PR 101

A Time magazine poll done shortly after Walter Cronkite’s death found Comedy Central “news anchor” Jon Stewart is now the most trusted newscaster in America. For those of you too young to remember, that title was held by “Uncle Walter” for the almost two decades in which he anchored the CBS Evening News.

That a comedian is now considered the most trusted man in American news has profound implications for those of us in marketing and public relations. It is another demonstration that the old rules no longer apply. Newspaper or television coverage of a client will no longer translate into increased brand awareness, increased sales or brand loyalty.

It means that social media is the now the best way to market. In fact, in the not-to-distant future, I believe social media will sweep away traditional advertising, marketing and public relations.

Why? And what does this have to do with Walter Cronkite and Jon Stewart?

Well, Walter Cronkite reported the news. He didn’t embellish or editorialize. He presented the facts as he saw them. People believed him because of who he was. Cronkite talked and we listened. Advertising, marketing and public relations were done – is still done in many cases – the same way. On behalf of our client, we tell a potential customer why a product should be purchased. We get a newspaper or a broadcast outlet to do a story on a client. We think convert potential customers into buyers because of what we did. We think we have succeeded.

We’re wrong.

Watch a Jon Stewart broadcast on Hulu.com. He doesn’t so much report as comment. Much of what he does is satire. One of my favorite segments is when he plays a tape of some public figure making a statement he never said something controversial. Stewart than plays half dozen clips showing the politician making the controversial statement. He often doesn’t say anything, but his expressions after some stories say what he thinks about what was just reported. Stewart is a reflection of much of today’s cynicism about just about everything.

This is how most of today’s consumers think. Just telling them something is good isn’t going to cut it. In fact, study after study shows that most people under the age of 35 just don’t trust advertising. Advertising and public relations doesn’t even reach most of them. They don’t read newspapers or magazines, they don’t listen to radio. In other words, the traditional model no longer works. Even if they do watch television, they probably use a Digital Video Recorder, or DVR, to record shows.  A DVR is programmed to skip commercials. Where today’s consumers get most of their information is from the Internet.

The recession has also things tougher. There just isn’t as much money to spend as there was even two years ago. Consumers are becoming extremely discriminating in how and where they spend their money.

An article in the June issue of McKinsey Quarterly notes: “Marketing has always sought … touch points, when consumers are open to influence. For years, touch points have been understood through the metaphor of a “funnel”—consumers start with a number of potential brands in mind (the wide end of the funnel), marketing is then directed at them as they methodically reduce that number and move through the funnel, and at the end they emerge with the one brand they chose to purchase. But today, the funnel concept fails to capture all the touch points and key buying factors resulting from the explosion of product choices and digital channels, coupled with the emergence of an increasingly discerning, well-informed consumer. (my emphasis) A more sophisticated approach is required to help marketers navigate this environment, which is less linear and more complicated than the funnel suggests. We call this approach the consumer decision journey.”

The best way, the only way, I feel to reach those increasingly sophisticated consumers is through social media. They need to be convinced that what they are considering purchasing meets their needs. They have to be shown. Most consumers today are going to do a lot of research before they make a purchase. They are going to talk to their friends and go on to discuss brands.

As I tell potential clients:” there is already a conversation going on about your company, event, or product. You need to be a part of that conversation. Whether you are not, the conversation will go on.”

That’s the role of social media. Companies can join in the conversation. But in doing that, they need to provide real reasons why a consumer should buy into that company’s concept. A company has to use all of the social media tools to convince a reluctant buyer that they should buy a product.

Blogs by company officials can tell a consumer the thinking behind a particular product’s creation. It can detail why the creator feels it is good product. A good blog will allow consumers to ask questions about the product. Remember, they expect accurate, concise answers. Try to hype them and you will lose them. If the blog is well done and honest, other blogs will link to it, consumers will tweet about and the word will spread.  To support the product, a company can post videos on YouTube demonstrating the product and how it works. Again, there has to be room for consumer questions and comments.

Many companies are starting to understand. I could use a Starbucks or Southwest Airlines as an example. But I will leave you with the story of a Texas car dealership. General Manager Hagen Durant is using Facebook, MySpace and Twitter to bring in business. This is an excellent demonstration of how everyone should be embracing social media.

NOTE TO MY READERS: If you are interested in a free, introductory course on social media, email me. Myself and three other social media acolytes are giving away an EBook written by social media guru Simon U. Ford. Ford sold several thousand of the books for $67. However, we have permission to give it away for a limited time. In addition, you get five free podcasts. We also will be holding a series of four virtual “book clubs” to go over the book. Between the book, the podcasts, and the four of us, you will receive a comprehensive overview of social media. Because we want to provide the best possible training, there are 25 spots left. For more information, go to the Social Boomers site. That’s right, we are actually marketing to Boomers – and anyone else who is interested.

I was once at a party where a couple of guys were talking about some websites they surf that feature lascivious content. I am taking their word for what was on the sites. Those sites are not anything in which I am interested. The sexiest thing I look at on the Web is the new Trek Madone bike.

At any rate, I asked these two if they weren’t worried someone would find out about their online viewing habits? One of them assured me that no one would find out because they use fake names and email addresses dedicated only to their pursuit of “pleasure.” Oh, I said, so you don’t use your home computers? Both of them looked at me and said of course they did – they would never do that kind of thing in public.

Both turned white when I told they were not hiding anything. Why? Because on the web, their computers are identified by their ISP addresses. They cannot fake those. In addition, I am willing to bet that the porn sites are dumping cookies into their computers.

“In computing, a cookie (also tracking cookie, browser cookie, and HTTP cookie) is a small piece of text stored on a user’s computer by a web browser,” according to Wikipedia. “A cookie can be used for authenticating, session tracking (state maintenance), and remembering specific information about users, such as site preferences or the contents of their electronic shopping carts.” (The emphasis is mine.)

In other words, your ISP provider knows where you are going and what you are doing, and the site you visited knows you were there. Actually, a spouse could find too, simply by checking the list of cookies stored in the computer.

What these two gentlemen discovered is there is no privacy on the web. The trade-off for using social media and other sites is that you are living in a glass house with no curtains.

I am not talking about hackers. That is entirely different issue that often involves criminal conduct. What I am talking about here is the entirely legal ways your personal information becomes public information. The problem is that once this information is collected and packaged, it doesn’t seem that difficult for hackers to steal it.

There are any number of businesses and agencies that collect and keep information that flows around the web. Retailers, credit card companies, and research firms, are some. Just to make it really fun, law enforcement monitors also the web.

“Among its many provisions, the (Patriot) Act gives law enforcement authorities additional authority to monitor individuals’ Internet activity, including e-mail and website visits,” according to a 2004 article by the Congressional Research Service. “Amendments passed the next year as part of the Homeland Security Act (P.L. 107-296) expanded the circumstances under which Internet Service Providers may voluntarily divulge the content of communications, and to whom.”

Think about all of this. When you buy a pair of shoes or anything else on line, information such the type of shoe you buy, your address, what kind of credit card you used, what other shoes you looked it, how long you stayed on the site, and where you live are all recorded.

When you join sites such as Facebook or Twitter, you provide such information as whether you are married, where you live, your income range and some of your interests. On LinkedIn and other such sites, you are telling the world where you work, where you went to college, what other jobs you had and what you are doing at work. Add to that some of the Google apps, such as IGoogle, that tells the world where you are and what you watch on YouTube.

Companies now regularly check such sites as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter before making a hiring decision. There are dozens of stories about candidates losing out on jobs because of the pictures of that beer bong or wet t-shirt contest. In my home state of Wisconsin, all criminal records are listed on a state website. If you look, you will find my two speeding tickets.

If you really want to lay awake at night, consider what two researchers recently discovered. According to Time Magazine: “by using data from voter registration lists and social-networking sites, and studying statistical patterns in the Social Security numbers (SSNs) of people who have died, researchers Alessandro Acquisti and Ralph Gross have developed an algorithm that could potentially identify the SSNs of millions of people. Acquisti and Gross warn that “unless mitigating strategies are implemented, the predictability of SSNs exposes them to risks of identity theft on mass scales.” (my emphasis.)

Just for the heck of it, I Googled myself. I found out a lot – just about everything I listed above. I found where I live, what I did, where I went to college and my original hometown. I should note that when I was a reporter, I was put through several Internet training courses. I am pretty good researcher. It wasn’t that hard for me to find just anything for which I was looking. But I am nothing special. Anyone with a logical mind and a knack for solving puzzles can find pretty much find anything on the Web.

Okay, so you are saying to yourself, well, I don’t use the web that much. I don’t purchase anything from a website. I mostly just send email. Well, let’s put aside credit cards for a minute. Like most of us, you probably have a number of discount cards in your wallet from various hotels, airlines, retailers and grocery stores. You think they give  you those cards out of some altruistic method? No, every time you make a purchase and use one of those cards, all of your purchases go into a database. Very soon, the retailer builds a pretty good profile of what you buy.

Companies who aggregate the information collect all kinds of other data from a variety of sources. You want to buy a list of blue-eye, left handed Catholics who make over $75,000 a year and play golf every Saturday? Someone can compile the information for you.

When I tell people this, they roll their eyes and stammer that somebody should do something about this. Well, what would have someone do? Do you really want a world with the Internet, if it was even possible? It’s here to stay. So unless you are planning on moving completely off the grid, we all just have to learn to be careful and just live with it.

NOTE TO MY READERS: If you are interested in a free, introductory course on social media, email me. Myself and three other social media acolytes are giving away an EBook written by social media guru Simon U. Ford. Ford sold several thousand of the books for $47. However, we have permission to give it away for a limited time. In addition, you get five free podcasts. We also will be holding a series of four virtual “book clubs” to go over the book. Between the book, the podcasts, and the four of us, you will receive a comprehensive overview of social media. Because we want to provide the best possible training, there are only be 50 spots available for the book club. For more information, go to the Social Boomers site. That’s right, we are actually marketing to Boomers – and anyone else who is interested.

In every company’s life comes a time when things don’t go so well. A product doesn’t perform well, there is an accident in the plant, or an executive is caught with his hand in the cookie jar. When bad news happens, many executives first instinct is to duck and cover. They deny, lie and obfuscate. Wrong thing to do.

No likes bad news. But bad news can be turned into either a demonstration of competency or a public relations disaster. Handling bad news incorrectly can lead to a depressed stock price, lower sales, and in some cases, government regulation. No smart CEO wants any of that.

If you remember my lessons on interviews and crisis communications, you know why. A quick review: liars get caught and destroy all credibility; not releasing all information, or giving incorrect information, can make a crisis worse.

In Milwaukee in the last few days, the right way to handle bad news was demonstrated. One of the area’s largest employers – meat packer Patrick Cudahy – saw a devastating fire destroy one of its primary buildings. However, local government officials and company executives handled the public relations correctly. Emergency officials gave updates as soon as they information to release. Local government did its part to tell people living around the plant what was going on.

Most importantly, both local Patrick Cudahy executives and executives from parent company Smithfield Foods, Inc. did everything they could to assure workers that jobs would not be going away. In addition, Smithfield worked hard to assure its customers that there would no product shortfall.

Writers note: I once was a member of the public relations team that represented Smithfield. However, I have not had any contact with the company in five years.

This was an example where everything was done right. Communication channels were kept open, information was disseminated as soon as it was confirmed as being accurate and no one tried to duck or cover. As a result, officials controlled the story and it’s positioning from the beginning.

Contrast that with the way some banks and mortgage companies are handling the rash of foreclosures. As reported in the July 12 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, some lenders are simply walking away from foreclosed properties. The effect is causing blight in otherwise stable neighborhoods.

The lenders’ defense is that it doesn’t make financial sense to take some properties because the profit would not offset the cost of the effort to rehab and resell the property. So they walk away from it. Often there is no longer any clear owner leaving the municipality and neighbors to deal with a property that can become a haven for vandals, squatters, prostitutes and drug dealers. The cash-strapped local government has to deal with both losing property tax revenue and eventually paying to have the building torn down.

Remember, these lenders are the ones who either originated the loan or sold it to a group of investors. As has been demonstrated time and time again, the people receiving the loans should have never been given the money. They usually did not have the ability to make the payments.

The “not our problem” attitude is probably why only 36 percent of Americans in 2008 told the Gallup Organization they had a positive view of the banking industry.

I will never understand why financial people in particular always talk in “money speak” when it comes to dealing with bad news. It just kills their image.

What the financial industry in this case has to realize is that what is simply a balance sheet issue to them is an emotional issue to someone living next to an abandoned house. Residents take it very personally when something affects their neighborhood.

What the financial industry is doing is a good example of thinking short-term. Something bad happens, so the first instinct is to put one’s head down, make an inane comment and hope it all goes away. What they are not seeing is the big picture. People remember these kinds of actions. That leads them to do things like demanding more government regulation. The financial industry will find it has no friends when it opposes such actions.

That’s key takeaway from this. When bad news hits, think long term. Deal with the news in a way that doesn’t cause damage. It might be hard to do in the heat of the moment, but it is best course of action.

Next week, I am going to write the other side of social media – how in today’s environment, privacy is becoming a thing of the past.