Flack's Revenge

Above the FUD: Keeping PR Clean when the Tactics Get Dirty

If you travel in tech circles, you may know what FUD is - no, not the slushy gunk that gets stuck under your car grill in the winter, rather it stands for Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. Wikipedia defines FUD as "an attempt to influence public perception by disseminating negative and dubious/false information designed to undermine credibility." The label has its roots in the tech industry.

If you have been in tech PR for awhile, chances are that at one time or another a client has tried to involve you in their FUD wars, or asked you to do something that just doesn't sit right. Perhaps they wanted the PR team to plant negative or false stories (a client once asked me to sniff around a competitor's booth at a trade show to collect intelligence, and to lie about it if asked). Closely related, is when the client asks for overly aggressive media tactics, things that you know will be counterproductive.

These situations pose all kinds of questions and ethical dilemmas. After all, isn't your obligation to the client? Aren't we advocates that, just like lawyers, take the guilty and not so nice clients, and do our level best to defend them and advance their interests? On the other hand, do we want to be dragged down into the dirt - and doesn't the dirt tarnish our own reputations?

Now that the PR field has had a chance to think about and get past the Facebook PR fiasco of months ago (in which the company hired a PR firm to spread negative info about Google, see the Ragan's PR daily article on this), I thought it might be a good time to look at ways of doing a great job and doing right by clients without getting tarnished, by offering these tips on how to keep your heads high and stay above the FUD amidst vendor wars and the dirty pool that is sometimes involved.

Keep Cool and Keep Your Perspective

Always remember that clients' battles are not ours. Agencies are independent; after all, the client hired us because we are experts and because of our media relationships.  Although it is great to be counted on as a close and trusted advisor, remember, too, that we are supposed to be objective counselors who stay above the fray of internal politics and external score settling.

Let the Client Know that FUD is Just not Good Business and Not Good PR

I have found that FUD becomes more of a problem when PR is overly influenced by sales, an area that encourages aggression and hardball tactics (I was in sales before PR, so I know what I am talking about).

You may need to remind an overeager client about the following facts:

1. Reporters do not enjoy being used to as pawns to advance vendor's interests; the FUD campaign could jeopardize the collective efforts to build positive equity with the media and thus not best serve the long term goals of the PR program. 
2. As we saw with Facebook, there is a good chance that the tactics will be outed and the campaign will blow up in their faces

Turn to Management for Cover

At the first signs that the client will expect something that does not pass the "sniff test," you should not hesitate to involve agency management. They can help you make the above arguments, and also let the client know that there are industry guidelines against unethical practices.

Does all this mean there is not room for a little hardball in PR? Isn't it a little naive to think that we can remain totally above the fray of our client's marketing wars? This is not just a question about ethics. E.g. the lapse of the PR team in the above-mentioned scandal (at least, according to PR industry ethical guidelines) was to hide their client's name, which can lead one to assume that it might be "okay" to sling mud if you do share the client's name.

It is not a black or white issue, there is no single right answer; it gets back to the style of PR that you want to practice, and what you and your agency brand stand for. Agencies need to make clear to employees what is acceptable (and what is not); and you as an employee or job seeker need to make sure that this sits right with you.

(By the way, the subject of PR and ethics is a hot topic right now, and I would be remiss if I did not point people to Heather Yaxley's excellent and very detailed post this week on PR Conversations: PR is what PR Does - A Question of Ethics).

News Corp. Goons Provide PR "Protection"

My post yesterday countered the idea some people have that PR corrupts the journalism process. But can    journalism corrupt PR?

The question kind of reminds me of an old joke, which I will retell with new players:

Question: What is the difference between a PR rep and a journalist?

Answer: One is sleazy fixer that works on the "dark side" the other tries to get their clients in the news.

Ba dum! (please hold the applause)

Wait, I am not finished:

Question: How do you make the field of PR, which many don't understand, or trust, seem even sketchier?

Answer: Get News Corp. involved.

The News Corp. mess seems to be a never-ending affair that gets more lurid and just plain weirder by the day. This week alone we heard about the Murdochs' appearances before the British Parliament, replete with a pie throwing incident, a dead body found ... and that was just the past couple of days.. It is ever- expanding, bringing a wider mix of institutions and characters into its ugly embrace.

PR has entered the fray, along with UK Prime Minister David Cameron, who hired an ex World editor as his communications chief, as was covered early on. The Journal wrote yesterday on this, and about another similar situation involving Scotland Yard:

Cameron Defends Handling of Crisis: U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron faced a barrage of accusations in Parliament on Wednesday over his relationship with News Corp. and his former communications chief, Andy Coulson, a key figure in the phone-hacking scandal that continues to inflict damage on the British leader...Mr. Cameron has been repeatedly drawn into this scandal through Mr. Coulson, who was arrested this month, but not charged, amid the hacking investigation. Mr. Coulson had resigned from News of the World in 2007 when one of his reporters went to jail for intercepting voice mails.

Police Face Questions: Two of Britain's most senior police officers denied to British lawmakers that they had a tight relationship with the U.K. arm of News Corp., but expressed regret at the police's handling of the phone-hacking scandal that has claimed them both among its biggest casualties.

Kicking off the day's high-profile parliamentary hearings, departing Metropolitan Police Commissioner Paul Stephenson said that he was unaware of connections between a police public-relations adviser and the media giant's now-closed News of the World.

The PR adviser, Neil Wallis, is former deputy editor of the News of the World and is at the center of the allegations over the alleged cozy relationship between Scotland Yard and the weekly tabloid.

The journey from journo to PR is a well traveled one; the big question is, was this really about PR or about buying "protection" from the tabloids?

NY Times Public Editor Puts PR Through its Paces

I enjoy Arthur Brisbane's Public Editor column in the NY Times, a feature that does a post mortem each week on the paper's editorial decisions and reporting.

It is a forum that lets him and the readers vent a bit and also get reaction from the editorial, management and reporting teams. The column really shows how reporting sausage gets made, as it is not afraid to ask the tough questions; and the light it shines is not always a warm and bathing glow. The Public Editor shows the newspaper's commitment to excellence and transparency, and is one of the reasons I love the paper.

I suppose it was only a matter of time before Brisbane got around to PR, and I saw that he had recently when Tom Bebbington alerted me via a tweet. The very title "PR Professionals, Bane or Boon?" got my hackles up (OK, can someone please explain hackles are). My readers know I am sensitive about how PR is portrayed in the media, and the very thought that an entire profession can be a bane!

Despite the title, Brisbane seemed to show an open mind in his musings about PR's proper role in reporting in this piece, and graciously asked for feedback from the PR field about this (more on this below).

The latest column refers to an earlier article that prompted lots of reaction from the PR crowd,  One can see why the earlier story caused a stir.  In that one Brisbane revealed an anti-PR bias and defended what I feel is an overly aggressive NY Times policy regarding the PR field. 

He took consumer tech reviewer David Pogue to task for getting paid to appear at a PR event.  Although Pogue is a freelancer, and might not be bound by the same rules as Times reporters (standards governing freelancers vs. employees were covered in an earlier column, and Brisbane talks about it a bit here), Pogue has since agreed to discontinue the practice. 

I share my thoughts on the eipsode below; the text in italics are exceprts from the original story:

..the speech flagrantly violates the prohibition against giving advice at paid P.R. conferences.

Maybe it is just me, but I fail to see how speaking fees from a general PR entity (in this case, Ragan, a publisher) can corrupt the process of reporting on the specific people, companies or issues covered in news stories. 

Moreover, I think it is a little silly to treat the PR profession as a separate class.  While It makes all the sense in the world to have rules that avoid conflicts of interest - my feeling is that separate rules are not nescessary for an entire field - why not throw lobbyists in there too, politicians, sports figures, and celebrities? We should be pretty well covered by rules that say, for example, that reporters should not accept gifts, meals, etc.

...Times readers deserve to be assured that journalists don’t get too cozy with the P.R. professionals who strive to influence coverage. A virtual army of publicists, media specialists and others stands ready every day to infiltrate the news with stories that help their employers.

The above statement makes PR sound rather dark and evil, doesn't it? 

For The Times, keeping the appropriate distance is important and the paper was wise to curb whatever P.R.advising the peripatetic Pogue has been doing.

Anyone who reads Pogue knows that he giveth as well as taketh away in his reviews, they can be pretty scathing; regardless of all the teeth gnashing over conflicts, he is fair (see my earlier post about this, and previous conflict of interest charges against Pogue made by the Public Editor).

Please see below for the questions Brisbane asks of the PR field in the more recent story (in italics) and my answers:

What are the benefits that publicists and P.R. professionals can provide to The Times? Are there any problems?

PR plays an important role in the production of news by acting as information providers, and by helping to connect reporters with information and sources.  As Brisbane wrote:  Pogue explains that, as a reviewer of new gadgets, there is no comprehensive database he can rely on to learn about new stuff. Hence he relies on companies and their hired pitchmen to tell him about new products.

The real PR pros are industry specialists who go beyond connecting sources and flogging news and products; we alert the media to trends, and suggest interesting story angles and opportunities.

This is at no cost to the journalist or publication; of course we  do have a vested interest.  If the journalist or publication is not interested, they can simply ignore us, so what really is the harm?

In terms of problems, I would think most PR people would agree that we have no interest in spamming or otherwise keeping after reporters if they tell you that they are not interested, but there are unfortunately those in our field who do not get the message; I would say that they are not the majority, although these instances do sometimes get lots of attention.

How easy or difficult is The Times to work with compared to other news organizations?

So this is where I am supposed to let off a little steam and say how I really feel, right? Here in this public forum? Or via an email to Brisbane which he might make public? Seriously (and honestly), in my experience the Times is not easier or harder to work with than most other top tier publications. It generally gets down to the relationship with the individual reporter or editor; like any other business relationship; building trust is important.  Over time, you hopefully build those mutually rewarding relationships.  Some choose not to work with PR, and that is fine too.

Rubel Move Sparks Tumblr vs. WordPress "Cage Match"

Many have been looking at solutions such as Posterous and Tumblr, which offer a middle ground between the longer topics and "care and feeding" that blogs generally involve and the minimalistic Twitter. In particular, It seems as if Tumblr is experiencing impressive growth and getting lots of positive buzz these days.

PR and social media influencer Steve Rubel gave Tumblr a boost and made waves last month when he implemented a "scorched earth policy," turning off his blogs and moving his digital presence to Tumblr. Steve explained his reasoning in his post - here's an excerpt::

I fundamentally believe that we are entering the next great era of the web - The Validation Era. In this age of too much content and not enough time, the public will increasingly need to hear things validated across four interconnected media clovers that are converging across four different screens - phones, tablets, PCs and TVs. To be successful, businesses and individuals will need to continually ensure their engagement spans the media cloverleaf.

That’s why I decided to jump to Tumblr and why I didn’t stay with Posterous or move to Wordpress or SquareSpace, all of which are solid platforms. Tumblr is a truly unique hybrid. It sits squarely in the center of the Media Cloverleaf.

Steve's manifesto made waves, and there were many posts, comments and tweets in its wake. I read the post and comments on Steve's blog (and on TheNextWeb, where it was cross-posted), and also on SpinSucks, which interviewed Steve about his move. The post drew 118 comments, many of which pitted Tumblr vs. WordPress (one commenter snidely reminded us of Steve's scorched earth move to lifestreams awhile back; another described Tumblr as '"the love child of blogging and Twitter").

Although Tumble vs. WordPress might not be the most obvious comparison (looking at Posterous vs. Tumblr would be more of an apples to apples contest), it does have its merits - in a sense it pits traditional and full-featured vs. new and streamlined, and the debate gave both sides the opportunity to make their arguments about why to go for one type of solution vs. another.

I thought I would feature highlights of the debate in my tale of the tape below:

DSK & Casey Anthony: The Dark Side of Story Crafting

In journalism they speak in reverent tones about the importance of THE STORY; i.e. weaving facts together into a compelling narrative.

Similarly, in PR circles we talk about storytelling as a way to make client news comprehensible and interesting. At Social Fluency, we are experimenting with new ways of doing this (see today's post there).

However there is a dark side to looking for the ideal story in a set of facts: the scenario you have lovingly crafted can be, well, just an all-too-convenient story - perhaps even a fictional one.

I was thinking about these things as I followed two courtroom dramas that have drawn us in and provided a tense and suspenseful backdrop to the start of the summer.

Yesterday morning, before hearing the surprising Not Guilty verdict later in the day, I heard some talking heads on TV discussing the merits of the prosiecution's case against Casey Anthony.  One said, more or less, that she prefers a case that is built on circumstantial evidence, because of the power of a good story; physical evidence can be questioned, witnesses can seem unreliable.

The jury apparently did not agree, and we all experienced a "WTF letdown" upon hearing news of the verdict, after hearing countless news reports that seemed to echo the prosecution's narrative.

Similarly, in the the Dominique Strauss Kahn case, there was a rush to judgment by the media, and their audiences all too eagerly jumped on board.  Bret Stephens wrote a great op ed piece in the Wall Street Journal about this yesterday: The DSK Lesson.  Here are some exceprts:

Let me confess: I was pretty much delighted by the way L'Affaire DSK seemed to be playing out...Not that I ever took any joy in the thought that a presumably vulnerable woman had apparently been raped by a man with a reputation for promiscuous and predatory appetites.

But I did enjoy the thought of this mandarin of the tax-exemptocracy being pulled from the comfort of his first-class Air France seat and dispatched to Riker's Island without regard to status or dignity. And I admired the humble immigrant who would risk so much for the sake of justice.

I doubt I was alone in feeling this: People generally, and columnists especially, want news that has the qualities of a parable—the surprise that turns out to be no surprise at all. With a story like DSK's, the temptation of a tidy moral tends to overwhelm whatever doubts might be cast upon it by a countervailing point of data.

...the media (broadly speaking) has too often been guilty of looking only for the evidence that fits a pre-existing story line. It doesn't help that in journalism you can usually find the story you're looking for..

But anecdotes are not data—which happens to be the world's most easily neglected truism. ...And the journalists who most deserve to earn their keep are those who understand that the line of any story is likely to be crooked.

Which is not to say that jurys or judges can't sometimes get it wrong, or that these people are innocent - just that we can reach different conclusions given the same set of facts, and that it is sometimes easier to believe the logical and compelling storyline.

 

 

 

 

Use plain language if you want more people to visit your blog and read your stuff

When I first started blogging, I think I tried to impress people with big words and long and dense posts, and quickly discovered that this did not go over so well.  .An article in Ragan's PR Daily reminded me of the importance of communicating clearly by using plain and simple language. Here is an excerpt.

The use of unfamiliar or complex terms interferes with comprehension and slows readers down. Readers may even skip terms they don’t understand, hoping to find their meaning in the rest of the sentence.Readers are not impressed by the use of complex words; they’re frustrated by them

It goes on to list 24 highfalutin words and their simpler alternatives (so, is "highfalutin" too fancy?)

The post also reminded me of a topic I saw a few weeks ago on Dan Zarrella's blog (this guy is pretty much a genius when it comes to the science of social media; you should subscribe to his email newsletter and read his blog if the topic is of interest). He has published a readability analyzer plugin for WordPress blogs that reports on how simple or complex your content is as you write it.

I think I will give it a whirl.  In addition, there are a range of utilities available (I am pretty sure that MS Word has one) for grading your content in terms of readability.

So, even if you find it hard to simplify language and like using big words, with all of these tools it is hard to justify writing dense text, unless you enjoy having a small audience for your content.