and the future of the social animal
Imagine a place that mixed Facebook, World of Warcraft, Second Life, podcasting, video, Twitter and Skype.
Such a place would be a magnet for already huge and seriously interactive communities online.
Such a place would be of interest to Chris Kimble, David Grimshaw and Paul Hildreth who have already shown that the online context is important.
What I am suggesting is context that would be hyper rich and more important that other places to go.
Such a rich environment would be very important because, as Elizabeth Shove, and Alan Warde at Lancaster University note, social theorists maintain that ‘people define themselves through the messages they transmit to others through the goods and practices that they possess and display. In an environment of games, avatars and Facebook-like display added to a wide range of channels for spoken, music, video as well as text communication, people will be able to satisfy their deeply embedded human needs online like never before.
That is why I think that the Microsoft announcement a couple of weeks ago is so important.
Microsoft is to add a social network element to Xbox. It potential offers a mix and match of sensations that are now only speculative.
This has the potential to mash the real and virtual person in a fashion we are not really prepared for.
People, that's us, manipulate and manage appearances and thereby create and sustain a ‘self-identity’ as part of their need to be effective as social animals. Its part of our DNA.
This is part of the evolution of the human species.
These new developments offer a real and virtual combination.
In an answer to the question: "What sort of person is s/he?" will shortly be answered in terms of a combined real and virtual lifestyle or visible attachment to groups rather than by personal virtues or characteristics alone and on a globally networked scale.
In such an environment, the many selves and the picture of the world we modify through inputs from our senses hark back to Featherstone who in 1991 reflected upon the tendency for the same individual to seek to present him or herself on different occasions in two or more ways, as bohemian and conventional or as romantic or formal and now, as the internet evolves, there a possibility to do so in many manifest ways in hyper virtual worlds.
It is an extension of a not uncommon practice we have see online for a couple of decades but now it will be much more dramatic, entertaining, emotionally absorbing and above all infective across the whole online experience.
This is futureology, guess work and musings.
Why would people do this? Why should sane people spend hours gazing at a computer screen? Why should people be engrossed in blogs, social networks and games?
There is a deep itch in our human make up that make such activities compelling. In our millions we already do it. But add even greater richness – a step change as great as from Newsgroups to blogs, to MySpace to Second Life and it seems that such change is inevitable.
Perhaps the big question for us now, is: dare we think of such things and be, just a little prepared, - well - Just in case.
Such a place would be a magnet for already huge and seriously interactive communities online.
Such a place would be of interest to Chris Kimble, David Grimshaw and Paul Hildreth who have already shown that the online context is important.
What I am suggesting is context that would be hyper rich and more important that other places to go.
Such a rich environment would be very important because, as Elizabeth Shove, and Alan Warde at Lancaster University note, social theorists maintain that ‘people define themselves through the messages they transmit to others through the goods and practices that they possess and display. In an environment of games, avatars and Facebook-like display added to a wide range of channels for spoken, music, video as well as text communication, people will be able to satisfy their deeply embedded human needs online like never before.
That is why I think that the Microsoft announcement a couple of weeks ago is so important.
Microsoft is to add a social network element to Xbox. It potential offers a mix and match of sensations that are now only speculative.
This has the potential to mash the real and virtual person in a fashion we are not really prepared for.
People, that's us, manipulate and manage appearances and thereby create and sustain a ‘self-identity’ as part of their need to be effective as social animals. Its part of our DNA.
This is part of the evolution of the human species.
These new developments offer a real and virtual combination.
In an answer to the question: "What sort of person is s/he?" will shortly be answered in terms of a combined real and virtual lifestyle or visible attachment to groups rather than by personal virtues or characteristics alone and on a globally networked scale.
In such an environment, the many selves and the picture of the world we modify through inputs from our senses hark back to Featherstone who in 1991 reflected upon the tendency for the same individual to seek to present him or herself on different occasions in two or more ways, as bohemian and conventional or as romantic or formal and now, as the internet evolves, there a possibility to do so in many manifest ways in hyper virtual worlds.
It is an extension of a not uncommon practice we have see online for a couple of decades but now it will be much more dramatic, entertaining, emotionally absorbing and above all infective across the whole online experience.
This is futureology, guess work and musings.
Why would people do this? Why should sane people spend hours gazing at a computer screen? Why should people be engrossed in blogs, social networks and games?
There is a deep itch in our human make up that make such activities compelling. In our millions we already do it. But add even greater richness – a step change as great as from Newsgroups to blogs, to MySpace to Second Life and it seems that such change is inevitable.
Perhaps the big question for us now, is: dare we think of such things and be, just a little prepared, - well - Just in case.
Friday, November 23, 2007
The year of the mobile -
Maggie Holland at IT Pro comments:
This means that the ever widening range of platforms and channels in intertwined networks become much harder to monitor and interaction is across a wider range of touch points.
Building relationships with so many forms of communication affecting constituents attitudes and interactive behaviours becomes more challenging.
So how does the organisation respond.
Relationships, built on values and the exchange of mutually interesting values becomes the key element.
Companies, nay all organisations, only have one thing to offer - their values.
In organisations there are many value systems at play. These centre on the culture, products, services, social interactivity and other drivers that sustain existence. They are the bedrock of the organisation.
They should be explored by the PR professional and need explication to be included in the scudding clouds of internet interactivity.
As we go more mobile they play locally and globally and all the time. Now they are much closer to the individual and for one very specific reason: people have an emotional relationships with their mobile phones of the same nature as once pertained to newspapers and magazines as described by Guy Consterdine.
Values and ethics now clime further up the ladder importance in PR practice.
Next year will be the year of the mobile customer, with a range of services and technologies on offer that are much cheaper and easier to use, as well as being much more sociable, according to predictions from the Mobile Data Association (MDA).I have to say that its been a long time coming. It was in 2001 that I included mobile as an important part of online PR (in Online Public Relations - Kogan Page). Then, SMS was the issue but now the a wide range of Internet Protocol is available on many mobile devices from phones to laptops, games and even SatNav platforms.
This means that the ever widening range of platforms and channels in intertwined networks become much harder to monitor and interaction is across a wider range of touch points.
Building relationships with so many forms of communication affecting constituents attitudes and interactive behaviours becomes more challenging.
So how does the organisation respond.
Relationships, built on values and the exchange of mutually interesting values becomes the key element.
Companies, nay all organisations, only have one thing to offer - their values.
In organisations there are many value systems at play. These centre on the culture, products, services, social interactivity and other drivers that sustain existence. They are the bedrock of the organisation.
They should be explored by the PR professional and need explication to be included in the scudding clouds of internet interactivity.
As we go more mobile they play locally and globally and all the time. Now they are much closer to the individual and for one very specific reason: people have an emotional relationships with their mobile phones of the same nature as once pertained to newspapers and magazines as described by Guy Consterdine.
Values and ethics now clime further up the ladder importance in PR practice.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Reputation Reputation Reputation
This post is about reputation in three parts.
First it is about the reputation of Allan Edwards at Chameleon PR.
He pitched me a story in an email that said:
Hello David,
I noticed you mentioned last year’s Blast Radius UK’s Best online report on LeverWealth. This year’s report is now out, the release is below. This year’s research has shifted to look higher up the chain.
Best regards
Allan
Of course he got my interest and I quickly went back to the post on 22 November last year.
The next reputation involved were the companies involved : Jaguar Cars Tops Blast Radius Best UK Online Experience Survey 2007, Magnet, Reebok, Burberry and SSL achieve best overall ratings; Avon, Cisco, Clarks and IBM trail in `best of the best` analysis.
The third reputation is of course Blast Radius who commissioned the report.
Everyone wins.
It was excellent PR because it was about my interests, reflects what I write about and is pitched at a level that just caught my attention at the end of the day (and I even spent time on their site - which I did last year too). I also looked into their background this years to discover that WPP had bought them a year ago (another example of johnny come lately advertising groups buying into what they should have developed in-house five years ago instead of going for short term cash hoping to buy companies instead of developing cultures - watch this space).
The work is good and the survey was done by Informars, a sister company to Datamonitor, and subjective panelists to come up with the 'best online consumer experiences of 2007'.
The car companies did well:
1 Jaguar Cars Ltd. www.jaguar.co.uk
2 Magnet Ltd. www.magnet.co.uk
3 Reebok International (UK) www.rbk.com (UK)
4 Burberry Group plc www.burberry.com (UK)
5 SSL International plc www.durex.com/uk
6 Saab Great Britain Ltd. www.saab.co.uk
7 Volkswagen Group (UK) Ltd. www.volkswagen.co.uk
8 Colgate-Palmolive Ltd. (UK) www.colgate.co.uk
9 Reckitt Benckiser plc www.veet.co.uk
10 Peugeot Motor Co. plc www.peugeot.co.uk
IBM took the 20th spot.
It is worth reading the report and visiting the websites.
If, like me you believe that a lot of reputation is tied up in web sites, their design, responsiveness and ability to act as a major part of the transition from visitors to ambassador, then this report will be of interest.
The picture is a screen shot from the magnet web site which is a great toy to play with.
Thanks Allan.
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
A web outage is a relationships issue
Yesterday the www.tiny.com service was down. In a few hours there was a mass migration to a range of other comparable services.
Tiny lost customers and its reputation was tarnished.
This is a lesson for us all. If our online presence is not maintained it affects our reputation. It also means people go elsewhere to solve their problem. In the case of Tiny services like http://snipurl.com, http://urltea.com and http://paulding.net and the Firefox add-on all came to the aid of the online community.
When reputation is in the news so to are obscure commenst like this one from Slashdot.com
There is a ripple effect and a raft of different issues become relevant.
The circle of relationships is fractured.
But what if your organisation is the UK airport owner BAA?
What is the consequence of its sites being affected especially in times of crisis, as for example when there is a security scare?
This is not a Webmaster issue. Webmasters will be at the coal face trying to get it back up. Its a PR issue because it went down. It will also be a marketing issues, a finance issue, an internal relationship issue and a vendor relation issue.
A web site is a big public relations responsibility. It always was. But now its is a critical area of PR practice - a full lecture and seminar for year two in any BA PR degree.
Using a service like http://www.periscopeit.co.uk, a host data about the performance of a web site plus SMS and email alerts is a simple precaution.
Hopefully, this big issue is part of the CIPR advisory to its members and to its approved course lecturers and courses.
I (ahemmm) expect so!
Tiny lost customers and its reputation was tarnished.
This is a lesson for us all. If our online presence is not maintained it affects our reputation. It also means people go elsewhere to solve their problem. In the case of Tiny services like http://snipurl.com, http://urltea.com and http://paulding.net and the Firefox add-on all came to the aid of the online community.
When reputation is in the news so to are obscure commenst like this one from Slashdot.com
"Thanks to twitter, SMS, and mobile web, a lot of people are using the url minimizers like tinyurl.com, urltea.com. However, now I see a lot of people using it on their regular webpages. This could be a big problem if billions of different links are unreachable at a given time."
There is a ripple effect and a raft of different issues become relevant.
The circle of relationships is fractured.
But what if your organisation is the UK airport owner BAA?
What is the consequence of its sites being affected especially in times of crisis, as for example when there is a security scare?
This is not a Webmaster issue. Webmasters will be at the coal face trying to get it back up. Its a PR issue because it went down. It will also be a marketing issues, a finance issue, an internal relationship issue and a vendor relation issue.
A web site is a big public relations responsibility. It always was. But now its is a critical area of PR practice - a full lecture and seminar for year two in any BA PR degree.
Using a service like http://www.periscopeit.co.uk, a host data about the performance of a web site plus SMS and email alerts is a simple precaution.
Hopefully, this big issue is part of the CIPR advisory to its members and to its approved course lecturers and courses.
I (ahemmm) expect so!
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Sleletons in cupboards - how do they get there?
JP Rangaswami is one of the more interesting commentators online and he came up with this utter gem today.
In building relationships we display our values and the things we value and judge others by the values they hold. This is true of people and organisations and very true of organisations and their stakeholders.
We are also conditioned (its part of our DNA) to judge those who hide their real selves or who try to deceive us with false values, obfuscation or untruths.
The abject skeleton of overdone brevity in the marketing in an attempt to 'grab attention' is a case in point.
Sometimes I look at what we do, and I think to myself: First we take living things and make abject skeletons out of them. Then we carefully build cupboards around the newly formed skeletons. And then we wonder why we have skeletons in cupboards.
In building relationships we display our values and the things we value and judge others by the values they hold. This is true of people and organisations and very true of organisations and their stakeholders.
We are also conditioned (its part of our DNA) to judge those who hide their real selves or who try to deceive us with false values, obfuscation or untruths.
The abject skeleton of overdone brevity in the marketing in an attempt to 'grab attention' is a case in point.
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
An economic ramble
If one were to take a economic geography perspective of the Internet and imagine places where people meet, converse and trade ideas, products and services (OK... Facebook is an example) then the picture of different Internet Domians and their values changes. These places are large 'real' cities. Microsoft (in part) and NewsCorp bought cities. NewsCorp is, in effect, the City Fathers of MySpace.
The value of a city is one of many faces and is not comparable with a value chain of raw materials, manufacturer, wholesaler, retailer or consumer.
Paying to buy a city, and countries and nations have done this in the past, is not part of the rest of conventional economics and should not go into calculations about the value of the properties and interactions in them.
Now, if you separate the nature of knowledge and things (Evans a & Wurster) the value of the Internet (and the value of the trade in the virtual cities) can be included in economic calculation.
If the value of a raw material is dependent on knowledge to turn it into a commodity, it has no value. The value is in the knowledge.
The extent to which that knowledge is dependant on the Internet, gives one a view of the value of the Internet.
The extent to which conversion of things is dependant on an Internet mediation in a 'virtual city' is a real value and so 'virtual cities' can be identified as a component of the 'real' economy.
If Facebook has markets trading in 'real things' it has an entrepôt value. It is a component of the real economy.
Perhaps we have to learn to think about these online 'places' and 'services' in a different light.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
The model for engagement
“We are seriously under-valuing certain things in advertising,” says Rory Sutherland, vice chairman of Ogilvy Group UK. “We don’t distinguish between what consumers ask for and what they don’t. Instead, we just target people by demographic, which is patently daft.
He went on to say
Sharon Shaw e-commerce manager at Standard Life adds:
That is why I believe that the planning model has to start with a proper audit of organisational values, the values of the online community and levels of dissonance.
It is only then that attracting the community is possible.
Just believing that 700,000 web site visitors are all happy campers is nieve and attracting people who don't want to go there is counter-productive.
He went on to say
“A website with 700,000 users isn’t necessarily less powerful than a digital campaign seen by seven million people.
“Those 700,000 users are visiting the site of their own accord, and they are visiting when they have an interest in the content of the site. They are far more susceptible to relevant advertising than a larger group that just fit the target demographic.”
Sutherland likened “old marketing” to ten-pin bowling, with one message looking to “knock down” a large amount of consumers. Modern marketing, according to Sutherland, should follow a pinball analogy, with the message kept high on the agenda by factors other than just a brand’s input.Sharon Shaw e-commerce manager at Standard Life adds:
"Developing a new digital strategy can be a daunting experience, especially considering the lack of case studies and benchmarks out there," and proposes an Attract, Convert, Support, Extend model.
Well welcome to the real world.What they are talking about is developing relationships and I am not convinced they are on the right track yet.
Before we attract, there has to be worked through value systems and then, the model is to Listen before anything else.That is why I believe that the planning model has to start with a proper audit of organisational values, the values of the online community and levels of dissonance.
It is only then that attracting the community is possible.
Just believing that 700,000 web site visitors are all happy campers is nieve and attracting people who don't want to go there is counter-productive.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Why Facebook is so valuable
This video is a visual interpretation of a contribution to For Immediate Release, The Hobson and Holtz Report.
It explores developments in psychology, human evolution and the brain sciences as motives for our use of social media. The would seem to be some very powerful drivers that explain the human need to be online and take part in generating content, sharing it and interacting. Enjoy.
Please feel free to share it from here.
It explores developments in psychology, human evolution and the brain sciences as motives for our use of social media. The would seem to be some very powerful drivers that explain the human need to be online and take part in generating content, sharing it and interacting. Enjoy.
Please feel free to share it from here.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
The death of music?
I loved JP Rangaswami's post "Which have eyes, and see not: Musings about the music industry and The Because Effect" in which he shows how copyright and music are parting company.
But there are issues.
First, how can we be sure that people will be tempted to find out about what they desire. How do people find out about Radiohead in the first place?
Its getting harder to help people understand the significance of value systems but there lies the key.
Those people who have or acquire the complementary value systems that makes them scramble for a Led Zepplin gig is the critical issue that PR faces in order that they can attract eyeballs and action.
At the same time, we have to be able to convince clients that this is the way forward.
They have to learn the value of knowledge and those value systems that make it valuable.
It is action on two fronts and requires long and serious and cerebral conversations with leaders in organisations. This is not for a marketing manager attempting to hype the very name of an organisation through the courts. Its far more important.
What is more valueable trust or knowledge?
Slashdot announced today that
"After months of promises to IP-holders, the long-awaited filters system for YouTube has gone online. The new system will make it easier, the company claims, for copyrighted clips to be removed. 'YouTube now needs the cooperation of copyright owners for its filtering system to work, because the technology requires copyright holders to provide copies of the video they want to protect so YouTube can compare those digital files to material being uploaded to its website. This means that movie and TV studios will have to provide decades of copyright material if they don't want it to appear on YouTube, or spend even more time scanning the site for violations.'"
Which, of course is hard work for the copy holders and YouTube.
Why?
Because there are lots of copycat sites like YouTube where the copyright material can go, folk will get fed up with being fed what the studios let them have (Stalin would be proud) and will, eventually punish them and the bright young things will have alternative entertainment anyway.
Its a question of understanding the nature of the value of knowledge.
Knowledge is expensive to produce and has no value at all.
Making available information that some knowledge exists is expensive too and has high cost and low value associated with it.
If a person or organisation has trust assets, people might believe them if they say they have knowledge and should that knowledge be of interest, it may have some value.
What is the most valuable trust or knowledge?
Knowledge in the form of copyright such as films only has value when the recommender makes it so.
'King Kong' is a film. It has value because we trust the view of people who have seen it. Among a trillion films, there will be a need for some very powerful and much trusted recommenders to give king Kong future value. After all, now that films have a 'Long Tail' who has time to see all the movies?
Perhaps the studios and broadcasters will eventually understand that citizen critics are seriously important and will stop the idiocy of trying to protect valueless copyright.
Picture: Wikipedia
Who's Who at the Web 2.0 Summit
The Times has a list of the key players at Web 2.0 Summit in an article today.
This is a major conference and Professor Jonathan Zitrain will be presenting - and as always is controversial arguing that Web 2.0 is potentially a challenge with counterintuitive arguments that Web 2.0 architectures pose distinct problems for competition, innovation, and freedom.
But when you see how much he has in-press, and with whom it makes one wonder how far he will go:
This is a major conference and Professor Jonathan Zitrain will be presenting - and as always is controversial arguing that Web 2.0 is potentially a challenge with counterintuitive arguments that Web 2.0 architectures pose distinct problems for competition, innovation, and freedom.
But when you see how much he has in-press, and with whom it makes one wonder how far he will go:
- Internet Law, Foundation Press, with Charles Nesson, Larry Lessig, Terry Fisher, and Yochai Benkler (forthcoming 2006).
- The Generative Internet, 119 Harvard Law Review __ (forthcoming 2006).
- Generativity and Meta-Gatekeeping, 19 Harvard J.L. Tech. __ (forthcoming 2006).
Turning a communication channel into a movement
Bloggers unite to tell world how to clean up environment
Organizers of the Oct. 15 U.N.-backed “Blog Action Day” said about 15,800 sites had signed up and were offering ideas to millions of people via blogs, or online diaries, ranging from planting more trees to how to recycle plastics.
“Our aim is to get everyone talking towards a better future,” according to www.blogactionday.com.
Says Canada's National Post.
The interest in environmental matters has a resonance (a set of values) with a wide audience that seems to want to crusade.
This seems to be another example of the effect of working with the grain of people's values.
Friday, September 28, 2007
Thursday, September 20, 2007
New and Notable
Mark Phillimore has started a blog.
He is providing the online BA module and more at Bournemouth this year.
A PR consultant of 20 years’ experience he loves the media and technology sectors and lectures at several business schools and universities, as well as running his own training consultancy.
Academic interest and professional training are strategy, organisational change and culture, and new media communications. He just did an MBA and has these thoughts on his MBA.
Looking forward to the posts in his new role.
Looking at PR's role in the Northern Rock fallout
Northern Rock, the British bank that defied a 140 year tradition when customers besieged its branches on the streets and crashed its web site to get at their their money, was under a lot of pressure when the Chief Executive, Adam Applegarth, was reported on 17th September to say "Your money is safe with us ....
If a British banker says such things they are true. Bank managers are people to trust, aren't they?
If The Bank of England, says it 'fully backs' a bank, and it gave that assurance about Northern Rock, then 'Old lady of Threadneedle Street's' mighty reserves are there to offer confidence and support the rhetoric. This is 'money in the bank'. Surely?
The same goes for the Financial Services Authority, which declared the Northern Bank was 'solvent' and the Chancellor of the Exchequer's called for calm. These are people and institutions whose reputation we can surely trust, aren't they?
The consequences of belief in such assurances are far reaching, bring the Prime Minister's reputation into question and even affect the biggest economy in the world.
But the sober citizens who save money, have bank deposits and who read newspapers and listen to reporting from the BBC just did not believe them last week and trotted down to their local bank and politely asked for their money back - in their thousands.
The words 'trust', 'confidence' and 'reputation' are bandied around and a failure in 'public relations' is blamed.
The Business says: "...a textbook case of how not to manage investor expectations and public relations...."
The FT noted: "But instead of shoring up public confidence, the public relations gaffe managed to shake it.
Douglas MacWilliams , head of the London -based Centre of Economic Business Research, said the Treasury, along with the Bank of England, had botched their response to the market crisis, damaging their reputation for economic competence.
The 'public relations' of these organisation and people is such that they are not trusted. People do not have confidence in them and their reputation counts for very little.
From today's headlines the same can be said of Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury and Tesco who are reported to have colluded to raise milk prices, according to an Office of Fair Trading report.
The same can be said of your local grocers who are said to add dangerous chemicals to our food and the same can be said of the medical profession.
In one day, like almost any day, the issues of trust confidence and reputation are affecting people's relationships with our institutions.
Now, as in all these cases, it is not that the organisations involved do not have public relations expertise available and at hand. They do. They have big PR departments and PR advice at the top-most level.
These cases of loss of trust, confidence and reputation is with the advantage of PR expertise.
These failures are the failures of PR professionals.
For PR people to evade the issue is, at best, disingenuous probably shameful and at worst, terminally damaging. The industry has laid claim to reputation, confidence and trust. It has had time to research, explore and develop the issues and practices involved. This is a matter for individuals but also for a wide range of privately and publicly funded organisations.
Who, then can take responsibility and who should be professionally concerned with developing trust, confidence and reputation among our leading institutions upon which our social, political and economic survival depends?
The Northern Rock episode brings into focus the failures of the whole profession involved in the practices associated with trust, confidence and reputation and none more so the representative trade associations in the field such as the Chartered Institute of Public Relations, the Public Relations Consultant's Association, AIBC among others. What are these institutions doing to provide capability and resulting belief in what their members do, say and influence?
Perhaps the Universities are culpable having churned out people with PR degrees and who yet are not equipped to affect corporate, not for profit, public sector and personal trust, confidence and reputation among their stakeholders. Are there competent teachers available to explicate the practices that the profession must have?
Perhaps we can turn to a panel of experts from five continents, representing academics, practitioners and senior executives of professional bodies who set the research agenda and the academics involved. Is their research up to informing and aiding the profession and its clients?
What of the people who monitor these things? How competent are they are in identifying the problems as they develop? What of the UK Media Monitoring Association comprising a wide range organisations that monitor newspaper, magazines and the web? Can they find the tell tale signs ? Is this something that its Chairman, the CEO of Durrants, and the members should be looking at?
It may be that there is a need for an early warning capability to show when organisations undermine their ability to create, sustain and develop trust, confidence and reputation from professional advisor's such as the Association for Measurement and Evaluation of Communication. Are their analysts up to the job? Have they an agenda that will help the profession?
My point is that there are a lot of institutions which, at the highest level bear a significant responsibility and who need to act to ensure that the nature of trust, confidence and reputation is taken very seriously for securing belief in the social, economic and political influences on us all.
Shoddy products and services, hype and spin, dissembling comments and obfuscation, may be at the root of the problem and that is down to individual markers, professions, politicians publicist and journalists and we may need to assemble the evidence and practices that refute such practices and offer more powerful and effective capabilities.
It is now time to develop the capability the PR industry needs and I have identified a number of organisations that need to get together and show that the reality matches the rhetoric.
If a representative of the profession, academic, teacher, monitor, evaluator, or practitioner, its time to put your hands up.
failing to do so means that forever you loose the trust of both our clientèle and the public that they so desperately depend upon.
In an economy founded on intellectual property, intangible assets and confidence in professional knowledge, skill and judgement this is an issue greater than any other in the public, commercial and private arena.
If a British banker says such things they are true. Bank managers are people to trust, aren't they?
If The Bank of England, says it 'fully backs' a bank, and it gave that assurance about Northern Rock, then 'Old lady of Threadneedle Street's' mighty reserves are there to offer confidence and support the rhetoric. This is 'money in the bank'. Surely?
The same goes for the Financial Services Authority, which declared the Northern Bank was 'solvent' and the Chancellor of the Exchequer's called for calm. These are people and institutions whose reputation we can surely trust, aren't they?
The consequences of belief in such assurances are far reaching, bring the Prime Minister's reputation into question and even affect the biggest economy in the world.
But the sober citizens who save money, have bank deposits and who read newspapers and listen to reporting from the BBC just did not believe them last week and trotted down to their local bank and politely asked for their money back - in their thousands.
The words 'trust', 'confidence' and 'reputation' are bandied around and a failure in 'public relations' is blamed.
The Business says: "...a textbook case of how not to manage investor expectations and public relations...."
The FT noted: "But instead of shoring up public confidence, the public relations gaffe managed to shake it.
"The public relations of all concerned has been extraordinarily bad and has exacerbated the crisis of confidence."
The 'public relations' of these organisation and people is such that they are not trusted. People do not have confidence in them and their reputation counts for very little.
From today's headlines the same can be said of Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury and Tesco who are reported to have colluded to raise milk prices, according to an Office of Fair Trading report.
The same can be said of your local grocers who are said to add dangerous chemicals to our food and the same can be said of the medical profession.
In one day, like almost any day, the issues of trust confidence and reputation are affecting people's relationships with our institutions.
Now, as in all these cases, it is not that the organisations involved do not have public relations expertise available and at hand. They do. They have big PR departments and PR advice at the top-most level.
These cases of loss of trust, confidence and reputation is with the advantage of PR expertise.
These failures are the failures of PR professionals.
For PR people to evade the issue is, at best, disingenuous probably shameful and at worst, terminally damaging. The industry has laid claim to reputation, confidence and trust. It has had time to research, explore and develop the issues and practices involved. This is a matter for individuals but also for a wide range of privately and publicly funded organisations.
Who, then can take responsibility and who should be professionally concerned with developing trust, confidence and reputation among our leading institutions upon which our social, political and economic survival depends?
The Northern Rock episode brings into focus the failures of the whole profession involved in the practices associated with trust, confidence and reputation and none more so the representative trade associations in the field such as the Chartered Institute of Public Relations, the Public Relations Consultant's Association, AIBC among others. What are these institutions doing to provide capability and resulting belief in what their members do, say and influence?
Perhaps the Universities are culpable having churned out people with PR degrees and who yet are not equipped to affect corporate, not for profit, public sector and personal trust, confidence and reputation among their stakeholders. Are there competent teachers available to explicate the practices that the profession must have?
Perhaps we can turn to a panel of experts from five continents, representing academics, practitioners and senior executives of professional bodies who set the research agenda and the academics involved. Is their research up to informing and aiding the profession and its clients?
What of the people who monitor these things? How competent are they are in identifying the problems as they develop? What of the UK Media Monitoring Association comprising a wide range organisations that monitor newspaper, magazines and the web? Can they find the tell tale signs ? Is this something that its Chairman, the CEO of Durrants, and the members should be looking at?
It may be that there is a need for an early warning capability to show when organisations undermine their ability to create, sustain and develop trust, confidence and reputation from professional advisor's such as the Association for Measurement and Evaluation of Communication. Are their analysts up to the job? Have they an agenda that will help the profession?
My point is that there are a lot of institutions which, at the highest level bear a significant responsibility and who need to act to ensure that the nature of trust, confidence and reputation is taken very seriously for securing belief in the social, economic and political influences on us all.
Shoddy products and services, hype and spin, dissembling comments and obfuscation, may be at the root of the problem and that is down to individual markers, professions, politicians publicist and journalists and we may need to assemble the evidence and practices that refute such practices and offer more powerful and effective capabilities.
It is now time to develop the capability the PR industry needs and I have identified a number of organisations that need to get together and show that the reality matches the rhetoric.
If a representative of the profession, academic, teacher, monitor, evaluator, or practitioner, its time to put your hands up.
failing to do so means that forever you loose the trust of both our clientèle and the public that they so desperately depend upon.
In an economy founded on intellectual property, intangible assets and confidence in professional knowledge, skill and judgement this is an issue greater than any other in the public, commercial and private arena.
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