PR 101

Sunday night my local television news station teased story about the things people should not post on Facebook. The basis of the piece was how dangerous it is to post certain information on the site. People seem all too willing to give up vital information about themselves.

While all of the sharing social media has caused might be connecting people, I see a lot of danger in that. Is it a really good thing for people to know you ate at Ray’s Famous Pizza in New York, then went to see “Promises, Promises” on Broadway and finally dropped in for a nightcap at your favorite local bar?

I often hear complaints from people who are inundated with marketing solicitations. They wonder why they are they getting so many. Think about it. I think this trend is increasingly dangerous. Do we really mean to give up all of our privacy?

Today (Monday), I read a piece in the New York Times about the late author John Updike. It reminded my just how much things have changed in a very short time.

In the piece, writer Sam Tanenhaus that says “Updike was a private man, if not a recluse like J. D. Salinger or a phantom like Thomas Pynchon, then a one-man gated community, visible from afar but firmly sealed off, with a No Trespassing sign posted in front.”

Updike was a man of the middle 20^th Century, pre-Internet, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and blogging. I think the reason he could maintain that distance was that there were not the tools to break the walls he had erected.

I wrote on this topic last year. But since I did, even more ways to reveal yourself to the world have come along. Now there is Foursquare, a site that tells everyone what restaurants, movies and other things you attend. There are more and more review sites, which ask people to comment on a hotel, a car or a book. There are location sites that tell people exactly where you live and where you are traveling.

The amount of information people are willing to share with the world – or at least the 1.8 billion people on the web – is staggering. When I was a reporter, I used to tell people in a week I could tell their life story. I could do that because the paper I worked for bought proprietary databases. Some poor person had spent weeks gathering and inputting all of the information those databases contained. It took time to look through them and you had to know how search what you were looking for.

Now, I can do it an hour or two. It doesn’t any particular skill to gather the information. Anyone with some time on their hands can find out just about anything they want about anyone they want. Often that information is used maliciously.

While malicious use of information is one effect of this spewing, I wonder if there are other side effects? Do we really need to know everything about everybody? I am not so sure. I am curious as to what you think.

I don’t watch a lot of television, but when I do, I pay close attention to the advertisements. As a marketer, I like to see what major companies are doing to drum up business. Granted, I think social media would be far more effective, but a lot of companies still feel comfortable with what they view as the tried and true.

Watching commercials always reminds me of a major reason reasons I don’t like traditional advertising. The copywriters and producers constantly use stereotypes and half-truths to make a point. It is a lazy way to make a point. As times, those ads can be downright insulting.

As an example, Kellogg’s has been running a commercial entitled on YouTube “Fruit Loops Doctor Commercial 2009.” The commercial has a small boy playing the doctor, a small girl playing the nurse, and a small boy as a patient.

The commercial claims Fruit Loops can be good for you because it now contains fiber. That claim alone I find dubious. According to Kellogg’s, a typical serving contains three grams of fiber. The American Dietetic Association says children under 12 should be consuming at least an amount of fiber equal to their age plus three. There are a lot better ways for a child to get enough fiber. Fruit and vegetables come to mind.

In addition, the first ingredient listed for Fruit Loops is sugar, 12 grams in a typical serving. The American Heart Association says that’s the amount of sugar a child should consume in an entire day. Somehow, the ad doesn’t mention that.

What really frosts me though are the gender stereotypes. As I said, the doctor is male, the nurse is female. According to the May 6, 2010 New York Times, almost half of medical students are women. The last number I could find – from 2006 – said 33 percent of practicing physicians are women. So why did Kellogg’s or their agency decide the doctor had to be a woman?

Plus, since women make most grocery buying decisions, wouldn’t it be logical to show a sympathetic character?

As for another stereotypes, AT&T has been running a commercial showing a family that has just signed up for AT&T’s Internet service. With that service comes Wi-Fi. Only Dad doesn’t seem to understand how Wi-Fi works. He keeps asking for a cord to connect to the Internet.  He is told the cord is invisible. He asks for his own invisible cable. I mean, come on.

It always bothers me when a campaign singles out a parent – be it mother or father – to ridicule. Why make fun of anybody?

As for the dad in this commercial – I don’t anyone who calls a USB cable a cord. Second, anyone using the Internet on consistent basis must know what Wi-Fi is. What kind of a dolt is this dad?

To me, this kind of commercial is just a very lazy way of doing things. And, no is it not satire. It is just a lack of creativity.

Why it is every time I turn on the television or listen to the radio, some company is trying to scare me into buying their product? Instead of touting the benefits of their offering, they tell me I will be facing dire consequences if I don’t purchase what they’re selling.

Now, I don’t watch a lot of television, but there are some shows I like. I am excluding watching sports. That’s a whole another issue. As a loyal Milwaukee Brewers, New York Yankees and Green Bay Packer fan, I try to watch as many of their games as possible.

Of course, watching television means accepting the advertising that comes with it. I don’t have a problem with that. It is how the broadcast networks can afford to provide those shows. I love PBS, but I am not naïve enough to think every network could hold pledge drives to keep themselves on the air.

What I don’t like are ads such as the one General Motors runs for its OnStar® system. Briefly, OnStar® is an “in-vehicle security, communications, and diagnostics system” GM puts in more than 50 of its models. It notifies an operator when there has been accident. It can also be used to track and shut down a stolen car and be used for diagnostic purposes.

In the television commercials, former NFL player Howie Long shows a “skeptical” customer how only OnStar® will help him in the event of an accident. The radio commercials are lot more graphic. The commercials play out scenarios where someone has been in accident and because of OnStar®, they are saved. Or a stolen car is found because of OnStar®.

H & R Block, the tax preparers, did something similar during tax season. At least one commercial talked about how there were something like over 1,000 changes made to the U.S. Tax Code. The narrator said how people should have H & R Block prepare their returns because of those changes. It intimated if you didn’t go there, you would be in trouble.

To deal with the last example first, there might have been over 1,000 changes to the tax code. But, I am willing to bet most of them were not to the personal income tax section of the code. What most people don’t realize is lot of laws are changed every year for many reasons, often very minor ones such as misplaced period or a word out of place.

Why should creating even more anxiety over something that has sweating already be a marketing technique?

As for GM, to me those ads are almost disingenuous. Yes, it is true OnStar® would help you. But, so would a lot of other new cars’ systems. Almost every car built today has Blue Tooth capability. Ford, for instance, has a hands free system in its cars. I was in a Lexus the other day that had the same thing. The systems allow a cell phone to be locked in to a cradle, so it would not go flying in an accident. A call could be made after an accident.

However, I have yet to see either Ford or Toyota, or other car companies, talk about how you need that Blue Tooth system in case of accident.

Plus, I am not sure I want people to be able to find me when I am in my car. Maybe I have read George Orwell’s “1984” one too many times, but I don’t like the idea of someone else being able to track my car. I don’t want someone else, no matter how benevolent they are now, to have the power to stop my car.

Frankly, in both cases here, and all of the other companies that do the same thing, I would rather hear about the product’s features and cost. I don’t want to think I end facing prison for tax evasion, or left to die an accident. That is just not the way I want to be approached.

I would like to thank the University of Wisconsin – Whitewater Public Relations Student Society of America for inviting me to speak April 24^th. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. There were a lot of very bright students from UW-Whitewater, UW-Lacrosse, UW-Stephens Point and UW-Oshkosh at the PRSSA regional meeting. Thanks again.