Archive for October, 2007
By Kyle Austin
Chris Anderson the Editor-in-Chief of Wired, made famous for coining the term “Long Tail,” recently made news (Albeit Valleywag news) by making public his blacklisting of 300 PR folks for sending unsolicited email.
His public outing followed popular blogger Marshall Kirkpatrick (Perhaps David’s long lost brother) outing 5 PR pros for bad pitches a week earlier.
Mark Frauenfelder at boingboing is also blacklisting “PR Flacks,” although he’s opting for a slightly classier non-public outing.
Not that the tactic of publicly scorning PR professionals is something new – We’ve all been somewhat fearful of appearing on the Bad Pitch Blog for some time now.
In fact Kevin Dugan at the Bad Pitch Blog sorts through the clutter and brings to light the real story here. Mass email blasts and mail merges are DEAD. You can argue all day on if you think Chris is right or wrong for making this email list public. I for one think he is wrong in listing specific email addresses (individual folks).
The point is the media, not just the blogosphere, has become extremely fragmented. New journalistic beats pop up everyday. The job of the public relations professional can no longer be described as a disseminator of news. PR pros today that “get it” have become akin to sommeliers – holding a deep understanding of each individual journalist, blogger and media outlet while also understanding the needs and desires of their clients.
The result: A perfect combination of Humanitas 2006 Monterey Sauvignon Blanc with pesto chicken.
Or in this case: A Briefing for your client with the ideal reporter at Wired without your name appearing on Chris Anderson’s blacklist.
October 31st, 2007
By George
Journalists often have a difficult time understanding the impact of a news article on the people they have interviewed for it. As a former newspaper reporter and now a PR executive, I have written hundreds of articles and have also been quoted in a few – most notably in my role as an occasional spokesperson for One Laptop Per Child.
So I feel like I can offer some insight that might help journalists do a better job of communicating with business executives.
The sensation of seeing your name in print is a disconcerting one for most people. It’s a thrill, but there’s also a sense of helplessness – a loss of control, especially when an executive feels like the journalist didn’t capture the essence of what they said. Unfortunately, this happens much more often than journalists would care to admit.
The problem lies in part on the inadequate job journalists do in preparing the people they are interviewing for the actual interview. Reporters often assume that people understand the process of researching, interviewing, and finally writing news articles when, in fact, most people have no idea how it works (which is why they hire public relations firms like Racepoint Group).
Here are a few mistakes I think journalists often make and ways I believe they can correct them.
- Vacuum Interviewing: Reporters hate sharing the list of people they plan to interview for a particular story – which is ridiculous, but often guarded like a state secret. Interviews shouldn’t occur in a vacuum and sharing that information can put the story in context for interviewees. Since it will public information as soon as the story is published – why the hesitancy to share? If a source is speaking on the on-the-record then reporters should provide that information if asked for it.
- The Undiscovered Blog: Many journalists now double as bloggers. If they blog they should be up front about that with the interview subject. It’s unfair for a reporter to interview an executive about topic A and then blog freely about topic B, which may have been a discussion during a side conversation after the main interview concluded. Many executives see this behavior as underhanded and a betrayal of trust. A simple statement of: “I’m interviewing you for topic A, but I also have a blog and any other information we discuss today might be published there.”
- Fear of Ignorance: Reporters – especially young ones – can be intimidated when interviewing a seasoned executive. They’re afraid of appearing unprepared or ignorant of a particular topic. As a result, they pretend to understand a complicated technology or partnership relationship, when, in fact, they don’t. Stopping an interview to have something explained in detail is smart reporting. “Getting it” matters. That way when the story is published, the information is accurate.
- Playing Gotcha: Younger executives tend to babble during an interview with a reporter. They’re nervous after all. As a result, they sometimes share information that they aren’t supposed to. If an interview subject asks for a data point to be retracted – and it’s not a crucial piece of information necessary for the story – why not let them do so? I don’t know how many times, I’ve heard a reporter say: “But he said it” as an excuse to use information like this. It’s one reason why executives dislike talking to reporters.
A good rule of thumb for reporters is simply to be reasonable. Interview subjects aren’t the enemy. And, yes, they have an agenda – promoting their company and their products – but it’s that agenda that keeps them talking with journalists in the first place.
October 30th, 2007
By Carla
Whether good or bad, YouTube allows virtually anyone to become a star overnight. Point and case: Tay Zonday’s ever so popular “Chocolate Rain” has garnered 10.5 million views to date and references on Carson Daly’s Last Call and The Daily Show not to mention a live performance on Jimmy Kimmel Live.
Photo is courtesy of Wikipedia
With the ease of communication and technological advances however, comes a whole new set of legal issues including the ever so controversial IP infringement. And at the moment it is a blurry line that publishers, the music industry and law makers are navigating to find appropriate ways to enforce current IP laws. I attended a recent conference hosted by Boston University’s School of Law and College of Communication where one of the principle speakers, Gigi Sohn, co-founder of Public Knowledge and an internationally known communications attorney, posed several changes to the current copyright law. She noted, “copyright law has become out of touch with our technological reality to the detriment of creators and the public.”
One of the examples of this disconnect that Gigi provided was the current debate of Google’s Book Search program, which allows anybody to search for passages in books that are part of Google’s system. Book publishers argue that by making a digital copy of the book Google is violating their copyrights. On the flip side, if a library is paying for the book in the first place and users aren’t able to see the entire book, then it shouldn’t be a violation. If the court sides with the authors, I agree that this would hinder future technological advancements, as Gigi rightly projects; “imagine if Google, Yahoo, Ask and MSN had to get prior permission from every single webpage owner whose works they link to!”
Lawmakers aren’t faced with an easy task. Laws need to be written that better suit today’s current digital world while still protecting the content creator. From NBC Universal alone, YouTube receives about 1,000 takedown notices a month! Recently, several of the larger media companies including Viacom, Walt Disney and Microsoft agreed to use technology to eliminate copyright-infringing content—however I question the effectiveness of the technology. One court outcome that inevitably will affect the industry is Viacom’s $1 billion suite against YouTube. If content creators aren’t rightfully compensated for their work, the quality and amount of creativity is likely to decrease. In the end, it is the consumer’s dollars that are going to have the largest impact. iTunes massive digital sales have already shown the consumer’s distaste for a $17 CD.
October 29th, 2007
ESPN pulled the plug on their cell-phone product after investing $150m including $40m in advertising. This is precisely the failure market research is intended to prevent. How can business harness customers and prospective customers to improve their hit rate and time to market?
The following simple figures demonstrate the difference between traditional market research and continuous engagement.
There are dozens of differences between the two approaches. Research is ad-hoc or at regular intervals whereas continuous engagement is, well, continuous. Research is one-way, and engagement is two-way. Research is devoid of any direct brand benefit (and research purists will claim this is beneficial) whereas continuous engagement inculcates brand loyalty. Here’s a list of the primary differences:
- Research is ad hoc or regular interval; engagement is continuous
- Research is one-way (+ prize or payment!); engagement is two-way (mutually rewarding)
- Research is unemotional; engagement is emotional
- Research is independent of loyalty; engagement inculcates brand loyalty
- Research has a tight focus; engagement has a wide focus
- Research deals with sequential parameters; engagement is multi-parametric
- Research is designed to achieve statistical confidence; engagement is designed to detect weak signals.
The disadvantages of traditional market research
Ad hoc or regular intervals
- Your last data set getting on a bit?
- Trying to read between the lines because the last survey didn’t ask exactly the question you now need answering?
- Is your market speeding up relative to your research frequency?
- Do you need to ask new questions, but want to continue trending previous survey data?
One-way
- What’s in it for your respondents?
- Ever wondered if they’re answering your questions conscientiously?
- Are they likely to benefit or suffer as a consequence of the information they share with you?
Unemotional
- Quite simply, do they care?
Independent of loyalty
- Ad hoc, one-way, unemotional interaction does not drive brand loyalty.
Tight focus
- How long can you keep them interested for the remote chance of winning an iPod?
- Once you’ve collected the demographics, how long remains to get to the crux?
- By what degree can you change the subject?
- How many times can you change the subject before their brain starts hurting?
Confidence
After all that, it’s no wonder you need some mathematics to determine the statistical confidence.
Social media
The best way to understand your customers, is to have a relationship with them. Online. On the mobile. In store.
Social media is defined on Wikipedia as:
“the democratization of content and the understanding of the role people play in the process of not only reading and disseminating information, but also how they share and create content for others to participate. It is the shift from a broadcast mechanism to a many-to-many model, rooted in a conversational format between authors and people”.
More simply, we define social media in the context here as:
“all integrated channels through which you can get people discussing you and your market, with each other and with you”.
Wide focus
Anything and everything is discussed by your customers in social forums. For each topic, you can choose to interact or just listen.
You can also seed the forums with topics relevant to your business tomorrow, not just today. Test their reaction. Harvest value-added feedback; qualitative and quantitative.
Multi-parametric
Traditional research addresses a limited sequence of parameters, whereas social media can embrace multiple parameters.
Nevertheless, your product roadmap may encompass hundreds of parametric permutations. In this instance, you could chose to present ideas based on “runs” (parameter groupings based on Taguchi orthogonal arrays) to your most loyal and valued social media participants.
Detect weak signals
Weak signals are easily overlooked in traditional research. But understanding how to identify the most authoritative members in your social media, and learning to listen to them, can place you weeks if not months ahead of your competition in timely new product launches.
New skills
Supplanting or supplementing market research with continuous engagement requires:
- A new strategy
- An implementation framework
- New analyses methods
- Sound corporate performance measurement to close the loop
For and against
Unsurprisingly, there are advocates and detractors from this point of view. Take an interview with Bill Neal of SDR Consulting for example:
“..But I have some real problems with consumer generated media as a source of credible and reliable information. In many ways it combines the worst elements of non-scientific research – self selection and advocacy – both positive and negative.
The information they generate may be true, or not true – there is no way to discern which. Therefore, the information generated by those folks is neither credible nor reliable.”
However, this perspective could not be more strongly countered by the assertions made in the Cluetrain manifesto:
“A powerful global conversation has begun. Through the Internet, people are discovering and inventing new ways to share relevant knowledge with blinding speed. As a direct result, markets are getting smarter - and getting smarter faster than most companies.
These markets are conversations. Their members communicate in language that is natural, open, honest, direct, funny and often shocking. Whether explaining or complaining, joking or serious, the human voice is unmistakably genuine. It can’t be faked.”
OK, continuous engagement may not signal the death of traditional market research, but it marks a distinct and influential turning point; a turning point leading companies are adopting today for competitive advantage.
October 29th, 2007
October 29th, 2007
By Kyle Austin
I have to admit I’ve been having fun with some contacts at the Wall Street Journal over “First Signs that Rupert is running the WSJ.” A few months back I was at the Wall Street Journal offices in New York with a client. While waiting, we were more then slightly amused that the one television in the lobby was already tuned to Fox News. In taking a lighthearted poke at the journalist we were briefing with, we brought it up.
Although she played it off as being jokingly outraged that they were airing Fox News, she was actually a bit mystified that they had already made the change from CNBC. However, she was pleasantly surprised that they had already started getting shipments of new furniture for the upstairs lobby – Only a month after the boards of the Dow Jones Co. and News Corp. had voted to finalize the deal.
First sign that Rupert is running the WSJ … Beer Pong is Page 1 – I wrote to a WSJ contact in San Francisco when this story was page 1 news on August 29th. He found it equally amusing.
Joking aside…We won’t see the first signs until December. And while the debate du jour has been “will he or won’t he get rid of the paid subscription model,” Mr. Murdoch outlined a few other plans that he has in store for the WSJ in an appearance at Web 2.0 yesterday.
Dan Farber of Cnet.com points to some of those plans here, as he quotes Murdoch’s conversation with John Battelle.
- Battelle asked Murdoch how the Dow Jones acquisition was going. “I don’t know. I haven’t paid for it yet. We”ll get it sometime in December. It’s a lock,” he said. He said he wants to add more international news and major coverage of arts, fashion and culture for the Wall Street Journal.
Come December we’ll see what those first signs really are and all joking aside (again) I think readers and investors will be excited by what they see.
October 18th, 2007
By Ben
This week CNN reported that political television advertising is expected to exceed $3 billion for this year’s presidential election. Not only could this be considered a tremendous waste of money (imagine what else could be done with this money), but there is an important question of whether or not this method of advertising is as effective as it used to be.
Stuart Rothenberg, editor of the non-partisan Rothenberg Political Report told CNN, “Chances are, just as what happened in 2006, voters will be numb after watching hundred and hundreds of ads. The sheer number of ads probably dilutes their importance. After a while, the ads just become lots of chatter and an ad will have to be really good to cut through the noise.”
First, as so many television viewers (like I do) record their favorite programs, less and less people are actually watching commercials and are instead fast-forwarding through them. The only time I actually do watch commercials is during a Red Sox or Patriots game – but they are usually the same ten commercials run over and over again. So in essence, many of these political commercials will be TiVo’d and skipped over – flushing a portion of that $3 billion down the toilet.
Second, is this the best way to win an election? Over the past four years there have been a lot of advances online (Facebook, YouTube, etc). Having a strong online presence seems to be just as important as having a commercial every thirty seconds that criticizes the opponent. I think this method proved to be unsuccessful during the Massachusetts gubernatorial race last year.
Although spending $3 billion that doesn’t belong to you could be considered fun, it seems that today’s candidates need to adapt better to the way people are using media. In 2004 when Facebook, MySpace, and YouTube were not as influential and mainstream as they are today, the presidential candidates spent $1.7 billion on television advertising. So why would they almost double this amount when less people are watching commercials and more people are online?
Perhaps a more effective example of how candidates can adapt to recent technology are the YouTube debates that recently took place. This allowed voters to submit questions for the debate through YouTube, and the actual videos were used during the debate – which created a much more interesting and unique way for voters to connect with the candidates – and cost a lot less then $3 billion.
I know that 98% of these advertisements will be recorded and skipped over on my TV. Will these commercials influence who you are voting for?
October 18th, 2007
By George
The debate about whether or not a journalist should blog is moot at this point. They blog – and will continue to blog in the foreseeable future.
But blogging can be a slippery slope for traditional journalists because blogging is about opinion and point of view while traditional journalism (at least in the United States) is about being impartial and balanced.
So when a reporter writes a balanced news story about a company and then blogs his opinions on the company – is she undermining her creditability?
That’s the big question.
Two recent episodes at Racepoint haven given us greater insight into the challenges journalists, PR consultants, and business executives face in the world of Press 2.0.
One of our technology executives was recently interviewed by a Boston Globe columnist. After the interview, the client and columnist engaged in small talk and the name of my boss, Larry Weber, came up. Our client and the columnist made a bet that Larry had his own blog.
He does not (and believes CEOs shouldn’t blog). The next day the columnist wrote a blog posting about Larry’s Phantom Blog. The executive was mentioned in the blog post, but not by name. Regardless, he sent an email explanation to Larry and said that he had no idea that the columnist planned on blogging about that part of the conversation.
(On a side note: the post playfully questioned Larry’s social media credentials because he doesn’t blog. From my perspective that’s like questioning the expertise of a football commentator because he’s never played in the NFL, refuting the creditability of an English professor to analyze a novel without having published one. It would also be like questioning whether business journalists should be allowed to write about business if they’ve never worked for one).
The second incident occurred in the spring when a journalist for the BBC wrote a story about another client. The BBC reporter talked to the client who had relayed some misinformation, which was dutifully written about. I called the reporter and asked for the information to be corrected.
I had a 30 minute conversation with the reporter. He insisted the team member “had said it” during the interview and that he was within his rights to report it. I agreed. But I told him the information was still wrong. Was it his job to parrot what he’d been told or to pass on accurate news to his readers? He finally agreed to issue a correction.
But in a box inside the body of the corrected news story he provided a link to his blog. In his blog, he discusses, in detail, my conversation with him and why, ultimately, he decided to correct the story. I wasn’t mentioned by name, but I had considered our telephone conversation private.
I still talk to this reporter and when I’m passing on information via email or telephone, I’ll humorlessly add a disclaimer about the conversation being private and not be used in blogging. I know it annoys him (which is part of the fun) – but I also believe that journalists need to inform people if they plan on blogging about a conversation.
We’ve also had cases at Racepoint where overeager bloggers have posted email pitches verbatim online. As I tell my colleagues – pitches aren’t news stories, but some bloggers apparently don’t understand that.
Blogs are a wonderful tool, but it’s still a new medium and the rules of engagement are still being hammered out. We’ll explore some of our ideas and recommendations for the new rules of engagement in future posts.
October 16th, 2007
By Kyle Austin
After indulging in a week long serving of Humble Pie I’m back and apparently so is the battle for the title of “Best Business Pub in the Land.”
Matthew Karnitschnig had an excellent feature on the rejuvenated rivalry in Friday’s Wall Street Journal (Sorry they’re still doing that paid subscription thing over there).
Karnitschnig does a good job in pointing to some of the new redesigns that the print editions of Fortune and BusinessWeek are undertaking while also taking a detailed look at the battle for winning Big Ad buyers - Something that has gotten increasingly difficult with the troubles in auto maker and real estate land.
The best part of the story -Those interviewed for the piece don’t mince words. James S. Berrien, president of the Forbes magazine group may have given the best bulletin board material.
- In the story Karnitschnig references a Publishers Information Bureau report that notes financial advertising pages across the board fell 7.3% in the first half of this year, while technology dropped 12.8%, and autos fell 4.5%.
- According to the study Forbes was the least affected by the fallout - down only 1.1% in ad pages. BusinessWeek and Fortune each saw ad pages drop by 20%, but they attributed Forbes marginal fallout to ad supported supplements and special sections that they did not include.
- This prompting Berrien to say “They ought to spend more time making ad calls than slinging mud.”
Conde Nast’s entrance into the market with Portfolio (Not TechVogue) has only half the circulation of the other books but as Karnitschnig notes it does have deep pockets and pre-established relationships with high-end advertisers.
David Carey, Portfolio publisher and group president with Condé Nast Business Media went on the record with Mediaweek for the first time in May when he gave some insight into the strategy for gaining market share from the incumbents.
At the time he sent some shockwaves through the industry by announcing that Porfolio’s first issue in April would be more then 300 pages - 150 of those pages being ads. The September (Monthly from here on out) and October issues were roughly the same size. Compare that with the most recent issue of Fortune (Probably the most similar in appearance) – 202 pages.
However, as I’m sure you’ve has heard by now. The early editorial reviews on the book have not been pretty. See Here. Former deputy editor Jim Impoco, who has since been fired by Portfolio editor Joanne Lipman, was instrumental (although I’m sure Conde Nast’s deep pockets had something to do with it) in bringing together an extremely talented group of writers including Kevin Maney of USA Today fame.
However, with Impoco no longer in the picture there seems to be growing dissent among the ranks. Case in point - Senior writer Katrina Brooker who was woo’d to Portfolio from Fortune last year; only to jump back to Fortune last month.
With all that said; the biggest uphill battle facing Portfolio will be in the online realm. Even if you’re covering business news at a “monthly” it has become a “daily” in terms of the internet.
When I sat down to lunch with David Kirkpatrick of Fortune last month the redesign of Fortune’s print edition didn’t come up once. What he was interested in was getting feedback on was how to better improve Fortune’s online destination. Specifically, he was looking for thoughts on how to make Fortune’s online columns more readily available and easier to register for.
As Karnitschnig notes in his piece - Fortune, which has bundled its online offering with CNNMoney.com (It will soon be re-branding Fortune.com) had 8.0 million unique visitors through September in year-to-date average while Forbes.com drew 7.5 million and BusinessWeek Online drew 2.8 million visitors. Karnitschnig and WSJ.com topped them all with 8.1 million unique visitors in year-to-date average through September. (Source: Nielsen/Net Ratings for “Top Online Financial News and Information Destinations.”)
Online IS the new forum for influencing through business journalism and you’d be hard pressed to find business writers at the monthlies that are willing to be left out of daily business drama. Business writers like David still enjoy writing the in-depth features for the print publication but they’ve become borderline obsessed with writing the daily exclusives to move markets.
With Portfolio clearly focusing on building the print publication rather then its online offering one wonders how long writers like Maney will stay content. He has started his “Tech Observer” blog on Portfolio.com but the number of online visitors likely won’t compare to what he was getting on his former USAToday.com blog.
Without support from the top to get audience numbers up online it will be tough for him and other online contributors on Portfolio.com to stay relevant in moving markets.
Portfolio.com did not draw enough online visitors through September (It was in beta mode up to August 23rd and only went live online in April) to register in the Top 15 of those Nielsen/Net Ratings for “Top Online Financial News and Information Destinations.”
This rejuvenation of the monthly/daily business battle between the three incumbents and the new player isn’t going away anytime soon and if this article is any early indication it will be fun to watch.
As TO would say “Getcha Popcorn Ready.”
October 16th, 2007
By Sydne
Last week the British rock band, Radiohead announced that they would let fans determine the price of their seventh studio album, “In Rainbows,” which was released yesterday. What’s even more interesting is that the band went completely against the grain and chose not to sell the album to iTunes, in order to sell the album in its entirety rather than song by song.
(Checkout screen)
This unusual yet bold move seems to challenge the typical music industry business model and it’s already catching on. Oasis and Jamiraquai are said to be considering whether to offer their music online for free, according to The Telegraph. Monday, Trent Reznor front man for Nine Inch Nails announced the band’s emancipation from Interscope Records – this after last month’s Sydney concert where Reznor advised fans on how to “steal” music to protest the high CD prices.
So what does this mean for the music industry? It has yet to be seen, however, this trend is not going away any time soon. Some say that the days of big record labels are numbered, others say that without big label’s help musicians will go back to singing for their supper. We’ll see.
Is this a music revolution? “It’s up to you.
October 11th, 2007
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