Pit Bulls and Labradors - The Dominant Narrative Theory

Visual Explanation for the Failure of Traditional Media

2011-03-12T19:29:00.003-05:00

7:00 p.m. EST Saturday, March 12, 2011MSNBC Online (msnbc.msn.com):MSNBC on my teevee:Compare and contrast ...var _sttoolbar = {}stBlogger.init('http://w.sharethis.com/widget/?tabs=web%2Cpost%2Cemail&charset=utf-8&style=default&publisher=adc5da21-aeaf-4c8c-9e47-29b2915bb0cf&popup=true&embeds=true');

Meetups, Tweetups and Burning Man

2011-03-10T20:24:00.012-05:00

On Saturday I’ll be leading a discussion with some of the Tri-State’s most prominent social media voices at the March round-up of New Media Cincinnati.NMC is a group of professionals, students, special interest bloggers, activists, consultants, freelancers … you name it who share a passion for connecting and sharing with other people in social media channels.In real life.Meatspace.We’ll be

Leadership, Dr. King and, The Drum Major Instinct

2011-01-17T21:10:00.004-05:00

And what will you do when you get there?I was honored to be a part of the Martin Luther King Legacy Awards breakfast with my colleagues from Powers Agency this morning. By “a part,” of course I mean that I sat there and drank their coffee and ate their turkey sausage. And applauded. A lot. And almost cried a couple of times, but enough about me.At the end of the program, one of the honorees, Mr.

TSA Relents, Revises "Enhanced Pat-Down"

2010-11-22T20:01:00.012-05:00

TSA Announces Changes to Pat-Down Procedures for ChildrenWASHINGTON – November 22, 2010 – The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) today announced changes to its “Enhanced Pat-down” security procedures at U.S. airports affecting children and teens flying over the busy holiday travel season. These changes are designed to reduce the trauma and apprehension some airline passengers –

Whatever Happened to the Social Media Revolution?

2010-11-04T00:19:00.006-04:00

After the transformational election of 2008, many so-called social media “experts” declared the old model of running a political campaign to be dead.The mantra was that MyBarackObama.com and hundreds of independently launched sites and Facebook pages proved that power had indeed gone to the people. All we needed to do was engage these audiences, motivate them to incremental action and, well WIN!

Live-Tweeting or Live-Blogging: A Lesson in Convergence

2010-11-02T22:51:00.011-04:00

A story, with a lesson:Live blogging any event that people outside would like to attend is a great way to gain followers, position your social media voice, and establish clearly how you’re using the channel. We know that.But ignore the connections between NEW(!) media and traditional powerhouses at your own peril.My boss at the agency was part of a panel discussion where leaders of prominent

The Revolution Indeed Will Be Tweeted

2010-10-05T21:37:00.006-04:00

At least at first.[In which he offends the literary gods by confronting Malcolm Gladwell]Okay, if you haven’t read Gladwell’s article, go read it now. We’ll still be here. I promise.As I wander around the Midwest talking to companies and professional groups about social media, one of my favorite opening slides is a simple one: Social Media Doesn’t Matter.That’s right; the people who have

It’s Not Them, It’s You: Selling Social Media to the C-Suite

2010-08-08T20:21:00.003-04:00

A couple of weeks ago, my colleague, Andy Sullivan, and I were in my office talking about – what else? – social media. At one point, after seeing a third or fourth college intern walk by outside I interrupted: “You know, to those guys, hearing us talk about social media is like us overhearing Dan Pinger and Charlie Powers talk about the phone.”See? I can dial a specific number and communicate

Spokeo.com, Privacy and the Triumph of Facts Over Truth

2010-05-04T22:07:00.007-04:00

“You better look at this,” she said.This turned out to be the shiny new Spokeo site, the latest social media aggregator/data-mining webby that in all likelihood will move the needle on more blood pressure gauges than anything else.Privacy advocates (disclosure: of which I am one) will see this as a threat to all that is sacred in the long twilight struggle against our entire lives being digitized

Context Rules Marketing, Too

2010-04-13T19:11:00.005-04:00

Direct marketing is a three-legged stool: Audience, Offer, and Content. But context still matters, maybe more than any of the other three.In a previous post, I mentioned an old gig I had at Cornerstone Brands, a direct marketing company/retailer. Their flagship brand is Frontgate, which offers high-quality functional items for affluent homeowners. The tagline for Frontgate is Outfitting America’s

Tyson Foods Proves Value of Focus in Cause Branding

2010-04-11T21:23:00.010-04:00

Curly: Do you know what the secret of life is? [holds up one finger] This. Mitch: Your finger? Curly: One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that and the rest don't mean shit. Mitch: But, what is the "one thing?" Curly: [smiles] That's what *you* have to find out. -- Source---------Ed Nicholson draws a bright line between cause marketing and what he calls cause branding. As director of

Content May Be King but Context Rules

2010-04-03T23:05:00.005-04:00

Easter is the highest of holy days in Christendom. Nobody does Easter like the Catholics (we Catholics actually, in the interest of disclosure). Easter is so important that the Feast itself actually lasts eight days and the season 50 days. And no Mass is more important than the Easter Vigil, which happens between darkness and sunrise on Holy Saturday. It’s the full-on bells-and-smells, bonfires

We’re All Smug B@stards Now

2010-03-29T21:17:00.004-04:00

There’s an unwritten rule among people who write jokes. If I tell you an original joke, you are free to retell it. The first three times, it’s only polite to mention where you got it. But after that, drive it like you stole it.Over at Marketing with Meaning, Bob Gilbreath is giving us the rundown on the sights, sounds and lessons of SXSWi10. As I didn’t get to make the trip this year, I’m

BlogWell Cincinnati April 7th 2010

2010-03-14T16:26:00.007-04:00

One of the best professional development series in social media is coming to town with BlogWell Cincinnati April 7th at the Duke Energy Center. It’s an impressive line-up of professionals using social media to advance the business objectives of their respective organizations. The line-up is heavy with practical experience and you can expect lessons that will apply beyond the digital realm and

Language Doesn’t Just Frame the Argument. Sometimes it Decides It.

2010-02-21T20:36:00.003-05:00

What are you for? What are you against?The words used to ask the question can go a long way to framing your perception of the question, and the position to which you commit.Last month, evil genius public relations consultant & researcher Frank Luntz circulated a memo to his clients on how to frame – and ultimately derail – financial reform legislation in the United States Congress.No matter how

NFL Corrects a Bad Call

2010-02-01T21:25:00.003-05:00

The Squire beat me to the punch, but I see from this story that the NFL has relented (at least a little)in its constant pursuit of people who love them too much. [What’s even more interesting is that the league may have been trying to protect the fleur-de-lis, in which case France would have a lot of explaining to do.]People who bill themselves as social media “experts” like to tell you this is

So, No. We Won't Be Paying For Your Content.

2010-01-24T18:48:00.007-05:00

Newspaper publishers seem to have a near limitless capacity for misunderstanding their own business model. The latest scheme by the Gray Lady to monetize online news on the backs of its audience will doubtless bear that out, though probably not without unfortunate results. What made the New York Times and other publishers successful were their audiences. They built those audiences by do

Making a Federal Case of the David vs. Goliath Narrative

2010-01-16T15:45:00.009-05:00

Long-time friend of Cincinnati Social Media’s old friend Jack Greiner has been all over the saga of the South Butt. If you haven’t been following along, this titanic legal battle pits The North Face, a division of VF Corporation, (NYSE: VFC) a $7 billion maker and importer of branded apparel, and Jimmy Winkelmann, a teenager from Missouri with a Web site.Goliath v. WinkelmannI am not making that

The Second Easiest Way to Get Press

2009-11-02T07:49:00.001-05:00

... or: Of Latvian Craters and Aqua Teen Brite LitesWhen people reported a bright light falling from the sky and the sound of an explosion led authorities to a large (and apparently geometrically perfect) crater near Mazsalaca, Latvia last week, skeptics were quick to point out the unlikelihood of it being a meteor strike. Still, the lure of the unknown and the desire to report the news first –

#pepsifail, Conditional Apologies & Chick3nsh!t

2009-10-14T19:14:00.005-04:00

We’ve talked about conditional apologies before. Y’know, that stuff you say when you’ve made somebody really angry even though you said (or did) what you meant in the first place. Politicians do it all the time. “I’m deeply sorry if my comments, out of context, offended the good and hard-working Tralfalmadorians among us, but …”So, are you sorry that you said it or that you got called out on it?

Friday Freakin' - I'm Working on It

2009-10-02T14:48:00.000-04:00

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Words Matter ... If you actually want to, y'know ... WIN

2009-10-02T07:28:00.001-04:00

We covered this with the Clean Coal debate: What you call things the first time you ask your audience to think about something realyreally matters. In the early 90s, and -- in case you missed it -- again now, the entire Beltway community seems obsessed with something called "Health Care Reform." Statistics, and indeed insults, fly. Some more trustworthy or sane than others, as the case may

We Obviously Live in Very Dangerous Times

2009-09-28T08:25:00.000-04:00

I mean, you can’t even leave your house anymore without fear of being assaulted, robbed, or worse.If you don’t believe me, just turn on the teevee news. I dare you. Chances are there’s a pretty girl missing … somewhere. There’s likely also an unexplained (at least to us) home invasion of some sort that just happened (BREAKING NOW!) in a town we heard of once. Maybe we drove past the exit on that

What Does "Clean" Really Mean Anyway?

2009-07-31T07:56:00.000-04:00

I keep revisiting this because there are so many lessons to be learned from some very smart people on both sides. When I started talking about it back in March of 08, I criticized this group for using the language of their opponents and thereby letting them frame the argument. In recent efforts, however, they're employing the time-honored art of verbal jujitsu -- and some cool images -- to take

Gates Arguments and Good Cop/Bad Cop

2009-07-30T08:40:00.001-04:00

Tonight the long-awaited Beer Summit on American Race Relations is being held at the White House. Where you stand on the arrest of Henry Louis Gates kinda depends on where you sit.Because after all the discussions, arguments, jokes, whatever ... most already have made up their minds about what happened last week when the Cambridge Police were called to the home of the famous Harvard

Just Kill a Guy

2009-07-06T08:14:00.001-04:00

Early (well, earlier) in my public relations career I was confronted with the client or boss we all know. In this case he was the CEO of his organization. He leaned across the conference table and, with his eyeglasses in one hand and the other hand clenched in ball pounding the table said, “Your job, young man [I was] is to get my name in the paper.”I was just young enough that I couldn’t control

Triumph of the Punditocracy

2009-06-29T08:46:00.007-04:00

Lots of comparisons are being made in the news between Michael Jackson’s untimely demise and the loss experienced by previous generations when first Elvis Presley, and then John Lennon died unexpectedly.There is no comparison. First, the obvious: Artists of previous generations dominated their medium is ways that nobody ever will dominate again. But here’s the biggest difference: When Lennon and

Everybody Knows Trial Lawyers are Out of Control, Right?

2009-06-23T08:37:00.001-04:00

We are a litigious society.We all know that. It barely gets noticed when someone says it anymore because, y’know … sky blue, water wet. Some lady got $3 million for spilling coffee for crisakes. Yeah, we get it. So much of our national productivity is sucked away by lawyers trying to score a big judgment and a hefty one-third lawyer’s share that if we only could rein this in we’d all have

There's only ONE Original

2009-05-22T08:46:00.001-04:00

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Media Relations Making Lemonade ...

2009-05-18T07:11:00.000-04:00

And that's how a shiny new narrative is born.As Americans grow accustomed during the recession to spending more time at home and living in the same places longer, home-improvement companies are regaining momentum.See the rest here.var _sttoolbar = {}stBlogger.init('http://w.sharethis.com/widget/?tabs=web%2Cpost%2Cemail&charset=utf-8&style=default&publisher=adc5da21-aeaf-4c8c-9e47-29b2915bb0cf&

Try to get it out of your head

2009-05-15T10:44:00.002-04:00

Happy Friday

When Catholics Attack!

2009-05-14T08:22:00.000-04:00

There’s a big stink up in South Bend over whether the University of Notre Dame should or shouldn’t have invited the President of the United States (!) to address its graduating class of 2009. Really, what institution of higher learning wouldn’t love to have a commencement speaker who, aside from being a constitutional scholar, the holder of a juris doctor from Yale, also happens to be a guy with

And I Shall Smite Them with My Social Media Hammer of Justice

2009-05-11T08:56:00.001-04:00

The second great narrative about PR is the shiny tool. In the last two decades there has been an endless supply of new tactics and applications that have changed the profession forEVAH.Seriously.Many of them have to a degree: at least in the sense that where practitioners spend most of their time – at least as a team – has changed dramatically. For example, PR pros very rarely walk into a

Hey, boy, where you been?

2009-05-10T21:40:00.004-04:00

This is the question one of my older colleagues asked me a couple of weeks ago. After showing him how the RSS machine worked, I think I implied a more consistent level of activity here.Hoping to fix that shortly.In the meantime, Cincinnati Social Media really has taken off, both as a movement (love that word … so vague …) and as an organization. I make a point to avoid blogging about teh social

Behold the Venn Diagram of Truth

2009-03-23T08:33:00.000-04:00

Successful public relations counsel is based on experience and observation. It’s not easy per se … in the sense that anybody can do it without really knowing much about it. But neither is it terribly complicated.Unlike the law, accounting, philosophy or countless other professions, most of the top finishing schools that each spring release thousands of freshly degreed PR practitioners on an

Does CNBC Get its Reputation Back?

2009-03-13T22:00:00.008-04:00