Tag Archives: media

Why nonprofits find PR so difficult

While all nonprofits are different, they all share common attributes and challenges.  Most of those challenges are in marketing, PR and having their voices heard.

Every nonprofit wants the world to know about the great work they are doing.  And most deserve to be heard.  They want people to know how they are making the world a better place.  Some of this desire is self-interest.  They want to attract funding, volunteers and Board members.  Some is truly altruistic.  Wanting the world to know how their services can help.

So why is it so difficult for the average nonprofit to stand out?

First, there are so many nonprofits.  Tens of thousands in the country, and thousands in each major city.  Competition.

Second, there is overlap.  Too many nonprofits do the same thing.  They have the same mission.  So when the media cover one organization, they won’t cover a similar one that isn’t that much different.

Third, many nonprofits simply don’t understand the media and how to structure a story pitch.  They do social media, but social media only hits their circle.  The media want certain stories, presented to them in a certain way.  This is a PR skill that most nonprofits don’t have.

Fourth, there are many avenues to tell your story.  TV, newspapers, internet and social media aren’t the only avenues to attract attention.  What are others?  That’s where experienced PR and marketing counselors come in.

Last, nonprofits are great at doing their work, but that doesn’t mean they are necessarily at telling their stories.  Most of our clients lack basic understand, skills and contacts to convey their message.  Not their fault.  PR and marketing is a skill that takes training, practice and understanding.

The larger nonprofits can afford to hire PR and marketing consulting firms.  Smaller nonprofits often can’t.  But that doesn’t mean they can’t work with a firm.  Some PR and marketing firms will take on small projects for reasonable fees.  Having a PR firm doesn’t mean all or nothing.

The moral of the story is PR and marketing is a skill like running a nonprofit is a skill.  Everybody can’t do everything.  Let the PR experts do the marketing while the nonprofits change the world.

 

Why Nonprofits need a PR plan

All nonprofits are created equal, right?  Not when it comes to marketing and public relations (PR).

Marketing and PR is perhaps the only business function where one size doesn’t fit all.  Accountants do accounting.  Managers manage.  Employees do their jobs.  But when it comes to marketing, it is the ultimate tailored function.  No marketing plan from one nonprofit or for-profit corp. can be automatically transferred to another with ease.  Each must be tailored to the specific organization, their goals and objectives, capacities, audiences, budgets and so forth.

Hence all marketing/PR campaigns must be tailored to the organization.  Having a fresh perspective is often helpful as long as the fresh perspective doesn’t ignore history and challenges the organization faces.  If these are not recognized and understood, then a fresh perspective will result in facing the same challenges.

There are numerous template marketing plans on the web.  A quick Google search and you’ll find hundreds of “fill in the blanks” plans.  It won’t take long to realize they are all pretty much the same.  There are basic marketing tasks, strategies and techniques that need to be done.  But what you won’t find on the web is a plan that speaks to your specific organization’s goals and objectives, audiences you are trying to reach, budget you have available, staffing issues, history and on and on.

I don’t want to make it sound as though creating a marketing PR plan is rocket science.  Much is common sense.  But common sense will not give you the experience of having gone through the process dozens of times, the knowledge of what works and what doesn’t, the research that has been done in your market segment, goals that are achievable and goals that are out of reach.  All that, and more, comes with experience.

Professional marketing and PR is an investment.  No doubt.  And, if you don’t keep a close eye on what is happening, budgets can get out of hand.  Worse, marketing can go in the wrong direction.

Our guidance for every nonprofit seeking a fresh marketing perspective is to look closely at your past with an open eye on the future.  The beauty of marketing is that it is dynamic.  What works today, may not work next year.  Organizations that do the same marketing tasks year after year will usually find support starting to decline as there are only so many times you can say the same things to the same people.

On the other hand, marketing is fun.  It is creative and can show quick results.

It also is among the best investments a nonprofit or a for-profit organization can make.

 

 

 

The art of PR in Los Angeles

Anybody in the PR business knows just how much the business has changed over the past decade.  There was a time when we could book clients on radio shows that had civil discourse and discussed both sides of an issue.  Seems that time has come and gone.

Today, radio has become all hosts and few guests.  A few remain, but the major radio outlets are dominated by personalities who talk solo for hours on end.  Occasionally they will have a guest on to prove a point — their point — but that’s about it.  Media is dominated by controversy, name calling, taking sides and putting down everyone who disagrees with you.

It’s unfortunate, but that’s the way it is.  We still are able to book our clients but it is admittedly harder.

The press has evolved from the impartiality of conveying “news” to promoting one side or another.  This is totally opposite what we who went to journalism school were taught.  Being objective was the hallmark of the press.  Somehow, when we weren’t paying attention, objectivity became a thing of the past.

Too bad, because an objective press is what separates us from dictatorships.

Maybe one day objectivity in the media will make a comeback.  Can’t wait.

 

Four steps to crisis PR preparation

One of the most difficult and stressful aspects of the public relations and marketing business is dealing with a media crisis.  But if one works in PR, crisis is inevitable.  Remember, it takes decades to build a good reputation and only minutes to lose it all with a PR crisis.

So here are four quick tips to prepare for a PR crisis.

1)     Create a Crisis Communications team.  This team should include the top person in the organization or company, the PR/marketing head, legal counsel and the person (variable) who may be closest to the crisis itself.

2)     Get the facts.  When a crisis occurs, the first step for the team is to gather the facts.  And I mean quickly.  You can’t respond and act responsibly and strategically if you don’t have all the facts.

3)     Develop a strategy, statements/materials:  Often crises just go away or a problem doesn’t evolve into a crisis.  In that case, be ready, but don’t start sending out materials unless it is part of a well-considered strategy.  You don’t want to publicize a media crisis that hasn’t yet occurred and may very well not.

4)     Act appropriate, cautiously and aggressively.  I know these contradict one another but how you react and respond is dependent on the situation and the facts.  The key is to be ready, and by doing steps 1-3 you will be ready to react and respond.

Last, I would add that in today’s digital world where everything is on video and on the internet, it is impossible to deny reality.  Keep the facts the facts and remember that historically, the biggest crises were cover-ups, not the crisis itself.

Watergate would be a good example.

 

When the media tries to become the story

The CNBC-hosted Republican debate turned into a debacle.  From the first question, it was clear that CNBC didn’t want to be the conduit of information for the candidates.  They wanted to insert themselves into the debate by asking ridiculous, mean-spirited and mostly irrelevant questions.

Candidate Ted Cruz, after several questions, took them to task and received loud audience approval.  He blasted the questioners for wanting to turn a civil debate into a “cage fight.”

This post has nothing to do with politics.  It has to do with money.  Since Donald Trump entered the race, the Republican debates have earned Fox, CNN and now CNBC big ratings.  And big ratings translate into big ad revenue.

It was no accident that CNBC asked the questions they asked.  They wanted the “debate” to be as bloody as it possibly could.  They wanted to turn it into a reality show that is talked about and YouTubed over and over.  And by doing so pump up the ratings.

The question is: what is the role of a news organization that hosts an election debate?  Are they supposed to ask meaningful questions that allow each candidate to state his/her positions on important issues, or is the media’s role to grab as many eyeballs as possible for its own bottom line?

The historic 1960 Kennedy-Nixon debate, which cemented John Kennedy’s election, was the first televised presidential debate.  But it was not an exercise in who could mess up the most.  CBS took its role as a news organization seriously and allowed each candidate to talk about the issues, not about their personalities, short-comings, poll ratings and everything else that had nothing to do with being president.

But, unfortunately, that time may have come and gone.  Today news organizations are profit centers and they cherish the opportunity to host election debates because they make money, especially if there are fireworks.

And if it takes a network like CNBC to flame the fires, well, so be it.

On the other hand, the fall-out from the CNBC was so pronounced and embarrassing that future primary and then election debates may actually do what they are supposed to — showcase the candidates qualifications for the most powerful job on earth.

Let’s see if that is the case.

 

Crisis PR: Getting the facts vs. taking action

When asked what is the first thing an organization should do when faced with a reputation management, or crisis PR issue, some will say to first get the facts. Others will say take immediate action — the longer you wait the more it may appear like a cover-up. After all, history has shown that the downfall of Richard Nixon was not Watergate per se, it was the cover-up.

In reality, both are true. And both need to be done simultaneously. Getting the facts is critical to devise an immediate plan of action. How can you know what to do if you don’t know what happened? This is easier said than done, as in the world of immediate communication, when every news outlet wants to be first, miscommunication is often the rule. News outlets can be wrong. They are not held accountable. But an organization can’t afford to be wrong.

At the same time taking instant action is critical. For example, if a staff member sends out an offensive tweet, albeit unintentional, there often is no other course of action than to terminate the employee — depending on the nature of the tweet and other factors. Once something is in cyberspace, and the world deems it racist or sexist or insensitive, there is no taking it back. A million apologies and explanations can’t undo the damage. Plus, it is a chance for an organization to show leadership by cutting the crisis off immediately. Then, a plan of restoring the integrity and reputation of the organization can be devised and implemented with the cause of the problem gone.

What is most important is that organizations be prepared for any eventuality. Anything can happen at any time and every company or nonprofit must be nimble enough to act. Acting can mean finding the facts and devising a plan. It can also mean taking immediate action.

There is no one right answer, as every crisis, or potential crisis, is unique; like every organization is unique. So the real way to prepare is not to decide whether you will first gather the facts or take action, but have an internal system that allows you to quickly make the right decision when and if crisis time comes.

The curious case of Brian Williams

NBC anchor Brian Williams has been suspended for six months without pay.  This will give the network and Williams enough time to figure out whether they will take him back or whether he wants to come back.

The “scandal” surrounding his suspension is curious.  One would think that in a world where everything that happens (especially to a public figure) is either captured on video or has witnesses, that Williams would not have intentionally embellished his Iraq war story. Certainly he knew that telling such a dramatic tale would come back to haunt him, one way or another.  You can call him a liar, but you can’t call him stupid.

Which is why I think the entire episode is so strange.  He obviously doesn’t suffer from dementia.  His only ailment, perhaps, is an oversize ego.  It could be that on the spur of the moment, while telling David Letterman the story, he just added a few details that never happened.  It made for a better story on late night TV, and he took a chance.

In an age of instant news 24 hours a day, one can hardly make the case that the TV anchor has much of a role anymore.  There was a time when Americans were glued to their TV sets every night to hear from Walter Cronkite or Chet Huntley and David Brinkley.  What they said mattered, and if they said it, it was the truth.  Today, I don’t think TV anchors or newspersons have the same credibility.  The competition to be first and to be the most dramatic has lowered the credibility of all news organizations.  It is not at all unusual for a CNN or New York Times or any of the other major, mainstream media to file a report, only to change it later when the facts become known.  They no longer even apologize for it, just file an “update.”  Being wrong is now part of the news business.

This is not even to mention how NBC bungled the entire fiasco.  Someone needs to give NBC a crisis management seminar.  While the mainstream and social media world took hold of the story, NBC seems to be in a daze.  There was no immediate and forceful taking of the reins.  No handling of the situation. No outrage over what their most prized possession had done.  Instead they were thinking about damage control.  How to keep a very profitable show on the air, even if it meant its star has lost all credibility.

Few people feel sorry for Williams, even if he will forfeit $5 million this year.  He probably can get by on the other half quite nicely.  But one still has to wonder why.  All a newsperson has is his/her credibility and when that is gone, he/she has nothing left.  Williams’ credibility has taken a dire hit and in six months we’ll see if he can recover.

I am not placing any bets either way.

The next favorite CNN crime story?

Justin Ross Harris is a 33 year old man in Georgia who is on trial for leaving his 22 month old son in his car all day.  The child died and Harris is on trial for murder.

The trial has received widespread media coverage from the start, with CNN covering live the “probable cause hearing” where a judge determined there was enough evidence for the prosecution to seek an indictment.

During the hearing, which lasted one day, it was revealed by police that there was more to the story than a father forgetting his child in a hot car.  The Father had searched Google for information on people dying in hot cars, living a child-free life, and legal terminology.  Further, police testified that while his child was in the car in 80+ degree weather, the father was at work sexting either women he had met online.

CNN is all over the story, as it was with Casey Anthony, Jodi Arias and select others.  At the same time CNN ran a story that in 2013 alone, more than 40 children died in cars when parents forgot about them.  In fact, they interviewed a woman who was prosecuted for doing just that and was found not guilty.  So why is the Harris trial getting so much attention?

It almost seems like the major media need certain elements to be in place for them to find a story worth following.  The Casey Anthony story centered on a young, attractive woman who liked to party.  Jodie Aria is also young and very attractive and her story included sex, lies and tremendous violence.  Perhaps it has nothing to do with it, but the case of the other woman who was acquitted didn’t contain sordid details of sex.  Boring TV.

The Harris story now seems to be much more than a forgotten child.  Police allege Harris was leading a secret life by sexting other women, one of which was under age.  Harris and his wife were having financial problems and marital issues.  They took out life insurance policies on their child.  On and on. Almost as if CNN knew all these salacious details before they came out in court.

Unless something dramatic changes, like a plea deal, Justin Ross Harris is about to become the next Casey Anthony story.

And you can be sure that CNN will be there gavel to gavel.

Careful what you write, it just may end up on CNN

Anybody who has been trapped in a car trying to get home in bumper-to-bumper traffic understands how infuriating it is.  You feel helpless and frustrated at whatever is tying up traffic.

So it is no surprise that when it was revealed that Bridget Anne Kelly, chief of staff to N.J. Gov. Chris Christie, orchestrated the tie up on the George Washington Bridge last month, a firestorm resulted in Kelly’s firing.  Apparently the intentional traffic tie up was payback for the Mayor of Fort Lee, N.J.  not supporting Christie’s re-election bid.

At the center of the storm was one email Kelly wrote that said “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.”

It seems that every political and business scandal brings with it incriminating emails.  The fact that people, especially those in positions of power who do evil things, put their bad intentions in writing is hard to believe and understand.  The first lesson of using email is never put in writing anything you don’t want the world to see, because it may.

Actually, the first lesson is not to do things that are illegal or stupid.  But if someone wants to put their career and the safety of others in jeopardy, at least have the sense to not put it in writing.

Every email that is sent has the potential to be forwarded to someone else without the original sender’s knowledge.  More scary is the fact that email recipients can be careless and send your email to someone else not remembering or realizing that it is part of a thread.  I have received emails from people that included other email correspondence that was not for my eyes.  Perhaps you have as well.

But it is worse for those who work in the public sector.  The email communication by elected officials and their staff are the property of the government, not the sender or receiver.  That’s why many who work in the public sector use personal email accounts to send messages they don’t want made public.  But there is never any guarantee that it won’t be revealed by someone somehow.

The lesson is simple.  Every email is a document and if you don’t want to see it again in court or at your dismissal meeting, don’t put it in writing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Christie fired Bridget Anne Kelly, a deputy chief of staff who apparently engineered the closures and who said in emails:  Christie said she lied to him about the issue.

http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/politicsnow/la-pn-chris-christie-bridge-official-takes-5th-20140109,0,5539696.story#ixzz2pwaA1fSh

The ‘selfie’ seen around the world

When is it appropriate for heads of state to have a bit of fun?

Not a funeral service, apparently.

When President Obama attended the funeral service for Nelson Mandela, he along with Denmark’s Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt and UK Prime Minister Cameron got together to mug for her iPhone.  In the language of teenagers, it is called a “selfie,” a self-portrait that is usually meant to post instantly on social media

The picture of these powerful world leaders crowding together made for an even greater picture.  Adding to the excitement, was Obama’s wife looking away and very stern. Every man of dating age knows that look of utter disapproval.

Almost as fast as the picture spread across the world, the photographer who took the shot came to the defense of the three leaders.  He discounted that it was inappropriate or immature.  He said it was during a time of “celebration” and not a somber moment.  According to him, he thought nothing of it at the time he snapped the shot.

Well, he thought enough of it to send it around the globe.

This bit of levity is another reminder of the power of the internet and how nothing and nobody is anonymous anymore.  It seems that every human movement is caught on video by someone, someplace.  Certainly, world leaders should be cognizant of the fact that they live in a proverbial fish bowl and need to be more careful.  But one has to believe that if they engaged in what many are calling childlike behavior at a somber event, they collectively had to believe it was not inappropriate and not childlike.

Or maybe they just didn’t care.

Defenders of the pic have also come forth to discount that the First Lady was upset, explaining that the camera just caught her in moments when she looked angry, but really wasn’t.

My take on the “selfie” is that if you’re a world leader, and you want to act human, do it in a room and make sure the only camera in the room is the one pointed at your face.

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President Obama gets into a shot with Denmark’s Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt and UK Prime Minister Cameron at the funeral service for Nelson Mandela.  First Lady Michele Obama doesn’t look amused.