High Stakes™ provides best practices for communicating on the most critical corporate, legal, and international issues of the day.

 

THIS ISSUE: NEW MEDIA

Actually, it’s a misnomer: If you’re still looking at new media as “new,” you have some catching up to do.

 

For example, do you know the high-authority bloggers that cover your industry? Traditional journalists do, with 71% naming favorite bloggers as their primary source of story ideas. In 2008, while key audiences turn to online venues for information, new media are driving traditional media as never before.

 

In this issue, we discuss the fundamentals of a successful Internet strategy…gain insight from the co-author of the preeminent business blogging book…examine what companies and countries can do to have their messages found first…and look at how new media will continue to change the communications craft in the years to come.

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When it comes to Web savvy, the plaintiffs’ bar, regulators, and public interest groups are often light years ahead of the organizations they target. To catch up, realize first that a strategic and optimized Web presence is no longer a novelty; it’s a necessity.

 
1) Create dark pages. Dark pages only sound sinister. They are unpublished web pages populated with placeholder content that can go live with just a click of the mouse at the moment they’re needed. When adversaries mount a campaign against you, consumers, reporters, and regulators will be turning to the Web for your side of the story. So ensure that your messages are there waiting for them. By anticipating the most likely scenarios that generate negative publicity and preparing Web content (press releases, FAQs, contact information, etc…) designed specifically for those scenarios, you’ll be ahead of the game the moment the game begins.

 

2) Monitor the high-authority blogs in your industry. Knowing the high-authority bloggers in your sector and what they are saying is essential to any online strategy. They are the online pundits who serve as gatekeepers to the mainstream media, often reporting stories days before they reach CNN, the Washington Post, or the New York Times. In times of crisis, it is possible to reshape their stories, defuse their stories, or recruit authors as allies before they damage your brand. But first you need to know who they are.

 

3) When needed, consider a pay-per-click campaign. Pay-per-click campaigns are paid advertisements that automatically shoot to the top of the search engine rankings when Internet users type in a keyword or keyword phrase. For plaintiffs’ bar, it is a primary avenue for recruiting class action clients. In times of crisis, consider initiating your own pay-per-click campaign that will direct stakeholders to your messages rather than to your adversaries’.

 

4) Create a blog or other opportunities for dialogue. A frequently updated, well-regarded blog is an excellent communications tool in times of crisis – but it can also help prevent a crisis in the first place. Sometimes, the best way to avoid public confrontation with potential adversaries is to create arenas for dialogue where issues can be resolved before they ever reach a boiling point. As Shel Israel points out in the interview below>>, blogs offer just such a venue. By providing opportunities for public comment, stakeholders can raise issues and alert you to imminent crisis. Blogs aren’t just for talking; they are for listening as well. Never forget that listening is half of the communications equation – and that the new media are open to all ears.

 

5) Optimize. These days, it’s not enough just to have a Website. You need to ensure that it’s accessible to those who may not know your URL or that your Website even exists. Search engines like Yahoo and Google use complex metrics to judge which sites are the best and most deserving of their highest rankings. These metrics can be manipulated if you know what you’re doing. Check out the “Website optimization” section of this newsletter>> for tactics for moving your site to the top of the search results.

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Industry Insight: An interview with Shel Israel, co-author Naked Conversations.

 

Shel and Robert Scoble literally wrote the book on business blogging, Naked Conversations. In this conversation, Shel talks about what every communicator needs to know before engaging stakeholders at the crossroads of technology and social interaction – a brave new online world that is also known as “social media.”

 

 

Shel: When we wrote the book, blogging was social media. But now, if you’re a business, or an institution, or an individual, you can blog, you can create video, you can Twitter, or you can do combinations of them all. You need to identify and utilize the tools that are right for you.

 

But, what’s important isn’t the tools. What’s important is the ability to have two-way conversations with your customers rather than sit around and devise marketing methods filled with adjectives and legal disclaimers and shovel them into the foreheads of people who just don’t want them.

 

We don’t like being marketed to. I just gave a talk at Intel and asked the audience, “Do you like to see other people’s messages?” Three hands went up and I think they were lying. Why do companies keep doing things their customers don’t like? Survey after survey shows that ads don’t influence us nearly as much as they used to. What influences us is our friends. What influences us to see a movie isn’t the big ad on TV; it’s our friend telling us that he went to see it and it was great. That’s what social media is all about.

 

We’re ending an era in which messages were sent out all over the world through mass communications and markets were “made” by those broadcast messages. Tell me, do you enjoy going to a Website for important news and seeing some little bug jumping up and down trying to sell you something?

 

My point is that social media and blogging are better, more efficient, more effective ways to have conversations with your customers than little cartoon ditties on television – and that conversations have a far greater impact that just talking at an audience. The control is going from centralized organizations to their communities.

 

Of course, the communities were in control all along, but nobody realized that.

This decentralization is the real challenge for traditional enterprises, because they’re used to mass communications and now have to convert to some sort of massive micro communications.

 

The question isn’t whether successful companies will make the change. The question is whether companies will start soon enough for the long transition required to change from thinking that they are the ones in control to realizing that the real commands and controls are in the hands of their customers. They don’t need to necessarily start a blog, but they do need to understand what is being said about them and try to participate in the conversation.

 

 

Shel: Probably, the best way is to hire someone right out of college who’s been living with this stuff since they were 12 years old. Get educated by that person and see what options would work best for you.

 

 

Shel: No matter how dark a company is, there’s a social media champion who says, ‘People say we’re so bad, but we’re not and we need to tell them that. We have these customers that are angry and, if we listen to them, they might not be so angry.’ In those companies there’s an old and potbellied CEO who says, ‘Not here, brother. Not while I’m in charge.’ The good news is that this guy is going to leave and will be replaced by someone who grew up with the Worldwide Web, doesn’t read newspapers, and respects social media. The companies that do not do this will persevere for a while, but eventually will be replaced by companies that use this technology. So be patient; change will come.

 

All revolutions start in the hills and get to the cities. Personal computers came in through the back door of enterprise 25 years ago. It always starts with somebody not doing what the keepers of the gate were telling them to do. The state of social media now is that it’s at the stage where normalcy is just the beginning. The thought of someone arguing about why we should be ready to use social media 5 years from now makes about as much sense to me as arguing about why we should have fax machines. These are false issues.

 

I guess what I’d tell the CEO is this: ‘Don’t listen to me; go listen to your kids. Picture what the world will look like when their buttocks replace yours in that chair and their feet and wallets replace our feet and wallets in the marketplace.’

 

 

Shel: There are reporters at the New York Post right now who are interviewing aliens about kidnapping women from New Jersey – and they call that journalism. There are a good number of bloggers who are not journalists, who do not dig into the facts, and do not get it correct – but there are many who do.

 

The definition of who is a journalist is changed. While bloggers are steps on a press tour, most of us – including me – are not media hits. We’re part of the conversation. When we report, we’ll say something like, ‘I liked him’ or ‘he’s full of it’ or something very candid that a traditional journalist would not be able to say. This is really a tough turn. You need to do more to find who’s credible and who is not…you also need to decide what’s getting more influential and what’s getting less so.

 

Don’t make this decision based on whether they’re a blogger – base the decision on individual journalistic merits.

 

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Website Optimization

When Internet users turn to Google, Yahoo, or any other search engine to find the latest news on your organization, there are reasons why your site will appear in the top 10 or why you don't find it until page ten. Getting better search results is what Website optimization is all about. Here are three tips that will move your site to the front of the line.

 

1) Get linked up. One of the most significant indicators that search engines use to rank the relevance of a Website to a particular keyword search is the total number of inbound links that a site collects. The search engines figure that a site with 500 other pages linking to it is more credible than a site with only two inbound links. Search engines also rank sites according to the quality and relevance of the sites linking to it. For example, one link from the Wall Street Journal might be worth 1,000 links from less popular sites.

 

2) Determine your keywords. Put yourself in the shoes of a Web user who’s looking for information on your organization or a potential crisis you may face down the road. Then, create a list of the keyword search terms that this user would likely employ. These keywords should be used liberally throughout all of your online materials. The search engines look for occurrences of these keywords in Web content or in site URLs to determine ranking – so don’t be shy about repeating them.

 

3) Update regularly. Search engines also rank sites according to when they were last updated. Routine updating of web content (even if the changes are minor or almost imperceptible to the average user) will ensure that your site keeps its place in the Web hierarchy.

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Announcing Stop the Presses

Stop the Presses: The Crisis and Litigation PR Desk Reference is a survival manual for corporate leaders, board members, lawyers, and communications specialists. This book provides the dos and don’ts of crisis planning and media relations, articulating the essential strategic guidelines to navigating bet-the-company issues. Stop the Presses looks at cross-border issues, SEC investigations, product liability, antitrust, health care, and more, for companies and their counsel. Order your copy today.

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On March 26, 2008, from 5:30 pm to 7:00 pm, American University will host the inaugural Richard S. Levick Lecture Series focusing on “The Role of Media in International and Legal Controversies.” The President and CEO of Levick Strategic Communications, Richard Levick, will be joined by Steve Ellis, Senior Vice President and Chair of the firm’s International Practice, and Michael Robinson, Senior Vice President and Chair of the firm’s Corporate and Regulatory Practice, for in-depth discussion of what every lawyer, executive, board member, and foreign businessperson must know to win in Washington and on Wall Street. American University’s Washington College of Law will host the event and is located at 4801 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20016. Registration is Free. CLE credit is available. Underground parking will be available as well. The event will be held in Room 600. Register today.

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It’s never too early to think ahead to how new media will continue to transform strategic communications in the years to come. Here are three emerging trends to reflect on…

1) The line between bloggers and the mainstream media will continue to blur. As bloggers become more specialized and enjoy a more significant role, they won’t be quite as easy to distinguish from mainstream media reporters. They’ll request media credentials for news conferences, they’ll call for quotes, and they’ll be just as tough – if not tougher – than the traditional media pit bulls. As Shel Israel reminds us, don’t judge them based on where they are published. Judge them based upon their credibility in the marketplace and the impact they have on the audiences that matter to you.

 

2) Reporters will increasingly turn to blogs for story ideas. In a recent study conducted by the Center for Media Research, 70% of reporters said that they check a blog list on a regular basis. 20% said they spend more than an hour a day checking blogs. And 57% said they read blogs two or three times a week. There’s no question that social media is influencing the mainstream media.

 

3) Technologies will continue to evolve. The same rules that make your new computer or cell phone obsolete within six months apply to all the strategies and tactics that we’ve discussed. Don’t get complacent. Be ready to evolve your capabilities to fit the new media’s ever-changing capabilities.

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Future High Stakes issues

Executive compensation:
The public still doesn’t understand what drives top pay packages. How effectively are you communicating corporate policy?

 

The Beijing Olympics and American manufacturers:
This summer’s Olympic Games are sure to fix the media spotlight on China and its business relationships with the U.S. Given the uproar caused by the lead paint and pet food recalls, is your organization ready to defend its ties to China?

 

Data loss and theft:
The number of companies and institutions affected is staggering. Are you prepared to respond to the crisis that may likely lie ahead?

 

More to come:
• Accidents and Disasters
• Antitrust
• Board or Board Member Liability
• Class Actions
• Coming to America
• Crisis
• Diversity
• Education
• Energy
• Executives Behind Bars
• FCPA
• Food
• Global Capital Markets
• Intellectual Property
• Internal Communications
• Internal Investigations
• Labor & Employment
• Monetizing Moments
• Money Laundering/Money Transfers
• New Media/Social Networking
• Product Liability
• Professional Services Crises
• Public Equity
• Qui Tam (Whistle Blowers)
• Reputation Management – Celebrity
• Reputation Management – Corruption
• Reputation Management – SEC Investigations
• Tourism
• Trade

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