Brand Central Station

Ben Silverman writes (via his PR Fuel blog) about how an Alexandria, VA area school set a very public example of accountability and “doing the right thing” when it admitted to mistakenly serving alcohol as part of a school lunch.

PR Fuel – A Service of eReleases: School Teaches A Lesson In PR

Get in on this running firefight between PR pros Trevor Cook and Neville Hobson as they discuss the need to develop strategies quickly and act decisively. Hobson argues:

“It must all be done far more quickly than before. There is no time to take weeks. Even if you don’t have all the elements fully planned or factored, you have to move with what you have.

This really is the time when communicators must show their strategic value. CEOs don’t want perfection. They want business results, quickly.”

Corporate Engagement: Still time to do strategies?

That merry prankster, William Shatner, pulls one over on Riverside, Iowa (the future location – according to Star Trek fans – of the birthplace of Captain James Tiberius Kirk). Then again, how tough could it have been to prank the fine folks of Riverside? After all, these are people who parade around town dressed up as aliens and people from the future.

So, who’s spoofing who?

Adrants: William Shatner Plays Joke on Iowa Town For Reality Series

I’ll never forget the time I took a PR person into a meeting with a client who manufactured power-washers, drain cleaners, hoses and related equipment. We talked about his business and then introduced our new person and started explaining what she did.

Our client stopped me in mid-sentence: “Oh, we already do PR.”

I have to admit, I was a little surprised. I wasn’t aware of another agency in the relationship. I felt a bit betrayed.

Then the client called in his secretary and had her bring the latest edition of an industry “bible”. He thumbed through to the back of the book and tossed it onto the table. The magazine was opened to a page that contained a small, one paragraph blurb about a new product they had introduced. The image was the cover of a brochure we had produced for them.

“There you go.” he said. “We sent in the picture and a couple of paragraphs along with the brochure and we got this.” He pointed to the blurb.

I looked at my new PR person and she had a look of horror on her face. As if I could read her mind, I saw her at her graduation ceremony, accepting her diploma, thinking she was going to work on changing the world. Now she was faced with the cold, hard reality that – at least for this client – PR consisted of single paragraph product announcements in the back of trade journals.

But it doesn’t have to be that way.

I’m constantly working with businesses to help them understand the fundamental differences between advertising and PR. Primary to that, especially for B2B marketers, is developing an appreciation for what PR can really do for them.

First rule of thumb: PR is NOT just product or new literature announcements in the industry trades.

Jim Schakenbach, the president of SCT Group, has provided a succinct explanation of the differences between the two disciplines that warrants a closer look. But let me expand on things so B2B and industrial marketers can start to understand (and appreciate) why PR is important to their business’s future:

1.) PR is strategic by its very nature – this means you have to have a complete understanding of what’s important to your customer and the media in order to make it work. The homework required to create an effective PR program can yield incredible dividends when re-deployed through other sales and marketing channels.

2.) Advertising and PR work together – especially in the B2B world. Advertising assures share of voice. It gets you noticed. It makes your message worth paying attention to – not just by customers but by the journalists who read the trades as well. If you don’t advertise, your PR efforts will have a harder time taking root. If your name and brand are more easily recalled (through advertising frequency and creativity of message), you’ll find journalists to be more favorably inclined to take your calls, read your e-mails, etc.

3.) Product and literature releases are important – but they’re not the “end all” when it comes to press coverage. That rule also holds true for new employee announcements, retirements, management changes, etc. All of that communication is good – and it needs to be handled effectively. But any PR firm that is worth its salt will help set that up and run those announcements on “auto pilot” focusing, instead, on the news that really matters.

4.) PR does not stand for “Party Resources” Trade shows, employee parties, customer appreciation events, etc. are all important PR tactics – but if you’re only contact with a PR team is to help plan and orchestrate your special events, you’re missing out.

The challenge for most B2B marketers when it comes to dealing with PR people, however, is in the quality of the relationship. PR people are trained to ask “why” and that can get to be a bit grating on busy people who are often as engaged in new product development, finance and direct sales functions as well as marketing.

Just a word of caution – take your time and work patiently for understanding. You’ll find PR people to be tremendous counselors and advocates for your brand over the long haul. But since many of them are trained as journalists first, they come with an ingrained skepticism that can be misinterpreted on the corporate side. That skeptical objectivity, however, can definitely work to your advantage when dealing with an inquisitive press who view it as their job to find the “truth” in every story.

And once you’ve been able to find a way to connect with the journalists who cover your industry, you’ll find your importance to the media has risen far above a new product announcement.

Bacon’s Customer’s Resource Site

There is probably no more telling evidence of brand depreciation than if your business takes a position and no one cares. And that’s precisely the subject of Tim Porter’s recent article in the American Journalism Review.

Porter provides an in-depth analysis of whether or not newspaper endorsements of political candidates really matters any more. The conclusion? Besides a select few (primarily political junkies, habitual newspaper readers and the candidates themselves), the answer is that people don’t know and they don’t care.

In the last study conducted to determine the importance of newspaper endorsements (the 1996 election), nearly 1/3 of the readers of newspapers endorsing Bob Dole thought their paper had actually endorsed Bill Clinton. Over 10% of the readers whose newspapers had endorsed President Clinton thought their paper supported Dole’s run for the White House.

While this may be a timely topic for discussion today – after all, the next US presidential election is just a few weeks away – it can also form the foundation of a timeless discussion concerning the consistent erosion of brand equity faced by newspapers (specifically) and the news media (in general). After all, while newspapers continue the tradition of endorsing one political candidate or another, you don’t see other media stepping out to voice an opinion.

Although, really, would any of us be surprised by the candidates chosen by most of the major news outlets. Let me see, just who do you think FOX News would endorse for President? What about Dan Rather and CBS? Ok, so there may not be much suspense to these choices.

But, more importantly, we don’t expect television, radio or magazines to annoint a candidate for one reason or another. Why is that?

Get those college history books out, boys and girls. If you know anything about the tradition of the free press in America, you’ll find newspapers played an important role in building candidate credibility (and tearing down the opposition) since the time of Washington. The editorial endorsement is a mere shadow of that original genesis.

As late as the 1940′s, newspapers were railing against opposing politicos in front-page screeds, shabby investigative journalism and the like. Newspapers represented select communities and supported ideas, beliefs and attitudes that were fostered inside those communities.

But as newspapers merged and journalism strove to extricate itself from political influence (thanks in no small part to Richard Nixon and Watergate), you started to see newspapers become broader and less opinionated. Yes, that’s right, LESS opinionated.

Was this a good or bad thing? It was, by all accounts, an economic thing. Using economies of scale and monopolizing ad markets by being the only game in town, newspapers focused on generating profit and not necessarily creating an editorial “mission” or clear point-of-view. In the short term, that was great for IPO’s, bonus checks and employee profit sharing – but it took the teeth out of the brand.

And, worst of all, it opened the door to other medias to adopt the standard of “thought leader.”

Newspapers are paying for these mistakes now. But look no further than the editorial page and the power (or relative weakness) of editorial endorsements to see that brand value for more newspapers is barely negligible. Can they come back? That remains to be seen.

But the big challenges faced by newspapers when it comes to media diversity, the Internet and a 24-hour/7-day a week news cycle are small when compared to the decades of self-inflicted damage when it comes to brand credibility and value.

Do editorial endorsements count for anything anymore? To a precious few they do. But for the vast majority of Americans, they’ve already turned the page on newspapers for good.

Later.

American Journalism Review