Digital Influence Mapping Project

The Communications Pro of the Future (2010 Edition) Part 1

The public relations discipline is changing. Social media and the complexity of our lives are conspiring to alter the job and its relevance to business. If PR evolves based upon these pressures, it will become one of the most important contributors to the health and growth of business. If we do not step up, PR may become a tactical trade applied as an embellishment to the complex marketing programs of tomorrow. Our path will largely be determined by how we tackle two big phenomena: social media and complexity. 

Let's just say that I havce an expansive view of the role of the communications professional. Last year, I outlined additional responsibilities and skills that challenge the traditional PR role. While the literal term "public relations" is even more relevant in this expanded view, the professional term may be irrevocably tarnished by images of media relations flacks - real or imagined. So, despite the chance for aliteration, we need to define the role of the "communications pro." In a December opinion piece for PR Week, I made the case for communications experts taking the lead on defining the brand and the strategy for engaging "publics" amidst an all-discipline, 360 approach. That means - in some cases - that with advertising creatives, digital marketers, store marketers and others around the planning table, it may be the communications experts who need to lead the strategy. This year, we have seen the rise of importance of communications (vs. marketing) in big global campaigns for brands.

To rise to that challenge, communications professionals need to master new skills (and poilish up old ones) to lead in this new environment.

The True Impact of Social Media on the Profession

Social media is pushing marketing and communications to work together more than ever before. Each discipline has something distinct to offer. Both need to grow to meet each other halfway and produce the biggest impact for brands hungry to transform the way they talk with customers. Social media demands new skills and old skills combined in new ways. The way we earn people’s attention and advocacy relates in some ways to the way we earned traditional media coverage but remains separate and full of nuance. We admit that in the volumes of new blogger outreach guidelines and internal social media policies we all create. Would these really exist if there weren’t a material difference?

Digital and social media puts consumers much more squarely in the driver’s seat of their own lives. We find content via the great aggregator – Google – when and where we need it. We are not waiting for the front page of the newspaper to flop open on our laps to tell us which way the wind blows. Nor are we waiting for the gardening show to come on at 7pm on HGTV to get our fill of our passion for orchids. The fact that 80% of us start our Internet session on Google makes clear that reputation and even business today has a lot more to do with what shows up in those first 10 blue links than most mass media. 

Social media is not some new channel. At the end of the day, the true significance of social media for us as communications experts is all about word of mouth. Peers, friends, ‘strangers with expertise’ sharing about their favorite hotel, what they hate about their car, whether their medication is helping them. What we say to each other is most often far more trustworthy and impactful than any other form of marketing or communications. If reputations are reflected in search results than they are defined in the millions of conversations and word of mouth mentions across the social Web. How to productively engage with this universe of millions of potential influencers is the new challenge, and we had better get busy.

We Need to Master Complexity

The list of how social media affects us goes on. As for complexity, that translates into severe limits on our attention compared to the abundance of marketing messages popping up in every elevator, smartphone or even bathroom we, as consumers, use throughout our day. That means more and more complex marketing and communications programs (marcom) to try and connect with customers.  That means a return to trying to understand people better (dare I say psychology and just plain listening?) and what is important to them vs. just trying to surprise them at the bus stop, in the mall or when they are trying to have a conversation with friends. Interruptive marketing will no longer cut it as a core strategy. We have to stop worrying about whether “engagement” sounds like a buzz word and just start practicing it. Public relations is ideally suited to earn people’s attention and advocacy. But the answer to scale likely sits in many of the other marketing disciplines. The communications pro of the future needs to know this. She needs to know how marketing and communications works. She needs to be a master of collaboration with digital marketing experts, CRM gurus, advertising creatives and more. She needs to live comfortably in complexity.

The Communications pro of the future must be a master of three important disciplines: Radical Listening, Social Influence, and Perpetual Beta. Within each are new practical skills that will define the true PR master – the next generation ‘”trusted advisor.” Of course there is one final, critical ingredient: judgment. More on that later.

Next up: Radical Listening...

My Twitter Account Was Hacked

My Twitter account was hacked. Second time this has happened (different scam this time). I clicked on a link from someone I follow. I did nothing else. The page never even loaded, Then several days later in one-fell-swoop, my account started DMing all my followers in the course of a few minutes with a similarly personal sounding message and prompt to click on an "IQ Me" link.

Total scam artists as they rope you into a fee service should you ever actually click through and take the quiz. I Googled them.This is the kind of stuff the FTC is trying to stop. Let's help them in any way we can and keep the tweetstream clean.

My apologies for anyone affected. Don't click on any 'IQ test' link prompts from me in a DM.

The one good news? Thanks to some great followers - @NathanRichie, @SusanEJacobsen, @ConversationAge, @thebrandbuilder, @Kat4PR, @labfly, and especially @mrgingold who let me know in the first place.

Here is a helpful (if a bit admonishing) link ot a helpul blogpost from ChelPixie: http://chelpixie.com/blog/2009/11/02/recovering-from-twitter-phishing/

Headlines from the 2009 Word of Mouth Marketing Association Summit Part 2

There were more sessions to go to than anyone could manage. That's a nice problem to have. The fact that the presentations are already up in the WOMMA Member Center eases that pain a bit. I wanted to share the session highlights from the event for me. I was surprised. I knew the conference would be great yet I thought so because of the wall-to-wall brand cases. We had those. The WOMMY Award Winners were particularly compelling. Still, the keynotes and general sessions were so strong that I would have gone just for those.

Here are my hightlights:

Keynote - Emanuel Rosen did an inspirational job and also just had a well-structured presentation with stories at the center and take-away points that were meangful.Those of us who speak often could learn a lot from his simplicity. He told us what we could learn from non-profits nd the lessons really were relevant. Everyone really liked his presentation.

 

Keynote - Rob BonDurant from Patagonia was the right mix of culture and marketing detail. Here's a guy who totally understands the power of brand, where it comes from and just how to drive folks to conversion at the same time. Too many CMO-types become disconnnected with the nuts and bolts of how marketing works. That won't fly in the social media age.

 
Keynote - Sugarland, Kristian Bush was terrific. (above: Gayle, his manager, Kristian and Ted Wright/Fizz) More than one person told me after that they had never listened to them before but were now complete fans just because of Kristian's enthusiasm and genuiness (and the kickass song they played/showed from their Christmas album.) I had the opportunity to speak with him offline and he shared even more detail about the WOM marketing activity that he does to remain genuinely connected to fans. I loved that he went into Walmarts and secretly hid concert tix, captured it all on a Flip Video cam to post online for fans. What he didn't share onstage about that whole Walmart integration was a simple tactic where he called up Walmart store managers the day the promotion (a DVD) broke to leave them a personal vmail about it. Imagine how that fueled their enthusiasm. His insight about how moments in time become key memories and stories. That led them to create concert-specific posters and t-shirts. I told him how I often use "tell everyone a favorite concert" as a tremendous ice-breaker for groups. (The Cult at Felt Forum in 198x with Rick Rubin on the sound board) Ted Wright from Fizz deserves all our gratitude for connecting Kristian with all of us.

 
Keynote - FTC and social media with Chuck Harwood/FTC, Tony DiResta/legal counsel for WOMMA, Jory DesJardins/BlogHer, Sean Corcoran/Forrester and led by Paul Rand/ the next President of the Board at WOMMA (above: Tony, Jory, Sean and Chuck). All the panelists contributed a great POV and it was especially valuable to get such a thorough walk-through from Chuck Harwood.  Our WOMMA work with the FTC has paid off in such a strong relationship. Ethics will expand again as a key issue and WOMMA's Legal Affairs Group will help protect a lot of brands with our best practices.

General Session - Customer Service with Levis, Bunn, Comcast and Best Buy's Twelpforce. I predict that customer service will become a bigger part of WOMMA in the future. Frank's work at Comcast and John's at Twelpforce/Best Buy have developed pretty sophisticated procedures and teams. Still, I was struck by the genuiness of Tom Asher from Levi Strauss. he had buttons made up for his team with their primary purpose - "I live to make your butt look great" (paraphrasing from memory). His team wants to deliver one level of service for everybody. He shared an anecdote about shipping an urgent package of black jeans to Thailand that only later they learned were for Steven Seagal on set for a movie. Customer Service sits at the heart of word of mouth. Time and time again, we head from customer service experts who see their job as creating vocal advocates for their brands.  

General Session - Academic Panel with Wharton, Tel Aviv University, Fordham, our own Walter Carl from ChatThreads and Brad Fey. Heavy stuff. I was not able to see the whole session but hard lots of the more advanced marketers in the room appreciated its heft and substance.  

Breakout Sessions
I got to as many sessions as possible. Only one truly disappointed. If I were to point our three sessions that had special relevance for me amidst all of the great ones. I would call out:

HP's Kari Homan shared not only about a simple metric they created around the revenue generated by postive word of mouth (and the loss from negative WOM), but she also shared about how they are organized internally. Their Digital Strategy group is a federation of marketers with program managers in 5 segments including mobile and social media. Rather than create a separate social media task force or center of excellence, they have opted for a model where social media is integrated with marketing (is this at the expense of "communications" integration?).

Ogilvy's Kaitlyn Wilkins and Blogher's Jory Des Jardins shared their case for Tropicana whcih was complex and highly integrated. I am obviously connected to this project and therefore biased. Still, this is a great case and both are passionate, insightful presenters.

Yvonne Nava from iTunes oulined how they had used Vitrue's Facebook management software to really optimze how they were using Facbook overall. her presentation ratified a lot of our own embrace of the "conversation calendar" model for engaging fans. ("Conversation Calendar" is a term that Facebook uses to describe the plan of differnt interactions delivered continuously through a brand page.). In iTunes case they have a spectacular well of content (music, videos, et al). Other brands may not have such an obviously valuable content asset but will find that they can program a rich calendar of interactions from media, offers, conversation starters, applications and events. 

Lot of lessons learned over the past week. I returned completely energized (okay, a bit tired) with fresh ways of looking at things. That's what you want from a conference experience.

Twitter Advertising May Cure Itself

Twitter advertising is not the devil's work. I once thought it was. Now it seems more like an evolution towards an ad form that will serve both users and brands. I don't know what that ad form will be exactly but the paid tweet we see today is not it. During this evolution, twitter advertising will likely piss off a lot of people. Here's why it will "cure itself:"

1. Full Disclosure is a Must: Tweets that are from paid or otherwise compensated advertisers must include a disclosure like (#ad) or (#Sponsor) to be in compliance with the new FTC Guidelines. With that clarity, followers will decide themselves if they want to continue to follow folks who deliver paid messages

2. Relevance Requires Few Ads: users who rent out their tweets will have to do so judiciously both choosing sponsors they care to endorse and keeping them extremely limited. So-called "trust agents" will lose trust, or worse, relevance for their readers if they pump out too many paid messages

3. New Formats on the Horizon: clearly Twitter, itself, is working behind the scenes on revenue (read: advertising vs. premium service fees). Not only that but services like ad.ly will continue to explore acceptable formats. If I can quickly see the paid tweets in my Tweetdeck stream becuase they are shaded differently or feature some other visual marker, that is to everyone's benefit.

4. Advertisers Will Lose Interest: Initially the format will draw the lazy marketer (thanks to Erik Boles and his comment on Scoble's post below). They will seek a reach play and what they really need is a "relevant reach" play combined with some string engagement on another platform. They will seek click throughs form tweets as a measure of success and when that eventually doesn't deliver business success for clients, the fad will die off.

 

Good Post on Subject From Robert Scoble

Scoble has a good post on Twitter advertising and based on today's NYTimes article on the subject, this will likely become a bigger deal for us Twitter users in the short term.  Robert explains his initial reaction to tweet-based adverts and then his exploration once joining ad.ly.

"But all this stuff makes me worried for the future of Twitter. I think Twitter needs to come out for or against these new ad networks and needs to build a platform that properly identifies advertising tweets via a different color. I’d love to be able to “tag” Tweets using my SuperTweet idea and write “advertisement” in the SuperTweet, which would tell everyone that that Tweet is an ad."

Read the comment stream - it's worth it.

Headlines from the 2009 Word of Mouth Marketing Association Summit Part 1

Record Attendance and so Many Brands
Attendance: 480+ Marketing and Communications pros from major brands, agencies, technology/solution providers. We have moved past a group of 'evangelists' into a active membership of experts with substantial experience. Intuit, Ford, Tropicana, Unilever, HP, McDonalds, Comcast, Levi Strauss, Best Buy and so many more were there.

Personal Significance: This was my last WOMMA Summit as president of the board. A lot of folks worked to make WOMMA what it is today not the least of which is our great Executive Director, Kristen Smith. Our record attendance and the spike in brands attending (and brands decoming members) pays off on a lot of work from all of us.

Experience Trumps Evangelism
Outside the Sessions: Everyone shared about the programs they have going on. And more than that, brands were talking about how they were training internally and organizing around social media.  Picture a dinner with a major hotel/gaming brand, consumer products good company and a premiere financial services company all swapping stories about how they are organized, how they sell-in programs, how their marcom universe thinks of social media and word of mouth. You would be surpised at how similar some of the organizational challanges are. 

Spontaneous meetings happened in between sessions and sometimes became more urgent then attending one session or another. Folks clustered around the tables set up throughout the exhibit space to share war stories and get advice. I loved the brief conversation with one of the McDonald's twitterers (they have 5) in the bus ride over to the Palms. He and his teammates have a very personal touch. I love that he can reward customers with surprise 'thank you' freebies. 

The exhibitors came as experts with something to offer not hungry salespeople. You were just as likely to sit down with Peter from LiveWorld or Reggie from Vitrue to hear their solution to a social media marketing problem as a colleague from an agency or brand.

And then there was the House Party at the Palms. The suite was outrageous. It gave me a new metric for the huge scale of Las Vegas (where even the morning muffins are the size of a small pie). And the company was terrific. No one got in the hot tub but plenty tried the rotating make-out booth (I know, sounds creepy and outrageous).

Our event hotel was the Paris which I can heartily endorse. We do some work for the parent brand, Harrahs, and this was my first experience at the property. It was all good.

The theme overall was one of experience. Everyone shared what they were doing, not what they observed others were doing or what their latest blog post POV. Here are some great reources that came out of the meeting:

WOMMA Measurement Guidebook: We set out to do this at least year's Summit and here it is - a practical guide to measuring social media and word of mouth programs

The Twitter Transcript: I have never seen this done before and while it may sound ridiculously boring in concept, browse through this as it really captures what peaked participant's interest throughout.  

The Photo Gallery: Great collection that captures in and out of session activity and faces.

The WOMMA Word Blog: Solid recaps of much of the action

(photo: this was taken from the WOMMA Gallery on Flickr)

WOMMA Looks at the FDA Social Media Hearings

After the first day of FDA Hearings, WOMMA, Ogilvy and LiveWorld held a tweetup at Ogilvy with WOMMA's legal counsel, Tony DiResta. Tony guided WOMMA through our work that led to the recent FTC Guidelines on Endorsements and Testimonials. He's also author of the WOMMA Blog, DiResta the Law, where he shares on the legal side of social media and word of mouth marketing.

He offers his own perspective on the first day and where he thinks this all may lead. After spending most of the two days there myself and [presenting to the FDA on the second day], I would say that all of his first day observations are relevant for both days.

Part 1

 

Part 2

Part 3

 

We will have a live wrap-up of the FDA hearings at the WOMMA Summit this week. We will also have a live session with the FTC in attendance as our next step in developing precise and practical best practices for that agencies recent Guidelines to marketers.
  

WOMMA Presents at the FDA Social Media Hearings

I attended most of the the two day FDA Hearings on use of the Internet and Social Media and was pleasantly surprised. The agenda was jam-packed. It was like speed-dating or some other rapid-fire challenge. While I was skeptical of the format and whether there would be substantive suggestions and ideas, both worked out well.

Speaking on behalf of WOMMA, Melissa Davies (member company Nielsen) and I delivered two different "testimonies."

WOMMA FDA Presentation November 2009

View more documents from jbell99.

I addressed questions 1 and 3 from the FDA docket. My goal was to share our recent experience with the new FDA Guidelines, suggest a level of brand responsibility around sites where brands establish a "material connection" and offer a suggestion for a new vocabulary to bring whatever guidelines come from the hearings more up-to-date and aligned with the industry.

WOMMA FDA Presentation on Adverse Events November 2009

View more documents from jbell99.

Melissa shared her POV on the real instance of Adverse Events based upon some novel research her company had done.

One thing did surprise me. Most of the presentations not-focused on adverse events were focused on digital marketing basics - search marketing, banners, et al. Its true, pharma has been held back in the basics. The FDA needs to deliver some 'pretty good' guidelines on this Web 1.0 stuff quickly and then turn its attention to the true social media practices.

There were quite a few presentations that corroborated our point that the FDA could serve the public best by delivering some basic "guardrails" and then encourage and allow marketers to define the actual best practices around implementation.

We need to create a climate condusive to innovation from the market. That's what led to Web 2.0, social media and the Internet, itself.

FDA Social Media Hearings Live

The FDA "socal media" Hearings are going on all day today and tomorrow. Packed agenda - 60+ speakers including Ogilvy and WOMMA. You can watch it live here from the FDA.

Join Us for a Post-FDA Tweetup in DC

WOMMA and Ogilvy will be presenting at the FDA "Social Media" hearings this week in Washington DC. I will be speaking on behalf of WOMMA in my role as President of the Board. Rohit Bhargava will be presenting on behalf of Ogilvy in his role spearheading our Digital Health business. We have all been waiting for some time for the FDA to engage and start evolving their guidlines to address the changes wrought by social media. The 2-day hearings is just a start. And a ton of experts will speak over those two days.

On Thursday night, November 12th,  from 6:30pm - 8:30pm, WOMMA and member companies -  Live World and Ogilvy PR -  will have a tweet up at the Ogilvy offices in DC (1111 19th Street - 10th floor). Tony DiResta who is WOMMA's legal counsle will give a post-hearing wrap-up and a lot of us who participated will be there offering our won thoughts. Mostly its social.

You can RSVP here or just show up.

WOMMA to Present at FDA Hearings on Social Media

On Friday, November 12th, Melissa Davies, Research Director at Nielsen, and I will present on behalf of WOMMA during two sessions with the FDA. These are part of the long-awaited FDA foray into considering new guardrails for health products marketers in social media. Pharma, one of a few heavily regulated industries, has stepped cautiously into social media over the past few years. Still, pharam is not as paralyzed as some would suggest. Dose of Digital maintains a great list of pharma social media activities from Twitter to communities.

WOMMA has just gone through a productive year with the FTC that culminated recently with the FTC Guidelines on Endorsements and Testimonials.We will have a follow up session with the FTC at this year's WOMMA Summit in November.

WOMMA's Role

Ultimately, WOMMA wants to protect the consumer and the trust that brands can build with consumers if they use social media well. Consumers increasingly expect brands to engage and be available in social media. Brands value third party word of mouth as one of the most trusted sources for opinion and purchase decision. Brands and consumers want to connect in socila media. And we have to do it right or the basic premise beneath WOM - trust - will crumble. We also want to empower marketers to productively engage within social media. Pharma has been held back in part because of their fear of additional regulations or actions.  

The FDA's 5 Questions

The FDA has set up a listening session on November 18 and 19. The agenda is full of marketers and each of us has a 10-minute slot to help inform the FDA's 5 questions. 

It is not clear yet if these are even the right 5 questions. Still, in respect to the FDA and the simple principle that we have to start somewhere, I am grateful that they opened their doors. You can review the FDA's Notice of Public Hearing here.

Here are the 3 questions we plan to address with a quick summary of our POV:

Question #1: For what online communications are manufacturers, packers, or distributors accountable?

In today’s social Web marketers and consumers alike are flocking to third party sites and platforms both to be where consumers are and to garner legitimate third-party mentions that corroborate their products’ benefits or around a topic related to a disease or condition. The power of word of mouth means that marketers want influencers/bloggers to experience their topic, product, or service that relates to a brand and then share about it authentically.

WOMMA has an aggressive POV on what is proper disclosure both in spirit and actuality. Aligned with the recent FTC Guidelines, we see the opportunity for marketers to not only practice ‘full disclosure’ of any and all material connection between brand and influencer/blogger, but also to strongly encourage those influencers to do their part to properly disclose. As with the FTC Guidelines, it doesn't take payment to define a material connection. Marketers are better off disclosing any type of material connection whether they be travel expenses for a health blogger, technology support on an unbranded community, or even the snacks at a tweetup. Disclose and let the consumer judge credibility. 

Question #3: What parameters should apply to the posting of corrective information on Web sites controlled by third parties?

Social media is defined by conversations and a hyper-democratized  approach to publishing. Brands and marketers want to connect more directly with customers to better understand their needs and build a stronger relationship. In addition, brands want to ensure that the full story behind products are shared outside their Web sites. They want to be where consumers are spending their time and that is increasringly across the social web.Can pharma marketers be allowed the opportunity to comment on blogs and message boards – completely transparent about their identity and interests – to help keep the information about medical products as clear as possible?  Most pharma marketers do not feel empowered to comment or "fact correct" as the historic FDA guidelines might interpret that as a new instance requiring advertiisng or labeling information. Imagine if every comment required that full page disclaimer you see in print ads.  Conversely, we must not require an unsupportable burden - the requirement to "story-correct" across the vastness of social media. Like the FTC Guidelines, the marketer must focus their energy on keeping their own communications accurate and encouraging and even enforcing accuracy from any influencers they proactively outreach to.

The challenge with health care information is to allow for this conversational interaction while always putting the full story behind products and services front and center. No blog comment field or Tweet will sustain the full content of a product Web site. We may need to allow pharma a consistent "one-click" solution where marketers can comment and link back to the full body of a product insert.  

Question #5: Specific to Adverse Events Reporting

One of the biggest effects of social media is the new opportunity for brands to hear what consumers are saying in public discussions about products, services and issues important in their lives. Smart marketers have adopted “big ears” to make sure they listen and respond to customer concerns. 

The historic and important requirements around adverse events reporting have held many health care marketers back from listening to consumers. How the intent of adverse events reporting actually applies when a patient posts a product experience in Twitter with no contact information in their “bio” or exactly when an adverse event is established over the course of several blog posts is not clear. We need to find a clearer way of recognizing an adverse event and then reporting it that does not hold back a marketer from listening to what consumers are saying in the public space.

Outcome of the Hearings
The real solution may lie in the FDA establishing clear principles and then encouraging the industry to define exact practices as we are doing at WOMMA in relation to the FTC Guidelines. Can the FDA really hope to define the exact nature of a url or how to balance their historic need to approve marketing claims with the non-stop, real-time nature of a twitter-ized social Web? Will this type of detailed regulation help or hold innovation back? We need principles that protect the consumer but do not curb marketers from innovating.

Stop by:

If you are in DC for the hearings, stop by Ogilvy on Thursday night. WOMMA, LiveWorld and Ogilvy will be hosting a post-hearing Tweetup to recap what we heard that day. RSVP Here