PR-Bridge

On Monday, Karen Russell at Teaching PR posted the week’s best blogs. She included one from Tamar Weinberg, titled “Best Internet Marketing Blog Posts of 2007.” Let me tell you, Tamar’s blog is mindboggling. I mean, it literally blew me away.

 Sprint, fly, surf to her site immediately for a complete education in social media. Caution, however, that you may never find your way out of the jungle of information Tamar provides.

Happy Monday! My co-author (USF Strategic Communication Management grad student Melanie Formentin) and I have an article coming out in a special issue “Public Relations and Sport” in Public Relations Review in June 2008.

Title: “Re-branding the NHL: building the league through the ‘My NHL’ integrated marketing campaign,” by Bob Batchelor and Melanie Formentin

Thoughts, comments, etc. greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Bob

Depending on one’s viewpoint, I am either in an enviable place or completely insane as a doctoral student in English Literature. The short version of a long story is that I have done everything backwards in my career, so entering the Ivory Tower, I had published books, teaching experience, etc., but no Ph.D. So, now after a career in communications, I find myself as a grad student once again. It is a necessary step to move from permanent Instructor to a tenure-track position.

On the plus side, there are interesting intersections between what I learn in English and the public relations classes I teach. Before I started taking classes, I would never have thought that English lit theory would add to my thinking about PR. Recently, however, we looked at a New York Times blog, “Will the Humanities Save Us” by Stanley Fish, a celebrated English professor and provocateur.

The essay linked to above is both oddly alluring, indirect, and ultimately frustrating. An example is one of Fish’s final paragraphs:

“Teachers of literature and philosophy are competent in a subject, not in a ministry. It is not the business of the humanities to save us, no more than it is their business to bring revenue to a state or a university. What then do they do? They don’t do anything, if by ‘do’ is meant bring about effects in the world. And if they don’t bring about effects in the world they cannot be justified except in relation to the pleasure they give to those who enjoy them.”

I am intrigued by Fish’s willingness to admit that the humanities exist for their own good and the pleasure they give, although he is fully aware of the assault against the humanities by education bureaucrats and others who would do away with the liberal arts in general. I decided to look at another Fish article, from a collection English as a Discipline: Or, is there a Plot in this Play? edited by James C. Raymond.

In “Them We Burn: Violence and Conviction in the English Department,” Fish argues for English to reclaim its ownership “taking care of verbs and adjectives,” rather than engage in the multidisciplinary tasks (Fish cites “cultural studies” as one example) that critics rail against when examining what these departments bring to higher education (161).

Instead, Fish says, “It is a requirement, then, for the respectability of an enterprise that it be, or at least be able to present itself (which is even more important) as, distinctive” (162). The point, for English departments to find success — just as I would argue for public relations professionals to distinguish themselves from other would-be “communicators” across an organization — is to be distinct and champion that distinctness.

Fish exclaims, “A practice only acquires identity by not being other practices, by representing itself as not doing everything, but as doing one thing in such a way as to have a society habitually look to it for specific performance.” More importantly, for the argument in favor of public relations within the organization, “When the hard outlines of a practice are blurred by a map that brings into relief its affiliations, borrowings, lendings, and overlappings with other practices, those affiliations, rather than anything specific to the practice, are what become visible” [emphasis mine] (169).

From one perspective, this argument for public relations might seem odd coming from me, particularly if you read Bill Sledzik’s fine blog and my stab at a rebuttal. But, Fish’s idea about what space a discipline should claim provides great clarity.

My idealistic viewpoint is that integrated communications means each part of the marketing mix works together toward common organizational objectives. In the business world, this does not happen often enough because the respective directors of PR, Marketing, and Advertising/Creative pursue their own agendas without much, if any, interaction.

From Fish, I realize that PR professionals need to trumpet their distinctiveness and more actively carve out what it is that we do so exceedingly well, like broker relationships between organizations and the seemingly endless number of interested parties, or stakeholders, all around them.

Given the PR profession’s manic inferiority complex, constantly bickering over definitions of what PR is and is not, and whether or not executive’s value it, I am not sure how one would go about making its distinctiveness known. Maybe such an attempt means blowing up everything about the profession and starting from scratch. Perhaps, as Fish also suggests about English, it necessitates PR’s demise, hoping that an eventual rebirth will occur (if a world without PR serves as a catalyst for recognizing its value).

What do you think? 

Monday starts a new semester, which along with the new year, provides a kind of rebirth for academics. There is power in this opportunity to start fresh, both meeting and teaching new students, at the same time refining and expanding on how we go about teaching them.

Living in 15-week spurts has disadvantages as well. Time goes entirely too fast. January bleeds into May, the short summer break comes, and then by the fall semester start in August, the year is basically over. The constant controlled and uncontrolled chaos of teaching pushes along at warp speed. The train is constantly moving and the destination seems a bit fuzzy. It is easy to develop a love/hate relationship with the semester clock.

Last week we lost electricity for a couple hours, just before darkness fell on our little piece of Florida. With a beautiful two-year-old daughter running around, the first instinct is to make sure she understands what is happening and, basically, does not freak out. To her, total darkness can be terrifying, so we made it a game with “magical” candles and fun sitting outside watching the stars. A few hours later, the lights came back on, and we packed up the Scion and went driving around to look at holiday lights around the neighborhood. We turned it into a great family evening.

The idea of the power outage stayed with me. My wife and I discussed how refreshing it felt without distractions, whether telephone calls or the constant blare of the TV (damn, it was nice to get a break from watching Caillou’s Xmas movie for the 1,000th time). For the first time in as long as I can remember, I actually felt decompressed. We pledged to turn everything off more often in the future in an attempt to recreate that unplugged feeling.

I realized that this conflicted feeling is similar to the way I feel about technology and teaching it to my students. On one hand, I love technology, not only working for years as a tech communicator and journalist, but exploring its power with my students, as well as the influence it will have on their careers. I think intellectual curiosity is the lynchpin of a career in communications and the constant technology evolution forces professionals to continue evolving, growing, and learning.

On the flipside, though, I hate my own addiction to technology…the gnawing feeling I get when I am not checking e-mail a million times a day; reading countless electronic newsletters, articles, journals, and essays; and trying to stay ahead of the curve on everything technology-related. When I give myself time to think about it, I know for a fact that I am spreading myself too thin, which is perpetuated by the way technology brings me closer to whatever pops into my head.

My lone attempt at fighting my own addiction is by completely repelling all technology based on cell phones. I realize that their are implications and that I am falling behind somewhat by not engaging in that arena, but there must be a stopping point.

Honestly, though, I can’t say that I use my time more wisely because I am not plugged in by cell, but I do devote some of it to the act of thinking. What I have noticed is that quiet time is virtually nonexistent in today’s society. We are so plugged in that reflection comes infrequently, if ever. Most college students cannot even walk across campus, whether a 7 a.m. or 7 p.m. without chatting away on the ubiquitous cell phone. For those of us over the age of 35, it is still unsettling to see people from a distant whose lips are moving or in the next lane over on the highway though all alone. I cannot be the only Gen Xer who gets a weird feeling in that fleeting moment before realizing that the person is on a cell phone.

Obviously, a blog is an odd place for such a technophile/technophobe confessional, but perhaps those who would read this are the most in need of thinking about the topic. These kinds of examinations are never simple and much larger than thinking about corporate America’s fascination with “work/life balance,” since technology is at the heart of the profession and unavoidable in the workplace.

More importantly, I do not think these issues should be pushed under the rug. Turnover (i.e. burnout) is a critical challenge in communications and tech-based chaos is a factor. My primary criticism is that technology should have made people more productive, thus enabling workers to work less, not more.

In fact, what happened is that technology gives management the opportunity to heap more on workers’ plates. I do not know a single communications professional who isn’t working the job of a person and a half or more. Fewer people on the payroll increases margins and profitability. Thus, the smartest, most efficient employees are given even more work, not a break from the onslaught. But, now I’m venturing onto another topic…

Getting back to the point. Technology enables us for better and worse.

I’ll admit: I am a technophile and technophobe. Are you?

The New Year is nearly here, which gets me thinking about what tips, tricks, networks, and newsletters students (and professionals) should be utilizing. This list is by no means exhaustive, rather a couple places I feel students may benefit from accessing.

Networks:

Linkedin – Linkedin is the hot social network for business professionals right now. Rumors also have it as a key acquisition of several larger social networks, including Rupert Murdoch’s MySpace. According to the site, Linkedin membership tops 16 million and represents 150 industries. Simply a must in today’s environment, particularly for job seekers.

MyRagan (www.myragan.com) is a newish social networking site dedicated to communications professionals. I have been a member for awhile and love the vast amounts of information available on the site. However, its actual social networking aspects is not as robust as you will find on the larger sites. As the site continues to grow, though, this may increase. And, as always, what you get out of these sites is about equal to what you put in. I have not been an overtly active member.

Newsletters:

MediaPost Publications offers a wealth of informative newsletters, delivered daily to your inbox. The selection covers everything from metrics to gaming and a variety of marketing topics. My personal favs are Marketing Daily, MediaDailyNews, and Around the Net.

Bulldog Reporter/Daily Dog is the one-stop for all things public relations. It is a key resource for anyone who wants to keep up with the current state of the field. From case studies to op-eds, the Daily Dog provides thought-provoking information from working professionals.

Ragan’s Daily Headlines is another great source of information from the Ragan Communications group. I am a huge fan of Ragan, which provides communicators with a ton of useful, insightful information.

Tips:

Ned’s Job of the Week – Searching for a job or just trying to stay updated on the state of hiring in the industry, then Ned Lundquist’s site and weekly e-mail newsletter of new positions is for you. Ned is a phenomenal guy who provides an invaluable resource to the countless numbers of professionals employed due to his willingness to help. Join his community and you will have a network of nearly 10,000 communicators at your door.

Here are the simple directions: To subscribe for free, send a blank e-mail to JOTW-subscribe@topica.com.

Tricks:

PRSA provides a wealth of information for free, including articles from its award-winning publications at Tactics and Strategist Online. Searching its archives and Silver Anvil winners database costs non-members money, but for those of you who are members, these are priceless resources.

Craigslist – If you are interested in working in a large city, then use Craigslist in your job search and hunt for a place to live. One of my students recently decided to move to Washington DC. She has a job lined up, but nowhere to live. We looked under shared housing on Craigslist and found about 300 in one day’s worth of listings.

I would like to thank Karen Miller Russell for featuring me as a ”Meet the Teacher” profile at Teaching PR. Please direct any comments, questions, or thoughts my way at your convenience. And…happy holidays!

Here’s the direct link: http://teachingpr.blogspot.com/2007/12/meet-teacher-bob-batchelor.html

Dear Bill,

Your post on public relations and marketing is compelling. Upfront, I admit that I am in complete disagreement. I teach from an IMC perspective and believe that students who are PR “purists” or who learn from that point of view are entering the workforce at a disadvantage.

Based on my own decade-long career as a “communicator” (rather than PR and/or Marketing label) at companies like Ernst & Young, Fleishman-Hillard, and Bank of America, and my own teaching, I don’t see how PR can be “on board” in one sense, as you say, “support[ing] the marketing effort,” then out of the equation in another.

From my perspective, the breakdown is separating marketing and PR into silos within an organization, rather than looking at them from a truly integrated viewpoint. It is not about which branch will “dominate the partnership,” but building a single organizational point of view (Management by Objectives) that places the needs of the company/organization ahead of differences between marketing and PR.

Communications management, using a centralized view, then focuses on aligning all an organization’s efforts toward mutual ends. Thus, a PR professional may use her skills best in an internal communications setting, developing an intranet content system or designing a better employee-based newsletter, while at the same time, a marketer is doing product development work or presenting at a trade conference, but BOTH are working off the central plan set out in a MBO setting.

I am also not sure that the two-way symmetrical model is important enough to criticize marketing, just because they do not preach the same jargon. Grunig’s two-way model, like his (and his co-authors’) so-called “Excellence Theory” is filled with logical holes.

And, is it unrealistic to think that public relations practitioners can (or should) “walk a fine line between organizational goals and goals of society – kind of like an ombudsman or arbiter?” PR professionals are a part of this organizational conscious, but so are all other employees across the organizational chart. We could call into question how business schools and universities in general teach ethics, just as we are questioning the role of PR courses.

By labeling marketing “our evil twins” and using language like “surreptitious selling,” “infiltrate influencer groups,” and “the sell job,” you are guiding readers to see sales as a negative. I do not see companies and organizations selling products as an automatic bad thing.

Where I completely agree with you is in how the problem of misunderstanding PR begins. At the University of South Florida, we require students to take Economics, Management, and Marketing courses, and many minor in Business. However, because of admission requirements to get into the School of

Mass Communications, business students cannot get into our classes. However, I think the challenge runs deeper. Marketing professors, business school deans, etc., have no real interest in adding PR to their curriculum. So, future execs are getting their knowledge of public relations from a part of a chapter in a marketing textbook. All the sudden, they think they understand the profession. Obviously, the number of PR crises that occur daily show this isn’t the case.

And, I do not throw all the blame on business schools or scholars. As a profession,  public relations has a long history of doing little or nothing toward getting these distinctions softened. After all these years, there are still arguments about the true definition of PR, like that matters in the bigger picture.

You wonder if you are “fighting a war of semantics” at the end of your post. I think you are correct in questioning the relationship between the two disciplines. I just see the battle differently. What we should be fighting for is to get public relations into business schools.

The PR profession also needs to be a part of this effort, initiating a communications campaign to reeducate the public about the field and its historical and current benefits. It’s all our concern (and fault, perhaps?) if people assume that PR is nothing more than pimping the Hiltons and rap stars of the world.

Respectfully yours,

Bob

Communicators are taught that it is not “if” a crisis happens, it is “when.” As a result, a response plan needs to be in place. In today’s 24/7 media environment, crises are bigger stories than in the past and disseminated faster. And, believe it or not, some flames are fueled by the media into even larger proportions.

A CEO sticking his foot in his mouth and responding in anger to criticism is not new. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is another in a long line who displayed poor judgment when facing an unwelcome spotlight.

How should Facebook execs respond to recent criticisms by Fortune magazine’s David Kirkpatrick and Josh Quittner? Are the concerns of these influential writers simply too “inside baseball” for the site’s users and the wider public to even care? I’m wondering if the disconnect between their criticisms and Facebook users is real or sensationalized by the press to generate a story. If so, what do communicators do to deal with the resulting consequences?

Let’s take a look at some of the language Quittner uses, for example, to discuss Facebook’s challenges. On his Fortune “Techland” blog, Quittner used the title: “RIP Facebook?” Here is his lead:

“A lot of people say that Facebook has jumped the shark. That’s flat out wrong. In fact, Facebook is now being devoured by the shark. There’s so much blood in the water, it’s attracting other sharks. And if Facebook’s not careful, one of them is bound to come along and finish it off. I’ve never seen anything like it in the annals of fast-rising tech companies that fail.”

He qualifies the lead with the “a lot of people say” phrase, but it is pretty clear that he is leading readers to agree. In essence, Quittner is saying, people say this really bad thing, it’s actually much worse, and I’ve actually never seen anything worse. Sounds a bit overly-dramatic doesn’t it? Among the thousands of Web companies that failed during the dot.com crash, Quittner’s never seen anything worse? Hey Josh, remember Webvan?

Quittner’s second paragraph:

“The really weird part of this story is that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with Facebook. It works as well as it ever has, and many of the people who use it (my kids for instance) are unaware of the worsening situation about its privacy-invading Beacon social ads scheme that tracks people’s web-surfing habits even when they’re not on the site. That’s bound to change. The market is fickle, something better is in the wings, and as soon as it arrives, the alienated and angry mob will race to it. Delphi’s errors begat Prodigy and its errors begat AOL, which was crushed by the Web.”

Reading just these two paragraphs, it struck me that Quittner could have easily led with the second paragraph, which would have been closer to the story he outlined. However, the doom and gloom of the lead gave it that little negative angle that journalists use to get the reader’s attention (perhaps if we replaced “attention” with “publicity” we would be even closer to the truth for using such language, but as a PR professional, I certainly wouldn’t want to publicly call out a journalist for self-promotion, would I?).

Anybody thrown by the “many” in the second paragraph? He equates Facebook’s users to his kids (without identifying their ages) in an attempt at disparaging the company:  “many of the people who use it (my kids for instance) are unaware of the worsening situation…”

Another shocking aspect of Quittner’s complaint, to me, is that he blames Facebook’s troubles on bad PR:

“What’s harming Facebook - perhaps to a terminal degree - is enormously bad PR. For a social media company, these folks don’t understand the first thing about communication; they have alienated the press by being arrogant, aloof and dishonest. Their idea of press relations is sending a stupid message to a What’s New at Facebook Group that directs you to another website for a canned statement.”

Calling out Facebook’s “enormously bad PR” is legitimate. A company as powerful as Facebook in the Web 2.0 world certainly should be on top of its game in terms of communications. However, is this another case of PR playing the role of easy target?

PR is playing whipping boy, which seems to be a favorite game of journalists lately, including the infamous Chris Anderson outing of those he labels as bad practitioners.

The problem I have with Quittner’s post blaming PR for Facebook’s current troubles is the air of superiority he takes (surprise, surprise), which those in communications are used to getting from journalists, and the insinuation that it is PR “folks” who “don’t understand the first thing about communication,” basically indicting the entire industry in one fell swoop.

In response, Quittner’s using loaded language, certainly designed to generate publicity for the blog/magazine. There are countless reasons that Facebook might fail, but it’s laughable to believe “that it has no one in its corner that anyone in the media trusts,” thus doomed to history’s dustbin. So, don’t worry about the 57 million Facebook users…move over sock puppet, make room for Zuckerberg. Sure…

What is on my mind more frequently these days is the ubiquity of “branding.” For some of you, this is a “master of the obvious” topic. But at the heart of the matter, I’m not sure there is even a reason to be talking about “public relations,” “marketing,” or “advertising” anymore.

Teaching in a public relations “sequence,” however, keeps me wondering about what kind of information gets eliminated when all the professions usually lumped under the “marketing” umbrella get pushed to ”branding.” Are communicators then giving up too much power…the traditional PR “purist” argument against integration?

From a more self-centered point of view, is my personal emphasis on integration and branding helping or hindering my students? My gut and career in communications tells me that the move toward integration is critical for future success.

What are your thoughts?

The spate of bad press public relations received recently is disheartening, but accentuates the basic premise of journalist/practitioner relations — build the relationship on mutual trust and respect.

In the Anderson/Wired magazine case, he lashed out because of the number of unsolicited and irrelevant releases he received. Calling out the public relations professionals publicly (including those from many big “name” firms) may seem a bit over the top, but the it made an important point: do your homework before mass mailing yet another press release.

This lesson about building trusting relations with journalists is important for students and young professionals. Having spent more than a decade as a freelance journalist, I have seen the downside of spam e-mails. I routinely receive releases about food, travel, and other topics that I have never written about as a journalist. And, I am just a part-time freelancer…I cannot imagine the number of releases that would cascade in if I were a magazine or newspaper staffer.

Both public relations professionals and journalists realize that they need each other. Trusting relationships are fantastic and mutually beneficial. Great PR pros I have worked with while wearing my journalist hat helped illuminate stories by providing additional (key) information and access to executives. Furthermore, practitioners on both sides have seen the studies that reveal about 75 percent of the news each day comes from a PR source. We need each other, so why not build the relationship on trust?

Brian Pittman’s exclusive interview with Anderson for Bulldog Report’s Daily Dog is revealing in many aspects, particularly for students and young professionals. Anderson talks about his own use of PR at Conde Nast:

“Condé Nast employs hundreds of PR people. I have PR people on my own staff. We believe in PR. We spend a lot of money on it. Some of our best employees’ functions are driven by PR. In fact, we’re changing the game internally here by using what we’re calling PR 2.0 to train staff to do their own marketing and outreach for their work and stories.”

So, Anderson’s criticism did not indict PR in general…it slapped sloppy practitioners who do not do their homework. Or, in other words, don’t try to build a lasting relationship with journalists at target publications.

Anderson’s “tips” for pitching are just about textbook, as well as the challenges. I’m going to end with a long quote, because it indicates a major problem that the PR industry must address:

“Read it. Freakin’ read what you’re pitching to. I shouldn’t even have to say that. Why don’t more PR people do it? The reason pitches are inappropriate is because making them work requires reading and a real interest in the industry you’re promoting. You have to care about it. We all want emails from people who really understand what we do, why we do it, and who are sophisticated about their own industries and who can speak the language. So, I guess the tip here is to really consume the press in your areas.

I don’t think you’ll ever get a 23-year-old communications major able to talk to me about my robotics interest in the same way as the engineer who created the product. So another major tip here or area of focus for PR people should be coaching the guy in the know and plugged into the development process on how to reach out to me himself—not some entry-level PR person who doesn’t even get the product. This is facilitating, not gatekeeping. If this is the only thing we can change about PR in our lifetime, it would be enough.”

Think about the facilitator/gatekeeper analogy…Is this the Public Relations 2.0 model?