Tag Archives: Wall Street Journal

March 1, 2013 · 11:30 AM

Is There No Such Thing as Bad Publicity?

I am a huge fan of Wall Street Journal columnist Jason Gay. In all the world, only my brother Evan can make me laugh louder or harder. But his column today on the gawd-awful new basketball uniforms adidas has created for my beloved Jayhawks and other unfortuate D1 programs has me wondering if there really is “no such thing as bad publicity.” As a PR pro, I’ve long counseled clients to err on the side of caution when seeking attention.

“Better to keep silent and be thought a fool, than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.”

– Mark Twain

But lately I’m not so sure. As Gay points out in his column, by talking about adidas’ hideous new designs, he is in fact, achieving the publicity goals aiddas had in mind. Even if everyone and his brother (including mine) is ripping the new uniforms, we’re all talking about them.

And maybe that’s where we are as a society in the year 2013. Perhaps Oscar Wilde was right:

“The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.”

In an age where Honey Boo Boo, Duck Dynasty, the Kardashians, etc. are rich and famous and I scuffle along, perhaps I’m the outlier.

1 Comment

Filed under Issues Management, public relations, Uncategorized

Tagged as adidas, Jason Gay, Wall Street Journal

May 21, 2012 · 9:59 AM

Is Facebook Already Dead?

Facebook stock is trading around $33.50 a share as I type this post, down $4.50 from its Friday initial public offering price.

I don’t want to call myself Nostradamus, but the events of the past few weeks, along with this commentary from L. Gordon Crovitz in today’s Wall Street Journal reminded me of an item I posted just over two years ago.

My theory at the time was that Facebook someday would have to sell out its users’ (more than 900 million worldwide) personal data in order to become profitable. While this anticipated move is both logical and predictable, the user backlash will be strong, ugly and likely elicit government action that will slow

Crovitz’s opening joke says it all:

Q: Why did Facebook go public?

A: They couldn’t figure out the privacy settings either.

CNN recently aired/posted a story on “why people are leaving Facebook,” which cited five reasons why a growing number of people are deactivating their accounts:

Maintaining a professional image
Focusing on “real” communication
Shedding an emotional burden
Avoiding a time-waster
Maintaining personal privacy

Little wonder a recent Associated Press-CNBC poll indicates Facebook may be a passing fad.

My own prediction is that Facebook will become similar to a television network, attracting a smaller number of heavy users (probably women ages 24-45), and that many other demographic groups will abandon the network in favor of the next big thing.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Issues Management, Social Media

Tagged as Associated Press, CNBC, CNN, Facebook, Jump the Shark, L. Gordon Crovitz, Wall Street Journal

February 25, 2011 · 9:16 AM

Social Media Spreads More Than Soundbites

Peggy Noonan, the former Reagan speechwriter and Wall Street Journal columnist, shares an interesting counterpoint to the notion that social media is about sharing ideas in tidbits and 140-character clips.

In “The Internet Helps Us Get Serious,” she notes with optimism that the ability for politicians to engage in serious political and philosophical debate has been greatly enhanced by Web-based technologies—an important and often-overlooked counter trend to the mass media soundbite world we’ve been living in for the past few decades.

Noonan credits social media for enabling citizens to share and digest “serious speeches” that enable them to analyze and understand where our political leaders stand on key issues, and to make informed decisions based on this knowledge:

“People in politics think it’s all Facebook and Twitter now, but it’s not. Not everything is fractured and in pieces, some things are becoming more whole. People hunger for serious, fleshed-out ideas about what is happening in our country. We all know it’s a pivotal time.”

Often, we in the communications business get so caught up in creating a clever headline or breaking off a quick Tweet in the hopes of garnering the attention that we forget to include the ideas that actually sell the product. And getting attention is a critical first step, as Alec Baldwin will tell you (starting at the 3:27 mark), but that doesn’t mean we should be afraid to put our ideas out there.

If you have 20 minutes worth of stuff to say, go ahead and put it out there…chances are good someone wants to hear what you have to say.

Just ask U.S. Senator Ron Johnson. Again from Noonan:

“[Johnson] was thinking of running for the Senate against an incumbent, Democratic heavy-hitter Russ Feingold. He started making speeches talking about his conception of freedom. They were serious, sober, and not sound-bitey at all. A conservative radio host named Charlie Sykes got hold of a speech Mr. Johnson gave at a Lincoln Day dinner in Oshkosh. He liked it and read it aloud on his show for 20 minutes. A speech! The audience listened and loved it. A man called in and said, ‘Yes, yes, yes!’ Another said, ‘I have to agree with everything that guy said.’ Mr. Johnson decided to run because of that reaction, and in November he won. This week he said, ‘The reason I’m a U.S. senator is because Charlie Sykes did that.’ But the reason Mr. Sykes did it is that Mr. Johnson made a serious speech.”

Don’t discount what you have to say. The people who care want to hear you.

1 Comment

Filed under Issues Management, Listening, Social Media

Tagged as Charlie Sykes, Facebook, Peggy Noonan, Ron Johnson, Twitter, Wall Street Journal

December 20, 2010 · 10:35 AM

Who’s Watching Whom? Do We “Deserve” Privacy at All?

As a marketing guy, I like the concept of being able to send a targeted ad directly to the consumers most likely to respond to my message.

And according to the Wall Street Journal, DirecTV is about to do just that, offering household-specific ads based on demographic data collected by “reputable” third parties. (I find the use of the word “reputable” disturbing, as it implies there are all sorts of dastardly entities out there tracking your ever move and offering up your deepest secrets to the highest bidder.)

DirecTV says households will be assigned a code, which does not correspond to the set-top boxes that will collect and “select” the appropriate ad that will be shown to a particular household. And I believe them.

But this won’t stop Congress and other inquiring minds from exploring the privacy issue ad naseum. And I suppose that’s their job.

Where does commerce end and privacy begin? Especially when we’re so interested in letting the world know the minutest details of our lives via Facebook and Twitter? Do we “deserve” privacy anymore?

2 Comments

Filed under Listening, Return On Investment

Tagged as DirecTV, privacy, Wall Street Journal

October 11, 2010 · 8:35 AM

People Better than Algorithms, Except When We’re Faking It

An item from this morning’s Wall Street Journal, which makes for an interesting read when contrasted with an article published by the Boston Globe last week.

Today, Facebook Vice President of Product Chris Cox speaks in an interview about Facebook’s plans to allow its users to drive the future of the social networking site—through tools such as the recently introduced “groups” and “places” features—rather than relying on computer algorithms that analyze and organize content to meet the same end. Cox calls this approach “social design.”

This is admirable and makes sense, except that so many of us have used Facebook to merely “manage” our relationships rather than seek genuine connection with our fellow man.

As Joanna Weiss points out in her Op-Ed from last Tuesday, the information we choose to share to the rest of the world via Facebook is often merely a front that helps us package ourselves the way we hope to be seen, rather than as we truly are. As a result, our online relationships are pretty flimsy.

If that’s the case, then perhaps computers, that are unencumbered by human frailties and self-deceptions, may in fact provide us with a better gauge of what’s truly important to us based on how we act rather than what we think we believe.

Sort of like when you ask someone if they’d be willing to take mass transit to help save the environment, most folks will answer in the affirmative…until Monday morning rolls around and they’re late for work and they’ve got a million things to do and their car is right there in the garage.

I applaud Facebook’s thinking, but wonder if human beings are as reliable as we think we are. And if we’re all going to be fake online anyway, wouldn’t it be a lot easier to let the computers do the thinking for us?

1 Comment

Filed under Listening, Social Media

Tagged as Boston Globe, computers, Facebook, fake, social design, Wall Street Journal

September 23, 2010 · 6:54 AM

Customer Service in the Trenches

Sue Shellenbarger’s column in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal offers some interesting data on the challenges facing our brave men and women at customer service centers across America.

According to a 20007 survey of more than 1,000 consumers conducted by Customer Care Measurement & Consulting of Alexandria Va., “70 percent of customers who have problems with a product or service are in a rage by the time they talk with customer-service workers; 24 percent yell, eight percent threaten to sue, and five percent start cursing.”

And that was back in ’07, when the economy was still fairly robust. Imagine what it’s like today when one in ten workers is out of a job and our nation is angrier than ever.

One can reasonably assume that this fever pitch is at least partially attributable to the piped-in muzak and assurances that “your call is very important to us” that one must endure for eternity while waiting to speak to an actual person.

Among the stats from the Customer Care Measurement & Consulting survey that I find most interesting:

While only one in four consumers stated their reason for calling was to secure financial compensation related to their complaint and a little over half (57 percent) demanded their money back, nearly three out of four (72 percent) called merely to express their anger and tell their side of the story.

Seventy percent wanted an apology and 69 percent wanted a “thank you for your business.”

In short, they wanted someone to listen to and appreciate them. (Don’t we all?)

And that’s tough work. According to the story, turnover at customer service centers ranges from 25 to 300 percent per year. Maybe that’s why companies today do such a poor job of serving their customers.

It’s tough work. It’s expensive. It’s a pain in the ass.

But it’s also something your customers value, and it’s something that most consumers will reward in the long run.

Are you committed?

Leave a Comment

Filed under Listening

Tagged as anger, Customer Care Measurement & Consulting, customer service, Wall Street Journal

September 20, 2010 · 8:32 AM

Who’s Watching Your Children?

Two stories on the issue of online privacy (or the lack thereof) from the Wall Street Journal of note. One today, the other from Friday. If you’re a parent, I urge you to check out the latter.

It’s probably no surprise that companies in the $23 billion online advertising industry are keenly interested in where you go and what you do online, and they’re developing all manner of new “super cookies” (my term) to track you. These new cookies, it is alleged, can re-generate themselves even after they’ve been deleted from your computer.

The Journal reports that at least six lawsuits have been filed since July in U.S. District Court in the Central District of California, claiming that these practices violate the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

Of course, your cable company already knows which television shows you watch, and your internet service provider probably knows where you’ve been surfing, and you can bet that they’re using this data to help advertisers target their messages more effectively.

In all cases, the parties involve state loudly and clearly that they do not share an individual’s data with outside entities; they merely offer anonymous aggregated data that is then used to deliver targeted advertising.

One area of special concern is the fact that commonly-visited children’s sites, including Snazzyspace.com and Shockwave.com, carry significantly more tracking tools than sites commonly used by adults.

The Journal examined 50 sites popular with U.S. teens and children to see what tracking tools they installed on a test computer. As a group, the sites placed 4,123 “cookies,” “beacons” and other pieces of tracking technology. That is 30% more than were found in an analysis of the 50 most popular U.S. sites overall, which are generally aimed at adults.

What’s of special concern to me, is that one of the sites investigated, “y8.com—featuring kids’ games with names like “Crush the Castle 2″ and “Dreamy Nails Makeover”—that has had ties to a pornography site, xnxx.com, according to Internet registration records. Y8 installed 69 tracking files on the Journal’s test computer. It also asks users to provide an email address to register.”

For me, that’s enough to keep me awake at night, as I am the parent of a 3-1/2-year-old who already enjoys playing Webkinz with her great aunt and will soon be using computers at school.

Wall Street Journal columnist (and mother of two) Rachel Emma Silverman has a blog post on the subject today. I encourage anyone concerned about children’s online privacy to comment.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Listening, Social Media

Tagged as children, cookies, online tracking, Rachel Emma Silverman, Wall Street Journal

August 27, 2010 · 3:03 PM

USA Today Overhaul Could Prove Successful if They Can Learn from UK’s Daily Telegraph

USA Today today announced a massive overhaul of the 28-year-old national newspaper’s operations, including a 9 percent reduction in the workforce,beginning this fall.

While fewer news gatherers isn’t necessarily a good thing, I do see hope in the way McPaper is restructuring its operations, as a similar 2007 restructuring helped catapult the U.K.’s Daily Telegraph into one of Great Britain’s most successful news organizations.

According to the story by AP reporter Michael Liedtke:

USA Today…will no longer have separate managing editors overseeing its News, Sports, Money and Life sections.The newsroom instead will be broken up into a cluster of “content rings” each headed up by editors who will be appointed later this year.

“We’ll focus less on print … and more on producing content for all platforms (Web, mobile, iPad and other digital formats),” according to a slide show presented Thursday to USA Today’s staff. The AP obtained copy of the presentation.

This is a good move for USA Today and one that should reap benefits for its parent company, Gannett Co., and for readers (many of whom have transitioned to reading news online anyway).

A 2008 study, “A New Model for News,” conducted by the Associated Press and the Context-Based Research Group, found (big surprise), that younger consumers increasingly accessed news and content via the web and mobile devices, and in multimedia formats.

As a result of this study, the AP conducted a thorough review of its own organization and implemented changes in not only the way it reported stories, but also in the speed with which information hits the wires and the web.

Additionally, the study touted the success of the Daily Telegraph, who began using a newsroom structure similar to that of a television station, enabling its team to quickly publish breaking news online, while at the same time allowing for more in-depth coverage of “big” stories both online and on its printed broadsheet, which has essentially become a “greatest hits” collection of stories from the previous day’s news cycle. The AP study reports:

“In a year’s time, the Telegraph has become the third most-visited national newspaper Web site in Britain – 17 million unique users visited Telegraph.co.uk in March 2008, compared to 7.2 million in March 2007.”

The study also found that the Telegraph has been able to extend a reader’s time on the Web site, allowing for “more targeted and contextual advertising and consequently generate more revenue.”

I do not anticipate USA Today ever reclaiming its status as the nation’s top-circulating newspaper (a title it recently lost to the Wall Street Journal), but if they manage their reorganization successfully, I do expect to see an increase in advertising revenues and that the paper will remain a force in American news for a long time to come.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Return On Investment, Social Media

Tagged as Associated Press, Daily Telegraph, USA Today, Wall Street Journal

July 22, 2010 · 2:09 PM

The Vast Conspiracy Against the Truth

Two items of note this week. The first is the whole Shirley Sherrod scandal, profiled here in a piece on The Huffington Post. The second is this op-ed from Fred Barnes in today’s Wall Street Journal.

Shirley Sherrod, until this week anyway, worked for the USDA administering government assistance to farmers in Georgia. Recently, a conservative blogger posted a snippet of video in which Ms. Sherrod appears to be disparaging whites and suggesting that she intentionally withheld assistance to white farmers based on their race, setting off a media firestorm which led to her being fired. As new facts arose, journalists and political commentators on the left railed against Fox News and others for fanning the flames without presenting all of the facts in the case. (The Huffington piece listed above includes links to YouTube videos of Ms. Sherrod’s speech in its entirety, as well as the widely circulated clip that led to her dismissal from the USDA.)

Today, Barnes picks up on a story first reported by Tucker Carlson’s Daily Caller back in June: that a listserv called JournoList includes a thread of messages in which liberal journalists discuss the possibility of conspiring to label opponents of then-Presidential candidate Obama as racists and to deflect news of Obama’s connections to Chicago preacher Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

So one could argue that journalists on both the right and left are having a field day catering to their audiences and feeding America’s “us vs. them” anger. (I can distinctly remember when “us” was Americans and “them” was the terrorists, but I digress.)

In this environment, how can the average person believe anything she sees, reads or hears?

But wait. It gets worse.

With all the bickering and half-truthing back-and-forth, our government has decided to weigh in.

As Jeffrey Folks reported recently:

“Discussions underway at the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission point toward a dangerous new effort to regulate what Americans read and hear. The takeover under discussion would apply across the board to print media, radio and television, and the internet. The result of proposed regulations would be nothing less than an end to free speech in America.”

You can read a copy of the FTC’s “staff discussion” HERE. But the long and the short of it is that our government (who knows what’s best for us all…sarcasm intended…is seeking ways to introduce “balance” and “fairness” in the news.)

All of this reminds of me of when my brother and I used to fight as kids and my Dad would threaten to beat us both if we didn’t knock it off.

At the end of the day, you still have two crying kids and a Mom with a headache.

What does this mean for those of us seeking to get our messages into the marketplace in a meaningful, credible way?

Don’t trust the news media to get it right.
Don’t trust the government to make it better.
Make sure you tell your own story, tell it well and make your story readily available.
Then connect your news and information directly to the people who matter through your social networks.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Uncategorized

Tagged as FCC, Fox News, Fred Barnes, FTC, Huffington Post, Shirley Sherrod, The Truth, Wall Street Journal

Tag Archives: Wall Street Journal

Is There No Such Thing as Bad Publicity?

Who’s Watching Whom? Do We “Deserve” Privacy at All?

Customer Service in the Trenches

The Vast Conspiracy Against the Truth

Subscribe

Tags

Categories

The Author

Follow “Nation Ranch”