Marketing Public Relations - MPR: The Blog

Editors, producers, journalists-rebuild this wall!

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 10:21:07 -0800

I have no objection to adverting sales people selling into content. For example, if a medium is planning to run a piece on golf, then approach golf courses, equipment manufacturer, retailers, etc., about adverting in that issue or during that episode. Also, I think it is smart marketing to copy your advertising sales rep with any press release you are sending to a particular medium. (I don’t mind another voice bringing a good story to an editor’s attention one more time.) What I do fervently object to is the creation of seemingly editorial content strictly for its sales value as well as tolerance of the unfettered quid pro quo where advertisers get positive and pronounced editorial coverage despite the quality of the product or service in question. Running editorial and advertising as one unit where advertisers are “partners” is ethically dubious and it destroys the credibility of real PR in that medium, and perhaps across all media. The wall between editorial and advertising has always had a degree of fluidity, but I fear it is now no more than a gauzy veil. Editors, producers, journalists-rebuild this wall!

Check out this segment from NPR’s On the Media for an example of such a conflict.

Click here and join the MPR Fan page on Facebook. You’ll be glad you did.

Twitter: Community, Identity, and Jewelry

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 11:53:25 -0800

There is no question-social media has changed the way that we interact with our fellow human beings. The potential for communicating with others, and finding groups of people with similar interests, no matter how obscure, has increased exponentially. It has also affected the way we write. (To my great consternation, students of mine will occasionally submit a paper that includes “text message English.” In such cases I am not LOL.) It has also altered the way that we identify ourselves by giving use the ability to create a fresh persona in the communities in which we interact, as well as a new name. For example, I get my wine buying advice from a guy that goes by @garyvee, and I just read a blog post on marketing psychology by @psychodude.

While I am steadfast in my belief that social media, in all its forms, is just an addition to the myriad of ways that we interact and sell to each other, I also believe that its terms and traditions have imbued themselves into our culture. To support this hypothesis, I’d like to introduce you all to Survival of the Hippest. They make custom jewelry with your Twitter handle or hashtag on it. This is to make it easier for people to put a tweet with a face when meeting in the real, non-virtual world. As co-founder Phoebe Jonas told me:

“Survival of The Hippest began when my co-founder, Ashley, realized that many of her 7000+ followers on Twitter knew her as @pluckypea, and not as her proper name. What better way to signal her virtual self in the real-world at Tweetups and conferences than a piece of Twittername Jewelry! (as the front-woman and mastermind behind the critically acclaimed rock band for kids, the Jimmies, Ashley is out and about a LOT!) As a social-media enthusiast with a fine-jewelry background and a hankering to Twitter, I was the perfect partner for our venture. Survival of The Hippest launched in Sept '09 --we're the original Twitter Jewelry company--and we've been adorning hundreds of Twitterfriends ever since.”

I speak about the importance of creating content as well as community when planning a social media presence. When real and virtual communities begin to blend and symbolism is brought into that mix I am confident that we can declare social media an enduring cultural phenomenon.

Oh, by the way, I am not getting compensated by Survival of the Hippest in any way. I found them while searching for best practices in social media/ word-of-mouth to write about, and I think they are cool.

You’re invited to join the Marketing Public Relations community and read this blog on the MPR Facebook fan page. See you there.

Social Media Analyitics

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 05:56:04 -0800

This blog post by Lee Odden in his “Online Marketing Blog” is a great introduction to some great social media analytics. It is worth a little exploration.

Also, I have posted a video of Lee talking about the use of social media and search by journalists to the MPR Facebook fan page. Check that out.

Thanks Sally Falkow for introducing me to Lee’s work.

What business are you in?

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 05:05:37 -0800

Give a listen to what Chris Brogan has to say about knowing what business you are in, and “augmented opportunity.” In case you didn’t know, Chris is the author of Trust Agents.

The Value of Twitter

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 05:55:38 -0800

If I had a nickel (ok, maybe a quarter) for every time someone said to me, “Yeah, Twitter is interesting, but I don’t see the marketing value in it,” I would be quite well off. Well, here I have an outstanding example of a business using Twitter to its benefit-Kogi Korean Barbeque.

This is a mobile restaurant based in southern California that announces its location by tweeting. Yes, they deliver a good product, but they add to the mix by making the meal an adventure, because you have to find them. This creates a type of scarcity, which we know from Robert Cialdini, author of Influence: Science and Practice that can make a product seem even more valuable to us. In addition, they have used this new marketing format to drum up lots of MPR. They have been featured on the Food Network, you can be one of their 50,000 plus followers on Twitter, read over 1200 overwhelmingly positive reviews on Yelp, and even read more about their next venture in the Wall Street Journal.

This, my friends, is Twitter done right.

(Become a fan of the MPR Facebook page.)

How We Decide

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 12:02:01 -0800

How We Decide, by Johan Lehrer is a reasonably well written excursion through the competing rational and emotional processes of the mind. For marketers interested in consumer behavior, decision making and general psychology this is not a bad introductory work. I was disappointed, however, because I was expecting more. Much of the text is a collection of interesting anecdotes, but many of them will be familiar to those who read a lot of this sort of material, including any of Gladwell’s recent stuff. It also fails to put together a model or coherent thesis on how he believes that we decide things.

In the end, conclusion seems to be that sometimes the rational mind is correct, and sometimes it’s the emotional mind.

Should you read it? You decide.

Ghostwriters

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 10:58:04 -0800

Creating a thought leading presence is one of the best ways for a firm to position itself and its products against its rivals. The primary vehicles for doing this are articles, case studies, and white papers written by a firm’s experts or experts outside of the firm. It’s no surprise that these documents, when well produced, enhance the credibility of a company and its wares. None the less, there has been a growing concern over the use of ghostwriters when producing these pieces. That is, the stated author of the article is not the person who actually wrote the piece. An article on Scientific American’s website illustrates how this issue has come to a head in the pharmaceutical industry, and how there is a call for an outright ban of ghostwriting in that sector. Ghostwriting is not limited to the pharmaceutical business, however.

Now, if the availability of a good writer, with good industry insight can get a firm to embrace writing articles, case studies, and white papers as a means for promotion, that is not, in and of itself, a bad thing. There are some inherent pitfalls in the process though. First is conflict of interest. If an article seems to be written by a known industry expert, but it is actually written by a firm that will benefit from the content of the piece, there is, in my opinion, a clear ethical problem here. The second issue is a bit more subtle, and is a little more concerning to me as a marketer. That is, when the articles and their content are completely foreign to the claimed author. Invariably, someone will ask the expert about the article, and if the expert cannot answer, there will be egg on the firm’s public face. Additionally, I’ll argue that this is akin to deceptive advertising. This is especially true when we are talking about services, as we make our decisions of whether or not to use a service provider (financial advisor, lawyer, auto mechanic, etc.) based on what we perceive to be their expertise. If what we perceive as that person’s expertise actually belongs to someone else, then we are being defrauded.

Yes, I know that experts are busy people and they don’t always have time to write. I am also fully aware that some people with great expertise in their fields are not necessarily good writers. So, what to do? YFind a good writer within your firm or from the outside and have them talk to, exchange emails with, and perhaps even job shadow the expert you’d like to showcase. Then have the writer draft an article and have it approved by the expert (yes, that means they have to read it), and publish the piece with a by-line that errs on the side of transparency. That can range from something like: “By Ellen Expert and William Writer,” to “By Brian Brainiac as told to Anna-Marie Author.”

Remember, good MPR is always authentic!

Super Bowl Buzz

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 11:56:31 -0800

The primary tenet of Marketing Public Relations (MPR) implores marketers to garner media mentions and spread word-of-mouth through connectors that are not compensated for doing so. Strictly speaking, advertising is not MPR, but in the case of the commercials run during the Super Bowl, I will confidently argue that the true value of these spots is their MPR component. Certainly, if you have been anywhere in the plugged in world in the last week’s time you’ve heard or read about these ads and talked to someone about them. Many media outlets from the Today Show, to NPR’s Marketplace, to Ad Age have given their analysis, and therefore, given loads of media mentions. But what about buzz?

Here’s where I can use your help. I have created a short survey and I ask you to complete it and to spread the word. I am happy to share the results with you and I am working on a prize for a drawing.

Click her to start. It will take you less than 10 minutes. I promise.

Thanks for your help. And thanks to Time Magazine’s Website for the links.

Click here to take survey

Auto Wars: East Meets West

Mon, 08 Feb 2010 06:07:25 -0800

Finally, this is getting fun. There has been much ado in the media about Toyota’s recent quality problems and subsequent recalls. Some pundits have been forecasting Toyota’s demise, while others have predicted that they will use this as an opportunity to turn the business around much like McNeil Labs (Johnson & Johnson) did in the wake of the Tylenol poisonings in 1982.

Regarding the latter of the opposing arguments, I think McNeil was positioned slightly better on two fronts. First, McNeil’s negligence, if there was any, was in not foreseeing the potential for product tampering and not taking steps to package the product more securely. That is, McNeil was not directly responsible for the crisis. Toyota is in a situation of its own making. The second point is that Tylenol did not have a large competitor with the U.S. government as its biggest stock holder. Toyota is facing inquiry from the same congressmen and regulatory agencies that have recently purchased loads of General Motors stock. Hmmm.

So, the question is, how do the two big auto companies play their hands to their advantage?

If GM follows the advice of the famous Chinese General Sun Tsu, it would use its new found weapon (friends in Washington, D.C.) to claim the victory that Toyota has handed to them. Robert Greene, author of 48 Laws of Power would suggest that GM crush Toyota totally. Can this be done? Actually, if congress and other U.S. authorities can keep Toyota off balance by continuing with inquiries that keep Toyota in the news, and GM can come forth with truly superior products, I think they can pull this off. Should they do it? I’m not going to wade into a discussion about the American government owning a large corporation, but I think there is a great discussion about the “end result” ethical philosophy here. I am truly ambivalent on this situation and I look forward to see how GM plays this out.

Toyota, on the other hand needs to stay the course in showing how their focus is the customer and their commitment to supplying high quality products. Hushing dealers, covering up problems, and complaining about what the boys in Washington are doing, are a distraction and might be Toyota’s undoing. Also, Toyota needed to apologize and move on, it seems like they may be over apologizing, which will put them in a weaker position then they already are. I am not saying Toyota will go away, but they could suffer a setback that may take decades to recover from.

This report from NPR’s Marketplace will illustrate some of the tensions I’ve discussed. What do you think? I’m looking forward to your comments on this one.

AAF Webinar on PR & Social Media

Wed, 03 Feb 2010 09:51:13 -0800

Hello all,

I recently conducted a national webinar for the American Advertising Federation as a part of their “From the Source” series. I’d like to thank Josh Guterman from the AAF for making this happen, and I’d like to encourage you to share this with your friends and colleagues. If anyone has any questions for me, please post them as comments and I will answer them promptly.

Thanks,

Gaetan

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