Open The Dialogue

Staci Kramer over at paidContent pretty much sums it up:

On the internet, any media outlet can overcome its single-dimension status offline. Print outlets can excel in video, local TV stations can add text and stills, radio can get visual. When NPR.org relaunches overnight, it will add all kinds of features to enhance and extend its audio, including improved search, embedding and transcripts, and more multimedia. But at a time when others are pushing ahead with video, National Public Radio is standing still.

I’ve felt this way about NPR’s approach to video for quite some time.  In April of 2008, I heard a great new band on the now-defunct Bryant Park Project.  They were a new indie rock band called Smoosh.  A big fan of one of the songs they played, I promptly embedded the video into my personal blog after it was available online.  Fast forward to March of this year, when I felt like listening to the song again only to see that the video embed had been disabled.  Now, this isn’t uncommon.  Content providers do this all the time, in fact.  Pageviews are pageviews and revenue is revenue.  I don’t blame them.

However, to me, this is antithetical to NPR’s culture and without the focus on video within this new direction – probably a shot in the foot to a very influential media brand.  They’ve always been scrappy; embracing new technology to spread the word about their great content and programming.  New audiences are using new technologies – embracing that tech helps get content (and subsequently “culture”) in front of new people.  In this case, it worked exactly the way it should for me.  I don’t often listen to the radio, but I heard this segment and was able to share it with my friends.  Quickly and easily.  What’s not to love?

Ben McConnell says it straight:  Word of mouth is a byproduct of a remarkable culture.

Why, then, make the decision to cut-off an integral vehicle in spreading that culture and, consequently, lose out on word of mouth capital?  This is a big issue staring not just media outlets but brands as well, straight in the face.  Content can be expensive to produce but how do you create life-long loyal fans and generate tangible social captial without providing something valuable and interesting upfront?  Ultimately, it has to come from somehwere and you can’t (NPR included) lose sight of the big picture.

What’s more valuable?  Saving money now or building exemplary passion through culture-sharing?  Odds are, the choice to put yourself out there will translate better to an invigorated base of supporters whom can carry you though the rough patches for years to come.  Walking away from video’s “unproven” value when new, vibrant audiences are certainly reachable through it hopefully won’t prove to be a mistake for NPR in years to come.

Nikon’s recent participation in BlogHer illustrates the power, speed and influence of the blogging community. Nikon, a conference sponsor, also hosted an invitation-only event Friday night, designed to engage a variety of women, including style, design, food, technology and parenting bloggers. Their common bond was a shared enthusiasm for photography.

The buzz was incredible; the event a major triumph; the response from the attendees overwhelmingly positive. To everyone on-site in Chicago, the event was a smashing success.

Yet to the outside world, a slightly different story was being told, one which adversely comments on both the Nikon and MWW brands. Because misinformation is being communicated, we wanted to share the facts of the event and more importantly, the outcome.

As many of the women who attended the BlogHer conference came with their families, two women wanted to attend the Nikon Night Out event with their young children.  While we politely informed them that they could not bring their babies to the cocktail event, one woman, in what she thought was a joke, tweeted #nikonhatesbabies from her Twitter account. This resulted in a storm of tweets and some misinformed blog posts from women who did not attend the event nor knew the full account of what happened. This is really unfortunate as the anticipation and excitement leading up to the event by those invited was tremendous.

These are the facts:

• Due to the time of the event, the noise level, the availability of alcohol and the proximity to water, we determined that from a safety perspective, children should not attend.

• During the event on Friday night, two people tweeted about not being able to get into the event with their babies.

• On Saturday morning, MWW and Nikon planned to contact the two women about the prior evening’s events, and the #nikonhatesbabies chatter made that even more timely. We contacted both original bloggers and asked them to stop by the Nikon booth to discuss the situation.  The woman who first tweeted said it was a joke and that she did not mean any harm to Nikon.  She said that her tweet had been taken out of context as a bad joke (indeed). The second expressed her dismay and embarrassment that the situation had become so inflated.

• A few marketing bloggers – who did not attend the event – started blogging about best practices while blaming Nikon and MWW for not understanding the audience.

• Following conversations with MWW and Nikon, the two women tweeted about their discussion and apologized for their impact.

• Once the corrected tweets appeared and began to circulate, other bloggers, fans and event patrons posted similar stories with the facts, and complimented Nikon on the personal response and engagement.

1. http://bit.ly/V8z7W2
2. http://tinyurl.com/msr7qn
3. http://twitpic.com/blxiu

Clearly, some people, who did not attend either the conference or the party, used the incident to elevate themselves and their marketing expertise without bothering to confirm the facts.

We felt strongly that these two women deserved a face-to-face, personal discussion. We could have simply taken our version online and debated in public, but in doing so, would have focused on the people this DIDN’T affect, rather than the ones it did. We had great conversations with both women, walking away hopeful we had just formed a future valuable relationship with two great bloggers. There are a few interesting lessons here, including:

1. Know your audience: We invited people who were interested in Nikon, cameras or photography, not exclusively moms or women with kids. Had we planned an event for only mom bloggers, the location and other logistics would have been different altogether.
2. Relationships: We hosted this event to extend and continue those engaging relationships we have with blog communities. The vast majority of the online and in-person feedback about a well-received event has been positive and gracious. Knowing we built stronger ties with the bloggers because of the event, we’ll continue to do so in years to come.
3. One-on-One: We learned that talking with people, hearing what they have to say, learning the facts, and questions they may have about Nikon products is one of the best ways to grow as a company. We also learned that there are many people out there who don’t listen and will jump-to-conclusions without the facts to spread misinformation.

What now? Should this scare big brands away from the increasingly real-time digital world? Not at all. In fact, this should encourage it. There was learning on both sides of the fence. Real-time opinion is just that – real-time. And it’s important to tell the whole story when all the facts are available.

In one post, a mommyblogger suggested this year’s conference had the theme of “not all bloggers are like that.” We agree and believe that the Mom in question isn’t either. We had multiple conversations with Liz Gumbinner of Blog with Integrity, and support the badge that she’s encouraging all bloggers to consider. In a real example of the blogger community policing itself, #nikonlovesbabies popped up with photos and statements as well.

Will this deter MWW or Nikon from continuing to engage and conduct open, honest and transparent dialogue with the blogger community? Of course not. We achieved our original goal to have meaningful conversation and personal interaction with bloggers and will continue to do so.

We recognize this BlogHer conference was a tipping point for corporations and bloggers to slowly come together on the same playing field. Together we should commit to letting the facts surface and put accusations on the back burner. Together, we can learn from one another and appreciate the influence and voice each of us has.

During a recent move, I  bit the bullet and switched my cable and Internet provider over to Verizon’s FiOS. And while the 3 inch hole in my bedroom wall isn’t trendy, the cool new features that my TV gives me certainly is worth it. See I turned on my TV this last weekend and saw Twitter. And it wasn’t a story on the News about Chad Ochocinco’s latest tweet. Instead real tweets were appearing on my screen!

This is the type of social media interaction that I love to see pop up in the home.  Not only could I see what was trending but I could see what other people were saying about the show I was watching. Plus I could log into Facebook, look at pictures and update my status for that my particular TV show. And while I cannot  manually update anything or see my friends on Twitter, the foundation has been laid for great things to come.

What you may ask? Well if one of the goals of social media is to share views quickly and efficiently; bringing them into another screen is only going to expedite that process.  This provides an excellent place for fans (and brands) to form a community around their favorite shows much in the same way that hashtags do already. If sense of community and interaction is a basic element in social media,  then adding interaction to another screen shouldy increase social media’s usage away from the computer. We are already seeing how the mobile web is growing, could TV be another element?

Would you use Twitter or Facebook if it was on your TV?

On Monday, Mashable posted an interesting study done by sharing company, AddToAny.  AddToAny is in a unique position to exmaine at the resulting data gathered from people using its service while sharing things among their networks.  Some great insights came out of the study as well as some accompanying perspectives from around the web:

• Facebook leads the pack – this is in-line with the size and growth of Facebook.  It also signals a generational change of communication practices.  People are spending more time communicating on the web inside social networks more than e-mail, which is extremely important to note.

• Don’t ignore direct communication – while the news is about Facebook, e-mail still holds strong.  When developing content sharing strategies, never overlook the power of a direct and focused e-mail.  It’s valuable to think of the context surrounding people when they’re communicating – most people are at work in front of a computer throughout the day and priorities get shifted to Inboxes instead of News Feeds.

• What’s missing? – A few things.  Mashable doesn’t disclose the sample size and the report itself doesn’t take into account somet things that commentors point out:  huge properties like CNN and The NYT have native systems.

• Mike Hudack, CEO of blip.tv, starts a pretty healthy discussion on Tumblr about the merits of focusing your sharing options.  Instead of using a widget, what if you had highly customized Facebook-only or Twitter-only sharing options?

• Christine Beardsell counters:  how valuable in the sharing ecosystem is someone on Digg or Yahoo vs. Facebook?  Properly, she points out two huge strategic caveats – who is your audience and how are you measuring?

Meme Curve | Zachary M. Seward, The Nieman Journalism Lab

Last week, Zachary M. Seward at The Nieman Journalism Lab put together an interesting post about breaking news, the origins of memes and how the influence of news orginzations (blogs included) fit into the big picture of information dissemination on the web.  From the post:

Another way of looking at the data is that influential blogs hanging out on the far-left tail are more likely to report on iterative developments as they happen, while mainstream news outlets feel compelled to fit memes into a broader narrative. The study lists several phrases that were first “discovered” by blogs more than a week before peaking, like when Sarah Palin quoted Ronald Reagan at the end of a debate. That immediately raised flags among bloggers who identified the quote’s origins in a 1961 Reagan speech opposing Medicare, but it didn’t gain traction until more than a week later, when Medicare briefly became an issue in the 2008 campaign.

However you view the chart, it feels like each news organization has situated itself quite intentionally along the curve, staking out a role in the political news cycle. With the meme-tracking technique demonstrated in Kleinberg’s study, news outlets could themselves keep track of where they stand and adjust their reporting strategy if they prefer another spot on the cure. They might consider, for instance, whether they add anything at all to the political discourse by reporting on a meme so close to its peak.

This falls in line pretty succintly with the constant argument surrounding networks like Twitter vs. networks like CNN when it comes to “breaking news.”  Lots of critics cry that major news networks are far behind the “8 ball” when it comes to this capacity.  While that might be true when it comes to event-reporting, I’m often seeing too many people make blind arguments/sweeping generalizations about news outlets for other types of reporting.  It’s pretty tough for 140 characters to give you all the context you’ll ever need about current events and, according to Zach’s research, it looks like news organizations large and small are appropriately finding their place in line vs. constantly fueling an arms race that will likely never end.

• 9 Ways People Respond to Your Content Online:  the great article that goes with the image above.  Rajesh Setty maps out how people pereceive and value content online.

• Sometimes focusing deeper on your customer base is much better than widening product offerings.

• Mediaite launched to bruising traffic and much debate.  A fresh new look at the media industry as a whole.

• John Cass on measurement strategies and social media goals.  Some good discussion surrounding the disconnect between value on the web and direct business results.

• Facebook unlocks the live streaming application that was made famous during CNN’s inaguration web coverage.

• Don’t have a blog?  Some great ways to be active online that don’t require a long-form base.

• The recent Morgan Stanley study on teenage social media use generated lots of feedback.  Mashable points to the importance of anecdotal vs. factual evidence whenver doing these kinds of reports (which is embedded there to read as well).

• David Finch on what social media is not.  Most importantly?  It’s not a short-term fix, a solid business culture commitment is required.

• Micah Baldwin on the lie of community.  Technology and modern marketing has shifted our perceptions of what a community is in the digital world.  Good lessons on getting back to basics.

According to the July 13 New York Times article, “Approval by a Blogger May Please a Sponsor,” more and more mommybloggers are “cashing in” on the interest from PR agencies to promote products and services by charging to get a mention or product review.

Bloggers charging for products is different than working with traditional media. In traditional media, PR agencies do not pay journalists because it poses a conflict of interest and causes the journalist to be unbiased in their reporting. Now, bloggers are changing the game. There is a wide range of blogger requests. They want products to review – and to keep. They want to be paid for running giveaways. They want to be included on blogger events. They want loaner items. They want to be paid and compensated for their time, which they say is valuable.

Transparency, whether it’s a product review on a blog, a post on a forum or in a 140 character tweet, is key because bloggers want to share real, honest reviews and to be a source of trustworthy information. Another issue is whether or not there is a mix of reviews – paid and unpaid. Mommybloggers may review both products that they purchase and that were given to them, but they don’t always indicate which is which. The lack of transparency causes confusion and makes it difficult to know whether or not a product is something blogger discovered independently or something that was pitched. The new FTC guidelines that are in the works could potentially solve this. The guidelines would require bloggers to disclose when bloggers were paid or given a product for free. This will make the distinction between true opinion and PR clearer. It’s important for PR agencies and clients to insist on proper disclosure, a benefit to both the blogger and to the consumer.

Until the guidelines are established, we recommend that PR professionals and their clients develop their own individual guidelines for how to ethically compensate and work with bloggers, and also to choose the right relationships that will benefit the blogger, the client and the consumer. We work with bloggers in a way that is beneficial and ethical for everyone. It is our policy at MWW Group not to pay bloggers for writing a post, and we request that whenever a blogger talks about a produce or service received from a client in any sort of public forum, bloggers discloses that they received it from one of our clients through MWW Group. This clearly shows the reader that the blogger did receive something from a PR agency and they can make an educated evaluation of the review.

Last year Dave Carroll was traveling to Nebraska on United Airlines, and watched as his guitar was thrown around by  their baggage handlers.  The guitar was severely damaged, and after 9 months of trying to get compensated, he instead decided to get even.

In 4 days, more than 1.3 million people have watched the video, it has been reported about across the web and in mainstream news, and will probably cost United more than the $3,500 they could have paid to avoid all this.

This isn’t the first time that companies have been faced with dissatisfied customers or disgruntled employees who have taken their message to the Web, with serious consequences.  At the end of the day, it means companies are more accountable for their actions and have more incentive to provide stellar products and great service.

We’ve seen companies like Comcast and Dell learn and grow from major online brand attacks.  United has apologized, and listening and making it right is the first step.  We’ll see moving forward if this helps drive a bigger shift in their approach and communications.

MWW Group Launches D.Advocacy from Joe Becker on Vimeo.

Facebook announced Wednesday that it will streamline privacy features and enable users to open their profiles to anyone on the Internet. Along with demystifying the complex privacy settings by unifying them into one simple page, users will now be able to set restrictions on individual pieces of content using the Publisher tool. Regional networks, adopted by only half of Facebook users, will be eliminated as the focus shifts to open content sharing.

Facebook’s move to simplicity still leaves users with plenty of options. For each of its seven content areas, users can choose one of five access levels:

Everyone [open to all Internet users]

Friends & Networks [all friends and anyone in your affiliated networks]

Friends of Friends [all friends and friends of friends]

Friends [only friends]

Custom [specific users and lists of users can be allowed or denied access]

With an option to make content public, you may wonder if a particular item you post on Facebook is visible on the entire Web. The biggest concern for people may be the possibility of their personal information becoming indexed by major search engines such as Google and Bing. When you first try to publish content for the world to see, Facebook will notify you that everyone will see your post unless you change your settings. The newest version of the Publisher tool includes a nifty feature that allows you to change privacy settings for individual posts. In addition to the added security, you can still use Publisher to share notes, photos, video and other content.

If you have already weaved through several complicated pages trying to set your privacy levels, plan to go through the process again with greater ease. The new settings will be introduced to you through transition tools designed to make the process as painless as possible. These tools will be tested over the next three weeks as the company begins a slow roll-out of its new privacy settings. Tech Crunch offers examples of these transition tools with screenshots from the Facebook press conference.

Facebook’s shift from promoting private profiles to public content sharing comes as the popularity of Twitter’s open platform continues to rise. Facebook began as a private network of college students with its owner, Mark Zuckerberg, capitalizing on its lure of exclusivity. Its platform served as a private alternative to popular social networking site, MySpace, which had become increasingly overrun by spam. Facebook users will now be encouraged to open their status updates and basic information to all Web users, mimicking Twitter’s default settings.

Twitter is a fast-growing force in social media, but Facebook regularly rejuvenates itself and holds strong in the top position with a massive variety of content and over 200 million users.