Mike’s Points

One of Forbes’ Louis Hau’s 2007 media predictions (See The Bold Prediction) is what I’ve been saying all along about what newspapers need to. (Okay, not all along, but a couple or so times, anyways.)

“With the Web awash in up-to-the-minute wire stories, print editions of savvy newspapers will devote more space to local coverage.”

– Mike

(Pointer for story courtesy of Poynter’s Romenesko.)

Technorati tags: Journalism

Well, sort-of.

In early December, the Federal Trade Commission, in a staff opinion stated:

“Besides other bloggers questioning the ethics of receiving payments without disclosure, the Federal Trade Commission said in a Dec. 7 staff opinion that failure to disclose could, in some cases, violate consumer-protection laws on deception.”

That prompted PayPerPost Inc. to require bloggers to “disclose that they are accepting payment, either in the write-up or in a general disclosure policy on the blogger’s Web journal.”

Transparency is good for all — and hopefully it’ll spread to other aspects of public relations and communications.

While I like PPP Inc.’s new policy, I would have bet that market and peer pressure would’ve forced the new policy sooner or later.

Granted, with as many people in PR and many more bloggers, there’d still be those who would deceive for the almighty dollar.

But, eventually, the wishes of the masses — due to bloggers “outing” others, etc. — would prevail. Just too bad that the gov’t had to step in first.

– Mike

(Pointer courtesy of Lucas County (OH) Commisioner and blogger Maggie Thurber.)

12/18/06, approx. 1 p.m. ET: Okay, now that I’m back up, I’m posting here my 5 Things meme I posted the other day. Don’t mean to spam-ping anyone (though another link can’t hurt?), just keeping myself organized, and duplicating what I did before.
thanks to Kami Huyse, APR. (For the next couple days, my main PR blogging site will be down due to server issues, so I’m posting here at my “back up” blog for now.) So, the game is for me to state five things you don’t know about me? I could go with Todd’s “five things” approach, but . . . . well, maybe I might. So, here we go:

1. My wife and I are expecting our fourth child. We thought we were done with three — two boys and a girl, ages 8, 5 and 3 — but guess God had other plans. (Okay, we were involved with the outcome as well, but there’s more to it than that. And, it’s stuff you probably don’t want to know.)
2. In high school, among the flattering and not-so-flattering nicknames I had were Larry Bird (I was much blonder then; but didn’t have any nears the basketball talent) and Shaggy.
3. I’ve seen The Wiggles live in concert at least four times . . . can sing a pretty mean (and awful) “fruit salad.” Before my daughter was born, my wife and our two sons even dressed like the Wiggles for one concert trip. (I was Murray.)
4. I’m balding (but at least I have more hair at this age than my older brother did!).
5. I was a newspaper journalist for the first four plus years of my working career.

Now, let’s see if Peter Shankman, Bob LeDrew, John Guifoil, the good folks at BlogWorks and Sherrilynne Starkie have played this game yet?

One of Chicago’s three public radio stations — WBEZ — will be changing its format come next April and offer a “user-generated content” format. (Tip-o-the-hat to JR at ToledoTalk.com.)

According to (not-so-secret) SecretRadioProject.com:

“It’s a creative free-for-all, with no shows and no stuffy time slots. . . .

Every time you tune in, you’ll hear something new and surprising - music, interviews, shout outs, essays and more. All with a local bent and an unmistakably Chicago voice.

And the best part: this radio comes from you. You’re the creator, deejay, producer and editor.

Give us your take on what’s happening in your neighborhood. Share your deepest thoughts, confessions and opinions about your world. Upload audio to our website and tune in as we play it for all of Chicago and the world to hear.”

There’s also a forum to discuss the project. And, NU student Matt Weir has a good story about it at his NewsAssignment.net blog. From Weir’s post:

“[I]t takes the infrastructure of cyber-community involvement — Secret Radio Project relies on YouTube uploading and a blog-esque style — and adapts it to a radio station serving a geographic community.”

I’m scratching my head a bit over this one. Maybe it’ll work out with some sort of semi-regular programming — ensuring the major airing hours are filled.

With outlets like radio, don’t we tune in based on the host and his/her show? We know what to expect.

While I’d be tempted to listen to WBEZ after the new format launches, if I’m not satisfied with the first few shows I hear, I doubt if I’d be back.

I’ll definitely reserve final judgment (assuming I’ll be able to pick it up on the ‘net), but it sounds like the new WBEZ be similar to the amateurish sounds and musings I heard on my college’s student-run radio station.

That is until PR and marketing people get wind of it. (Then, it’ll be one long commercial. )

– Mike

Last weekend, John Wagner/On Message pointed me to a very good MSNBC article about Best Buy’s ROWE experiment for its employees (with ROWE meaning results-only work environment).

So, go ahead, read the comments on John’s post and the story. I’ll wait . . . .

Okay, but how would ROWE work in an agency environment?

Well, for a minor point, unlike Best Buy, there would have to be mandatory meetings. Face to face. Our work is all about communication. Interaction. Relationships. We can’t brainstorm, develop strategies and tactics, and other team-work activities via conference calls.

Secondly, we’d have to come to terms with objectives and goals for clients as a way to measure our productivity and value. We should be doing that already, but how often are year-long and campaign goals set? That is, for the client, not our agency income goals.

Yes, the work-at-home vs. work-at-the-office discussion could be worked out. For the most part, I don’t need to be in the office to do my work — just as long as I’m connected to the file server, my e-mail, etc.

I’d say we’d have to be in the office for team and client meetings, and X number of hours per week. The casual interaction, the stopping by a co-worker’s office for a quick question, working with creative to get RGB and CMYK jpgs and/or other work just can’t be done over the telephone or via e-mail.

It can, but something would be missing. Again, that level of one-on-one interaction among team members.

Let’s go back to the goals bit. Do we judge productivity on clients’ editorial coverage? Yes, but the lead time can be days to months, depending on the outlet.

What about social media? Do we judge by “hits” or visits to clients’ sites or sales?

What about turn out at events: # of customers/audience, media, etc?

What about clients’ internal communications programs: Do we judge by increase in morale (recorded via surveys), increase in participation rates in events and activities, feedback on newsletters and other communications?

Granted, these should already be part of our day-to-day jobs, but there is enough discussion and disagreement about PR measurement to make me think it’s not.

So, how would a results-only work environment work in an agency setting?

– Mike