High-Tech PR Blog >> Beyond the Hype

'The value of the individual article'

It's great working in a team environment because it beautifully extends my own attention capacity. Colleagues will often send interesting articles and blog fodder my way, and I appreciate how it uncovers gems that might go undiscovered by my RSS reader. 

So, a hat tip to colleague Jim Crook, who recently sent along this post by Michael Scherer in Time's Swampland blog. Scherer jumps into the ongoing self-examination of the evolution of traditional media in the age of the blog (and social media) with a very unique perspective. He discusses the "value of the individual article" and how this is increasing due to the fact that consumers no longer have to purchase information in packaged offerings like newspapers. He states that among the options for consumers to individually select stories they want to read, there are well-read blogs like Huffington Post, Drudge Report and others that have links to articles of interest to them. These linked sources augment and give greater context to the information they pass along to their readers. 

With the need to replace revenue because of declining subscriptions, ad inventory and classifieds, maximizing online advertising potential is paramount. In this context, Scherer offers this:

There is a corollary effect here: As the value of the package declines, the value of the individual article increases. Online, news organizations charge advertisers based on the number of hits they can get on a site. And since the hits are often coming for specific stories, and not the entire site, a blockbuster story that gets linked to, say, Drudge, is money in the bank.

He then poses questions about what it would take for one out of several competing stories on the same topic to capture the attention of Drudge (or comparable blog). He uses the example of a Politico story on Hillary Clinton's chances in the Democratic primary that is very provocative in nature -- as Scherer characterizes the story -- describing Clinton "as toast". He makes a note of how Politico enjoys regular linking by Drudge and speculates that it is because of this provocative tone.

If you say something provocatively, in a new way, or with an unexpected spin, you will succeed online...This trend towards story-by-story competition, and away from package-by-package competition, is a blessing and a curse. It is forcing better writing, quicker responsiveness, and it is increasing the value of actual news-making and clear-eyed thinking. But it is also increasing pressure on reporters to push the boundaries of provocation.

I happen to think that there is a great deal of truth to what Scherer has to say, and find this kind of insight valuable in terms of understanding how journalism will evolve. Thinking about this dynamic in the tech world, it certainly is consistent with the fact that TechCrunch and Valleywag have grown to be such influential and lucrative ventures. They are provocative themselves (although in some cases trying to become more journalistic at the same time), and therefore tend to link to fellow bloggers and blogging reporters that lean towards this style as well.

If this is true, does this translate into the fact that companies need to be more provocative in the news and communications they put out in order to capture the attention of journalists and bloggers? I tend to believe so, but this requires careful thinking on how to do it successfully. I'd love to hear what you think.

Tom Foremski's Elevator Pitch Challenge

I love it when I read things in blogs that we've been preaching forever -- even before PCs, if you can imagine.  It just shows that even in this new world of social media, the fundamentals of good communications haven't changed -- it is still about clear, concise communication combined with relationships and the ability to connect to news and trends.

In his well-read Silicon Valley Watcher blog, Tom Foremski announces that he is bringing back his "Silicon Valley Minute" videos of companies who basically have 60 seconds, on camera, to tell the world what their company is and (my words, not his) why anyone should care.  He has an example of a past video with this blog post to show the format, and comments that several of those who put themselves through this exercise in the past were later successfully acquired by top players in their fields.

As Foremski states,

Concise, clear communication, is vital to the success of any venture. It is the most valuable piece of communications that any company possesses.

And it is also the most difficult to master.

He acknowledges that when he was building his own social media business, he recognized how difficult it was to concisely explain his new venture to people.  He's right.  It isn't an easy task to boil down the essentials of a company and its mission into what we call "the elevator pitch" -- the concise description you give someone on an elevator before you reach your respective floors.  The goal is to have them understand the essence of the company and walk away with an accurate impression that will stick.  You don't want them scratching their heads or glazing over. 

As a journalist for a number of years, I was often stunned by the inability of some of my interview subjects to answer "what do you do?" with something I could grab onto and understand.  Careful "market-speak" and jargon really can get in the way of clear communication of what you do and why it matters.  It is one of the reasons I do what I do today, working with companies to help them cut through the noise by boiling down their information into messages that really resonate.

So kudos to Tom Foremski for pushing this discipline and inviting companies to submit their "Silicon Valley Minute."  I certainly will be watching the results and pointing out his comments as a way of reinforcing the need for brevity and clarity in those elevator pitches.

Podcast: Jerome Wendt on the state of storage

Today, we bring you Episode 4 of our Beyond the Hype podcast series. In this segment, LP&P's Don Jennings chats with Jerome Wendt, lead analyst and president of DCIG about the key drivers in the storage technology market.

Don opens the discussion by asking for Jerome's view of the impact of the current economic uncertainty on storage spending. Jerome states that he's not seeing signs of a negative impact because companies are getting more value for their money, and their storage needs continue to grow. Jerome feels companies need to tier data storage and as part of this look at archiving and storage resource management software.

Don then asks what storage technologies are exciting customers the most. According to Jerome, data de-duplication is at the top of the list, with off-site storage commanding a good deal of mindshare as well.

Jerome then talks about two other issues on the minds of customers -- data recovery and lowering power costs. On recovery, he says that "everyone is holding their breath" and saying "I hope this recovery works. But that's not going to cut it, as customers are going to expect data to be recovered in near real-time." He adds that any technologies that lower power costs will be hot this year and beyond. "Companies are telling me that we can't plug any more stuff into our wall without jumping through hoops to run more power to our data center because [power companies] don't have it to give anymore."

We hope you enjoy this podcast, and we'd love to hear your feeback. You can subscribe to the podcast series through the Podcast Ready button in the right sidebar, or via iTunes.

CEO Communications in a "Say on Pay" Era

And you thought annual shareholder meetings were tense in the past!  With the moves of some major brands like Aflac, Blockbuster and Verizon to allow shareholders a nonbinding vote on the appropriateness of the executives' compensation packages, future annual meetings should be a field day for reporters looking for drama and controversy. The Columbus Ledger-Enquirer reports:

Aflac Inc.'s board of directors released Monday to shareholders its proxy filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which provides details on compensation packages for its top five executives.

This year's proxy also invites shareholders to cast a say-on-pay advisory vote, the results of which will be revealed at the company's May 5 annual shareholders meeting.

Of course Aflac made it clear that a nonbinding vote means its board is not required to change executive compensation based on the vote, even if it shows shareholder displeasure with the Chairman and CEO's package of more than $14.83M.  But Aflac's move demonstrates transparency and a willingness to listen to shareholders' concerns and consider them when making these decisions.  And it seems to signal a confidence that the packages the company is proposing are appropriate and are tied to the value these executives are creating for shareholders.

Verizon was the second U.S. company to adopt this approach, after Aflac.  Blockbuster announced this past Tuesday that its board has authorized this type of advisory vote on compensation starting in 2009.  The recent BusinessWeek article chronicling this issue pinpointed the issue precisely with this quote: 

"The real question shareholders have raised is whether we are overpaying, in effect, for failure," says Stephen Davis, program director at the Millstein Center for Corporate Governance and Performance at Yale School of Management, and editorial director of Global Proxy Watch.

It goes beyond corporate governance and is part of the personalization movement in which shareholders -- and consumers in general -- feel they should have as much say in the workings of the companies whose stocks they own or products they buy as the executives and directors who manage them.  You see it in blog posts and in comments about articles covering companies and their executives. 

As this "say on pay" movement grows, it definitely raises the communication challenges of the corner office.  In the past, a heated annual meeting typically revolved around a vocal activist shareholder who may or may not draw interest in the media.  When the same individuals with the same rants appears year after year, even the most muckraking journalist has to temper his or her enthusiasm for giving them air time or space for their grievances.  But when the entire block of shareholders have the opportunity to review executive compensation -- which formerly was something grumbled about but never addressed directly -- any journalist or blogger who attends the meeting will have a bonanza of sources for articles.  This will particularly be true if the board chooses to ignore the shareholder's "say on pay" vote.

The CEO and Chairman's communication charter, therefore, is to accept this as the new reality and adjust accordingly.  The brave ones like Aflac, which are taking it on already, will score big points with shareholders and with the marketplace in general.  The ones who are agreeing to participate need to make sure their executives are ready for the scrutiny and open to discussing the value they are bringing and will be bringing to the company.  If they aren't already doing extensive preparation sessions for their annual meetings, complete with mock Q&A sessions from the floor, they need to start this practice before their next annual meeting.  If this is done correctly, the toughest and, in some cases, rudest questions they will field, will be in the mock session.  Nothing on the actual day will catch them by surprise.

If the CEO doesn't already have some external visibility or tends to shy away from interviews, now is the time for him or her to get the training and support they need to be more visible.  They will need to tell their story publicly and stand by it.  It is best for them to have the shareholders and the public understand in advance what they bring to the table and why what seems like a large compensation package is appropriate because of the knowledge, connections and vision they offer to steer the company to greater growth and profitability.

The CEOs and Chairmen who embrace this approach and look their shareholders in the eye, with confidence and openness, will come out of this the best.  The ones who fight the trend and continue to consider themselves beyond question regarding compensation or any other decisions will make the best copy for enterprising journalists. 

I Want my Internet TV

After listening to a few friends discussing two new TV shows, Cashmere Mafia and Lipstick Jungle, I decided to engage.

Our terrible weekend weather this month made it fairly easy for me to commit a few hours one Sunday to watching several episodes of each show on my laptop via the on-demand options the networks are offering. I have to say, it was pretty great. (I have a cable to connect my MacBook to my TV so I could have watched it on the big screen, but that was a technical challenge I wasn't ready to address. And honestly, the quality was pretty crisp on the laptop screen, so it was fine).

Since then I've learned that I'm not alone. A recent article in the New York Times referenced an October Nielsen Media Research study which found that "one in four Internet users had streamed full-length television episodes online in the last three months." It also noted that NBC.com had measured more than half a billion video streams in just over a year.

So I must ask, do you think this watching TV over the Internet thing will really catch on so much that it will outpace actual television viewings?

It certainly is more attractive for me than watching a show when it airs. (I've really learned to dislike commercial interruptions!) The DVR is good too, with the ability to skip commercials being invaluable. But there are enough times that the DVR is close to full (I can't record very many HD shows with the current hard drive capacity) or that I just forgot to program it. The shows online have commercials that you can't skip, but you know exactly how long they will last, and for some reason they seem a bit more bearable.

The implications for broadcasters and service providers are significant if this shift continues (advertising questions, capacity issues, etc.), but that discussion is for another post. At this point, for me, this is about the user being able to watch what they want, when they want. (It brings to mind an old jingle -- Have it Your Way...). In this case, because I did have it my way, the advertisers on Cashmere Mafia and Lipstick Jungle might have benefited. Because I was able to check out the shows and get caught up, they are now programmed in my DVR, so I'll be another set of valuable eyeballs.

Or will I? Since now I will inevitably skip the commercials when I actually watch the recorded shows.

IR and PR: All About Smart Communication

Last week, Lois and I attended a NIRI Boston chapter meeting which included a panel discussion with three buy-side analysts (from The Boston Company, Putnam Investments and Cambridge Trust) sharing approaches for valuing companies. As the conversation progressed, we were struck by how similar the counsel these analysts offered to IROs and executives about how to best communicate with them was to what we share with our clients in dealing with the media. These truly can be considered basic tenets of good communication.

1. To establish credibility to help them understand your business...efficiently. Like the media, these analysts are looking at huge volumes of companies and don't have the time to dig deep into every company.

2. Answer the easy questions honestly. When it comes to questions of topics such as marketshare, address the questions head on. The analysts (or media) will either already know or be able to quickly find it out.

3. When offering up metrics about the company, make a long term commitment to making them available...in good times and in bad. An example of this on the media side is with executive access after earnings calls. If you decide to make the CEO or CFO available to speak to the media, commit to this approach quarter after quarter, no matter the results.

4. If you believe in what you are doing, stick with it. By this they meant not changing course frequently because the stock price is not responding. Consistency builds credibility. Again, this holds true with the media. It's necessary to communicate messages consistently over an extended period of time in order for them to gain traction.

5. Target analysts appropriately. Make sure you understand what interests the analyst from an investment perspective and the kinds of companies he/she covers before targeting them. At that point be sure to provide the right kind of information to drive interest and the right frequency of contact. With regard to media, my experience is that the programs that begin with focus and the right level of homework before outreaching are those that yield the highest return. 

Participating in this discussion gave me yet another data point on the synergies between public relations and investor relations. As a matter of fact, a year or so ago there was a quote in a NIRI publication that spoke to this: "By getting IR and PR together, it can develop a clear and accurate picture with rich details to show how the company is meeting its numbers, achieving management's goals and objectives and executing the strategy laid out in previous quarters." 

If there are synergies you'd like to point out, please do, as I think there is always room for these two functions to work more closely together.

Austin American-Statesman Interview from SXSW

The advances in social media have given all of us the opportunity to virtually attend almost any event by reading the real-time blog posts, Twitter entries, and by watching videos from the floor of trade shows and conferences.  Our Austin-based team was right in the thick of the SXSW Interactive, Film and Music Festival, as Carol Hanko described so well in an earlier post this week.  Two of her team members, Linsey Krauss and Lauren Whittenberg conducted some great interviews from the conference.  The one below is with Omar Gallaga who writes about technology culture for the Austin American-Statesman.

Linsey told me Omar was kind enough to answer a few questions when he was running from the infamous Sarah Lacy/Mark Zuckerberg interview (which his blog chronicles better than any other account I've read so far.)  I certainly was impressed with how deep into social media the Statesman is, based on Omar's references to many tools that are his everyday ways of staying in touch and reporting.

He personally started with a MySpace page, moved to Facebook and initially used Twitter as a cool personal connector, but then saw it was a great reporting tool.  In an email to Linsey, he commented, "I send . . . messages around now to find a source and get a very quick response." 

I particularly found interesting his comments in the video about the higher level of freedom his publication is giving him when reporting real-time from a busy show like SXSW using social media tools. This is quite different from the higher levels of review and scrutiny reporters like him deal with for the traditional print publication.  As part of his coverage, he has a great blog entry on a SXSW session that predicted the end of traditional print media due to social media.  I personally think his coverage of SXSW and the Statesman's forward thinking about leveraging their reporters' use of new tools portends the merging of good pubs and good blogs in the future. 

Meanwhile, enjoy the video.

Less is More on the Political Trail, Barack

Watching the tense battle going on in the Democratic primary, I have been paying particular attention to the communication lessons I believe are being told by the recent crisis in the Obama camp.  As I watched the news and the blogosphere to see how the Democratic front-runner was going to respond to the outrage at the selected diatribes from his pastor of 20 years, I was curious to see how his well-organized and Internet-savvy campaign team would respond.  The buzz was all over the news yesterday morning -- if somewhat quieter in the blogs -- about the important speech on race he was planning to give in Philadelphia at the Constitution Center.  I was in a meeting during the actual speech, so I have watched clips from it and have pulled his transcript off of the web.  It truly was a brilliant speech, which Obama apparently worked on himself in the middle of this crazy period of his campaign.  It was personally revealing.  It was heartfelt. It was well delivered.  He is a gifted orator.

But from a communications perspective, did it do the job it was intended to do -- to quiet the furor over Reverend Wright's assertions that associated Obama with someone who is being depicted as racist and anti-American?  The news media is asking the same question and is saying "time will tell."

Obama refers to YouTube in his speech and says that if all he knew of Rev. Jeremiah Wright was the inflammatory clips on YouTube that are being watched by millions online and, seemingly on an endless loop on cable news (my words, not his), he would be appalled about him too.  He then goes on to give a larger picture of the man and his contributions and his struggles that are the context for the snippets the public have seen. 

Obama's detractors quickly point out that he did not stand up and correct Wright or walk out of the church when he made the inflammatory comments.  They are looking for a defense for Obama's passivity in the face of these types of comments.  They bring up the fact that he allowed his children to listen to this week after week in church.  Listening to the detractors, I recalled the times my own Dad would take me by the hand and walk out of Mass at our parish church because he disagreed with the singing of patriotic songs like America the Beautiful in place of a closing hymn.  His reason was that Catholic means universal and should transcend any country.  He felt it was inappropriate and he showed that he disagreed by leaving whenever it happened.  I mention this personal incident because I believe that is what the detractors are looking for from Obama -- something that shows he took courageous action against something he did not believe in.

So the speech did not dissuade them.  But perhaps that task is impossible, just as Hillary Clinton cannot change the minds of people who feel she is cold and calculating and have issues in general with the way she and her husband have operated over the years.

But will Obama's speech -- as a vehicle to address the crisis -- move the undecideds?  I don't think so and I think it's purely a case of the wrong medium for the time.  The speech was described by some of the commentators and reporters as Lincolnesque.  It certainly began with  an eloquent recounting of our forefathers' language in our Constitution.  It was statesmanlike.  It was educational.  It was riveting.  But it was 45 minutes long.  He decries the reduction of Jeremiah Wright to snippets on YouTube, but he seems to forget that we are a YouTube generation, whether we like it or not.  His speech is difficult to cut into sound-bites or snippets that can capture his entire meaning.  It is being diced and sliced depending on what the person using it is trying to get across.  It is too long to provide the kind of clear messaging that is the hallmark of effective communications.

As a long-time communications professional and someone who has counseled many executives regarding clear and concise messaging, I have to say that this new tactic of long speeches will not work to Obama's advantage at this point in the campaign.  His catch phrases like "yes we can" and "not this time" (in the current speech) will work for him.  But the days of people sitting down and listening -- really listening -- to a 45-minute speech to understand a candidate's view on an important issue disappeared a long time ago.  The only ones who will do it are the media and most of them are struggling with how to boil it down into something they can quickly comment on.

So what should he have done?  The speech was great.  But I think he needed to spend more time crafting a segment of the speech which would quickly deal with this situation.  Because of the Wright clips, he is now viewed by many as being led or influenced by someone painted as racist and anti-American.  He needed a sound-bite that said, "I heard these statements and I disagreed with them, and I was remiss in letting them go by without my comment or action."  Then he could have continued his speech, eloquently explaining more about this man and his work so people will understand why he made this mistake.

Now THAT would have been the clip on the news and on YouTube.  Instead, the latter has his speech in four segments and the last segment has the fewest viewings so far.  It is just too much information.

Less definitely is more when you are in a sound-bite age of communications and politics.

SXSW - Connecting Is What Matters

For the past two weeks, Austin, Texas has pretty much been taken over by thousands of interactive, film and music enthusiasts from all over the world attending the SXSW Interactive, Film and Music Festival. More than 2,000 bands performed in a span of two weeks. And with an office sitting at the corner of 6th and Congress, we heard quite a few of them just sitting in our office. We heard the music, no doubt about it. It is one of the fringe benefits of our location, though it also made it difficult to concentrate when it's 85 degrees outside and the streets are shut down for parties at 1 p.m. in the afternoon.

The conference kicked off with an awkward keynote featuring a Q&A with Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg and BusinessWeek's technology journalist Sarah Lacy. As Ted Weismann noted last week, the audience was unhappy with her questions and style, and quickly made this clear by wrestling the microphone away from her to ask their own questions in between loud jeering remarks and angry twitter messages to colleagues. Drama is a good thing with this crowd.

Twitter was the big hit last year - everyone was talking about it.  And based on our video interviews with conference attendees, everyone is still talking about it.

LP&P attended the show and also interviewed multiple attendees about various issues, including the tools they were using to stay connected. Facebook and Twitter were the overwhelming hits, though other tools mentioned in the discussions include:

Kyte TV: The service allows users to create and post videos taken from any phone.

Socialthing: This application organizes various social networking profiles into one place. It hosted a party Sunday night at the PureVolume Ranch.

BricaBox: New York's very own Nate Westheimer launched the roll-your-own social network late February. One of its first iterations was a SXSW party guide.

Drop.io: This service allows users to create “drops” of different types of media so they can share information and communicate with each other.

Pownce: Users can send messages, files, links, and events to friends.

BitStrips: Make your own comic strip/blog, with Twitter-like speech bubbles.

UStream.TV: BusinessWeek was using this live streamer to provide SXSW coverage.

Corporate community and transparency were big topics among attendees - they felt it was critical that companies provide real-time technology-based venues for collaboration - and they want companies to become more transparent, which of course provided colorful commentary by corporations adhering to compliance and SEC mandates. We also heard people say over and over again that they use social media to stay connected and they want a place to connect with their peers. We interviewed one guy from Seattle, in particular, that works remotely and he said the only time he gets to see all of his co-workers is at SXSW. Not only do attendees crave connection, but they are demanding immediate interaction, which is fairly obvious based on the types of tools listed above. People want to close the gap on communication lags and have real time conversations via multiple channels.

Listening to my colleague Linsey Krauss talk about the show, she said what really struck her was the diverse cross-section of the audience that were all seeking the same type of information. She spoke to CEOs, venture capitalists, advertisers, photographers, gamers, musicians, professors and Hollywood types all under one roof (not your normal niche trade show crowd). The show make-up was diverse, but the interest to connect on multiple channels and have them all connect together was shared by all of the attendees. There was plenty of information to digest and people to meet. Next year, we will be at the show with a larger presence, hoping to connect and learn just like everybody else.

Yahoo! Buzz Place to Be?

There was an interesting post on Read/Write Web today detailing how much a new Yahoo! service, called Buzz, has boosted traffic for major Web and blog publishers.  News sources and blogs like Salon.com, Portfolio.com, Huffington Post and Dallas Morning News reported record traffic as a result of referrals from Yahoo! Buzz.

What is Yahoo! Buzz?  It is a "social news" site that is similar in nature to digg.com, where members of the community can link to stories or blog posts of interest, and others can give a vote of approval of that content.  The more votes, the higher the profile of the content on digg.com.  We've had clients who have received record traffic as a result of blog posts that have made it to the home page of digg.com.

Yahoo! Buzz adds to this model by ranking stories according to a "Buzz Score", which is determined not only by votes of approval, but also by popularity of search terms and how many times a piece of content is e-mailed.  Given the fact that the Yahoo! audience outnumbers digg's by several million, and is more mainstream, the referring traffic potential is much higher.

It is in beta, and looking at it now, it looks like most content comes from Yahoo! News.  If it is going to be the "game changer" and digg killer Read/Write Web predicts, it's going to need to represent content from much more than what is elsewhere on Yahoo!  Until then, it is only signficant to publishers.