Piaras Kelly PR - Public Relations in Ireland

Nice to see something I read about on a trendwatch website a while back has hit Irish shores - handvertising. Irish Handstamps basically puts your brand or message onto the wrists of clubgoers across Dublin. Karl McCarthy and Russell Altman, the pair behind the company, have signed up 30 clubs and counting thus far and received a nice writeup in the Irish Independent also.

Organisations are constantly trailing new mediums for advertising purposes. It will be interesting to see how companies incorporate a call to action for consumers. Irish Handstamps say that they expect drink companies and mobile operators to snap up the advertising space, whereas I would have thought that transport organisations, like Dublin Dus or a taxi company, or fast food restaurants might be more relevant for clubgoers.

All we’re waiting for now is for consumers to start selling advertising space on their bodies in the form of tattoos.

So you’re a sports clothing manufacturer that primarily targets fans of mixed martial arts, boxing, etc. In order to appeal to consumers, what do you do? Take out advertising or sponsor fighters perhaps? Or you could take a leaf out of the book of Affliction Clothing, who decided to become a mixed martial arts promoter and capture the attention of consumers by offering them dream bouts.

This weekend, the company puts on its first event - Affliction: Banned - and has attracted some of the top fighters in the world, in the process offering a credible alternative to the UFC, the leading organisation in the mixed martial arts world. Some may question whether the event is a stretch too far for Affliction, but the approach taken by the organisation in not tying its fighters to exclusive contracts has given the UFC something to worry about. Its star champion, Randy Couture, is even in dispute with the organisation as he attempts to engineer a move to Affliction.

So what has this got to do with brands in general? Personally I think it offers a tangible example of how a brand can tap into a community and build a platform to create ongoing positive engagement with its target audience. It flips the traditional sponsorship model on its head by building its own property from the ground up. The promotion is effectively a giant outlet for its clothing range.

In his book, the ‘New Marketing Manifesto‘, John Grant offers advice to brands as to how they can engrain themselves into the lives of their target audience:

In the past, this drive [the pack instinct] found expression in the real communities people were part of – the extended family and village or neighbourhood or the firm which gave you a job for life. Now people are more uprooted. Social, geographical and work mobility are a central of most people’s lives. Sociologists say that in this sense we are all homeless because we have no fixed point as our emotional origin. This creates a hunger for communities we can belong to.

If Nike as a brand was grounded in local community sports clubs and activities people would have had to give up exercise and friends to leave it behind, rather than just giving up on a badge. Communities of interest make brands less disposable. The old marketing relied on identifying passive target audiences whose only connection with the brand and each other was purchasing. New marketing aims to form a much more active and bonded community of interest.

Affliction Clothing’s move to become a mixed martials arts promoter has enabled it to form this bonded community of interest with its consumers. It has moved passed the old sponsorship model of simply slapping your brand name on the content and hoping the public remembers it. Instead, to paraphrase Jeff Hicks, CEO, Crispin Porter + Bogusky, it has created “content so valuable and useful that [consumers] wouldn’t want to live without it.“

I cancelled my Moviestar.ie account the other day. Simple decision to make really, I’ve a backlog of DVDs to get through so paying EURO12.99 per month for a service I didn’t use hardly made sense. Nothing against Moviestar.ie, they had lots of films I wanted to see but I don’t have time for them at the moment.

So it would just be a simple click of a button and sayonara Moviestar.ie…or would it?

You have to hand it to Moviestar.ie, they have a fantastic cancellation service which means you have to go through five stages before canceling the service. It’s largely designed to capture information so that they can improve their service, but I was impressed by the manner they handled the cancellation.

Am I sure I want to cancel my account? Would I like two weeks service instead before making up my mind? It got to the stage that I felt guilty that I was breaking up with Moviestar.ie.

The sign of a good brand or service - it feels like you’re in a relationship with them. Breaking up is hard to do. In this case it was of a case of ‘It’s not you, it’s me…honest.’

I was fortunate enough to attend a briefing by Triona Campbell of Campbell Ryan Productions, the company behind the online soap opera Sofia’s Diary. The briefing is available on the IIEA website and please find it below on YouTube.

Couple of interesting points:

• Sofia’s diary is in profit before it begins production thanks to sponsorship revenue. The soap opera typically has five sponsors (there is a queue waiting for one of these spaces apparently), and as a result the show features product placement and even one of the characters is there as a result of a hair removal company.
• While Sofia’s Diary is an online soap opera that is primarily distributed on Bebo, the show has signed deals with multiple media outlets for promotional purposes. The weekly web episodes are also combined together for broadcast on Fiver, a UK TV Channel.
• One other interesting aspect is that they have also recently formed a partnership with iTunes after noticing all the comments from viewers wondering which artist was responsible for a song played in a particular episode. They receive part of the revenue from iTunes for the songs that viewers download.

While the recession dominates headlines in Ireland at the moment and most of the attention about the Lisbon Treaty focuses on whether it will be ratified by Poland or the Czech Republic, ultimately saving face for Ireland, there has been a steady undercurrent of activity by parties involved in the No Campaign.

The No decision in the Lisbon Treaty has become part of Irish folklore now, inspiring a couple of videos since the referendum:

Cowen’s Downfall (Another remix of Downfall)

Shamrockfield (Created as part of the Darklight Festival)

It will be very interesting to see how Sarkozy reacts when he finally makes his visit to Ireland, only to be greeted by an unappreciative audience.

Mark Nagurski has a good post on Really Practical Marketing on why people hate networking. Six reasons why people hate networking include:

• It’ll be full of people trying to sell me things
• I don’t want to stand there and try to sell to other people either
• I’m just a startup business I won’t fit in
• My kind of customers aren’t there
• There’s no chance to do any real business there anyway
• I don’t know anybody, who will I talk to?

I must profess I’m not that much of a networking fan, but it’s something which I’m putting more emphasis on over the coming months. I was at a networking event organised by the Irish Academy of Public Relations recently which featured Tricia Murphy of the TiG Alliance - the self processed the Queen of Networking. Despite the cheesy title, she really put the crowd to ease and structured the session well to move the attendees around and get people talking.

Some observations I made on the night and based on Mark’s post and other material I’ve read recently:

• A lot of people are put off by networking opportunities because they don’t know anyone. When they introduce themselves to people at the event, they can often latch on to someone for the duration of the event. I’m often guilty of this. One simple way to get around this is to set a minimum number of business cards that you want to come away from the event with.
• Another simple suggestion is to attend the event with someone else from your organisation. You’ll be more at ease and get introduced to their contacts.
• Latch on to a maven if they’re at the event. I was at Le Web a couple of years ago and met Fergus Burns of Nooked, who proceeded to introduce me to a veritable who’s who of the online world anytime I was chatting to him over the course of the event. I would hate to see Fergus’s address book, he knows everybody!
• When you’re talking to someone, find out about what they do. If you know something of interest to them, talk about that instead of going into a sales pitch. As Hugh MacLeod says “What’s true in life is also true in marketing: If you want to be boring, talk about yourself. If you want to be interesting, talk about other people.”

On a related note, for information about networking events or opportunities read Conor Lynch’s new Connector blog. Speaking of networking I hope to make it along to the SMS Text News mobile networking event on St Stephens Green this evening

Why is it that viral marketing reminds me so much of Hans Christian Andersen’s classic tale? It seems everyone out there wants whatever they’re flogging to go viral. Interesting feedback from Ben Ayers on his Twitter profile about brands on social networks that “of the 122 major branded pages in Europe, half had less than 1000 ‘friends’ - largely because of assumption that they would ‘go viral‘” Ayers rightly points out that these profiles need plenty marketing and PR behind them.

Helge Tenno has a very interesting presentation in this respect on Content Marketing. Slide 7 stands out for me, it simply states:

Content isn’t King. Conversation is King.
Content is just something to talk about.

When marketeers think Facebook, Youtube et al, they see that there are plenty of conversations taking place on these platforms. They wrongly assuming that by inserting themselves here, their brands will somehow suddenly be relevant and be talked about. Hugh MacLeod talks a lot these days about ‘social objects‘, a node in people’s social network which brings them together to have a conversation, i.e. content that is of interest and relevant to them.

The simplest way of going viral? Mark Nagurski has some simple advice:

So, if repeat business and word-of-mouth make successful businesses AND being really good helps fuel word-of-mouth and keep customers coming back for more, then …
The best way to market a small business 
is to be really good at what you do.

For those that thinking going viral is a case of flicking a switch, more wise words from the Canadian Marketing Blog:

Viral is not strategy. Viral is an outcome. You can plan for it all you want. You can implement the right hooks that makes something go viral. You can even trick components of it to get passed along, but in the end, you don’t decide if something goes viral… everyone else does.

Viral is the effect of doing everything right - strategy, design, content, creative and marketing it in the right channel - the added layer that makes something “go viral” comes through community acceptance and embrace. Stuff we think should go viral never does, and the stuff we think nobody would ever care to play with always goes viral.

If a Marketer claims that they can make something go viral, be sure to steal their crystal ball on the way out of the meeting.

Going back to the slide on Helge’s presentation, organisations have to give consumers something to talk about. Today’s successful brands will bring ideas to life that are implemented through an integrated communications campaign - one idea that is easily communicated through a variety of mediums and communications disciplines. It is not enough to say ‘Oh we should be on Facebook, let’s create a fan page.’ You need to give consumers a tangible reason to ‘adore’ your brand, otherwise as the Sinead O’Connor lyrics inspired by the original fable go - “Through their own words, they will be exposed. They’ve got a severe case of the emperor’s new clothes.”

Ajax, a Dutch soccer club, had the best jersey launch I’ve ever seen. To announce their new shirt sponsor Aegon, they held a mass shirt swap in Amsterdam, where the club are based. Clever way to generate talkability around the shirt launch and made for a good video on YouTube (via ViralBlog.)

Great presentation from Helge Tennø on Content Marketing (via Paul Isakson.)

I’ve been very impressed by the buildup to the new Batman film. Prior to its impending release, the publicity machine shifted into another gear with a clever marketing tie-up with Toyota ahead of the Formula One grand prix in Silverstone, where the new Batmobile took on the Toyota F1 car in a lap around the circuit. Pics and the full story from World Car Fans

With the new Champions League sponsorship format, GAA sponsors have to work harder than ever to stand out from the crowd. I think the Guinness Hurling Cubed initiative is a good example of a brand working hard to get the most out of its sponsorship. It’s effectively the hurling version of street football and the perspex cubes make for an interesting playing environment. While it sounds like a flashy marketing gimmick, it seems to be getting good feedback from people who attended the event. In terms of attracting people to the sport, particularly casual fans, the format seems to have definite potential.

I love seeing organisations leverage their presence at music festivals and similar events in interesting ways. Thought I would highlight Orange’s efforts at Glastonbury this year (hattip to Gizmodo), which I think is quite innovative and also leverages the green theme. Basically Orange have commissioned Gotwind to develop an environmentally friendly mobile phone charger. The company has developed a tent mounted wind charger which can power 100 mobiles per hour. I like the initiative because power sockets aren’t exactly readily accessible on a campsite, so festival goers will actually use this. At the same time however, the Gotwind creation will also resonate with the audience as it stands out and ticks the box from an environment perspective.

Orange Recharge Pod at Glastonbury

No harm in highlighting the two initiatives which grabbed my attention the most over the course of the last two years. Nokia’s soundproof capsule, giving festival goers the opportunity to make calls without being drowned out by the music, and Wrangler’s jeans washing service, which would definitely be of use if the videos of Oxegen from last year are anything to go by.

Advert for the Nokia Silence Booth

Wrangler Laundromat at Lowlands music festival

Mudbaths at Oxegen

I had to give a talk to a bunch of US university students last week. Towards the end of the presentation I was giving them I pointed out that they all have tremendous opportunities when they graduate, primarily because they are the MySpace generation. The year that’s in it with the US elections and Barack Obama currently on the crest of a wave will also have a lot to do with it. Everyone is sitting up and taking notice of how the Internet is being used as part of his communications campaign. Suddenly this class of graduates will be in demand as prospective employers also want to tap into this trend, but lack the in-house expertise to leverage it.

Needless to say back in Ireland (and pretty much every other western democracy in the world), communications professionals are all smelling the potential dollars that the Internet promises for future communications campaigns. Just look at the recent Lisbon Treaty campaign which saw thousands wasted on advertising on social networking websites. Oh what’s that, you didn’t read that advertising on social networks is pretty ineffective? Don’t worry it’s not your fault, the same people that sold you the adverts are the same guys that would have told you to spend the money on Second Life eighteen months ago. It’s better to be confused by the digital media consultant who tries to baffle you with clickthrough rates than get attacked by flying phallic objects halfway through your political rally in Second Life (it really did happen!)

Pundits galore are all harping on about the future role that the Internet will play in politics. So I’m going to take this moment to draw a line in the sand. Yes the Internet offers politicians offers massive potential to communicate their message. However, if their message doesn’t resonate then it will sink like a lead balloon. As the Hugh MacLeod cartoon goes, “If you talked to people the way advertising talked to people, they’d punch you in the face.”

Barack Obama has an extremely effective Internet campaign, but I think there are wider societal factors that should also be credited with its success. The generation dubbed the millennials are going to be hugely influential in the upcoming election. Race isn’t as a divisive an issue it is with previous generations, they are disconnected with the political process and they are looking for change. Barack Obama is the obvious candidate for them.

While Obama has used the Internet to connect with this important audience, it should be noted that the Web rallied the troops before their Commander in Chief arrived on the scene. In essence Obama is the little Dutch boy with his finger in the dyke about to unleash the power of a new generation of voters. He doesn’t have it entirely his own way though, as he is the target of many spurious claims in an orchestrated email campaign.

So what about Ireland? The same generation in Ireland is perhaps more digitally connected than their counterparts in the States, given the increased penetration and usage of mobile phones here. Surely Irish politicians will harness the same power in the next general election? Probably not. Politics in the US is simpler in a way, you pretty much have a choice of voting Democrat or Republican, whereas in Ireland there is a much more diverse political landscape (albeit that it tends to be dominated by the one party.) As a result, the population tends not to get as worked up like our peers in the States.

The opportunity for Irish politicians to engage the electorate online is around single issues. You only have to look at campaigns like the Evening Herald’s ‘Stop the M50 Toll Madness’, the broadband lobby or the Hill of Tara protests to see how worked up the population can get. However, the difficulty with politics is that it inevitably involves compromise and thus real change is often difficult to deliver. Adopting single issues is a way for Irish politicians to engage with voters online, but in the long run it could further the seed of dissatisfaction amongst voters in the political process. Change is a great message for Obama, but ultimately it is something he will have to deliver on. Needless to say political parties in Ireland will be watching this space very closely.

UPDATE/ If this post is of interest, make sure to read Damien Blake’s comment.

Here’s an observation I want to throw out there. Myself and my peers are increasingly getting invites to events through our Facebook page from two Irish PR agencies. Creating an event page for an event that you’re running is a no brainer if it’s a free for all and to be honest more organisations should be doing this as its simple integrated communications.

A thought that ran through my mind though is that both agencies have strong relationships with a lot of people on their invite lists. It popped into my head that PR agencies could potentially win pitches in the future based on the perceived value of their network (and their ability to leverage that group) on the likes of social networks.

For example, if I’m an avid surfer and I’m well connected with this community online, then I am as a result in a better starting point to help you achieve your communications objectives if this is one of your target audiences. Sounds slightly silly, but considering agencies have won accounts on how well they are supposed to know a particular segment of the media, it doesn’t sound too far fetched.

So ultimately will PR agencies win new business based, not simply on their knowledge of communications techniques, but on how well connected they are with specific audiences?

Just to make it clear I’m not saying that all PR agencies need to be on Facebook, but I am putting the suggestion to field that PR agencies of the future will need to be and have to be able to deliver on those relationships in the future - the Internet could help them leverage their existing relationships on a bigger scale.

DoshDosh points out some interesting research on people’s relationships and technology:

According to a recent study of 2 million people and 8 million phone calls over one year, researchers discovered that the cause of persistent relationships is reciprocity - returning a friend’s call. The more often you call each other, the longer your relationship.

The results showed that the strongest factor determining persistence values was when individuals returned calls to each other. When links were reciprocated, those links had a greater chance of persisting for longer time periods. Also, when an individual´s connections had connections among themselves (when a person´s friends knew each other), his or her own connections lasted longer.

It’s a topic I’ve touched on before and something which I think is increasingly relevant for organisations who are seeking to engage their audiences on social networking sites. As I pointed out in the past:

Metcalfe’s Law is due a revision. It currently dictates that the value of a network is determined by the amount of users of that network - “A single fax machine is useless, but the value of every fax machine increases with the total number of fax machines in the network, because the total number of people with whom each user may send and receive documents increases.”

In the past the value of your network depended on how many people owned a fax machine. Today, however, Metcalfe’s Law should take account of how many people send faxes to each other. The value of the network also depends on the level of activity in it. While some social networks may not reach the same scale as Bebo or MySpace, they will remain very valuable to their users due to an active community.

As organisations create profiles for themselves on social networking sites, it is increasingly naive of them to think that the value of their network is based on the number of friends that they have. Instead it should be judged by the level of interaction they have, whether that’s in the form of profile views, comments or how many people have installed and are using their widget on a regular basis.

I honestly believe that organisations thinking about creating a social networking profile should also take the time to think about how they plan to engage their audience once their profile goes live. Social networks aren’t like the movie Field of Dreams - if you build it, it doesn’t necessarily mean they will come.

I wholeheartedly believe that any organisation that wants to succeed online needs to be an active participant with their audience. For example, the simplest way for anyone to build an audience for their blog is to visit other blogs regularly and leave comments. Sure enough, you will find that people begin to reciprocate.

This ultimately goes back to the research that Maki highlights on DoshDosh - the cause of persistent relationships is reciprocity.

So the Irish public has voted and they have responded with an emphatic no. I voted yes, but wasn’t surprised at the result. Listening to the analysis on the Pat Kenny Show on RTE, I think people were genuinely shocked. While everyone had commented that there was a strong No Campaign, there seemed to be a sense that just about enough had been done to convince the public of the benefits.

The long and short of it is that the Yes Campaign was abysmal from start to finish. I’m not going to weigh in on the political analysis, Stephen Collins has a great piece on the Irish Times website in this respect. I am simply going to repeat my thoughts from a month ago. From a communications perspective the Yes Campaign was poor, it gave voters few tangible reasons to vote to approve the Lisbon Treaty. How are messages like “A soul for Europe”, “A Citizens’ Europe”, “Proud to be Irish – Yes to Europe” supposed to motivate you to go out and vote yes, when the no campaign comes out with consistent messaging on a range of issues from corporation tax to neutrality. Ant wonder that the Irish Times/TNS poll before the referendum pointed out that “the reason most often cited by No voters is that they don’t know what they are voting for or they don’t understand the treaty - with 30 per cent of No voters listing this as the main reason for their decision.”

I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again, puff taglines like “A Citizen’s Europe” are all well and good if you can illustrate them to the public. However anytime any yes campaigner got the opportunity to talk, they seemed insistent on talking down the No Campaign - a tactic which never works with Irish people. Why take up precious time immediately prior to the referendum to discuss Libertas’ funding? It was the equivalent of Enda Kenny urging the public to vote for him in the next general election because he is better looking than Brian Cowen. Libertas’ funding was irrelevant, the yes campaigners should have used the opportunity to show how the Lisbon Treaty could help improve the situation in Chad, combat climate change or take a combined approach to immigration. The negative attitude in their campaigning hardly encouraged the electorate and each and every time it was brought up a minimum of thirty seconds airtime was wasted.

Ivan Yeats made some insightful comments on the Pat Kenny Show when it became apparent that the no vote had prevailed. Politicians had left campaigning so late, that they were effectively asking the electorate to trust them. As the RTE news reports later pointed out, many politicians were left reflecting on the reasons behind a No victory with some pointing to an obvious ‘disconnect’ between the people and politicians.

This disconnect between politicians and the public is obvious. There are countless research reports to underline this. We even had Enda Kenny point this out at the launch of the Edelman Trust Barometer launch earlier this year. For some reason Fianna Fail are trying to push some of the blame on Kenny and Fine Gael, when the blame completely lies on their doorstep. Kenny offered the best advice on promoting the Yes Campaign back at our launch event when he said that third parties like Corporate Ireland and NGOs had an important role to play.

Unfortunately the only good argument from the Government came late in the day, Richard Delevan points out Dermot Ahern’s passionate argument to vote yes on the Marian Finucane Show on RTE, the weekend prior to referendum day:

First, what Dermot Ahern said, then why I believe it’s effective:

He starts out badly, threatening to go into abstract eurospeak: “The treaty is about trying to make the EU work better. To get 27 to agree is extremely difficult.” [snore]

Then he gives an example of WHAT THIS MEANS from when he was minister for foreign affairs:

The UN asked us to send troops into Chad and Darfur. The decision was made at a high level — to do that — in the EU; but unfortunately because of the arcane rules, it was delayed. The went out to Chad October in the middle of nowhere, in a desert. I was asked if i would speak to a number of women. I was asked questions through an interpreter. A lady with a child — thankfully they weren’t starving because the UN and the EU were feeding them — they were there because they had been, basically, run off their land, nearby and also from Darfur. And they were there for protection. The first question a woman asked me through an interpreter was, why is Europe taking so long to come here with their troops?
…In my view what we’re trying to do in this treaty is to make those sorts of decisions quicker and better, the difficult issues of the world.

Eamon Dunphy could no longer contain himself at this point, declaring this to be “emotive nonsense”. But unless Ahern is seriously overegging the pudding about his trip to Chad, and admittedly he breaks his own rhythm a few times in trying to get out this anecdote, this seems effective to me, and that this is what’s been missing from pro-European arguments. Here’s what I think was working:

1) DA is telling a STORY, not babbling in eurospeak about process and procedures
2) The story has actual human beings
3) The story isn’t gratuitous - it makes real in human terms why the labourious nature of EU decisionmaking isn’t just an aesthetic or theoretical problem. Ahern’s underlying argument smacks you in the face: the EU could have acted sooner to stop genocide in Darfur, but it was prevented by an unwieldy decision-making process
4) Even though I don’t think it’s a slam dunk that Lisbon actually fixes the problem, DA is at least getting the argument out of airless abstraction and into something a lot of people actually care about

The final point I am going to make about the Lisbon Treaty is that anyone that thinks that traditional advertising is dead should take a walk around the streets of Ireland and see what an important role the No Campaign posters played. Normally the criticism of traditional advertising goes along the lines of “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.” In this instance, ask the Yes Campaign about the half that was wasted.

Todd Deffren’s SWOT analysis for the PR industry makes for interesting reading. The first thing which pops off the page for me is:

“the single biggest weakness of PR in the Social Media age is related to scale. As I noted back in June 2006, ‘[How can] PR practitioners possibly find the time & energy to create, monitor and nurture the hundreds of relationships that might (or might not) aid their clients?’“

This is something which I’ve had a bee in my bonnet from a commercial perspective for a while now. Ultimately if clients are to embrace the Internet as a communications channel, it must be managed in-house. The PR agency’s role, as it should be, is to play devil’s advocate and provide strategic advice.

The second interesting point to draw from Deffren’s analysis is his opinion that:

“Social Media is either the end of PR or its biggest opportunity…For the first time in Marketing’s history, the “sizzle” is less important than the steak. PR sells steak. PR not only has a unique opportunity to step into the light and interact directly with consumers, but in so doing is gaining the authority to guide the overall corporate communications approach. Tactically, PR has an unprecedented chance to lead on the content creation side, as well. Used to be press kits and releases were the sum of our effort. Today we can help devise blogging strategy; produce podcasts and vlogs; participate openly via microblogging platforms like Seesmic, Utterz, Twitter, etc. In addition, in part via its content creation experiences, PR is also gaining a stronger hand in SEO approaches (and we all know Search is king).“

This sounds all well and good, but creating content is a lot harder than it sounds, but more importantly PR agencies need to be thinking about content creation from an integrated communications approach rather than simply social media. What I mean by that is whatever you are creating to get customers talking should have talkability that can be exploited in any situation, whether it’s on Twitter or in face to face conversations.

On a related note to this, Ben Ayers points out an interesting video of Vint Cerf, Google Vice President and ‘Chief Internet Evangelist’. Ayers notes that:

According to Vint, we call advertising ‘advertising’ when it’s something we are not interested in. When we are presented with something we are interested in, we call it ‘information’. This of course is the secret of Google’s success and why the company is so valuable - the ability to target users with information that is relevant (so it’s no longer advertising).

Ultimately PR professionals need to emulate this from a communications perspective. There are numerous challenges to overcome, not least of which is a basic understanding of the new tools emerging on the Internet. Words like blog and Facebook are part of today’s PR professional’s vocabulary, it doesn’t mean that they necessarily understand their role though. What’s more important is identifying communities and understanding how to tap into them. On this note, I flicked through Neil Perkin’s PowerPoint presentation on slideshare recently which I’ve embedded below. Slides 27-29 are the most important ones for me. People are obsessed with creating communities, when in fact as Mark Zuckerberg’s quote in the presentation points out that “communities already exist. Instead, think about how you can help that community do what it wants to do.”

| View | Upload your own

Really interesting story in the Times in the UK last week about the Japanese Air Self Defence Force abandoning plans to send military aircraft to help earthquake relief efforts in China. The article purports that the request for aid originally came from China, but due to the backlash of Chinese Internet users over the perceived symbolism of Japanese military aircraft entering China for the first time since World War 2 the plans were abandoned and civilian aircraft will be used instead.

What I find truly amazing is the power of the Internet community in China. The Times writes that “the idea of China’s reviled wartime enemy crossing its borders in uniform was too much for the country’s avid hordes of internet users – a group rapidly emerging as a powerful force of political influence.” Even the Japanese defence minister “acknowledged the massive backlash that the plan had attracted on Chinese websites.”

There is a lot made about Barack Obama’s use of the Internet as a means of mobilising voters. I’m slightly cynical of this, while it has served as a means of pulling people together, the hype around it ignores a number of societal factors. If Barack is voted president, let’s see how successful he is in four years time using the same tactics if he runs for reelection given that the change he promises is likely to fail to materialise.

However contrast this to what is actually happening in China when you can see that backlash on the Internet is actually effecting government policy and then you have to take a step back and catch a breath. The Queen Bee is literally sitting up and taking notice of the opinions of all the worker bees in the hive. I don’t know whether to be amazed or scared.

One thing is for sure. The Internet has a powerful role to play in the shaping of the future of Chinese society.

I couldn’t help but laugh when reading one of Martin Samuel’s latest commentaries. Here are the main highlights:

The schools are the worst. In business, I can almost understand it. At work, you might be confronted by a person from a different generation, or a different culture, and it is important to maintain an appearance that will not make them uncomfortable. Nose-rings and cross- dressing are out for the same reasons. But schools? Institutions of learning, expression, free thought, with the capacity to change the outlook of future generations: no wonder this place is in a mess if the first thing we do is batter the individuality out of every citizen at the age of 12.

…

You read the material on these school websites or pick up a glossy prospectus or mission statement and it is wall-to-wall buzzwords about freedom and nurturing the individual: “vibrant… exciting… opportunities… enthusiasm”. Boot camp is not mentioned. There might be some blather about traditional values thrown in for those that like mathematics learned parrot fashion, but no one lets on that a school aspires to row after row of uniform adolescents, looking the same. My idea of traditional values is to turn out kids that can read, write, spell and think for themselves, not to have them properly kitted out and groomed in appearance and mind for a career with the Royal Air Force. Regulation haircuts produce regulation thinkers, and we’ve got enough of those, thanks. That is why we are where we are.

What I find amusing is that we are churning out thousands of students now that opt for university courses that fit their ‘lifestyle and leisure priorities’. John Reynolds had a good article in the Sunday Independent a number of months back on the third level education trends.

One of the things commentators highlight when discussing science, engineering and IT courses is that they aren’t ’sexy’ in the eyes of Generation Y. What is interesting to note is that they are opting for creative courses like the arts, media, graphic design, etc. A lot of people put this down to the fact that Ireland has become an affluent society. However if you look at emerging trends like the undercurrent of DIY hackers, epitomised by Maker Faire, it is obvious that we’re missing out on engaging the inner geek in all of us during childhood. Just look through some of the following videos and you can see that people like to tinker.

Teen makes wrist mounted flame thrower (and almost burns his face off.)

Working NES controller coffee table.

Wii Remote transformed into a digital whiteboard, a touchscreen and a head-mounted 3-D viewer.

So how do we go about unlocking young people’s inner curiousity and exploit it for the ICT industry?

Anyone that wants to brush up on their presentations skills should give this BNET Video - Present Like Steve Jobs - a watch (via Mitch Joel.)

I went to the Institute of European Affairs‘ Young Professionals Network on Monday night. It’s a surprisingly good networking event with people from a variety of backgrounds in attendance. RTE Prime Time presenter Mark Little was at the event to speak about his career as a journalist and a variety of topics such as US politics, journalistic standards and the rise of digital media. Jill Farrelly, researcher with the Institute of European Affairs, has a blog recapping the events. If you fancy attending contact Jill at the IIEA.

I was recently doing some research on examples of interviews that went every well…and very bad. Two of which I thought would be worth sharing.

Let’s start with the good. Bill Clinton versus Fox News. Despite walking into an interview with an obvious bias, Bill completely flips the tables on the interviewer Christopher Wallace, who is left squirming in his seat at times. The 2 minute 55 second mark onwards of the second clip of the Fox News interview is pure gold (video 1 and video 2.)

On the flip side, rather than select one interview I’ve selected a compilation of Jeremy Paxman interviews. Paxman makes his interview subjects feel so uncomfortable, it’s actually comedic.

Any examples of good or bad interviews that anyone wants to share?

The funniest thing I hear back when I’m talking to people about Guitar Hero or Rock Band is “So after playing the game are you actually able to play the guitar?” Good question, but the answer is unfortunately no. Something which the makers of South Park gleefully exploit in a recent episode.

The interesting thing though is this new market of casual consumers who have picked up the plastic guitar have opened up a new opportunity for guitar companies. Wired reports:

Of the top 20 podcasts offered by iTunes, six are iVideosongs tutorials. The second most popular podcast on iTunes is iVideosongs’ “Beginning Guitar 101.” The wave of interest in guitar tutorials comes amid renewed interest in the instrument, spurred at least in part by wildly popular games like Guitar Hero and Rock Band. IVideosongs’ chart success comes only a few weeks after the company released its first tutorial through iTunes, on April 2.

…

Budding guitarists can purchase iVideosongs lessons individually for $5 or $10, depending on whether the song is being taught by the artist who wrote it or not, with certain titles available for free download within iTunes. Purchased tutorials are in HD quality, but can also be transferred onto iPods and iPhones for portable tutelage.

This is a trend which has also been recognised by one of my clients, Canon, who point out that the huge surge of cameraphones has actually led to an increase in the purchase of digital cameras, rather than eating into the market. What we’re seeing is that casual consumers are rediscovering their passion for certain hobbies. Once hooked they are potentially in the market to ‘trade up’, whether it’s switching from a digital compact camera to an SLR or swapping the plastic guitar for a Gibson.

Paul Dervan has an interesting post about Southwest Airlines use of Twitter. For those unfamiliar with Twitter, it’s a bit of a mix between an Internet forum and Instant Messaging (watch this video for a better example.) Paul, the interested marketeer, points out that:

Southwest have 1,212 followers (like me) on twitter. While I’ve never actually flown with them, I suspect most of these people are Southwest customers. The interesting bit is they follow anybody that follows them. Yes, they follow the daily thoughts, ramblings and rants of these individuals - most of which have nothing to do with Southwest.

This sounds like a lot of effort, so why do it? Well, firstly it is a commitment to their customers. They are essentially saying “You are interested enough to follow us, then we are interested in you”. But this is also an excellent way to get under the skin of their customers and of course have a dialogue with them.

Does it work? I’d say so. I read a post (tweet) today from one of their followers which simply said “I hate Southwest”. They responded within a day on their page with the following “I’m sorry to hear that! What did we do, and how can we make it better?”

This is a extremely customer-centric brand that is using technology to get closer to customers and helping them serve them better.

Can you imagine an Irish bank, retailer or airline doing something like this?

I can.

This resonates with an observation that was made at a recent Edelman Digital meeting I attended:

A colleague raised an interesting point about the evolution of the role of a customer service agent. Why wait at the end of a phone, when you could be hunting down unhappy customers online and setting the ball rolling to solving their problem.

Sounds great in theory, but this requires a fundamental shift in how customer service departments are operated. Like Paul I can imagine an Irish bank, retailer or airline doing something like this, but I can’t see it happening it tomorrow. This is the future of customer service, more importantly though it fundamentally increases the importance of customer service in future product/service development. A few bloggers have recently been pointing out how certain brands fair when you look at their tag cloud (here’s a definition.) In the case of negative attributes, if these aren’t addressed it shows up the lack of connection between the company and its customer. Hardly a healthy relationship in the long term.

One important point I want to make on this is that online monitoring of customer feedback underlines the fact that this type of engagement belongs in house. It (is) will be a 24/7 commitment so let’s skip past the old chestnut of which discipline ‘owns’ the social media space. You pay consultancies for their insight and their devil’s advocate advice. In the long run you won’t pay them to do this for you 24/7.

So whose responsibility is it to engage with an organisation’s audiences online? It is something that Damien Mulley has been pondering also, he believes that the role belongs to a community manager:

My definition of a community manager is someone that looks after the community that can develop around the company blog, wiki, social networking profile or discussion forum and also go out further than that onto the net and (if the company permits) engage with people on their personal spaces. Gone is the time when you must wait for the email or phonecall to engage with a customer. A community managers is the point person for the company for the company’s public facing endeavours on the wild wild web. In a hotel analogy the PR people are like the front desk while the community manager is, in a way, like the concierge, able to route around officialdom and get the customer what they want. A concierge that again can also go walkabout.

Damien’s post makes for interesting reading. My only observation is that we’re increasingly getting too bogged down in differentiating between mediums when interacting with customers, when ultimately the end result is the same. Seriously are we advocating that we should only listen to consumers’ thoughts online. You do have to question how many organisations take the good old fashioned suggestion box seriously. With this in mind, I’ll point to Paul Isakson’s excellent PowerPoint on ‘What’s Next in Advertising & Marketing?‘ again.

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With Paul’s PowerPoint in mind, I’d advocate something more along the approach of Nike who increasingly looking to build 360 degree experiences for communities that offer multiple points of intereaction, such as the third floor of the Nike Store in New York, dubbed the ‘Nike Running Club’, where according to the New York Times, “runners can map out running routes, receive training advice and attend an evening speaker series — all free, even if they trot in wearing Adidas or Brooks sneakers.”

This is the future of marketing. Don’t believe me, John Grant puts it best in his book ‘New Marketing Manifesto’:

If Nike as a brand was grounded in local community sports clubs and activities people would have had to give up exercise and friends to leave it behind, rather than just giving up on a badge. Communities of interest make brands less disposable. The old marketing relied on identifying passive target audiences whose only connection with the brand and each other was purchasing. New marketing aims to form a much more active and bonded community of interest.

The Irish Times is gradually adopting audio reports into its website. For example, on a recent breaking news story (the free section of the Times’ website) David Duffy of the ESRI discuss its Medium-Term Review. This is interesting because it is a move towards rich content, but most commentators until now would have seen an overlapping of photographers and journalists functions for breaking news stories. If the move is a sign of things to come, it would mark an interesting departure and it remains to be seen how journalists will react to report in audio, a format completely different to print in terms of editing.

This was also noted by Eoin Kennedy, fellow Irish PR blogger. Eoin points out that:

Journalists recording interviews is nothing new but them editing and uploading the content is a fairly big progression.

Interesting implications from a PR perspective. It introduces an element of colour to press conferences that may not always be desired and further erodes the fallacy of control but it also opens up opportunities. If they are using audio content then why not high quality audio interviews that are supplied by a PR company especially if the reporter cannot attend.

But its his next observation that jumps off the page for me:

This is a trend that is only likely to increase in complexity with rumours that Silicon Republic will be introducing video content or at least recording some events they cover. Undoubtably this will be a sellable item for them but again once the PR industry invests in the software and hardware its another area of potential growth for the PR industry.

There has been murmurings of a few news outlets and organisations incorporating video content onto their website. The obvious reason for this is that the barriers to entry have been falling pretty quickly of late. On this note, Damien Mulley reveals that:

Wexford Software company Ubcam have developed software for a whole load of Nokias, Sony Ericsson’s and some other brands (but not the iPhone) that will turn your phone into a live video streaming device. It’s like the well-recognised service from QIK except more phones can run the Ubcam software than can run QIK.

While the barriers to entry might have dropped, I am still slightly perplexed how news organisations (other than broadcast outlets) aim to overcome the challenge of quality. For example, I had an RTE news crew at a recent launch and two hours work turned into two minutes footage. Journalists are busy enough as it is these days, I just can’t see them being overjoyed at the prospect of more work. With media outlets increasingly streamlining their operations, which invariably increases the workload of its staff, how will they justify the time required to edit this content and ensure it adheres to its overall standards.

Damien goes onto point out that he “chatted to a TV crew from RTE recently about QIK and they were amazed that a simple mobile phone could empower the average punter into becoming a live news broadcaster. Wouldn’t they have been impressive during the Dublin riots?” Well would they? While the reports and photos of the Dublin riots from regular consumers showed up traditional media outlets, what about the Finglas riots on St Patricks Day. Judge for yourself from the two YouTube videos below. Somehow I don’t think that RTE will be quaking in their boots.

This isn’t too say that your average punter couldn’t have recorded footage as well as any TV news crew. What I am pointing out is that everyone has a core function as part of their job. It is expected that you should meet a minimum standard of quality. Hence we outsource functions that aren’t part of our day to day jobs to people who fulfill that that function on a 9-5 basis. Putting it in simple terms, As Chris Rock would say - “You can drive a car with your feet if you want to; it don’t mean its a good f***ing idea.”

While I might sound excessively negative about the potential dual role of journalists, I do believe that this evolution is only a matter of time. I’m just interested in seeing whether Irish media outlets will invest the sums required for a quality product, when in the short term the payback won’t cover the costs for the initiative.

Judging from the latest Sunday Business Post/Red C tracking poll, it’s all to play for when it comes to calling which way the pendulum will swing when Ireland goes to the polls to vote on the Lisbon Treaty.

You’ve got to give it to the anti treaty campaigners for their communications efforts. Despite what some may think of the legitimacy of their claims, they have proved to be highly successful at developing messages for specific voter segments. Targeting segments like the farming community looks like it could pay dividends when it comes to trying to mobilise the general public to get up and vote. And in general, judging from the placards on my way into work this morning, their messaging is simple and succinct.

The main problem with the campaign for the Lisbon Treaty, much like the text of the treaty itself, is that it is slightly obscure. Pro-campaigners seemingly fail to explain why the public should go out and vote yes. Just reading some of Labour’s slogans (subscription required) - “A soul for Europe”, “A Citizens’ Europe”, “Proud to be Irish – Yes to Europe” - and it’s clear why groups like Libertas simply ask voters to read the treaty of the text to see if they can make sense of it.

It would seem to me that the benefits of the Lisbon Treaty mainly revolve around taking a combined approach to issues that affect all member states such as immigration or climate change. These types of issues are tangible in the minds of the voting public, yet pro treaty campaigners get bogged down debating Irish neutrality and our corporate tax rate.

Funnily enough, I was at an event earlier this year that Enda Kenny spoke at, where he highlighted the joined up thinking approach that Europe needs to take and discussed the valuable role Irish business and NGOs need to play to ensure the treaty is passed. Perhaps that’s why I’ve been disappointed by the lack of buoyancy around the pro-treaty campaign thus far.

Simply looking at the issue of climate change, it would seem to me that the Irish public would be willing to accept that a combined effort is required if Europe is to triumph the cause of sustainability. In addition, it would be difficult for groups like Libertas to argue against issues like climate change, given that there is such a positive tide of public opinion around environmental issues.

Slogans like “A soul for Europe”, “A Citizens’ Europe”, “Proud to be Irish – Yes to Europe” are not going to sway my decision. Even off the top of my head, a simple position such as “Together We Can” which could be easily extended to issues like climate change or immigration would help voters focus on the bigger picture.

Another couple of things that caught my attention that I feel are worth highlighting.

First of which is KMPG’s ‘That’ll Never Work…’, a book about twelve Irish entrepreneurs. From a PR perspective this is a great example of a company putting its money where its mouth is and taking ownership of a space. As Minister Harney points out in the press release, “KPMG provides invaluable support to many of our most successful entrepreneurs, and congratulations to Michael Gaffney, Colin O’Brien and all at KPMG involved in the publication of this fascinating read. Most of all - our congratulations go to the contributors. The inspirational stories of the challenges they faced, their unfailing determination and ultimately their hugely deserved success are wonderful examples of Irish enterprise.” I haven’t read the book yet, but it looks insightful.

LG punk’d some Hollywood celebs for the launch of its new Scarlet TV range. Celebs like Lindsey Lohan turned up at the red carpet affair thinking they were there for the launch of a new TV series by a Sopranos and Smallville director. It was a rather well run campaign as I noticed a few banner ads and blog posts in the runup to its release, genuinely thinking that it was a new TV show. Great way to get stars to your launch without paying appearance or endorsement fees.

The producers of the new Batman film which hits cinema screens in June this year are running one of the best commericla online viral marketing campaigns I’ve seen. Here’s one aspect, the recruitment campaign for the lead villian’s gang. It should be pointed out that it always helps when you’ve got a huge budget and hardcore fans.

There’s a great New York Times article about the evolution of Nike’s marketing spend. For me, Nike is a brand which encapsulates marketing 2.0 (or whatever buzzword you want to use), between its Nike+ partnership with Apple, “word-of-foot” marketing by tapping into running communities and redistribution of advertising spend to incorporate online videos (not all of which are great.)

And finally John Naughton points out a great ad from New South Wales police warning teens about the dangers of tuning out from the world on their iPods.

For once I’ve managed to benefit from free giveaways online. Thanks to Daragh Doyle, I’ve scored two tickets to Iron Man at the Coca-Cola Cinemagic Film & Television Festival. The festival lineup itself looks great and were it not for the combination of work and the return leg of Manchester United vs Barcelona, then I would have attended more.

Looking forward to Iron Man. Finally, a superhero film that actually looks like it might be entertaining: