Creative Public Relations for a Digital World

Is any industry more challenging than retail? Not only is the business tough, but your employees are your brand. And those employees are notoriously transient and often underpaid, overworked, and just plain bored.

And sometimes they do things that are just plain stupid. It takes only one misstep, powered by social media, to create a full-blown crisis. (Remember the rogue Domino’s video? The FedEx “special delivery”?) And what happens when the business is franchised? Fragmented communications only makes things worse.

The latest case in point is Papa John’s Pizza. When Minhee Cho, a 24-year-old Korean-American New Yorker, ordered a pizza at an uptown franchise, her experience was topped by an insulting ethnic reference on her customer receipt.

(Now, I once worked in a restaurant and often noted details about customers to match orders with faces. But my comments were limited to “red sweater” or “baseball cap.” Not even a “bald guy” escaped my pen.)

As it happens, Cho is a social-media-savvy communications manager for ProPublica. After she posted a photo of the damning receipt on Twitter, it swiftly became the crisis du jour, serving up a reputational mess for the chain.

To its credit, Papa Johns was quick to respond. It sacked the offending employee, posted an apology on its Facebook page, and responded individually to Twitter complaints. But just as things might have cooled, employees from the actual store were quoted about the incident. Their take was different from corporate’s.

One manager at the franchise complained that the brouhaha was “disruptive” to their business. Another defended the fired employee to Gothamist, explaining, “It’s a busy place, and it was a way to identify her and her order. We’ll write…’the guy in the green shirt.’”

Hmmm. How is “green shirt” like “lady chinky eyes”? Yet, even the franchise operations partner seemed to agree that the offense was minor, explaining that decorum and professionalism in minimum-wage jobs are hard to come by.

Problem is, he’s right. Just last month, Chick-Fil-A was roasted in the media when a California employee handed receipts to two Asian customers which identified them as “Ching” and “Chong.” And a notation on a Pizza Hut receipt given to an African-American customer sparked a lawsuit. The offensive receipt reports are such that Gawker has invited its readers to send copies of horrible receipts or stories of “casual racism” at QSRs.

So, this may be just a slice of an ugly trend. And it’s a reminder to all retail companies that they are ultimately responsible for employee behavior, and that they must own the damage control measures for any breach of service, quality, or worse. Anyone can hire a bad apple. But when you can’t control your own brand communications well enough to issue a coherent, timely response to a problem, it’s a huge obstacle to brand reputation management.

Papa John’s needs to go one better than the apology. They, and their competitors, should institute mandatory cultural awareness training for all staff, insist that headquarters clear all media interviews, and impose harsh penalties on franchisees who don’t follow the rules. Anything less is a reputational threat and a recipe for bad PR.

When Microsoft announced that the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show would be its last, the news unleashed a spate of predictions about the largest technology conference on earth. Is CES in decline? Could the show that attracts 130,000 attendees, including most of the biggest names in tech, actually disappear? (Anyone else remember COMDEX?)

Columnists like Troy Wolverton makes the case that CES has peaked. Changes in the formerly seasonal product launch cycle, the importance of operating systems over hardware design, the fact that Apple long ago chose to sit out CES – all could point to a gradual downshift for the Vegas extravaganza, he claims.

Others point out that many of the gadgets unveiled in Las Vegas aren’t destined for success. And it’s true that blockbuster products shown at CES are often PR statements – examples of engineering prowess or trial balloon items designed to build buzz or elicit feedback. Many never will be “productized,” to use a verb that once made me cringe, but that, after countless CES’s, now rolls off my tongue as fluently as “OLED” or “Bellagio.”

Then there’s the annual Vegas pilgrimage itself, with its cruel post-holiday timing, long travel lines, and even longer hours for attendees. It’s truly the trip you love to hate. And, yes, I do remember COMDEX, the once-indomitable computer expo that faded away in 2004 after a few years of decline.

But, still. The show that used to be a haggle-fest for manufacturers and retailers over fourth-quarter wares is much more than just a gear-and-gadget gala. It’s about connections, both the human and the unwired kind. Networks and networking. In addition to the manufacturer-retail connection, it’s a hot spot for VCs looking for investments, resellers, engineers, importers, and job-switchers. There’s simply nowhere else on earth where you can make or renew as many contacts, take as many meetings, or broker as much business in the business that is technology.

And, unlike COMDEX, whose decline started when it limited media attendance, CES is about PR. As noted, where there’s cool stuff, there will be media. And there’s always cool stuff here. For many exhibitors, a big booth and impressive product line-up is a show of strength versus competitors. It’s bragging rights among frenemies who may even share offshore manufacturing facilities. A kind of muscle-flexing for geeks. Sure, there are companies, like Apple, and now, Microsoft, that are powerful enough to generate PR independent of the show, but they’re in the minority.

Ultimately, Microsoft’s retreat from Vegas may say more about the changing relevance of its own products and the twilight of the PC era than anything else. But whatever the case, I’m betting on CES for many, many years to come.

Wendi, we hardly knew ye.

The all-too-brief period in which Mrs. Rupert Murdoch took to Twitter was thrilling for Murdoch-watchers, social media pros, and PR  types. It seemed another example of the faux-democratizing power of the social Web. It also showed the cleverness of Ms. Deng, and her uncanny ability to humanize her much-reviled husband. (Who can forget the video of her bitch-slapping his pie assailant?)

Of course, @Wendi_Deng appeared rather quietly on Twitter after the much bigger news that her husband had embraced social media with a Twitter account of his own. Yet, unlike Sir Rupert’s terse and fairly mundane observations, @Wendi_Deng’s tweets were fun. They weren’t nakedly personal, but they revealed tantalizing tidbits about the Murdochian relationship, through kittenish exchanges that took us back to the (now sad) innocent days of @aplusk and @mrskutcher. Ah, billionaire love. Even the rich and famous flirt, bicker, and make up, but now they do it in front of thousands of followers. Fake Wendi actually scolded her husband for one of his cranky tweets, and he promptly deleted the post. Kind of cute.

But the delicious @Wendi_Deng was an imposter, of course. The fact that Twitter gave the account the familiar blue checkmark has undermined its supposedly bulletproof verification process for boldfaced names. Fake Wendi was also an embarrassment for News Corp., which seemed uncertain when asked about the account by the press. But the reddest faces may be at media outlets like the Associated Press and the British Guardian and Telegraph, which breathlessly reported the Deng account as real. And then there’s Sir Rupert himself, whose account is legit; did he even know that @Wendi_Deng was fake, or does he just like a bit of Twitter domination?

My brief fascination with fake Wendi got me thinking about how and why the real celebrities often pale in comparison to faux blogs or social media accounts that usurp their famous names. Writers, for instance, aren’t always interesting on Twitter; maybe the medium is just too constraining.

But stars like entertainers can also be dull. Many seem uncomfortable with the medium; they name-drop (or so it seems to us regular folks); they use Twitter as a broadcast medium chiefly to promote projects; or they’re just plain boring. Airplane rage notwithstanding, @alecbaldwin was an exception, with his witty, lightning-fast, and unapologetically cocky updates. Baldwin is sorely missed on my boldfaced list since shutting his account after the Words with Friends intervention late last year.

But, embarrassments aside, fake social media personas aren’t all bad PR; in fact, if you’re a celebrity or a mogul, they let you have it both ways! Those faux tweets and the fresh relevance they bring can breathe new life into a celeb’s image, who then bears no responsibility for the posts. They can simply retreat into full, Garboesque social media silence, whetting our appetite all the more by withdrawing. It’s a classic strategy.

It’s enough to make you wonder if a personality might quietly hire a ghost to impersonate them,  gain attention, play coy for a bit, then issue a furious denial and sit back to watch the ripple effect. A Twitter impersonator in the social media age might just be a signal that you’ve arrived. If so, Mrs. Murdoch has one-upped her mogul husband – and probably not for the first time.

When a serious setback or crisis occurs, not even the most talented PR pro can make it go away. Yet, a poor response invites reputation damage, while proper handling can help mitigate or limit it. Here’s my “Top 10″ list, from a communications perspective, of the most badly handled public situations of the year.

10.  Governor Sam Brownback.  Something tells me the governor’s not in Kansas anymore – at least as far as his reputation goes. Brownback looked like a bully and created an unlikely teen hero with his handling of a nasty tweet about him posted by high school senior Emma Sullivan. Brownback’s staff, who tracked down the teen, put pressure on the school principal to extract an apology from Sullivan. When she ultimately refused, it was Brownback who did the apologizing. Meanwhile, the student’s Twitter following soared from 65 to over 14,000. Who’s sorry now?

9.  Delta. The airline hit rough PR weather when U.S. troops returning from Afghanistan were charged onerous fees for extra baggage, with one squadron spending nearly $3,000 out of personal funds. The disgruntled troops took the story of their rude welcome home to YouTube. Delta reacted about a day late to the video, which swiftly went viral, triggering hundreds of complaints on its blog.  It did end up changing its baggage fee policy for members of the armed services but not without reputation damage.

8.  Groupon.  Groupon’s reputation issues come in contrast to its previous image as a media darling. It started 2011 with that ill-conceived Super Bowl ad, followed by a halfhearted apology after it went wrong. It then ran into more PR hot water later as the company prepared for a much anticipated IPO. Founder Andrew Mason made impolitic remarks in an internal memo that was leaked to The Wall Street Journal, raising questions about “quiet period” violations. The Groupon IPO was a success, but its toughest reputation challenge will be to prove its business model actually works.

7.  Burson-Marsteller.  It’s notable when the world’s largest PR firm handles a crisis this poorly. In May, mega-agency Burson-Marsteller was busted by The Daily Beast‘s Dan Lyons after a clumsily executed “whisper campaign” against Google. The campaign was carried out on behalf of a mystery client who turned out to be Facebook. Not only was Burson guilty of a major ethical breach, but its response seemed to blame the client, which made it look both weak and defensive.

6.  AOL and CrunchFund.  TechCrunch Editor Michael Arrington’s plan to start an investment fund immediately raised conflict of interest questions. More troubling was the response from corporate owner AOL. CEO Tim Armstrong excused the move by referring to TechCrunch’s “different standards” of journalism. He was immediately contradicted by Arianna Huffington, who announced Arrington’s departure from AOL, which was then “clarified” by a subsequent announcement that he remained with AOL Ventures. While AOL struggled to get its stories straight, the incident undermined the credibility of senior management and its content standards.

5.  Netflix. The famous Netflix mea culpa is a good example of a public apology that backfired in a rather spectacular way. Instead of letting its admission of “poor communication” regarding a price increase stand, Netflix used the occasion to announce its split into two units – doubling the cost, and the hassle, for customers. It made the classic mistake of focusing on its business rationale rather than the customer interest and was forced to backpedal.  In the end it was Netflix that paid the price in lost business and a depressed stock value.

4.  The U.S. Congress.  One way to read the summer’s debt ceiling gridlock is a case of too great an emphasis on PR – to the detriment of real issues or progress. Both sides of the debate were so focused on their public posture — Tea Partiers hewing to the no-tax-increase line and progressives preoccupied with blaming the GOP — that everyone looked bad and absolutely nothing was done.

3.  Bank of America.  Its move to institute a $5 monthly debit card fee was not only poor judgment but terrible timing. B of A made the announcement just as the Occupy Wall Street movement was gaining steam. The new fee wasn’t tested, pre-announced, or even particularly well explained to customers, who responded with predictable outrage. Although the bank tried to justify the fee by tying it to new regulations, its argument was ineffectual. It ended up retreating a month later in the face of harsh criticism by consumers, bloggers, and even government officials.

2.  Herman Cain.  Political scandals were rife in 2011, but Cain’s meltdown stood out because he showed real mastery of public communication at the outset (remember “9-9-9″?). Yet when the candidate was hit with allegations of sexual harassment, the campaign’s response was amateurish. Politico sat on the initial story for ten days – an eternity in crisis response time – but Cain’s reactions ranged from denial, defensiveness, and hostility to humor and a plea for privacy. Consistency, credibility, and message control deserted the Cain campaign, and the result is history.

1.  Penn State. No shock here. Penn State will end 2011 taking the trophy for most egregiously bad handling of a crisis. Granted, the allegations against Jerry Sandusky would have been damaging no matter what, but it’s even worse when you consider that the Grand Jury investigation started in 2008. The university had plenty of time to prepare its public communication strategy. But when Sandusky was arrested in November, the statement by ex-President Graham Spanier, in which he called the charges “troubling,” was a study in what not to say.  Its focus on closing ranks and defending those in the know helped turn a shocking scandal into a serious breach of responsibility by the top players.

A version of this post was originally published on MENGBlend.

Over the years, I’ve worked with many startups with a wide range of needs, from brand positioning and messaging to launch publicity. Most have been successful relationships. Yet, more than other client programs, startups need focused attention on business-building strategies and tactics.

Expectations management is key. If they say, “We’re really counting on PR to drive demand, so we’re putting everything into our PR budget,” it’s a red flag. Even the most well-crafted PR program isn’t a replacement for a full marketing plan.

Startups are supposed to have lofty goals. All the more reason why it’s essential to define – and manage – them at the outset. Of course, this is true of any client-agency engagement, but startups are more passionate because they have to be. It’s their job. Which means that it’s our job is to make them see that PR is a better tool for brand visibility and positioning than demand generation. Those who expect to launch a consumer business fueled purely by publicity may be disappointed.

The founder is not the brand. This is where I think Jason Calcanis and others get it wrong. An evangelistic founder is a huge asset, and he or she is usually the most credible media and analyst spokesperson. But, the founder’s vision is only the beginning. And, not every entrepreneur is the best person to sell his story. I’ve worked with those who are either too close or too emotionally invested to connect with media and understand their point of view. A press tour is not a road show.

PR doesn’t stand for press release. A newsstream should flow from the overall business and communications strategy, but the document itself is a commodity. If they’re hiring a PR team for press releases, it’s a waste of money.

Some startups should handle PR internally. It’s not possible  to generalize, but there are many companies – particularly early-stage ones, for whom PR is basically networking and fundraising. For them, a DIY approach can work well.

Finally, PR can’t overcome a mediocre product or flawed business plan.  If it could,  Webvan, Kozmo.com, and Pets.com would be household brands today instead of symbols of vaporized cash – and dreams.