NY Times Public Editor Puts PR Through its Paces

Posted on July 21, 2011 by rgeller

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.

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Rubel Move Sparks Tumblr vs. WordPress “Cage Match”

Posted on July 11, 2011 by rgeller

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:

TapeTale

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DSK & Casey Anthony: The Dark Side of Story Crafting

Posted on July 6, 2011 by rgeller

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.

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

Posted on July 1, 2011 by rgeller

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. There are also online tools like this fry readability calculator, it needs a wordcount of 600 to be really effective, but it has a lot of technical stats that may be useful.

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.

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The Web: Efficient Outing Engine, Big Brother – or Both?

Posted on June 23, 2011 by rgeller

They used to say that on the Web, no one knows if you are a dog.  These days, it seems like  anonyminity

has gone out the window and everyone knows everyone else’s business (see my related post on FOMO vs.TMI).

The New York Times wrote about this in the article: Upending Anonyminity: These Days, the Web Unmasks Everyone.  It cited recent examples, like the now famous picture of the kissing couple in Vancouver (amidst the riots following the Canucks’ hockey loss) and Anthony Weiner.  It said:

The collective intelligence of the Internet’s two billion users, and the digital fingerprints that so many users leave on Web sites, combine to make it more and more likely that every embarrassing video, every intimate photo, and every indelicate e-mail is attributed to its source, whether that source wants it to be or not. This intelligence makes the public sphere more public than ever before and sometimes forces personal lives into public view.

In addition to embarassing people, the Web can also be helpful in solving crimes and revealing truths.

So, which is it: is the Web a harsh enforcer of mob vengeance, a tool of repressive governments or is it an engine for efficiently revealing truths? Perhaps all of the above?

Despite the name of my blog I am not paranoid, and tend to be centrist in my views.  I am not some kind of  anarchist.  Yet this whole idea kind of reminds me of words from the opening pages of George Orwell’s book 1984.

There seemed to be no color except in the posters that were plastered everywhere … BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU, the caption said….inside the flat a fruity voice was reading out a list of figures… the voice came from an oblong metal plaque like a dulled mirror which formed part of the surface of the right-hand wall… the instrument (the telescreen, it was called) could be dimmed, but there was no way of shutting it off completely… the telescreen received and transmitted simultaneously… any sound that Winston made, above the level of a low whisper, would be picked up by it; moreover, so long as he remained in the field of vision… he could be seen as well as heard

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Walking to Raise Money, and PR

Posted on June 22, 2011 by rgeller

An op ed piece in the New York Times raised an interesting question about the connection between walking and raising money for charitable causes.  Why not take the same effort that is exerted at these events, and apply it to something really useful, doing even more good in the process?  Regarding the Boston Walk for Hunger,Ted Gup writes,

What I saw that morning in Boston was a resource diverted from its true purpose. Imagine those 210,000 man-hours (42,000 times a five-hour walk) put into direct service to benefit the poor. Think of the houses that might be built, roofs repaired, gardens planted and harvested, public spaces improved, and meals delivered to shut-ins. (And add in the efforts of the 2,000 volunteers that day and the contributions of 50,000 donors.) Now multiply that by the millions of man-hours that are represented by such events in cities across the nation, from Los Angeles to Louisville, Ky., from Austin, Tex., to Grand Rapids, Mich.

In reading further, though, it becomes clear that mass walking serves a purpose to support charitable causes that is not wasted effort; rather it is collective motive force applied to something that sounds a lot like PR.  Gup writes:

The easy explanation, of course, is that there would be no giving

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Wiseguy Way for PR

Posted on June 15, 2011 by rgeller

I was flying back from my brother's bachelor party in Las Vegas (alas, the details of the trip will need to remain in Vegas), picked up a copy of the NY Post, and saw an article – Wiseguy Way – about the book Mob Rules: What the Mafia Can Teach the Legitimate Businessman.

Written by an ex-mobster, the book explains how mob rules can be applied to legitmate businesses.  I enjoyed the article, and it occurred to me that some of the rules cited in the review could also apply to the PR agency world.  Here are some examples, the text in italics is from the article:

Don’t forget a name

Everyone knows a memory for names is a valuable business tool. Mobsters excel at this, says Ferrante — thanks to mnemonics. Basically, this is the practice of nicknaming someone so you’ll remember who they are.

The takeaway here is that you need to value your client and media contacts – confusing them or forgetting their names is a recipe for disaster.  I am not so sure about inventing nicknames, sure this is done but can backfire, especially if the names aren't flattering.

Don’t close yourself off

Ferrante looks back on his prison days… Although he was in a lockup where cell doors could be left open, he often kept his shut so he could get more reading and writing done. “This guy came up to me and said, ‘Lou, you can’t do that,’” he says. So he tried leaving it open…

The lesson for managers: Keep an open door, so as to a) stay connected to what’s going on; b) keep in good standing with your people; and c) stimulate creativity.

This is good general advice for managers; also, it is important to be available for the media if you want to maximize coverage.

Don’t let things fester

In “Let’s Meet in the Back for a Sit-Down: Mediating Disputes and the Art of Compromise,” Ferrante advises dealing with intercompany squabbles as the mob does — quickly and fairly.“Squash a beef before it gets out of hand,” he writes, “and be sure to offer fair and honest advice every time.”

Yes, it is a good thing to avoid conflict, with clients and media too of course.

Don’t shortchange your customers

Ferrante talks about the difference between mobsters and corporations — and the mobsters come out looking like the good guys.

“I would feel more secure sitting down with another mob guy and shaking on something than I would with a businessman,” he says. “On the street, your name is all you have. If you screw somebody, you’re out of business.”

True enough, agencies need to deliver excellent serivce and be responsive to client concerns.

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For Just $1/day, You can Save the PR-challenged Celebrity

Posted on June 9, 2011 by rgeller

In my last post, I wrote about how Anthony Weiner and Charlie Sheen are great ads for PR.

Sally-struther-300x225 (1)

Rather than dwell on what is becoming an increasingly bizarre (and as Jon Steward said, "now officially sad") story, in the case of Anthony Weiner – I thought I would focus on something more positive – like getting these guys some much needed PR.  For just $1 dollar a day, your contributions will make sure that PR-challenged public figures like Charlie Sheen and Anthony Weiner get the representation they need.

 

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Weiner and Sheen: Possibly the Best Pitchmen for PR

Posted on June 7, 2011 by rgeller

For the very definition of unscripted, unplugged and a little if not a lot nutty public figures, you have first Charlie Sheen and then Anthony Weiner, possibly the best advertisements for PR in recent memory.

They both took us on pretty wild rides. Weiner’s episode culminated in a surreal press conference yesterday that was almost carnival sideshow (see the New York Times article Confession and Apology…) in which conservative blogger Andrew Breitbart (who first broke the story) led off. Exactly how or why this came to be, I am not sure.

What is clear is that both celebrities pretty much winged it when it came to mixing it up with the media and going on public record (as the Times article said, Weiner did not use PR – As a politician, he was his own publicist, megaphone, strategist and multiplatformed tech man wrapped into a tightly wrapped Type A package – that now seems pretty obvious).

There will be some that say that these public figures deserved what they had coming, and no amount of spinning or image crafting would have helped. To them, I say: “are you serious?!!!” I guess if you enjoy watching public immolation and train wrecks that might be true (the stories also refute the myth that there is no such thing as bad PR).

How could PR have helped? Well by helping these guys not look like total idiots for starters. A little thought and planning when it comes to media relations, and some moves from the crisis management play book would no doubt have helped. Sure, they both probably would have crashed and burned anyway, but in a less horrific way, with easier paths to redemption.

Posted in Campaign Analysis, Current Affairs, Politics | 1 Comment

Morrissey Gets a Bag of Popchips; We get an Article on the Tricky Art of Influence Tracking

Posted on June 6, 2011 by rgeller

Brian Morrissey, who writes, tweets and blogs on advertising, related an episode in which he was sent a bag of Popchips.  Apparently the algorithms, CPG marketers and Klout reckoned that Morrissey was a snack food influencer.  His article (excerpt below) is a good read on the tricky are of tracking influence.

Sometime last year — I don’t remember when exactly — a box arrived at my apartment. Inside was a handful of bags of Popchips. I ate them, then didn’t think much about them again.By doing so I became part of an “influencer” program. I got the chips apparently on account of the sway I hold when it comes to snack food as part of the Klout Perks program. Like many regular Twitter users, I’d used Klout to gauge my social media reach on Twitter. I’m apparently a 61. The question that nagged me was why exactly was I an influencer when it came to snacks?

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