Thomas Graham is the founder of Crosswind Communications and occasionally posts Insights and information on the state of business, government, media and, from time to time, life. We welcome your feedback and input.
Recently Microsoft launched a new Web search engine, or in Microsoft positioning-speak a decision engine, called Bing.
I suspect you’ve seen a few of Bing’s commercials. They’re quite funny, poking fun at competitor Google’s information overload by having the conversation bounce from query response to query response through rapid-fire word association.
Another pretty funny development in the search engine market share competition is the appearance on the scene this week of Walter Will Wawrika Bing, a fun-loving, nose picking troll that has squatted on the domain name of wwwbing.com.
When consumers begin a search, a common mistake is to fail to include the “.” between the www and the domain name. So many big name brands own the wwwBRANDNAME.com domain and forward it to their real one. Unfortunately, the world’s largest software company, Microsoft, did not own it for their current most favored site, Bing.
Instead, wwwbing.com is owned by Patrick from Ireland who says he’s writing a children’s book about a troll named Walter Will Wawrika Bing and he hopes his blockbuster will be bigger than Harry Potter! My friends at TechCrunch tracked Patrick down and report that Microsoft’s bureaucracy seems uninterested in acquiring the domain from him.
According to Patrick’s email from Microsoft, the product team is responsible for the acquisition, but I suspect before the week is over the Microsoft Corporate Reputation team may have a different view about having a troll pop up any time someone mistypes the name of the company’s hot new toy.
Domain squatting is a practice I usually detest, but in this case, I think I might root for the troll.
I’m no social media expert, but I do have several resources that I turn to when my clients need counsel navigating and exploiting the world of social media and social networks, including my Crosswind colleague Ephraim Cohen.
Ephraim’s philosophy is one that I very much appreciate: Social Media, despite its explosive growth and tremendous hype, is but one media channel in the comprehensive mix and all media channels should be thoroughly evaluated for their potential contribution to achieving an organization’s communications, marketing or public relations goals.
For most organization’s, social media’s primary benefit is to energize the brand or rev up the marketing engine. It’s a matter of taking an offline community and connecting them via online social networks to further fuel their passion or interest in the product, service, issue or cause that connects this disparate group of individuals to begin with. There are numerous other roles social media can fill for an organization. Customer service-oriented organizations have taken a huge leap forward by monitoring twitter and other social media for complaints or issues that arise.
Not long ago I was having a conversation with a guy who’s probably a “social media expert,” as much as there is one. I’ll tell you up front that it puts me off that he calls himself an expert. He pointed to the fact that he has more than 1,000 followers on twitter, laughed, picked up his Big Gulp and took a swig as if to say, “Beat that buddy.” (For the record, I have no desire to beat that, and Mark Cuban has 100,000 followers, so there.)
We then talked about how he’s pushing the social media envelope as he described using aggregated geotagging and twitter recommendations to help customers find cool events or discounts on behalf of a client. Wow. That’s cool. And it cost about $180,000 to implement, which honestly isn’t too great a fee to build something that helps one’s customers find value. Customers will appreciate and have greater affinity for the brand.
Then today I ran across a commentary from Adam Sernovitz describing the kind of talk a client gets when an agency is more interested in selling you an expensive new campaign in some experimental new venue — where the fees are high and it’s cool for them. He says when they’re pushing the envelope, they may well be messing with your budget and your communications plans. Hmmm.
I prefer Ephraim’s approach. And I suspect my client’s do to.
Having tweaked Austin American-Statesman environmental reporter Asher Price for his reportorial principals in my post a few days ago, I think it only fair that I now cknowledge and bring attention to his profile on Padre Island’s Tony Amos.
A beach-combing, self-taught biologist, Amos is on a 35-year mission to protect loggerhead turtles, migratory birds and the beach from pollution, man, changing weather patterns and a whole host of other threats. It’s a 24-hour job, as Asher describes in the story when Amos conducts a 1 a.m rescue mission of a loggerhead turtle on Goose Island.
As I mentioned in my previous post, Asher has a passion for environmental issues and his story today about Amos is an excellent example of that passion. And it’s a story that I’m glad he told. Amos’ work as part of Animal Rehabilitation Keep and his energy and dedication to protecting Padre Island is a laudable commitment, and one I personally appreciate.
One of my family’s favorite vacation trips has been to Sea Turtle, Inc., on South Padre Island, where injured Kemp’s Ridley Sea Turtles are rescued, rehabilitated and released into the wild to ensure they continue to repopulate the island. You can learn more by follwing this link: www.seaturtleinc.org
We can breathe a little easier today now that Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke proclaimed the recession is “very likely over ” as consumer spending has showed some tangible signs of steady increase.
Mr. Bernanke was speaking after the Commerce Department reported retail sales climbed 2.7-percent in August, after falling 0.2-percent in July.
Nearly 3-percent increase in spending is pretty significant, but, as I said a few weeks ago and Bernanke said yesterday, we’re still going to face a few rough stretches.
“Even though from a technical perspective the recession is very likely over at this point, it is still going to feel like a very weak economy for some time as many people still find their job security and their employment status is not what they wish it was,” Bernanke said, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Bernanke said much of the increase was auto-related from the “cash for clunkers” rebate program, as well as rising energy prices. But gains were also broad-based, reflecting discretionary spending on restaurants, which are often more closely tied to the economy’s health. Credit conditions will remain tight, and the economy will likely grow only moderately in 2010, Mr. Bernanke said, leading to little improvement in the job market and crimping consumer spending.
I was thrilled this week to learn that Public Citizen’s Tom “Smitty” Smith received a Heinz Family Foundation award of $100,000 for outstanding individual achievement. I’ve known Smitty for more than a decade and no one is more committed to their cause and more deserving of recognition for their work than him.
Tom is the director of the Texas office of the environmental and consumer group Public Citizen and more appropriately he’s the conscious of the community around issues affecting Texans pocketbook and environment. Seldom will he be on the side of business, but he finds ways to work with business to achieve mutual success.
He’s a rare individual who recognizes that to achieve an objective requires a seat at the table. He has earned his seat at the table by engaging in meaningful and constructive debate and earning the respect of those he opposes and collaborates with. Many in the environmental community could learn from Smitty’s example. He is a true public citizen.
Congratulations, and a special thanks to the Heinz Family for recognizing Smitty and the role people like him play in the public debate
The Austin American Statesman today published a piece by environmental reporter Asher Price that did more to expose the reporter’s bias than it did to ensure the state enact good public policy.
The premise of the piece (Ex-Perry aide gets No. 2 job at environmental agency) is that the appointment of Zak Covar to a position with operational oversight of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality raises a number of questions about whether politics will now drive the agency’s decision-making process. The presumed rationale for the story is that Covar previously served as Governor Rick Perry’s natural resources policy advisor.
Price, someone I know and whose passion for environmental issues I fully appreciate, makes two egregious errors in his reporting on the Covar appointment, both of which undermine Price’s credibility and the credibility of the Statesman’s reporting on environmental issues. First, he makes the statement that questions are being raised about the appointment, yet he doesn’t produce a single source to actually raise such a question. Then he seeks to undermine the appointee’s qualifications for the position, again without having a third-party quoted anywhere in his piece to actually question the qualifications of the appointment.
It is clear from the reporting that these are opinions held by Price himself, and because Price apparently cannot separate his own bias, his preconceived notions about environmental public policy from the facts, he seriously undermines any reporting he will do in the future.
Politics versus policy is always a valid question when leadership changes are made at any state agency.
It’s obvious that Price approached this story with the end in mind. He saw the Covar appointment and immediately jumped to the conclusion that it must be bad policy for a former gubernatorial staffer, especially a Perry staffer, to serve at an environmental state agency. Unfortunately for his premise, the reporter failed to produce a single source to legitimately ask this particular question.
In fact, his sources had quite the opposite response to the appointment.
Smitty Smith, head of government watchdog group Public Citizen and no environmental patsy himself, said, “It’s not unusual for former staffers of the governor to be in high places in key regulatory agencies to make sure the governor’s policies get enacted.”
Reporter Price went on to quote another governmental “watchdog,” a publisher of a now-defunct newsletter, who doesn’t bat an eye about the appointment. Instead, he says, “There’s always been a political intermingling.”
Shocking news: an elected governor appoints people to public policy decisions with whom he has philosophical alignment. Former Lieutenant Governor Bob Bullock is well known to have appointed former aides and staffers to positions of importance throughout state government. I wonder if Price would have challenged these appointees’ qualifications and the motives of Democrat Bullock?
I’m sorry Asher, where’s the story?
And since he couldn’t find someone to support his premise that “questions are being raised” about the mingling of politics and policy, Price then goes on to question Covar’s qualifications by stating that previous holders of the position have all been long-time government employees. Covar, on the other hand has been a public servant a mere 10 or 12 years or so, including legislative, policy and most recently executive administrative roles. His has been a “metoric rise” in state government, according to Price’s observation.
I don’t mean to surprise my friend at the Statesman, but to a number of people, perhaps a majority of people, tenure in state government does not necessarily translate into qualifications to manage effectively.
It’s not uncommon for a reporter’s bias to make its way into his or her reporting, but for newspapers to compete in today’s explosive self-publishing environment, their most valued currency should be their credibility. This is a case of credibility being undermined.
I look forward to reading more of Price’s opinions. He is a highly educated individual with an engaging viewpoint, but hopefully, I’ll read them in a column, in his blog or perhaps on the opinion page rather than embedded within the reporting he produces about important public policy.
What’s missing from public relations now that the world’s all atwitter over social media? Strategy. Sound, defensible strategy. Or at least that’s an apparent impression from a piece I read not long ago in the New York Times.
“Spinning the Web; PR in Silicon Valley” profiled a Silicon Valley public relations practitioner and her planning session with a client and the client’s chief investor. As the conversation between the three rolls along, it becomes clear the PR pro has no objectives and no strategy for her client, whose business objectives we’re never quite clear. When she pitches a media tour that would focus on influential bloggers, the investor recoils causing the pr pro to change course and decide to leave the social media component on the shelf. The reader is left to understand that the PR practitioner will change course on a whim in response to the client’s suggestions and leave out important components of the plan altogether. Basically, we’re left to believe she has no strategy.
The story also conveys that the practice of public relations is only about who you may know, whose ear you think you have and how many followers one may have on Twitter and that our industry is really more about whispering into someone’s ear and catering to digital online influencers first and foremost.
This is on my mind after a visit last week with a PR professional whom I had just met. Not two minutes into our conversation I was responding to a series of rapid fire questions about social media and how our clients were using it and how it has changed the landscape of our business. Essentially, my new friend was exhorting that “it’s all social media now.”
I was glad to meet him, too, but no, it’s not all social media, it isn’t just who you know and whose ear you have – although I will admit it’s nice to be able to have your phone calls returned!
The art and science of public relations is about listening, learning, advising and directing our clients in the act of engaging their audiences in meaningful dialogue. To effectively do so requires research and understanding of the various issues and perceptions all the stakeholders face and hold. It requires a clear communications objective, closely tied to the business objective and a sound strategy which utilizes or considers all mediums – including but not exclusively social media.
In my view, public relations is about creating a compelling dialogue that energizes your audiences toward your objectives.
A few weeks ago, several global banks and investment groups captured headlines by proclaiming the end to the longest recession to hit the U.S. since the Great Depression. Barry Knapp, a strategist with Barclays, is quoted widely as saying, “We may be in the sweet spot of recovery.”
That’s a nice place to be, of course, if the road ahead is paved and smooth. But as Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said today while speaking at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City’s Annual Economic Symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, “economic activity appears to be leveling out” yet we continue to face a challenging road ahead. While Wall Street has been hit hard the complex financial transactions, Main Street’s credit line — consumer credit, small business credit cards – is just coming due.
Bernanke cited risks of limited access to credit for businesses and households, additional losses at financial institutions and ongoing financial strain in many global markets as the areas of greatest concern. As a result, he said, “the economic recovery is likely to be relatively slow at first, with unemployment declining only gradually from high levels.”
“Leveling out” is a far cry from the “sweet spot” but certainly there are terrific signs that, as Bernanke said, “the prospects for a return to growth in the near term appear to be good.”
I personally believe it will be 2Q10 when we begin to see Bernanke’s gradual upturn in economic activity become a robust recovery. But over the next six months the recovery will be comprised of slow and gradual upticks interrupted by the hiccups that come with natural recovery.
Consumer credit concerns, including surprises at the amount of consumer debt held by financial institutions, will, I believe hold back what would normally be a robust recovery spurred on by retail incentives to drive sales.
Corporate procurements will take a continued hesitant view of the commitment toward non-essential and non-operational purchases, as CFO’s direct a sure-footed acquisition process to ensure the fewest missteps possible on the road to recovery. Over the last year, we’ve all seen the purchase process extended well beyond the expected period of time.
The one certain area of opportunity, however, continues to be the government sector as stimulus spending – Obama Dollars – flow through the federal and state agency procurement process and into the economy.
What this means, in my view, is that the recession has indeed bottomed out. The worst is behind us. But the “sweet spot” is yet to come.
With stimulus spending providing a certain amount of increase in economic activity – regardless of one’s view of the necessity of such efforts – the continued settling out and firming up of the economic foundation and the gradual uptick of natural demand, the growth is going to return – but slowly. The sweet spot, the place where we’ll see the economic home runs, comes when business steps up to the plate and takes a swing.
For those businesses which have been able to weather the storm, conserve their resources, keep their organizational leadership and who also have access to capital – now is the time to make their move. As Warren Buffett has advised, now’s the time to “bet on America.” That’s when we find the sweet spot.
After a couple of morning meetings and a lunch time conversation with a true social media guru, Dave Evans, I sat down late today with a veteran Texas political reporter. We immediately began to discuss the day’s big political news: word from the world of twitter, facebook and blog postings that Kay Hutchison’s announcement tour was off to a less than stellar start.
The Austin American Statesman’s Ken Herman posted video from KBH’s kickoff announcement in her hometown of LaMarque. With fewer than 30 guests in attendance, Hutchison must be extremely disappointed and frankly, she should be. Given the resources she brings to bear, for her campaign to turn out such a small number in her own home town simply does not bode well for her efforts.
The reporter asked two questions, “Why is she running?” and “Is it over before it starts?”
Hutchison should get busy building excitement fast or decide to stay in D.C. and fight Obama full-time. Of course, her visit with Greta speaks to her campaign strategy and the fight she will wage with Perry over social conservatives. She says Perry is attempting to narrow the base and she will attempt to broaden it by making it “mainstream.”
U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison will announce her candidacy to run for Governor of Texas rather than for re-election to the most exclusive of clubs – the United States Senate.
I am not surprised by her decision. Two years ago, a delegation of Chamber of Commerce members from Austin visited with Hutchison in her D.C. office. After a few pleasantries and conversation about a few issues, I asked the Senator, “Are you planning to run for Governor?” She wasted no time in telling the group, that, while a few considerations needed to be worked through, she indeed thought she’d make a better governor than the incumbent.
Monday she begins a 19-city tour to announce that she is tossing her hat into the ring and plans to take on Governor Rick Perry.
For Hutchison to unseat Perry, she must overcome an already sluggish start to her efforts. Kay’s current challenge isn’t Rick Perry, it’s clarity. After saying earlier in the year the planned to run, and with polls giving her a double-digit lead over the Governor, she has been mostly absent from the conversation about Texas public policy over the first eight months of the year. She’s also had more than a few missteps with her campaign organization, including confusion within her campaign about when or even if she would resign her seat in the Senate to commit herself fully to running for Governor.
Beginning Monday, she must have her campaign house in order and be clear about what her message is and what her intentions are. Her message will be results, not politics. But, as I told the Statesman’s Gardner Selby, the voters are likely to look at the results and say, “you know, things are pretty good right here in Texas, especially when you look around at the rest of the country.”
What she will attempt to do, I believe, is pump up “Perry fatigue” pointing to his lengthy tenure as the state’s governor and criticizing him for a lack of leadership around education, immigration and perhaps transportation, among others. In order to gain any real traction, she will have to be very aggressive about pointing to the problems she believes aren’t being addressed. That’s a very difficult position for her to be in because she could then be seen as criticizing Texas institutions, which plays to Perry’s advantage of positioning her as a Washington, D.C. insider – and a Texas outsider.
Hutchison has, of course, assembled a pretty solid team of advisors, including Karl Rove and Karen Hughes. They’ve navigated a few touchy subjects over the years.
To defeat Perry, Hutchison must be clear, confident and have a plan to address those areas she sees as being ignored.
The campaign promises to be rough and tumble, and will inevitably lurch to the right. A harsh primary and a move to the right potentially opens up greater opportunity for a credible Democrat, should one enter the race (more on that in a later post as well as in today’s Statesman from Ken Herman)
