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Posts Tagged ‘Communications’

Recollections involving the rise of integrity, remembering Peter Sewell, and saluting a new generation of PR leaders

Saturday, November 14th, 2009 by John Mallen

Fresh from the Autumn meeting of  the Public Relations Global Network (PRGN), now 40 agencies on multiple continents, it’s inspiring to experience the energy being devoted to communications that can help energize business and financial success of clients these agencies serve.

Several top-line themes emerge for me, our firm being a member and one of the host agencies here in New York City along with Adam Friedman Associates and Cooperkatz&Company.

1. Central to commercial communications today are the themes of trust, integrity, honesty and sustainability.  While always important, they have become top-line priorites as a result of the economic melt down, governments’ response, and the roaring disaffection and cynicism of consumers and citizens.

2. The responsibility for formulating trustworthiness, cultural integrity and commitments to honesty in our institutions is falling to a new generation of executive leader and communications consultant — those in their mid 40’s (the tail of the Baby Boom Generation) and the 40+ group in the Generation X tribe ( from the mid 40’s to early ’80’s).  Looking at our PRGN members, our corporate guests and speakers from Dragon Search Marketing, Coldwell Banker, Guardian insurance, Polar USA, Davis & Gilbert law firm — there is a wave of intelligent and responsible leaders coming to the bride and taking over the tiller of our institutions.

3. And point No. 3 here involves my reflection on the last meeting the PRGN held in 2005 in New York. We recalled the then president Peter Sewell, a good friend of the earier generation, who has passed away and whose firm has morped from his son Adam Sewell to a new identity (Beyond PR) and most recently new owners, then the  ”pioneering” (for PRGN) survey we conducted about the emerging importance of new media, and our own first media tour — a kind of “coming out” for the group founded in 1999.

As it 2005, it has been a rainy in New York as it moves across the threshold from fall to winter, as we in PRGN move to a new season and a strong position of leadership in a field that has become increasingly crucial in this world.  These are my recollections.

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Posted in Communications, Corporate communications, News & Thinking, Openness & Transparency, PR, PRGN, Public Relations, Uncategorized | No Comments »

Obama Overexposure for Health Care Reform? Naa! It’s All About Frequency

Monday, September 21st, 2009 by John Mallen

11-21-09 NYTIn marketing frequency holds a lofty position as a key factor for effectiveness. Frequency is  the number of times a consumer needs to see your ad before they recall an buy.

I mention this because on September 20th virtually every pundit I’ve heard has hinted that President Obama may suffer from overexposure. 

Following a number of news conferences since January, multiple appearances on television interview programs, the President appeared on five different public affairs shows yesterday, and tonight he appears on David Letterman.

Of course all of this aligns with his goal of selling comprehensive health insurance reform.

The question of overexposure has to do with a struggle of the Mainstream Media to understand their own roles in an era of sea change in media and communications.  No longer is MSM the interpreter of developments for us - - at least in this case.

President Obama is using the MSM as an advertising media, speaking directly to the citizenry.  Not once, not twice … But clearly as he delivers consistent messages that are successively relayed on these networks and by other media who cover the President’s every major action.

So how many times do you have to repeat the message to get people to buy? At least three, but maybe seven, 17  if you are on line and, well, maybe up to 20 times.  These stats are well explained by Aussie blogger Bryan Ong in “A Marketing Blog by Marketing Journal” in a great 2006 post and another in 2007

My take?  What’s in play is an PR campaign driving frequency for the President’s main points.  He doesn’t need to buy air time.  But the message is direct from the country’s CEO to his electorate  ( who in turn can place extraordinary pressure on the directors, that is to say Congress)

What’s the message for those of us in the ” real world” of tight budgets, scarce resources and limited time?  The answer is more than the enduring value of frequency itself.  Even more  significant in the President’s campaign is an underlying two-step strategy. Get the out in your voice, accurately.  Then let it go viral.

To take the message public, perhaps you and I cannot command time on Sunday public affairs programs.   But you and I can publish on the Web in our own voice and with accuracy.  And we can take it viral.  I’ll post more on the Web opportunities in a future blog.

 Image from The New York Times, Sept. 21, 2009

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Posted in Advertising, Communications effectiveness, Mainstream media, News & Thinking, media | No Comments »

Prefaces and Prologues

Tuesday, January 20th, 2009 by John Mallen
   books                               I was browsing in our small, comfortable library — perfect for book people, a light rain from gray skies. Gazing at faded maroon covers of The Harvard Classics, I found my way to Vol.39, Prefaces and Prologues.
Why pring prefaces? “No part of a book is so intimate as the Preface. Here …the author descends from his platform, and speaks with his reader as man to man, disclosing his hopes and fears, seeking sympathy for his difficulties, offering defence or defiance, according to his temper, against the criticisms which he anticipates,” the introduction states.
Nice to note that prefaces and prologues made it into “the most comprehensive and well-researched anthology of all time … both the 50-volume “5-foot shelf of books” and the the 20-volume Shelf of Fiction.”   The Harvard series was compiled by retired Harvard University President Charles W. Eliot, LLD and English professor William A. Neilson and published by Collier between 1909 and 1917. It can be found online at Bartleby.com ”Together they [The Harvard Classics] cover every major literary figure, philosopher, religion, folklore and historical subject through the twentieth century,”continues Bartleby.
Hmmm. Prefaces. Here in the age of blogs, of Facebook, LinkedIn and more, prefaces are nifty personal peaks into the personal views of the writers of long ago. Fascinating to read long past the publication and the authors themselves.
They are a great reminder that a personal touch is often a valuable connector in many forms of communications. 

 Photo by guldfisken

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Posted in Best Practices, Communications | No Comments »

A Higher Purpose

Saturday, September 20th, 2008 by John Mallen

I have wanted this blog to be about the value of communications as a resource that can contribute to the success of a business or organization. This morning Scott Simon interviewed Tim Reid and Tom Dreesen on NPR’s Morning Edition Saturday reminded me there is far more than that in communications.

As the only mixed race comedy team when it was formed in 1969, and the only such team ever since, these two guys did more than rock the houses they played until 1974. As I listened to them speak with Scott, as bits of their routines played that as the 1970s unfolded, it occured to me that their act showed communications’ higher purpose.

The laughs helped to crack the cultural granite that had for so long maintained the racial divide. Once cracked, dialogue could ensue and dialogue — the most authentic form of communications — could follow. Their act did not endure. But in some imperfect way, they helped catalyze the dialogue between Black and White that has.

How else could we have the Barack Obama - John McCain act? one of them asked Scott Simon.  Tim and Tom: An American Comedy in Black and White by Tim Reid, Tom Dreesen, with Ron Rapoport (University of Chicago Press).

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Posted in Communications, Uncategorized | No Comments »