High-Tech PR Blog >> Beyond the Hype

How I decide on friend requests

As we've mentioned here recently, Twitter use has exploded at the agency.  Facebook preceded it, and I hear the same questions now that I heard when people were building their Facebook networks.  How do you find people to follow?  And the more important question, how do I determine if I should follow someone, especially someone that follows me?

These questions, a post by Mark Glaser this week, and the in-process BusinessWeek story on Twitter, inspired me to type up my rules for determining who to follow and whether to follow those who starting following me.  Follow?

[For those not familiar with Twitter, I've embedded a nice video at the end of this post to explain.]

1. Is someone going to offer me value?  I can tell by looking at the first screenful of tweets.  Are the majority about business issues relevant to me or serious things that interest me?  If not, I'll pass on following.

2. Is someone going to help me do my job better?  If there is a reporter or blogger I can follow and get to know better because they're on Twitter, I'll follow them.  If there is a smart social media practitioner who can help me keep up with the lightning fast developments changing this world every day, I'll follow them.  If there is someone who gives me more insight into strategic, global trends, I'll follow them.

3. Is someone entertaining and related to a particular interest of mine?  I recently discovered a great video blog about wine, which is an emerging hobby, done by a very entertaining sommelier named Gary Vaynerchuk.  I later discovered he is on Twitter, so started following him (@garyvee).  I haven't regretted it.

4. Is someone already part of my business network?  This is a no-brainer.

5. For those that follow me, and I want to determine whether to follow them back, what is their "following" to "follower" ratio?  If it's a high number, I'm immediately suspicious because they are either a spammer or random person of no particular relevance to me.  No thanks.

I'm adopting another rule as well -- a great one I saw from Max Kalehoff, VP of marketing at Clickable, on Twitter yesterday.  "If I follow you and you become actively misaligned with me, I'll probably stop following you very quickly."

Anyway, fwiw.  I think those rules could be adapted for any other social network (Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.) as well.

If only we all had columns for "Do-Overs"

Whenever I media train someone, I always tell them to pause and think before responding to a reporter's question so they can formulate a concise, accurate response.  The outcome should be a well-phrased sound-bite that will be deemed newsworthy and printable.  This approach also helps protect them from shooting from the hip with a glib response they will regret later.  "Your most controversial statement will be placed right over your picture," I warn them.

Well, Jack Welch had one of those moments a couple weeks ago around GE's disappointing earnings announcement.  But since he's Jack Welch and, with his wife Suzy, has a back-page column in BusinessWeek, he got to plaster a box in the middle of the May 5 column that essentially amounted to "what I meant to say about Jeff Immelt."

The press all reported on this, of course, as evidenced by the AP story that noted:

On Wednesday, Welch, who retired in 2001, said he would be "shocked beyond belief" if Chief Executive Jeff Immelt again missed an earnings target. He said he'd "get out a gun and shoot" Immelt if GE missed an earnings target.

Welch, 72, also said Immelt had "credibility issues," but vigorously defended GE's business model.

On Thursday, he renounced his earlier comments.

"I want to get back and just make the one point I tried to make yesterday," Welch said. "GE's a great company with a great model with a hell of a CEO who's reshuffled the business portfolio to make it stronger for the next decade and all this nonsense that's been buzzing around for the last week is just silly talk and I am 100 percent supportive of everything going on there."

Even with the glare of the television lights and the pressure of the live broadcast, it's always better to pause and think before responding.  This is especially important if you don't happen to have a national magazine column you can use for your make-good comments.

Twitter and the future of news

Perhaps it is coincidence, or perhaps it's another example of how news delivery is changing.  We've seen how the nightly news delivers stories in flashy snippets and how the sports component is reduced to a mere 3-4 minutes (thanks SportsCenter).  We've seen the demise of the morning news program, illustrated so vividly by Dana Milbank in yesterday's Washington Post.  He highlights Robin Roberts' interview with George and Laura Bush -- leading the broadcast -- that focused on their daughters' wedding and the Rose Garden in the spring as opposed to the housing crisis, gas prices, or the tragedy in Myanmar.

"It's a beautiful place," the president discloses. "In the spring, the flowers are fantastic. In the fall, the -- it's just such a -- kind of a place that's so fresh. In the winter, of course, it's got a lot of snow. [Laughter.] Summer is real hot, but it's -- we love it out here. It's beautiful."

...where Roberts pressed Bush on his daughter's wedding at the ranch.  "So, what have you done to make it special there?" the anchor asked. "I know that it's always special at the ranch, but for this wedding?"  "We put a giant cross made out of Texas limestone that will serve as the altar," the president replied.  "That's beautiful," Roberts said. She went on to note that a beagle named Uno, the 2008 Westminster Kennel Club's Best in Show, would visit the Rose Garden later in the day.  "Uno is coming," Laura Bush confirmed.  Roberts was impressed. "Big day here at the White House," she said.

But I digress...back on point...

Is the future of news Twitter (and I mean this figuratively)?  News stories are getting shorter and less in-depth, reporters are now required to blog to keep up and compete in an ever shortening news cycle.  We're now seeing evidence, however, that the cycle is compressing more to a point where blogs don't cut it as a rapid information delivery mechanism.  What I saw Tuesday is convincing me that micro-blogging, i.e. Twitter, is cutting the news cycle down from hour-to-hour to minutes and even seconds.  Within the span of five minutes Tuesday afternoon, I saw -- on Twitter -- links from two people I follow pointing me to separate instances where Twitter is impacting news making and news delivery.

The first was from a Reuters blog deconstructing how news of a minor earthquake in northern Virginia first broke on Twitter, which then triggered the mainstream news media to follow up and report on the story.  While it was interesting that a Twitter user was the original source by asking if there was an explosion in Falls Church, VA, the local media jumped in an hour later to chase down the story that it was, in fact, a 1.8 magnitude earthquake centered in Annandale.  What the Reuters post doesn't confirm is whether the local media was turned onto the story because of Twitter.  But it does pose the question of whether Twitter can and should be used as a real-time source of news.

The second example shows how Twitter is starting to be used in news reporting.  Reporters at WCNC, the NBC affiliate in Charlotte, NC used Twitter to micro-blog about this week's primary and the campaigning that led up to the vote on Tuesday.  The station integrated a feed of all of the reporters 'tweets' into its Web site.  While in my opinion most of the tweets are trivial in nature, it was interesting to see reporters disclose what specific stories they were working on for upcoming newscasts, as well as to ask viewers to submit comments and questions that they would use for these stories.

Yet another case in point is how Steve Baker of BusinessWeek -- very much on the bleeding edge -- is going to put out a story on Twitter, 140 characters per hour, starting at 2:30 today.  Despite the fact that there may be an attention problem, the amount of reader comments that will take place should blow away any amount of reader response that would occur on the BW web site.

UPDATE: Heather Green of BusinessWeek clarified on Twitter that Baker is writing the story on Twitter over time to allow followers to help build the story.  It looks like he also may have used my suggestion that the tweets be tagged so one could follow it using Twemes.

Despite the fact that Twitter is experimental, I've been interested in overlooking the drivel about how someone's drinking a bad cup of Starbucks and seeing how Twitter both helps us do our job, as well as helps our clients reach its buying community.  And I'm seeing more and more potential.

DEMO On the Road in Boston

It's always great to catch up with Chris Shipley, exec producer of the DEMO conference and co-founder of Guidewire Group.  She's on tour right now doing what she does best -- meeting with and evaluating technologies all over the world to pick the best for DEMO Fall.  She's also adding the social element to this tour and participating in cocktail receptions in key cities -- Seattle, Boston, Austin, Providence, Denver and NYC.

In between meetings with prospective DEMO Fall candidates, Chris was kind enough to sit down with members of the agency team and it was an interesting discussion.  Chris talked about how conditions in  local markets drive certain technology expertise.  For example, she is seeing London emerging as a next web technology hotbed because of the community of developers based there.  In Australia and New Zealand, she is seeing business applications, particularly related to health care, emerging.  These complex medical management applications for patient management and risk management are related to national health care systems in these regions that also can be marketed in the UK and Canada.   China and Vietnam are emerging markets, but in her view they still are focused on their own huge market opportunity. 

Chris commented during one point in the discussion that she hasn't lived in Boston for 14 years.  Interestingly, she manages to maintain an objective view of Boston despite being on the other coast for so long.  Her tour recently stopped in Seattle and one interesting company there is led by an entrepreneur who said he specifically chose that city to build his company because of the quality of life and his family.  He was criticized for not starting the company in Silicon Valley.  Chris commented that it actually is harder to start a company in Seattle or Chicago or Boston or Austin because you don't have the wealth of resources available to you that are so readily available in Silicon Valley.  As a result, the founders have to make smart decisions which can lead to very strong companies. 

Since Chris spends so much of her time traveling the world evaluating technology for DEMO and her Guidewire research service, I'm not surprised that she is less a Silicon Valley person than a citizen of the world.  She brings a measured perspective that is refreshing, in my humble opinion, and not always seen in the blogosphere.

Say what?

I've never been a fan of the blind pitch.  And for many of us it's one of the numerous reasons we talk to our clients about how best to engage media, media that blog, and even non-media types that blog.  From my perspective at least, it should be about creating meaningful conversations and lasting relationships.

So imagine my surprise when I received a comment to a blog entry I did almost a year ago, promoting an event that I have no interest in attending and probably wouldn't even write about.  Huh?   So what was I supposed to do?  Post the comment and thank the commenter for taking the time to read what I've written about in the past? Decline the comment and ask to be removed from his spam list?  Black list the commenter from ever posting a comment again? Take the comment and post it in a new blog entry, holding the example up to the world to see? 

It didn't take long to do what probably happens to many in the PR community who don't take the time to do things right.  Ignore the comment, use the info as a lesson learned, and report the comment as spam.

As one of my colleagues accuses me of offering life lessons on any given day, today's lesson is work to create a meaningful engagement.  Sadly, the comment I received today didn't quite fit in that category.

Pub Club "Mixer" for Press and PR at Fenway Park

The Publicity Club of New England had a nice event last night, inviting the PR folks who make up the club and a group of local media from the business and trade press, to attend a networking event at Fenway Park followed by a Red Sox game. 

There were 110 people total who piled into the Players Club, one of the event rooms.  I was standing at the bar waiting for my drink when one of the attendees ran up to me and handed me her cell phone, demanding, "Tell him where I am!"  I said to the unknown person on the phone, "Fenway Park."  She persisted, "Tell him where at Fenway Park."  I summoned the name of the event room, which is very nice, but probably isn't where Josh Beckett and Jonathan Papelbon hang out, for my silent phone pal:  "The Players Club."  She wandered off, trilling how exciting it was to be there.

I shouldn't be so smug about it.  Getting into Fenway Park these days is not easy.  Tickets are scarce and usually expensive.  So the Pub Club did a great thing by making this game available, including a buffet and drink tickets.  I would bet many of the people attending haven't been to Fenway before.  Some brought family members, including some very excited kids who were set to see their heroes.

It was nice to catch up with some of the press who attended -- Barb Darrow of TechTarget, Martin LaMonica of CNET, Rick Whiting of VARBusiness, Eric Lundquist of eWEEK, and Scott Bradner of Network World.  With both my PR industry colleagues and the media, there was a constant sharing of data regarding the "r" word.  Although many of the publications are contracting or reorganizing these days, the general tone of the PR people assembled was positive and business seems to be good. 

I also took the opportunity to ask around about the use of Twitter.  Martin LaMonica is registered for Twitter, but isn't using it a lot.  Dan Farber, his boss, really only "Tweets" when he has a particularly interesting tidbit or link to share.  I can relate to that approach to this new tool.  Eric Lundquist seems to be still in the mode of finding it amusing.  Eric is hilarious, so he can make anything sound funny.

There also were representatives from People magazine, the Today Show and Popular Mechanics, in addition to local daily reporters from the Boston Herald and Boston Globe.  It just shows how much of a media center Boston has become in recent years, which is great to see.

All in all, it was a good night except for the 3-0 win for the Blue Jays.

Taking blogging to new heights

Thanks to my colleague Mark today, I enjoyed this post on Wired about how climbers on Mount Everest are blogging about how Nepalese soldiers have closed the summit due to an Olympic torch run scheduled to take place on the other side of the mountain in China.  Apparently, the military presence is to prevent more pro-Tibet protests.  Here's one excerpt:

"We saw lots of military staff and one solider carrying a very sophisticated sniper type of gun," [climber] Jim Curtin wrote on his blog Monday. Curtin has been blogging his ascent of Everest for several weeks but is now stuck at Camp 2, at 21,000 feet. Over the last several days his blog has chronicled the frustrating wait as Nepalese soldiers block climbers from ascending the mountain.

The most interesting aspect to the story is how, as part of the restrictions on the mountain, there is a news blackout from Base Camp and no news media on other camps on the mountain.  Once again we're seeing the power of blogging and in this case extreme citizen journalists filling a media void to inform the rest of us of another fascinating subplot to the controversial Beijing Olympics.

The Wired post also reveals the power of the technology available now to make this blogging possible.

Mountain teams are supposed to be under a communications blackout, but a group called Climbers Without Borders have set up an anonymous information service that allows climbers to post updates to MountEverest.net.  In addition, several climbers have their equipment stashed away, according to a climbing-equipment salesman who requested anonymity to protect clients in the field. 

Luis Benitez, a climber who has ascended Everest six times, said that all the technology necessary to run a blog could be stowed in a tiny bag.  "You need a satellite phone, a PDA, special compression software, one cable and a solar panel and that's it," Benitez said.

Now I have to go to Twitter to see if any of these climbers are there.

Twitter English, MySpace English, Business English

A colleague sent me a link to an article in the Washington Post pondering in a rather amusing way about e-mail decorum.  The author does so by deconstructing and attempting to "decode" an e-mail thread that includes recipients irrelevant to the conversation, and is protracted by the default "reply to all" action most people take when participating in such threads.  Much has been written about e-mail etiquette in the past, so I won't elaborate on the article too much.

One aspect to the article that I can't help but comment on, however, is how it characterizes the (over)use of exclamation points and question marks in typical e-mail communication, something I've caught myself doing too much of in the last few years.  This brings me to the point on how much business English has changed -- for the worst -- not only because of e-mail and instant messaging, but now because of channels MySpace, Facebook and Twitter.  Twitter, tremendously growing in popularity (I've seen a 10 fold growth in my colleagues getting on board in the last two weeks), limits everyone to 140 characters per tweet, so it requires shorthand through a whole new dialect.  Writing on one's Facebook Wall, dropping messages into Super Pokes and the like demands another flavor of quick, snappy (and hip) conversation.

With these networks and others being used more and more in a business context, I fear that we'll see Twitter speak or Facebook-ese bleed its way into places where good old-fashioned business English is needed and expected, which is most business e-mail correspondence, not to mention other business documents.  I'm already seeing it. 

Now, not to come across as a Gen X curmudgeon, I'm all for certain new flavors of business English -- dialects appropriate for Twitter or Facebook or Flickr or whatever.  But, the traditional style of "old English" will never go away and we will do our best to make sure of that here.

Social network funny

When you have 5 minutes to take in some comic relief, this is must see 'net video!

(Hat tip to Tom Foremski via Twitter.)

Why Stop at Twitter? Try Thunkit

As an advance guard for our clients in the social media world, I am doing my best to try the various communication vehicles so we can advise them appropriately. So I'm not only in Facebook, but I also ventured into Twitter last week. Watching the stream of thoughts, quips, to do lists being checked off, and links being shared on the web by bloggers, journalists and some of my colleagues, it occurred to me that the next step is shared thought.

I introduce to you Thunkit.com, which takes social networking to a new paradigm, the sharing of thoughts. With a special chip added to your Bluetooth headset, you can send your thoughts at any point in time to people you choose to link with. Simply touching their name on the your Mac or iPhone address list connects them with you, as Steve Jobs -- clearly the deepest thinker in the industry today -- has embraced Thunkit and enabled all of his technology with this capability. Uri Geller has signed on to be the celebrity spokesperson. He's not making any appearances, though. He's just sending his thoughts to everyone who signs on.

When it happens, as I'm sure it will, the VC community will pour money into it.  But remember, I Thunkit first.