Privacy has become a huge issue on the web with the recent explosion of social networking and social media.  Many even say that Privacy is dead, but that’s an issue for another discussion.  One of the most overlooked areas of privacy is the Public Relations fallout. Many of the biggest debacles include Facebook, AOL, Google,etc.  Here are some PR tips when it comes to dealing with Privacy. 

1.  Make Sure You Clear The Air- Many times a privacy issue comes up and everyone gets the facts wrong.  The telephone game is played, distorting the message.  It goes from some of your information may not be as private as you thought to everything is becoming public.  The first thing you should do is focus on getting a unified message out to as many people as possible.  Focus on the highly critical blogs and publications.  They would rather print corrections, than be caught as a source of misinformation.
2.  React Fast, But Not Blindly-  Something needs to be changed in your application and fast.  It usually happens to be either a) getting rid of the feature all together or b) adding more granular privacy controls.  Don’t have a knee jerk reaction, or you may compromise the actual purpose and effect of the new feature.  Work for a compromise- A feature that provides privacy, but is still a new powerful tool for your users.
3.  Have Someone Important Respond-  When you finally make a decision on what will be done about the decision, there needs to be an important face to the response.  I list the Facebook Beacon debacle below.  One key factor in their response was having Mark Zuckerberg,CEO, respond on their blog, NOT a PR bunny.  The transparency and sincerity NEEDS to be there from someone important.
4. Refer To Your Privacy Policy-  Remember that document your lawyer helped you create that refers to privacy?  Never thought it’d come in handy, right?  Well, refer to that document and update it, if need be.  This is a contract with your users.  Uphold your end of the bargain, and remind users of that.  Seeing things on paper, and knowing it’s in the privacy policy is actually calming.

In the past year or so, tons of Privacy PR disasters have come about.  Here are some of the top picks:

•  Google Reader Shared Items Ruins Christmas
• Facebook Beacon Woes
• AOL Search Result Data Being Leaked and Correlated to Actual Users
• Facebook NewsFeed Debacle  
•  

 

When hiring staff or developers for Publictivity, we like to consider all angles:  experience, education, whether they fit our company culture, location, etc.  It would be dumb not to.  However, depending on the position that we’re trying to fill, some of those things become less important.  For example, if a person approaches us for a developer position and has 10 years of experience, great references, a flawless code sample, but doesn’t necessarily have the most appealing educational background in computer science, we’re still going to give the guy (or girl) a good look.  On the other hand, if we were looking for a CFO, education does matter.  So, here is the question:  Does a degree with a specialization in public relations really matter when hiring staff for your agency?

 

Of course, there are two sides to every issue, but my opinion is that it should not weigh too much on your hiring decision.  While PR certainly has its rules, strategy, and finesse points that could be taught in a book and class, PR is more so about a person’s ability to communicate and spread information effectively, to a targeted audience, through some sort of medium.  This relies heavily on personality and shrewdness of an individual.  It takes a certain kind of person to be a PR professional, so learning how to approach a PR campaign or make a pitch in a book won’t be all that helpful.  My point is, if you are looking to hire additional staff for your agency, look for educational backgrounds that will diversify the skill set of your staff as a whole.

 

What type of educational backgrounds, you ask?  How about someone with a specialization in Social Computing as part of a Master in Science Information?  The University of Michigan has a great looking program that offers this degree.  As part of it, students learn the ins and outs of social networking, user generated content, and online sharing.  The program doesn’t seem to be too technical in nature, and puts heavy emphasis on the study of human relationships and information sharing on the web.  While digging around on the subject, I ran into this Wall Street Journal article that pointed out that the Social Computing programs “tend to draw as much from the sociology, psychology and communications departments as they do from more traditional computer science classes.”

 

Also another good thing to look for is experience in Social Media, which is related, but not exactly the same thing.  A lot of universities are beginning to catch on to this demand and offering courses on the subject.  For example, our friend, Alex de Carvalho, teaches a course at the University of Miami that focuses on Web 2.0 and Social Media for collaboration, community building, and citizen journalism (course # CVJ 596).

 

With or without a formal degree, it’s imperative for a PR professional in this new landscape to understand how new media and online social interactions affect their industry.  I recommend looking for someone who understands this, whether they have good personal and professional experience on the subject, or have learned the ins and outs of it via the classroom.

 

Check out this post by a UK public relations blogger.  He seems to feel the same way, only more “passionately”.

My good friend Melvin at The PR 2.0 Universe wrote a great post on how the Bubble may end up popping not only in Web 2.0, but possibly with PR 2.0.  Since this topic applies to both startups and PR Practitioners, I figured I would take some time analyzing the possibility presented in Melvin’s post by answering two questions. 

1.  Will the tactics of PR 2.0 live on once the Web 2.0 bubble pops? Of course they will.  Like Melvin said, the landscape of media has changed immensely.  If anything, the bubble popping may be a sign that the tactics of PR 2.0 have crossed over to mainstream PR, and not just the Web 2.0 tech crowd.  Social media, blogging, word of mouth marketing, online video, and more are here to stay.  Why?  There is now a pretty clear ROI.  Whether it is measured in pageviews, influence, etc. it is measured somehow.  The way to measure social media influence is a whole other topic, but I won’t digress.  Just because the Web 2.0 bubble pops does not mean these tactics are going away.  Like Melvin also said, there is already such a large investment by PR agencies in social media and web 2.0 strategy.  I wouldn’t reconsider investing less resources in those strategies, but I would consider shifting some of those resources to bridge the gap between old PR/PR 1.0 and PR 2.0.
2.  Will the PR industry see a downturn? This is more of an economic question in some senses, but in short, yes the PR industry will see less revenue brought in as far as technology clients go.  When this so called bubble pops, there will be less startups funded, which means less money to be spent on PR.  We saw this with the first bubble, and it will most likely happen again.  I could be wrong as I see the following as a possible scenario: a) Less startup clients b) Tons of resources invested in PR 2.0 c) These tactics must be put to use somewhere. Since there are significantly less startup clients, there will be a huge push to apply these tactics to larger companies. d) PR 2.0 breaks into the mainstream more than ever now, due to the ability to focus PR 2.0 tactics on more mainstream and larger clients than startups. e) This shift keeps revenues fairly steady. Not growing, but steady.

In closing, it’s hard to say what is going to happen.  I think many people blow the Bubble 2.0 issue out of proportion.  On the other hand, it is something we should all keep in the back of our mind.  

Blogging has hit the mainstream when it comes to making PR pitches.  Most of the PR professionals we have worked with or talked to, always have a strategy for hitting the blogs. Publications like TechCrunch can make or break a startup, or at least get them a lot of initial traction.  A lot of people have asked us, “So how should I pitch bloggers?” So here is a list of tips and hints, along with a few good must read articles related to the subject.

1.  Familiarize Yourself With The Blog-  Find out who the main staff is, what they do, and possibly what they may have done in the past.  Most Gawker blogs list this on the left.  Get a feel for what they write about and certain hot points.  Every blogger has certain companies or technologies they find to be interesting.  For Example, I love enterprise 2.0.  Much more likely to get me to write about Enterprise 2.0 versus An MP3 player.  
2. Don’t Boilerplate and Mess It Up-  Do you know how many times a blogger has gotten an invite to review a product, but the name and contact info is for another blogger?  Many bloggers are used to boilerplate press releases, but at least have some dignity with it.  Try to avoid boilerplate and standardized emails if you can.
3.  Be Relevant- Please please have a clue about what the blog is.  Do not pitch a gadget review to an Enterprise 2.0 blog or vice versa.  Check editorial calendars if the blog has it.  This is more likely to happen on larger blogs like CNET.  Also see what stories they’re running, or try to read posts for what they might be looking for.  For example, Read/Write/Web asked for Facebook collaboration tools.  
4.  Offering a Product Trial Does Not= A Positive Review- Guess what?  Free stuff doesn’t buy good coverage.  In some cases, it might even backfire on you.  Remember the Acer/Vista/Ferrari laptop scandal from last year?  .  Also be sure to answer any technical questions they may have.  You don’t want to be slammed just because of simple miscommunication.
5.  Have a takeaway- Be short and to the point.  Let them know next steps, how they can contact you, and anything else that is relevant.  This applies to all emails in business, but especially with PR.  If you leave things too open ended, they will be ignored.
6.  Provide attached background info (not too large)-  Attach or link to media files, supplemental materials, and more.  Don’t make the email too large, as it becomes overwhelming.  You’re one of 100 on a good day for some blogs.  Get the good vibes going, not the “this sucks” vibes.
7.  Send to the right person- Chris Anderson made this very clear with his PR “Blacklist”.  Tons of PR pros were sending emails to the editor, instead of the right contact at Wired.  Certain bloggers cover certain topics on blogs.  Don’t end up on a blog blacklist, it’s not a pretty place to be.

Some Additional Posts to Read : 

Blogger Relations 201

 Elevator Pitch on PR and Blogging  Bad Pitch Blog PR Wiki-  Tips on Pitching Bloggers Blogger Relations 101 

Wow… this has been a long time coming. The team at Publictivity is beyond excited to have you here for the first time at our Education Blog. We started blogging in late 2006- mid 2007, but stopped in preparation for Beta. We wanted to create something more than just a blog, but a resource that was useful to Public Relations Practitioners, Social Media Enthusiasts, Bloggers, Startups, and more. To keep things simple, we’ve created a list of what the Education Blog IS and IS NOT.What The Publictivity Education Blog IS

• A Resource For Anyone- We made this resource for everyone, not just our first target customers, Public Relations professionals. Whether you are a social media enthusiast, a student, an entrepreneur trying to launch their startup,etc., this blog will provide useful insights.
• One Side Of The Story- This is fact mixed with opinion. To put it simple, it is a lot of interpretation. The great thing about blogging comes in the form of different opinions. Everyone gets to tell their side of the story. Look at TechMeme for example.
• An Open Conversation- Comments will always be open. Period.
• Explaining Why Things Work- This is about why things work. The inner workings and the deep analysis, not a straight forward observation. For example, the community aspect of facebook moreso than the technical or UI aspects of Facebook.

What the Publictivity Education Blog IS NOT

• Purely About Public Relations- right now our focus is on Public Relations, but as entrepreneurs, we have a ton to share. You’ll also gain insights into our company, and issues that we face.
• A Definitive Answer- We’re not the end all source for the topics we talk about. Most of the time we’ll provide supplementary sources, that might even argue against what we say.
• Ego Boosting- We’re not here to sit on our high horses, and tell you what’s right. We want to help contribute to the community with our thoughts.