The Flack

Commander in Control

2012-02-01T19:49:00.000-05:00

One of the points I had hoped to emphasize in my last post was that Twitter, blogging, Facebook and Google+ offer an even more controlled communications environment than what a fastidiously prepped/messaged executive might face in a media interview.

David Carr may give Rupert Murdoch props for his more authentic Twitter persona, but it's Mr. Murdoch who's thumbing his nose at Mr. Carr and his colleagues in the Fourth Estate whose journalistic scrutiny Twitter has allowed him to sidestep.

This week, we're witness to another example of this "command(er) and control" approach to making one's POV heard in a less fettered manner. Our President participated in a Google+ Hangout. In her piece titled "Obama finds virtual end-around to bypass the White House press," Amy Parnes wrote in The Hill:

"The virtual interview is part of a larger effort by the White House to connect directly to Americans without going through the news media."

In his defense of Mr. Obama's ~~media~~ public availability, White House press secretary Jay Carney said:

"I know we’re not picking the questions," then quipped: "Would that we could."

Journalists were not too pleased:

"I worry sometimes that the administration subverts the Wild West appeal of new media by rather scrupulously scrubbing and screening questions — like they have done in various new media town-hall settings," said Julie Mason, a talk show host on Sirius-XM.

Here's the full hour-long session:

Truth be told, communications pros have more options available to them than ever before. I, for one, am not discounting the value of "earned" media, especially when one considers the still-dominant digital and social footprints generated by stories originating in stalwart news orgs such as The New York Times, Bloomberg or Reuters. Didn't HP's study of some widely shared stories on Twitter validate this?

On the flip side of the coin, when was the last time Google subjected itself to a media interview? When it wants to make news, it simply posts what it wishes to say on one of the company's blogs. Those that stalk Google soon are tweeting away until the world knows what Google wanted it to know.

This "owned media" strategy for delivering unfiltered prose is especially effective when it emanates from a company in the media spotlight or a recognized newsmaker or newsmaking enterprise. As Tom Foremski astutely noted, all companies are media companies today. Now we just have to figure out how best to call out those who use their new-found platforms-to-persuade for nefarious ends.

Then again, most don't. I'm looking forward to CNBC's Darren Rovell's Google+ Hangout on Monday following the Giants victory over the Pats this weekend!

Communications Slop

2012-01-30T16:15:00.000-05:00

"The modern chief executive lives behind a wall of communications operatives, many of whom ladle out slop meant to obscure rather than reveal."

David Carr

-- David Carr of The New York Times lamenting the way many CEOs have long interacted with members of his profession. Not surprisingly, he lays the blame on communications professionals. The quote appears in his must-read column today on Rupert Murdoch's sudden embrace of Twitter. More on that below.

He's right, and wrong. Yes, the PR pro is charged with advising C-Suite executives on what to anticipate in a media interview, and how best to respond to journalists' questions. Frankly, why should only the reporter's editorial agenda be met? Shouldn't the company also use the opportunity to advance its agenda? If not, why grant the interview in the first place?

And just as a good reporter will do some homework in advance of engaging a newsmaker, the better PR people among us will strive to wrap their arms around where a reporter's journalistic proclivities will take the conversation. In fact, there is no shortage of ex-journalists making their livings as "media trainers," though few of them directly interface with reporters to ensure that the goals of both sides of the media relations equation are met. (We take special pride in pegging reporter's questions in advance.)

Obfuscation? Maybe in the eyes of the journalist, but from the perspective of the CEO, C-Suite or Board of Directors, this is a necessary step for advancing a company's POV, let alone enhancing its reputation.

Mr. Carr does make a good point when he infers that the CEO has traditionally hidden behind the company's communications (or general counsel as was more likely the case). This began to change a bit as corporate blogging took root. The CEO of Sun, vice-chairman of General Motors, founder of Zappos were just a few of the corporate chieftans who embraced blogging early on as a means to share their (mostly) unfettered musings. It was also a way to bypass journalistic scrutiny to speak directly to core constituencies.

UMass Study of Corp. Blogging Among Inc. 500 ('09-'11)

Ironically, it was probably the company's PR department that nudged their CEOs into this brave new medium, though a new study of the Inc. 500 by UMass Dartmouth indicates that corporate blogging may now be on the wane:

"Small businesses are backing away from blogging as a marketing tool and shifting to other social media outlets. Bye-bye, company blog—and hello, Facebook? The number of Inc. 500 companies maintaining corporate blogs has dropped."

Rupert Murdoch (graphic via Gawker)

Are they being replaced by shorter-form, and less time-consuming tweets? Perhaps. The catalyst for Mr. Carr's piece was the unlikely embrace of Twitter by the octogenarian (and lately much beleaguered) CEO of NewsCorp, Rupert Murdoch. Carr writes:

"But, Twitter has the potential to cut past all that clutter. Given its ubiquity, there’s a chance to get a glimpse into the thinking of otherwise unapproachable executives, and sometimes even have a real dialogue with them. No one can be forced to use Twitter, but some people, even captains of industry, cannot resist."

What's ironic about Mr. Carr's take on the PR profession is that the "flacks" he accuses of masking the company's real CEO are again the same folks who advised Mr. Murdoch to take to the Twittersphere. The strategy was simple. After Murdoch was hammered in the media stemming from his appearance in the British courts and subsequent revelations, someone on News Corp's comms team had an epiphany: let's use Twitter to humanize him. It worked like a charm. Mr. Carr end his piece with this:

"Mr. Murdoch’s desire to be seen as a paragon of civility in any media realm, old or new, is rich. But give him credit for engaging in the world we all now live in and for not losing sleep over what pops out."

Ironically, News Corp's top communications officer resigned today. Was it the phone-hacking scandal or Rupert unleashed on Twitter? We'll probably never know for sure.

Those Five-Star Reviews

2012-01-27T16:00:00.002-05:00

How important are consumer-generated reviews in your purchase-making decisions? If you're like me, the answer is VERY. When assessing hotels, the write-ups on Virtual Tourist and Trip Advisor invariably make or break my booking. The reviews on Yelp play the deciding role in tipping the restaurant scales. Same with Fandango for movie reviews.

Then there's the granddaddy of them all, Amazon, which recognized the intrinsic value of its customers' reviews early on in the game. It even applied for and was granted a patent.

As I think about it, nearly all of the big-branded retail websites today allow customers to weigh in -- good, bad and ugly. More importantly, these "peer" reviews have attained such influence, they've pretty much usurped the influence of professional gadget, restaurant, and film reviewers at media outlets like CNET, New York and TIME magazine, respectively, who do this full-time for a living.

One, two, five stars...how ripe are these reviews for gaming? Wouldn't an enterprising marketing executive fork over some dollars to elevate the ratings for his company's product or service? A computer scientist at the University of Illinois tells The New York Times:

“More people are depending on reviews for what to buy and where to go, so the incentives for faking are getting bigger,” said Mr. Liu. “It’s a very cheap way of marketing.”

A few years back, I wrote about how one cruise line (smartly) cultivated some prolific bloggers whom they identified as rabid fans of the cruise line. Consumerist cried foul, implying that the company was resorting (excuse the pun) to a pay-for-positive-play scheme.

The ubiquity of consumer reviews on e-commerce sites has given rise to more sophisticated methods to manage this increasingly important determinant of purchase decisions -- from the perspectives of both retailer and manufacturer. When it was learned that an author of a book being sold on Amazon had pseudonymously written a review of his own work, Amazon stepped up efforts to shore up the sanctity of its reviews. Or so I thought at the time.

A piece in today's New York Times lets shoppers know that there's still some gaming going on. One firm made a business out of selling rating stars for $10 a piece.

"By the time VIP Deals ended its rebate on Amazon.com late last month, its leather case for the Kindle Fire was receiving the sort of acclaim once reserved for the likes of Kim Jong-il."

Of course, it's one thing for the retailer to monitor and moderate the reviews posted to its site -- if that's even scalable at Amazon given the number of reviews it hosts -- and another to put the kabash on companies outside its control who seek to capitalize on this new "very cheap way of marketing" that permeates the world of e-commerce. The Times alerted Amazon to its findings, which prompted Amazon to reply that:

"...its guidelines prohibited compensation for customer reviews. A few days later, it deleted all the reviews for the case, which itself was listed as unavailable. Then it took down the product page itself.

Asked why Amazon did not seem to notice that at least a few consumers called into question the VIP deal on its own site, a spokeswoman declined to comment. Nor would she say exactly what happened to VIP’s other products, like the Vipertek VTS-880 mini stun gun, which also disappeared from the retailer."

If the world's largest online retailer can't fully get its grips around the duplicity that exists within its consumer reviews section, just think about the myriad other online retailers hosting such reviews.

Maybe I'll rethink my blind reliance on these reviews when I purchase my new video camera, and head back to CNET or gdgt whose motto is "Reviews from people who actually know." As for pricing and interface, Amazon, you still rule.

Update: Received a link to Big River Review via email after my post appeared.

Pando's 'Cuda

2012-01-24T17:13:00.002-05:00

In case you hadn't noticed, a very refreshing bi-product has risen from the ashes of the rather acrimonious breakup between TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington and his wealth-creating nemesis, AOL. The tech/social news-savvy site PandoDaily, led by former TechCrunch ed-at-large Sarah Lacy (aka @sarahcuda on Twitter), burst onto the scene only a week or so ago and already is a must-follow in my stream.

PandoDaily's Sarah Lacy

Some initially dubbed it TechCrunch II, but I'm finding PandoDaily to be less of a mix of frenetic, short breaking news stories about the latest start-ups to land notable VCs' millions or the coolest new apps and gadgets. Ms. Lacy offers a more thoughtful take on the issues swirling around the whole media-tech-social-finance ecosystem.

The jury of course is still out, but based on the posts emanating from the keyboard of the seasoned Ms. Lacy, PandoDaily is destined for greatness -- which today means influence.

Google chief Larry Page

Take for example her post today. It delves a little deeper into the whole Google-Twitter-Facebook smackdown wherein Google finds itself fending off allegations that it has gamed its vaunted organic search results in favor of its own socially generated content.

Search Plus Your World (or SPYW for the digital cognoscenti) supposedly surfaces Google+ postings to the exclusion of those generated relevantly from Twitter or Facebook.

"I’ve heard from several Googlers who are embarrassed and unhappy with the company’s silence the last two days as the core of the company’s values have been called into question," Lacey writes.

I mentioned this perniciuous PR problem in a post last week, which prompted a call from Google PR -- not about SPYW, but rather to ask me to update the company's position on some ethically challenged third-party operatives in Kenya hired to build Google's local advertising business. (I already had.)

Ms. Lacy pegged her post to Google co-founder/CEO Larry Page's internal "ultimatum" on Friday to fellow Googlers:

"This is the path we’re headed down – a single unified, ‘beautiful’ product across everything. If you don’t get that, then you should probably work somewhere else."

Ms. Lacy peppers her post with links to Business Insider's Henry Blodget, Chris Sacca and former TC colleague MG Siegler posting to Pando. She didn't link to this TechCrunch-posted video interview with Brad Noble on the subject:

She continues:

"The quasi-ultimatum caught our source by surprise and underscores just how important this new direction is for Page. It also helps explain why Google’s PR was so silent since evidence of the Don’t Be Evil toolbar came out yesterday. If this is the future of the company and it flies in the face of Google’s stated values, what can they say?"

Now we know how Ms. Lacy got her Twitter handle . (Hint: it wasn't derived from her last name.)

My Big Messy Social Life

2012-01-20T13:48:00.004-05:00

My social life is a mess. And I know I'm not the only one mired in the digital muck. Here's the lowdown, which stands in contrast to just two years ago:

I'm feeling pressure to bolster my presence on the red hot Pinterest even though the app (on Chrome) couldn't find the image of Danny Meyer's new downtown dining spot on the home page of Eater.com, which I had hoped to add to my hot NYC restaurant board.

I still get daily emails from Empire Avenue even though it's been months since I've traded in anyone's personal stock.

Someone just started following me on Google Schemer. Geesh. I forgot I registered for that one.

I continue to use Google's Blogger as my primary blogging platform, but the lure of Wordpress and Tumblr grows.

I have taken a few photos using Instagram on my iPad, but it's a bit clunky and the utility remains a mystery to me. (I suppose it's really made for the iPhone.) I guess I'll wait for the next-gen social media-enabled DSLRs.

Twitter is a lifeline. I say this in spite of the spousal grief I endure when checking the stream at the dinner table. It is the one channel I actively manage. I also have it linked to Ping.fm, which syndicates my tweets to other social channels. Also, the advent of social news aggregators that auto-curate content from those I follow, such News.me and Zite, is proving a wonder.

Bit.ly's been great to gauge the traction of my tweeted links and blog posts. 2012 will be the year when this dominant URL shortening service will do something big-time with all that data it collects.

Plancast is another channel to which I pay a fair amount of attention. It lets me know the events for which my friends in the social spheres have registered. NEWS rthios weekend is that its CEO may let it go by the wayside. Here's a must-read on Plancast's fate. I suppose it has replaced Dopplr, even though Dopplr's more geared to travel.

I am a member of Yelp, and have even reviewed a restaurant or two. I suppose if the eating establishment is exceptional good or atrociously bad, I'll take the time to contribute my opinion. Otherwise, it's a great resource to find local dining spots. I'm liking its iPad app too. Same deal with Virtual Tourist and TripAdvisor.

The consumption and socialization of music has its share of channels. Spotify allows one to tap my and my friends' iTunes files and listen on the go. I had signed up for the lowest-level premium account, but didn't see any added value so I scuttled that. Also, the UK-birthed music site just restricted the ability to experience free unlimited listening. Of note, Ticketmaster's new Facebook app has Spotify baked in, while Facebook just bowed its own Listen With feature.

The other site I played with for a while until it became too much of a time sync is Turntable.fm. I created a standard avatar, found the room with the music genre I liked (yes, I did find some rooms with deeper cut from classic artists), then queued up to take one of the five turntables on which I could expose the other avatars in the room to my taste. Tunes came could be uploaded from my own collection or gleaned from the site's massive archive. Spending four hours/week as a progressive FM radio station DJ in college was cool. Today? Not so much.

If you thought the socialization of music was big news, keep an eye on what's happening in the TV-viewing space and how mobile devices are bringing the promise of interactive TV to life. Sites like GetGlue, Miso, Umami, IntoNow and others have added a new dimension to the TV viewing experience -- one that benefits viewers, programmers and advertisers. I've checked in a few times on GetGlue, but I'm a little skittish about sharing my sometimes pedestrian viewing tastes on Twitter. Also, no dopamine released for me when getting a badge for watching a particular show.

I also like the synchronously-delivered content and conversation model of Umami TV (a client). Social Media Week plans a panel on the topic Feb 16.

One can't help but be impressed by the success of Quora, at least in terms of the size of its user community and the amount of original content it produces. I hear the site is planning a Pinterest pivot and will keep an eye on that. How do I know the site is successful? Try posting a question not already posed (and answered) by its members.

After meeting the founders of vYou, the social video startup at SXSW last year, I registered for an account. VYou is kind of like Quora for the moving image set. I set up my page, but only received one question (out of left field). The NY-based company just did a major update to the site, so we'll see where that nets out.

After Delicious melted down, I quickly migrated all my past links to Diigo, only to re-migrate them back to Delicious after it was acquired by AVOS, led by YouTube founders Chad Hurley and Steve Chen.

Talking about YouTube, I find it useful to post video I shoot (e.g., #2 and #3 sons' sailing regattas and lacrosse games). More recently, it's been a great outlet to upload (and link to) video clips from the industry events I cover, e.g., NYTM. Right now, my YouTube page is not all that social, but I suspect 2012 may bring some changes in this regard.

Having ignored Farmville, I have been liking Zynga's Words with Friends -- Scrabble for the social set. It's a total time sync. When you play with strangers, however, the lack of a time limit for adding letters can be frustrating. I just wonder how Hasbro missed the boat on this one. (Shades of Scrabulous?)

I continue to post to Google+ with its 90 million regular (?) users, but wish there was an easy way to merge my Google-hosted business account with my free GMail (to which all my Google tools and apps are linked). Thank goodness for my #2 son's roommate who works at Google. He introduced me to GMail's Incognito window.

I like what LinkedIn has done with shared updates on profile changes, and the channel's new ability to add "skills" to one's profile. I also signed up for Job Change Notifier, a nifty little third-party app developed by PaperG co-founder Roger Lee. It tells me when anyone in my LinkedIn network has changed jobs. Now I just need to figure out how to take all the business cards I've scanned via CardScan and merge them with LinkedIn's newly acquired CardMunch.

Foursquare still gives me that dopamine release, especially when collecting new badges or leap-frogging one of the digital influencers I follow. I'm, not too happy with Blackberry's Foursquare app and its frequent inability to find venues. This frustration may very well be the straw that sent this camel to iOS.

Facebook, the elephant in the social room, has so many bells & whistles that one would be hard-pressed to find anyone fully utilizing them. Maybe one day I'll collect and digitize all my life's media assets and add them to timeline? Should I try to accomplish this Herculean task in time for FB's IPO, which may also coincide with the one billion-user milestone? Then again, do I really want Facebook monetizing my life for its own aggrandizement, let alone that of its advertisers & marketing partners?

PR for Startups: Deconstructed

2012-01-16T15:42:00.000-05:00

Blog Maverick

It turns out that my post last week about item #11 on Mark Cuban's list of 12 Rules for Startups -- "Never Hire a PR Firm" -- set off a firestorm that prompted a more nuanced response from Mr. Cuban.

In his expanded view, Mr. Cuban did not disavow his disdain for the PR industry. In fact, he even attempted to school the PR community by drafting a sample pitch letter. More on that in a moment.

My first post mentioning Mark Cuban came in August 2005 during the nascent days of this blog. A then-ascendent New York Times business reporter named Andrew Ross Sorkin had just published a less-than-flattering profile piece on the founder of Broadcast.com and owner of the Dallas Mavericks. As a fellow blogger and admirer of Mr. Cuban, I dashed off an email to him early that morning offering some free advice on what he might do to set the record straight.

Andrew Ross Sorkin

I didn't hear back, but about 90 minutes later, a line-by-line retort of Mr. Sorkin's story appeared on his blog. It turns out the interview was conducted via email, so Cuban simply reposted the unedited Q&A, adding his own clarifying remarks. (Very cool early example of "We the Media.")

Taking a page from the newly crowned NBA champ, I thought I would deconstruct his less-than-ebullient take on the PR profession, at least as it relates to providing value for the startup community.

Mr. Cuban:

"The first problem with hiring a PR firm is cost. Cash is always in short supply in startups. Given all the potential places that you need cash in a startup, is the company better served having that cash available to potentially keep the company alive another day, week or month ? Or hiring a PR person? I would rather have the cash."

In effect, Mr. Cuban is correct. When should a startup consider retaining PR counsel and why: for initial positioning, funding news, product launch, partnerships...? The cost, however, will vary from agency to agency, and often is considerably less compared to other marketing disciplines. A small consultancy can run as little as $5,000/month, solo practitioners even less. Mid-sized agencies tend to go for $10K+/month, and larger agencies $15-20K+. (I'm generalizing here.)

Mr. Cuban:

"The next issue is time. The thing about PR people is this: while they may have great contacts and they can get articles placed, they are not capable of doing a vulcan mind meld. They don’t automatically know all the elements about your business that you want to convey to media, partners, customers, potential employees and even potential investors."

Tipping Point's Art Chang Judges Ultralight Startups

Yes, it's can be a time sync to have to continuously educate a third-party vendor on a startup's underlying technology, its audience, business goals, etc.

However, as I said in the comments section of his post, the startup should hire a rep who's a quick study and will take the time to fully understand the competitive landscape, what distinguishes the startup’s product or service, and most importantly, what keeps the founders up at night. This is where most firms fall down.

The very best in our business will fully immerse themselves in the client's DNA, freeing up the founders to build the business, while leaving the communications piece to the communications professionals.

Mr. Cuban:

"But the reality is that for the vast majority of startups, particularly tech related startups, most of the media that is going to benefit you out of the gate is trade related or local media. And these people are ALWAYS looking for stories to write. They want to hear from unique companies."

Shoutem Showcased at Ultralight Startups Event Jan 12

Not necessarily. Tech trades, bloggers and even local media are not "always" looking for stories. And if the are, they tend nowadays to be primarily influenced by those whom they follow on Twitter and Google+, their Facebook friends, and their RSS readers and social news aggregators like News.me and Zite. An email from the founder of a cool new tech start-up, no matter how cogent or compelling, will rarely be opened. In-demand tech journos received hundreds a day.

A seasoned PR professional may have represented many startups and thus be known by the reporter. Who stands a better chance of gaining traction: an unrecognized founder of an unbranded and untested company or the PR person with whom the reporter has worked before?

Mr. Cuban:

"It’s amazing how often a simple email to a writer for a trade publication or local media will get a response. The key to getting a response is being short, sweet , hyperbole free and to the point. You have to sell your differentiation in a paragraph.

Subject : Tracking Traffic to Reduce Vacancies

Dear Real Estate Industry Writer,

My name is Mark Cuban. I would love to tell you more about our company motionloft.com. We have internally developed a sensor that when placed on the side of a building can track in real time the number of people and cars that pass by. Motionloft is being used by building owners in San Francisco and New York to lease space by showing potential tenants the exact amount of foot traffic in front of a store location. Its being used by tenants to determine the best time to open, close and to offer specific products in services.

In one test case we would love to share with you, a tenant decided to rent a store front and go against the conventional wisdom of the area and open for lunch…with great results. They made this decision based exclusively on the data provided by motionloft.com

If you would like to see more information about motionloft.com and how your readers could benefit, just let me know!

all the best

mark

Nice pitch, Mark, but it ain't happening for you. Yes, if that pitch were coming from the owner of The Dallas Mavs, as opposed to Joe Startup, it might get an airing. To your credit, there's much good in the query including a lack of hyperbole and rhetoric, brevity and a positive, conversational tone. These are sorely missing in many of today's PR pitches.

Robert Scoble & Michael Arrington

Still, the reality is that tech journos are drowning in hundreds of daily story suggestions -- mostly irrelevant -- but many from pathbreaking companies whose products or services actually merit editorial consideration.

The ability to capture the limited bandwidth of a tech or startup beat reporter takes time, trust, perseverance, ingenuity and frankly, a little luck. Clearly a company's co-founder has better things to do with his or her time.

Mark Cuban:

So back to startups hiring a PR firm. Yes, you can get there from here with a PR firm, but im a believer that you accomplish much, much more with direct relationships than by using an intermediary. And that cash you keep in the bank can be the difference between staying alive as a small business, or not.

Spotted at Ultralight Startups Showcase in NYC

As I said in my initial post and in the comment section on your blog, it matters little who’s opening the doors to reporters and digital influencers. In fact, I agree that it's preferable to have the client interface directly with the journalist. We're perfectly happy to remain in the background, providing advance prep, positioning and the narrative. We're also there for the client who's not familiar with the delicate dance that exists between the newsmaker and journalist, and more importantly, what it takes to tango.

What value can one place on the PR counselor who prevents a journalist from skewering the client's business or POV, or one who is so passionate, articulate and infectious that the client can sleep at night knowing that his or her interests are well represented? What would you pay for that, Mark?

Don't Be Evil

2012-01-13T11:53:00.002-05:00

Scott McNealy

In March of 1998, the straight-talking CEO of Sun Microsystems travelled to Washington to testify before Congress on the then-monopolistic ways of one famous tech company out of Redmond, WA. Scott McNealy, with whom I sat the following morning in the green room of NBC "Today," had this to say:

"The only technology I'd rather own than Windows would be English," McNealy said. "All of those who use English would have to pay me a couple hundred dollars a year just for the right to speak English. And then I can charge you upgrades when I add new alphabet characters like 'n' and 't.' It would be a wonderful business."

That testimony is reminiscent of the battle brewing in social circles between Twitter and Google, which this week, changed its indexing algorithm to capture the content generated on Google+, to the apparent exclusion of Twitter's hundreds of millions of tweets per day. Obviously, Twitter was not pleased. Its general counsel tweeted this example:

"Folks asked for examples,” he wrote. “Here’s what a user searching for ‘@WWE’ will be shone on the new @Google."

Results of Google search of @WWE (via Mashable)

Google shot back saying it does not index the @ symbol. The Electronic Privacy Infomation Center (EPIC), for its part, wrote the FTC requesting an investigation:

"Google is changing the results displayed by its search engine to include data from its social network, such as photos or blog posts made by Google+ users, as well as the public Internet," EPIC wrote. "Although data from a user's Google+ contacts is not displayed publicly, Google's changes make the personal data of users more accessible. Users can opt out of seeing personalized search results, but cannot opt out of having their information found through Google search."

Dick Costolo

It was only last October that Twitter CEO Dick Costolo seemed to shrug off the challenge by Google+ and Facebook:

"We think we can reach every person on the planet, we think the way to do that is to simplify it," he said. "Over time, Google+ and Facebook will be more and more different than the experience we want to pass onto our users."

Now that Google has flexed its search muscles in the social spheres, Twitter is crying foul:

“Bad day for the Internet,” tweeted Alex Macgillivray, Twitter’s general counsel. "We think that’s bad for people, publishers, news organizations and Twitter users.”

We will keep a close eye on developments in this epic battle given the implications it has for any person, product or service hoping to build a bigger social footprint.

Separately, Google has another PR controversy brewing that may pose an even bigger affront to the search/ad monopoly's informal motto of "Don't Be Evil.' In an effort to establish a beachhead of ad/website business in Kenya (of all places) from small local merchants, Google's sales teams insidiously tapped the customers of a Kenyan company called Mocality for its business leads.

Mocality set up a sting and soon learned that Google operatives were behind the sales overtures to its customers, and in the process, had misrepresented themselves. Business Insider reported:

"In September Google decided to replicate some of what Mocality had already done. It launched a program called, Getting Kenyan Businesses Online (GKBO). After Google launched GKBO, Mocality started getting what it calls 'odd calls.'"

Apparently caught with its finger in the Kenyan cooke jar, a Google rep could only say this:

"We're aware that a company in Kenya has accused us of using some of their publicly available customer data without permission. We are investigating the matter and will have more information as soon as possible."

In my experience, it takes three well-publicized controversies in a short time span to create a crisis tipping point that could indelibly hurt a company's reputation. Right now, Google is navigating two (that we know about).

Update 1/13/12 1:30pm ET: Google "apologizes unreservedly" to Kenyan firm. Here's the statement from its Europe and emerging markets product and engineering VP Nelson Mattos:

“We were mortified to learn that a team of people working on a Google project improperly used Mocality’s data and misrepresented our relationship with Mocality to encourage customers to create new websites.

“We’ve already unreservedly apologised to Mocality. We’re still investigating exactly how this happened, and as soon as we have all the facts, we’ll be taking the appropriate action with the people involved.”

"Never Hire a PR Firm"

2012-01-11T15:45:00.000-05:00

Maverick Mark Cuban

That NBA champ, author, and billionaire blogging maverick Mark Cuban offered up some mostly sound advice to the startup community this week in a post titled "Mark Cuban's 12 Rules for Startups" on Entrepreneur.com.

I say mostly because his #11-ranked recommendation read as follows:

"Never hire a PR firm. A public relations firm will call or email people in the publications you already read, on the shows you already watch and at the websites you already surf. Those people publish their emails. Whenever you consume any information related to your field, get the email of the person publishing it and send them a message introducing yourself and the company. Their job is to find new stuff. They will welcome hearing from the founder instead of some PR flack. Once you establish communication with that person, make yourself available to answer their questions about the industry and be a source for them. If you are smart, they will use you."

Mark, you're right in some limited sense. Many (PR-beleaguered) tech journalists have developed an inherent distaste for a profession that peppers them with inane pitches that are mostly irrelevant to their editorial interests.

In reality, many bad pitches emanate from the lazy ones in our profession who rely exclusively on those automated services to build their media lists, but who never take the time to properly vet them. (They've also been know to originate from junior PR types whose bosses don't take the time to vet their prose.)

It's no wonder that some reporters take glee in publicly posting these spammy overtures.

Please know that not all PR people fall into these unfortunate categories, though at times it may seem so. In fact, an informed and conscientious PR professional can be a great asset to a time-challenged journalist looking for a lead on a hot new startup or one simply trying to find timely answers to his or her questions.

Moreover, Mark, you're not wrong in recognizing that many journalists -- especially on the tech beat -- would rather hear directly from the expert or executive within the company versus the account exec at agency of record. Certainly, you above all can appreciate that startup CEOs wear far too many hats to take on the blocking and tackling that goes with engaging reporters, industry analysts or trade show programmers.

At my firm, we prefer to open the door for our startup clients, then step back to let them directly interface with the journalist. We're hardly divorced from the process, but we defer to reporters' desire to let the newsmaker be front and center. We're perfectly happy to remain in the background providing counsel. Invariably, the reporter will come back to us for varied informational needs.

Most importantly, we are there for the client who may not understand the nuances of the dance between the newsmaker and journalist. I've had clients who've demanded a reporter's questions in advance, final copy approval, or that their story appear in a certain section. (Groan.)

Trust me, Mark, many startups, especially those on the brink of losing their media virginity, will derive and be thankful for the considerable benefit a smart PR firm can bring to the mix.

Wikipedia & PR: Friend or Foe?

2012-01-10T14:58:00.001-05:00

WIkipedia founder Jimmy Wales

Shortly before Christmas, I ran into an old friend who oversees social media for one of the big-branded management consultancy firms. He confided in me that he was having an issue with Wikipedia.

Wikipedia wouldn't grant him editing privileges, as a PR person, even though the information on the site about his employer was inaccurate. His question to me: should he pose as someone else to make the necessary changes?

I immediately said no. As untenable as the situation was, I thought it was clearly an ethical breach to misrepresent himself. (BTW - he was advised to do so by a reputable professional.) I then referred him to a friend in the biz who was much closer to the machinations of the world's largest crowd-sourced encyclopedia.

As for the tension between this Google-juiced, crowd-sourced repository of information and the PR community, here's what Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales had to say about it in 2006:

"I think we need to be very clear in a lot of different places that PR firms editing Wikipedia is something that we frown upon very very strongly. The appearance of impropriety is so great that we should make it very very strongly clear to these firms that we do not approve of what they would like to do."

Wikipedia's bias against PR pros (as bona fide site contributors) speaks to the challenge our industry faces as it seeks to redefine itself in a world where myriad other reasonably credible information sources abound.

Who's to say that PR people have the most timely, accurate and unbiased information about a company or topic? What's preventing PR people who represent clients with nefarious social, political or business agendas from tainting the site?

Edelman's Phil Gomes

As it just so happens, I coincidentally received a Facebook message last week from another friend in the biz John Cass inviting me to join a new group called "Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Engagement" (CREWE), which was started by Edelman's Phil Gomes, another old pal from the digital PR trenches. Phil penned an open letter to Jimmy Wales in which he asserted that:

"A truly serious conversation needs to happen about how communications professionals and the Wikipedia community can/must work together. Since recent events have thrown this issue into sharp relief, I’d like us to have an open, constructive and fair discussion about the important issues where public relations and Wikipedia intersect."

Jack O'Dwyer

CREWE now has 72 members, including -- in the same forum no less -- long-time industry chronicler Jack O'Dwyer and his nemesis, PRSA, the industry's U.S. trade association. (Jack's interest deviated a bit from the others' in that he's lobbying to gain for his newsletter "third-party" status and thus the means to validate the acuity of what's posted about PR.)

For PRSA's part, the association's newly anointed chair & CEO Gerry Corbett had this to say:

PRSA's Gerry Corbett
"Public relations and corporate communications professionals are a resource, not adversaries when it comes to working with Wikipedia on behalf of clients, and employer companies and organizations to correct for inaccurate or missing information. Ultimately, that is one of the many valuable roles of public relations: to help organizations better connect with and inform stakeholders. And few can argue that there is any greater a stakeholder in the digital age than the hundreds of millions of people around the world who use Wikipedia as a source for information.

The effort by Phil Gomes and the group he has started on Facebook, is a critical advocacy activity that the Public Relations Society of America wholeheartedly supports. It is our intention to assist this effort however and wherever we can, and with the resources we have available. Doing so, we believe, will augment a timely campaign that will benefit the entire public relations and corporate communications industry, while helping to establish better relationships with the Wikipedia community, which clearly has an influential role in modern research for people of all professions.

One outcome we hope will come of this initiative is a better understanding by those from Wikipedia and others that PR is not about "spin," but about accurate and truthful information in accordance with an established code of ethics, such as PRSA’s Code of Ethics.

It is an initiative we hope will be taken up by many and used as a catalyst for an open and honest discussion with Wikipedia and its editors regarding the role and value of allowing corporate communications and PR professionals to responsibly and transparently make necessary edits to their employers’ and clients’ Wikipedia entries."

For my part, I suggested that the group, and its more prominent members, engage directly with Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales and others in a decision-making capacity. Sure enough, members Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson called out Mr. Wales on the issue on Twitter and elsewhere, and John Cass invited him to join the group. He accepted and has been posting his POV with promises for a full airing shortly. Here are some of the exchanges:

Phil Gomes:

For one client (multi-billion-dollar U.S. company), there was frustration about the gross inaccuracies and old data on the company's entry. She created a login for herself and, in the interests of full disclosure, included the name of the company in her login name (e.g., JudyACME). She then went to the talk page and suggested some changes to bring the entry up to spec. Her login was summarily banned because someone felt that using the company name in her login was overtly promotional. (!) The items mentioned on the talk page went untouched for some time. They were eventually let through, but subsequent requests went ignored. (One unhelpfully leaves it as, I'm paraphrasing, "You have a conflict of interest.")

Summary:

- So, here we have someone going out of her way to be above-board and is banned on the slimmest of justifications. This provided some initial rationale, I guess, for ignoring what she had to say.

- The corporate representative made the entry *better* than it was, despite accusations that people in her line of work are buzzword-spouting automatons.

Jimmy Wales

Phil, send me the example privately so I can study it? [sic]

Jimmy Wales

I've got Marshall's example and I'm looking at it. If you can get me yours in the next 12 hours or so, I can look at it tomorrow morning. I hope to post something about these tomorrow afternoon.Obviously I won't mention particular clients publicly, that isn't the point. The point is discovering what went wrong and what could have been done better.

Elsewhere others chimed in:

Jack O'Dwyer

John: here is the correct link to my WP blog: http://bit.ly/v0Ndc7. If that doesn't work free user/pass for odwyerpr.com for Jan. are happy & year. What I mostly know about WP now is that the PR entries are woefully insufficient and lacking coverage of major topics. When I tried to post five entries, they were all removed by people without much knowledge of PR as far as I can determine. I assume this is true with all your subject areas--editorial judgments being made by inexperts. WP's reliance on "reliable" published sources is naive since no media are reliable on everything. Also, truth is hammered out in vigorous pubic debates and WP does not like controversy.

David King

I'll be damned. I went to check the policy to prove you wrong and there it is. "The principle of verifiability implies nothing about ease of access to sources: some online sources may require payment, while some print sources may be available only in university libraries"Which is interesting, because an editor was just telling me I may not be able to cite a book that is difficult to find and I've been told in the past not to use articles that require paid access.

Jimmy Wales

David, that's an easy to confusion to clear up. Easily available sources are naturally preferred, but if a hard to find source is better, then that can outweigh that initial preference.

Derek DeVries

Jack - If it's important to have your thoughts on the PR pages in Wikipedia, why not make your web content publicly-available for free to all? That would solve the problem.

Jimmy Wales

Derek, that's absolutely correct. Many brands should consider freely licensing a LOT of content so that Wikipedians can easily use it. But what I'm recommending goes a lot further than that. If you think a page should say something, write it up, and post it on the talk page. That actually works wonders in virtually all cases - I think the people claiming that it doesn't will be hard pressed to prove their case, although of course it is always possible to find rare cases where things have slipped through the cracks.And in those cases, there are clear and highly workable avenues for escalation. There is never a need for PR people to directly edit articles

We have to give Mr. Wales credit for re-engaging with the PR community on this topic. I firmly believe that the vast majority of professionals abide by ethical rules that strictly prohibit the willful spread of disinformation. As for the spreaders of misinformation (Frank Luntz?), they too are no small consideration, especially as the industry seeks to reestablish its credibility.

Others who have thoughtfully weighed in include:

Phillip Sheldrake "Reputation and Wikipedia"

Stuart Bruce "Wikipedia & PR Have Got to Work it Out"

Jack O'Dwyer "WIkipedia Desperate for Input on PR Subjects"

Serge Reuter "PR, Ethics & Wikipedia"

Stephen Waddington "Not All PRs are Rogues"

Let's keep an eye on this, especially since Mr. Wales appears to have listened and may be poised to make some concessions to the PR industry.

Why CES Matters

2012-01-09T14:49:00.000-05:00

Just as my Twitterstream is about to be overrun by hangover-induced tweets from the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas, former tech scribe for The Journal Nick Wingfield who's now toiling for The New York Times, yesterday presented a sobering view of the last standing major consumer electronics confab on the planet.

In his Times piece, "A Tech Show Loses Clout as Industry Shifts," Nick questioned the value of CES as a platform for launching major products:

"...the show is unlikely to be where any blockbuster products of 2012 are introduced. Many of the hottest new gadgets in recent years — including Apple’s iPad and iPhone, Microsoft’s Kinect and Amazon’s Kindle Fire — were first announced at other events, even though C.E.S. remains the world’s biggest consumer technology convention."

He talked about the changing nature of personal consumer electronics:

"...the most important developments in the electronics business are no longer coming from the makers of television sets and stereos that have been most closely identified with the show since it started in 1967."

True and true, but I believe that CES still serves as a valuable venue for product introductions, not unlike how the Super Bowl is a showcase or ad creative or a catalyst for countless game-related sidebar stories. First and foremost, the show continues to draw a captive (and maybe even its largest-ever) contingency of credentialed journalists, each of whom is tasked with filling his or her editorial pipelines with gadget-driven stories. Clutter, yes, but a very large firehose to fill.

Muckrack, btw, offers a decent way to identify CES reporters without pissing any off through misguided overtures. Moreover, a cursory look at the first day's tweets will give you a sense of just how much editorial content (i.e., earned media) will emerge from the show, and frankly, why CES remains an important factor in one's marketing plans:

Jessica Vascellaro, The Wall Street Journal: Doing 2 interviews via hotel landline because cell service doesn't work at Trump Hotel at #CES. Crazy. At least wifi is good. #its2012folks

Tim Bradshaw, The Financial Times:My brave @FT colleagues @chrisnuttall @richardwaters & @mattgarrahan are at #CES - follow their exploits at http://www.ft.com/ces2012

CNET News:LG's #CES TV news rundown: Thin, 3D, and Googley #CES2012 http://cnet.co/yGa6IK

Joshua Topolsky, The Verge:Our girl @joannastern is killing it at Intel keynote #CES2012 The Verge

Andrew Wallenstein, Variety: Rovi announces tech at #CES that lets you convert your DVDs into digital copies for Ultraviolet. #nice

Los Angeles Times:Following developments at #CES? Follow our tech reporters, @nateog, @dsarno, @jcahealey, @DawnC331, @byandreachang, @emamd, @mmaltaisLAT

PSFK:At #CES this week? Just a reminder to look out for PSFK's @piers_fawkes and @JGWeiner who are flying in today.

Pete Cashmore, Mashable:Vimeo Brings New Apps to Android, Windows Phone and iPad - http://on.mash.to/zbh8sL #CES #CES2012

Veronica Belmont, Tekzilla:Sitting behind Team @Engadget at the Sharp press conference, they're getting ready to rock their liveblog: http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/09/live-from-sharps-ces-2012-press-event/ #CES2012

Robert Scoble:My first CES report: New Toshiba tablet is mighty thin: https://plus.google.com/111091089527727420853/posts/6LSwdVWa15r first video look.

And then of course there's this. (Be careful what you wish for, Roy.)

Roy Furchgott, The New York Times: Packed and ready for C.E.S. Then I realized I have no meetings set for Monday morning or afternoon. Oops. Not liking the down-time.

Sure, the big guys - Apple, Amazon, Google -- already have their captive media audience for any of their big or small product or corporate announcements. But what about the rest of us? Getting one's start-up on the docket for TechCrunch Disrupt or an O'Reilly Ignite event can provide some decent media fuel to set tongues a wagging. But that's a big if.

The Onion's Baratunde Thurston at 2011 Mashable Awards

It's no coincidence that Mashable chose CES as the venue for its Mashable Awards show and networking party. Other than SxSW, CES remains a vital venue for virtual connections to get physical, and there are scant few in the tech space who'll argue the value of that. As Scoble recently wrote on his Google+ stream:

"One reason I love traveling is because it is a people-meeting affordance...It always amazes me at how often I'm sitting next to someone interesting in trains and planes and how rarely people even introduce themselves. It's one of the things that makes travel interesting. The randomness of it all. It also makes me realize that great tech stories can just be sitting right in front of you. You just have to figure out what they are. Do you have a story of when you were traveling and met someone interesting?"

While I wish I was out there in Vegas right now - who doesn't? -- I am looking forward to my several days in Austin for SXSW Interactive. I'll be at the Courtyard Marriott next to the Convention Center, if you care to say hello.

NYC Ratchets its Tech Cred

2012-01-06T13:14:00.001-05:00

It's a new year. The ebullient New York tech community picked up where it left off with several notable events: the first New York Tech Meetup of 2012, a Zaarly-sponsored Startup Crawl, and the auspicious piece in The Economist on Mayor Mike's goal to see New York City give Silicon Valley a run for its VC money.

First, that Economist piece "Reimagining the Future" in which this paragraph sums up the great expectations the city has at this moment in time:

"The city’s embrace of high-tech has already begun. Tech clusters have emerged in Manhattan’s Flatiron District and Brooklyn’s Dumbo, home to firms like STELLAService and Etsy. Venture-capital firms and angel investors have been looking at New York more seriously than they once did. Henry Blodget, of Business Insider, notes “the financing ecosystem has also gotten very well developed, from late-stage private equity right down to angel investing.” Some $1.2 billion was invested by venture-capital firms in New York in 2010. The Big Apple even overtook Massachusetts in venture-capital funding for internet and tech start-ups, making it second only to Silicon Valley. And in the third quarter of last year, it surpassed it in venture capital in all categories. Between 2005 and 2010 employment in New York’s high-tech sector grew by nearly 30%. Google alone has about 1,200 engineers in the city."

And let's not lose sight of that audacious announcement that will eventually herald in a new era of technology innovation: the joint plan from Cornell University and Israel's Technion Institute of Technology to build a $2 billion campus on Roosevelt Island. Here are more details and a flyover:

I did make it to the first New York Tech Meetup of the year, held before (another) sold out audience of 800 or so at NYU's Skirball Center. The event attracts the dominant share of notables from the city's tech, academic, media and venture funding communities. I've seen former NBCUni chief Jeff Zucker, financier Donald Marron, and entrepreneur Craig Newmark milling in the audience.

And as you know, the NYTM played host to many of today's successful tech-driven companies including Foursquare, GroupMe (recently sold to Skype), and Tumblr, which is on fire right now. So much so that moderator Nate Westheimer announced that Tumblr was joining the ranks of Google and Microsoft BizSpark as NYTM's third "annual sustaining sponsor." In the news release, company CEO David Karp said:

"Our NYTM demo back in 2007 was a pivotal moment in Tumblr’s history, and we’re really excited to give back to this incredible organization. As Tumblr has grown over the years, so has the NYTM, and we could not be more thrilled to support the monthly meetup as well as the larger mission to promote the NY tech industry. This thriving community has been so welcoming and encouraging through every step of Tumblr’s life, and we're honored to be a part of it."

As for the January 2012 presentations, nearly all have some redeeming value, but typically a small handful capture the collective imaginations of this - a most discerning New York audience. Among those that did were:

Deaftel -- a very early stage smart phone app for the hearing impaired that allows audio-to-text without operator intermediation. Westehimer noted that it generated a decent share of Twitter buzz, indicating the audience's growing proclivity for technology that makes a difference in people's lives.

The next technology (that also makes a difference) was called ObscuraCam. I had a personal interest in this smart phone app that makes it easy to remove meta data from digital images captured while documenting public protests, as an example. Faces and location-identifying objects can be obscured.

The technology's development was supported by WITNESS and The Guardian Project. For two years, I had handled PR for the Reebok Human Rights Award, which partnered with WITNESS early on to provide much-needed video equipment to activists in countries with media-repressive governments. REM's Michael Stipe and Peter Gabriel were just two of the rock stars (literal) rock stars who supported the program.

Tara Hunt presents Buyosphere

NYTM vet Tara Hunt opened her (show) case for Buyosphere by taking the audience on a search for a pair of shoes that would complement her gold dress. It was soon apparent how frustrating and overwhelming the typical product search can be. With a few filters, Buyosphere's model taps the crowd, a la Quora, to help surface the exact item one is seeking. A Google search on Buyosphere reveals the tagline "People helping people." Right.

In spite of the squeamish similarities to Chatroulette, YouNow proved to be another crowd favorite. It's a website on which ordinary people (with perceived extraordinary talents) can subject themselves to the scrutiny of the viewing audience.

The audience, for its part, rates the "performance" in real time. The worse the rating, the quicker the proverbial ax. Here's a short video clip:

Terry Jones of FluidInfo

Terry Jones of FluidInfo was next up. Brilliant for sure, but perhaps a bit Quixotic in his mission to literally tag verything in ther physical world. Loved the idea. Not sure of its practicality. (I'm still getting over QR Codes.)

And finally, we heard a very cogent and relatable presentation for Chat&, a B-toB startup that offers consumer-facing online retailers the ability for their customers to derive product information from a customer service rep via a live video feed.

To my left, Personal Democracy Media founder and NYTM chair Andrew Rasiej thought there were some potential synergies between Chat& and YouNow (i.e., rate the customer service rep for starters), but Sim, the VC guy to my left and his pal and I debated whether a visual interface (versus text-driven chat) would result in higher conversions.

Finally, I was fortunate to nab a ticket for New York's first "startupcrawl, sponsored by Zaarly (which had mounted one in SF). About 40 of us started the evening at (former client) Unigo where the founder of the three-year-old company Jordan Goldman gave a brief overview of his site, the most comprehensive online resource for prospective college students (and their parents). All the content on the site is student-generated, i.e., it's authentic. What's new there? A service matching prospective students with bona fide college counselors or college students at a cost that's minuscule compared to the expected going rate.

Gary Vaynerchuk

We then crossed Park Avenue South to check in on everyone's favorite oenophile turned social media marketing guru Gary Vaynerchuk and his Vaynerchuk Media. After the group had a few minutes to kibbutz, Gary took the chair, as he's prone to do, and cajoled the crowd to lose their obsession with that piece in Mashable or how many retweets you're getting. Stay focused on what's real and redeemable: your users and customers. If you do this, you'll be able to live your dream another day.

I had another obligation, so I unfortunately missed visiting the last three offices on the crawl: Adaptly, Spotify and Zaarly, though I did get a chance to meet some folks from those vibrant startups. All in all, a busy first week of a new year for the New York Tech scene. Next week, I expect to make it to the Ultra Light Startup showcase, so keep an eye on this space.

PR, Social Validation & The X Factor

2012-01-04T14:33:00.000-05:00

The PR industry has come a long way from the days of measuring a campaign's success by the number of media impressions it generates or how they might equate into an ad spend (i.e., "ad equivalency"). Truth be told: too many practitioners and client organizations still rely on these increasingly outmoded metrics.

Today, the industry is more focused on tangible actions that result from either elevated brand awareness in the editorial and owned news channels or friend-shared/endorsed recommendations in the social spheres.

Anyone keeping tabs on the burgeoning social TV/second screen phenomenon wherein TV viewers receive program-related content and conversation on their mobile devices via apps like GetGlue, IntoNow, Miso and my fave, Umami TV (a Flatiron client), will be familiar with the near-daily reports touting the week’s “most social TV programs.”

Companies like Trendrr, Bluefin Labs and Social Guide are crunching Twitter's and Facebook’s data streams to determine which TV shows generate the most buzz.

One recent week's winners were "WWE Raw” on cable and “The X Factor” on broadcast. As for the most "social" TV networks of 2011, Fox led the way with "The X Factor," The Super Bowl and World Series, followed by ABC ("American Music Awards," "NBA Finals," "Dancing with the Stars"), and MTV ("Video Music Awards," "Jersey Shore," and "Teen Wolf.")

In predicting where the PR industry may be headed, I’m beginning to believe that a campaign’s ability to produce buzz in social or shared media may become the holy grail barometer of one’s success plying the “earned, owned and paid” media channels. Six months ago I said as much in a blog post that re-configured the oft-quoted Forrester Research infographic showing the new “interactive marketing paradigm.”

There are now a myriad apps, channels, platforms and devices on which our clients’ messages might reside and spread. This new measure for success will gauge our ability to create original and sufficiently compelling or edgy content to catalyze shared, aggregated or curated conversations.

The new currency of success will take the form of tweets, retweets, likes, and favorites on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+, and may eventually play out in an entirely new ecosystem of personalized social media news aggregators like Storify, Paper.li, News.me, Flipboard, Storyful, Google Currents, Pulse, Zite, Livestand, and Instagram, among others.As The New York Times's NY tech reporter Jenna Wortham recently wrote:

"Most important thing of the year: the retweet. 2011 was the year that retweeting became less about achieving value and followers and more of a new form of cultural and information currency — not unlike a viral version of the bit, self-propagating units of information."

In spite of all the changes and challenges we’re witnessing in our industry, a core (and bankable) competency still entails building a positive client-branded presence in the media – one that directly and measurably enhances business and reputation.

Buzz in the social spheres, I believe, will be the desired bi-product of this earned, owned and paid media presence wherein digital denizens gladly share client messages with their friends, family, fans and followers across a growing multitude of digital and mobile apps and channels.

PR/Social Predictions: Who Got it Right?

2012-01-02T12:39:00.000-05:00

I decided to take a look back at the PR/social/marketing pundits' predictions for 2011. Fortunately the wiki I created a year ago to crowd-capture the more prominent of these prognostications remained intact.

Below are those skewed to or posted by PR professionals (even though I admit that PR, as a discipline, has bled across the entire marketing communications spectrum):

"Big Social Media Trends for 2011" (Dec. 22, 2010)
Jeremy Woolf
Hypertext

"11 Public Relations Trends for 2011" (Dec. 22, 2010)
Keith Trivitt
PRSAY

"My Predictions for 2011" (Dec. 26, 2010)
Shel Israel
Global Neighbourhoods

"PR to Face Myriad Challenges in 2011" (Dec. 29, 2010)
Ronn Torossian
MediaPost

"The Top 15 Marketing and Social Media Trends to Watch in 2011" (Jan 2, 2011)
Rohit Bhargava
Influential Marketing Blog

"Eleven Digital Trends to Watch in 2011" (Jan 5, 2011)
Steve Rubel & David Armano
Edelman Digital

"10 Ways Social Media Will Change in 2011" (Jan 6, 2011)
Ravit Lichtenberg
Ragan.com

Ogilvy's Rohit Bhargava

While each of the above includes some very worthwhile, if not prescient take-aways, hindsight has made me appreciate the clairvoyance of my pal Rohit Bhargava, one of the founders of the 360 Digital Influence Group at Ogilvy.

Here's Rohit's list, which is accompanied by a slide show:

Likeonomics
Approachable Celebrity
Desperate Simplification
Essential Integration
Rise of Curation
Visualized Data
Crowdsourced Innovation
Instant PR & Customer Service
App-fication of the Web
Reimagining Charity
Employees As Heroes
Locationcasting
Brutal Transparency
Addictive Randomness
Culting Of Retail

I was able to add my own two cents as part of an industry round-up titled "#PRin2012: 12 Trends That Will Change Public Relations," compiled by trade association PRSA a few weeks back. I plan to post my full submission, "PR in 2012: Social Validation," on these pages shortly. Happy new year, and thanks for hanging with me in 2011.

Is Twitter Influence Portable?

2011-12-27T18:11:00.001-05:00

When influential chronicler of all things politics Ben Smith announced his decision to leave Politico to edit Jonah Peretti's ascendent BuzzFeed blog, the Twittersphere was all abuzz with congratulatory words. After all, Mr. Smith had amassed some 60,000 followers on Twitter during his time at Politico.

As one of his followers, I tweeted both warm wishes and an observation:

@PeterHimler "I guess @benpolitico will need a new Twitter handle."

Scott Monty

The question of who owns one's Twitter handle (and its followers) has been around since the earliest days of the real-time social and news channel.

I remember asking Ford's social media chief Scott Monty, with his then 20,000 followers, about it back in May 2009:

@Scott Monty Tell @peterhimler that it's no different than when the Ford CEO leaves. #mrs09 about 20 hours ago from TwitterBerry

@PeterHimler But are you followers transferable?about 18 hours ago from Power Twitter

@ScottMonty @peterhimler When we're effectively leveraging @Ford @FordDriveGreen @FordCustService @FordMustang @FordFiesta, etc. they are.about 18 hours ago from web in reply to PeterHimler

One would be hard-pressed to find a marketing executive or reputation manager who hasn't lamented the loss of a staffer with a large Twitter following. We've seen it with brands as diverse as The New York Times, Coach and Comcast. Yet some still question the value of a sizable Twitter following. A PR/marketing guy from Philly named Eric Fischgrund commented on a recent post of mine:

"Referencing Twitter followers is so 2009, Peter."

Perhaps, but when the news stories one's Twitter friends tweet form the basis of our daily media consumption, the value of Twitter grows exponentially. Who hasn't noticed the tablet-driven boom in what I call "personalized social news gators?" They have names like News.me, Storyful, Google Currents, Pulse, Zite and Livestand, to name a few. But that's a discussion for another day.

Let's talk about portability of one's Twitter handle. I mean if the wireless companies permit subscribers to migrate their phone numbers to new providers... (Oh, right. The government had to intercede.) On the other side of the coin, many corporate Twitter stars have built their personal brands by leveraging the brand equity of their employers.

On Christmas Day, The New York Times reported on a lawsuit between a company and one of its highly influential employees who departed, absconding with his 17K+ Twitter followers in the process. Here's what reporter John Biggs (9991 followers, 3171 following) wrote:

"...in a world where social media’s influence can mean the difference between a lucrative sale and another fruitless cold call, social media accounts at companies have taken on added significance."

Noah Kravitz

Noah Kravitz's employer PhoneDog Media is suing Mr. Kravitz alleging that his followers are actually customers. Here's how one intellectual property lawyer in New York summed it up:

"This will establish precedent in the online world, as it relates to ownership of social media accounts," said Henry J. Cittone, a lawyer in New York who litigates intellectual property disputes. “We’ve actually been waiting to see such a case as many of our clients are concerned about the ownership of social media accounts vis-á-vis their branding."

Columbia J School's Sree Sreenivasan, who's authored Sree’s Social Media Guide, said smart companies let social media blossom where it may:

"'It’s a terrible thing to say you have to leave your Twitter followers behind,' he said, talking specifically about media companies that may employ popular Twitter writers. 'It sends a terrible signal to reporters and journalists who care about this, and this will make it less attractive to recruit the next round of people.'

He said that many industries had policies that required sales staff to leave their Rolodexes behind, but that these policies were as relevant to social media as Rolodexes are to the modern office. After all, social media accounts are, almost by definition, personal."

Jonah Peretti

We'll be keeping an eye on the lawsuit. Until then, please note that my pal Scott Monty now has some 64,000 followers on Twitter and is listed in nearly 22,000 circles on Google+.

BuzzFeed's Jonah Peretti and Ben Smith would combine to influence 72,000+ followers -- that is if Mr. Smith can somehow maneuver those followers to his new gig. Even if he doesn't, BuzzFeed is in the enviable position of having nearly 52,000 Twitter followers of its own.

What in Your Wallet? Nothing!

2011-12-23T10:42:00.000-05:00

Class Action

I've been looking for a reason to write about Capital One for the longest time. No. I'm not a customer, nor will I ever become one. My distaste for the nation's "10th largest bank in terms of assets" stems from its inane and pervasive Viking-themed advertising.

"What lies in your wallet?"

It's unclear what Capital One spends each year, but in 2010 the company ranked right up there as one of the nation's largest advertisers and #2 (behind only BofA) in the financial services sector.

What Capital One won't be advertising anytime soon is its practice of pursuing (and in some cases illegally suing) 15,500 of its credit card customers for outstanding payments...after the customers filed for bankruptcy protection.

The Wall Street Journal reports today:

"In 2008, a U.S. bankruptcy trustee in Massachusetts accused Capital One of illegally trying 5,600 times to collect debts already wiped out by a bankruptcy judge.The trustee, who declined to comment, said the wrongful claims were the result of Capital One's failure to keep track of bankruptcy filings by its customers. The trustee began investigating the company when it allegedly sought $5,542.50 from a couple 14 years after the debt was erased."

Few will argue with the success of those dumb viking/visgoth spots. They have empowered Capital One to build some 1000 U.S. branches in a relatively short time, and bid on ING's online banking group for some $9 billion. (Eat your heart out, Geico caveman!)

Inane and attention-grabbing advertising, while often effective in terms of customer acquisition, can also be a double-edged sword. Who among isn't feeling some schadenfreude this morning after hearing the news of Capital One's practice of trying to doubly screw its customers?

I am, and I'm sure I'm not alone. Given all the other nefarious doings we're seeing the banking sector sector, I wonder whether Capital One's missteps would have merited the unwanted media attention if it didn't have such a large and annoying advertising campaign.

Fortunately for the bank, the world is poised to shut down for the holidays. This negative story will have a short shelf life:

"The Capital One spokeswoman wouldn't comment on the allegations, settlement or ongoing scrutiny. In a court filing, Capital One said it beefed up record-keeping procedures before being prodded by the bankruptcy trustee."

Facebook's Hackathon Culture

2011-12-20T15:48:00.000-05:00

Facebook's agency relations manager Jennifer Kattula

I swung by 360i's new offices in Tribeca last evening for Social Media Week NY's weekly board meeting and holiday get-together. SMW chief Toby Daniels invited Facebook's agency relations person Jennifer Kattula to walk the crowd through the company's "hackathon culture," but it wasn't exactly what we've come to know as the hackathon.

Facebook's Rules of the Hack

Facebook views hackathons less as group coding events -- though that model remains popular -- but rather as individuals brainstorming alone in a room shared with others each, focused on a particular business activity -- from marketing to new product development.
It's not a free-for-all. Facebook mandates that all hacked ideas comply with a very defined set of rules (at left) The prize: the idea gets "shipped." More photos of Facebook's hack rules here.

Following Jennifer's glimpse into Facebook's creative culture, the evening's attendees broke into four or five "hackathon" groups to (more traditionally) brainstorm fresh event ideas for the New York leg of Social Media Week February 13-17. (Not that it needs it.)

Social Media Week NY Keynoters

Pictured here is a list of some of the confirmed keynoters for NY:

I'll mention some of the ideas that emerged since anyone can take the lead and submit a more fleshed our proposal for consideration. (The last SMWNY in September drew 10,000+ "hyper-social" New Yorkers who attended some 200+ events in the city.) Here are some of the new ideas from last night:

Collaboration Creation -- Social Media Week attendee stories contribute to an ebook that's developed over the course of the week
Festival Fest -- Tribeca Film Festival, CMJ Music, SMW, Fashion Week, NY Wine & Food offer sneak peaks and entertain
The Voices Behind the Voice -- Those responsible for crafting twitter personalities of notable news sources, political figures, celebrities
Guess that Source: Propaganda in Social Media -- Audience guesses origin of tweet based on tone of voice, message conveyed
Unfortunate Tweeters: "I got [fired, divorced, found out] because of Social Media" -- Highlight stories to discuss dual nature and precautionary aspects of social media
Who REALLY has the most Klout -- Competition to see whose followers attend most events
Open Call -- Participants tweet and trending topics become focus of panel
Strike a Pose -- Photobooth transfers photos into online Hipstamatic album
Sketch - Artwork is created during a panel to turn "ordinary into extraordinary"
VIP Influencer Events -- All attendees are required to have x followers or a certain Klout score to attend.

As mentioned, anyone can submit an event for consideration. Here's the submissions link. Deadline: January 20.

Krochmal

Separately, I brought my digital audio recorder so was able to grab some sound from a few of the attendees I knew. It was the end of the year. so we danced around what lies ahead for 2012. Here's what I learned. Click on the name to listen to the audio exchange.

Social Media News NY's Mo Krochmal (RT: 3:44) talking about his effort to curate notable predictions for 2012. I sent him my Wikispaces-hosted collection of digital prognostications for 2011.

Schafer

Deep Focus CEO Ian Schafer (RT: 2:39) who forecast that "the only thing you can count on is change."

Berkowitz

360i's Digital Veep of Emerging Media David Berkowitz (RT: 2:33) whose company hosted the event. His clients are "beyond why social matters," and are asking "what's the value for me."

Daniels

Social Media Week's founder and executive director Toby Daniels (RT: 4:56) observed that entrepreneurs in 2012 are going to look beyond just selling more consumer packaged goods and try to tackle some of the important social issues affecting us all.

I did make an attempt to grab some insights from a couple of the women attending last night, but for various reasons got turned down. Bad breath? Actually, I've been promised some time in January after their gestating professional plans become known.

Photos of Ms. Kattula and slides: Mo Krochmal

Too Big Not to Fail

2011-12-16T10:26:00.000-05:00

Soho Grand Hotel - Scene of the Pitch

I had about an hour to kill between my breakfast in Soho yesterday and my next meeting. I decided to stroll over to the second floor lounge of the Soho Grand Hotel to grab just one more cup of coffee and dash off a few emails.

Before too long, I couldn't help but overhear a very loud and self-assured man putting on the big sell to a well-dressed couple.

"We work with them all," he boasted.

"I can guarantee that we will have you on with Jon Stewart, Charlie Rose, GMA, and CNBC...a couple of times."

My ears perked. Was this a PR agency pitching a new client prospect in a most open and public venue? I couldn't exactly determine what the client did to merit both the affections of "The Daily Show" and "Good Morning America," but it sounded like the prospect was another Wall Street-themed film documentary poised to debut on the Web.

If you followed my Twitter and Facebook streams yesterday, you heard in real-time how the pitch progressed:

"Bloomberg, AP, Reuters, Fox Business, Andrew Ross Sorkin...we can get you these tomorrow."

It appeared the client prospect was taken in by the fact that this senior executive could actually rattle off the names of these top-tier outlets and journalists. Me? I was tempted to walk over and ask the guy if he even knew who Hilary Kun was -- Jon Stewart's supervising producer. I refrained.

I felt a little sorry for the filmmakers who were clearly new to the process of retaining a PR firm. They were being won over by a most hyperbolic pitch. You heard of "Too Big to Fail?" Well, this was "Too Big Not to Fail."

"We do social too," the exec boasted. "Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin...we do them all."

Hmmm. No Google+? At this, I finally deduced the name of the agency and decided to check the activity of its Twitter stream. Its followers numbered in the hundreds with an equal number of those being followed.

The senior exec finally acknowledged his female colleague who sat demurely opposite him throughout the pitch. "She's the best in the business," he crowed, but offered little room for her to demonstrate this assertion. The meeting was winding down. Money was discussed.

"It'll be $40,000 for four months, " the agency exec explained.

"We're entering the holidays. Does the engagement start right away?" the filmaker asked.

"No. We'll use the next few weeks to draft materials and build a media list, then start in January."

Hands shakes all around. The agency woman finally had a chance to talk, but it was about her three children, including a newborn. They said their goodbyes. The filmmakers hung in. They were staying at the hotel.

In retrospect, maybe the firm did have the mojo to deliver on the promise. I guess we'll just have to come back to the hotel's lounge in April for the post-mortem.

Thank You Lowes

2011-12-14T13:09:00.001-05:00

TIME magazine, The New Yorker, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, CNN, The New York Times ABC News... A PR home run? Hardly. These are just a handful of the bigger-branded media outlets that weighed in on TLC's new reality show "All-American Muslim." Would they have done so had home improvement retailer Lowe's not bowed to pressure from some wacky misinformed group in the wacky misinformed state of Florida? Unlikely.

You know the story. An inherently racist organization called the Florida Family Association took issue with a TLC reality series produced by the same evil geniuses who brought us the high-minded "Real Housewives" juggernaut. "All-American Muslim" gives the nation a counter-intuitive look into the humdrum lives of five families of Muslim descent living in Dearborn, Michigan, a city with the nation's largest percentage of Muslim Americans, but also the home to that most American of companies - The Ford Motor Company.

Of course, it wasn't Lowe's intent to thrust its brand and this issue into the national public spotlight.

Here's how Lowes' spokesperson Chris Ahearn explained management's decision:

"Our decision was not political. It was not social in any way! We just knew that it was a controversial program, and we wanted to reach consumers, and a controversial program is not a place to do that."

Yes and no, Chris. Ironically, you reached more consumers with your company's knee-jerk reaction to some Florida whack-jobs than you would have it you left well-enough alone. In fact, had the FFA taken the same tack as that other intolerant similar pleasant-sounding group Focus on Family, and decided to specifically target the show's national advertisers, you probably would not be as much an object of all those hateful FB posts and this TIME Magazine headline:

"All-American Muslim Meets an Un-American Advertising Pullout"

Lowes' controlled and reasonable-sounding Facebook fan page post still doesn't change the underlying decision to capitulate rather than stand up for tolerance and the American ideal. (Are you listening, Mr President?) Ben Popken just observed a change in Lowes' FB page commenting rules.

"It appears that we managed to step into a hotly contested debate with strong views from virtually every angle and perspective – social, political and otherwise – and we’ve managed to make some people very unhappy. We are sincerely sorry. We have a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion, across our workforce and our customers, and we’re proud of that longstanding commitment.Lowe’s has received a significant amount of communication on this program, from every perspective possible. Individuals and groups have strong political and societal views on this topic, and this program became a lighting rod for many of those views.

As a result we did pull our advertising on this program. We believe it is best to respectfully defer to communities, individuals and groups to discuss and consider such issues of importance.We strongly support and respect the right of our customers, the community at large, and our employees to have different views. If we have made anyone question that commitment, we apologize.Thank you for allowing us to further explain our position."

In thinking this one through, clearly the PR people didn't this this one through. They didn't anticipate the public outcry that the decision to pull the spots would produce. Personally, I think it's better to assertively side with the angels and take a stand, than to mount a lame attempt to avoid controversy.

I bet Lowes' do-it-yourself customers might even appreciate resolve than cowing down to the lunatic fringe. Ironically, the advertising avails for "All-American Muslim" are now sold out and the subject of intolerance in America is now on everyone's lips. Thank you, Lowes.

Social Media on Steroids [Video]

2011-12-10T08:11:00.001-05:00

Some of this blog's followers have commented on how much they've enjoyed the once-regular feature "Your Weekend Viewing," a curated collection of cool and useful videos posted here at week's end. Unfortunately, Flatiron's client obligations and the emergence of another outlet for this blogger's musings have sidetracked the capture and sharing of these video views in recent weeks.

This week, however, one could not avoid the digerati's "Fab Four," and specifically their product launches, platform upgrades and new marketing campaigns that dominated the social media and marketing spheres. Most were accompanied by both company-"owned" video tutorials and influencer-"earned" third-party video reviews. Here are a few of the more noteworthy:

Twitter

Twitter set Twittersphere's tongues-a-waggin' this week with the private launch of the new new Twitter. This major Twitter re-vamp sort of coincided with the company's intro of brand pages as a means to compete with Facebook and now Google+ brand pages. I suppose Sheryl Sandberg's quip to marketers about putting "a little Facebook in everything you do" hit home. Here's PC World's look at all three, and earned and owned clips of the new new Twitter.

Google

Not to be outdone, Google went a little launch crazy last week. It put Google Schemer into private beta, bowed both Google Currents and Google Carousel, and integrated Google+ Circles into GMail users' accounts. Here's a look at Google Currents for Android and iOS users:

And Google Carousel for image search on tablets:

Facebook

No new videos from the king of all social nets this week, but that doesn't mean Facebook is off the media's radar. (Will it ever be off the media's radar?) Obviously, the conjecture over Facebook's IPO continues to rage,and then there was the schadenfreude over someone posting personal photos hacked from Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook profile.

Nevertheless, I did take an interest in a clip posted this week by the BBC in which a reporter questioning Facebook's VP/Public Policy Elliot Schrage about what happens to those who hit the "Like" button on a branded page, and whether they realize that their endorsement will be displayed like an ad. "It's a profound question, " Schrage ultimately admits:

Apple

Never to be outdone, Friday was the day Apple opened its biggest store yet on the balcony in New York City's landmark commuter hub Grand Central Station. Smartly, the company gave journalists a sneak preview the day before. Here's a short noisy clip from Friday's opening.

Finally, as the holidays get that much closer, that deal paving the way for the original Fab Four to finally join iTunes is looking sweeter and sweeter. Here's Apple's new TV spot featuring Beatles covers, and one of my fave LP's title tracks:

Questions Answered

2011-12-08T11:27:00.001-05:00

Here are the answers to the PR 3.0 Questionnaire:

Rank the following in order of their unique visitors per month:

#1 (72.8M uniques) NYTimes.com
#4 (6M) Gawker.com
#5 (5M) Politico.com
#3 (7.5M) TechCrunch.com
#2 (54M) HuffingtonPost.com

Match the following people with their place of work:

Dennis Crowley - Foursquare
Tina Brown - The Daily Beast
Andrew Mason - Groupon
Pete Cashmore - Mashable
Sheryl Sandberg - Facebook
Larry Page - Google
Vivian Schiller - NBC
Jack Dorsey - Twitter

Describe the following:

Spotify - Cloud-based social music service

GroupMe - A mobile app that lets you easily connect with groups of your friends

Flipboard - A social magazine app for the iPad

GetGlue -A social networking app for entertainment that involves check-ins and ratings

Instagram - Fast, beautiful photo sharing for the iOS.

Tumblr A feature rich and free blog hosting platform

Bit.ly A URL redirection service with real-time link tracking.

BuddyMedia - A social media marketing products company to help brands engage and grow their audiences

Who is Siri?

The voice-activated assistant on Apple's new iPhone 4S

Whose Twitter handles are these?

@Carr2N - David Carr (NYTimes)

@APlusk - Ashton Kutcher

@acarvin - NPR's Andy Carvin

@pkafka - All Things D's Peter Kafka

@benpolitico - Politico's Ben Smith

@Xeni - Boing Boing's Xeni Jardin

@Zee - The Next Web's Zee Kane

@Dens - Foursquare's Dennis Crowley

@Ev - Twitter co-founder Evan Williams

@Finkd - Mark Zuckerberg

What are The Shorty Awards?

The annual event in New York City highlighting Twitter's best short-form content

Where can one find The App Store?

On iTunes

What's the significance of Twitter hashtags?

A way to build community on Twitter around a person, place or thing.

Match the following journalists with their news organizations:

Emily Chang - Bloomberg TV
Andrew Ross Sorkin - The New York Times' DealBook
Bob Garfield - Co-host NPR's "On the Media"
Piers Morgan - Host of his own show on CNN
Kara Swisher - AllThingsD's co-editor
Lara Logan - CBS News correspondent
Henry Blodget - Founder /ed-in-chief BusinessInsider

True or False?

The Huffington Post owns AOL - False
The Atlantic's digital ad revenue is greater than its print ad revenue - True
Fox News Channel is "fair & balanced" - False
Bill Keller has left The New York Times - False
Fairchild Publications is the parent company of W Magazine & WWD - False

Which does IAC NOT own:

The Daily Beast, Newsweek, Match.com, Vimeo, Expedia, Ask.com, Gothamist? - Gothamist
______________

What do the following abbreviations stand for?

SXSW - South by Southwest
API - Application Programming Interface
iOS 5 - Apple's mobile Operating System
RT - Re-Tweet
HTML5 - Hyper-Text Markup Langauge
DM - Direct Message
NYTM - New York Tech Meetup

Complete the following:

President Obama recently made news in social media circles. He joined Google+.

Michael Arrington recently quit TechCrunch to start a venture capital fund.

Lance Ulanoff is the new editor of Mashable.

Frank Rich recently left The New York Times to write for New York Magazine.

Anderson Cooper is the son of Gloria Vanderbilt.

Robert Scoble first made a name for himself blogging for Microsoft under the name Scobleizer.

Keith Olbermann has his own show on Current TV.

What is the standard email nomenclature for journalists at:

The Wall Street Journal: FirstName.LastName@wsj.com

The Associated Press: FirstInital.LastName@ap.org

Conde Nast FirstName_LastName@condenast.com

How many years has CBS "60 Minutes" been on the air?
43 years

What is Mediaite and which ABC News contributor founded it?
News site devoted to media started by Dan Abrams

How does Twitter make money?
Advertising via promoted tweets, promoted trends, promoted accounts (2400 accounts thus far)

Which print magazine has the largest U.S. readership? AARP

When is it OK to pitch a story idea via a Twitter direct message?
It's not.

Having fun yet? YES!

That Exclusive TV Interview

2011-12-06T12:07:00.001-05:00

Several weeks ago, a friend referred a client prospect who was embroiled in a headline-making PR imbroglio. The out-of-work man, who shall remain nameless, filed a lawsuit against a small mom & pop shop for non-delivery of services from more than a decade earlier. To make matters worse, the founder of the shop was a Holocaust survivor, a detail that emerged in a prominent story in the newspaper-of-record.

As many PR pros have come to understand, this colorful, antithetical newspaper piece prompted interest from some salacious segment producers at a couple of network TV magazine shows. The question he had for me: should he agree to do these interviews to try to set the record straight or should he ignore them altogether with the hope the whole mess will go away? More on this below.

The decision to avail oneself for an on-camera interview is a nuanced one. In the last week, we watched as Penn State perv Jerry Sandusky hail-Mary'ed himself for a four-hour, on-camera, on-the-record sit-down with The New York Times. We also witnessed the once down-and-out and now Iowa frontrunner Newt Gingrich sit for a love-fest with the Faux News Channel. And finally, we learned that 82-year-old Barbara Walters snagged a (Hail Allah) interview with Syria's notorious, terrorist-supporting, and tenuous leader Bashar Al-Assad. (I wonder which PR firm facilitated that one?)

Sandusky Talks to The Times

Following the Sandusky-Times interview, we heard an outcry from PR and legal experts about just how fatalistic this unorthodox tack will turn out for Mr. Sandusky. Me, I'm not so sure. The lawyers will invariably err on the side of extreme caution, making the (not unreasonable) argument that whatever is publicly shared can (and will) be used in the court case.

I believe, however, that if the newsmaker is well-prepared, assertive and articulate, with supporting facts as back-up, a high-profile interview can produce a net-positive result in the court of public opinion, and perhaps with prospective jurors. Sandusky's mistake was that he didn't appear to have been adequately prepared, nor have credible answers to quell his accusers. He also could have applied some leverage by insisting that the final footage be posted unedited.

Most significantly, if the media world was Sandusky's oyster, why did he opt for a tough Bob Costas followed by four hours with The New York Times? Where's Larry King when you really need him?

Gingrich on his Fave Network

Separately veteran media manipulator Newt Gingrich also carries his share of negative baggage. I mean which is worse: frolicking in the shower with a young boy or frolicking with another woman while your wife lay dying? At least Newt's handlers had the wisdom to have him chat it up with his friends at Fox, or was it Fox & Friends? The segment was a home run for the ethically challenged and disgraced former Speaker of the House.

Bashar Gets Celeb Treatment

As for the beleaguered Syrian president -- who had the choice of virtually any U.S. journalist with which to espouse his POV -- Mr. Assad chose ABC News veteran Barbara Walters who, in recent years, has put her share of A-list Hollywood celebrities on the hot seat during her highly rated pre-Oscar specials.

Nuf said here.

Now back to that litigious client prospect being chased by the TV magazine shows. I had two thoughts: The first was to have him lay low and ignore the media requests. The 24/7 news cycle will soon dissipate any interest in his story. The second idea, which I'm kinda liking better, is to have him agree to all the interviews (and more)....but for a counter-intuitive reason.

He should forgo trying to mount a successful public defense of his position on television. The segment already is written in stone, and the questions he'll be asked -- every which way but up -- will only serve to support the predetermined story premise. RATHER, he should take/milk the interview for what it's worth because in this cockamamie media culture, notoriety can breed opportunity. In other words, he's got little to lose and much to gain.(BTW - I turned down the assignment.)

Business Insider Ignites New York

2011-12-02T14:50:00.001-05:00

NYC's Time Warner Center

In compiling the questions for this week's much-shared "PR 3.0 Questionnaire," I did some research to see where various blogs and news sites ranked by unique monthly visitors in relation to one another. I hadn't done this exercise in a while, but pretty much assumed that Boing Boing no longer topped the list as it had for years as blogging grew its sea legs.

BB remains a most respectable #15 of the list with its 3.5M uniques. That might change after a brave (and nervous) Xeni Jardin took her 50K Twitter followers through the exam and results of her mammogram this week.

What surprised me about the blog analysis was just how far one of my fave sites has climbed into the top tier of blogdom with its 12M+ monthly uniques. The Business Insider not only blew past TechCrunch, but also left PerezHilton, Gawker, Engadget, Mashable and other big-branded blogs en route to its boffo #3 slot behind only Huffington Post and TMZ.

(Would one even consider Business Insider, HuffPost and TMZ "blogs." Aren't they really just shorter form and dynamic news/opinion sites? We'll look at that question another day.)

Mark Cuban

Business Insider's ascendant influence, its business acumen, and cool New York sensibility, is no doubt giving AllThingsD a run for its money when it comes to talent acquisition in the conference game. While nothing will ever compare to Walt Mossberg chatting up Steve Jobs and Bill Gates together at the D5 conference in 2007, Business Insider's Ignition 2011 conference this week at the Time Warner Center certainly drew more than its share of media and tech luminaries.

Glenn Beck Ignites (credit: BI's Matthew Lynley)

Among the digerati were Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg (who joined Mayor Mike the next day at FB's NY offices to announce an engineering office in the Big Apple and lots of new jobs), Twitter's chief revenue officer Adam Bain, Gilt Groupe founder/CEO Kevin Ryan; NBC and News Corp's digital chiefs Schiller and Miller, respectively, Pandora's Joe Kennedy, Federated Media's John Battelle, the always quotable Mark Cuban, the notorious Glenn Beck, Hulu's Jason Kilar, Google's Developer Advocate Donald Dodge, Eric Hippeau, Glam.com's Samir Arora, SecondMarket's Barry Silbert, PiperJaffray's Gene Munster, Kleiner Perkins' Aileen Lee, and the list goes on.

Business Insider founder/ed-in-chief Henry Blodget

Business Insider founder and editor-in-chief Henry Blodget served as a most competent impresario for which he deftly tackled moderating duties with the most luminous of the luminaries: Sandberg, Miller & Schiller, Battelle, Kennedy.

His grounding in tech equity research and more recent embrace of the evolving media and mobile content worlds served him and the audience well - thankfully, since the event format didn't allow for questions from the floor.

My client commitments prevented me from attending all the presentations, but the several that I did were well worth it. The first day opened up with Blodget giving a topline on the changed media landscape. Some notable quotables included:

"...the future of media is already here...all the power has shifted to digital...content is distantly less important than distribution"

"Where's the digital growth going forward: social, video, display, ecommerce (daily deals), mobile."

Twitter's chief revenue officer Adam Bain

Next up was Twitter's chief revenue officer Adam Bain who took a shot at answering the #NYTM-banned question: how're you gonna make money? First the metrics:

"Twitter has 100M users/month, 50M log-ins/daily, 2400 advertisers, a renewal ad rate of 80%, and a conversion rate for promoted tweets of 3-5%..."

So there! He then got a bit more granular, as if Twitter weren't granular enough:

"...50% of our usage is through mobile...we have an incredible connectivity with TV biz."

"The ad sales team is already built to sell...promoted tweets, promoted trends, promoted accounts"

As for metrics to measure user engagement, Bain said:

"Retweeting and favoriting messages are signs of engagement...and again, we have a 3-5% response rate..."

Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster

I didn't really think I'd care much about what PiperJaffray's Gene Munster had to say -- that is, until he started talking. Munster follows Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), among other things in TMT, and as such, he's consumed with all things emanating from Cupertino, CA.

He kicked it off by asking the audience how many owned at least one Apple device. Two? Three? It was clear he was speaking to an audience of the Apple-converted. There wasn't a lowered hand in the bunch. Here are some Munster snippets and the audio of his preso (ends at 19:37):

"Apple is a very secretive company. In fact they [intentionally] give us misinformation."

"Apple's international blueprint for expansion: lead with the iPhone, follow with a retail presence, enhance with apps."

"We have confirmation of an iPad3 in March 2012, iPhone 5 in August 2012 and iOS 6 in 2013."

"Don't buy a TV right now. Wait until the 2012 holidays when Apple enters the TV market in a big way. In fact, we think SONY will eventually get blocked out of the living room by Apple."

"We're bullish on Apple's sales figures for December...more iPads were sold on Black Friday than the Street was led to believe."

Photo: Michael Seto

The morning continued with Flipboard's editorial director Josh Quittner opining on the issue of to pay or not to pay for content and the staying power of Apple's iOS:

"I'll pay for NYTimes.com, HBO, my Internet service provider (Time-Warner), but not much more."

"We love iOS. It's a phenomenal platform that has some much life left in it, but it is a three-way race between Google, Amazon and Apple."

Some other bites from the first day of Ignition 2011:

Glam.com's Founder & CEO Samir Aora:

"100% of Glam's revenue is from premium advertising...we have 4000 writers in 'the long tail'...Glam is the outside Facebook social media web. The click? It's already changed. We have the data that's not click-based."

Buzzfeed's Jonah Peretti on "how you make something go viral."

"The biggest factor for virality is the network, i.e., the right network at the right time with the right idea."

BI's Blodget, NBC's Schiller, NWS's Miller (l. to r.)

Here's an abridged audio clip of Jonah's preso that ends at 16:15.

NBC's Digital Chief Vivian Schiller

"The TV industry has been behind other mediums in terms of embracing digital."

News Corp's Digital Chief Jon Miller regarding the newly announced YouTube network and video at The Journal:

"You move where the market's moving...we're training all WSJ reporters to file video reports."

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg

Here's some abridged audio (ends at 15:23)

The second day of the conference opened up with a tete a tete between Henry Blodget and Facebook's COO Sheryl Sandberg that concluded with Blodget nudging her to run for the U.S. Presidency -- a suggestion to which this particular audience did not object.

Here's the full audio of the interview (RT: 60 mins +/)

And some of the bites:

"What I saw FB doing: technology powering us as real people."

"What Mark [Zuckerberg] did first at scale was creating 'privacy you can control'...We really do take this [privacy] incredibly seriously."

"What Mark worries about the most is a lack of change and lack of innovation...the innovators dilemma...the most important thing Mark & I focus on is how to stay innovating, i.e. keeping teams small."

"Everything is better if it's social (w/friends)...Wisdom of friends is better than wisdom of crowds...Facebook is as interesting as what your friends do and share"

"Our business strategy is distinguished from most other players...we are a very deep partnership company."

"Our product strategy is as different from Google's as two companies can get...we're much more integrated."

"We have 35 million people updating their status (check-ins) every single day."

"I don't want to speculate about a Facebook phone...our strategy really is to be a social (horizontal) layer to work on every device."

Re: Google's ramp-up versus Facebook's: "It's not about mapping to any one trajectory. It's about building user base and engagement."

Re: Google+ "Imitation is highest form of flattery and Google+ is flattering."

"I don't think Google is evil. We care a lot that Android stays true to its promise of being open."

Blodget w/ Federated Media's John Battelle

The last full session I attended featured Mr. Blodget and Federated Media's founder and search/web/media/technology visionary John Battelle, who ironically, played a similar role journalistically during the dot-com era (as editor of The Industry Standard) that Blodget seems to be enjoying now as Business Insider's chief.

Here's the audio (RT: 21:33) and some notable quotes:

"Federated Media powers 'the independent web,' including all of WordPress. We have a reach of 200MM uniques."

"The quality of a site's content and where it resides 'matters deeply' in terms of advertiser engagement."

"I believe the independent web is a multi-billion dollar space...equal to or larger than the portals."

"I don't believe all brands should put their tap-roots into Facebook, though they should play there."

"Five 'horseman' that have a play in the 'operating system of our lives:' Google, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft and Apple....all of which will pivot 3 or 4 times over the next decade."

My only regrets: missing Mark Cuban speak and paidContent founder Rafat Ali sticking it to Glenn Beck. Here's how Rafat described the moment.

Photos: Peter Himler with a Canon PowerShot SX20 IS; Audio: Olympus DS2 digital audio recorder

Oh, That Test!

2011-11-29T09:02:00.001-05:00

Over the summer, my wife and I ran into an old friend: PR maven Robbie Vorhaus on the streets of his hometown of Sag Harbor. I've known Robbie for far too many years that I'd care to admit. We reminisced about the PR biz back in the day when the choice of media channels and methods for gaining mindshare seemed so finite (and manageable).

He eventually reminded me of "the test," which I hadn't thought about in years. Back then, I had devised a media relations questionnaire for prospective hires, which served as a non-scientific barometer of one's experience toiling in the PR trenches. Sample questions included:

Fill in the cities:

__________ Times Picayune
__________ Globe
__________ Inquirer

Where can one watch:

KUSA-TV _____________
WMAQ-TV _____________
KGO-TV _______________

What do the following stand for:

SMT ___________________
DMA ___________________
VOT __________________

The questionnaire also asked prospective employees to match high-profile journalists with their national news organizations and even NY-based news organizations with their street addresses. There were also some practice questions as well:

Both "Good Morning America" and "Today" have requested to interview your celebrity client. How do you determine which should get the booking?

You accidentally gave both Time and Newsweek the same "exclusive" photo. Now what?

(Gee, life was so easy back then!)

The test ran about 3-4 pages. For today's new world order, I thought the time was ripe to update the questionnaire, which, again, only provides a glimpse of one's media connectivity and curiosity (versus PR acumen). Internet access d̶i̶d̶n̶'̶t̶ ̶e̶x̶i̶s̶t̶ is forbidden during the administration of this test.

The PR 3.0 Questionnaire

Rank the following in order of their unique visitors per month:

___ NYTimes.com

___ Gawker.com

___ Politico.com

___ TechCrunch.com

___ HuffingtonPost.com

Match the following people with their place of work:

Dennis Crowley ___________ Facebook

Tina Brown _____________ Foursquare

Andrew Mason _____________ Twitter

Pete Cashmore _______________ Groupon

Sheryl Sandberg _______________ Google

Larry Page __________________ Mashable

Vivian Schiller _____________ NBC

Jack Dorsey __________________ The Daily Beast

Describe the following:

Spotify ________________________________________________

GroupMe ______________________________________________

Flipboard _______________________________________________

GetGlue _______________________________________________

Instagram ______________________________________________

Tumblr ________________________________________________

Bit.ly __________________________________________________

BuddyMedia ___________________________________________

Who is Siri?

_______________________________________________________

Whose Twitter handles are these?

@Carr2N _______________________

@APlusk _______________________

@acarvin ___________________

@pkafka ________________________

@benpolitico _____________________

@Xeni _________________________

@Zee _____________________

@Dens _____________________

@Ev _______________________

@Finkd _____________________

What are The Shorty Awards?

_______________________________________________________

Where can one find The App Store?

______________________________________________________

What's the significance of Twitter hashtags?

______________________________________________________

Match the following journalists with their news organizations:

Emily Chang ______________ CNN

Andrew Ross Sorkin _______________ NPR

Bob Garfield ____________________ Bloomberg TV

Piers Morgan ____________________ Dow Jones

Kara Swisher ____________________ The New York Times

Lara Logan _____________________ Business Insider

Henry Blodget ___________________ CBS News

True or False?

The Huffington Post owns AOL ____

The Atlantic's digital ad revenue is greater than its print ad revenue _____

Fox News Channel is "fair & balanced" _____

Bill Keller has left The New York Times _____

Fairchild Publications is the parent company of W Magazine & WWD _____

Which does IAC NOT own:

The Daily Beast, Newsweek, Match.com, Vimeo, Expedia, Ask.com, Gothamist?

______________

What do the following abbreviations stand for?

SXSW ___________________

API _____________________

iOS 5 ____________________

RT ______________________

HTML5 __________________

DM _____________________

NYTM ___________________

Complete the following:

President Obama recently made news in social media circles. He joined ______________.

Michael Arrington recently quit ______________ to start a _____________________.

Lance Ulanoff is the new editor of ________________.

Frank Rich recently left The New York Times to write for ____________________.

Anderson Cooper is the son of ______________________.

Robert Scoble first made a name for himself blogging for ______ under the name __________.

Keith Olbermann has his own show on _________________.

What is the standard email nomenclature for journalists at:

The Wall Street Journal ____________________

The Associated Press ____________________

Conde Nast __________________________

How many years has CBS "60 Minutes" been on the air? ___23 ___33 or ___43 years

What is Mediaite and which ABC News contributor founded it? _________________

How does Twitter make money?

___________________________________________________________________

Which print magazine has the largest U.S. readership ______________________?

When is it OK to pitch a story idea via a Twitter direct message?

______________________________________________________________

Having fun yet? Y or N

Wodka Woes

2011-11-22T15:50:00.001-05:00

What's the best way nowadays to thrust your unknown brand into the public spotlight?

For one brand in the ultra-competitive vodka category the answer seems to have emerged during a marketing creative session in which the participants apparently helped themselves to a more-than-generous sampling of the product.

The result surfaced above New York's West Side highway on a billboard that read:

"CHRISTMAS QUALITY. HANUKKAH PRICING. Great Vodka. Priced Right."

Two carefully selected dogs were pictured. One in a Santa hat, the other in a yarmulke. Now clearly this ad offends through its stereotypical depiction of the Jewish people. I just wonder whether the geniuses behind this campaign recognized how offensive the creative execution really is/was, and went ahead anyway. The importer Panache describes the brand this way on its website:
"In 2009 Panache brought Wodka Vodka to market — a quirky, premium vodka with a value vodka price tag. Wódka was a hit drawing the attention of consumer and business media alike for its fresh positioning and innovative business strategy. Wodka Vodka sold its first bottle in October 2009 in New York City, launched its marketing campaign nine months later and recently, following multiple features in Time Magazine, Forbes and Bloomberg Businessweek, has been anointed as the leader in the rapidly growing 'Cheap Premium' segment of the vodka category. Panache is focused on growing Wodka Vodka rapidly while maintaining the humble, egalitarian beginnings of the brand."
Truth be told, Twitter was all a-flutter about the campaign, which also earned the Gawker treatment. Had you ever heard of the brand prior to this?

On second thought, the purveyors of (tasteless) Polish vodka came to their senses in recognizing it's not nice to f**k with the residents of Manhattan's upper west side, let alone the Anti-Defamation League, which issued its own opinion. The billboard will be coming down. From The Examiner:
Kim caricature by Mike Briggs
"UPDATE(November 22 3:45 EST): According to a publicist who works with Wodka vodka, an official response is being prepared, but the publicist assured Examiner that the billboard in question ((Christmas/Hannukah") 'is coming down.'
Let's drink to that. Now if only the Boycott Kim (Karadshian) petition would have the same effect!

PR Redefined

2011-11-21T14:48:00.001-05:00

Over the weekend, I received an email from Keith Trivitt who (literally) manages PR for PR's sake. He's the in-house communications pro for PRSA, the industry's trade association. Keith tipped me off to a new campaign by the organization that hopes to "modernize" the definition of public relations in a world where social media has changed everything. It seeks to accomplish this (no small undertaking) through crowdsourcing, a new logo and umbrella theme.

One of most venerable chronclers of the ad/marketing industry, who periodically acknowledges the PR profession in his column, took the opportunity to do so today. Stuart Elliott of The New York Times wrote:

The New York Times's Stuart Elliott
"The effort, of course, has a catchy name, Public Relations Defined, and a logo, too, that proclaims its goal: “A modern definition for the new era of public relations.” The effort is being spurred by the profound changes in public relations since the last time the organization updated its definition, in 1982."

BTW -- You can catch Stuart -- if jury duty doesn't sidetrack him -- along with four other influential ad/marketing reporters editors at our next PCNY lunch Dec 12 in NYC. (But I shamelessly digress.)

The trade association is not alone in scrutinizing how the profession see itself and is seen by others for its future sustainability. MWW's Michael Kempner posted today on his blog about the need to inculcate college students:

MWW's Michael Kempner
"We spend so much of our time… and rightly so… helping clients brand themselves for future employees, we often forget to do the same for ourselves. Yet, PR firms offer among the best places to work for those searching for creative, collaborative work environments on the cutting edge of technology and trends. We need to do a better job as an industry of merchandising the field for graduates if we are going to compete for the top young talent and ensure the future of our profession."

And the other week at PR Week's NeXT conference, we watched the leadership of Ketchum, Edelman and Golin Harris paint a most promising picture of our industry's future in spite of the absence of a clear and consistent definition for what we do.

Since I'm fond of the PRSA team and appreciate their earnestness here -- sorry Jack -- I did write Keith back to offer my two cents on what currently ails the profession:

It's a question to which I've given considerable thought, especially nowadays as practitioners grow increasingly frustrated by unanswered emails to journalists and ineffective direct-to-constituency communications, two-way included.

One PR pro recently summed up the disruption of the engagement game: "it's a buyer's market," meaning that those you're hoping to engage have a myriad other credible sources for story ideas or actionable information. We're simply no longer serve or are perceived as the primary bearers of timely, accurate and actionable information. Google, Twitter and Facebook have seen to that.

Hence, as I see it, the challenge for the PR industry lies less in redefining what we call or how we define ourselves, and more in regaining that lost authority we once held as the most trusted and informed sources for our clients' news and point-of-views to both journalists and end-stakeholders. After all, we're still closest to the real newsmakers.

If you do want to weigh in with a new definition, here's the submission form to make it easy.

Nook's Pants on Fire

2011-11-17T17:25:00.001-05:00

Kindle Fire

It's not nice to ~~mislead~~ lie to one of the two most influential gadget gurus reviewing today. Well, that's just what the inimitable David Pogue of The New York Times ~~alleges~~ proves Barnes & Noble did in describing its new Nook e-Reader, built to go head-to-head with Amazon's much-ballyhooed Kindle Fire.

Nook

What's more, it's not the first time that @pogue caught the once high & mighty bricks & mortar bookseller in a ~~fib~~ lie. He even pulled the language from his two-year-old review outing B&N for its (under)exaggerated weight claim:

"There’s no doubt at all that we, the overworked members of the tech-reviewers’ union, have always accepted manufacturers’ benchmarks as accurate. In the Nook’s case, for example, every single major reviewer–Wall Street Journal, USA Today, PC World, CNET, Engadget–wound up parroting the company’s weight claim. Including me. It’s just never occurred to anyone that these companies might lie about this stuff."

This time the misrepresentation had to do with Nook's purported and promoted ability to play videos at true high-def resolutions. As Pogue wrote:

"But if I read all of this, I might come away with the impression that the Nook Tablet can show high-definition video! Well, guess what? It can’t. Its screen resolution is 1024 by 600 pixels. That’s not even close to high definition."

In his just-posted column, aptly titled "Nook’s Specs Are Exaggerated, Again," Mr. Pogue takes the company to task in no uncertain terms. Other than the fact that the specs don't live up to the billing, I wonder whether Mr. Pogue was also feeling a bit used by Barnes & Noble's communications consiglieres. He writes:

"During the week that the world’s tech critics were preparing their Kindle Fire reviews, Barnes & Noble representatives went into pre-emptive attack mode. They gave us private briefings to make sure we knew that they, too, had a new line of e-book readers coming out."

I mean, no self-respecting reporter wants to feel that he or she is a cog in a company's marketing strategy. Right?

Crisis Quarterbacks

2011-11-16T12:55:00.001-05:00

BP former chief Tony Hayward Photo | Justin Thomas

Playing Monday morning quarterback for the crisis du jour has long been a favorite pastime of PR pros and media types everywhere. I mean who didn't have an opinion about how BP behaved in the aftermath of the Gulf oil spill?

And did Tiger Woods, faced with a growing chorus of accusers, do the right thing by using his website to break his silence, holding a presser to which few press were invited, and eventually talking exclusively with ESPN and the Golf Channel? Even this PR pro weighed in at the time.

It's easy to opine about such things from afar, but much more difficult when you're sitting at the table with what you are told are all the facts at hand. Trust me. The facts are never all at hand.

Didn't we learn in the last 24 hours that Penn State Asst Coach Mike McQueary did in fact stop the "horse play" in the shower and inform the police? And didn't we learn that Penn State president personally appealed to authorities to seal the details related to transgressions by Mr. Sandusky?

CBS Corp's top PR guy Gil Schwartz recently put the business of crisis management in perspective by asserting that these are not PR problems at all. BP, Netflix, Bank of America and Herman Cain eventually developed PR problems, but they started as behavioral or operational problems.

The rapidity with which they grow into a full-fledged PR crisis often is a function of having good instincts, or in these cases, a lack thereof. If you've been in this game for any notable length of time, you can pretty much predict how stakeholders will react to certain words or deeds. Schwartz noted:

"It's my contention as Gil Schwartz who thinks about this seriously and as Stanley Bing who just pokes fun because it's a lot easier, none of these people have PR problems. They have decision-making problems. They have operating issues. They are ones that produce situations that can only be fixed by good public relations. So these aren't PR problems, these are management problems that are solved by the heroes of business." Here's more.

Mike McQueary

In revisiting the Nittany Lions, now that they've experienced the requisite blood-letting, but reel anew from a surprise network TV news appearance by the root cause of the university's anguish, we learn that Penn State's overseers have wisely tapped crisis counsel from one of Omnicom's premier agencies - Ketchum.

On the same day, The New York Times's Joe Nocera weighed in with "five steps" the university should take to put this dark chapter behind it. They included:

Withdraw from post-season play this year.
Discipline the rioters.
Promise not to use its status as a state institution to shield itself from the inevitable civil lawsuits that will be brought by those who were allegedly abused by Jerry Sandusky. (Too late?)
Establish a victims' compensation fund.
Announce the cancellation of the 2012 football season.

Even a Penn State lecturer, when visiting a professor's class titled (!) "Joe Paterno, Communications and the Media," conceded that the university has "lost the PR battle." Steve Manuel, a senior lecturer of public relations in Penn State's College of Communications, said:

"The golden rule of public relations is you have to get something out in the first 60 minutes," Manuel said Tuesday during a guest appearance in professor Mike Poorman's class. "And mentioning the victims always comes first. Bad news doesn't get better with time. When you cede the message to (critics or adversaries), you lose the battle."

I'm not sure I agree with Mr. Manuel. In this 24/7 news environment, time does eventually heal. People simply forget or are onto the next shocker. Wasn't the GOP frontrunner recently accused of sexual improprieties?

Quick and thoughtful action can help quell a growing problem, unless of course, new facts emerge to thrust the issue back into the public spotlight. But then again, here I am armchair quarterbacking a PR problem without the luxury of all the facts at my fingertips. Shame on me.

Political PRatfalls

2011-11-14T19:21:00.001-05:00

Bachus denies trading options on non-public info | AP Photo

Can a muckraking piece on "60 Minutes" influence the national conversation and produce real change? Or has the splintered and ephemeral media, coupled with audiences so easily sidetracked by the next Paterno or Kardashian, lost their mojo to move mountains?

In this new news environment where few hard-hitting stories stand a chance of supplanting child molestation or celebrity divorce headlines, one still has to appreciate the work done by CBS News in the opening segment last night. Correspondent Steve Kroft and his producers outed (mostly GOP) Congressional leaders for sleezily profiting by (legal) insider trading.

Nancy Pelosi

The segment stunned, and was the talk of the Twittersphere today. There was something in it for everyone's political proclivity. We expect this kind of sleezeball behavior from the likes of Boehner, Hastert, and Gregg, but when Kroft pressed Princess Pelosi at her presser, it was priceless.

Will these revelations produce new rules prohibiting politicians from profiting from material info gleaned in closed-door sessions? Five years ago, perhaps. Today? Doubtful.

Talking about politics, we're just beginning to get a real taste of the politicization of the Roberts Court. I'm not talking about today's news wherein SOTUS has agreed to hear a case on Pres. Obama's landmark Health Care Reform Act after it was upheld in the lower courts. No. I'm talking about the emergence and soon-pervasive political ads funded by Super PACs of questionable provenance.

I even heard a few TV spots for local New Jersey races last week paid for by "Americans for Prosperity," or rather, the top 1% of Americans who wish to remain prosperous. We all know who's pulling the strings, here, right?

So it was refreshing to see the first TV spot for Massachusetts Senatorial candidate and political newbie Elizabeth Warren. And it wasn't even paid for by some opaque, inspirational-sounding organization with deep, yet nefarious pockets. What impressed me most was Ms. Warren's opening line:

"I'm Elizabeth Warren and I'm running for the Unites States Senate. And before you hear a bunch of ridiculous attack ads, I want to tell you who I am."

It's a small thing, but her calling out those attacks ads in advance is a thoughtful and pre-emptive tack that won't eliminate the nasty ads, but will make people think twice when they hear them. Brilliant.

Hardball's Chris Matthews with Alan Cummings ("Eli Gold")

After "60 Minutes," my wife and I watched "The Good Wife" wherein one subplot showed the Eli Gold character (the law firm's "crisis guy") offering CNN's Chris Matthews, in a prime-time cameo, a compromising photograph of his politician client.

The goal of course was to use Matthews to put the photo in the public domain to pre-empt a potential voter backlash. Sounds good on television, but such a blatant quid pro quo is easier said than done with a reputable journalist.

Still, Matthews took the bait, and all was going well during the live TV interview until Matthews surfaced a few other unanticipated photos. The next day, the candidate announced he was heading into re-hab. Now that's more like it.

NeXT PR

2011-11-11T09:37:00.001-05:00

I headed back to PR Week's NeXT Conference at The Times Center on Wednesday, and managed to catch most of Gil Schwartz's keynote presentation in which he ran through a litany of supposed "PR problems." You may know Schwartz by his Fortune magazine nom de plume, Stanley Bing. In his Clark Kent day job, Schwartz serves as CBS Corp's long-time communications chief.

CBS Comms Chief Gil Schwartz (aka Stanley Bing)

As part of his talk, Schwartz cited Bank of America's ill-conceived $5 debit card surcharge, NetFlix's fatal decision to intro then kill Quikster, BP's Tony Heyward's thoughtless sound bites, and Herman Cain's alleged personal transgressions.

He made an important distinction by insisting that "these aren't "PR problems." They are at their core behavioral, decision-making or operational problems, which good PR can help to resolve. Here's an audio clip (RT: 14:57) of most of his keynote.Schwartz also has this to say:

"One of our specialities is our ability to have nightmares. If you do that, this will happen. It is that attempt to make the organization 'do the right thing' that's at the heart of great public relations, which actually ends up producing no public relations at all...no stories. I have the Hippocratic Oath of PR on my wall, first: 'Make No News.'"

Following his presentation, someone in the audience asked him about his outing as Fortune's Stanley Bing. Here's his recount (RT: 3:25) in which The Times's Randall Rothenberg (now IAB chief) let it slip to his intrepid NY colleague (now in DC) Mark Landler.

I did manage to catch up with Gil as he was about to leave The Times Center and was able to get him to elaborate a bit more about his approach to cmmunications and the changes he (we) have seen in the approach we take to quell supposed "PR problems." I asked about his feeling that apologies do not work and that perhaps it's better to "starve a story of oxygen," i.e., respond once (in The Times perhaps), but leave it at that. Here's the audio clip of the exchange (RT: 5:55).

New Roots of Authenticity Panel

Later in the day, I sat through the conversation with Elizabeth Lee, group head, Edelman Digital, Sarah Colamarino, VP, corporate communication, Johnson & Johnson, Christine Cea, director of brand PR, Unilever about "the new roots of authenticity."

It was an excellent discussion with some neat case studies for the Axe, Dove, Suave brands among others. I especially liked Ms. Colamarino of J&J's summation of the new communications palette, which we're all striving to understand, let alone fill:

"It used to be a 30-second TV spot and a public relations campaign. Today, there is so much white space between the two to fill."

Finally, I attended the last session of the day in which PR Week editor Steve Barrett gathered leaders from Ketchum, Edelman and Golin-Harris to wax on the state of the industry. In this audio clip (RT: 28 mins), we hear from Rob Flaherty, Richard Edelman and Fred Cook.

Barrett, Flaherty, Edelman, Cook

First, it was clear that the agency business -- especially large global agencies like these -- are flourishing in the new communications world order. Second, in spite of many declaring the death of the meme of "who owns this new communications world order: PR or advertising? -- the debate rages on.

The energetic and always quotable Richard Edelman suggested that PR firms are best-served when "aligned with the Chief Communications Officer." He mentioned IBM's John Iwata and the Smarter Planet campaign in which all the different communications disciplines come into play such as branding, reputation, public affairs...

"On the corporate public affairs side, I think we have to say that our opposition is not other firms nor is it McKinsey. It's actually the Chief Legal Counsel. I think we need to go at that guy's jugular. The reason is: it's a complete control function. It's totally wrong in today's society...they're thinking 1980, we're thinking today. ...I think we have to say: advertising, lawyers...enemies."

On the question of measurement, Ketchum's Flaherty has this to say:

"One of the questions facing our business is do we prepare so that our discipline can fit in really well to what's now become the big business of markting analytics or do we try and create some sort of uber marketing analytics product of our own? I don't think we do the latter. That train has already left. There are now many systems and hundreds of companies built around marketing analytics. We have to make sure that our discipline fits in a very compelling way into that. I do think that our discipline has to measure traditional and earned media, and have our own sense of how to measure social media."

All agreed that the PR profession's prospects remain rosy. More coverage here.

PR Week's 40 Under 40

2011-11-08T17:28:00.000-05:00

I managed to slip away from my clients today to sit in on the the kickoff lunch of PRWeek's NeXT Conference held at The Times Center in New York. It was great seeing some old friends, (including a few former interns now running agencies).

I didn't recognize any of the folks honored at the "40 Under 40" lunch, but was impressed by their accomplishments. They ranged from bringing their companies into the digital age to convincing the public that soybeans have tremendous nutritional value. Oh. I love this business!

The winners will be featured in the weekly, I mean monthly magazine's August issue.Ironically, I sat at the mostly Edelman table where I caught up with some former colleagues from that agency -- the largest independent agency in the world. Damn IPG! (FD: Edelman was my last big agency job).

I also had the good fortune to sit next to a couple of seniors communications folks from ESPN. I couldn't resist soliciting their opinions on the Penn State imbroglio. We all agreed that it was as bad as it gets in the PR business.

The lunch was held during Joe Paterno's presser today, and I asked my tablemates whether this octogenarian had sufficient mojo to go toe to toe with the press gaggle. "He's definitely slowed down, but still has his wits," was the consensus. Then, as if on cue, a New York Times news alert crossed my new BB 9930.

"Penn State Said to Be Planning Paterno's Exit."

Maybe he has lost his wits? Or more likely, the presser was cancelled. Apparently it was against the legendary coach's wishes:

"The AP says Paterno's son Scott tells it that the decision was made by President Graham Spanier's office. Scott Paterno says his father was disappointed and was prepared to take questions about the scandal as well as the upcoming game against Nebraska."

I'll be back tomorrow to catch some of the keynotes and panels.

New York Tech Meetup: College Edition

2011-11-07T09:30:00.000-05:00

Hoodies on the NYTM Stage

The venue was different, as was the average age of the presenters. But that was all that had changed. The energy from the stage and the warm embrace from the always sold-out audience at this month's New York Tech Meetup remained palpable. In fact, I sensed even more electricity in the room in spite of the event's temporary uptown setting at the 92nd Street Y.

Back in July, I cajoled my #2 son, a newly minted college graduate now toiling in technology M&A in San Francisco, to join me at NYU Skirball. Last week, my #3 son, a college sophomore on a week-long break, joined me. We found ourselves a few seats away from former NBCUni chief Jeff Zucker at his second NYTM. He (again) brought his school-aged son along for the ride. Smart.

Foursquare founder Dennis Crowley at NYTM

This particular NYTM was billed as the "second annual academic meeting." It featured presentations by student coders from mostly New York-area colleges and universities, all devout worshippers at the temples of Dennis (who was in the audience), Naveen, Jack, Ev and Biz.

The NYC-as-tech-incubation-engine meme will only continue to grow thanks to Mayor Mike and the imminent selection of one or two prominent academic institutions to build a technology research center within one of the city's five boroughs. The list of those vying for the $100 million in incentives include Stanford, Cornell, Carnegie Mellon, Columbia, NYU, Rockefeller University and India's Amity University.

But enough with the set-up. The evening opened with the usual sponsor and event announcements. NYTM's executive director Nate Westheimer turned the podium over NYTM managing director Jessica Lawrence who introduced Evan Korth, Faculty Liaison for Technology Entrepreneurship and CS professor at NYU as well as co-founder of hackNY. He took the reins from Nate as the evening's guest moderator.

We opened with a fashion-challenged Otavio Braga who demo'd BodyJam, a melding of augmented reality and one's wardrobe. I found it reminiscent of Clothia from the March NY Tech Meetup. Here's a short video clip above.

Suzanne Kirkpatrick (Commons)

All New Yorkers have come to appreciate Mayor Mike's 311 number as a channel to help make our already very civilized city even more so. Now what someone incentivized social-minded New Yorkers to report potholes and unusual doings on the city's streets? With Commons, Suzanne Kirkpatrick has tapped the city's API to do just. Her app rewards the civic-minded with badges and a place on a leader board for reporting ways to improve the city. Nice work, Suzanne, and kudos to Rachel Sterne and the NYC Big Apps program too for encouraging such government innovation.

I also liked Grafighters, a game that lets anyone draw a character and enter it into an animated fight. What's neat: the software recognizes the physicality and other factors of one's creation to weight its prospects for winning. See below.

Zach Sims & Ryan Bubinski of Codecademy

The mythic quality of the Zuckerberg character in "The Social Network" no doubt ratcheted interest in coding well beyond geekdom. Taking this cue, the creators of Codecademy have set out to make it easy for anyone to learn to code. Once you learned, try finding a Hackathon to put your skills to the test. We heard from the founders of Hacker League, which seeks to crowd-source and list Hackathon events around the country.

And since we're in the realm of academia, what if you learned your chemical bonds on an iPad? The Times's Matt Richtel this week penned a piece on Apple's fam trips for school admins to Cupertino, a couple days after presenters from NYU-Poly showcased Lewis Dots on an iPad to help chemistry students better visualize and manually manipulate how those atoms bond.

The crowd loved LoCreep, which re-enacted a bar scene wherein a creepy-looking guy (wearing a wife-beater shirt) put the moves on a tech-savvy young woman. She gave him "her number," which, by dialing, automatically registered the creep on the LoCreep site. His creepy follow-up voice-mail only added to his "creep factor." My son and I loved the concept, but were dubious about its commercial viability. Lots of fun and a great skit! See above.

Another crowd fave was Bluefin Labs, which aggregates the online conversation, specifically around television programs from which the company produces real-time data sets and accompanying graphics to help TV programmers/advertisers better grasp viewer engagement. The audience, clearly cognizant of the growing social TV phenomenon, sat in rapture as MIT's Deb Roy presented. Jeff Zucker, who knows a thing or two about analyzing television viewer data, was less ebullient when I asked for his opinion.

Talking about advertisers, the team at AdRunner developed an animated game that challenged the players to dodge the ads coming at you. If you crash into one, you're subjected to the pitch. Yikes.

The end of the evening featured two music-oriented applications. MIDIphon, which won the 4th annual hackNY Hackathon, showcased a mobile device as musical instrument that allows up to 16 users to each "play an instrument" via their iOS devices. The other music presentation came from some folks at FIT who developed open-source wearable instruments (FIT, wearable -- makes sense). We finally heard from a CS professor at Rutgers who planed to show as true automation of everyday household objects, each with their own IP addresses. The demo didn't work as planned, but the professor was engaging and the audience appreciated the effort.

My #3 son was glad he attended his first NYTM, and even checked out Codecademy when we got home. I don't think he'll change his major from Political Economics to CS, but having a little coding acumen in one's personal or professional tool kit clearly can't hurt.

Photos/Video: Peter Himler with a Canon Sureshot SX20 IS

PR Rogues Gallery

2011-11-03T23:03:00.003-04:00

Periodically this blog looks at the media machinations of dictators, despots and the desperate to expose the dark side of PR, or at least how it's practiced by morally corrupt governments.

Nowhere is this violation of accepted PR practice more prominent than in the Middle East (though Russia could give most countries in that region a run for their money).

Arafat and Qadaffi were masters of double speak and media manipulation. Virtually everything that emanated publicly from their mouths directly contradicted their actions or their private exhortations. But then again, look where they are today.

Of the practicing media manipulators in the Arab world, few compare to Ahmadinejad and Assad in their success perpetrating a hoax on the court of public opinion. Hopefully one day each will land in that other court in The Hague.

Iran's Prime Minister of Deception wrote the PR playbook. His Syrian partner in war crimes is now following it.

Don't believe when the master Persian propagandist calls on his Syrian brother in arms to lay down his arms. Privately, he serves as Assad's consigliere in extolling the virtues of murder and a citizen media blackout to silence critics. Where was the Green Revolution anyway as the Arab Spring was blossoming in the region?Yesterday, Assad announced another PR ploy: the acceptance of an Arab League-brokered cease fire in his country. The headline in The Telegraph blared:

"Syria accepts 'entirety' of Arab League peace plan"

A day later, we learn that 12 more protesters were killed by Syrian government forces. The New York Times headline read:

"Syria Killed at Least 12, Opposition Says, Despite Deal to End Violence"

The Committee to Protect Journalists also reports on the growing number of journalists gone missing in that country, and exhorts the world to hold Assad accountable for press freedom:

"Syrian agreement must be monitored for press freedom"

Atta Kenare/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

What bothers me most is that there are still many western media who continue to put their faith in the Syrian (and Iranian) government's empty words. When will these editorial gatekeepers learn that actions not words of deception is the only news that merit inclusion in their news holes?

Surely the Arab League must be embarrassed by having been duped by a desperate leader who'll do anything to hang on to his job, even if it means bringing his country to its knees. (Sure sounds like the Congressional GOP.)

We'll always have government-controlled media arms. But when governments deceive, arrest or eliminate legitimate journalists, their news organizations should simply block these PR propagandists' public pronouncements from their pages and airwaves, and recognize these despots for what these are: leaders who lie.

Ambushed

2011-10-31T19:46:00.000-04:00

NYU's Jay Rosen

NYU's Jay Rosen is a very smart fellow. I've heard him speak on many occasions about the transformation taking place in the worlds of media and journalism. He even joined one of our Publicity Club of New York panels back when the sea change had not fully taken hold. I was thus surprised to see him in the news last week for an entirely different reason.

He apparently was caught in a sting orchestrated by right-wing video prankster James O'Keefe of Acorn and NPR-defaming fame. Mr. O'Keefe insidiously dispatched a young man to one of Mr. Rosen's public lectures under the guise of having an interest in potentially matriculating at NYU.

The man's real intention was to capture Prof. Rosen and his fellow presenter Clay Shirky's insights into The New York Times in an attempt to discredit the news operation of the (world's most) esteemed news organization. Ahhh...if only someone would secretly embed at Fox News to really demonstrate news bias. I suppose there's always Anonymous.

James O'Keefe

Of interest to me, and by extension, my PR-minded readers, is what happened next. The pseudo grad student contacted Prof. Rosen to arrange "an interview" two days after the session. with the ruse of exploring enrolling at the university, but instead used the meeting to secretly record the politically progressive professor for publication. As a result, more fuel was added to the pretender's prefabricated narrative.

In a Poynter piece titled "To Catch a Journalist," Rosen reflected after the fact:

"I now realize he was scamming me and almost certainly taping me. The intended story line, worked out in advance, was lefty journalism professor jumps at the chance to assist with the discrediting of the Tea Party by passing along sensational footage to his buddies at the Times."

By quickly agreeing to the interview, While Prof. Rosen was duped into this interview, many other newsmakers blindly agree to talk to strangers, breaking a cardinal rule in PR: don't avail yourself to a media interview before learning about the reporter, outlet and intended story line. Truth be told, newsmakers (and their PR handlers) are perfectly within their rights to have a few questions answered before acquiescing, e.g.:

What is the nature of the story?
How much time will be needed for the interview?
Where will it run?
When will it run?
Who else is being interviewed for the piece?

I'll never forget some of our media training sessions in which we would ambush senior executives as they emerged from the office elevator. With a hand-held camera and sun-gun, the executive reflexively started answering questions without any cognizance of who he/she was talking to or in what context the footage might be used. In Rosen's defense, the faux-journalist had a hidden audio recorder.

In today's media-driven environment, anyone with a decent-grade video camera or lowly blog can grab face-time with some pretty influential newsmakers, no questions asked. Sure, the White House press office remains solicitous about granting access to their main charge, as do the corporate communications departments of most publicly traded companies.

But without professional gatekeepers, many newsworthy folks can be feckless in their desire to attain some of that 15 minutes of fame. Many big names have even succumbed to the charms of this decidedly niche blog, and I've seen whole sites sprout, aggregate and flourish based on the relatively new dynamic wherein thought leaders have myriad new outlets to air, well, their thoughts. Beet.TV and BigThink are two that come to mind.

Another positive outcropping of the times in which we live lies in the ease with which anyone can publicly share his or her POV. To this end, one has to give Prof. Rosen credit for taking the time to thoughtfully address the very reasons for which he apparently was targeted in the first place. His post is titled "A note to my conservative friends."

(Who knew he had conservative friends?)

State of the Biz

2011-10-27T14:14:00.000-04:00

I typically reserve my weekly round-up of videos for the weekend, and actually have a number of cool clips queued up to post either tomorrow or Saturday.

In the interim and in light of some client pressures right now, I'm posting a video of a recent sit-down I had with Mike Bako of Inside Communications wherein we talk about the state of the biz. Here's the clip as it appears on Forbes.com:

Your comments are welcomed. I did confuse one question concerning goals for this blog versus my company website, but other than that it was a good conversation to have.

OWS: A Sustainable Stage Show?

2011-10-25T18:34:00.000-04:00

Occupy Wall Street Photo-Op (photo: Kathy Williams/AP)

Since learning (and writing about) the Occupy Wall Street protesters' pro bono use of a PR firm to ratchet up media coverage of their actions -- versus their call-to-actions -- I have viewed the movement with a jaundiced eye.

No. I have nothing against the use of PR to help an organization or enterprise advocate a point-of-view. After all, I've spent my career doing much of the same. I also am sympathetic to some of the themes that have emerged.

My beef has more to do with the PR peeps' use of fabricated photo ops that come off as more flash than substance, and the potential ill will it might engender with the media they're trying to influence. Did anyone bring the giant scissors to the ribbon cutting ceremony?

I remember years ago the sour taste I had after a colleague from our DC office convinced our New York team to create a ruse designed solely for the shooters and reporters at a press event. We had the U.S. Treasurer in town -- at Radio City Music Hall no less -- on the day the newly redesigned $50 dollar bill went into circulation.

It wasn't enough for the Treasurer to sit at a table on the street opposite the Music Hall's $50-emblazoned marquee to sign her name to the new bill for anyone trading in $50 worth of old currency. My politically minded colleague insisted that we create a second photo op whereby Radio City would open its box office specially so that the Treasurer could purchase the first tickets to the Christmas Spectacular. If my memory serves me well, this took place over the summer.

I cringed at the blatant choreography of it all wherein my colleague physically positioned the photographers over here, and the Treasurer over there to create the right effect. If journalists thought PR people were manipulative, it was certainly validated that day. More significantly, the fake ticket purchase surfaced nowhere in the ensuing coverage.

I also remember the event in which we renamed West 43rd Street & Broadway in honor of Adolph S. Ochs on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Ochs-Sulzberger family's ownership of The New York Times. I arrived early to make sure that all was in order and to meet then Mayor Giuliani's advance person.

His first observation: the actual street sign, which his boss and Arthur Jr. would jointly reveal later that morning, was not squarely facing the media riser we erected acoss the street.

The advance guy insisted on maneuvering the sign so it would face the cameras. I resisted. After all, my client was The New York Times! I'd do it for any other client, but not this one. I even remember suggesting that "Mr. Ochs would turn over in his grave if he thought we were gaming this photo op." In the end, the mayor's guy prevailed out of expediency.

Flash forward to Occupy Wall Street. Today, we're treated to a photo op that also struck a hollow chord, but one which the AP decided merited movement over its vaunted wire. It featured a couple of protesters getting fake haircuts while wearing bibs with bank names printed on them. (See image above.) Geesh.

Maybe this says more about the state of journalism than it does about some enterprising PR firm? In either case, former AP president Lou Boccardi wouldn't be pleased. And other esteemed journalists are beginning to question the sustainability of the movement, as New York Magazine's Adam Moss did in his tete-a-tete with Frank Rich today:

"I find it plausible that the rage itself is sustainable — but I have a hard time seeing how the Zuccotti Park manifestation of it lasts much longer. It looks too fringe not to eventually be dismissed as fringe. The media will turn against it when it's no longer convenient to the narrative."

The only thing that was real in today's photo op in Zuccotti Park: the protester pictured actually needed a haircut.

Your Weekend Viewing

2011-10-21T16:03:00.000-04:00

Stop...Motion

As the cool kids are "freaking out" over the Lytro camera, here's a neat little stop-motion video courtesy of BitRebels (HT Steve Farnsworth).

Email Overload Tee'd Up

With emails suffocating many inboxes, here's a wearable creation to keep track of the madness. (via Launch):

A Scottishman in New York

Yes, print still begets broadcast, or in this case, cable. Here's a one-on-one from NY1 News with Mashable founder and New York transplant Pete Cashmore. Click HERE to view the seven-minute segment.

Newest Social Net to Music

Simon Mainwaring via David Armano tweets our attention to this Google+ music video:

Bad Siri, bad!

In case you were out of town the last couple of weeks. (I mean really out of town.) Here's a clip in which the now famous (and transformative) Siri disses an iPhone 4S owner (HT Nick Bilton via Google+) Also, love the SiriLogs Twitter feed, which is another take on this meme.

http://twitter.com/#!/GuyKawasaki/status/127123308901711873

Siri's Starr Turn

It may not be the iPhone 5, but Apple is putting its marketing muscle behind Siri. Here's the first TV spot for the 4S. Pretty soon we'll be seeing a Saturday morning cartoon about her!

iPhone Though the Ages

A video history of the iPhone via CNET UK HT TheAtlantic

CNET UK Presents: History of the iPhone, dedicated to the memory of Steve Jobs from Drew Stearne on Vimeo.

Lady Gaga Through the Ages

Ms. Gaga's rise via the YouTube viewing barometer (HT @mackcollier)

PR as Blood Sport

2011-10-19T12:04:00.000-04:00

A Media Frenzy (Photo: Spencer Platt, Getty Images)

I received a call last week from a wire service reporter who sought some insights on the PR industry, and specifically why a New York PR firm would accept Occupy Wall Street as a pro bono client. The reporter had received from the firm the same email blast that I had proclaiming the firm's new association with the Wall Street protesters.

Before getting on the phone with this reporter, I checked out #OWS's new PR firm's clients and credentials. It described itself as "a leading boutique agency specializing in fashion, publishing, luxury, consumer and lifestyle accounts." Huh? Luxury? Fashion? The protesters were anything but luxurious and fashionable. What gives?

Brooklyn Bridge (Photo: Mario Tama, Getty Images)

As for the firm's core competencies, it is in essence an old-fashioned publicity and promotion shop whose singular goal (and measure of success) rests in the amount of ink and airtime it could muster for its coterie of downtown, style and celebrity fringe clientele. I didn't see much of anything about the firm's social or digital marketing prowess nor, more significantly, anything indicating a passion for politics.

This firm was essentially "retained" to get the Wall Street protesters as much media coverage as possible. Street theatre and histrionics would trump a core messaging and content syndication strategy.

It mattered little what was being reported as long as dramatic sound and images of a disaffected mob made their way into online, print, television and mobile media channels.

White-shirted, pepper-spraying police. Bravo! Bloodied protesters. Fabulous! PETA, eat your heart out! Drumming and chanting. Great for radio!
Running from the cops on the narrow (and once-bullish) streets of New York's financial district. Pamplona, step aside!

Running Against the Bulls

Ironically, for the PR tacticians, here is one client for which a cogent message track is actually not required. In fact, espousing specific demands could actually splinter the movement. The more specific, the less populous the group would become.

Stick with the 99% versus 1%. It appeals to the widest spectrum of the disenchanted and disenfranchised. Some have even suggested that the Tea Party, with its own far-flung and often incoherent message track, should align itself with the Occupy Wall Street crowd.

So back to the wire reporter's question: why would a PR firm accept a client like the Occupy Wall Street protesters without pay or a history of political activism? The answer is simple: media exposure.

The protesters aren't the only ones craving the fleeting fame of the media spotlight. The PR firm's long-term sustainability actually depends on it -- especially nowadays when PR peeps outnumber reporters 3-to-1, and the challenge PR pros face capturing reporters' limited bandwidths.

After Zuccotti Park is emptied and the Occupy Wall Street movement dissipates (at least in its current form), the PR firm that served as the primary intermediary for local, national and international journalists will live on to leverage the very same news organizations with which it ingratiated itself during these tumultuous events of the last several weeks.

Update: The PR firm's CEO provides his rationale here.

A Virtual Feast

2011-10-14T10:00:00.000-04:00

Giada at Home

I really enjoy watching the cooking shows on TV. From the over-the-stove talents of the MasterChef and Lidia's Italy to the other talents of Top Chef's Padma Lakshmi and Giada at Home, these shows, for me, are a veritable feast. On the other side of the culinary coin resides Adam Richman in Man v. Food!

Chef Ramsey

And who doesn't revel in watching Chef Ramsey dress down some lame restaurant owner in Kitchen Nightmares? His reaction alone to the tasting at the outset of each episode is priceless.

I suppose I'm drawn to this content because I happen to love to dabble in the kitchen myself.

Man v. Food's Adam Richman

Padma Lakshmi

My wife may
be Italian, but I'm the one who makes the sauce (and the meatballs).

I don't however code.

I'm more of a hack than a hacker, flack than a.... Maybe it was that early taste of MS-DOS that forever cleansed my palate of this popular proclivity.

Hence sitting through a few of the presentations at this week's New York Tech Meetup left me a little high and dry. I mean how pumped can one get watching a nervous geek painstakingly key-in computer code on a giant screen before an SRO audience of 800? The answer depends.

New York Tech Meetup Audience 10.11.11 (Photo: Clay Williams/NYTM)

For me, not very. But for many at NYU Tuesday evening, it was like the fifth game of the Major League Divisional Playoffs or the finals of American Idol.

The audience seemed mesmerized by the letters, numbers and symbols rolling out horizontally before their eyes. When a typo was made, several folks blurted it out before the coder on-stage even knew what hit him.

When the coding was finally cooked and ready to serve -- and it actually sated the audience's discerning appetites -- the adulation showered on the coder could give the announcement of the winning couple on Dancing with the Stars a run for its money.

As for me, I'd just prefer skipping how the sausage was made. My attraction to the monthly gathering rests with getting wowed by the every day utility of the apps, products and services that emanate from the all-night hackathons. Perhaps it's because my job to try to bridge the communications gap that invariably exists between the developer and the end-user. For start-ups, it's frequently less a question of where to take the story, and more of how to tell the story.

Sure it was very cool hearing Mayor Mike describe how he personally soldered the transistors onto a motherboard to build the first Bloomberg Terminal in a pre-PC age some 30 years ago.

But few can argue with a powerful narrative that explains how those terminals facilitate real-time data sharing and its implications for the financial markets and other industries.

Of the nine or so presentations, I'd say the one with which I was most enamored was for Aurasma. We've all heard about 2D barcodes (QR codes to some). I wrote a post last spring proclaiming that their ubiquity at SXSW earned them the distinction of "winning" the giant tech fest.

Aurasma Demo'd @ #NYTM 10.11.11

Taking the idea of smartphone-scanning of still images to the next level -- GoogleGoggles notwithstanding -- Aurasma's developers treated the audience to a demo wherein a still photograph on the cover of USA Today morphed into an ABC News video clip on the same subject with the simple click of a smartphone. Or a scan of an image of a DVD player on its box instantly launches a video tutorial about the machine.

bit.ly's Matt LeMay

That's not to say that I didn't also enjoy hearing bit.ly's Matt LeMay, whom I've met previously over a table of unpeeled barbeque shrimp and fine wine, outline his company's plans to monetize bitly's billions and billions of bits of data for anyone wishing to analyze the online conversation.

He showed the audience a spare, Google-like search page under which all that data resides, and can be searched real-time...by geography too. Smart (especially given Twitter's limited public archives).

bit.ly Search!

I had to dash out early -- thank you Mayor Mike -- and was sorry to have missed the presentations from Gust and from Framesocket for which my pal Clay Hebert played a presenting role. I'll check out their sites.

I'll surely be back next month. (BTW, I'm liking Kikin's browser, demo'd last month, on my iPad.)

All photos and video: Peter Himler with a Canon PowerShot SX20 IS

A Trio of Thought Leaders

2011-10-12T14:04:00.000-04:00

Wrong Location

OK So I arrived late. Who knew that O'Reilly Media/UBM TechWeb's Web 2.0 Expo had moved from that behemoth complex along the Hudson River to the heart of Manhattan's tourist district? (I guess I should have.)

I thus missed the first of the four sessions I hoped to attend. It featured Karin Klein, Bloomberg LP's head of biz dev. Oh well. It wasn't really of primary interest to the PR-minded readers of this blog anyway.

Dorie Clark

The next three sessions, however, were spot on. The first featured Dorie Clark, one of several comms pros who parlayed the pathbreaking digital work on the Howard Dean Presidential campaign into a successful Boston-based communications consultancy. (Others I know from that campaign include Nicco Mele, Joe Trippi and Teddy Goff who toiled at the agency that was spawned from that work for Dean.)

Dorie's session was titled "How to (Mostly) Control Your Online Reputation." She opened with a slide with some practical advice, and then proceeded to run through a litany of examples that were familiar to anyone following such things.

I especially related to #2, which I tend to call banking one's "reputation capital" for a rainy day. One case in point was Taco Bell whose "well" of Twitter and Facebook friends and followers helped shield the QSR from potentially reputation-ruining ruminations of selling "mystery meat".

I was able to catch up with Dorie after her session. Here's the audio clip. (RT: 5:41) Her full preso is here. (RT: 38 mins, volume boost req.)

FH's Joshua Micah-Ross

Next up was Joshua Michele-Ross alongside whom I sat on a panel several years earlier. Joshua heads digital in Europe out of Amsterdam for Omnicom's Fleishman Hillard. His talk was titled "What's Your Social Media Architecture."

Winchester's Mystery House

He cleverly used the metaphor of the "mystery house" that heiress Sarah Winchester built following her husband's death wherein stairways led to dead ends, doors opened to nowhere... Josh cited a recent study that showed how large companies today owned an average of 178 (disconnected and many languishing) social channels.

Social Media Architecture Goals

He went on to list five attributes a company must strive to meet for its social media architecture to succeed, I had a chance to grab some sound with Josh following his session. Here's the link. RT: 6 minutes). Here's the audio of his full presentation. (RT: 38 minutes)

Dachis Group's Peter Kim Works His Magic

Next up was the always insightful and affable Peter Kim, chief strategy officer for the Dachis Group out of Austin. Peter's talk was titled "Social Media Mythbusters" for which he honed in on three myths:

Fail Fast

Customers in Control

Brands Don't Need Facebook or Twitter Strategy

I was especially enamored with the third "myth," since for years now, social media pundits have decried the notion that organizations need to be in these channels simply because its de rigeur to do so.

Peter pointed out that Facebook and Twitter now have such critical mass that it's almost mandated for consumer-facing brands to play in their digital sandboxes. He pointed out that Facebook alone would be the third most populous country behind China and India.

I did grab sound sound with Peter following his session. Here's the clip. (RT: 6:02). And here the audio from the full session. (RT: 33 mins, volume boost needed)

All in all, Web 2.0 Expo New York provided a most worthwhile visit for this blogger. But I've come to expect nothing less from the team at O'Reilly Media.