Shame on Lowes for Pandering to Special Interests: When a Home Improvement Giant Could Use a Fixer-Up All its Own

“Never stop improving.”

Well, at least for Lowes, the above slogan parked in bold blue all caps on the top left corner of the home improvement giant’s webpage, it’s an appropriate start.

The question is how will the company’s recent public relations snafu ultimately pan out as their corporate brass has plenty to improve on now. (And we’re not talking basic roof repair) Earlier this week, the shopping behemoth that only days ago was about as far removed from politics as one of its featured bathroom redesigns, has landed itself in quite the brouhaha.

In yielding to mounting pressure from a variety of sources, including our very own Florida Family Association, (more on that later) the company pulled an ad it was running on commercial breaks for The Learning Channel’s All-American Muslim, a new reality TV show that purportedly shows real Muslims going about their daily lives – you know exactly like the rest of us. I don’t know about you, but the very fact that we need a program such as this to allay our tired and torturous fears of the proverbial “other” – in today’s day and age is frightening. But I digress.

As we enter the peak shopping days and weeks of the increasingly secular holiday season, you can bet this communications bombshell was not what Lowes was expecting. Already Google is working its magic. Google “Lowes” and the fallout from the pullout is the fourth hit. And with the decision making front pages news on CNN.com on Tuesday and Connecticut congressman Chris Murphy addressing the matter on the House floor, calling Lowes’s decision a rubber stamp on “basic foundational bigotry against a major American religious group,” you can bet their troubles are only beginning.

From a public relations perspective, this is the kind of textbook nightmare we dread: an apolitical company becoming unintentionally embroiled in a very politicizing and polarizing mess. So all this begs the question, where did Lowes go wrong?

Lowes went wrong by not following the advice I wrote about in my recent Blagojevich blunder post. Louder voices aren’t more credible voices. And while the company continues to say that its ad pulling had nothing to do specifically with the Florida Family Association, a nonprofit whose web “About Us” description says the group aims to, “educate people on what they can do to defend, protect and promote traditional, biblical values,” it seems VERY likely that it was at least a contributing factor to a collection of below-the-radar narrow-minded people and groups.

Shame on Lowes for pandering toward groups that mask McCarthy-style witch-hunting in the guise of religious enlightenment –whether they’re a 501C3 or not.

There’s comes a point in any communications campaign where all the writers, all the support staff, all the leaflet designers, and press release pitchers, must step aside and let the company speak for itself – without the buffer PR teams necessarily provide. While Lowes has been diligently responding via Tweet and in the press, perhaps a more transparent apology would be in order –without our help. Until now Lowes CEO Robert Niblock, 48, has been mum on the controversy.

As Lowes closes out 2011 and opens 2012 searching for repair and replacement parts in its “corporate improvement” aisle, we can all rest comfortably knowing that the modern social media landscape and blogosphere won’t let red meat like this out from under its digital jaw grip easily. And if there’s a communications upside to any of this, All-American Muslim, which has enjoyed modest success with 908,000 to 1.7 million viewers since its November 13 launch, stands to gain at least something of a ratings bump following the buzz.

Then again, the show’s producers probably wished Lowes would never have gotten involved in the first place and “never stopped improving” their advertising campaigns somewhere else.

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Offirce of ThinkInk, originally appeared on eHotelier on 12/14/11.

Shhhhhh. Listen. Can you hear them?

It's the sound of millions of consumers, leisure travelers, hotel guests and on-business patrons alike, across all demographics, adding to the mobile phone bandwidth super highway by jumping on the mobile phone bandwagon.

Roughly a quarter century into mobile phones' mainstream release, the technology - and its uses - has sure come a far piece. Mobile phones and their increasingly "intelligent" smartphone cousins have morphed into the ultimate digital Swiss Army Knife -marrying the best of computer-based processing power with the ease, simplicity and functionality of a 5-ounce pocket-sized device. Not bad, huh?

For hotel managers looking to capitalize on these rapid and profound changes there are only two words: Game on.

Without doubt, the mobile phone has become ubiquitous: 77% of the world's population (5.3 billion people) owns at least a basic mobile phone, capable of receiving SMS messages. Not to be outdone, though, the smartphone is playing some Major League catch-up ball, making up anywhere from 17% to as much as 63% of the global marketplace in some regions. Today the average global smartphone penetration rate hovers at around 27%, but is growing rapidly.

Increasingly mobile phone users see their devices as "always on" extensions of their everyday lives. From so-called "couch commerce," to mobile couponing, to booking airline flights while sitting at a traffic light (hands free of course), the mobile phone and the opportunities presented by the channel are just too great for hoteliers to ignore.

With this background picture in your mind right now, it's surprising, then, that the hospitality industry, specifically hotels, has been relatively slow at embracing the mobile platform. While the challenges to embrace mobile are real, ranging from hiring the necessary tech-savvy staff, to ensuring data security, guarding against errors, and incorporating an ability for users to book their stays on the go, and even choosing which mobile operating system to embrace, none of these obstacles should relegate hotels to the mobile sidelines. Surveys indicating a strong desire for hotels to adopt mobile (92%) don't seem to be enough, however.

In many cases, actions can speak louder than words, so let's see some action in the mobile game please hotels! That said, "action" without a game plan or playbook is equally foolish. For hotels, going mobile isn't simply a catch-all phrase or something that screams, "hey, we have an app too." It's about knowing your customers' wants, desires, and mobile habits: today's hotel booker is no longer tied to the home or office computer - but is mobilized with mobile in hand, capable of searching, comparing and booking from anywhere, at anytime.

So here are my five recommendations for hotel managers to consider when launching their mobile programs:

#5 KNOW THE DIFFERENCE between web surfers and web hunters. Here's the deal: laptop and desktop Internet users tend to "surf" the web, casually scanning data, comparing prices, and toggling between multiple sites. In other words, they take their time. Mobile customers lack this luxury. Instead, due in part to a smaller screen size and limited ability to multitask, (or multitask as effortlessly) mobile users are said to be "hunters," carefully picking and choosing exactly what they want from the website's they've visited or the app they've accessed. For hotel managers that means designing a mobile website that contains less superfluous data. Leave the "About Us" section for the web and instead have engaging, lively pictures and video of your hotel and current guests (with their permission). Consider thumbnails, though, and don't overwhelm a mobile users viewing space. Interactive maps, too, help zero-in on what your hotel is trying to promote in terms of neighborhood and curbside appeal - all of which a mobile user would like to know.

#4 DUE TO MOBILE USERS' hunting nature, they tend to book their trips in an even narrower window than their laptop or desktop counterparts - a tech sector that has also seen a closing of the booking widow. Earlier this fall, for instance, when New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut were hit with an intense power line-collapsing snowstorm, mobile bookings for hotel stays onPriceline.com jumped 270%. Although mobile booking on hotel sites directly remains a small part of the marketplace, there's every indication that if hotels build it, customers will come.

#3 APPS ARE NOT ALL THAT. Rely on what works: Here's the caveat to the above. Mobile bookers, regardless of whether they use a meta-search engine or an online travel agency, (OTA) want simplicity. It may not be necessary to have both a mobile-formatted website and an app. Choose which one works best. The time, money, and effort that goes into designing an app could, perhaps, be spent better elsewhere. With more than 500,000 apps in the iTunes App Store alone, it's incredibly easy for a hotel app - even a great one - to become buried in the digital noise.

#2 MOBILE GUESTS WANT TO TALK... about you: Mobile users increasingly expect and demand an ability to post their thoughts and opinions (good or bad) about their travel stay and booking experience. This is already being done through aggregator and OTA sites, as well as through Facebook and Twitter. Why not shift that buzz back to your hotels' mobile site?

#1 USE MOBILE TO WELCOME YOUR GUEST - long before they step foot in your lobby: Mobile patrons are often tech-savvy, out-of-the-box thinkers. Hoteliers can use this to their advantage, as customers are increasingly receptive to purchasing in-hotel amenities like movies and room service, or securing hotel conference space, gym and spa time - all while on the go.

Considering that smartphone penetration rates are likely to increase, it's fair to say -as many already have - that a critical mass of public interest and user engagement is being reached. Whether or not 2012 is the year that crosses that threshold is anyone's guess.

But like the airline and retail industries before them, the hotel industry, armed with the above knowledge, needs to fully embrace the mobile channel and all its capabilities while understanding the unique characteristics of their users, their potential guests. Is your hotel in the mobile game yet, or still sitting out on the sidelines?

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Offirce of ThinkInk, originally appeared on eHotelier on 12/14/11.

Bowled Over By Blagojevich

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Offirce of ThinkInk, originally appeared on Marketing Daily on 12/13/11.

Maybe he thought his retro mop-top/’80s-poof hairdo would equal the success of the mop-top-clad likes of John, Paul, Ringo and George? Well, it didn’t.

Then again, when it came to Rod Blagojevich, the eccentric former Illinois governor, who was sentenced to 14 years in prison last week for crimes related to his attempt to profit from then-president-elect Barack Obama’s vacated Senate seat, his voice – and the less-than-truthful words he was known for spouting – was really what was on his mind. Never mind his head.

Despite some of the most theatrical grandstanding and public performance antics from any politician since the likes of Ronald Regan proclaiming his televised innocence (or ignorance) to the weapons-for-hostages Iran-Contra scandal, an uncharacteristically muted Blagojevich accepted the 14-year fate handed down to him by U.S. District Court Judge James Zagel.

"The harm here is not measured in the value of money or property. The harm is the erosion of public trust,” said Zagel.

Sometimes, even in our 24-hour, talking-heads news cycle, no matter how loudly you say something, fact trumps fiction and public trust is preserved. (Score one for us.)

It’s a lesson Mr. Blagojevich will have some 5,110 days to ponder in prison. For public relations companies and communication experts, trust is the currency we necessarily deal in – both for our clients and through what prism the non-PR-world views our work. And it’s a lesson refresher we can work on right now.

Perhaps the greatest lie propagated about our profession is the myth that we’re all in the business of outright Blago-style distortion. (Minus the federal wiretaps and profanity.) Pardon the pun, but nothing could be farther from the truth. Where in the PR rulebook does it say it is okay to lie? Nowhere. Are there times when the industry, by design of its client-driven nature, requires positive spin? Of course.

But I’d like to think that that relationship has an inherent self-correcting nature to it. There are far too many examples of companies whose in-house and out-sourced communications teams alike throw too great a curve ball on the proverbial spin.

The result? A failed company; a failed politician; a failed business leader, and a failed PR message.

Imagine if a modern cigarette company tried to promote the safety of its products as it once did decades ago? Talk about blowing smoke.

To be sure, not all lies—like claiming one’s innocence when trying to blatantly sell a senate seat – are Blagojevich big. Some, as posted by a recent socialmediatoday article, are almost funny and a little disturbing. Here’s a snapshot of some winners:

Ford Motor Co.’s admission that some of its gas gauges read full when they actually weren’t. The logic? With soaring gas prices, it was felt that the faulty fuel readout would inspire positive thinking.

Famed New York City restaurant Tavern on the Green chef claimed to be serving gluten-free pasta. Their logic? What’s a few allergic reactions versus the savings?

A report that Office Depot sales people upsell their customers, duping them to spend more, telling them those certain items aren’t in stock, when in fact they are.

As communication professionals, it’s our job to ensure the message our client puts forth is credible — and that’s not always exactly what they want to hear.

To do anything less, however, would violate the trust we have with our clients. Maybe it’s not the same level of public trust Judge Zagel was speaking of, but breaking it comes with its own sentence, too.

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Offirce of ThinkInk, originally appeared on Marketing Daily on 12/13/11.

Empty Hands and Open Wallets: Amazon’s Amazing Little App

Don’t pay us, we’ll pay you.

That’s pretty much the simple genius behind a new marketing gimmick in the form of an app being launched today by Amazon, the online shopping goliath, and growing threat to brick and mortar stores everywhere.

Starting today, smartphone users will be able to use the company’s free Price Check app (available on iOS and Android platforms) to scan the bar code of items in stores, take their mug shots, and report their price comparison findings back to Big Bro….I mean Amazon. But here’s the best part. Even if customers walk – or click – away with nothing, Amazon will still give its faithful participants $5 or 5 percent of the value off up to three Amazon purchases.

Now, I don’t want to oversell this, but I have to say, I think this is a really great idea. There’s been growing buzz this year in marketing and consumer circles alike that mobile technology is finally coming into its own, maturing from being a cool toy to an everyday necessity. Tech blogs and mainstream media outlets salivate over the inching upward smartphone penetration rates, which stands as high as 63 percent in some US demographics and is approaching 30 percent as a global average. But dry statistics only tell part of the story. Anecdotes like Amazon’s promotional plan really underscore the rapid changes reshaping the mobile landscape.

Think of it like digital democratization. Consumers are being empowered to essentially do the marketing hard work that’s at the core of any successful company: finding out what your competition is offering and what they’re selling it for. Amazon’s approach turns this effort into an almost scavenger hunt or game. The dollar award amount is trivial, yet I’d suspect that at the height of holiday season shopping, it’s high enough to get shoppers to notice, and seek to save a few bucks on items they were already likely to buy for themselves or others on their wish lists. It’s also a very good way to till the digital soil for future, more expansive campaigns, or ones that rely on detailed message marketing tailored to specific shoppers and their typical buying habits.

Of course, all good things must come to an end, and Amazon’s Price Check App $5 promotion will be over almost as soon as it begins, ending shortly before midnight. I’m sure everyone from Mom and Pop stores to the Big Boxes and everything in between will cry foul over Amazon’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers-like consumer takeover. But as a communications professional, and one who tries to keep her fingers on the digital pulse of the people, I can’t help but sing Amazon’s praise for an amazingly simple idea, made possible through some amazingly cool technology.

Happy hunting! The clock is ticking.

The Gift That Keeps on Giving: To Yourself

Leave it to marketing professionals to come up with this one. Buying yourself that little “I’ve earned it” pick-me-up has a new name: self-gifting.

Just in time for the peak of holiday season giving and receiving, evidence suggests that 60 percent of all shoppers will add themselves to their holiday lists, spending an average of $130, a 16 percent increase from last year. In the short term, many are quick to call this yet another strong indication that the still-weak US and global economy is taking its vitamins and getting stronger all the time. Deep discounts and the relaxing of recession-era belt tightening seems to have left customers in the buying mood.

But is it me, or does anyone else see a bit of a problem with this “I, Me, Mine” relapse? I remember reading somewhere that Americans’ gluttonous consumerism and anemic savings rate was supposedly at the root of our current economic troubles?

Ellen Davis, Vice President of the National Retail Federation, who was quoted in an Advertising Age post that addressed the phenomenon, rightly points out the pragmatic downside to such an aggressive self-indulgent holiday marketing campaign. If the holiday season becomes overly connected with adding oneself to their annual guest list, as people patiently wait for the end-of-year price slashing, how will retailers attract business during the other 10 months of the calendar, she asks?

Davis’ concerns, however, aren’t even number one on my list, shopping or otherwise.

The bigger question is this: what happens when the over-terming of trends and excessive labeling, waters down the meaning behind such actions? There’s absolutely nothing wrong with an occasional spur-of-the-moment purchase. Such actions send your brain’s pleasure center into the stratosphere, washed over with the neurotransmitter dopamine. And like that coveted end-of-day piece of chocolate, provides your body with warm and fuzzy feel good feelings. But when impulse buys are turned into a self-promoting season of “You’ve Earned It” and “Gift Yourself” tag lines, as is being done by J. Crew, hasn’t the meaning behind the purchases been lost?

Instead, what once felt good has morphed into another transparent attempt to get consumers to open their wallets?

As a public relations professional, and one who is keenly aware of properly calibrating messages for clients, marketers this holiday season would be wise to consider the pitfalls of overly promoting the self-gifting fad. Otherwise self-gifts could rapidly become self-returns.

To Post or Not to Post

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of Thinkink, originally appeared on ehotelier on 11/22/11.

"Get it in writing."

It's a phrase one often hears when guarding against legal action. It's also a physical affirmation of something positive or constructive. But when it comes to hoteliers, "getting it in writing" has a more nuanced meaning.

Ever since the first hotels and temporary lodging facilities arose, hoteliers have had to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of their most valued resource: their customers - especially when it came to the delicate world of written feedback.

But what was once relegated to a quaint leather-bound book on the corner of some concierge desk has expanded exponentially. First came widespread travel publications that would print with equal care both positive and negative reviews. Today, those efforts seem decidedly quaint as social media and the increasingly ubiquitous nature of mobile and smartphone technology allows current and former guests unparalleled commenting access - without the filter of a publisher. While it's easy for hoteliers to remain skeptical over such unfettered open access, the benefits of "going social" for hoteliers far outweigh the risks.

The logic behind this embrace is simple. The proverbial Pandora's box has already been opened. Former and future guests alike are already posting their opinions on sites like Facebook and Twitter about their travel experience, beginning with the initial booking and following through all aspects of the travel cycle including: dreaming, researching, experiencing and sharing. In addition, user generated content sites like TripAdvisor, and online travel agencies like Expedia and Priceline, among many others, are similarly embracing user comments. If hoteliers are concerned about losing control of their messaging, the best way to track what's being said about their hotel is by promoting a guest shift from private and independent site postings to include the more controlled public arena of a hotel website or its affiliated Facebook or Twitter page.

Recognizing the inevitability of this trend, a growing number of hotels are already jumping on board. Earlier this month Marriott Hotels announced it would allow guests from several of its locations, (Marriott Marquis in New York and the Marriott Courtyard near Orlando, among others) to post comments about their stay regardless of the quality of their experience. The announcement follows a similar move by Starwood Hotels & Resorts that also began allowing their preferred customers the ability to post comments directly to their website.

To be sure, hotels that choose this route require a firm commitment and necessary web-savvy staffing. In other words, it can't be done half way. Whether or not Marriott's open-access approach or Starwood's more limited approach is best for online guest reviews remains to be seen. One thing is clear. Even if hotels fail to embrace online customer reviews, they are already being written on numerous personal and public sites. Growing smartphone penetration rates, (around 62% for young adults ages 24-35) suggests postings will be grow easier, more mobile, and more frequent. In time not only will reviews alone be important to future guests, but the transparency and openness of a hotel that allows such access may also be factored in a guest's lodging decisions. This is similar to how some restaurant patrons choose their dining experience as much based on food quality as they do on whether the establishment offers free Wifi: an expected service.

So whether it's via text, personal website, or a hotel's own webpage, getting a customer's review in writing has always been a component to the hotel-guest relationship. It's time hotels welcomed the modern social media conversation by letting their guests joins theirs.

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of Thinkink, originally appeared on ehotelier on 11/22/11.

Occupy What?

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of Thinkink, originally appeared on Marketing Daily on 11/18/11.

If ever there was a group in America that could benefit from a public relations team -- or some PR counsel -- it’s the Wall Street protesters and their increasingly global counterparts. Penn State or the recently released Jack Abramoff? I wouldn’t even bother…

The protesters may number in the tens of thousands, cut across demographic, cultural and socioeconomic lines, and are handy fodder in GOP political debates when the talk of 9-9-9 grows old. But when it comes to effectively disseminating what they stand for, millions of Americans throw up their hands in, well, protest, and draw a blank.

Considering their growing clout, that’s not a good sign.

A CNN/ORC International poll released earlier this month revealed a major disconnect between the protesters’ aims and what people think they stand for. They’re having an identity crisis, you say?

Not at all, they simply don’t have one.

Nearly half of those polled (40%) said they had no idea what the movement stood -- or stands -- for. Another 27% said they had a negative view of the overall cause – even if they were still fuzzy on the specifics. People I know who have taken part in the sit-ins, stand-ins, and protests have become disillusioned with the lack of organization or united message.

As someone who spends her days (and nights) helping companies develop and communicate a united and coherent message, I have to admit that I, too, would have trouble drafting up, say, four or five critical aims the group is trying to accomplish.

I think I know the basics: they are known as the Wall Street protestors or Occupy Wall Street, and spinoff groups or self-identifiers have cropped up across the globe, from Lower Manhattan to Oakland to Miami, to cities in Europe to as far away as Guam – the island, literally, not the expression. Their aim, or rather, their manifesto “is fighting back against the corrosive power of major banks and multinational corporations over the democratic process, and the role of Wall Street in creating an economic collapse that has caused the greatest recession in generations,” according to the group’s website.

But beyond carrying signs saying they represent 99% of the not-so-silent majority, brandishing megaphones, and getting into skirmishes with law enforcement, what exactly are they doing, and what, specifically, has been achieved by the group’s existence?

The truth is, not too much. But asking the above questions is exactly the type of maturing the Occupy Wall Street movement needs if it wants to be taken seriously in the long run. There are too many overnight successes, start-ups and movements that are forgotten as quickly as they rose to (limited) fame.

It’s time for Occupy Wall Street to embrace a modicum of corporate structure and communications strategy, and better disseminate what it hopes to achieve. Ranking second on a Google search is just not enough. If it wants to fight corporate America, it has to put itself in corporate America’s shoes – if only for a few moments, or hours.

Granted, in terms of civil (mostly) non-violence and grassroots organizations, the “occupiers” are babies, and still have a long way to go. For comparison, it’s easy to associate the civil rights movement with the decade of the Sixties, but its stirrings and undercurrents had been set in motion decades and generations before. Even with that slow burn, over time, civil rights moved from restaurant table sit-ins and hard-fought bus seats, to the top of the national agenda. Only then, finally, did meaningful change sweep across the country and flesh out its most discriminatory backwaters.

Whether the Wall Street protestors recognize it or not, the success, durability, and health of our citizen’s democracy has long been able to absorb these types of splinter groups and incorporate their values into the middle class, and through the legislative pen and ballot box, effect meaningful change. The road to that change may begin with street signs and protests, but it continues with a smart, cohesive, well-publicized public relations-honed message.

Here’s hoping that in our instant-gratification society, the Wall Street protesters grow up fast. I’m sure they have a lot to say and can definitely benefit by taking their message – whenever they work out what it is -- in multiple directions. Their actions and their words may have a tremendous impact on our future.

So I’m ready to listen, and I think so is the rest of that 99%. Still. For now.

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of Thinkink, originally appeared on Marketing Daily on 11/18/11.

Loyalty Linguistics and the Loss of Value?

You know what the beauty of having your own blog is? The ability to instantly publish your thoughts – especially when you have a bit of a bone to pick with the thoughts of others. Here goes:

Last week, blogger-author and Loyalty specialist Bill Hanifin sought to parse out and expand on a recent LinkedIn post regarding the contemporary challenges facing customer loyalty and loyalty programs in his own blog, HanifinLoyalty.com. The LinkedIn poster, Annich McIntosh, the managing editor of C&M Publications, a UK event managing and media marketing publication, asked her followers if they could come up with one word to describe those loyalty obstacles. Several respondents chimed in over a six-month period. Never one to sit on the sidelines of a public relations debate, (I love a challenge) I too, buzzed in, writing the word: VALUE. “Creating value, shaping value, (of the program and rewards/incentives being offered), proving the program is of value,” I wrote.

I was surprised, then, to find out from Hanifin’s follow-up that no other readers agreed with my word choice, VALUE. What gives?

In my professional opinion, ‘Value’ is the word that best encompasses what respondents were addressing in both Hanifin’s and McIntosh’s posts. Instead, the word most commonly chosen to address loyalty challenges was “relevance.” While relevance is no question a critical component to promoting and expanding loyalty programs, I view it as more of a result than an action. Loyalty programs, or incentives and promotions that attract repeat customers, are essential for a business’s success. But with all the fierce competition and background noise created by many channels these days, it’s in some ways easier than ever for customers to tune out than tune in. Value includes relevance. As for a sampling of the other terms: engagement, differentiation, creativity, and budget, when added up, they too, equal value. (For instance, allocating a sizeable loyalty budget is easy once the value of the program has been established).

But rather than expending all this effort on somewhat trivial mental exercises over which are the most effective umbrella terms, as PR professionals, for ourselves and for our clients, shouldn’t we be promoting value, and not just throwing around terms? Contrary to some opinions that loyalty programs “have mastered the art of enrollment,” I think there’s plenty more to be done – especially as it relates to the still-growing mobile universe and increasing smartphone adoption across all demographics.

When it comes to loyalty campaigns, creating value while ensuring relevance is a good way to start!

Stirring the BS PR $hitstorm

I didn’t want to write a post like this, but alas, the public relations $hitstorm must be stirred yet again.

What do I mean by this? Last week, MediaPost (where I have a bi-weekly column) published an article by George Simpson, president of George H. Simpson Communications, titled “More PR BS” where he cried foul over a piece written by Rosanna M. Fiske, chair and CEO of the Public Relations Society of America. In it, Fiske calls for better accountability when it comes to measuring PR’s ROI, or return on investment in marketing non-speak.

Simpson characterizes her 508-word article (it really was that long, I checked) as a blatant waste of time; a classic example of bloated PR language that promises much, yet says little. The article champions seven principles for measuring global standards as highlighted by a recent conference in Barcelona, Spain. The obvious heavy hitters include: quantitative goal setting, measuring outcomes (like increased business revenue or number of media clips) versus measuring the cost of what goes into a campaign, and the crème de la crème of the measuring sciences – the ability to replicate ones results.

There really is a lot of BS that goes in PR.While I agree with their obviousness and to some extent the redundant nature of Fiske’s post, I really don’t see the need to throw Fiske under the public relations bus. When I first read Simpson’s provocative title, I truly wanted to agree with him.

Our world filled with, no, gorged on superfluous language. (Simpson, by the way, manages to throw in the word circumloquacious – pot, kettle, black) But I really don’t see the harm in reemphasizing the need for measurable standards in an industry with a track record of, errrr, circumloquacious language and standards.

The fact remains that in order for Public Relations to be taken (more) seriously, it needs to better address these issues. Like political science and psychology, PR struggles at times with applying the scientific method to its results.

In other words, sometimes a little from column A and a little from column B doesn’t add up to C. But this obstacle hasn’t stopped the other two disciplines from growing and gaining legitimacy. Neither should it stymie PR.

Simpson’s overly simple litmus test for a successful PR campaign is if after said event the phones start ringing: ringing from your client, ringing from fans that they liked what they saw or read in the papers or on other digital media, and ringing from your enemies that you’ve stolen their thunder or piggybacked on a campaign they had already pioneered for their clients.

Is it all really that simple?

Ah, no.

I wonder what would happen if Mr. Simpson tried to disarm one of his client’s concerns by saying, “Don’t worry, we’ll know if our campaign was a marketing hit once the phones start ringing.”

Forgive me, but if I was one of those clients, I’d be desperate for something a little more reassuring. You know, something more measureable, like at least an attempt at business-world serious ROI figures. Barcelona and the Fiske-endorsed seven principles may not be making the world safe for democracy, ending world hunger, or returning humankind to the moon, but at least it’s a start.

That’s a lot more than I can say for Simpson’s “Put together a string of good stories in good publications” lukewarm advice.

Supersized Profits from a Supersized Pig: Cult of McDonalds McRib a Marketing Knockout

I've had a lot to say these past two months about Apple and its visionary former CEO, the late Steve Jobs. But for today’s blog post, let’s leave Apple aside and change food groups. Enter McDonalds and the McRib.

In case you haven’t heard (CNN deemed it front-page-worthy last week and it led the news on three of the major networks), the gut-busting artery clogging cult-classic, McRib, is back, re-released October 24^th.

Introduced nationally in 1982 and a menu mainstay until 1985 after slumping sales saved it from the butcher, the McRib nevertheless may just well be swine-dom's – and the Golden Arches – greatest success. Rather than rolling its snout in the mud at a failed sandwich and marketing campaign, McDonald’s turned the boneless “fantastically flavorful” sandwich into a mega hit.

Except for Kentucky Fried Chicken’s nasty Double Down, (a sandwich whose "bun" is two fried pieces of chicken, mmmm I can feel the lard accumulating on my thighs right now) I can't think of another fast food sandwich that captures CNN's news hound attention quite like this. When you're a company who boasts, "99 billion served" it's hard to top yourself. But McDonalds and the McRib have done it again – and flying in the face of a high-volume national debate over the obesity epidemic.

In terms of marketing, kudos – or ribs – to McDs.

McDonalds marketing folks took a failed pork sandwich and turned it into a recurring limited edition hit. The McRib enjoyed a 16-year break after briefly being brought back last fall. Such an approach, combined with creative, playful marketing, and even self-mocking humor, helped not only CNN take note of the sandwich’s periodic return, but it has been mentioned almost daily on multiple morning radio talk shows, has been lampooned by the Simpsons over the years, and has enjoyed multiple billings on David Letterman’s Top 10 List.

Embrace Your Inner Pig

Swiftly embracing today’s social media generation, McRib fans can visit the sandwich’s Facebook and Twitter pages as well as check out the McRib locator website, complete with a Google map showing where the McRib is being served as a countdown timer ticks away the days until the sandwich goes back into annual hibernation.

The result of all this pig pandemonium? Last November during the McRib’s 2010 cameo, overall McDonalds sales enjoyed a 4.8 percent US sales increase, according to CNN. To be sure, such marketing success is not all about fun and games and over-the-top pig humor. It also serves as a reminder for PR professionals and our clients. Promoting your brand doesn't always require reinventing the wheel. Sticking with what works – and even what doesn’t work at first – can go a long way too. Not taking yourself too seriously is also a great way to demonstrate sincerity – a corporate characteristic that many in the public feel is sadly lacking.

All this for a greasy, sauce-laden sandwich.

Singing The Blues For Pink

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of Thinkink, originally appeared on Marketing Daily on 10/25/11.

For a color whose name doesn’t even get top billing on the visible spectrum of light, pink has certainly developed potent staying power. From the Pink Panther to pink Cadillacs, and everything in between, this dainty mixture of red and white has also come to symbolize a less benign issue: the hundreds-of-millions-of-dollars-a-year-fight against breast cancer – the third deadliest cancer in America today and No. 2 killer of women.

Are you surprised I didn’t say it was the No. 1 killer of women and the second deadliest cancer in the United States? You can thank the power of marketing for shifting those perceptions.

Not only has breast cancer taken more than 240,000 lives since 2005, according to Cancer.org, it has also commandeered an entire month through powerful -- some would even say extreme, marketing influence. For the past 25 years, October’s ghosts and goblins have had to share the stage with the specter of breast cancer and its increasingly corporate-like kissing cousins – Breast Cancer Awareness Month and the inexorably linked Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation.

While no one can deny the impressive global awareness and funding these organizations have brought to the breast cancer cause – Susan G. Komen alone raised about $420 million in 2010 – am I the only one who thinks that all the merchandising: the pink ribbons, the pink-clad NFL teams, the Bank of America pink checking accounts, the pink armbands, pink lunchboxes, pink Kitchen Aid food processors and whatever else has been Pink'd for October is diluting both the issue at hand and, in reality, siphoning more money toward profits than for research for an actual cure, and skewing public attention away from other serious cancers -- or other causes, period?

When was the last time you paid attention to cervical cancer, or colorectal cancer? Why don’t any NLF teams wear ribbons to support Male Breast Cancer – something that kills, on average, 450 men per year?

Pinkwashing: Where Does All the Money Go?

In 2002, Breast Cancer Action launched a side project called “Think Before You Pink,” whose goal was to raise awareness over the types of companies that chose to go pink, and “encourages consumers to ask critical questions about pink-ribbon promotions.” Doing battle with so-called “pinkwashing,” their motto is “raise a stink.” Here, too, donations go to cancer research. The organization asks consumers to do some research before a pink product is purchased, for example:

• How much money from your purchase actually goes toward breast cancer? Does it say so plainly on the box or packaging?
• Does the company you’re purchasing from have a cap on the amount it sends in donations regardless of the number of pink-related sales?
• Are funds being raised through direct purchase, or is a clever marketing scheme disguising the fact that you need to purchase additional merchandise from the company in order to make a donation?
• How, specifically, is your money being spent?

I was reminded of the need to research when I received an email from Etsy (a site for artisanal wares), promoting all things pink but without any visible endorsements. Showcased vendors were promoting their wares with descriptions such as, “This apron knot dress is a great way to show support for all those around us touched by Breast Cancer and a fashionable and fun way to show your support for the fight for a cure.”

I don’t know about you but I don’t that think fun and breast cancer belong in the same sentence, and it’s precisely this sort of overreach that at first confuses consumers (who exactly am I giving to?), then moves onto cause fatigue (not another pink promotion!!), and finally cause alienation (what a sell-out; I want nothing to do with that brand).

Have Sponsorship Dollars, Will Go Pink

Susan G’s overreach, too, seems to have gotten the organization into several snafus, the most notable when it partnered with Kentucky Fried Chicken to sell pink buckets of chicken to franchise operators, where 50 cents of every purchase went to the “For the Cure” campaign. Seriously, KFC?

Needless to say, the public and media backlash was acute, and the partnership short-lived. Is a pinkwashed KFC really going to unclog all those red blood vessels? Fried chicken is a well-known contributor to obesity, critics said, and obesity is also linked to cancer. How can a campaign be genuine if, on one hand, money goes to a worthy cause and, on the other hand, unnecessarily shines the spotlight on a fast food chain driving its sales and profits?

The truth is, it can’t.

Then there was the perfume brouhaha where independent testing of the chemicals in Susan G.'s Promise Me perfume revealed that some of them might be linked to cancer. For its part, the foundation released a statement saying that the levels of questionable ingredients fell “well within the guidelines of the International Fragrance Association,” but that out of an abundance of caution, the perfume’s formula was being tweaked.

Of course, the plot thickens when you consider the driver behind this story was cancer charity rival Breast Cancer Action. Is it possible their constant nitpicking is also part of their own marketing campaign called "my charity is better than/more deserving than yours?"

For consumers, it becomes very tiresome and, if that example raises questions of agenda bias on Breast Cancer Action’s part, this one won’t. Earlier this year, Stephen Colbert took Susan G. Komen to the court of public opinion when he teased the group’s million-dollar-plus effort to squash nonprofits that allegedly appropriated the “For the Cure” slogan. Who can blame these smaller nonprofits wanting to cash in on what's become a multimillion-dollar marketing machine.

To Komen’s credit, the organization makes no bones about its size, its influence or the way it does business.

“It’s a democratization of a disease,” said Komen CEO Nancy G. Brinker, in a recent New York Timesarticle about the pinking of professional football. “It’s drilling down into the deepest pockets of America. …America is built on consumerism. To say we shouldn’t use it to solve the social ills that confront us doesn’t make sense to me.”

Raising awareness is all well and good, and Americans have huge hearts and pocketbooks when it comes to giving, but why must that awareness come with a pair of New Balance sneakers or a Kitchen Aid blender?

The truth is that it shouldn’t. Since when did we start needing to get something in order to give?

Let’s Reconsider Our Disease Consumerism

Pink’s 2011 October reign is almost complete. Soon we’ll be on to November, which is officially recognized as Lung Cancer Awareness Month. You remember lung cancer, don’t you, the No. 1 American cancer killer that took nearly a million lives in fours years? It’s got a color and a ribbon, too, though it shares its pearl-colored badge of honor with multiple sclerosis. Only its marketing budget can't compete with pink.

As we close out the final months of 2011, why don't we leave the color spectrum and our "disease consumerism" aside? Perhaps my singing the blues over pink may convince others to think about the effect that one cause's marketing efforts have had on so many others.

From breast to colorectal to pancreatic and prostate to ovarian, esophageal and all the insidious rest -- cancer kills indiscriminately. Choose whichever form of runaway cell growth you want and re-focus on the color of money instead: donate all that you can directly to treatment and screening sources of these other unadvertised cancers – having done your research first, of course.

Trust me. That blender – pink or otherwise – can wait. Because all cancers and life-threatening diseases are equal-opportunity killers, even if the marketing budgets of the nonprofits that support them aren't.

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of Thinkink, originally appeared on Marketing Daily on 10/25/11.

Are Marketers About to Face Facebook Fatigue?

Call it a building generational misstep.

Just as marketers seem to be catching on to social media’s professional usefulness, new data suggests sites like Facebook may be losing some of its youngest faces, today’s college students and recent graduates, who will soon form the next generation of adult consumers. Fed up with the site’s frequent rules changes, feared invasions of privacy, and overwhelmed by the never-ending stream-of-consciousness thoughts that seems to ooze from its millions of users, so-called “Facebook Fatigue” is growing.

The “disease,” which was diagnosed by Inside Facebook, a blog who owes its existence to tracking all things Facebook, (along with social gaming and mobile applications), found that while the number of Facebook users continues to grow, growth rates have slowed. In the US, some 6 million users have defriended the social media site, dropping its total number of nationwide users to 149 million, down from 155 million in recent months, a nearly 4 percent drop. Across the pond, UK Facebook user numbers also took a dip, where 100,000 people –out of about 30 million users – deleted their accounts.

So what’s the big deal if Facebook’s portrait these days isn’t as bright?

The Facebook usage study coincides with marketing research that suggests Fortune 100 companies –if belatedly – plan to ramp up their spending sharply on social media campaigns in 2012. A summer 2011 study by Booz & Co. and Buddy Media, as reported on eMarketer, found that nearly a third of respondents said they expected to grow their social media budgets to as high as 10 percent of their overall marketing budget in the next three years. More than a quarter, (28 percent) predicted their social media spending would surge to 20 percent of their marketing spending.

As with any hot new trend like social media at large and Facebook up close, it’s critical marketers, aided by their in-house and external Public Relations partners, remain fresh with the times. Anyone remember Friends Reunited, Bebo, (short for Blog Early, Blog Often) and MySpace? Well, maybe you remember them, but when was the last time you checked your profile or sent a post? Chances are it’s been a while.

Thanks to the growing bonds between social media and mobile communications, its likely the new medium will continue discovering ways to reinvent itself and maintain popularity. In other words, if it’s not Facebook or Twitter, chances are it’ll be something else.

So is there a building generational misstep?

It’s too soon to tell. But when marketers express confidence over their social media spending plans, remind them that on today’s fast-changing digital high seas, it’s easy to miss the boat.

Two Weeks On, Apple Endures

Two weeks may not sound like a lot of time, but for a company that’s just lost one of the world’s most influential technological and social innovators, it is.

That’s why in the huge wake left by the passing of Steve Jobs, tech writers, bloggers and PR professionals, continue to hang on almost every word the company says, and look for signs, no matter how small, that suggest the company is foundering.

On Wednesday, 14 days after Jobs’ death, the naysayers may have found one.

For only the third time in nearly a decade, (cue the foreboding music) the financially conservative tech giant missed its quarterly earnings estimate – a fact that sent the stocks spiraling downwards by some 22 points before today’s Nasdaq opening. As of 10 o’clock this morning, Apple’s stock was down 5.4 percent.

I don’t know about you, but this latest sign of the purported apocalypse hasn’t caused any iPhone 4 or 4s, or any of my iOS devices to suddenly crash. (My Blackberry, however, is another story) Over the last few weeks, both before and after Steve Jobs’ death, I’ve written about Apple’s long-term vision, its ability to manage its message, and its resilience going forward. So lets set the record straight – a missed earnings call by any other company, like Goldman Sachs and Google, generates news, for sure, but few people start questioning the company’s future. Miss a few more earnings estimates, however, and legitimate concerns mount. Apple Q4 sales still rose 39 percent to $28.3 billion and the company ended its fiscal year with $108 billion in sales.

Only Apple has the bragging rights to call this a “poor performance.”

The Street writer, James Rogers, rightly points out three reasons why the bite into Apple’s profits won’t last: An already better-than-expected Q1 outlook, an expected uptick in iPhone 4s sales, offsetting sales declines in older models, and the staggering $81.6 billion the company has in on-hand cash.

Apple’s aim high and shoot low forecasting approach should serve as an important reminder for PR professionals. No matter how groundbreaking and dare we say media controlling Apple can sometimes be, the company often underestimates its projected performance to its own advantage. (Yesterday’s miss aside) Clients, especially young startups, run the risk of being overzealous when it comes to the type of messaging and marketing campaign they seek to launch. Reigning in those expectations sounds like a good idea to me.

Two weeks without Jobs and Apple’s message still bears fruit. And it will for a long time to come.

IPhone 4s-teve: There Was No App For That

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of Thinkink, originally appeared on Marketing Daily on 10/12/11.

It’s unfortunate that for all the hype, “The Jesus Phone” -- or its latest upgrade -- couldn’t do more to help its creator.

Billed as the device that could almost turn water into wine (at least in app form), Apple’s muted unveiling of its iPhone 4s, and not the much-ballyhooed fifth-generation earlier, was met with a chorus of naysayers that a Jobs-less Apple, (a reference then only to his departure as CEO) might mean bad tidings ahead. Apple, it was said, in a rare fumble, mismanaged the hype express, failing to mitigate and control the Internet rumor mill.

In fact, so under-woven were supporters after the initial announcement that Apple stock tumbled an iOS-crashing $20 to $355 a share a day when both the Dow Jones and tech-heavy Nasdaq enjoyed 1.4% and 3% gains, respectively, before a robust recovery stopped the bleeding. Apple ended the trading day down some $2 or 0.6%.

To be sure, now that the technological shock has passed (the human one is just beginning), Apple’s electronic awe is flooding back. Model number aside, the specs are impressive: a new processor seven times faster than the iPhone 4, an 8-megapixel camera, better battery life, and an almost artificially intelligent talking personal assistant called Siri.

Some 48 hours late --, the time it nearly once took to download several DVDs to bulky desktop computers -- and we are stunned by how much has changed. Last Wednesday Steve Jobs, who had been battling pancreatic cancer, died. He was 56. Looking back to Tuesday, it's very likely some of Apple's less-than-shiny rollout was due in part to the behind-the-scenes building tragedy. The fact that would-be tech insiders, bloggers, journalists and PR leaders didn't report any of this -- clearly being kept out of the proverbial loop -- reinforces how shortsighted we may have been in Apple's negative critique.

Shame on us.

Rather, Apple’s performance over the last few days was message control at its finest. While we don’t know what time Jobs passed away, we do know the announcement came around 7:40 p.m. Eastern time -- some three hours after the close of business and nearly four after the close of the Nasdaq, where Apple’s stock is traded. Whether this was by chance or design, we’ll never know.

Unlike media outlets like CNN that had plastered Jobs’ picture across its homepage as it began its homage, Apple relied on its Jobs-honed, simple, sleek, approach. Apple’s homepage featured a black-and-white portrait of their leader, circular glasses rimming his eyes, a piercing look that jumps off the monitor (or smartphone screen) as he inquisitively pinches the salt and pepper scruff of his beard. Click on the image and visitors are brought to a concise, three-sentence tribute, along with a link to email one’s memories of Steve to the company.

At the end of the day, whether the iPhone 4s is derisively called the “Peter phone” and not the “Jesus phone” doesn’t much matter. In retrospect, CEO Tim Cook’s gray tenor Tuesday and iPhone4’s stuttering launch, was more appropriate than ever, and a clear sign that an Apple without Jobs, whether it wants to or not, must continue updating its message. Like Apple so often successfully does: The public was once again misdirected over what was truly unfolding.

Robert Mead-Green, in his TechRadar blog, rightly points out Cook’s southern drawl, his somewhat muted style, and his desire to share the mic and limelight with fellow Apple executives -- a far cry from the one-man-band hoopla that Jobs was famed for delivering. The point: Managing your message means updating it too. That’s exactly what they’re doing. Kudos to them.

Or try this analogy: Companies -- and ballplayers -- can’t always hit home runs, even when they want to leave the crowd whooping and hollering. Sometimes a well-placed bunt does just as well or better.

Apple’s “bunt” Tuesday and press redirection in no way suggests the tech giant is heading to the Minor League -- with or without Jobs. What’s more likely is that a quieter launch gives the company healthy breathing room from now until next summer (or sooner) when the iPhone 5 arrives.

Looking ahead, while uploading some perspective, Apple has had numerous product hits in the last decades, and few duds -- think Apple’s original “hockey puck” mouse or the $7,500 20^th anniversary Macintosh, released in 1997. Thanks to his commitment and total dedication to the company, Jobs’ ideas and inspirations, like spare parts for a classic car, are poised to keep Apple well stocked with his genius and vision for at least the next decade.

Until now, there has been a belief on tech blogs and in PR circles that whatever Apple touches turns to gold (I actually wrote that in another column last week). The iPhone 4s product launch and our metaphysical recall in no way diminish that mystique.

Jobs wasn’t Jesus. Nor are his phones. But the way Jobs and Apple handle its stardom in even the darkest of hours is almost religious.

When it comes to the tragic passing of a great visionary like Steve, and all the surgeries and efforts to save him, it’s too bad there wasn’t an app for that.

If given a little more time, perhaps he would have designed it.

The following article by Vanessa Horwell, Chief Visibility Officer of Thinkink, originally appeared on Marketing Daily on 10/12/11.

Stop The Presses!

Yes, there are still presses!

And, no, we’re not talking about cookie presses, juice presses or drill presses, but rather that staple of mechanical print writing that for oh, about the last five and ¾ centuries –iPads and other iOS devices aside— dominated the newspaper and communications industries and marked the dawn of our information age, version 1.0.

That was the heartening, (and perhaps stunning) conclusion in a recent article on The Daily, which profiled a Brooklyn “pressman” Dan Morris and his efforts through his business, The Arm letterpress, to help a now-niche industry prosper in decidedly digital times.

Considering that I recently wrote about the power of old school print and supported our cheers with data that suggests print media – in all formats – may have endured the worst of its circulation declines, I wanted to throw my support (and ThinkInk’s), albeit digital, to Mr. Morris’s work. His business, launched in 2005, offers Sunday DIY classes on the mechanical printing art while his own 1950s-era Vandercook presses, according to The Daily, pump out wedding invitations among other individualized requests.

Morris’s passion for print preserves our written heritage. From Gutenberg to Jobs, we all should offer a simple thank you.

Now start those presses!

The Down Low on the High Tech Women Workforce: Numbers Could Be Better

Download this: for all the achievements high technology has accomplished in recent years at bringing different people together, when it comes to the high-tech workplace, women are still being left out.

That’s the troubling conclusion reached by the Level Playing Field, a San Francisco-based nonprofit that researches educational and workforce inequality. Their data, released last week, reveals that women working at high tech IT and startup companies continue to feel isolated compared to their male peers – and even feel belittled and bullied in the work place, resulting in high job dissatisfaction. And, despite encouraging signs that women make up 46% of the workforce and half of all college graduates, a paltry 22% include the high-tech marketplace – an area critical for 21^st century advancement.

So why don’t women feel more empowered to successfully tackle tech? There are many theories – here’s a snapshot of two:

#1 – With all that has changed in the American workforce in recent decades, it’s hard to remember that only a short while ago, women, were relegated to secondary positions in male-dominant corporate hierarchies. Is there a residue of (outdated) beliefs still filtering through the last bastions of male-only (or mostly male) domains?

#2 – The age-old throwaway: “Women and technology don’t mix.” I always find that one amusing considering the first waves of modern office and domestic inventions were consistently in the stereotyped sphere of women’s use.

The bottom line? Technology and women do mix. Women-led startups generate higher revenue per dollars of invested capital and have lower failure rates, according to Cindy Padnos, founder of Illuminate Ventures, a venture capital firm catering toward woman business leaders. Women-run high tech companies, her research found, had annual revenues that were 12% higher, using a third less capital.

It’s fitting, perhaps, that October is National Bullying Prevention month. While the initiative –a collective work by a variety of nonprofits –is geared largely toward children and teens, it’s nevertheless a good time to remember that bullies, like other bad apples in a high school or college class, graduate too. Upon receiving their diploma where do they go? The office.

As Public Relations professionals –an industry that has enjoyed an unprecedented male-female flip-flop with 85 percent of the field’s employees being women – we can work with our male and female clients alike, helping them craft a more balanced message about who they’re looking to recruit internally and who their products or messages are directed toward externally. Nobody likes a bully and everyone can afford to be a little more inclusive. Now that this boss (who happens to be a woman) is about to get her own cup of coffee, (don’t need an assistant of either sex for that) let me post this high tech blog –before I magically forget how.

You know…. ‘cause I’m a woman. Please.

Message Not Sent: Public Eager to Adopt Mobile Buying; Businesses Not So Much

For a three-word sentence, “Message not sent,” does a pretty good job at frustrating text messagers from completing and sending their digital thoughts. And when it comes to m-commerce, ‘M’ for mobile, businesses it seems, haven’t gotten the message either.

A new survey compiled by Empirix reveals a mixed message: 91 percent of American shoppers believed mobile buying for anything from airline tickets, to department store purchases, to all items in between by text message, email or smart phone app, will generally benefit their shopping experience, while nearly two-thirds of respondents expected an improvement in customer service via their mobile outlet.

But like a garbled message trapped in the Internet ether, fewer than half of businesses surveyed in several countries including the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Germany, said they’d be investing money toward establishing m-commerce networks. The US, which often plays second fiddle (or third, or fourth) to tech-savvy Europe, was a relative “winner,” with 41 percent of businesses saying they would. Better still; more than half of US businesses said they at least had a mobile strategy in place. By contrast only 14 percent of UK businesses were game for upgrading from ‘E’ to m-commerce.

Dealing with the digital disconnect

That’s where PR companies come into play. Playing the watchdog role for our clients means it’s our job to inform them when it’s time to enhance their business and marketing models, offering concrete mobile marketing suggestions and strategy. In short, just having a web page is so last decade. As seen on airlines, mobile onboard buying campaigns have really taken off. (Pardon the pun)

If airlines can be persuaded to the see the benefits of turning a jumbo jet’s cabin into a touch and click sky mall, then why not other businesses?

To be sure, an m-commerce-embracing public and a plugged in communications industry are only the first steps toward success. But they’re not bad starts. In Empirix’s press release on the study, Tim Moynihan, VP of Marketing cautioned companies against quantity of mobile initiative versus quality of effort.

“As more businesses deliver m-commerce applications to an increasing number of consumers, the risk of poor service increases dramatically,” he said. “Investing in an end-to-end service assurance program at the start of this journey will separate the winners from the losers.”

An “end to end service assurance program,” huh.

Sounds like the perfect job for us.

Why almost everything that Apple’s PR machine does turns to gold

The following article originally appeared on Mobile Marketer on October 3rd, 2011.

I started writing this article the morning after the media vultures started picking over Steve Jobs' resignation carcass. Why add more fuel to the Apple fire, I thought.

It has been “Apple this” and “Apple that” for longer than I care to remember. So I put down my notes.

Now, more than five weeks later, the world has not ended with Steve Job no longer at Apple’s helm. Its shares have not plummeted. The iPhone 5 will likely dominate 2011 holiday sales. And, in the process, Apple became the most valuable company on the stock market.

Life continues, and so I write.

Give an apple to the teacher, as the cliché goes, and you stand a better chance of getting in their good books.

But in a very real sense, for the better part of its existence, Apple has been the company that has given us the apple and kept the public relations spinmeisters and media industry singing the company’s praises – right down to its very core.

So how has Apple kept us plugged in?
Consider this: Twenty-five years ago tech was geek. Majorly geek.

Tech was for nerds who were shunned by the masses. They were the ones who rode bikes or skateboards when we bought our first shiny BMW. They discovered iPods while we were still ooohing at clunky MP3 players. We got hammered at parties while they wrote code wired on Mountain Dew.

Who’s laughing now?

They are, all the way to their tech-stock engorged portfolios. Today, tech is très, très chic, and much of that chic transformation goes to Apple.

It is not every day that a balding, lanky, somewhat geeky man can command the stage, holding a twinkling device that promises the universe but is only a phone/music player/tablet attain rock star status.

Yet, Steve Jobs and Apple have done just that, launching hit, after hit. As Kool and The Gang sang back in the ’80s, “He’s got the Midas Touch.”

In the PR trade, it is usually us who are the ones drawing the lines and making the rules – or we like to think so anyway.

In the case of Apple, however, we have been entranced – or is it enchanted? – right along with consumers. I cannot image doing our work without an iSomething to hand and it is hard to imagine a world without Apple.

The Apple R&D folks create what often kicks off long and gushing reviews of the company’s line of firsts, but it is the marketing department which really goes to town on the behind-the-scenes work – even though it goes out of its way to appear not to.

Not all about what’s under the tech hood
While we sell our well-honed communications skills – skills that are supposed to help our clients develop strategies that communicate their messages with pinpoint accuracy – Apple’s PR strategy has been the opposite. Obfuscate, block, and say nothing.

Mix that in with lots of hype, cult-like adoration and oodles of staging, and you have the only brand that is globally tolerated for its “magic of misdirection.” Any other brand would be excommunicated from the journalism world, but not Apple.

Take the iPhone 5 prototype “accident” from a few weeks ago. Left at a bar, the only prototype available. Just like that.

A similar watering hole mishap occurred last year with the iPhone 4.

Although Apple says nothing, the publicity rumor mill speeds away at over four megabits a second. Did Apple deliberately lose a new phone to generate buzz? Was it to lap Android in a sort of subtle way, “We’ve done it again, you suckers?”

Even if the iPhone 5’s loss was a five-alarm fire of genuine concern does not much matter. Nineteenth-century showman P.T. Barnum is often credited with the expression, “There’s no such thing as bad publicity.”

Mr. Jobs and Apple have polished that phrase to an all new sheen.

Apple, truly, has broken all conventions when it comes to media and PR strategy, from allegedly misleading the press – Electronic Games, 2007; the delayed Korea launch – to letting its fanatics have a free-for-all without saying much to deflate some, at times, far-fetched theories.

As someone with a vested professional interest in damage control, I have to admit that Apple is a PR treat to devour.

Instead of taming the media beast with a crisis strategy or even strategically controlled messaging, it has let the media beast feed on itself by strategically saying nothing at all.

Think about for that a couple of minutes.

For all the talk of CEOs and corporate communications teams stepping up and commenting the second a negative tweet or blog post appears, Apple has done the opposite. Its lack of response when it comes to conjecture only makes any actual responses all the more poignant.

Company that talks little but says much
Since Apple is regularly seen as observers in the melee, when it does speak, we listen.

Notable instances include the company’s denial of tracking iPhone and iPad users – which we know is a lie; we are tracked and yet we still do not much care – or when Steve Jobs' illness was finally clarified (way more serious than we thought).

Both instances could have been far more damaging for any other brand.

But Apple's product launch rumors and news kept us magically distracted.

In late April, we were talking about the tracking rumors. By mid-May, we were discussing a new product launch – a 180-degree turnaround in just 15 business days.

When we were talking about Mr. Jobs' health issues – for the third time – in January 2011, we were also knee-deep in iPad 2 news. His health, it seemed, played second fiddled to the life-changing promise of the iPad 2.

Humility: Great for philosophers, the religious, and repentant politicians during an election cycle; bad for Mr. Jobs and Apple.

Perhaps I am being too harsh: the media industry is human, after all, and we are suckers for strong personalities, bravado or otherwise.

In 1983, Apple, still a seedling of its present self, launched the ambitious Lisa computer.

With a staggering near-$10,000 price tag – $21,589 in today’s dollars – Mr. Jobs and Apple aggressively marketed their product.

Confidence may not have helped sell Lisa to a price-conscious consumer – Lisa was pretty much dead on arrival – but similar stances on a myriad of Apple products since have ultimately turned it from a computer company to an icon.

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