Brett Favre, The Packers, and Situations PR Can’t Touch
I like Brett Favre, and I like the Packers. Still do. Both of them. Equally.
Brett put his (former?) team in a sticky situation. The team put Brett in a sticky situation. Neither of them had bad intentions, I don’t believe. The team didn’t do what it did because of money or ill will or any other ulterior motive. Brett didn’t change his mind maliciously; he didn’t crack a kneeling teammate’s eye socket on the sidelines of training camp (Dooh!); he just wants to play. He’s healthy and not one concussion away from big problems, like Steve Young when he made his heart-wrenching decision to give up the game he loves.
Brett changed his mind. What we don’t understand sometimes is that these guys are addicted to this game. Methhead addicted. Believe it or not, it means more to them than what it means to even the fiercest fan. Go on nfl.com sometime and watch the Hall of Fame induction speeches. It’ll tear you up.
The Packers made a football, organizational and business decision before or after March of this year and they stuck with it. Can’t argue that. They didn’t need Ari Fleischer to help spin anything — not that he did a superlative job in the 11th hour anyway.
No amount of PR spin on either side could have resolved the odd, uncomfortable situation that’s occurred. Each party should just stand tall in the pocket and do their job, and they will.
That said, John Sprecher wrote a great posting in the Small Biz Times blog for the local Milwaukee business journal regarding lessons learned from this drawn-out, not-soon-over drama. The bullets:
1. Anticipate your crisis.
2. Articulate your key messages.
3. Appear (and be) sincerely concerned.
4. Identify an articulate spokesperson.
5. Don’t hire a high-profile PR guy at the 11th hour.
Seven Quick Reasons Why People Hate Consultants
I recently asked Ed Callahan of Brightwood Consulting to give me seven off-the-cuff reasons why people hate consultants, and here’s his list:
1. Paid too much.
2. Do too little.
3. Find only problems they can fix.
4. Find ways to charge you (travel, time, etc.).
5. Don’t understand my business, or don’t listen.
6. Only have their solutions, regardless of my problem.
7. Consultant jokes are always top of mind: What does a consultant do when they see light at the end of the tunnel? Sell more tunnel.
There were a couple more jokes; send me an e-mail with the standard disclaimer and I will repeat them.
The point here? Don’t embrace the stereotype if you’re a consultant, or if you’re perceived to be one.
Why Use a Strategic Planning Process?
- It will help us find short-cut paths to gaining and sustaining the attention of our audience. It helps us start the customer conversation the right way, increasing the chance that they’ll listen. The clock is ticking, and they’re not going to take it on themselves to figure out what it is you’re selling and what it means to them. We have to help them out.
- It may modify our pre-conceived notions about which communications tactics to employ. Together, we’ll answer important questions such as, Do you really need a brochure or webpage or video, or is your time, efforts and money better spent on something entirely different? (Think efficiency; think return on investment).
- Are you talking to different audiences that require specific messages and tactics? This is called segmentation, and it can make things easier, not harder. Ten years ago, for instance, Americans aged 60+, as a general demographic, did not use the Internet as much as those 25-34. Today that’s changed radically. They have the time, the experience (now), and the need to stay in touch that puts them on the Internet as much as any other demographic. Let’s make sure we’re talking in the best way possible to those we need to reach.
- Is everything you’re doing communications-wise in line with what you need to say? Are all of these elements supporting one another? [Again, I'll sneak in efficiency and ROI, because it applies.]
What is Strategic Communications Planning?
Strategic marketing communications planning is a process that allows an organization and its communications partners to make good decisions regarding what is said within various communications tactics, how it is said, why it is said, to whom it is said, and when this messaging is deployed.
It’s always customer or audience focused, meaning it allows the organization to take the customers’ or audiences’ point of view by asking key questions:
- What needs or problems move you to consider buying from our company?
- What improvements in your personal or business life can we enable or improve?
- Which market segments are attracted to our products or services?
- Which motivations or values lead you to decide to purchase our products or services?
- What changes or trends are affecting your or attraction to products or services like ours?
Is strategic planning a strict mandatory? No. Oftentimes, tactics are tactics and can be accomplished well with knowledge already acquired. But when the big picture looms in a tough market it can be an invaluable source for all communications elements. More on how it can happen to come.
How Branding Professional Services is like Climbing the Corporate Ladder
The steps you take to brand and market your professional services firm is not radically different from your steps up the corporate ladder. In either case, it’s typically not an overnight accomplishment - and if it is, you’ve probably done something disingenuous or perhaps illegal to get there. Is that the “60 Minutes” van outside?
Selling services is selling people - primarily yourself and secondarily your firm as a group of diverse people with a similar, cohesive goal. So, where do you start building that brand and planting the seeds that grow the elusive word-of-mouth success?
Start with your cube neighbors. Do they know what you’re about and what you’re doing? Can your employees, associates, partners, accountant, attorney, and current customers recite your elevator pitch? Are you staying in contact with them with news, developments, accomplishments? It’s a captive audience and they can be your biggest advocate.
Don’t set off the BS alarm. Start with talking in plain English, everywhere. On your website, in written and oral communications, in your collateral material. Buzzwords are for you and your comrades. The people don’t get them and glaze over when you use them. Not a good thing.
This is the first step to what James Gilmore and Joseph Pine term “exceptional authenticity” in their book Authenticity: What Consumers Really Want. Gilmore and Pine remind service providers in particular that “people tend to perceive as authentic that which is done exceptionally well, executed individually and extraordinarily by someone demonstrating human care.”
Become that helpful, smart coworker. Be a thought leader in your area of expertise and give away your ideas at every turn. Become an expert and the media, other influencers, and eventually the right customers will stop by your cube and form a line.
Use the web as a forum for raising your stature. Blog, write and distribute white papers and case studies about what you’re doing. Speak at events. Call reporters back within five minutes when they do call you.
Tell your story until your voice fails - or until you are promoted. Individual self-promotion and professional services self-promotion is essentially the same thing. The key is creating and refining efficiency in your message - meaning discovering and developing your spiel, then creating all the fun stuff - logos, taglines, websites, printed materials, ads and press releases.
NY Post Adding Video? Scary….
The day of my first-ever trip to NYC was the day after Sonny Bono was tragically killed on the ski slope. The page one image of the tabloid showed a distraught Cher overwritten with the bold headline, “I’ll Miss You, Babe.” For some twisted reason, that paper made it into my briefcase and back home to NC. And, no, I don’t still have it.
Now the Post is adding video to its web presence. Look out tmz.com, there’s a new sensationalist on the block. With tmz’s new television counterpart, once again the Post is behind the technological curve, but this foray should be interesting nonetheless.
NFL Films: “Seven Seconds of All That’s Good About Football”
NFL Films, the $50M 300-employee adjunct to the hallowed league has filmed every game since 1962 on moody 16mm film. If you’re not familiar with the unmistakable three-quarters speed replay with orchestral background music, then you’re just not a football fan.
Now, according to Wired, the group is working to digitize the entire collection. So far, they’ve made it back to 1992 and have 110TB of football history-slash-data.
The driving reason for this is to provide easily editable footage for the expanding NFL Network, which opens the vault for fans of this stuff. Let’s hope going forward they never change that “mythology” achievable shooting with authentic 16mm film.
Nielsen Reports Overall US Ad Spending Down, Online Spending Still Rising
Newspaper and local radio advertising continue to lose ground over the the first half of 2007, according to Nielsen. Both are victims to the Internet’s rise as a news and entertainment go-to source.
While overall spending is down 0.5%, Internet, national magazines, national Sunday supplements and outdoor are on the rise, as is smaller-market spot TV.
Redesigning, Rebranding, Relaunching without Customer Insight is Futile
Ted Mininni, president of Design Force, writes in the Marketing Profs blog about the tendency to put a new face on a product to try to achieve instant fresh appeal with consumers. Whether is repackaging, a new package design, or a new name to the same old stuff, this represents a quick-fix mentality that often leaves out the insight of the buyer.
A better use of time and resources, writes Mininni, is to get clear, usable feedback from customers:
Getting consumer feedback is a vital aspect of conducting an internal audit. Spending time, capital, and human resources on this exercise, if done thoroughly, is never fruitless. Never a waste of money. It’s the best bang for your marketing buck.
In fact, the results may surprise some executives and lead them back to reinstituting those products, those policies, and those brand values that made them successful in the first place.
Survey Ranks Corporate Marketing Challenges
Check out the results of the three-minute online survey of marketers from My Creative Team.
