Social Media: The Cocaine of Communications?

I`ve come across a very interesting view on social media, stated by Mirko Lange, head of Talkabout Communications. He says social media is the "cocaine" of communication, referring to a conversation between Bill Cosby and a friend of his:

Cosby: "Tell me, what is it about cocaine that makes it so wonderful?"

Friend: "It intensifies your personality."

Cosby: "But what if you`re an asshole?"

Now according to Lange, this applies to social media just as much: Using it, whether professionally or private, will enhance and intensify your personality (i.e. your brand`s or your company`s personality). If you are an asshole - don`t use it. It`s as simple as that.

Well, unfortunately only few people see themselves that clearly. So they`ll do it anyways. And I do think that even a negative reputation can be turned into a positive one through social media, through public engagement and transparency.

But for some reason it`s usually the corporations who have a negative image already - the shady big players - that manage to screw up something as easy as social media.

Why? Because they handle it exactly the way they used to handle traditional media: dumping information on a passive audience and performing one-way communication instead of dialogue. This is bound to fail, since passive audiences don`t exist anymore. They`ve turned into publics, and publics want to be engaged.

We`ve seen the examples of Nestle, Walmart and BP (all issued in this blog) and they all had one mistake in common: they entered social media (a medium based on and consisting of two-way communication) and forced it into a one-way communicational approach. By spinning and holding back information, ignoring customers and other stakeholder groups, or - most obvious - by trying to withdraw information through legal actions (like Nestle who tried to get rid of the Greenpeace youtube video by issuing copyright claims). At least we now know how they`ve been handling their PR for decades.

These actions backfire in social media. Once information is online, it will stay there forever and there is no sense in manipulating your public anymore. The main principles of social media are dialogue, transparency and engagement.

So join the social media party, but even if you think you`re the coolest kid on the block: be social and take part in the conversation! If your not interested in other people`s opinion - don`t ask for it in the first place.

In many ways, social media is like cocaine. It`s highly addictive and it turns out the best and the worst in people. So make sure you are on your best behaviour.

How journalists use social media

PR and journalism go hand in hand and when you speak of the importance of social media for PR and how it`s become such a game changer, you always have to consider its influence on journalism as well.So here are some interesting facts from a piece of research by Middleberg Communications and the Society for New Communications Research, titled "Media in the Wired World"

• Nearly 70 percent of journalists are using social networking sites, a 28% increase since the 2008 study

• 48 percent are using Twitter or other microblogging sites and tools, a 25% increase since 2008

• 66 percent are using blogs

• 48 percent are using online video

• 25 percent are using podcasts

• More than 90 percent of journalists agree that new media and communications tools and technologies are enhancing journalism to some extent.

So is Twitter the new press release? Probably not. Still, it has developed into a notable source of information for journalists and therefore provides countless opportunities for PRs. Some people still think that social media suffers from the "shiny object syndrom", being hyped because it`s new, but I think social media came to last, enhancing the dialogue between audience and writer.

Even journalists` perception of the credibility of social media is increasing.

So it`s crucial for public relations professionals to use and embrace all different kinds of social media - not (only) because it gives them the chance to overcome gatekeepers and communicate directly with their audience, but also to maintain and enhance media relations.

Another epic PR fail: When Nestle met Greenpeace.

It all started with this video. WARNING: It`s hardcore.

Have a break? from Greenpeace UK.

The story behind this video addresses a couple of issues in PR: the power of NGOs, why they always seem to be one step ahead, why corporations are still so vulnerable when it comes to their reputation, why you can`t live without a descent social media strategy these days and last but not least, why having a facebook fanpage and a twitter profile doesn`t mean you control social media.

When a powerful NGO like Greenpeace starts a worldwide campaign against a corporation like Nestle, it is hard for them to react adequately. Greenpeace wants Nestle to remove palm oil from their products, because its production destroys the rain forrest. They launched the video above, a parody on a kitkat commercial and basically accuses Nestle of killing orangutans by destroying their natural living environment.

Nestle was not amused. But what is the right way to react in a situation like this? Well, we certainly know what the wrong way looks like: Nestle lobbied to have the video removed from Youtube, citing a copyright complaint. That was clearly a bad decision: first, because the video was bound to appear on several other video platforms and second, because it drew even more attention to it. Now that it`s banned, we have to see it, right? Nestle itself gave the video its news worthiness. A text book example for a phenomenon called the Streisand effect.

One user commented on vimeo:

"Thank you Nestle...I would never have seen this video if you hadn`t had it kicked off YouTube. Now I`m forwarding it all my friends, through Facebook, and guess what they are forwarding it all their mates. Fire your PR team. They are muppets."

We`ve seen this scenario before: While NGOs know exactly what the web2.0 is capable of, partly because they`ve participated in it and needed it from the very beginning, big corporations like Nestle are still wary of it. They use it because they have to, so they employed some people to run a facebook fanpage, a twitter account and maybe a corporate blog. But when it comes to a crisis, they immediatly fall back into old habbits, in this case pulling some strings, make some legal threats, publishing a press release with empty phrases about CSR and hoping that everything will calm down eventually. They just don`t get that the world of PR has fundamentaly changed and that these tools don`t work anymore.

As the video went viral, Nestle made another mistake. Instead of using their existing accounts on social media plattforms to jump into the conversation and calm the waves a bit, they decided to stay away from it. Nestle decided not to address the issue on their twitter feed, except for one single link to their corporate press release, whereas Greenpeace makes it more than easy for supporters to participate in the campaign through social media. Even worse: Nestle is following only 8 people on twitter: what kind of dialogue is that?

Nestle tried to do the same with facebook, but Greenpeace wouldn`t let them. Supporters started posting to the Nestle and the kitkat fanpage en masse, encouraged by Greenpeace. Many changed their profile pictures to Anti-Nestle slogans. Once more, Nestle completely missed the chance to produce any kind of dialogue around the issue, but instead decided it would be a good idea to threaten the facebook users and snap back at fans. When a user posted the following (very true) comment:

"not sure you`re going to win friends in the social media space with this sort of dogmatic approach. I understand that you`re on your back-foot due to various issues not excluding palm oil but social media is about embracing your market, engaging and having a conversation rather than preaching!"

Whoever is responsible for the Nestle facebook account decided to respond this:

"Thanks for the lesson in manners. Consider yourself embraced. But it`s our page, we set the rules, it was ever thus."

Nestle completely lost control over its own facebook page - which shows the ugly side of social media. An open forum for comments and feedback can turn against you, when badly managed. The way Nestle snapped back at users is just ridiculous. The whole social media strategy seems completely uncoordinated and unorganized.

But I don`t see that as a threat to social media marketing in general, as some bloggers already predict. Corporations should be alarmed and learn from what`s happening to Nestle. Don`t take social media for granted and try to dig a little deeper before using it. True engagement in social media first requires you to understand the sociological and cultural implications that social media is funded on. Like every PR tool, it needs to be used strategically and consciously.

It`s the network, stupid! Social media in election campaigns.

"Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not be president. Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not have been the nominee."

Ariana Huffington

Barack Obama`s 2008 election campaign was the first one ever to embrace the power of social media. In fact, his online campaign was seen as a major part of his success. Obama`s election was one in which the world felt involved. He was using a simple bottom up strategy, heavily relying on the millions of small donations he got online instead of getting funded by traditional party elites (like Hillary Clinton). Thus he was able to raise the record sum of $ 270 Million for the campaign. Obama`s team startet building up mailinglists of supporters at a very early stage, lists they could later come back to. They built a database of 3 million mobile numbers by promising that in return, supporters would get campaign news before the media. Obama didn`t use the new media as an addition to his traditional campaign, he made it core. He was particularly relying on social media networks like facebook, myspace, twitter and youtube. Eventually he had over 800.000 followers on facebook (McCain: 130.000) and 13.000 youtube-subscribers (McCain: 5.000). He had and even came up with his own network, mybarackobama.com, using a neighbour-to-neighbour tool, empowering individuals by enabling them to find out where to canvass and encourage voters. This resulted in a whole new level of engagement, volunteer participation and feedback. It made Obama supporters feel like a strong, tight-knit community. He also understood the power of viral videos and brought the element of fun into political campaigning. For example, the "I got a crush on Obama" song has been watched by 16 million people.

Since Obama`s striking campaign, everyone tries to copy it, but not always with good results. During the German general elections in 2009, Chancellor Angela Merkel made a fool out of herself producing a vidcast, where everyone could see how uncomfortable she was. The online activities where planned poorly and not much in advance, thus they completely backfired. Something very similar could happen during the UK elections. Watch this video of Gordon Brown introducing the Liberal`s youtube channel.

He clearly has no idea what he`s talking about and has been fed every word of this announcement. However, Gordon Brown is not the attacker in this election. It`s Tory candidate David Cameron who really needs to mobilize people to vote for him. Social media might be Cameron`s biggest chance to distance himself from Gordon Brown. He`s younger and might therefore be more appealing to young voters, that`s why he needs to approach them where they spend their time - online. Facebook has 23 million British users - half of all eligible voters are social networkers, sharing and seeking recommendations among peers rather than trusting broadcast messages. So far, Tory candidate David Cameron seems pretty comfortable with new media. MyConservatives.com is an example of the Tories using social media to galvanise activists, very similar to the way Obama did. Cameron has also reached out to niche websites such as Mumsnet. The Conservatives need the social web to help create a positive, reassuring buzz around them.

On the other hand, the internet`s hard to control. Especially when it comes to elections, poisonous negative campaigns can downgrade a candidate`s image. When you google David Cameron, one of the first results to appear is mydavidcameron.com, a website that shows nothing but spoofs on a Conservative poster campaign featuring an apparently airbrushed David Cameron. However, candidates need to embrace new media in general, not only the beneficial parts. For believers of the theorie "All PR is good PR", the huge amount of traffic going on on the site may actually be positive for Cameron, because it provides him with extra coverage. In the end, it`s the viral concept, the element of fun, where European politicians can really learn from Obama.

One way or another, social media is the future of political campaigning. It gives politicians the unique opportunity to directly address their voters, truly engage them and get immediate feedback.

Bibliography:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/nov/10/obama-online-strategy

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/election-2010/7206981/New-media-new-politics.html

Edelman (2009): The Social Pulpit. Barack Obama`s Social Media Toolkit.

Plouffe, David (2009): The Audacity to Win. The inside story and lessons of Barack Obama`s historic victory. New York: Viking Adult.

Social Media - do it right or don`t do it at all?

"Today, there`s nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. The moment you hide something, you will end up being exposed and picked apart."

Paul Rand, Ketchum PR

Ever heard of the term "astroturfing"? Well, here`s a textbook example: Edelman, one of the biggest PR firms worldwide and self-constituted "pioneer of the web 2.0" decided to work on their client Wal-Mart`s image by founding a "grassroots" organization called "Working Families for Wal-Mart". Then in 2006, they created a nice little blog called "Wal-Mart across America", that featured the story of Laura and Jim, an elderly couple that travelled from Las Vegas to Georgia in an RV, parking for free in Wal-Mart`s parking lots. They didn`t miss out on telling the whole world how happy the Wal-Mart employees seem to be. Everybody just loves to work there. And everybody just loves to shop there! Sounds a bit too good to be true? That`s because it wasn`t.

The travel costs were entirely paid by Working Families for Wal-Mart, which is staffed by Edelman employees. Jim and Laura were on the Edelman payroll as well. A few weeks into the excursion, Business Week outed the blog as being fake. Two other blogs, "Paidcritics" and "For Wal-Mart" were also found to be written by Working Families for Wal-Mart. A storm of protest followed and Edelman was being chastised for misleading the public. Even worse, Edelman refused to admit its guild, saying that the blogs were set up by the organization Working Families for Wal-Mart, not by Edelman itself. Richard Edelman later apologized on his blog, taking full responsibility for the scandal. In fact, Edelman may have ended up suffering more from the mess than Wal-Mart. Fundamental issues of ethics in Social Media have been raised.

But shouldn`t Edelman, out of all PR firms know better? In fact, Richard Edelman has been running around lecturing New Media ground rules for a while now. They helped to write the rulebook for companies tapping into the blogosphere, preaching transparency and "honesty of relationship, opinion and identity". And there they go violating their own rules. This also shows how hypocritical internal code of conducts can be. But the huge loss of credibility that resulted for Edelman, as well as their client Wal-Mart hopefully showed others how to do it right. The Arthur W. Page Society established a set of principles for public relations on the Web:

• Disclose any affiliations in chatroom postings
• Offer opportunities for dialogue and interaction with experts
• Reveal the backround of experts, disclosing any potential conflicts of interest or anonymous economic support of content
• Practice principled leadership in the digital world, adhering to the highest standard

When it comes to Social Media, it is particularly important to follow those rules. One key characteristic of web 2.0 is that everything is open, transparent and accessible, so it is simply impossible to get away with things like fake blogs. Manipulating social media in ways that alienate users will eventually backfire The future of PR lies in New Media, so professionals should be careful not to ruin its credibility.

Even Edelman seems to have learned its lesson. At the Annual New Media Summit, Richard Edelman gave an inspiring speech, saying:

"The PR business must move from pitching to informing, from control to credibility, from influencing elites to engaging the new influencers. Trust is established through continuous conversation and appropriate behaviour. PR can become the communication partner of choice in the coming decade. We have little choice but to move to seize the mantle."

Lets just hope he sticks to his own rules this time.

Bibliography:

Gogoi, Palavi (2006): Wal-Mart`s Jim and Laura: The Real Story. In: Business Week, 9/2006. Read online

Gogoi, Palavi (2006): Wal-Mart vs. the Blogosphere. In: Business Week 10/2006.

Read online

Nolan, Hamilton (2006): Edelman acknowledges mistakes in blog matter. PR Week, October 23, 2006, p.3.

Wilcox, Dennis & Glen, Cameron (2009): Public Relations. Strategies and Tactics. Boston: Pearson.