Category: Social Media

Threat vs. opportunity in digital

When organisations think digital (especially for PA purposes) there’s always too much focus on threats:

  1. We’ll avoid the digital space because we might put our foot in it by saying or doing the wrong thing.
  2. We need to understand who matters in the digital space because someone might be a threat to us.
  3. We need to have a full-on online content and SEO strategy so we’ll dominate the search rankings and keep threatening stuff at bay.

1 is a miserable excuse in anyone’s book. 2 and 3 are pretty valid. But why focus just on threats with all the opportunities on offer?

  1. Embrace digital as it’ll make your intelligence-gathering and research more complete, easier, cheaper and faster.
  2. Embrace digital as it’ll allow you to be in more places where your audiences are present (including policy-makers.)
  3. Embrace digital as you might find supporters willing to back you up.
  4. Embrace digital as it might make it easier for you to manage relationships.
  5. Embrace digital as it’ll make it easier for you to tell your side of the story (and quicker.)

In short, are you selling digital within your organisation or your client? Think more happy thoughts, not just impending doom.

Why PA struggles to adapt to digital: don’t blame it all on the old fogeys

I just re-read my last post and had a thought. Point two – in which I state that PA professionals increasingly need to think issues and reputation management rather than pure government relations, and hence should embrace the campaigner’s toolkit, including digital – sounds simple enough (the concept, but certainly not the execution.) However, although I imply that it’s because people aren’t moving with the times, I’m now thinking this – as easy as it is for young whippersnappers like me to blame old-school PA types for the fact that Brussels and other PA hubs are lagging, two other issues are no doubt key in determining why organisations aren’t more visionary in their PA approach:

  1. The nature of the game: short-term legislative priorities over long-term reputation. Countering Directive X is more pressing today, frankly. And as soon as Directive X is dealt with, along comes Directive Y to soak up all your time. With a PA team consisting of 5 people and 1 consultant on call whose hours are nearly all used up, it’s no surprise that organisations struggle to think long-term.
  2. It’s not you but your entire sector that needs rebranding. A lot of organisations struggle with long-term reputation because they operate within a tiny niche of a far bigger sector. They produce chemical X or energy resource Y or financial tool Z; but no one has ever heard of any of them. Yet they’re getting hammered because chemicals, energy and financial services at large have reputational issues. Why should they, representing 0.1% of a far bigger industry, be leading the charge? Quite.

Many would no doubt add another reason for PA’s struggles with digital: the fact that many issues are off the public radar and don’t need a campaign element given that “we know our entire target audience” or “our audiences don’t use the web.” Whatever. Sure, 90% of the issues I work on don’t require campaign elements suited to digital, like mobilisation and community building, but NO ONE can possibly think they are maximising their chances of success without backing up their offline narrative with a good online content strategy, supported by at least a search strategy to ensure maximum visibility amongst target audiences.

“We do government relations, we don’t need digital”

To people in PA hubs like Brussels who understand the value of communicating on issues (fewer than you’d think, given the status of traditional government relations), digital is no longer treated with suspicion. Although there is plenty of confusion around what digital actually entails and an annoying propensity to approach it tactically rather than strategically (i.e. “let’s do Twitter” rather than “who do we need to talk to and what do we need to say”), it’s generally regarded as an important part of the toolbox.

And yet “we do government relations, we don’t need digital” is still frequently heard around Brussels. Why? In actual fact, it’s got anything to with digital per se: the people who say it used to claim, “we do government relations, we don’t need communications.” In an environment where that just won’t stick anymore, given that the need for integration of government relations/advocacy and wider communications can not be disputed in polite company, the naysayers have found something new to dismiss: digital. They like the comfort zone they’ve developed over the years. One where long-term client reputation matters little compared to the ability to get a half-hour sit-down with the right official or MEP.

Wake up and smell the coffee. The sit-down will not matter if you haven’t got a credible storyline to back it up. The storyline needs to respond to real-world matters, and should be delivered to the right audiences via the right channels – including digital.

Online campaigning: avoid the “accruing worthless mass” temptation

Eurotypes – myself included – have often cited Oneseat as an example of a successful online campaign. It was (is) in a sense: it drummed up support for a popular cause to the tune of 1.2 million people signing a petition to have the European Parliament’s seat in Brussels only. What’s next? Not sure.

That’s one issue with the web: it’s just too easy. Tick a box and send an email – hey presto – you’ve lent your support to a worthy cause and mobilised your peers. But as with so much else online, the question is: so what? In truth, not much (usually.)

For this reason, campaigners should avoid the worthless mass temptation when seeking to mobilise people online in order to help drive meaningful political change: what’s important is what the figures mean, not how many zeroes they contain.

In a presentation I recently saw by Clay Shirky, author of multiple bestsellers on the web (look him up on YouTube and Amazon: highly recommended), he rightly states that you need to make people DO something that actually requires some effort. Just ticking a box may provide people with a warm fuzzy sense of having done their good deed for the day, but the fact of the matter is, it’s too easy and won’t usually carry any clout. If you’re trying to institute meaningful change through the actions of many, they’ll need to do something more.

Like what? Not just “tick this box to send an automated email to your parliamentarian” but writing a heartfelt personalised email/letter including quotes, photos, videos. Not just following a stream of content but contributing to it. Not just connecting to people in an online community but organising offline meet-ups. And so forth.

Your job as a communicator/campaigner? Provide the means and the encouragement, but make your audience do most of the hard work.

Engaging with bloggers: start with a humble caveat

To anyone dipping a toe in the blogosphere for the first time, the one thing I’d advise above anything is humility. Meaning what? If you’re not 100% sure what to expect but you’re keen to give it a go, lay down a massive caveat when you start. Something along the lines of: “I’m just getting started, I’m not sure what to expect, I might make mistakes, bear with me, please feel free to offer me some advice along the way.” You may still screw up here or there, but you’ll be forgiven.

Challenging clients and integration: two telling quotes

Heard on the grapevine last week: “my CEO friend tells me he only works with a handful of consultants. They’re argumentative and critical but they’ve been working with him for years.” And a day later: “I used to be fed up of hearing all the talk about how the web was going to change the way we operate. But once it had been put into context, I agreed.”

They may be amongst the first things mentioned in any Consulting for Dummies type handbook, but it doesn’t hurt to repeat them.

First, you’re far more likely to succeed in the long-run if you challenge the brief. Again and again. Every consulting function that largely focuses on execution eventually becomes a commodity which someone else can do faster and cheaper. You’ll only stay in your client’s good books in the long run through added-value thinking, and that invariably means challenging the client. In short, don’t just agree then execute. Think creatively, challenge, and only then execute.

Second, there’s no point harping on about a channel like the web unless you’re putting it into context. That context should be what someone is doing already: so you’re not selling something new; but rather, you’re integrating a new set of tools and an existing client reality and making it better. In short, the web isn’t great because it’s yet another channel; and a new and shiny one at that. But it may be great for you if you can take what you’re doing already and further improve your reputation, reach, influence, sales (or whatever) through smart integration.

Policy blogging in Brussels: more of it please

I wrote a post on Fleishman-Hillard’s Public Affairs 2.0 blog last week on the shortage of policy-specific blogs in Brussels. My point in short was this: plenty of good quality blogs are being written about the EU at large which cover a wide array of issues and often result in decent conversations. Movers and shakers in Brussels read these blogs, and yet the scores of organisations present here whose remit is to engage with policy makers and other stakeholders on issues key to their sectors are virtually non-existent in the blogosphere. Why?! They’ll write position papers, engage in face-to-face meetings, develop alliances, work with the media, and yet they won’t blog. What a wasted opportunity to present their views in an ongoing narrative, engage with other stakeholders and build relationships, all while showcasing people in the most open and transparent medium imaginable rather than just presenting a faceless organisation through the same age-old tactics.

Anyway, no point in paraphrasing the post when you can read it here (note the good comments too.) Further comments very welcome (here or on PA 2.0.)

Your first priority online: become a resource

In PR/PA anno 2010, the web is acknowledged as being an absolutely integral part of the communications mix, but quite often for the wrong reasons. PR professionals who view their job through the prism of media relations have transferred their thinking to the web, but replacing journalists with bloggers and the like. They view the opportunity purely in having more influencers to tell a story to; they’ll even ignore the web entirely if they find there aren’t high-profile bloggers interested in their issue.

To be honest, it’d be tricky to run a blogger relations campaign or build community on most issues. Sorry, but there just isn’t enough critical mass yet. That doesn’t mean the web has no value in these instances though! We’re moving from a world of push to one of pull. People’s first point of call? Google. So when they do search, you need to have a presence: and an impressive one at that. So forget about the external influencers for just a second and start thinking of yourself as one instead. You reach the end-user DIRECT through search. Grasp the opportunity.

p.s. and even if your issue could warrant a blogger relations campaign or a community-building approach you STILL need to build a great presence before engaging, or you won’t be taken seriously (the four pillars of online engagement maps out the steps in a little more detail.)

Diagrams: Brussels PA-Corp Comms channel splits

How do most organisations operating in the Brussels PA-Corp Comms space approach their work? By and large, via channels operating in splendid isolation: lots of focus on advocacy (yes, I’m calling it a channel), a fair bit on media, and a tiny bit on web communication. Lots of it may be very good, but it’s poorly integrated.

How would I like to see them operate? With all channels neatly placed within the same circle, treated as part of the same larger “comms” framework on any given issue.

p.s. the web circle is not bigger than the media and advocacy circles because it’s more important, but because the web acts as the integrator that brings the rest together, beyond its own individual benefits as a channel. Whenever you engage in the media or through advocacy, it should be supported and channelled via the web also.

Online engagement: Brussels audiences’ five standard questions

Here are five questions which I’m invariably asked when organisations are thinking about exploring online engagement but aren’t quite sure what they’re getting themselves into. They’re not the most interesting or strategic questions, but are understandable stumbling blocks which hold organisations back and need to be answered. Here goes.

1. Won’t we get attacked by the other side? What if they say things we really don’t want anyone to hear?

Maybe, but in any case, you can moderate, so if there’s something you really don’t want to expose, you don’t have to (read a recent post about angry commenting trolls here.) Having said that, don’t moderate too much. If you remove everything that isn’t rose-tinted, what’s the point of engaging? View it as an opportunity. There are people out there who dislike you no matter what. There are others who aren’t so sure about you, but if you actually respond to their concerns, you might even win them over.

2. OK so we can moderate, but aren’t we going to get inundated by thousands of hateful attacks every day? So much so that we’ll end up spending all our time moderating?

In my experience, nobody has ever been attacked in this way (don’t flatter yourselves: people have better ways of spending their time!) I’ve heard of instances of automated responses by angry pressure groups, but have never experienced it myself. In any case, these people had your email addresses before: were you “attacked” then?

3. We’re only a small team with a small budget: do we really have the resources to do this properly?

Sure, proper online engagement is time intensive, but so are conf calls, meetings and writing reports no one reads. View it as an opportunity, not something you could do on top of all your – supposedly – far more important tasks. This might actually be the most important thing you do (although this depends on the nature of your sector or organisation.) In any case, if you plan properly, it needn’t take up too much time. Have an editorial plan in place so you organise publication properly, and give yourself a timeslot for the actual work like you would for a regular meeting or whatever else, and you will find it just becomes part of your working day.

4. How do we target people in multiple languages?

The perennial comms nightmare in Europe. It depends on the nature of the organisation in question and what you’re trying to do. If your key target audience is French-speaking but your organisation primarily operates in English, it’d be hard to recommend against trying to communicate in both languages. As a starting point, I’d certainly recommend against overstretching i.e. trying to engage in multiple languages; but to what extent this is the case really depends. Conversations shouldn’t be translated, so I wouldn’t ever translate blog posts, tweets, forum entries and the like; but I would not recommend against a mixed basket approach where a few languages are in use on the same platforms (but not more than three….) For instance, a blog could have posts in different languages, each tagged by the language in question so that a user can select to view all posts written in any given language in one list. Again though, this is complex issue and there’s no right or wrong answer apart from don’t overstretch…!

5. How do we know if engagement works? How do we measure success?

Another perennial question, and one which I’d (controversially) say is relatively easy to answer, even though ROI calculations for engagement (and comms in general) are notoriously contentious. I’m not saying that it’s easy to guarantee success or that it’s easy to define very clear ROI measurements – it’s not at all – but there are so many things you can measure in quantitative terms online, that you can develop a very substantial set of KPIs which you can follow and improve on an ongoing basis. So when the question arises, your response can be: with press releases, you get clippings; online, you get viewing numbers, behavioural and trending figures, you’ll know who said what, when and where; and you’ll know how many of your key targets viewed your content. Plus you’ll have qualitative input which you’d ordinarily have needed polling to assess because you can measure word of mouse (as opposed to traditional word of mouth…) i.e. you’ll know what people think because they may comment about it. The bottom line of the sell is this: my professional opinion is that this will work, but don’t just take my word for it; with you, the client, we’ll develop a very detailed set of KPIs which will be exact indicators of success. Given that they’re so substantial, you’ll know very clearly whether the programme is a success or not; far more clearly that any of the other communications channels you use.

Are people totally won over? No, the novelty of engagement and the “loss of control” it entails is still a big leap; but at this point people tend to be willing to take their first baby steps.