Must Read: WSJ's Paul Steiger's Final Article-Future of Newspapers

I hope you all had a nice holiday. It's been a busy but fun past week. Christmas with the kids is always a delight.

This will be my final post of 2007.

If you haven't seen or read the Saturday edition of The Wall Street Journal, you missed a real treat and I insist you do. For those who don't know, Paul Steiger is Editor-at-Large and spent 16 years as the Journal's managing editor. His last day post-News Corp. purchase is Thursday, Jan. 3.

In his final contribution to the Journal, he penned an amazing restrospective of the newspaper business from his 41 years in print journalism -- Read all About it: How newspapers got into such a fix and where they go from here.

First of all, it's an insightful walk through history starting the mid 196os, the fall of evening newspapers, rise of morning newspapers, the thick profits the newspaper companies enjoyed in the 70s, 80s and into the early 1990s. And then he discusses the impact the Internet has had on print media, and the troubles big media companies like the New York Times Co., Washington Post Co., McClatchy and others have experienced in seeking to find ways to survive the turmoil. He also highlights recent changes in print media such as Sam Zell buying Tribune, News Corp. buying Dow Jones, Thomson and Reuters merging and so many other changes.

He makes the following point: "In some ways, what's happening to the newspaper industry is a return to its past. Less than 50 years ago, American newspapers were in the main relatively small, narrowly profitable, family-owned, locally focused and hotly competitive."

And this: "Then in the 1990s came the digital networks and the Internet, unleashing forces that would ultimately undermine newspaper business models that had been so supportive of journalism."

Finally: "The decisive blow may have been Google's, with its powerful search engine that would either give you a quick answer to a question you had or steer you to sites that could. The irony, of course, was that some of the most useful of those sites were newspapers'."

The article concludes with a new venture Steiger is pursuing -- Editor-in-chief of a nonprofit news agency (Pro Publica) dedicated to reporting on the abuses of power in business, government, universities, healthcare and so on. Interesting that investigative journalism is moving toward non-profit status.

Where the article falls short is in predicting the future of the newspaper industry. Or, perhaps his absence of a prediction is the prediction itself.

Take 20 minutes to read this article. I, for one, am keeping the hard copy in my files for future reading and reference.

Happy New Year.

Investing in Followers

Great article in The Wall Street Journal on Dec. 24 on the critical need for companies to listen and empower those that make up 90+% of a company -- followers, or employees. In "Management Leaders Turn Attention to Followers," George Anders writes about a new crop of books being written to draw attention to the fact that change happens from the bottom up.

The central issues these books discuss are nothing really new. It's nothing more than effective change management and communications strategies: Identify influencers, maintain ongoing communications with them, empower them to execute projects in the most effective way possible and cascade best practices.

The point is simple and too often ignored. Rank-and-file employees look to each other to do their jobs and know the best way to do them. They know the customers, the local community, the suppliers. They know what sells, what doesn't, why and so on. And they often have their own channel to communicate these aspects of their work.

One example in the article is Best Buy. Management implemented an expensive software tool to let employees collaborate and share ideas. But people didn't use them, regardless how much management publicized the value of the program. Instead, employees created their own website to share ideas, personal interests, complain, and so on. Its been a huge success, and it was created by employees for employees.

While management and corporate communications need to create an environment that inspires innovation and best practices sharing, it cannot effectively tell employees the best way to do it. That's where the line-worker change agents and cheerleaders become so critical to organizational success.

Scrooge: A Lesson in Rebuilding Reputation

We all know the story. Ebenezer Scrooge is a curmudgeonly old man consumed with one thing -- getting more wealth. He didn't spend it on anyone, not even on himself. In the dead of bone-chilling winters, the only warmth in a room might come from a flame the size of a small candle.

He is a man everyone loves to hate and mock. He is a self-made man, ruthless, feared, with many enemies and no friends, and he likes it that way. In modern times, he might be compared to the likes of Leona Helmsley. In the film world, perhaps his ruthlessness is not unlike Gordon Greko from the movie Wall Street. To quote one line from the movie Scrooge might have said: "If you need a friend, get a dog."

Then, through a series of ghostly visits, Scrooge is given another chance to change his ways.

If a PR consultancy had met with Scrooge, they may have said: We recommend aligning corporate behavior and rhetoric to achieve business reputation objectives. First, create a new mission and corporate values statement and solicit support from employees and the community. Second, embark on a series of philanthropic initiatives that demonstrate the company's commitment to giving back. Third, engage third-parties including government officials, community leaders and influencers to endorse the company. Fourth, publicize every time you give to a charity. Together, these programs will reposition Scrooge and Marley, Inc. as a favorable brand.

Bah, Humbug. In Scrooge's case, there was no PR spin or consultancy language. It was more simple than that. Much like he didn't care if people liked him, when his change of heart happened he didn't care if people thought he was insincere when they saw him a changed man. He simply went about doing what was right, because it was the right thing to do. It's called "Integrity."

How refreshing. In today's corporate world, doing what's right is so often viewed as a means to an end -- get positive recognition -- instead of doing what's right because it's the right thing to do.

May public relations professionals in 2008 seek to help their respective organizations and clients be more like the Scrooge of Christmas.

Merry Christmas!

Bad PR Advice from WSJ

If you saw today's Small Business section in the Wall Street Journal, you'll notice an article on how to hire a PR firm. The article profiles the challenges of a women business owner looking for ways to create greater awareness and turned to PR. But that's where the positives of the article stop.

The complaint from the business owner was that one firm she hired asked for $3,000 and after a few weeks had nothing to show for it. So the piece advocates pay-for-placement ... pay only for the coverage you get.

Two words: Bad Advice. I wouldn't expect a mainstream business publication to "get" PR, but it totally misses the strategic value of PR. In this case, PR is just a tactic -- get ink. What companies need is a strategy -- greater influence.

Shame on PR agencies and freelancers who promote pay-for-placement. They are shorting the business value PR offers.

The Consumer is in Control

Two interesting items related to the Wall Street Journal. First, a moment of silence as we pray for the safe stewardship of the Journal under the control of News Corp.

Now, onto the topic at hand. In today's editorial, Randall Rothenberg, president and CEO of the Interactive Advertising Bureau, wrote an editorial regarding Facebook's recent about-face regarding the use of Beacon to share information about purchases made by Facebook users (Facebook's Flop -- subscription required). Enough has been written about the intrusion and invasion of privacy of the technology, so I won't comment on that.

Rothenberg points out there are advocacy groups that are lobbying government to regulate interactive advertising. Rothernberg's bigger point in the piece is that the Internet is really good at self regulation, using the Facebook Beacon issue as a case in point.

It's the Body Internet Politic (Internet government of the people, by the people, for the people) at work that captured my attention. Think about it. Facebook had received a sizable investment from Microsoft, supposedly valuing the company at $15B US dollars (still haven't figured that one out). In launching Beacon, Facebook was trying to create new revenue opportunities, as any for-profit companies must do. But the Beacon backlash from the public was so fierce and swift, the company changed policies -- albeit after a few weeks.

This action clearly caught Facebook by surprise. I guess the question is, should it have caught them by surprise? It illustrates a key principle in public relations expressed by Edward Bernay: Public relations tabulates public attitudes, defines the policies, procedures and interest of an organization followed by executing a program of action to earn public understanding and acceptance.

I'm not picking on Facebook. Pick any company and you'll find examples when the company did not tabulate public attitudes well enough or execute programs to earn public understanding and acceptance. But crisis situations like the one Facebook has endured should remind those of us in the public relations profession that our role as counselors is to understand public attitudes so as to mitigate risk and maximize opportunity for our companies.

The other thing the editorial reminds us is that consumers are in control -- they drive what companies make, how much they want to pay for goods and services, where the products and services are made and sold, what labor and environmental considerations are comprised in the making of the product, and the list goes on. And, the demands can absolutely conflict with each other (e.g. demand for cheaper prices for goods; expectations for Western wage standards in third-world countries).

Going back to Bernay for a moment, while there is no possible way to make every constituent understand and accept company products, policies or practices, it certainly underscores two essential points: One, the importance of corporate behavior that support (not detract from) company positioning and stated values; two, the power of the collective population in strong-arming even the most well-intentioned businesses to change unwanted behavior.

Is the "Green" Message Getting Through?

The Wall Street Journal Business Technology blog cites a report by Global Action Plan, a UK-based NGO, noting that enterprise IT is not living up to the Green messaging being communicated by IT vendors. So the question is, is the message getting through? Is the pain point not acute enough? Is it not reaching the right level within the organization (i.e. C-level) or is it the wrong message altogether?

As I noted in my post, Ecological and Economic and CSR, I'm not convinced the message should be about "going green." That's a trailing benefit to the larger objective, reduce costs and create greater efficiencies to create shareholder value.

In the Financial Times Dec. 5, Alan Cane writes about CIO's priorities in, "What's on CIO's Wish List." The article outlines top 10 priorities (granted, this was not a scientific poll, but still provides some insight into CIO priorities). Where's "green"? Number 11. This suggests to me that the message companies are communicating -- go green -- is possibly not aligned with customer priorities and hence not resonating.

The top 10 from Financial Times Digital Business, Dec. 5, 2007:

1 Business alignment and strategy

2 Hiring and retaining the best staff

3= IT innovation/new methodologies

3= Security

5 Collaboration technologies

6 Controlling costs

7 Compliance and regulation

8 Virtualisation

9 Customer service

10 Mobility (Green issues came 11th)

CMO Jobs Shortest Among C-Suite

Interesting article in this week's BusinessWeek, The Short Life of the Chief Marketing Officer (subscription required).

A few interesting extracts:

The article notes that as recent as 5 years (I suspect it's more like 7-10 years) ago the CMO's role was much simpler -- develop a brand strategy and positioning, hire an ad firm (and PR firm) to create break-through-the-clutter communications programs, manage promotional activities, then they "waited for their bonus or pink slip." Talk about a coin toss.
The magazine makes the accurate point that CEOs and CMOs have differing demands -- CEOs have to answer to investors quarterly. While the work of a CMO -- brand building, sales generation, corporate positioning and so on -- is a long term investment. With CEOs lasting an average of 44 months on the job (Ed Zander of Motorola a recent victim), "long term" is barely in their vocabulary. Hence the conflict between CEO/CFO expectations and CMO priorities.

But with the average CMO on the job about two years on average (26 months according to executive search firm Spencer Stuart) it's not like they have a lot of time to make things happen.

Yahoo!'s former CMO, Cammie Dunaway took an interesting approach. In the article, she recounts how she partnered with the CFO to handle the analysis of the ROI for marketing. Having the CFO support marketing's efforts (assuming the strategy is working) helped create greater credibility with executives, she says.

The big challenge, the article says, is the unchartered territory of "new media." It's been tough enough to prove that traditional marketing using traditional media worked. Now CMOs have the added challenge of trying to educate themselves, let alone C-level colleagues, of the need to incorporate new, often unproven marketing methods on the Web. At Geico Insurance, Ted Ward worked to figure out how to market on social networking sites and whether to try Web TV, among other new media ventures. As he puts it, "it's hard to choose marketing options when the sands keep shifting."

So where does public relations fit into this mix? I tried to see if there was any research on the average tenure of a senior public relations executive in a corporation (vs. an agency/consulting firm). Nothing popped up quickly, but I have to believe that if the average CMO last roughly two years, and the average CEO lasts less than four years, that the average corporate communications executive probably lasts somewhere in the middle.