Love-Hate Relationship with PR

I love the good that PR can do, and yet I hate its power to promote and support evil.

Jon Stewart has been in the news recently for taking on CNBC -- specifically investment "watchdog" Jim Cramer -- and other news programs for not asking the tough questions and providing the "real" information about investment scams, such as that by Bernie Madoff. Cramer and others, in effect, had fallen for the "evil PR message" from Wall Street.

Rachel Maddow, on her evening talk show on MSNBC, recently skewered the PR agency Burson-Marsteller for being the servant of evil. "When evil needs public relations," she said on her show, "evil has Burson-Marsteller on speed dial." She gave example after example of how B-M has been hired to handle "crisis communication" and "reputation management" issues for people, countries or groups such as AIG, which accepted a bailout from us, the U.S. public; Blackwater after some of its members killed 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad; Saudi Arabia three days after 9/11 (remember, most of the hijackers were Saudi Arabians, not Iraqis or Afhanis); the military junta in Argentina in 1976 after it overthrew the legitimately elected government; Indonesia after the genocide of residents of East Timor a few years ago; and even the ironically named company "Spin Master," the maker of Aqua Dots, the bead craft toy that contained the chemical in the "date rate" drug and that made children sick when they chewed on the beads. Wouldn't you feel proud having that type of reputation for your PR agency?

Then there's Edelman, a PR agency I happen to admire for some of its work with social media and its annual "trust barometer" (a list of whom we tend to trust most for information). Edelman sponsors the annual New Media Academic Summit that I find so useful; in fact, attending the summits has helped me reshape our PR curriculum. And yet Edelman was responsible for violating part of the PRSA Code of Ethics when it created a blog supposedly written by people traveling in their RV from Wal-Mart to Wal-Mart and writing about their adventures. What Edelman "forgot" to do, however, was to be transparent and admit to readers that all of the blogs were written by Edelman operatives, not "real folks" -- you know, the ones Edelman's trust barometer says "we" tend to believe more than "PR hacks."

This got me thinking about what we, in the PR education business, tell you about the "father" of PR, Edward Bernays. He's the one who first spoke of "counseling on public relations" rather than "doing propaganda" within society. Do you remember that Bernays taught the first course on PR? Do you remember the story of how he got women to start smoking in public during a march in an Easter parade in NYC? Now, this is a "funny" story. You see, Bernays was hired by George Hill, president of the American Tobacco Corporation, to find out what would make women overcome the taboo (reinforced by males) of smoking in public. Borrowing from his uncle Sigmund Freud's ideas, Bernays hired psychoanalyst A.A. Brill to run a focus group and find out what smoking meant to women. His finding? Cigarettes were a symbol of the penis and of men's sexual power. So Bernays set about to persuade women that smoking would make them feel more powerful and independent. He got a group of young debutantes (he told the media they were "women's rights" marchers) to light up at a set time during the parade (just where Bernays had alerted the media they would be). Then framed the lit cigarettes as "torches of freedom" (which true Americans wouldn't support this?), and the media ate this up. Sales of cigarettes rose dramatically as women's health, eventually, began to deteriorate (but boy, were the women -- and the cigarette manufacturers -- happy!).

Bernays is recognized as playing a major role in changing us from a "need" society into a "desire" society. He believed humans should be looked upon as selfish, irresponsible "consumers" who needed to be controlled, rather than as rational "citizens" who could thrive under democracy.

Imagine what type of conversation George Lakoff (remember, he's the one who said that most of our thinking is unconscious and that we need to reframe our view of America to be more caring and responsive to people's needs) might have with Edward Bernays. Both believe in the power of the unconscious. But Bernays felt people needed -- and wanted -- to feel as if they were in control whereas they actually weren't. Lakoff, I propose, would argue people need -- and want -- to have those who are in control be responsive to the real needs of people.

This seems to me to be the true promise of PR: to help one another achieve a common good, to share the best we have with one another.

Preditors Bring New Life to Old Media

That’s right, I mean “preditors” (online publisher/editors), not “predators” (people who prey on others).

I just read an interesting piece in The New York Times (“Slicing Decades of Video for New Life on the Web” by Brian Stelter). Stelter describes how media companies are repackaging old TV footage and posting it on the Web. One such media company is Discovery Communications (DC), which owns The Discovery Channel, TLC, Animal Planet and the Science Channel, among others.

Preditors search through old video files from past shows that likely will not make it to the air again. Yet the material is still interesting, still relevant. People want to watch the footage – especially when it’s repackaged into 7-minute or shorter bits – and advertisers are clamoring to support the postings.

This is a great example of a company paying attention to trends (people watching video online or on their cell phones) and finding a way to meet customers’ needs while making a profit.

As a PR practitioner, you need to keep your eyes open for similar opportunities for your clients. For example, maybe your client has a backlog of graphic images it might want to repackage and sell – one image at a time or on a subscription basis – to similar organizations without graphic designers. You could offer this service online and maybe even attract related advertisers to help pay for the space.

Or what if you work for a client that promotes nutrition education. Perhaps you have “evergreen” newsletter stories about food-borne diseases, such as salmonella, that would be particularly relevant now. You could create a Web site with links to these stories, or you could repackage them as hints or posts on a blog.

Can you think of other examples of what companies – especially traditional media – might be able to repackage and sell online? What about newspapers? Do they have old information that might be worth something to someone? Or might they have new information people might pay for?

"Stuff White People Like" -- and how we get information

Yesterday while we were watching TV, my husband was also scanning the Internet, looking for the blog "Stuff White People Like" (http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/), which he had heard mentioned on NPR and then told me about. I continued the cycle by going online myself, checking out the blog, then clicking on a link to "The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard" (http://www.storyofstuff.com/), which gave me the idea for this blog, and now I'm writing to you.

Think about how old (TV, radio) and new (blogs, Web sites, streaming video) media work together with face-to-face communication to generate a conversation. Can we doubt, as PR practitioners, that we must think about how people think (often as a "stream of consciousness") and make sure we provide information in many ways so that our publics can find our messages?

The blog "Stuff White People Like" started as a distraction for young author Christian Lander, who worked in advertising. It's described as being for "left-wing, upper-class Caucasians." While I don't fit into the "upper-class" category," I find his blog hilarious ... and right on the mark. Here are a few of the things he says white people like: hummus, sea salt, "The Daily Show"/"Colbert Report," being an expert on YOUR culture, public radio, New Balance shoes (that's all my husband wears), promising to learn a new language, grammar (ahem) and recycling (double ahem).

Of course, this is an oversimplification, but it does play into the idea of a buyer persona -- knowing whom you are targeting with your messages, products and services.

While scanning the blog, I saw a reference to "The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard" (http://www.storyofstuff.com/). I just had to click on it ... and then, I just had to keep listening to the 20:40 minute streaming video (because that's what guilt-ridden white people do). In the process, I found an answer to a question I'd posed to myself last week: How is it possible for a company to sell something (e.g., a cotton blouse made in China) so cheaply (e.g., $4 on super sale) and still make money? What about the cost of planting, harvesting and milling the cotton; cutting and sewing the blouse; packaging and shipping the garment from one continent to another; warehousing and then shipping the garment to the store; advertising, displaying and then selling the blouse, packed in a store-brand bag; and, somewhere along the line, paying rent, utility bills, wages and taxes? Well, "The Story of Stuff" answers the question.

As PR professionals, we must be aware of how people get information and how we can help them find what they need and want to know.