A proposal for raising the profile of ethical PR
The latest controversy over deceptive and unethical PR practices doesn’t even involve a public relations agency. No, this time Dan Ackerman Greenberg is in the hot seat after posting the steps he and his company, The Commotion Group (which describes itself as “New Media and Marketing and Consulting") take to improve the chances a YouTube video will go viral. These include having staff members post heated comments to the videos they’re promoting and using misleading titles to draw viewers to the video.
The fact that The Commotion Group doesn’t tout itself as a PR firm won’t help offset the damage the firm’s revelations has caused. Once again, the behaviors of those who seem untroubled by deceptive tactics are tainting everybody working on similar projects regardless of the steps they have taken to ensure they are behaving ethically.
Sadly, this will continue to be the case. Those too lazy to employ ethical techniques, those who delight in misleading consumers, and those who will do anything for a buck will always be with us. The question, then, is this: How do the rest of us differentiate ourselves and deflect the bad rap PR and marketing are getting thanks to the actions of the bottom-feeders?
The idea of a code of ethics has surfaced several times, but it’s a non-starter. The codes of ethics already in place are having no significant impact; PRSA goes so far as to insist there is no enforcement behind its code. A code without teeth is hollow, since only those inclined to behave ethically in the first place will abide by it while others may claim to embrace it while simultaneously violating it since they will suffer no consequences for doing so.
I’ve been toying with a possible solution that I’m ready to propose. This idea has been percolating in my head for a while and I can’t find a downside.
Companies or agencies engaged in a PR or marketing effort should create a page that outlines the elements of the assignment. The page would include the goal, objectives, strategies and tactics. Objectives should include any metrics the project is designed to achieve. Each tactic would include the specifics about approaches taken. For example, if blogger outreach is one tactic, the outline would cover the steps taken, from how bloggers are identified to how they are contacted.
Call it disclosure. Call in transparency. It would end speculation about how a company or agency goes about its communications. Those who adopt the practice should stand apart from the rest of the herd, assuming they are honest and forthright in their reporting. If enough organizations adopt this idea, those who do not share their project plans may be perceived as having something to hide. If you’re looking for a template for the contents of such a page, look no further than the evaluation form for IABC Gold Quill judging. If you can answer all of these questions on your project pages, you’ll be in good shape. (The link is to a PDF of the form.)
It seems to me an ideal way to draw a line between ethical and unethical practitioners.
For those who would shy away from such transparency, it’s an idea you’d best get used to. After all, deceptive project plans are being revealed all the time. Why not expose your approaches to the light of day? It could wind up being the best PR you could possibly produce for your agency. And for those who see this is extra unbillable work, look at the bright side: Your IABC or PRSA award competition entries will already be completed.
Just to make sure I understand what you’re calling for, are you suggesting that companies create public Web pages (or blog posts or wiki entries or whatever) to explain their intended tactics?
If so, the idea does have some merit. In fact, if it’s done in a “social” environment, it could be a great learning experience for all involved.
On potential downside: not a concern over transparency for ethics’ sake, but concern about protecting valuable intellectual property. To what extent should these tactics be outlined, and at what potential risk to the brains behind the plans?
Posted by Mike Keliher on 11/26 at 09:28 AMThis is a joke, right?
I sure hope so, because you’d be crazy to even suggest that companies make their marketing and PR plans public - putting them at the mercy of competitors, demeaning their persuasive abilities (which is, um, what companies pay the big bucks for), and encouraging even more of the copy-cat-crap going on all over the Web. Actually, the fact that your post misguidedly lumps marketing and PR professionals together as though we do the same thing to begin with is baffling. I’m sure you know better than that.
Transparency is great to a degree, but it can be overdone just like anything else. It’s also not a requirement to be ethical in marketing or PR - you can be incredibly ethic in your operations without telling everyone everything you do.
Giving up a full marketing plan publicly (especially a successful one) would be the business equivalent of telling Coke to give up their recipe in favor of “transparency.” Full transparency like you’re talking about would kill a company’s competitive edge. So ha ha… next time save it for April Fool’s.
Posted by Jennifer Mattern on 11/26 at 10:34 AMJennifer, to what degree is transparency great and at what point do you become opaque? Transparency refers not to competitive, proprietary, or confidential information, but an open window into how things are done in your organization.
I have struggled for years to draw a distinction between marketing and PR. Unfortunately, the masses don’t make such a distinction. I’ve even had PR people tell me that marketing and PR are the same thing (read some of the comments in which I’ve participated on Strumpette).
Practitioners disclose their processes all the time. Take a look at http://www.iabc.com/awards/gq/ and click on any of the sample winning work plans. These are ALL examples of what I think we should do for every campaign. Either that or become irrelevant as the trust level between people and organizations continues to plummet.
Laugh all you like. I’m dead serious.
Posted by Shel Holtz on 11/26 at 11:14 AMYou’re right. There are a lot of PR people (as well as marketing folks) who don’t know enough about their disciplines to tell them apart. But is that an excuse to forward those kinds of misconceptions with any audience? I’d argue that it’s not.
A company’s marketing strategy is generally confidential information, at least until it’s fully been implemented and can be looked at in hindsight by outsiders. I’ve yet to work for any company that would say what they do “behind the scenes” isn’t confidential information in some way. To share a marketing strategy is to hand over your strengths, weaknesses, and plans to competitors. That is competitive information.
Trust is far less an industry issue than a personal one. Each individual company builds trust in their own ways. Google, as a large example, is one of the most trusted companies around with their users (even still with the bulk of webmasters although they probably shouldn’t be), and they’re far from known for their transparency (often on important issues). So should companies like Google go around giving away their marketing and PR strategies just because it would give some in the marketing and PR industry a warm and fuzzy feeling, when they’re doing just fine? Of course not. Let’s be realistic here… companies don’t need to build trust with us. They need to build trust with their users, consumers, etc.... groups that very often wouldn’t even understand their marketing and PR plans.
Posted by Jennifer Mattern on 11/26 at 11:24 AMShel,
While I applaud the intention and rationale behind the idea, I would think that agencies would have to provide more details than they want for this to be effective (as Jennifer Mattern alluded to).Specifics about approaches taken and other items you outline are too specific. And, they may change, based on initial contacts. So, it would require updating the plan.
The industry as a whole (the PR and other communications industries) will likely always have a bad reputation. So, it means that the honest ones have to work that much harder.
And, the more the honest ones have success, the more our reputation will preceed us and the lazy and dishonest ones will (eventually) go away. Though, they’ll be replaced by others as lazy and dishonest.
That is the business we work and have fun in. The pessimist in me sees little hope in developing an effective, enforceable ethics code or procedure.
MikePosted by Mike Driehorst on 11/26 at 12:00 PMMike, if the reputation of the honest and ethical practioners would precede us, we wouldn’t be in the position we’re in, with bloggers left and right proclaiming PR the refuge of talentless hacks (Chris Anderson and Tom Coates leap to mind).
I’m not proposing that this page that outlines the steps of an effort be published proactively; nobody will care or be interested until the effort has been launched. Thus, a single post saying “Here’s how we did it”—precisely what we include in competition entries that are public—is all that’s needed. It doesn’t need to be granular in its detail, just an outline of the approaches taken.
This is going to be forced on us anyway. I wrote about David Berlind’s transparency effort almost two years ago. (http://blog.holtz.com/index.php/weblog/can_pr_handle_transparency/) While he didn’t keep it up, the concept’s return is inevitable—with the reporter posting every email, every conversation, every exchange with a PR representative. Berlind wrote at the time, ““The PR community didn’t respond favorably,” Berlind said. “The whole PR community went berserk...They didn’t expect it.”
Why we in PR (or marketing, for that matter) think our practices can remain opaque while the rest of the business world is opening theirs is a notion that escapes me. It’s not impossible that we’ll find the balance between disclosure of our practices and keeping our secret sauce in the valut.
Posted by Shel Holtz on 11/26 at 12:07 PMShel,
I can agree more with the post-disclosure timing. So, it sounds like you suggest all agencies post, in effect, a case study for each and every program?-Mike
Posted by Mike Driehorst on 11/26 at 01:01 PMYep, Mike; exactly.
Posted by Shel on 11/26 at 01:17 PMI like David Berlind’s idea! Does that mean I get to blog all the rude and cranky messages and phone conversations with journalists? That’ll go down well.
Shel, the idea behind a disclosure document is not bad, but the practicalities of it are enough to kill it stone dead. Most practitioners working inside the big PR companies are already so overburdened with approval forms and documentation that I can’t see another form to fill out really making much headway.
I’ve been on both sides of the fence for 20 years and I can exclusively reveal that there are as many stupid journalists as PR people. Including myself from time to time. That’s life.
The difference between journalists and PR people in these situations is that journalists take delight in ‘outing’ the practitioners, while the PROs have to be a little more restrained for the sake of their clients.
I have a little difficulty with journalists demanding transparency when many media outlets go out of their way to hide details of which journalists work on what beat. No wonder they get so many misdirected pitchesPosted by Andrew on 11/27 at 12:36 AMAndrew, I used the Berlind example to convey the idea that disclosure is coming whether we manage it or somebody else does. The proposal, on the other hand, has nothing to do with journalists, but rather with a means by which we can portray the processes we use to accomplish our work.
As Dov Seidman points out his how book, “How,” the only thing that differentiates a company from its competition is HOW we do things, not WHAT we do (since that can be duplicated by anybody in short order).
As for the time it takes, if we’re doing our jobs well, we’re writing a project plan anyway. If it takes a decent writer more than 15 or 20 minutes to adapt that plan into a one-sheet case study, you have to wonder what they’re doing in this business to begin with.
Posted by Shel Holtz on 11/27 at 05:40 AMShel, certainly more transparency is coming.
If we are going to manage the situation then we should actively manage the process rather than producing a one-page document after the fact. We need to make sure that it doesn’t go wrong in the first place - we have to look at the ‘what’ is being made transparent. If its a rubbish process then transparency will highlight that, but it won’t solve the problem.
A one-page document will take 15-20 minutes but I think its effectiveness will reflect the time taken
Posted by Andrew on 11/27 at 05:59 AMAndrew, EXACTLY. If it’s a rubbish process, then transparency will highlight that! But companies that produce rubbish won’t be inclined to produce a case study. Hence, the ability for those who spin gold to separate themselves from the pack. And the 15-20 minutes is for editing an existing document that presumably took considerably longer, not for creation of a wholly new document.
Posted by Shel Holtz on 11/27 at 06:27 AMThe case studies are much needed. Of course this is a post campaign process, so how does this method keep bad practices from occuring? I understand the frustration. All of us are still learning in the social media world, but there are some definite black and white tactics. Those who cross the line are knowingly doing so and will continue until their practice is financially compromised.
A case study does not solve the root problem: middle management practice/teaching to up-and-coming PRs. We can’t keep slapping bandaids on the symptoms/issues.
Posted by Lauren Vargas on 11/27 at 07:05 AMLauren, in the short term, this isn’t designed to keep bad practices form occurring. I’m pessimistic about anything keeping bad practices from occurring. Unfortunatley, those bad practices are being communicated broadly through social media and are tainting the entire profession. The goal here is merely to begin balancing the scales by putting the best practices on display. In the longer term, with any luck these solid case studies will heighten expectations and lead more and more practitioners to embrace best practices.
Posted by Shel Holtz on 11/27 at 07:55 AMI think this is a great idea Shel. I posted my thoughts on it here: http://ringblog.typepad.com/corporatepr/2007/11/shels-modest-pr.html
An excerpt: Basing our practices on what we believe to be true, instead of what actually may be the case is what creates and/or supports the inertia that leaves the field open to unethical practice. Why not take a risk in a positive direction instead of simply dwelling in the negative?
Posted by Elizabeth Albrycht on 11/28 at 12:28 AMWhat about accreditation? If we really want an entire business segment to behave ethically there needs to be some sort of association that regulates the industry. Accountants have the CICA (in Canada,) lawyers have the BAR and the LSUC (again, Canadian) and doctors have an equivalent I’m sure. The only way to really enforce ethical practices is with serious consequences for those who act otherwise, such as being kicked out of the club.
A lot things would have to slide, since there are fewer laws than in accounting and, well, law, but most of what D.A. Greenberg recommended should warrant reprimand.
Posted by Tom Reidt on 11/28 at 11:49 AMOh and I gave some thoughts on the matter myself, from a PR perspective, in my own blog. Click my name to check it out if you like, thanks!
Posted by Tom Reidt on 11/28 at 11:50 AM