“We have nothing to fear but fear itself,” Franklin D. Roosevelt

Nothing can kill a corporate social media campaign quicker than fear. This great cause of many problems is the number one barrier to corporate adoption of social media. Consider these types of fear.

Fear of losing control: The old saw is back! But do not underestimate how strong a hold message control still has on today’s communicator. Unwriting 60 years of communications theory — theory that is still being taught in universities throughout the world — is no easy task. It’s no wonder why corporate types balk when they hear brand management theories won’t work anymore.

Fear of negative feedback: Less of an issue these days, but still prevalent. In a class I taught the other day, students were told to ignore negative blog posts and comments. Uh no. Negative posts are an opportunity to listen and engage.

Fear of legal repercussions: Lawyers, they always get in the way! Companies have great fear about how statements made on the blog can be viewed not only from a liability standpoint, but also from a compliance standpoint (you know, the SEC). They forget the company needs to be marketed, that consumers demand open communications from companies.

Fear of change: This more than any is the 800 lb. gorilla that social media advocates really need to start talking about. All of the other fears can be combated using case studies and examples. But no matter how many examples of collaboration and social media excellence a company is exposed to, it must still face itself.

The Big Change

Let’s not oversimplify this change. It’s simple to understand tactically, but simple is not easy. Especially when it involves shifting cultures and decades of practice. Sea changes are extremely difficult to deal with for many people. Human beings just don’t like sudden changes. They balk when the normal gets turned upside down.

Remember “Who Moved My Cheese?” Well, Spencer Johnson can make a killing off of PR agencies and marketing departments for the next few years. It’s going to be rough for some folks (image credit: photo.net).

Competition will eventually force most companies to adapt social media tools, but it’s going to take time. And we who have already adapted need to be patient.

The role of the social media savvy is not to chastise these folks, but to help them. I’ve called it evangelism, but perhaps the right word is coaching. And who hasn’t had someone coach them through a challenge? Or choose another word, navigator, pathfinder, etc. The point is we need to extend an open hand.

Connie Reece writes Every Dot Connects and is the team leader of Social Media Club Austin. Her approach of connecting people, developing relationships and starting conversations drives her success as a social media expert. She’s also got a wicked Scrabble game. In this Buzz Bin interview, Connie discusses her views of social media in Austin, and provides insight into the Social Media Club workshop on November 6th featuring Shel Israel, Chris Heuer and Kami Huyse (Geoff is attending, too, and will live blog the event).

BB: What’s the social media scene like in Austin?

CR: Fast-moving. Austin is a high-tech hub, so adoption of social media technologies and tools is naturally high. When we started Social Media Club at the beginning of this year, most of the interest came from PR/marketing/comms pros working with the tech industry. But now we’re seeing corporate communicators and business owners as well as creative types — artists, writers, designers — eager to learn about social media.

BB: Tell us about the Social Media Workshop: “Starting the Conversation.”

CR: It’s a one-day workshop designed around the premise that the most effective marketing occurs when companies build relationships with their customers by starting, or at the least joining, conversations. Shel Israel, coauthor of Naked Conversations, will give the opening keynote and Chris Heuer, cofounder of Social Media Club, will preside over the event. I’ll also be presenting, along with Kami Huyse, who will talk about how to measure social media. And it’s rumored that the author of Now Is Gone may show up with copies of his book. That would be a treat!

BB: What should attendees expect?

CR: It will be a toss-up which will hurt more at the end of the day — your brain or your butt! Yes, there will be hours of sitting around a table soaking up the collected wisdom of some social media gurus; but we plan for a lot of interaction with the attendees. We want to make sure attendees acquire the information they need, so we’ll answer questions, facilitate discussions, and fill their heads with knowledge until we start to hear brain cells exploding. Then we’ll stop before anyone sustains a serious injury. :)

BB: Dell is playing host. Tell us about their role in the event?

CR: In addition to being our corporate sponsor, Dell’s Digital Media Team will participate in the workshop. It’s an unprecedented opportunity for attendees to sit down with people like Lionel Menchaca, the driving force behind the Direct2Dell blog, and Caroline Dietz, online community manager for IdeaStorm — the folks who are leading the social media revolution inside Dell. It’s been my privilege to get to know some of the team members, and I can guarantee that they’re not just passionate about their company, they’re passionate about social media and generous in sharing their experiences.

BB: What’s your favorite social network?

CR: Right now it’s Twitter because it’s so much fun, and I’ve made some amazing connections there — like you. I call Twitter the virtual water cooler. Just like at an office, people show up randomly and join whatever conversation is already in progress. Sometimes it’s trivial, sometimes it’s humorous, other times it’s helpful, and occasionally it’s intense and riveting.

Like all social networks, It’s absolutely impossible to keep up with, but that’s not a critical component of Twitter. You just jump in and out of the stream as you have time. And I love that I can take it with me on my mobile. My “tweeps” (Twitter peeps) go everywhere with me.

BB: Facebook, fad or forever?

CR: How about … for the foreseeable future? :)

BB: What’s next for Connie Reece?

CR: Learning to compartmentalize. Mike Chapman is my partner in Reece & Company, and as CEO his most important role right now is keeping me sane–not an easy job–by helping me prioritize and keeping me away from shiny objects. Our social media consultancy is growing faster than we anticipated (see question #1), so it’s sometimes a roller coaster ride. It’s thrilling, though, to sit down with clients and brainstorm ways we can help them join conversations and employ social media as part of their overall marketing and PR strategies.

As social media consultants and professionals, there may be times when we struggle to create an effective voice. Whether it is for our clients to counsel them on developing a personal voice that also delivers a brand message, or for our own blogs where we are sharing our ideas about social media and how businesses can best utilize the technologies.

The Personal Brand Conundrum

Justin Kownacki had a post a couple of weeks ago questioning whether or not professional bloggers were seen as a person, or a brand. We know that many bloggers may continue to be followed through their career – no matter what company they are blogging for. People like their voice, their personality, and the comfort of the name (or is it the brand?).

I think that what makes a brand successful on the internet is its ability to be personal. We have all decided that transparency and authenticity are two ingredients necessary for a blog to be credible and popular. People want to read blogs that are written by people that they understand and relate to. They want to feel a part of the conversation and interact with others who are interested as well.

(Picture credit: Beth’s Blog)

The Passion to Blog

On Monday, Toby Bloomberg had a post asking if as women bloggers, we could directly impact the success of social media in a corporate world. One of her main questions was this:

Q: What is one common denominator of a successful blog?

A: I say passion. Without passion about the topic it’s difficult to sustain these hungry critters with content. (Yes, there is also honesty, transparency, authenticity and more but stay with me on this one.)

That got me thinking, the most popular blogs are without a doubt those written by passionate people. From technology to social media to entertainment, the most influential blogs are those written by people who are passionate about their life and their work, and are determined to share those thoughts and ideas with others.

Where would Web 2.0 be without those people who were driven to discuss and start conversations about how we were interacting with one another online, and how we could be doing better?

So What?

I think that overall, people read blogs because they like the personal connection. They enjoy the feeling of community and interaction that comes with it.

There will always be people who criticize and disagree with your views. It’s the nature of the immediate impact that blogging has on the internet, the ability to gain comments (good and bad) and other insight from all kinds of people. Again, once something is posted, it’s there online forever. So, stand by it and be proud of where it came from. It’s your passion.

The main question is, are the relationships you are forming and conversations you are starting on your blog for yourself, your business, or your brand? What do you want your voice to be?

Following up on last week’s Now Is Gone case study, here are some statistics from Dell Computer on their social media efforts. In case you missed it, Jeff Jarvis reversed “Dell Hell” with a great article in the current edition of BusinessWeek.

• At start of program, 49% of blog posts were negative. Today, overall tonality is 22% negative.
• Direct2Dell currently ranked about 700 on Technorati, among the highest corporate blogs.
• Direct2Dell gets more than 5 million unique views per month
• Over 7000 ideas have been submitted via IdeaStorm
• Studio Dell is gets more than 200,000 views per month

Impressive numbers. These stats have been added to the Dell case study permanently.

Great marketing is simple (but not easy). It communicates obvious value to a customer. It should be a no-brainer.

It’s even easier when the product or service does its own marketing.

Breath mints for construction workers and automotive maintenance engineers is not obvious. Until now.

Wrench Mints changes that. “When your breath is broke… Fix it!”

The cap slides off using a pretty cool packaging technique. Suddenly it’s cool for tough guys to have fresh breath. And the stars are noticing.

By happen stance, I met Wrench Mints Founder Eddie Rubin in Southern California the weekend preceding CEA. He showed me these mints, and as a marketer I could not help but feel inspired by the clever, yet simple value proposition Wrench Mints offers.

It’s just a reminder to me that even though we live in a new world of “advanced marketing,” nothing works like a simple, unique message that delivers epiphanies whenever someone sees it. Work to make marketing simple, regardless of the media form. Remember, simple is not easy. Kudos to Eddie for a brilliant concept.

The blogosphere has been abuzz the past week with many posts about the future of PR, the press release, the social media release, and overall relationships between clients, agencies, and each other.

Social media’s impact is evidenced here in the Guardian Unlimited, showing that with the boom in MySpace and Facebook popularity, PR firms have nothing but growth to report. “Social networking is really recommendation between people about the things that they are interested in and they like… this has stimulated people’s attention in terms of the importance of PR.”

However, is that really the relationship between PR and social networking? I think not. And neither does PR Disasters.com, who reviews the article further here.

Scobleizer wonders where Forrester got its Twitter data? A report claiming that 6% of American adults are using Twitter, leaves a bad taste in Robert’s mouth. However, the numbers are broken down and explained here, stating that the numbers come from an online survey, and consider the nature of a volunteer, sample panel and the results from that.

And speaking of PR and Robert Scoble, Brian Solis had an excellent post yesterday about blogger relations, PR and the news media cycle. Given the current news cycle and media deadline driven industry, bloggers play an important role in getting the word out, essentially adding a little oomph to the traditional wire services.

The semantics of social media and PR are discussed by Copywrite, Ink. in a post about the various “roadblocks” that social media has with the corporate world. Comment moderation and concern, transparency issues and message control, measuring success, and the participation and practice of PR practitioners are key factors and roadblocks to social media adoption.

Last week an article in Forbes highlighted the power of Digg. Stemming from a discussion at the SMX Social Media conference, more and more media and marketing people are taking notice of Digg… again.

Today marks the start of the annual PRSA conference in Philly. Invariably this conference spawns a bunch of posts about what’s wrong with the PR industry. In spite of this meeting, PR industry leaders cannot affect the changes necessary to reverse the public’s negative perception of PR.

Confession: I used to be a member of PRSA and found little value in it. Why? A few reasons:

• My first boss was an award winning APR and a local PRSA champion. He also had six internal ethical charges filed against him in three years. I mistakenly associated the two together.
• PRSA events seemed like a great place to recruit young PR pros, but not to find clients or make senior contacts
• The seminars were skin deep

In short, spin and chest beating was abound. Nobility and right actions were not. I lost my faith in the PRSA.

Years later, blogging has provided introductions into several PR pros — some who are certified APRs — that I admire. They have shown me through their actions that PR as a profession — and that certification — can mean something. They walk the talk, and restored my faith in public relations. They understand it’s about relationships… not looking good.

The Problem

This is not a defense of PR or the PRSA. I realize this business is a mess. Not one of our trade publications seems to cut the mustard. Furthermore, one angry voice in this business goes so far as to claim that it fights hypocrisy while threatening critics’ wives and calling their employers (sounds like the pot calling the kettle black to me).

Our leading association is pricey and cannot affect change (to date). The industry is plagued by astroturfing and hucksterism. And really that makes sense. Why?

PR pros are taught that it’s OK to spin. This myth spreads all the way up the ladder to the CxO suite in most companies. In essence, they think by saying the “right” thing — a.k.a. what you want to hear or what makes them look good — they are doing the right thing. But the two do not coincide. Lying to people please or position oneself as an expert creates the incredible distrust PR pros experience in the marketplace (image credit: Spin Thicket).

Most supposed PR pros and experts don’t walk the talk. They just tell you what’s wrong with PR, and how they know what’s right. They forget that public RELATIONS is about interactions, creating value in your relations by doing (not saying) the right thing, and building goodwill. And that’s why PR is such a troubled industry.

Getting Back to Relations

A better course of action is to focus on the actual meaning of PR - public RELATIONS. That means relations — as in relationships between people. Organizations - companies, government bodies, non-profits — are made up of people. People need to talk to people.

One budding meme is the public relations expert’s desire to separate PR from marketing and sales. This denies the current hybridization of PR & marketing skills that social media demands. Or the fact the most organizational PR departments are a subset of the sales and marketing department. Yet, ironically the reasoning — that sales and marketing communicate to get something — is the same jaded view that many people rightly smeer PR people with. That’s because regardless of professional label, people have forgotten the old saw — build relationships by creating value.

Any good sales or marketing person will tell you that sales is about building relationships, not getting leads. That is as old as Dale Carnegie and Napoleon Hill (or if you prefer, modern day leaders like Seth Godin and Jeffrey Gitomer). BTW, note the second word in public RELATIONS. See the correlation between good salesmanship and PR?

It’s time to get back to old school PR and forget about this command and control approach towards looking good. Last month, I wrote a piece on Now Is Gone dubbed, “The Art Of Participation PR.” It encapsulated the Participation Ethos as it applies to public relations. Here’s a snippet:

The dictionary definition of PR is (via Dictionary.com):

1. the actions of a corporation, store, government, individual, etc., in promoting goodwill between itself and the public, the community, employees, customers, etc.

2. the art, technique, or profession of promoting such goodwill.

Perhaps public relations is an art. So many practitioners don’t get it (see Brian Solis article). But in my mind social media is just another form of old-fashioned public relations: creating goodwill by being a contributing, participating member of the community (see Kami Huyse article).

It’s time to get back to basics, folks. In baseball great teams make it to the World Series, because they do the simple things… They play defense, they pitch well, they execute. Great PR is about basic relationship tenements.

Be Real, Be Human

Part of relationships is being human. That’s why people really like social media. We see the good, the bad, and everything in between. We identify because it’s authentic and real. Contrary to many PR pros constant attempts to look good 100 percent of the time, humans make mistakes.

One of the most uncomfortable and unintended results of writing Now Is Gone is the desire for some folks to put me on a pedestal. I am not some guru, and I still put my pants on one leg at a time.

For every grain of knowledge I have gained, there are twenty more that I am missing. Now Is Gone was written because I got tired of being asked to free lunches everyday to explain social media. So I wrote my experience, strength and hope in one book during a ten week period. That knowledge was accumulated by listening to and reading others (see Now Is Gone sources), as well as experimenting on my own. But a book does not make me perfect or a guru.

For example, one of my character defects is a short temper that causes me to get into it with folks sometimes. This is particularly bad when I am dealing with the gemeyn shmegeges at Strumpette. But I realize I’m wasting my time. Why fight? Why bother? Rolling in the mud with pigs is never a good idea: They like it too much (or as Susan says, don’t feed the trolls). Though I try, sometimes restraint of tongue and pen slips. And believe me, I know it doesn’t make me look good, nor is it a good use of my time or energy. I ALWAYS regret these exchanges.

At the same time, BS cries of hypocrisy are inaccurate because I never claimed to be more than human. Being a PR pro does not necessitate perfect, 100% righteous behavior from me. But being a man requires a willingness to do the very best I can for my family, clients and friends every day, and to set right my wrongs when they occur. I look for progress, not perfection. And I do not associate this behavioral expectation with my career.

Charles Barkley, one of the greatest basketball players of our time, had a mid-career crisis around his rough character. He caught grief for getting in fights, saying the occasional stupid thing, etc. That passed quickly once he told people he was not perfect, and was not a role model. People liked him for he was.

Seth Godin recently had a more eloquent version of Sir Charles’ message.

I like being wrong. Not enough to make a habit of it, but enough to realize that I’m actively testing scenarios… If you need the core fact to be guaranteed right and perfect, you’re doomed, because facts like that are in short supply.

The point: If your view of PR is trying to portray a perfect image, then Get Over It. Relationships and RELATIONS are about being human — not God. Together as humans we experience life and grow together. Mistakes happen, and good PR can overcome this. Consider Dell’s incredible lesson in admitting wrongs, listening and changing. This week’s BusinessWeek story is a celebration of relations.

Pardon the Interruption! The Buzz Bin may experience downtime through Monday. We are implementing a new WordPress template and changing host companies. Thank you for you patience.

Conversations on blogs can get pretty heated sometimes. Additional comments from the author or continued conversation in the comments section may provide counterpoints worthy of a response. But sometimes they don’t.

Many organizations and individuals make the mistake of believing that they need to get the last word in these debates. Not so.

Companies and individuals running social media efforts should know that having the final opinion in any social media conversation does not don you the victor of discourse. In fact, restating your opinion to get the last word in can make parties look insecure and unsure of themselves. Consider that getting the last word in is a common behavior pattern of insecure children.

Many A-List bloggers receive contrary — even challenging — responses, yet do not feel compelled to respond to them. Why? Because they can let their words stand for themselves. They understand they’ve said their peace, that they need not add anything to conversation. Their final word is enough to stand on its own.

The key should be can the organization or individual add anything to the discussion by commenting? If not, then letting the conversation continue via other commenters or elsewhere is the best course (It’s still nice to add a comment thanking visitors for stopping by).

This is not a surrender, nor an acknowledgement that the author/commenter yields to another’s point of view. Yielding occurs like this: “You know, you’re right, Joe. Thanks for adding your insights.” No response just means they’ve said their peace. And to be frank, sometimes ill formed logic does more to reveal itself than a comment could.

Ultimately, in a fitting end to this post, there is no final word, for all discourse is a response to prior discourse. And the end of one blog post may inspire another… positively or negatively.

Earlier this week, Seth Godin had a short post about a woman’s blog called I Heart Zappos.

In the post, the woman details how she had ordered all of these shoes from Zappos for her ill mother, and then her mother dies and they never got around to sending back the shoes. When Zappos calls and she tells them what happened, not only do they arrange with UPS to pick up the shoes, but the next day she receives a huge floral arrangement from Zappos.

Now that’s good pr. Granted, as Seth Godin points out, it is one human being reaching out to another. And maybe they were moved by the customer’s circumstances, but they also did it to reach out to the public. They probably did it hoping they would get the reaction they’re getting — and it worked.

In the fast paced society that we live in today, very few organizations would go out of their way like that for a customer. It’s a rarity, and Zappos was probably banking on that.

Yet that’s exactly what we should be doing. <B>Bold Interactive says that when your organizations values are in tact there’s no need to worry about social media or blogging. I completely disagree. While Zappos made a nice gesture, there was an ulterior motive behind it. It doesn’t necessarily mean they are connected to their community, but what it does imply to me is that they’ve made a start.

As a result of their actions, and the customer placing her story on the blog, this is the best type of pr. It’s the kind of stuff that people will remember them for, and when it comes to pr, that’s what you want.