PR's Tarnished Reputation

The Curmudgeon is back after a few weeks off, although I’m a more grouchy than curmudgeonly at the moment, having just survived that annual nightmare known as Form 1040” in which we expose our deepest, innermost numerical shortcomings to the Internal Revenue Service so they can squeeze out every last penny. After finishing with this year’s version, I didn’t want to even look at anything with numbers for at least a week, including my cell phone and computer.

However, after watching way too many political speeches where all the world’s ills are neatly solved in a five second sound bite, I finally reached the end of my patience this evening, when Sen. Obama proclaimed that he wasn’t going to rely on politics based on “PR and spin,” instead he would have a government “based on straight talk” (speech broadcast on CNN March 1, 2008,). If Obama is such a proponent for change, someone who won’t rely on the same old tired methods, then why is he falling back on the same old hackneyed practice of (incorrectly) equating public relations with lies and cover ups. And worse yet, why are we allowing it to continue happening?

If this slam were directed at any other profession (well, except for lobbyists, perhaps) the members of said profession would be up in arms – and maybe even legs – denouncing the person who made the slam. Outraged letters would be written, protests would be made, followed by the standard public apology. But for some reason the denizens of the public relations world have remained silent throughout – in fact, in all the years I’ve worked in public relations, for all the times I’ve heard “PR ploy” tossed around as the media’s favorite pejorative, I’ve never once heard anyone from the profession defend us. Why is that, I wonder?

In light of slams like these, a few weeks ago I sent an email to the chair of PRSA’s Advocacy Committee, essentially pointing out the poor public reputation of the profession and asking what, if anything, PRSA was doing to deal with this problem. Not too surprisingly, I have yet to receive a response. Neither PRSA nor its counterpart, IABC, seem to feel the need to address this issue, and to be honest, without a major, concerted effort I doubt that it would do any good. We as practitioners have remained mute while allowing the press and others to portray the profession as one step removed from the [insert your most hated profession here]. We have also contributed to PR’s tarnished reputation by failing to educate the public on just what public relations actually is, instead letting Lizzie Grubman-types become the public face of the profession. Lest you think I’m blaming PRSA and IABC for the current state of affairs, we as individual practitioners share the responsibility as well. Every time we fail to conduct valid evaluation of PR activities, every time we let someone incorrectly us PR as a pejorative, every time we fall back on the old “PR is an art, not a science” argument, every time we – in essence – tell executives to “trust us,” that PR is working, we are every bit as responsible for the sorry reputation of our profession.

So the next question is: What are we going to do about it?

Super Bowl Silliness

It's that time of year again, when all the silliness and hoopla over the Super Bowl ads - who, how much, how avante garde, who wins the battle of the ads - invades the media, completely stampeding over the fact that, gasp! be still my heart! an actual football game is being played. That is, of course, if you can find the game in the midst of all those parties, specials, Ironman Award shows, Madden Awards show, and the endless jockying of everyone, everywhere to find some tie-in to the main event. The Animal Planet cable channel is once again holding it's Puppy Bowl for the non-football TV viewers. All the news channels have segments about Super Bowl parties, what to cook, who to invite, etc., etc. As a football fan, I am particularly curmudgeonly over all the extraneous stuff, particularly the day of, as once again the host network will spend the entire day dissecting everything remotely connected to the game. Can we just shut up and watch the game? Please? Ok, so no, we can't.

As the noise about the cost of Super Bowl ads starts to grow as we get nearer to the main event, I've started wondering if any executives at these companies have actually stopped to ask one really simple question: Do these ads actually accomplish what they are supposed to do? In other words, DO THEY SELL THE PRODUCT? When advertising becomes entertainment, do they still sell? For instance, I though the best commercial last year was Blockbuster's Carl and Ray in "How to Use a Mouse" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFLS_RexrWA. It was cute, it was funny, it was memorable and a YouTube hit ... but I haven't set foot inside a Blockbuster before or since, and probably won't. I don't remember any of the other commercials, except that Emerald Nuts contributed its usual dumb ads (which the ad people loved - go figure) and I waited the whole game for a new Budweiser Clydesdale ad, which never showed. But none of the ads I saw gave me the slightest urge to spend so much as a penny. It's entertainment - fiction, which means "not real". Which means I don't spend money on products that aren't real. I just watch the entertainment. But do I remember it the next morning? Not really.

Grant Johnson, of Johnson Direct, LLC, http://johnsondirect.wordpress.com/2007/11/01/super-bowl-ads-near-sell-out-why/ put his finger right on my point of contention (plus he said it before I did, so he gets the credit):

"It will come as no surprise to readers of this blog that I am not a fan of “killer” creative, which seems to dominate Super Bowl advertising. Nor do I agree with those who try to convince us that “buzz” is a desirable result of advertising. “Biz” is a measurable result, and buzz without biz is just noise ... Successful advertising is about relevancy. It’s about selling your product. It’s not about some schmo standing at the water cooler on Monday morning saying “Hey, Dude … did you watch the ads on the Super Bowl yesterday?”

Like Al Ries in his "The Death of Advertising and the Rise of PR" book, both Johnson and I have a "distinct problem" with the "creative” types who persuade their clients that creative awards and buzz are the measure of advertising success. I quite simply don’t agree creativeness and/or buzz does not necessarily equal sales. It simply equals buzz, and the public relations is just as guilty of this as advertising. Publicity does not equal public relations, no matter how much coverage is generated.

So should we do away with all advertising and special events? Not so fast. I still think there is a place for advertising and publicity. However, there needs to be a reason for advertising, a reason for publicity, and there needs to be a way to determine if the reason was valid. In football, it's scoring more points than the other guys. In advertising and marketing, it's sales. In public relations, it's outcomes: behavioral or attitudinal change. The only difference between us is how we keep score, and in PR, keeping score seems so much more difficult than in advertising or marketing, but that's no excuse for not doing so.

Now, lest you think I'm some sort of super measurement guru, think again. Like most PR professionals, I'm a wordsmith, and a former English lit major, which means I can discourse beautifully on present perfect and dangling participles. And like most wordsmiths, I am allergic to numbers and can barely balance my checkbook. In fact, it is because I'm numerically intolerant that I'm so fascinated with the subject. How do we, as communications professionals, make strategic decisions on the tactics we use, and how do we determine if those choices worked? Because if we don't do it, some non-PR manager, most likely in marketing or sales, is going to make that decision for us, and we may not like the outcome.

Next time, I think I'll talk about naming rights - a topic I've been stewing over for quite some time. For now, on February 3rd I'm going to watch some mini-movies disguised as Super Bowl ads. I hear there's going to be a new Budweiser Clydesdale commercial. I'm looking forward to watching it ... with a glass of 15 year old Bruichladdich single malt scotch in hand. Till then, a Scottish toast ta ye:

Here’s to them... brought us this far
And to them we’ve yet to see,
Them that made us what we are
And them that we will be.

Slainte Mhor!

I've been remiss lately with this blogging stuff. I blame it on an overwhelmingly curmudgeonly mood, brought on by the winter weather, holiday letdown, and too much politics lately. It's been compounded by the discovery that my subconscious pulled a fast one on me, and prompted me to choose a very unoriginal name for my foray into new media. PR Curmudgeon turns out to be an unconscious rip off of a PR person whose writing I admire tremendously (although have never had the luck to meet face-to-face), Rich Barger, ABC, APR, www.cornerbarpr.com 's "Curmudgeon in Chief". If you've yet to read any of his articles, I strongly suggest that you get yourself over to the Bar to check them out. Rich, I'm nowhere near as talented, and can only blame failing brain cells and temporary premature senioritis for forgetting the title of "PR Curmudgeon" was already in your talented hands - I can only say that my subconscious is a great admirer of yours, which must explain why I picked this for a blog title (that and the fact that it was available). In all fairness I should change it, but I barely survived getting this thing set up in the first place - I doubt I'd survive another attempt undivorced. Better to just attribute, attribute, attribute (as my old high school college prep teacher Ted Quinn would say), and move on from here.

But back to the politics - there's been a couple of developments lately that have prompted me back to this blog (aside from guilt at blowing a New Year's resolution so quickly and a wish to avoid some much-needed housework and job hunting). These developments would be a position opening for Press Secretary for Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich listed in Ned Lundquist's Job-of-the-Week newsletter, and US GOP Presidential candidate Duncan Hunter's press conference announcing that he was NOT dropping out of the race, despite his dismal performance to date.

If you aren't familiar with Ned Lundquist's Job-of-the-Week newsletter (JOTW) and you work in public relations, then you haven't lived. So hie thyself to www.nedsjotw.com and check it out. Ned is another shining star in the PR firmament. Ok, enough with the blarney (what's the Scottish version of blarney? Haggis? Ah, well, whatever). ANYWAY ... a week ago JOTW listed the governor's press secretary position, and I considered applying for it. After all, I've just finished a 3+ years' stint as a full-time grad student, and am now in need of gainful employment to support a bouncing baby student loan in addition to my mortgage. So I thought about it - I thought about it REAL hard for 15 minutes or so before the next newscast about the governor's latest maneuver in the Chicago area mass transit chess game. At that point, I realized that I had no desire to place myself in the middle of that circus - politics requires someone with a better poker face than I possess - which then made me wonder: Can truly ethical PR professionals function in politics? Particularly the type of politics that flourishes in places like Chicago and Washington, D.C.? That and the fact that I was raised in Southern Illinois, a place where "Chicago" is a dirty word, and therefore know that there's an entire world beyond I-80.

I won't bore you with the details of the Blagojevich-Madigan spat that's been running longer than some TV series; you'll have to look up the details online yourself, and this Rick Pearson/Gary Washburn Chicago Tribune article is a good place to start: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0405130281may13,1,4716215,full.story. I just don't think I could resist the urge to laugh at some of the pronouncements that come out of the assorted governmental offices that I read each day. And lest you think I'm anti-politics, think again: In my 40+ years, I've only ever missed voting in one election, primary or general, that I was eligible to vote in, and that was a primary one where a) there weren't any meaningful, contested elections to vote in, and b) I spent election day trying to get home on an alternative flight after the first one had been canceled. Late last fall, I even tried volunteering for a local Congressional race in my district. That lasted about two weeks, even though I didn't progress beyond stuffing envelopes and putting together a media list - my offer of one day a week (generous, I thought, given that I was approaching finals week for my MBA) turned into a "why didn't you work 24 hours a day all weekend long to get us this media list by 8 am Monday" situation. I resisted the urge to point out the fact that my offer to provide them with my Mondays each week meant that the rest of the week was booked with such trivial things as term papers, exams and studying, and politely excused myself from further involvement. If there's one thing I've learned, it's that Illinois politics is a full-contact sport that would put rugby to shame. So what does that say about political communicators? Are politics and communications ethics mutually exclusive (sorry, but I just can't call it political PR when I don't see anything other than publicity in it)? If anyone can show that it isn't, I'm all ears. Truly. Really.

Now to the more interesting aspect of political communications this week: Duncan Hunter's press conference announcing that besides corporate news attempts to shut him out of the race, he was announcing his intention to remain in the race. This caught my attention because, after my first reaction - Duncan Who? - my second reaction was a slow awareness that he appeared to be right - the news media had decided who the interesting candidates were (Obama, Clinton, Edwards, Giuliani, Thompson, Huckabee, Romney and McCain) based on the human interest aspect, and had ensured through neglect that the others were shut out (Gravel, Dodd, Paul, Kucinich, Cox, Richardson) and never had a chance. Just how much influence should we as citizens allow the media to have over our candidate choices in elections, and what alternatives are there for finding out about others? I confess I never did (and still don't) understand what the big deal was with Howard Dean's "scream" last time around. So what? On the basis of a few notes higher in the octave you're going to sink a perfectly viable candidate? How shallow of a country are we? Or am I just totally out of touch?

I do understand Rep. Duncan Hunter's stance, having spent the morning prior to his press conference listening to the talking heads on CNN (which was apparently the only major media channel to cover the press conference live) talking about his "withdrawal" from the presidential race and the whys and wherefores, only to be made to look like idiots when instead of dropping out he blistered the "corporate media" for shutting him out of the public airways. Hunter blasted ABC and Fox for excluding him from their debates the previous weekend, blaming "some knucklehead, arrogant corporate executives" for the decision, and pointing out that unlike candidates Giuliani and McCain, who did participate, he actually had some delegates before the debates took place. If you want to read more, as a starting point try

http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/politics/duncan_hunter_is_sick_of_knucklehead_executives_74422.asp.

It does make you wonder just how much of the political process we've surrendered to media gatekeepers, doesn't it? Although the American political process has been dominated by adroit use and abuse of the press since the Founding Fathers engaged in it 200+ years ago. If you still believe the Founding Fathers were pure, upstanding, and noble in pursuing freedom for the original 13 colonies, you need to recheck your American history. I'd suggest starting with Patriots: The Men Who Started the American Revolution, by A.J. Langguth, then going to Infamous Scribblers, by Eric Burns, with a detour into the Bantam Classic Books collection of The Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay, with an introduction by Gary Wills. You'll come away thinking today's politics a little bland, I guarantee.

So for now it's back to hunting for a job, now that I've eliminated any future chances as a press secretary. I think I'll leave that to the professionals.

Blogging as a National Security Risk

OK, so blogging is a national security risk - can someone explain that to me? I'm watching CNN, and they are inteviewing Ahmed al-Omran, a friend of the imprisoned Saudi blogger. Mr. al-Omran is making the argument that bloggers should identify themselves publicly. Yet he turns around and says that it's wrong for imprisoning bloggers, then goes on to imply that al-Farhan shouldn't have written what he did, and that bloggers do risk their freedom based on their choice of topic in Saudi Arabia. I confess I had trouble following his circular logic.

He does have a valid point, however: Bloggers should have the courage of their convictions and freely admit their identities, if they are going to take a public stance on an issue. For politics, that could be dangerous, and in many countries, like Saudi Arabia and China, it can lead to imprisonment, torture, and death. In the US, it can lead to nutcases targeting your house and business, as in the Megan Meier/Lori Drew case. Up until now, I haven't posted my personal information, for a few reasons, primary among them is trying to decide how to balance my opinions with the need to guard against those who feel the anonymity of the Internet gives them license to do things that if done in person would most likely get them arrested. Plus, as a female, I am always aware of being a potential target when I walk on the streets, unlike most men of my acquaintance, and thus am much more concerned about personal security. In the best of all possible worlds, Internet mobs would not exist, rational discussion would rule the day, and Nancy Grace would allow her guests to complete a sentence instead of verbally tramping all over everything they are trying to say. But until this world becomes perfect (like that will ever happen!) free speech will be continually be oppressed by governments, including the US, and individuals will pay the price for expression opinions contrary to those in power. After all, according to Bush and Cheney, I am a traitor, since I oppose their policies in Iraq and the limitless detentions at Gitmo.

I am more interested in whether or not Internet companies like Yahoo, AOL, Comcast, etc., should be obligated to provide identities of users who attack others in their posts and end up damaging their reputations, particularly those like the blog attacks against Circle Group Holdings a couple of years ago. The company was featured in Forbes Magazine, http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2005/1114/128.html, which profiled the company and its then-CEOs attempt to fend off what was essentially an Internet mob bent on destroying the company for no reason other than it could.

I suppose what I am getting at is this: Why are people so gullible? Why do they believe it because, Virginia, if you read it online it must be so? Are we really that naive? And if we are that credulous, and if a segment of the population is that vicious, should we legislate away the anonymity of the Internet, either in whole or in part? In Circle Group's case, should the SEC begin regulating this aspect of the Internet? Just how far should free speech extend in this new world?

Dragged Into the 21st Century - Kicking and Screaming

OK, I confess - I'm a 20th Century kinda person. I like the feel of paper in my hands, so eBooks are most likely not in my future. I've owned an iPod for over a year (2006's Christmas present) and have yet to put a song on it - heck, I'm not quite sure I even know where it is at the moment, much less how to turn it on. My video gaming stopped at Pong and Breakout, but I'll pass on those for a really good pinball machine. So learning to blog is like going from a Model T to an Indy car in one leap. I know its something I need to do, particularly if I'm going to keep up with all these wet-behind-the-ears junior account execs with their freshly minted degrees, but that doesn't mean I'm comfortable with it. But then, I had to be cajoled into getting married, and I've survived that, very happily, for nearly 10 years now - so new experiences aren't all bad, I suppose. I even got an MBA from an online university - and is that ever a topic to blog about!

I've come to believe blogs and the Internet are potentially a dangerous thing. I'm originally from the St. Louis area, and I've been following the Megan Meier suicide story closely, particularly the involvement of the bloggers. While I agree that the deception perpetrated against Megan was truly vile, and the behavior of the adults involved in setting up the fake "friend" was childish in the extreme, what really has me concerned is the actions and words of several of the Internet posters - if that is the correct term.

The "Send" button is the most dangerous part of these dangerous things. We really don't realize just how dangerous they can be until after we've pressed them and realized we shouldn't have; that there's no way to take back the risque joke or R-rated photo we've just sent to the person we'd rather not have - the prospective boss, the current boss, or worse yet, Mom. So I'm wondering, just how much of what I think about is safe to share? Inside our minds is the last resort of privacy, but once we've typed merrily along and then hit the "Send" button, even that vestige of privacy is gone if someone is determined enough to find you. And common courtesy? That seems to fly out the window, given some of the vicious comments I've read.

The postings about Megan's death ranged from thoughtful to rabid, with people practically frothing at the mouth, urging death and destruction on the parents who set up the fake Internet friend, particularly the mother. While the Internet is a wonderful tool for communicating, it has the potential to be used to harm others indiscriminately. This woman's business has been destroyed, she and her family have been ostracized, and various acts of vandalism have been committed against her house and property. While I have little sympathy for her, I find troubling the level of venom aimed at this woman and her family behind the anonymity of the Internet. The local community paper refrained from naming her out of concern for her underage daughter, but bloggers managed to dig out the information and broadcast her name, business name, address, phone number and customers' names and phone numbers. The resulting attacks have been fairly serious, including destroying her advertising business. I have to wonder how many of these attacks would have been made without the anonymity of the Internet to hide behind?

So I'm going to try this blogging thing out without virtual training wheels and see what happens. As a fifteen year PR veteran, I've accumulated some strong opinions on the current state (or lack thereof) of the profession. I'm also an inverterate people watcher and a born cynic, so in the coming days I'll begin meandering around the corporate world, musing about the mess most corporations and their execs are in with regards to PR, marketing, integrated marketing communications (now there's an oxymoron!), strategic communications, the future of the Internet, and whatever else happens to catch my eye. Comments are welcome, as long as the're rational, polite and intelligent - as an official Curmudgeon, I will enjoy obliterating any nasty, stupid or off-color posts.

So hold on, and buckle your seatbelts, folks, it's going to be a bumpy ride! (Thank you, Bette Davis!)