QUESTION: How much of a corporate blog should belong to the corporate side and how much belongs to the blogger?
ANSWER: There is no be-all/end-all answer to
this still-evolving field. One person who is defining a very distinctive corporate blog is Steven Cody, managing partner at Peppercom Strategic Communications in New York,
and the recently elected chair of the Counselors Academy of the Public Relations Society of America. Cody's blog, called RepMan, takes no prisoners in its commentary of
media, the PR industry and the world as a whole - but it eschews being a digital billboard for Peppercom.
"We're not trying to sell Peppercom in any way, shape or form," says Cody. "In fact, I've got an internal group who looks at the blogs before they go out. And they'll slap me
on the wrists and say: 'Hey, you're trying to sell crisis communications services here.' They will reject it, which is pretty cool."
Cody warns PR professionals against outsourcing the content of this new media format. "The ghost writing is a big challenge for corporate blogging," he says. "Whoever that
blogger is, he or she should be the content provider. The worst thing that can happen is when guys come in and ask: 'We want to blog for our CEO, can you write that for us?' And
I say: 'Absolutely not.' We get that question a lot. Even though they understand the customer is king now and the rise of the citizen-journalist, they still think: 'I've gotta
sell. How do I manage this to sell, sell, sell?'"
So what does Cody put on RepMan in lieu of "sell, sell, sell?" Consider Cody's viewpoint of TV reporters covering a recent snowstorm: "When the wind-and snow-whipped reporters
turn things over to their peers inside the warm studios, the latter make sure to express their concern and admiration for their daring counterparts braving the raging snowstorm.
What must 'real' journalists covering 'real' crises like the war in Iraq, mass genocide in Africa and the ever-more scary bird flu think of these local yokels?"
And what is the feedback to such musings? "The reaction has been really, really good," he says. "I was invited to do a teleseminar on blogging. I was the only agency guy,
along with IBM's blogger-in-chief, and Disney's. The reason we did it was not to sell Peppercom, but because so many prospects were asking our opinion we thought we
had better walk the walk and do this ourselves."
RepMan is http://www.repmanblog.com.
QUESTION: If you had to pick a community in need of high-profile PR support, who would you choose?
ANSWER: If an upcoming conference is any indication, the
answer would be the nation's Native population. The conference is called "Who Wants to Hear Our Story?" and it is designed to formulate PR strategies to address the absence of
mainstream media coverage of the American Indian communities.
"There are a number of results that the 23 national co-sponsors hope for as a result of the day and a half gathering," says Patricia Powers, director of the Native American
Program for the Friends Committee on National Legislation, the Washington, DC-based sponsor of the event. "We have found from past gatherings that opportunities are needed
to share ideas, successful projects and breakthroughs that are happening. Most of these are Native directed, but some are joint efforts between tribes and community allies who
are non-Native. Since most such activity and success is reported only locally and through limited Native channels of communication, many project leaders, role models and creative
entrepreneurs have not met or heard about each other's projects, so some exciting networking takes place that builds community."
This conference will bring together journalists, government officials and Native leaders, and Powers adds diversity is a goal for this gathering.
"The symposium provides a forum for a small and marginalized population to show the world how bright, articulate and thoughtful their spokespeople are and how diverse the
American Indians, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians are," she says. "A positive result would be that feature writers and television producers would begin to realize how much
has been missing."
"Who Wants to Hear Our Story?" will be held in Washington, DC, from March 2-3.
Contact: Steven Cody, [email protected]; Patricia Powers, [email protected]