Marketing Roadmaps

BlogHer06

The Week in Review: March 6-10

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A new (and very interesting) client has just come on board,  I had deadlines for some other projects, and I had to take a quick trip mid-week. Time has been tight, so blogging has been light.

So this post is going to be the week in review —  comments on the things I probably would have blogged in more depth had I more time.

Of course, the top PR blogging news of the week was the Edelman-Wal-Mart blogger relations story, starting with the New York Times article on March 7th, and continuing on with commentary from just about every PR/Marketing blogger on the planet. Except me of course. I was at a client 🙂 Check out the great round-ups of the commentary written by  Constantin Basturea and Tom Murphy. And don’t miss Richard Edelman’s post. For more coverage, here are the google and technorati searches on "Edelman Wal-Mart"

My .02 — this really does look like a simple effort at blogger relations, perhaps not the best execution, but not intentionally sinister.  In fact, I think Wal-Mart would be foolish to not engage in grassroots blogger relations, given how well organized its critics in the blogosphere are.

Here’s my take-away from this tempest in a teapot:

First, we have to be fair in our criticisms. Part (but not all) of the outrage about the Wal-Mart outreach was outrage about Wal-Mart in general. You have to put both your friends and your enemies to the same test. If something would be okay if your buddy did it, but it is bad if the evil empire does it,  you are not being fair. This is not dis-similar from what happened in the initial outrage more than a year ago about character blogs. GourmetStation and others were being lambasted for having characters as the blog authors. I pointed out a certain inconsistency using the example of Spencer F. Katt, the PC Week/eWeek mascot for 20-plus years who has both a column and yes, a blog. Somehow, a character everybody knew and liked was okay. It was only the new ones that were bad blogging practice 🙂  Wrong. Be consistent in BOTH your flames and your kudos.

Second, as PR practitioners start reaching out to blogs… as they should, and as most of us have preached, dare I say ad nauseaum, we have to expect mistakes. Given the ongoing commentary on PR blogs about the general quality of much PR practice, we shouldn’t be surprised if some PR agency efforts at blogger relations are better than others. I have no particular opinion about Edelman’s blogger outreach program. Time will tell whether it was good, bad or something in between. I am certain however, that no blogger outreach program will be (or should be) successful without complete transparency. You MUST be completely honest about your role and your vested interests. And not surprised if your entire campaign is published on a blog somewhere.

Again, a comparison. When I started to get a great deal of media exposure as spokesperson for Cyber Patrol in the late 90s, I was very careful to make sure that my public statements passed the ultimate test: would I be embarassed if this were on the front page of the NY Times? Different times, same general principal. Ain’t no such thing as "off the record."

Moving on, conferences. Without a doubt, the model of conferences where the panel is presumed to be the "experts" and the audience the "students" is outmoded. In tech and in marketing, the two arenas where I have spent most of my professional career, the audience often knows as much, or more, than the panelists. I’ve written about this here a bit, and it was one of the inspirations for the Room of Your Own proposal for Business Blogging currently under consideration for BlogHer 06. Our idea is that the panelists are there to kick off the discussion, but in fact the entire audience is the panel, and an active part in building our takeaway "best practices" for business bloggers.

This week,  some smart bloggers asked some great questions about the "conference issue:"

And if you haven’t figured it out yet, Elisa Camahort brings it home: BlogHer is the conference that takes a truly different approach. See you there in July.

In the category of smart business advice:

  • PR Squared has a series of three posts of "bad advice" about customer references which of course are excellent advice for PR and MarCom pros. Here they are:  one, two, three
  • Converstations gives some great advice on how to best write your posts in A Blog Posting Mantra.
  • And Jill Konrath has some great advice on thinking like your customer.

In the news:

And finally, if you stuck this post out this long, you deserve some fun. Don’t miss this clip on trendspotting from the Daily Show. Thanks to Small Business Trends for the link.

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Spam and Porn and BlogHer

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So today is apparently not my day. I got a notice from a blog search engine (FINDINGBLOG) that two of the blogs I write were rejected because:

Your submission is not compatible with our listing policy because:

(1) it is not a human-maintained blog, or

(2) it is a product-selling blog or a sign post for another website, or

(3) it contains sexually offensive materials.

Now, last I looked, I WAS a human, I don’t sell anything on my blog, and except for the occasional expletive, you’d rate my blog "G." Now I know how all those sites that were "Blocked by Cyber Patrol"  must have felt. Anyway, I suspect they automatically rejected me because I use RSS Submit, rather than manually doing my submissions. So it goes. Probably not the best policy on their part, but their prerogative.

Then I went and posted some additional information on the BlogHer site about the Room of Your Own that I’ve proposed for BlogHer and apparently I did something wrong there too, because they are holding my comment as "potential spam, to be reviewed by a site admin." I think I forgot to put a subject on the post, cause the content was pretty straightforward. I wanted to let folks know who had committed to attending the session, if we are lucky enough to be one of the final six.

Not to leave you in suspense, the other marketers (in addition to me) who’ve agreed to participate and kick off the session with their stories are Debbie Weil from BlogWrite for CEOs and Toby Bloomberg from Diva Marketing. Plus one or two others who haven’t yet finalized BlogHer plans,but once they do, I’ll let you know. And remember, we are just there to kick off the conversation. If we are selected, my hope is that this collective Room produces a set of tips/best blog practices to help us all be better bloggers for our businesses and our clients.

To be fair, I am sure the post on the BlogHer site will be approved once someone logs on. It was just my day to be blocked I guess.

UPDATE 26 Feb: I heard from the BlogHer folks today. Apparently, there was an issue with a spam filter — which was pretty much what I had figured, having worked for web and email filtering companies for 10 years.

Also heard from the FINDINGBLOG folks. I’ll let the complete email trail speak for itself.

My query:

I’m curious about your criteria. A blog I write (Marketing Roadmaps at getgood.typepad.com) was just rejected for listing with you for the following reasons:

(1) it is not a human-maintained blog, or

(2) it is a product-selling blog or a sign post for another website, or

(3) it contains sexually offensive materials.

None of which are true, which your editors would have seen had anyone actually visited or read the blog.

So, just wondering what the deal is. I plan to blog this and I’d like to have the facts straight.

Thanks

Susan

The reply:

hi,

i’d like to clarify one thing before continuing conversation further:

did you use any automatic submission software to submit your blog?

if you did, what software did you use?

My answer:

Yes I use RSS Submit, so if you automatically reject anyone who uses automatic submission software, that would explain it.

Doesn’t make sense, given that many of us use such tools, but certainly your prerogative.

Regards

Susan

Which apparently they did not receive because I got another email today:

Not having heard from you yet, I assume you did use some sort of automatic

submission tool to submit your blog to us.  Correct me if my assumption is wrong.

Our editors volunteered to help us review each blog submission manually.

If you don’t want to spare your time to submit your blog to our directory on your own, there is no reason we want to spare our precious time to review your automatic submission either.

WOW. I sent a final reply:

I actually did reply right away, and told you that I used RSS Submit, so if you automatically reject any submissions made by automatic tools, that would explain it.

It is certainly your prerogative to make that decision, but you might want to consider telling people that’s the reason. Telling them that they are not human or that their blog contains porn is not so great.

Best regards,

Susan

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And that’s all I have to say on the subject.

BlogHer: More about the Room of Your Own Proposal

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Elisa Camahort has posted the candidates for the Room of Your Own slots at BlogHer this July so I thought I’d give a little more detail about the Business Blogging session I’ve proposed.

We’ve all gone to conferences where much of the audience is just as qualified (sadly sometimes more) as the panel of experts. But very little time is actually given for interaction between the panel and the audience. Usually, there is time for one or two questions, and that’s it. Not very satisfying for anyone really, but especially the audience — at least the panelists get the professional recognition for being on the panel.

The other problem (one that is handsomely addressed by BlogHer) is that all the conferences start to blend together — the same speakers seem to hop from one to the next, presenting pretty much the same material. Interesting the first time perhaps, but not so much the 2d, 3d, 4th time you attend a conference with the same players. And the same topics. Not really worth attending the sessions when you could save the airfare and read the same material on their blog or in their book.

Now, sessions aren’t the only reason for attending conferences — networking is a big part of why we go as well. For my part though, I really need to find value in both the conference program and the networking opportunities. It’s too expensive, both in hard cost and time away from billable work, to attend otherwise.

Hence the idea for a business blogging session that makes the audience members part of the panel. The focus is on "what worked, what didn’t" in your blog projects. What would you do again? What will you NEVER do again? We’ll learn from each other’s experiences to collectively build a set of blogging best practices.

A few folks will be identified in advance to kick off our discussion, however, the only difference between them and the rest of the people in the room is that they will have PROMISED to have something to share. Everyone in the room will have an equal chance to participate.

And that is the key word: Participate. We won’t have presentations or speeches. To the extent we can, we’ll post brief descriptions of the blogs that people want to discuss on the BlogHer site in advance so we don’t have to spend a lot of time bringing everyone up to speed on what a blog was all about. That way, we can focus on the discussion, not a ton of exposition.

I think this will be a lot of fun and look forward to reading your comments, either here or at the BlogHer site.

Going to BlogHer 06

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I plan ahead. Way ahead. Especially when I really want to do something. So, I’ve made my travel plans for BlogHer 06 this July.

Conference is being held at the San Jose Hyatt, July 28-29, 2006. The BlogHer team negotiated a great hotel rate of $75.00 per night, so don’t wait too long to book your room.

Hope to see you there!

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blogher observations

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Rather than do a blow-by-blow of blogher, I’m going to make some general observations, and share my main take-aways from the day.

And, before you read any further, let me be completely clear – I have no criticisms whatsoever about the blogher conference AT ALL. Lisa, Elisa and Jory, all their volunteers, helpers, and sponsors, panelists and attendees – everyone did a great job. It was one of the best conferences I have ever attended, although I could have done without the "opera" at Nicolino’s.

I do however have some observations that I would like to share that perhaps will help us improve future events.

Conference program. One of the things I liked about blogher was the highly participatory format of the sessions. It really worked for most of the sessions.

The message was clear from the outset; the organizers felt that everyone in attendance could just as equally be on a panel as those sitting in the panel seats. The main difference was that the panelists had a unique experience to share with their peers. And, by and large, I think this was true of the blogher audience. Everyone I spoke to was pretty knowledgeable.

The participatory format really works well when the topic is issue-oriented, and diversity of opinion, of panelists and attendess, creates an energetic session.

Here’s the BUT:

Where I think the participatory format falls down (and in general btw,  not just re: blogher) is when the intent of a session is to teach new skills or new materials. Under these circumstances, I think a more traditional presentation “teaching” format works better.  That’s not to say that the audience shouldn’t be involved, but in a much more structured format that educates as it engages.

My take: anything that needs to convey new skills, and especially anything for newbies, should use a more traditional presentation model, so the attendees walk away with the new skill. As long as the overall agenda strikes the right balance, and offers a mix of session types – skills, issues, debates, birds of a feather – we can keep the conference from turning into death by powerpoint.

Second comment. Of all the sessions I attended, the only one I was a bit disappointed with was the closing session. I really liked the idea that Lisa, Elisa and Jory put forth at the beginning of the day, that the closing session would build the mother of all to-do lists. In practice, however, I think the group was too large to effectively do this. In my opinion (and YMMV), a number of the comments sounded more like folks waxing philosophical than actual concrete suggestions. Almost like the person really had something they needed/wanted to say, and they hadn’t yet had their moment in the sun. What they said wasn’t necessarily bad or uninteresting. It just wasn’t a concrete action. Hence my disappointment.

Not all the comments were like that – there were some good concrete suggestions. One that springs immediately to mind without even looking at my notes is Mary Hodder’s suggestion for a “speaker’s bureau,” which has already been executed as a speaker’s wiki.

But I didn’t feel like we walked away with a collective to-do list as much as individuals quietly left with theirs.

Now, one should never make a criticism without a suggestion, so here’s mine. Next blogher, the session before the closing session could be small group sessions. Perhaps organized in advance by interest area, but with a specific goal in mind – to walk into the closing session with at least one to-do to present to the assembled group. Each designated spokesperson would get a few minutes to present the group’s to-do and the ensuing discussion could be focused on agreeing a final, blogher to-do list.

With a group that large, I just think you have to focus the discussion and give everyone a chance to have their say beforehand.

Next post … speaking of personal to-do lists, I’ll share a few things that are on mine after blogher.