The Buzz Bin

A guest blog entry by the Telecommunications Industry Association’s Ian Martinez

Last June, I helped Ian Martinez and the TIA marketing team launch the TeleCommunities blog at the international NXTComm trade show and conference (that’s us with our blog carts!). As a former TIA employee this was truly a great joy, and even more so because Ian is really a natural blogger. Recently, Ian offered to make some guest appearances, and I gladly accepted… And with that, here’s Ian’s thoughts on message control.

It’s really exciting to get involved with the Buzz Bin, but its a little intimidating, especially since Geoff was in such great form when he joined me on TeleCommunities for the NXTcomm show in June. Michele Capots posted last week on the reporter-client-PR relationship, and I really loved the way she emphasized the value of person-to-person relationships, and the way each one is slightly different.

It occurred to me that so much of the Bin’s focus in on what avenue the “message” will take whether it’s a PR message, a media message, a policy message, what have you. I think Geoff’s take on “message control” is very much like my own — and much like several of the other Washington-area bloggers, whether in policy or PR — in that the current state of play in information technology has rendered “message control” an oxymoron.

We’ve all had the experience at some point where we encounter that overzealous corporate flack who doesn’t work with reporters, or that equally overzealous blogger or reporter who, guns and laptop blazing, shows no regard for cultivating trust relationships with PR folks. Everyone remembers those comms directors that hold grudges because some story didn’t properly reflect their company’s message, and if anything, it only tends to reinforce in the reporter’s mind whatever negative facts he might have gathered in the first place.

What they share in common, along with being generally infuriating, is an unrealistic desire to be the sole proprietor of information they think is valuable. Rather than work with you, maybe helping shape your story, or shaping their own story in a way that better reflects your client’s take on things, they hold fast.

No one likes this. With the ubiquity of communications technologies, and most importantly, the explosion of third-party messaging, the “unitary executive” approach to message control is obsolete if not downright detrimental. The Buzz Bins and the Mobile Diners of the world are already out there, operating full tilt, and there’s nothing anyone can do about it.

I’ve written before about the value of having employers who don’t squeeze the message so tight they strangle it. Smart companies will move away from strangling the message or suffer for it, especially as ICT technologies continue to proliferate (more on that later this week at TeleCommunities).

What then? Are corporate entities simply to leave their brand out in the wind, no control over how it’s managed? Of course not. The answer is in Michelle’s post: develop relationships. You may not be able to micromanage what gets said or how, but can sure as heck make decisions about who’s going to bat for you.

When we brought Geoff on for TeleCommunities it wasn’t so we could direct him precisely how — or what — to blog. It was because the leadership at TIA was comfortable that we knew what Livingston Buzz could do and how. We trusted our brand with Geoff’s. This is how you win the game, not by dictating what gets out there and in what way.