Ban Politicans From Social Media And Content Marketing?

 Should we ban politicians from social media and content marketing for the sake of transparency?

I'm a content marketing fan.  But there are dangers when governments use content marketing to go direct to voters. It may be attractive for Ministers to craft content and use social media to release information, but essentially what they release is a formulaic, sanitized version of events.  

The core of the content marketing movement is directly engaging people of interest to you.  It is easy to see why that would appeal to bureaucracies.  It gives them a chance to control the message and avoid the spotlight traditional media might shine on their story. 

Social outlets are news sources for more and more Americans and Australians, and administrations frequently use them to go directly to the masses.  It may appear democratic to release information through social media but it is easier than standing before a hungry media pack asking pesky questions. 

Even if the pack reports what our leaders say, that information can be filtered and viciously edited for the evening news or tomorrow's paper. Social media and its cousin, content creation, let leaders meet people directly through digital chats, hang-outs, meet-ups and tweet ups.  

But remember these forums are imperfect platforms for ideas. A Government can choose not to answer questions or respond to comments and there is precious little time in such cyber sessions to question a President or Prime Minister.  And online questions can be vague and without the context and history a seasoned correspondent can throw around an issue. 

In Australia Tony Abbott uses Facebook and Twitter to broadcast policies more than to  interact with Australians.  Reading his Twitter account this past week you'd never know about the firestorm of protest over Tuesday night's budget. Yet traditional media - for all their faults - extensively reported the story. 

In the US the White House Correspondents Association have lodged concerns with the Obama Administration's use of digital to bypass news outlets and go direct to the public.  A recent edition of On The Media explored the issue in detail and it is worth a listen. 

Let's be cautious about proclaiming social media as a force for democracy even in Western societies.  In some cases it may mean governments have a communications channel that let's them control information while seeming to be open.  

Social Media in Campaign Communications

Are political campaigns living up to the promise of digital technology?  

Professor Jenny Stromer-Galley, Associate Professor at Syracuse University, explores this in her book 'Presidential Campaigning in the Internet Age'.  She concludes digital is pushing politicians to reconsider how they reach and involve people yet there is still a long way to go.

Jenny Stromer-Galley

Obama's presidential campaigns in 2008 and 2014 showed the technical infrastructure to shrink the distance between candidate and community is with us now. The social media platforms we use every day offer the chance for electors to be more involved in the political process.  Never before have voters had access to so much information to share, re-interpret, re-purpose and organise.  So has digital delivered a new era of political emancipation?

The theory is good, right?  Digital should spell a rebirth in political conversations, yet Stromer-Galley thinks the promise is still to be met.

Perhaps because digital is about sharing, interaction, connection while politics is about control.  Control the numbers, control the cash, control the message.  And of all places in the political realm control is central in campaigns.   

I must win ... so craft me the right message, target the right group, bring in the cash and round up the vote. 

This makes most candidates reluctant to relinquish control preferring to use social media as a one way channel. We need to be into this stuff, but we don't really believe it.

Which of course runs counter to the two way world many of us live in, with friends, business and not for profits. It seems politics is slow to innovate when it comes to connecting.

To be fair, engaging in the digital age involves willingness plus patience, energy and time.  Consider how much time many of us devote to staying close to Facebook friends. But those resources are in short supply when the next election looms closer each day. And, many of the senior staff behind political campaigns are still old school intent on using traditional methods and media.

Campaigning like other forms of communications is at the cross roads.  Politicians need to innovate and experiment with the new technologies or risk coming across as old, outdated and one dimensional.  The ballot box prize in future may well go to the clever campaigns unafraid to experiment and really connect.

Will Media Use Your Photo?

Last week the Central Connecticut Valley Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America hosted a luncheon with top media executives who shared ideas on the shifting role of imagery in media.

Provide media with newsworthy images

For starters they all agreed social media has drastically altered how journalists operate. Outlets are under continual pressure to get out the news first and fast.  Which means accuracy of information often suffers.  We know Twitter can break news at lightning speed but spare a thought for the editors and producers who need to monitor and react to tweets and simultaneously check their accuracy in a breaking news story. 

Today devices abound.  Anyone with a smart phone now sees themselves as a photographer.  Which makes the job of traditional newspaper photographers and TV crews more difficult as they compete at media conferences and other events with amateurs jostling for the perfect pic snapped from their Androids or Iphones.  

Of course many outlets, especially smaller ones, capitalise on the smart phone trend and invite readers and viewers to share their imagery. After all it is just more grist to the continuing content mill. But only a foolish editor or producer would use something without due diligence.

In recent times most media outlets have evolved guidelines for absorbing user generated content into their coverage simply to keep up with the new wild, wild West where citizen reporters can scoop  news faster than gumshoe journalists.  

So the typical questions media outlets ask when offered content include: 

• Firstly and most importantly: is it breaking news or otherwise newsworthy?
• Can we verify where the information or imagery comes from? Who owns it?
• Quality-wise can we use it?
• Does the image 'have a verb'.  In other words does it tell a story, show something happening or someone reacting to something happening?
• Can we use it freely or are there limitations?
• Does it show children or other groups for whom explicit permissions are needed?

Content marketers want to see their imagery widely spread online and in traditional forums.  But before offering up something consider the media filters an editor or producer will apply before deciding to use it.

 

The History of Social Media

Media Relations Is Not a Dying PR Skill

Peter Hilmer leads Flatiron Communications

"...we must be mindful that a great “placement” in and of itself no longer has the capacity to drive a contemporary communications campaign. Stand-alone news stories are simply too ephemeral or lost altogether in the vast ocean of dynamic content. For a story meme to take hold today, it must reside and be amplified across multiple news and social channels even if that means using alternative (e.g., sponsored) means for achieving it."
Peter Himler

You hear a lot about the death of traditional media.  

But I have yet to meet a client who does not want to be on TV, score favourable print coverage or hear the Boss on radio. Few, if any, demand more Facebook and less conventional coverage.

So, it was refreshing to read a recent post about media relations continuing to be important and no way is it a dying PR skill.  

New York-based PR pro Peter Himler says old school media is still critical for success but must be part of a broader engagement program.  He claims many PRs have failed to keep up with changes in journalism which means they are not earning the coverage they previously did in less digitally challenging times.

It's tougher than ever to get media coverage, so Peter suggests a good way to boost your chances is to avoid making the 25 mistakes that drive reporters nuts.

Read Peter's very thoughtful post.

...and while we at it ... a recent Neilsen Poll shows US consumers are more likely to trust traditional media advertising over other forms. So hold the funeral notices for traditional platforms.

Infograph courtesy of Statista Inc.

Creating Infographs The Easy Way

Creating Infographs the Easy Way from Bob Crawshaw

What Slideshare Success Looked Like In 2013

SlideShare Zeitgeist 2013 from SlideShare

Abbott Ranks # 26 on Twitter's Leader Board

The December 2013 report of the Digital Policy Council shows 123 out 164 countries or three out of four heads of state have now embraced Twitter.

The biggest mover in the Twittersphere was US President Obama.  He occupies # 1 spot and gained 16 million followers this past year.  This pushed the number of people who follow him north of 40 million. 

Starting with the 2008 Presidential Election Obama has always been comfortable with social media but a noticeable upturn in his numbers occurred when the US Government shut down in September 2013.  Obama joined other politicians and citizens to tweet his frustrations about the situation.

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) made the most spectacular debut onto the Twitter stage. SBY only joined Twitter in 2013 but 4.2 million followers quickly followed him. 

The Indonesian leader is a quick leaner. 

 He strategically took to Twitter to chastise Australia over allegations the Australian Government spied on Indonesian officials.

The Australian Prime Minister comes in at # 26 in the global Twitter rankings, a drop from his # 20 ranking the previous year.  Abbott has been tweeting since November 2011 and has 270 000+ followers. The PM is an infrequent tweeter.  Recent posts serve up mainly feel good content with little apparent effort to interact with others or converse on issues.

Still our PM is streets ahead of leaders from China, Denmark, Sweden and some Gulf countries who are yet to get on to the micro blogging platform.

While the adoption rate among some world leaders may have slowed, the number of people following political leaders continues to grow.  In 2013 83 million people  followed a world leader up from 10 million people just three years ago.
 

Read the Digital Policy Council's 2013 report.

Infographs: Distraction Or PR Tool Of The Future?

A previous post talked about infographs as a compelling format for presenting detailed information. 

Below is one I was recently involved in.  It condenses a complex industry concept into a simple, one-stop image - at a very reasonable cost.

Will the infograph become a standard PR tool like the media release or will it soon disappear replaced by the next, best toy for communicators?

Are infographs merely pretty distractions? 

Infographs in three easy stages.

Content Marketing: Infographs In 3 Easy Steps

We recently arranged this infograph through Fiverr.com
Click to expand

The digital age has bought a deluge of data and given communicators another dimension to storytelling. The downside is all those numbers and details can quickly overwhelm our ability to make sense of the information we present.

Enter the infograph, a newly arrived social media and PR tool blending graphics and data into digestible imagery, and proving popular in content marketing.

In recent times I've become an infograph fan but only recently started using them in my campaigns.  If like me, you're new to commissioning infographs, here's three simple steps to get you started when someone hands you a pile of data and asks you to make sense of it for their audiences.

Design  Firstly check what capacity there is to design or commission an infograph. If you're lucky you may have in-house talent.  No. Then a quick Google search of free infograph software will bring nearly 6.8 million results.  Or sites like Fiverr offer cheap ways to tap into experts for minimal cost. Either way there's plenty of online help available.

Numbers Next settle on the numbers to highlight.  It's similar to crafting key messages.  Decide on the most important pieces of information you feel audiences to know. That's probably the single most important call in the production process.  Sometimes you get to make it but more often it means collaborating on what's considered essential.

Icons   Successful infographs are simple.  They use clear iconography to breathe life into data.  So it's important to choose symbols appropriate to your story and which will aid the understanding of your audience.

Finally bring together your numbers, icons and other visual elements into an educative but easy on the eye graphic.

So there you have it.  Producing them is straightforward but infographs can be highly effective particularly when you need to convey complex information. 

Good luck and let me know how you go.

Story Telling in 2014

Perhaps Gary Vayerchuk is a bit over the top in his presentations on marketing.  

But Gary's presentation has nailed the need for storytelling (and at the same time promoted  his book.)   

It will give you some ideas so it is worth reviewing it. 

Search for it on Slideshare.

   

Creating Social Marketing That's Actually Social

Image courtesy of thesocialskinny.com

Creating Social Marketing That's Actually Social

The above blog post by Ryan Darby and Jake Herway explores why businesses don't succeed on social media and how to get better results.  It may sound like SOCMED 101 but we all need a refresher on the fundamentals every now and then.

Ryan and Jake report businesses doing the best with their social outreach:

• Set unambiguous expectations on why they are on social media.  They have not blindly wandered into the social media space nor are they there to do everything.  They go for a clearly defined business purpose - it could be to sell, provide customer service, tap the mood of the market or simply share information.

  

• Engage the engaged.  Rather than going for volume they go for quality.  They use social media to reach out to those who already understand or like what they do, keep them informed and encourage them to spread the word to their networks.

• And they are simply social.  They appreciate social media was born to connect people to family and friends.  So they share and converse, and scrupulously avoid blatant advertising.  

They get it and instinctively know command and control communications and banging a broadcasting drum don't work in this space. 

Global Chief Forecasts Communications Trends

Don't try to control the conversation, be prepared for never ending PR campaigns and acknowledge the  consumer is king.

That's what IABC Global Chair Robin McCasland advises leaders confronted by an ever-changing communications landscape.  

During her recent leadership tour of Asia, Robin briefed government communications chiefs in Canberra on trends in international communications. 

Speaking in a government town a few of Robin's observations run counter to traditional government models.  

For example while surveys routinely show public trust in government and corporate leaders is falling, administrations still put forward only the top echelons of officialdom who it comes to advocating policy to the public. 

Robin forecasts that in future, smart organisations will empower their employees to share the communications load and deal directly with citizens, consumers or clients particularly through social media.   Workers already know the issues and are the buffer between the community and their own hierarchy.  The time is coming when clever leaders will look at  workers not only for what they do, but how they can evangelise the corporate brand. 

The Global Chair also touched on the growing importance of peer opinions in decision-making, illustrating this with a personal example. When an  online dress buying experience turned sour, Robin took to social media to alert her friends to her dissatisfaction   Someone with Robin's global profile must have significant networks, so after the offending company learned of her displeasure they were quick to fix the problem.  

Which proves that while communicators can labour long and hard to present a persuasive case, often it's the conversations we have within our own circle that really decide how we act and the results we get. 

 

 

Did This Blog Change Government Policy?

On Thursday I blogged on why Australian military officers should not be part of Government media conferences on Asylum Seeker operations.

Yesterday the Immigration Minister Scott Morrison announced changes to these weekly briefings.  These foreshadow a much more limited role for the  ADF spokesperson, Lieutenant General Angus Campbell.

Did my blogging cause a shift in the new Government's media arrangement?  Hardly!!!

My concerns were but one voice in a growing chorus of condemnation and frustration from traditional and online media about the way the new Coalition Government is so tightly managing information on Asylum Seeker matters. 

Along with other veterans who now work in PR, I'm pleased the Government has restricted the ADF's media profile.  Having said that, the communications strategy behind the "stop the boats" policy still needs a major overhaul.

As much as the Government tries to curb the flow of information by referring to operational security, people interested in the issue will skirt around tight Ministerial policies to get information somehow. They might seek it from from the Indonesian Government and other sources, concerned citizens letting the rest of us know what's happening on  Christmas Island, Manus or Nauru, or welfare groups across the country alerting the public to the ongoing plight of refugees. At this stage all seem willing to talk through mainstream and social media.

Government media mangers, no matter how shrewd, cannot contain news of Asylum Seeker issues.  The issue is too enormous, contentious and ongoing not to find a way to make it to the surface.

This is a story that won't be stopped, so watch this space for more changes to the Abbott's Government communications management of this issue.  

Australian Government Use of Social Media

My colleague Craig Thomler recently talked to IABC Canberra about how the Australian Government is using social media.  

Despite challenges, Craig gave government agencies a tick of approval.

Australia Is Ready For Content Marketing

We're super connected, everyone is now a publisher, we're busy and trust levels are low.  So it's time for a new approach to communicating as Australians move from mass audience to  niche communities. 

(Summary of a recent address by Contentgroup's David Pembroke and myself at the National Press Club in Canberra.)

 Podcast Powered By Podbean

See how Australians are using social media in 2013. 

Rudd and Abbott Use Social Media For Election. 7 Things to Watch

We're off and running to the ballot box.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has set 7 September as the date for Australians to go to the polls to choose a new government.

In the 2007 and 2010 elections social media was seen as something of a novelty. That makes 2013 Australia's first real social media poll because Australians are now terminally addicted to social through devices, phones, laptop and desktops.  In fact there has never been a more connected and potentially better informed electorate than today's voters.

Preparing for the upcoming battle the Labor Party recently hired three top American social media types who worked on the 2012 Obama campaign.  You'll recall that campaign set the gold standard for politics and social media.

So as we start the Election trail, how do the chief contenders rate on social media?

PM Rudd starts with a well established social media presence.   He's been in that space a long time. He has 1.3 million followers on Twitter and tweeted over 9500 times.  On Facebook he has almost 94 000 likes.  That's impressive, and the tone and level of his conversations on both platforms shows Rudd is comfortable with new media.

Mr Abbott starts the Election campaign with only 148 000 Twitter followers and 1350 tweets. His Facebook following of around 39 000 fans is almost one third of Rudd's numbers. In comparison Abbot's social conversations come across as more formal than Rudd's dialogue and at this stage Abbott does not show much online interaction with others. Still it is early days!

Interestingly both Labor and Liberal Parties have similar numbers of Youtube subscribers (around 3500 each).  This is likely to grow with many predicting Youtube will be where it all happens as the parties turn negative as they invariably do during Australian elections. 

Over the next five weeks it will interesting to see how both contenders adapt and adjust to social media.  

So keep a mouse ready and eye out to see how the two candidates use these new channels in their bids to win high office.  

Among the things that would indicate the candidates are serious about social, are their:

• Frequency of using social media to get their Election messages out.
• Level of interaction with followers and fans or do they stick with one way conversation?
• Cross linking to others' commentary such as media and third party endorsements to portray credibility.
• Ability to persuade voters to donate money or volunteer their time.
• Use of imagery to bring emotion into messaging and cut through the clutter.
• Willingness to bypass traditional media and use social to break news.
• Capacity to inspire others to produce and share favourable content.

...and of course look out for novel or unusual online tactics as the campaign unfolds.

It is interesting times ahead.  So in the coming weeks check your screens for what could well be Australia's first social media election campaign.

Progress Of Open Government in Australia

My colleague Craig Thomler recently delivered this very insightful presentation. 

Open government progress in Australia from Craig Thomler

One of World's Toughest Regulators Ticks Social Media

In April 2013 the US Securities and Exchange Commission  (SEC) ruled companies trading on the US Stock Exchange can post investor information on social media.

That's a major tick for social media channels as  "perfectly suitable methods for communicating with investors."  

Noting the rate at which information flows through Facebook, Twitter and other platforms, the SEC cautioned companies to give investors adequate notice of when and how they plan to use social media when releasing information.  

 In a survey of 120 financial types the online publication, Bulldog Reporter, found 60% to 70% of all investors say they use traditional sources of investment information (press releases, newspapers, analyst reports.) 

People under 40 are the most likely group to check company information  on social media. 

The US stock market operates in a highly litigious environment and the SEC oversees highly regulated, multi-billion dollar transactions every trading day. 

The ruling should encourage Australian governments wrestling with what information is suitable for their own online accounts. 

Content Marketing: Why Now?

"Content is information others find useful or entertaining or both.  

 It is not necessarily what you want to tell people.  It is what they want or need to hear.  Content marketing is about providing that type of information on an enduring basis." 

The term ‘content marketing’ may have recently landed in Australia but the practice of content marketing has been with us for a very long time. 

Down the centuries people have always shared their content.  It could be in the form of knowledge and awareness of the world around them, transferring skills, warning others of danger and or just passing along useful facts, figures and opinions.  

Today the demand for helpful content, from reliable sources, is the greatest at anytime in history. That is because personal and corporate communications are changing fast, our lives are busier than ever and we are increasingly selective in choosing who we listen to.  
  

• Families are time-poor. Too many people want our attention and we would be simply overwhelmed if we surrendered to their demands.

• Since 2003, social media has accelerated the pace and rate of communications change.  Social media has an insatiable appetite for information and gives us a channel for direct and very personal information.  It also gifts us each of us with a publishing platform and a filtering system.  We now have numerous options to receive and share information, anytime, anywhere, any place.  And we can easily block out information from those we distrust, don't now or who hold different interests or attitudes.

•  Recent Australian research shows we are skeptical about what we hear. We mistrust brands, business, government and other traditional sources of information.  (2013 Edelman Trust Barometer for Australia.) and operate on the basis that no organisation has the right to be heard.

• Traditional media used to be the dominant communications channel for most of us.  Now it is fragmenting and as it searches for new business models, it is becoming one more way - not the only way - to connect people with similar opinions, behaviours or needs.                                                       

So it is time for a different PR approach if we want to find, produce and share the type of information that will connect us to our customers, clients or fellow citizens.  

Enter content marketing, an evolution of old-style marketing.  It is a system that is gaining traction in the US and now emerging in Australia.