Here is a little change management tip that probably originated back in the bible.  People find it much easier to identify with a person than a title, an organisation or a group.  How many times have you heard someone say, I hate <insert racial group here> but Fred is OK even though he is a <racial group>.  Crazy isn’t it? 

For some people it is OK to hate someone who appears removed, distant or part of a group of nameless nobodies.  On the other hand it is much harder to hate a fellow human being.

In companies undergoing change, positions and senior management are often demonised by the employees particularly if the senior management team appears different or disconnected from the average employee.  It is far easier to blame some (essentially) meaningless acronym such as the CEO, CFO, CIO or EOO (basically the boss) rather than employees taking responsibility and admitting that the old business processes don’t work well any longer.

A technique for breaking down the us and them barriers is to make it easier for employees to realise that difficult decisions are being made by a person who also has a mortgage, kids and similar (if not more) pressures in life.  Since it is easier to identify with a person, make sure that the CEO (or other senior manager) is seen to be personable.

In one my roles we encountered this problem. The key manager was seen to be an outsider who didn’t belong and who was basically brought in to replace the existing (well liked) management team. Employees didn’t know much about this manager and as a result it was easier to demonise this person.  It didn’t take long before everything that went wrong was blamed on this manager and serious efforts were made to discredit them.

This is not related to a specific organisation.  You know there are problems with disengagement when the management team are referred to as “blow ins”, “people who have no experience in…”, “stooges” or other derogatory terms.

Whilst it was easy to hate the CEO or director, it was much harder to hate Joe (not the person’s real name).  As part of the change process, I worked with Joe to make him more personable. We softened the tone of communications and Joe revealed personal things about himself (for example announcing the birth of his grandson and what he was doing for Christmas).  Joe was also seen around the office, spending time with staff and even attended functions.  This was reported in the company newsletter so that people could see that Joe was a person too.

The technique worked and the hostility level dropped appreciably!

It’s all in the name.  Now it helps if the CEO really does care about people and wanders around the office, chatting to staff, listening to their concerns and actually taking part in office and social functions.  Make sure that communications have a personal touch and make it easy for staff to identify with the manager.  Be truthful but above all human.

How many followers do you have on Twitter and how many likes do you have on Facebook?

The answer may well be an impressive number.

Now go through that list of followers and likes and work out how many of these people you actually know and even more importantly how many of these people are likely to want to purchase your product or services? Chances are that this number will be much lower.

There are many people who believe that the one with the most followers wins and that the more followers you have the better. There are even websites (and scams) to help you increase the number of followers with some organisations even offering to sell access to their highly followed accounts.

There are two approaches to marketing; one is the mass market approach where you send your message to as many people as possible using every avenue possible in the hope that someone will take note and actually do something to purchase your products and services. The second approach is using public relations to target your message to specific relevant audiences that are most likely to respond.

Which one is the most effective? That would depend upon the nature of your products and services.

If your product and services are the type that would be purchased by most people (for example food, banking, insurance or music) then the mass market approach may well work well for you. Of course if you also target messages to key influencers (journalists, fans, leading bloggers) you are likely to obtain even better results.
On the other hand if your products and services are niche, then the mass market approach is likely be a costly waste of effort. Think about it! If you provide specific services to certain businesses you are more likely to raise your brand awareness by having your name appear in publications that those businesses read rather than running a series of television or radio commercials.

This is where public relations really helps. An experienced public relations practitioner can help you target your messages and has the contacts within the media (and strategic experience) to place your message in places where it is most likely to be seen by potential customers.  In some cases social media tools such as Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare and LinkedIn can form part of your messaging strategy but the publication relations practitioner will closely monitor the impact of this as part of the overall program.

To an experienced practitioner, it’s not the number of followers that makes a difference, rather it is the quality of followers. If you have a niche product and you have many followers in that industry then I would say your social media campaign is working. If however you just have lots of people (or scammers) following you who aren’t likely to be interested, then you might as well go out in the middle of the city and shout your message out over the sound of the traffic as both are likely to have a similar impact!

Who are you?  What is your purpose?

These seem like easy questions to answer but dig deeply and you will find that the answers will take you on an important journey of self discovery.

This might sound a little Zen for a corporate blog but have you ever asked yourself these questions about your company.  Who you are is much more than your company name. Hopefully your company name is a partial reflection of who you but your company identity needs to be more than just Widgets R Us or Blue Diamond Consulting.

Rather who you are represents the values and vision that your company or organisation stands for. Are you a widget factory or are you the leading provider of budget widgets in Australia?  Perhaps you are an innovative widget maker or perhaps you have forgotten who you are and need to really rediscover your company self?  Often you will find that your name is irrelevant here as your customers will remember your company for the values rather than the name.

Pick a well known brand see in your mind what that brand represents. Does Coke really represent pre-burnt coal or cocaine or rather do you associate it with a specific soft drink that you can almost taste along with the occasions when you drank it?

More importantly that what you think, do your customers relate to who you are? Have you ever asked them?  Their answers will give some blunt feedback as to how your company is perceived and if they are honest, the answers may prompt you to completely review how you conduct your business and what you communicate about your business.

What is your purpose represents the drive or desire to be who you are. It is fine being the best widget maker in Australia but why do you do it? Is it just a job that pays the bills or is it something more?  Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with wanting to be highly profitable (and if you don’t want to be highly profitable you would have to ask yourself why you are in business in the first place!) However being profitable by itself will not sustain the business or give you the drive to get up every morning.  Profit is also very transitory as the first downturn will have you questioning why you keep the business running in the first place.

What is it about your work or company that motivates you to keep coming to work? Some honest company soul searching is required here as it is easy to get bogged down with weasel words, motherhood statements and just plain fluff.

Successful businesses have a passion that drives them to succeed.  Use this passion to motivate you and more importantly communicate this passion to your customers. This is why you are in business and ultimately why your customers are dealing with you rather than the competition. Your purpose is also the reason why your staff put their effort into the organisation. This is more than your mission statement, this is the reason for your company's existence!

So who am I and what is my purpose?

I am a specialist communicator who prides himself on being able to help people and organisations communicated messages as effectively as possible.

My purpose is to help you grow your business by communicating your achievements, product benefits, news and other information to your customers, potential customers, staff and other stakeholders. Oh yes, I also am doing this for profit and choose to work for clients who can pay and see the value in the work I do.

That’s who I am and that is my purpose.  Who are you?  What is your purpose?

Cloud computing! Sounds soft, fluffy and a great concept in theory. Rather than purchasing software, managing upgrades, backups and security you simply run your applications in the cloud. You don’t have to worry about where your data is because, it is in the cloud. It is accessible from anywhere, someone else keep viruses and nasties away and you never need to back up your data.

I personally use cloud applications such as Gmail and occasionally Google Docs. The temptation of having a no cost full email system with outstanding virus checking that can be accessed via a web browser, my mobile phone or an email client (such as Thunderbird) is just too great to resist. Occasionally the system goes down but then again so does any part of the Internet (including my ISP link and my server).

However, I recently discovered one pitfall of cloud computing when I couldn’t retrieve an attachment from Gmail. The system refused to download an attachment I uploaded to an email message and kept displaying a temporary error, try again later. When the same problem kept reoccurring, I visited the help centre where after searching the forums I found numerous people experiencing the same error.  Google has been silent on the issue and the many complaints and requests for help appear to have been largely ignored. No one is taking responsibility for the problem and my data (if it still exists) is buried somewhere in the GooglePlex where I can’t get to it.

What's worse is that these organisations reserve the right at any time to terminate you without notice. Suddenly you could find yourself without email (or access to your sent and received messages), Twitter, your company Facebook page or other data.

In my case the data wasn’t that valuable, but for some people on the forum who entrusted Google with business critical correspondence, accounting information and sensitive information, this problem is very serious. Who owns the cloud and more importantly who fixes it when it breaks??

Most people do not read the terms of service when signing up for free (or inexpensive) cloud computing services. To summarise most contracts they basically limit any liability or responsibility for anything. Contracts aside, who can you call at Google, Facebook, Twitter or WordPress if (and when) something goes wrong? The answer is probably no-one. It is that same no-one who takes responsibility for ensuring you can access your data, the same no-one who provides personal technical support and the same no-one who fixes the inevitable problems.

Would you trust your business information to no-one? I certainly don’t!

Cloud computing is great if you sign up with a contactable organisation with a guaranteed service level agreement and method to export ALL (and I mean ALL) of your data out of the system if you decide to cancel the service or the provider ceases operation. Unfortunately many cloud computing providers only give you access to no-one.

At this stage of the game, cloud computing is a bit like gambling in that you can win if luck is on your side, but you never bet more than you can afford to lose! Remember that if you decide to entrust Face(less)book, Twitter, Google or FourSquare with your business process, information and reputation.

Many organisations are taking a reactive approach to social media which is driven more by a sense of panic than part of a corporate communications strategy.

Quick! We must get a Facebook page, appear on LinkedIn, start Tweeting and have people check in to us on Foursquare.  Yet, these same organisations wouldn’t dream of rushing out a marketing brochure or throwing together their annual report. The Internet is littered with individuals and organisations who have rushed into social media without a proper strategy. Unfortunately, many of these organisations have made very public online fools of themselves and have earned the dubious honour of being judged as failures by the very customers they were trying to impress.

The first thing to understand about social media is that it is not really that new and revolutionary! Now I might get burnt at the stake for that comment, but the reality is that social media is just another communications tool and should only form part of your corporate communications strategy. It is best to think of social media as a giant chat group (or to borrow US parlance a water-cooler) where you and your customers can talk to each other via Facebook, Twitters or LinkedIn (for professional and business to business communications).

One of the best things about social media is that it is extremely dynamic and virtually instantaneous.  This means that if you are launching a new product or service, want to garner feedback or respond to customer questions, you can use social media tools very effectively. The converse is that if you don’t communicate properly, your mistakes can also spread very quickly and in an embarrassingly public manner.

Before embarking on social media it is wise to develop a proper corporate strategy. To do this, you need to ask a few questions;

1. Why are you embarking on social media in the first place? For many organisations it will be because they feel they have to, but ask yourself honestly what you intend to gain from it? Do you want to be able to better communicate with your customers? Do you want to reach potential customers? Is it to build or enhance your online presence? Or do you want to use these tools to provide better customer service?
2. How will you use social media? Once you have answered the first question the answer to this question should become reasonably straight-forward. If you want to communicate you will need to set up a place where your organisation can put messages and (this is the important part) your customers and potential customers can hold discussions with you. Some good examples of this are Nike, Coca-cola and General Motors (Holden) who use social media quite effectively. If you want to provide better customer service you may choose to monitor social media channels and respond to customer queries or complaint. Recently I posted a comment on Twitter that I was having problems with Office 2007. Within a few minutes I received a message from @MicrosoftCares putting me in touch with an engineer who helped work through the issues. That was a good example of using social media to provide great customer service. Other organisations which do well in this space include Telstra and Vodaphone.
3. What messages do you want to communicate? Now this is where social media must fit in with your overall corporate strategy. If you want to give the impression of being funky and cool, don’t get legal to write the messaging. On the other hand, if you want to give the impression of being serious and businesslike, you would target your messages accordingly. The key is getting the balance correct between being casual and rigid. For example, a particular company tried to be cool but then sent out strict legal warnings to their followers when these followers tried to redesign the company logo – not cool! In this instance a more human message such as, we like our logo the way it is so please don’t play with it may have been more appropriate.
4. Use common sense. Just because you are at a keyboard doesn’t mean you cannot offend. Make sure that comments are polite, and avoid any racist sexist or otherwise offensive interpretations. A funky pizza chain found that out the hard way when, for a joke, they provided a link to a video clip about bad women drivers. Whether the clip was funny or not was irrelevant because many of their customers (men and women) found it offensive that only women were singled out in the video clip. Within minutes news of this gaff spread and the company was subject to some fairly passionate (and colourful) comments. They issued an apology but the damage was already done. Needless to say don’t abuse customers or make comments that would be unsuitable if they were printed on posters at the company headquarters!

Social media used properly is a very rapid public method of communication but unfortunately if handled inappropriately is a very public way of looking foolish and earning your organisation a #fail tag!

One of the best things that can happen to your brand is for your customers to become your sales force and advocates for the brand. Word of mouth recommendation from friends is still considered to be one of the best methods of marketing.

There are some real advantages in referral marketing; it doesn’t cost money, it builds credibility and grows exponentially as friends tell other friends about your brand. Some notable companies or brands that have achieved this include Apple (where people will queue up days in advance to purchase a new product and fanboys will flood social media channels with positive news about products), Lady Gaga (who has nearly 5,000,000 followers on Twitter) and certain high profile fashion brands and celebrities who can do (almost) no wrong.

With social media, referrals are now global and spread at the click of a mouse. Anyone can be anybody’s friend and with Twitter and Facebook, the good news spreads rapidly raising the profile of a brand.

The ideal situation is when people talking positively about your brand and tweets fly around encouraging others to check you out. Just recently I posted a tweet about a new Internet radio I purchased and within seconds the positive comment was picked up and retweeted (passed on) to numerous other people I never even heard of. That is the power of social media!

Of course it is not always possible to have your brand as the subject of the conversation, so if you can’t be the conversation, the next best thing is to be part of conversations you want your brand to be associated with. This means becoming involved Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn (where appropriate), special interest groups, forums and chat groups that you want to know about your brand.

For example, if you have a new technology device, you would ideally like the Internet and social media channels filled with rave reviews. Traditionally you would hire a PR organisation to send out press releases and review units to journalists, have the journalists review the product (favourably) and wait for reviews to be published in print and on-line. Unfortunately, this may not be always possible particularly if you are a start-up company or have a limited budget.

When I was working as a journalist, my inbox would be flooded with press releases and as unfair as it was, it usually was the big established companies who used large PR companies that attracted my attention.  The only exceptions being smaller organisations with whom I developed a personal relationship with and who I would approach for review product.

I have also seen people ab(use) twitter in a form of e-pimping where they would constantly send out tweets luring people to a website or to spruik their product. Not very sophisticated or successful because it doesn’t take long for your “followers” to realise that you are not being part of the conversation.  Such techniques only lead to you being unfollowed and effectively ignored from the Twitterspace.

A more sophisticated and successful approach is to become part of conversations that you want your brand to be associated with. When I say conversations, I mean actually contributing something of value rather than just spruiking your stuff!

So, for example, if you have launched a new camera, you might contribute to photography blogs and tweet about photography. People won’t mind that you mention your camera or use your camera in tutorials as long as you provide valuable information about the topic.  Video is an excellent medium as long as you again, remember that the focus is to provide information and become part of the conversation.  Mention your product in passing or as an example so that you and your brand become associated with being an expert or at least a known contributor to the area of interest. Making low budget television commercials on the other hand are a turn off and are unlikely to fool anyone over the age of 8!

So how do you go about getting your brand talked about in a positive way and become part of a conversation you want to be associated with?

1. Decide which groups you want to be a part of. Who do you want to be your customers and where are these people likely to seek out information on the Internet?
2. Decide what you can contribute. If you are a product manager or expert, consider producing informative how to tutorials which use your product as an example.  You are an expert in the field so share the knowledge occasionally using your product as an example.
3. Join in conversations. This means actively contributing to discussion in relevant forums, on Twitter and in Facebook. It is important to be genuine and provide useful information not just plug your product
4. Get to know the journalists that write about your area of interest and offer yourself as an expert in the field. This takes some work and persistence (trust me, when I was a journalist everyone wanted to be quoted as an expert!) but if you are credible and don’t badger the journalist, you may end up quoted or even better the journalist may want to review your product

Clients generally engage a public relations professional to help them communicate about themselves in the best possible light. As PR professionals we do our best to oblige by helping the client talk up their strengths and either downplay or ignore their weaknesses. People are not naive and will accept this and take some exaggerations with a grain of salt realising they are listening to "spin" or advertising.

As long as the customer’s (or message recipient’s) experience reasonably matches the message, everything is fine. Being human, there are the inevitable stuff ups which if handled properly can actually enhance the reputation of the organisation. On the other hand if the message is so far removed from the reality experienced by customers, no amount of PR can fix the damage. In fact it may even be in the customer’s best interest not to delivery the message in the first place.

Take the case of a certain Australian bank which several years ago invested in television monitors in every branch to broadcast positive messages about the bank whilst customers were waiting in line. Rather than messages actually adding value such as describing new services or ways customers could save money, the messages were pompous self congratulatory advertisements that reflected a parallel universe of exemplary service and the bank changing people’s lives. Messages which explained how customer service was improved, queues were diminished and the bank was there to help. Messages which customers could not relate to when their experience was waiting 15 minutes in line to deal with a poor overworked teller or when they were hit with yet another excessive fee.

Did these messages in any way enhance the bank’s reputation? Probably not because it didn’t take long before bank staff took matters into their own hands and turned off the monitors. Such messages were embarrassing for the staff and the organisation as a whole.

The question to ask is are we doing clients any favours by exaggerating the truth so much that it looks as if we are living on another planet? Messages need to engage the customer which means they must to some extent reflect the real experience the customer has. This is where techniques such as 360 degree feedback can help when refining messages. What does the real customer experience, what do they like (emphasis) and what needs improvement (explain or change).

I wonder if the CEO and Board of that bank have ever been inside a suburban branch on pension day to see the queues and frazzled staff? If so, could they honestly say that their service was outstanding, or would the money have been better spent on just hiring more staff and improving the real customer experience?

In my career as a technology journalist, I had many opportunities to deal with public relations consultants (PRs). Now as a PR myself, I can share some of the things that PRs can do to make life easier for their journalist colleagues.

1.  Keep it relevant. Journalists get bombarded with press releases. It is hard enough to manage the torrent of releases when at your desk but it gets even worse when on the road and trying to sort through them on your handheld device.  PRs, spend some time understanding what your journalist colleague writes about and only send them relevant releases. When I was writing for technology publications, I would often be sent releases about a client’s financial reports.  This would be great if I was writing for the Financial Review or an investment magazine but completely irrelevant for a tech audience.  Too many irrelevant releases PRs and you may find all of your releases going straight to the spam bucket.

2.  Keep it relevant II.  If a release or press conference is going to happen in another city, let your journo colleague know about it, but don’t bother sending an invitation unless your client is prepared to fly the journalist up to the event. Few (if any) magazines or newspapers have budgets to fly staff or freelancers up and it really annoys your journalist colleague immensely to be invited to an interesting event only to be told that “we don’t have the budget to fly you up”.  The only thing worse is to keep sending him or her reminders to respond to the invitation.

3.  Make life easier particularly when dealing with products.  Technology (and other product review) journalists have to conduct reviews quickly.  Make their life easier by ensuring that everything is packed in the box, the product is in as new condition and that it actually works.  There are many instances in my career when I received review product that was incomplete (no power pack or power cords), looked as if it came straight from a council recycling depot or didn’t work. Journalists are human and if they have a bad out of box experience they are likely to give a less favourable review.

4.  Making it easy II.  Couriers are the bane of a product review journalist’s life!  I cannot count the number of times a courier would roll up asking to collect a box to go to Sydney.  Hmmm, as I point to the pile of boxes in my office.  Which one?  The one going to Sydney.  Problem – all of the boxes were going back to Sydney.  The PRs who I used to love would include a completed consignment note and self addressed label so that all I needed to do was call the courier company, quote the account code and the courier would collect the correct item.  It’s these little things that can make a journalist’s life easier and help spread the PR journo love!

5.  Keep it real.  As a PR now myself, I know how important it is to make my client look good however there is a difference between looking good and completely creating a fiction.  A good journalist should be able to smell a rat and like a terrier, it should unleash the instinct to chase and tear the rat apart.  You are not doing your client any favours by letting a pack of journalists loose on them – keep it real and journalists will respect you, lie and you are asking for trouble.

6.  Keep it real II.  One of the best things for PRs is social media and the Internet as it allows you to disseminate information easier.  One of the worst things for PRs is social media and the Internet as it allows others to expose lies and fabrications much easier.  As BP are finding out, it is just too easier for people to obtain information beyond the official company line.  When (not if but when) this information leaks out, you and your client are left looking stupid.  Monitor other channels of information and be prepared to deal with them.  The biggest mistake a PR can make is believing that they are the single information source from your client – journalists do know how to use the Internet, social media and Google!

7.  Tone down the superlatives.  Yes, it’s true that journalists have an inbuilt dictionary that translates superlative phrases into plain English. Most events are just press conferences or product launches, products are not revolutionary unless they do something never seen before and consumer goods are not magical (unless operated by David Copperfield).  Treat superlatives like chillies – use sparingly to add a bit of spice when really needed but don’t over do it.

8.  Return calls and keep the journalist informed.  Journalists by nature are a suspicious (almost paranoid bunch) and if you don’t return calls or seem evasive they will suspect a rat (see point 5 about chasing and hunting down rats).  The truth is you may be busy or distracted but your journalist colleague who is often writing a story 5 minutes after deadline will think something is amiss.  Even a simple email such as  “CEO in meeting but will answer your questions tonight” will allow the journalist to plan the story (or negotiate deadlines with editor) and will keep the killer instinct at bay.

9.  Stick to what you know.  You know when you go to a department store to buy an electrical appliance or clothing and the shop assistant looks dumbfounded and admits that last week they were working in children’s books and really have no idea about toasters, microwaves or fashion.  A PR who doesn’t understand their client or their client’s business is no better.  Journalists work to tight deadlines (or if freelance are generally underpaid) and get frustrated if their PR (who is supposed to be a source of information) knows nothing about the topic.  The most pointed example of this occurred at a product launch many years ago which was hosted by a television personality.  The autocue broke, the personality was lost for words, the journalists knew he was clueless and walked out.  Bad PR!!  Spend some time understanding your client and their business and have a list of experts at the ready.  In complex industries (such as tech) you cannot be expected to know all of the details of complex systems but putting the journalist in touch with a technical manager will allow the journalist to talk technical with someone who can provide them with the information they need.  Good PR that spreads the PR journo love.

10.  Get the little things right!  Yes, simple things like spelling a journalist’s name correctly, remembering something about them and getting meal preferences correct can really make a difference.  It does take some work to keep a database up to date and to remember who is a vegetarian (before inviting them to a client lunch at a steakhouse) but doing so makes for a happier journalist colleague and a happy journalist is more likely be a happy recipient of information.

Photo by Tony2 - Licences under Creative Commons