Although I don’t totally agree, but somehow, I think that is a natural evolution in digital marketing & PR. It is simply a natural extension from offline to online to uphold the most basic principles of honesty in business. Most of us industry professionals do live up to the promotion of transparency and authenticity. However there are cases where makes it hard for these principles to be in place. Well explained by John Bell from Ogilvy, I highly recommend you should read it.
Unlike journalists, bloggers are free individuals who are not bound by job responsibilities or professional ethics. They are not obliged to promote or say good things about the brand. There are many grey lines to the concept of a effective set of governing rules. While monetary transactions are clear, there is a difference between giving away samples and endorsements. While I agree that any form of endorsements should be disclosed, but are samples considered “sponsorship” as suggested by FTC? Surely it’s not an issue to tell anyone the sample was given. But it is also the influencer’s free will to decide if he/she thinks it is an issue worth mentioning at all. After all, you get samples when you shop at malls. It’s not such a big deal to everyone.
According to page 59 of the FTC guidelines, this example was cited,
A consumer who regularly purchases a particular brand of dog food decides one day to purchase a new, more expensive brand made by the same manufacturer. She writes in her personal blog that the change in diet has made her dog’s fur noticeably softer and shinier, and that in her opinion, the new food definitely is worth the extra money. This posting would not be deemed an endorsement under the Guides.
Assume that rather than purchase the dog food with her own money, the consumer gets it for free because the store routinely tracks her purchases and its computer has generated a coupon for a free trial bag of this new brand. Again, her posting would not be deemed an endorsement under the Guides.
Assume now that the consumer joins a network marketing program under which she periodically receives various products about which she can write reviews if she wants to do so. If she receives a free bag of the new dog food through this program, her positive review would be considered an endorsement under the Guides.
Assume now that the consumer joins a network marketing program under
which she periodically receives various products about which she can
write reviews if she wants to do so. If she receives a free bag of the new
dog food through this program, her positive review would be considered
an endorsement under the Guides.
Okay, I understand the examples above. But what if… the consumer did not join a network marketing program, but rather because she’s an existing customer, the brand was listening to her rants online and approached her to try a new product to garner feedback. Would that be considered as endorsement under the Guides? Apparently it should. But as free individuals, not representing professional bodies, this rule to make it compulsory (forced) for the influencer to mention, and the brand/company to monitor his posting for “compliance” may make the influencer feel pressured, as though prisoned or under the eyes of an eagle. Such action seems to be sailing away from the primitive objective of blogging and conversations. Please don’t mistaken me, I am not against the ideals of this guideline as a marketer. I am just doubting it from my capacity as a social media activist. Question is… would I prefer to freely do it, or be compelled to do it – by law. But again, this is a very tough question to answer, as laws are usually there to protect against deceit and fraud. But this case in particular, it seems to infringe the private space of individuals. Much to be debated about.
Social Media Guidelines beyond FTC
I definitely foresee the Guidelines to be assessed and reviewed over time. But nevertheless, it will become a norm in many countries in the years to come. And one such place I believe which will catch it on quickly, will be my homeland, Singapore.
Singapore has always been known for all kinds of rules and regulations. Being a country run by campaigns and systems, I am confident MDA (Media Development Authority of Singapore) will definitely use FTC Guidelines as a benchmark to draft a similar set of domestic guidelines for Singapore. However, the issue of disclosing collaboration between brands and bloggers was kind of resolved a pretty long time ago here, when Nuffnang was set up in 2007. Nuffnang is a blogger advertising community which bridges advertisers and bloggers. Note, I mentioned advertisers. Which means it does not exactly promote or build long-term relationships. It basically plays as the media company (like a matchmaker) between the two. Which, to be really really honest, despite the success of the concept, I don’t agree with it at all. It is making all our top blogs look like advertising billboards, and instilling the concept of blogging to earn money. I can’t decide which comes first. Passion or Money.
Anyway, back to the topic… despite having bodies like these in place setting some rules straight so consumers can recognise an ad when they see it, it is still an opt-in program. An official guideline will act as a good balance to set the note right for the many social media developments in the near future. Social media as we know it, has expanded beyond simply blogs. And it is fast becoming unclear what would deem to be an advertisement, what is really credible and what is actually a chapter of stealth marketing. It is likely beyond a community effort to keep it authentic any longer. Even with official guidelines, it will be challenging to execute it efficiently.
What Singapore Can Do?
Instead of implementing hard and fast rules, what I suggest MDA could do, is to work with 4As and other professional bodies governing the marketing and PR profession to make it mandatory for agencies to commit and declare themselves to a set of disclosure guidelines (Take a leaf out of CASE – Consumer Association of Singapore), which binds the industry to perform ethically instead of confusing the public with vague descriptions on concepts of “endorsements” and “sponsorships”, which could lead to 101 different cases of possibilities and arguments.
No one would want to risk a personal reputation for nothing. Unless it is a clause or request from the paymaster, I doubt any influencer would intentionally keep payments or endorsements discreet. So by instating such guidelines on the professional bodies, most of such doubts should be cleared. And in cases where samples are sent to bloggers, I think it should be their free will to disclose the source. There are always sites to sign up for free samples and I do not think this is a pressing issue since they are not obliged to write anything positive about the product. Hence, their credibility should not be doubted.
Asia Beyond Singapore
With Asia’s social media developments growing at a robust 29% annually, it is currently the largest region in the world with lowest internet penetration.
And would such guidelines be effective in other parts of Asia outside Singapore? I’m not sure if there are existing guidelines in Japan or Korea (please let me know if there are) but I think this would probably work in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The consumer market there is largely similar to Singapore although having different purchasing behaviours. Social media activities such as blogging is a mainstream activity in Taiwan, where it is reported that 70.9% of the internet users have created a blog themselves. Which many of these celebrity bloggers have now been converted into TV commercial models.
However, you would probably be more interested with the case of India and China. I would think China is desperate for such a set of guidelines but they are not ready for it. I would use the word “messy” to describe the social media landscape in China at this point. I believe they are still in a process of figuring out the best model that will work for the majority. Having such a vast land and population also means it is hard to administrate the rules if mass education is not in place. (Just look at all the domestic problems they have in ensuring quality control over health, food, manufacturing products etc).
As for India, I am not all that familiar with the market but I think it still lacks maturity and will take a couple of years to grow before the population catches it on as a mainstream activity.
But I do believe South-east Asia would be a potential region to explore such guidelines. It is however up to individual countries to decide the importance that social media will play to its economy.
Never too early to think about it, never too late to execute it.
But the FTC guidelines for social media has grown to become an international concern and benchmark beyond the United States. The world is watching, observing, learning and reflecting.
No matter what kind of approach is adapted in the end, nevertheless, it’s time to stop and rethink authenticity.
So? How do you know if your social media strategy has worked?
Answer : When I start taking note of all links and information posted on your Twitter account, Facebook and actually click on them. Load the site, wait, read every page and register for your event. And end up writing this blog post.
Good job!
A consistent, conscientious and sincere approach is required in all initiatives to see it through success. Especially when your focus is on people.
I was invited to 2 Hewlett-Packard events in the past few weeks. One for the Touchsmart Personal Computers featuring local visual artists’ work, the other is HP City of Dreams to promote HP Workstations.
HP “Touch the Future”
The invitation was extended by Edelman to attend this event held at VivoCity on 11 July. As part of the campaign to showcase the new HP TouchSmart technology, HP worked with a group of local artists to create a series of digital artwork interpreting the theme of “Touch the Future“. These artwork are then animated step-by-step to look as if it is “created” by a “hand” touching the “screen” into a Light Show projected on the facet of VivoCity.
The bloggers were also introduced to the artists in person over a casual drink and snack at Queen & Mangosteen. I have to say a little alcohol made everyone quite happy.
Blogger guests were also introduced to the TouchSmart technology through creating personalised “postcards” using an HP proprietary drawing software. I manage to attract quite a crowd while trying to create the above picture correctly. I was however a little disappointed this software did not allow multi-user interactions. HP TouchSmart is also used as a platform to display the new Windows 7 OS.
HP “City of Dreams”
Approximately a month thereafter, I received an invitation from Waggener Edstrom to attend another HP event called “City of Dreams“. As an extension to HP’s effort in supporting the local creative circle, this event was sparked off with an online HP Lightropolis Contest that seen over 400 submissions. A winner from each category was chosen, encouraging creations spanning different industries from engineers, graphic designers to animators. The event marks as a finale and these winning works are now exhibited at ION Orchard.
To showcase the “Dream Work Stations” of HP, this event invited mainly bloggers with design backgrounds as target audience. The little surprise was that we had to create a desktop wallpaper with the theme of “City of Dreams”. I am proud to say my team was the winning team. Not with our design sense, but with a better understanding of the HP brand.
Our team (@iammyy, @berubetto & myself) amused the General Manager of HP by claiming green was chosen as the background colour due to HP’s initiative of Green IT. As technology of the future, HP’s concern in its CSR activities are further emphasised in this “City of Dreams”. It seem that we managed to market ourselves across. We walked away with an HP Laser Gaming Mouse. Nothing to complain about though I would definitely prefer a TouchSmart personal computer or one of those dream workstations. Haha!
Why HP knows Social PR?
Many of the same bloggers were invited to both events and despite by different PR agencies, the Product Manager from HP had a good memory and could remember some of us by names and occupations. The effort of “following up” and maintaining the relationship is especially essential in building the fundamentals of a direct response channel from the digital population.
HP seems to understand the importance of community influence and attempts to identify these individuals (influencers) as significant word-of-mouth broadcasters for their current & future campaign initiatives.
HP has a successful Facebook and Twitter presence for its CSR arm, “HP Power to Change“. Their social media consultant of a managerial level who goes by the name of @HPinsider actively scans the Twitterverse for HP related news and links. Just half an hour before the “City of Dreams” event, @HPinsider made a tweet introducing the attendees. Yes, social media should be managed by someone who is of capacity to answer queries and not by junior marketing staff. Glad HP realised that. Across the board, it looks like there is an understanding of a common corporate direction and digital blueprint in place. It is important that the entire company works out a holistic vision to what they want to achieve out of the digital sphere. And to understand the building these relationships at an early stage for future opportunities is important.
In view of this, I would say they had been relatively successful. I wasn’t a big fan of HP before this, but would definitely keep an eye on their future developments. I believe my responses has achieved some of their KPIs. Raising awareness of both brand and product is more relevant for social media than trying to push direct sales. Hence social media should be seen as part of a long-term brand marketing process and not simply a direct sales channel. Relationship with bloggers or social media activists should be viewed as a friendly partnership rather than pure online journalism.
It would be interesting to see how HP further engages CSR in Asia as well as their continued efforts to support local arts.
Are PR Agencies Understanding Social?
After going to a few blogger events, my only disappointment is that not all the PR agencies did a good follow-up job. Basically the invitation, thereafter the thank you ends the relationship. And many of these agencies still do not have their social media domains added to their signature.
To know the group, you first have to be part of the group.
Amongst them, I must say Waggener was active and prompt. Their staff continued the conversations (both clientele related and just regular chat) with the bloggers on Twitter and Facebook and created a bond which could come in handy for many future uses.
I was invited to a closed-door Crocs’s blogger event two weeks ago jointly organised by Lewis PR and Salesforce for Crocs. It was held in the cozy lounge of The Screening Room. The handful of guests were served with a comfortable selection of gourmet tapas.
To be really honest, I was never a fan of Crocs, much less to say that I even liked it. I thought it was a product over-priced, overly-hyped, a fad and ugly. As a member of the individualistic generation, obviously I do not enjoy wearing something that is so highly recognizable and everyone seem to be owning. Those were my introduction lines to JP, the Event Specialist of Crocs Singapore, when asked about my impression of the brand.
The main objective of this event is to gather feedback on a new engagement site Crocs has designed as an effort to hear consumers’ wants and needs. Hence the birth of CrocsIdeas.com. Singapore is chosen as the testing ground for this pilot project before it is being officially launched worldwide. CrocsIdeas.com is generated by Salesforce and works on the same platform as Dell’s IdeasStorm. The concept is for users to suggest what they hope to see or have in the products or innovations that can potentially be executed to improve it. Then, users can also “promote” or “demote” the item according to their individual likings. Although not all suggestions may be feasible for production, but if certain items on the list gains popularity, the Crocs team will reply and look into it. If an idea has been adapted, the user will be given credit and possibly find THAT very product in their mailbox when it is launched.
Dell has always been the frontier in adapting social media in its business strategies. Dell’s IdeasStorm is an astoundingly successful project and more than 350 ideas from consumers has been implemented since the site was first launched. Another brand that has modelled after Dell based on the same platform, is Starbucks and it has received many positive feedback on the initiative. Perhaps a shoe-brand like Crocs may receive less attention but such an attempt is a good start and I foresee it could snowball positively if adequate marketing and integration with the parent site is implemented effectively. What Crocs should be careful is not to leave it unmanaged and allow it to become another white elephant. Most brands get excited in the preliminary phases but the efforts are not carried through thereafter. A common feedback about Dell’s IdeasStorm is that there is lack of interaction and engagement from Dell’s marketing team on the site. Which, is something I casually voiced out to the marketing team of Crocs. Consumers generally do not enjoy talking to an “administrator” or a “logo”. Putting a face to a response helps in bridging the relationship. And such loyalty is what brands really want to establish over the long period.
Genuinely, there are things to be excited about in Crocs’s new range of footwear. I hated the classic design because I had no idea why I am paying so much for a piece of plastic. Apparently, I was convinced I’m wrong. Crocs are recommended footwear designed for therapeutic relief for a number of foot conditions. Did you know that? Well, that’s pretty new to me indeed. The intention is for you to feel like you are walking in the air when you wear them. I may be weird, but I didn’t really like weightless shoes. However, I tried on a few pairs and hmm… I don’t hate them. I am convinced that I can give them a second chance. Most importantly, they understood they had to innovate and explore a wide variety of designs for different people. No one shoe fits all but everyone should find a shoe that fits them. “Shoe the World”, that’s what Crocs is trying to achieve. But the common perception of Crocs in Asia has been mixed extremes. Will the strong image of Crocs as simply a fashion fad cover the true quality of what seems to be like a down-to-earth wear? It would be too early for a baby brand like this to say if it will be successful but there are some headways made as far as I can see.
And to end it off, here’s a preview of some unreleased Crocs design.
Many companies are wary about joining the social media because they have no idea how to manage negative information and news. A digital crisis can come like a typhoon and most companies are not armed for it. Although it would probably take an entire book to explain how companies can best deal with the digital sphere.
I have summarised 3 most important points here to helping your company manage negative information and feedback.
Timely : Have a clear internal process on management of a digital crisis within the organisation. Most company have no idea if the PR people or Marketing folks, Corporate Communications, GM or MD should make the decision. Hence have this thought process clearly drawn out. Make the approval and clearance channels as minimal as possible to assure shortest response time. Remember, time is often the deciding factor to all crisis management especially online.
Transparency : Maintain a policy of transparency. I understand this may be hard for many companies to embrace. But there is NO way one can dictate all the information distributed online. And attempting to do so will only give a bad name. I recommend that all negative comments be taken in positively. Engage active commenting users to gain insight to the issue and credit them for the efforts. Such successful examples include AsiaAir, who transformed negative publicity into loyal customers and a long-memory of good word.
Consistency : Consistently gather statistics, observe and listen to conversations in order to understand ground sentiments. Digital strategies should be frequently relooked and adjusted accordingly to meet organization’s objectives as well as ground demands and expectations
Lastly, note that a digital strategy for any company is never one person’s work. It requires the like-mindedness and joint effort of every single member of the company. Encourage the culture, not attempt to deminish or control it. However, draft a clear social media guideline for your staff so that certain professsional ethics will still be met and expectations managed.
After the Domino’s effect, it has become ever more obvious that Crisis Management is one of the most important function of every PR person in a company. In the digital age today, it is almost impossible to take absolute control of every individual and tiny bit of information. Many a times, the bad PR would have found its way into the mass faster then you can say, “SXXX!”. And just in case you missed all the action, Adage gives an overview on the “cheese in the nose” incident here. And guess what, the two protagonist of the prank video are facing charges, as reported by NY Times.
Traditional marketers usually attempt to lie low and wait for news to subside as people tend to (used to) have a short memory when overwritten with news of the following day. But things online is a quite different scenario. News don’t simply get overwritten. But rather, they get passed on and duplicated in multiplies. People talk wildly about them, make assumptions and create a large snowball effect that could have an unimaginable damage. One that can get out of hand and destroy an entire brand, if not dealt with properly, and timely.
Domino’s was critized for not responding to the issue promptly. But on realisation that these rumours are not going to stop and customers are quickly losing trust in the brand, they reacted swiftly to turn the tables around. Domino’s incident started off with a viral video. Domino’s decided to end it with a viral video.
As touched on previously during the China’s melamine poisoning incident, hiding facts or pretending to be an ostrich no longer works. Likely that the most positive PR is really to face the issue oncoming and find all possible ways to minimize the damage and rebuild brand confidence. Taking criticisms positively may also help to calm and convince consumers in one’s willingness to listen and address the problem. Consumers wants to know what IS to be done, not what cannot be undone.
But what really prompted me to write this was not Domino’s. I mean yes, Domino’s affair caught my eyeballs and I was having a whole lot of fun following the news. There are no Domino’s in Singapore, so I guess what doesn’t really concerns me won’t affect me too adversely. However, one incident DID affected me.
Just last Wednesday, I posted a blog post on “How Companies Are Using Twitter” and commended on the proactiveness of Midphase (my web hosting company) in addressing customer satisfaction issues. I was given much confidence from the General Manager himself on the service quality and was promised downtime wouldn’t happen again. That was last week. I was happy for a couple of days and tweeted positively about it. BUT today, not only was there a server outrage, emails were down but the entire Midphase iterally “disappeared“. Even their own company site and support systems could not be reached. No one is attending to their Twitter accounts. GM Marc Bollinger‘s last message was 8 hours ago and their parent twitter account @Midphase was 16 hours ago! It was creating a nervous breakdown for many customers who anxiously hanged online to wait for any possible news.
Reviews on Midphase’s services has been dropping quickly since 2008 when their service quality suddenly deteriorated. With 71,900 domains owned by Midphase and hosting on their servers, you can imagine the kind of anxiety each and every customer is going through. Customers are not demanding an immediate restoration. Customers demand and has the right to know what is going on. However, that channel was not made readily available, especially essential for a company with such a global customer base. I had to make a long distance call to the United States to find out what is actually going wrong. As I do not have any existing number with me (website is down). I am for once grateful that Google caches information. (Not grateful for this all the time as their cache caused me a lot of trouble once).
About 3-4 hours later, the service came back on. When the General Manager for Midphase, Marc Bollinger woke about 6 hours later, he was overwhelmed with the unhappiness and short of explaination to customers on the outrage. People (including me) were coming together over twitter, making wild assumptions and threatening to terminate the service due to frequent downtime. Marc quickly sent a personal apology to each customer and the Midphase blog was promptly updated to explain the issue. Although he explained he was asleep at that hour, the promise of a 24/7 service has been broken and it has shook the confidence of customers in a big way. Isn’t it ever more prevailing that value of customers are invaluable especially in times of recession where businesses are constantly trying to cut each other’s throats to stay afloat. Competitors will be more than happy to benefit from the spill over of this effect.
So you can see, social media does not necesasary only cause damage to big brands, but small companies can suffer as well. This is of course, largely dependent on the type of business you are in. But a digital crisis is not something to be seen lightly as. Regardless if your company is big or small.
Post-Domino’s Effect
After the much hyped Domino’s incident, PR agencies are sitting up and relooking into ways to tackle digital crisis when they happen. Niall Cook, the Worldwide Director of Marketing Technology for Hill & Knowlton posted a question on twitter yesterday,
“Thinking about a rapid response Twitter app for companies to use during a crisis. Any thoughts?“
As quoted from Adage on the aftermath of the Domino’s case, “In Just 24 Hours, Clip Has Received 760,000 Views, and Warrants Are Out for Offending Employees’ Arrest.” Los Angeles Times quickly churned out an article reflecting the on recent incidents on how the businesses of CNN, Amazon and Domino’s are affected by the power of Twitter.
Like it or not, brands don’t really have a choice to the kind of publicity they want in digital age. The only way to counter the game is to be part of the game. Like they always say, don’t wait for customers to come, be where your customers are. And obviously, where your customers are, will be where the action sparks too.
I am no PR expert, although I am trying to hone my skills in this area. Perhaps PR gurus can drop your comments here on
how you think a digital crisis could be better managed to minimize damage and what is the desired minimum time delay of responses.
I have been spending quite some quality time on twitter and reading useful blogs of others. As I am writing, I am still continuously trying to figure out what may be the correct focus to direct this post.
Social media has always been a very skeptical form of marketing for alot of traditional marketeers as there is no clear ROI or statistics which can be provided as a base for business. Especially in the context of Asia, where almost everything must be “seen” or “touch” to “believe”. However, this may all change with evolution of statistical tools on individual social networking platforms and most of all, the recent launch of Buzz Gain. If you need to get excited over something, then this must be it!
Currently in Beta stage (Free for limited period), Buzz Gain is a really simple web-based client that allows you to track over 100 social networking sites and search your keyword on blogs, microblogs etc. This allows a complete consolidation of data, including listening to all the important conversations about your product or business all in one site. Learn about who you should be tracking or following. And at the click of a button, analyze your demographics as graphs are created automatically to explain trends! Now you know WHO is looking and talking about you, WHO you should be talking to and WHAT are the results or outcome of the conversations. Finally a one-stop and affordable solution to all Social PR headaches.
Although I wouldn’t say the program is perfect just yet. Afterall, it is still in beta launch. One of the biggest turnoff is its speed. The program would have been close to a wonder if it loaded up nicely and promptly too. The beta version may be showing signs of lagging and delayed information. More insights of analysis and information can also be developed, hopefully at a later point of time. But at the very least, if you have no idea where start on your social PR, now here’s a useful assistant.
The service would probably have very large potential in Asia also, especially in China. With latest stats by Internet World Stats, China’s internet population leads the world with approximately 253 million internet users end December 2008. And we are looking at a merely 19% penetration of its entire billion population. Imagine how much this service could potentially do for clients wanting to enter the dragon’s gate? There are over 578 million internet users in Asia alone (versus 885 million in the rest of the world), where rising markets like India only has a 5.2% internet penetration currently. (Statistics are quoted from Internet World Stats) With the consumer market so saturated in Europe and America, brands and businesses are quick eyeing on the big piece of cake in the less-than developed far east.
However, Asia’s consumer behavior and internet trends may differ with those from the West, with their own specialised and isolated platforms (such as qq.com in China). And these are usually quite contained within their own communities. Hence services such as BuzzGain will need to obtain a better and more thorough understanding of the system to efficiently get it right. Even as a fellow Chinese, I’m finding it tough to keep up with the lighting speed trends of the China market. Their growth is tremendous and they are quick in developing tools that match those of the West. Moreover, the web structure in the east is not as organized and there are alot of “noise” to filter before actual contents and conversations can be read and analyzed. Hence adequate time will need to be invested to study the market in detail.
In the meantime, I would like to give a pat on the shoulder of the BuzzGain team. If you haven’t signed up for a demo, do so today. You’d be pleasantly surprised at the convenience it provides. And if you have a word to say to BuzzGain, feedback on how you think it could help you better, or just thank them for the wonderful innovation, give a BUZZ to @mukund on twitter. The fine man will be more than pleased to hear from you.
Consumers used to be only on the receiving end, taking in whatever information advertisers wants to let out. But online media has opened a new path that allows consumers to be the source of information, to judge and decide what to say. We call this people, bloggers.
I stumbled upon http://blog2u.sg/ today, and out of interest, signed up as a member. However, I am rather skeptical about the system that goes in there. I would say there’s both sides of the coin to this portal. What it does, is that it links bloggers and advertisers together. The advertiser will have to pay (in monetary of course) to put a banner ad, a sponsored post or a sponsored review on the blogger’s site. It can also come in the form of an invitation to a product launch, event or link to partner’s sites etc.
Somehow, I’m just thinking, is this the best and most appropriate method to execute social PR? The primary objective of reaching target audience through social PR is to bypass advertising. But isn’t “banner ad” or a “sponsored post”, simply just advertising end of the day? And “paying” someone to write something simply won’t give you an honest posting. Hence, that defies the evolution of social media and its realiability in the long term.
PR is all about building relationships. The relationship should be transparent, honest and sincere. When identifying suitable bloggers to talk about a product, we should first be sure that these are trustworthy people who are not simply living off posted advertisements. And who are the people reading the blogs? Does the product simply want mass awareness? Or targeted awareness? We should remember that no one medium can reach out to everyone. This is especially evident on the internet, where freedom of choice rules the cyberworld. Hence, we should take into consideration power of multiplication. Is this target group we have chosen the best people to spread the word? How many tiers can it lead to? Which is more effective? Selling the technical specification of a product/event or selling the experience of a product/event?
I think http://blog2u.sg/ will be useful for many direct advertisers, who wish to save the dollars from a good digital PR agency. But I would still suggest, the internet has a long memory. Campaigns and good word can go a long way if the appropriate method is being explored by professionals. A hundred thousand dollars is money well-spent if objectives are met. But a dollar spent could be a dollar too much if it does not work at all.
Of course, I am not indicating that this site does not work. It probably does to a certain extend. Most of those bloggers link their posts to twitter and facebook and plurk etc. So there’s still some form of extension there. However, do also remember it’s probably the same people, the same links on all these different platforms.
Ask around your office, how many people (who are non-avid bloggers) uses twitter and plurk? Or even digsby? As far as I am concern, I only know of one other person who does apart from me.
I am subscribed to Social Media Today although I admit I don’t read it very religiously unless something interesting catches my eye. Well, something did today. The blogger of the week featured Mr. Niall Cook, who is Worldwide Director of Marketing Technology in Hill & Knowlton. I don’t know Mr. Cook. But H&K caught my eye.
Sometime not too long ago, earlier this year, I was offered an interview opportunity with H&K. And although the result was negative, but this series of interviews were one of the most valuable lessons in my life. I had the pleasure of meeting the Managing Director of H&K China in Singapore. And I flew to both Beijing and Shanghai to meet with 13 business directors in all. I was also fortunate enough to be invited to an internal workshop on digital PR. The entire process opened a new perspective and worldview for me. It was quite an exciting and mind-blowing process. Although I’ve always knew PR is a niche by itself, but only then did I began to understand how in depth and what kind of expertise is required to be a successful PR person. It is all a very different ballgame from where I came from. And although the interviews lasted almost 3 months (it continued when I returned Singapore) but I must say it was a time and money well-spent. I couldn’t explain how rewarding it was, but I sincerely appreciated the opportunity.
H&K is somewhat very different from some other PR companies I know. I have friends who work for renown PR firms in Singapore and although I don’t know much about PR but the values they hold are very different. H&K has very strong integrity about their business and they strongly encourage their clients to anticipate and practice the same transparency. They also understands the importance of constant innovation and finding a new niche in PR with the everchanging technologies. And that the lines between advertising, marketing and PR are constantly getting blured and it no longer is about “traditional” or “digital” anymore. It is essential that each is integrated into one another to provide a complete solution for businesses. Every business director has a clear idea on the kind of team they want to groom and the vision of the company is very clear. Which is something I value alot because I find it impossible to contribute too much to a company I can’t seem to see the vision. Getting lost is simple in a mundane office life. Vision, values and positive culture in a company are some of the things I consider the most important when seeking a potential employment.
Someday, I still look forward to be a part of H&K. I think there is a wealth of knowledge and new worldview for me to apprehend from there. It is an organisation I will want to work for.
And here’s to share with everyone, the blog of Mr. Niall Cook.
I made a very short remark on a minister’s facebook somewhere earlier this month on the topic. Apparently the China government did not learn very much about transparency from SARs 6 years back.
I was studying in Beijing during the SARs period. Just 10mins away from my school was the first hospital to be infected in the entire capital city. When it was finally isolated, we were told there were 134 cases of SARs within the hospital. A houseman later told us, there were double of the actual figures. Opposite the hospital were a row of restaurants we love hanging out at. The restaurants were only closed for quarantined about a month later. My lecturer himself contracted the virus when he went for a minor operation in the hospital. He was lucky to get out of it alive.
Somehow, this culture of secrecy and cutting off the truth may have been passed down through the generations from the days where Emperors rule and servants are silenced as the dead do not speak. The belief is “the only way to get out of the situation is that the situation doesn’t gets out”. And quite obviously in the modern day where technology thrives and global transparency is regarded as highly importance, it is no longer an issue of the backyard. Not when in this case, tens (if not hundreds) of international brand names are tainted and reputation tarnished by the food quality control of one single country.
After the bad word got out, panic was aroused and unfounded rumours began spreading from one to another. There was even a so-called “professor or doctor” who went on TV to say melamine can be removed from the body by drinking acid! The country has a vast rural landscape and the contaminated milk can still be easily bought in villages. These peasants cannot afford televisions, they can’t read and no one told them there was a problem. The country should have sent all the province heads to the village heads and carry out a large scale educational program to inform the public, even the less previlaged.
Of course, to dig to the bottom of the issue, it was not only a case of badly handled PR. But crossed over to the discussion of politics, education, health and food care. It was a case that shouldn’t even have happened in the first place. Crisis management measures should have been in place before the occurence of a crisis as such.
It proved to be a hard lesson, but whether is it a lesson taught, remains to be seen.
An advocate of self-defined success and excellence, Belinda found her passion and forte in the social media sphere, with an all-rounded perspective of the integrated marketing environment having served in areas of film, events, viral with a foundation in multimedia. She is also guest contributor for marketing column in Lianhe Zaobao.
