All Posts Tagged With: "blogs"

Leslie Richard thought she was doing her fellow business owners a favor when she took Vision Media Television to task in a blog post. The North Carolina businesswoman said she felt “creeped out” after learning that VMT’s offer to include her in a news story that would run on PBS, or maybe CNN, would cost her about $25,000. Hoping to alert other small businesses to what she felt was a misleading sales pitch, Richard used words like “scam” and “lies” in her blog post.

Not a good idea. VMT got wind of the post, sued Richard for $5 million in lost revenue and $15 million more in punitive damages. Lawyers have been working out a settlement after Richard agreed to take down the blog post.

The lesson here is that blogs do not enjoy special protection when it comes to libel or defamation. As attorney Marc Zwillinger says in the story that appeared in the November issue of Inc.com, anything posted on a CEO’s blog — including reader comments — can be construed as carrying the weight of a company’s endorsement. That can put an entire business in jeopardy, he says.

Added Seth Godin: “Blogging is a cheap and scalable way to talk to interested people. But understand that while you advocate for your company, you are also walking a tightrope from a legal and business point of view.”

Popularity: 10% [?]

I’ve been newspaper junkie since discovering the sports pages of the old Philadelphia Bulletin in 1964. From the first day I walked into a newsroom more than 30 years ago, I’ve been captivated by the rhythms of putting out the equivalent of a novel a day. The gritty smell of a newspaper fresh off the press still gives me a rush.

So it pains me to see what is happening to the newspaper industry. Three papers I’ve worked for have gone through painful cuts in the last few months with dozens of solid, hard-working journalists losing their jobs. It’s no different anywhere in the country. The villains are precipitous drop in advertising revenue and an unrelenting corporate thirst for unrealistic profit margins. With less quality content, fewer readers subscribe. That means fewer advertisers. Until the bean counters find a way to make a buck off the Internet, the vicious circle will be repeated.

As difficult it is for me to watch as a former journalist, what does the slow demise of the newspaper industry mean to me as a public relations professional? Are newspapers still a relevant part of PR efforts? Should I invest the time and energy it takes to forge relationships with editors and reporters who could be laid off any day? Do enough people read newspapers to make them a worthwhile target?

For now, the answer is a lukewarm yes. But the day is coming – sooner than anyone ever predicted – when printed newspapers will be just an afterthought in most public relations programs. In some cases, that day has already arrived. If your target audience is under 30, forget about newspapers.

So what will take newspapers’ place?

A recent study by the Public Relations Society of America says social media and blogs are becoming a medium for companies to communicate externally - that is, through its public relations. According to the study, “two-thirds of public relations practitioners believe blogs and social media have enhanced what happens in public relations and that social media and traditional mainstream media complement each other.” Furthermore, “61 percent believe the emergence of blogs and social media have changed the way their organizations (or client organizations) communicate.”

While nothing can replace the thrill of a front page story — and I’ll date myself here — “above the fold,” the fact is social media and blogs are the future of public relations.

Popularity: 55% [?]