Archive for the 'Company/Organization Advocacy' Category
Today’s New York Times includes a story about how Wal-Mart’s badvocates are retreating (“Wal-Mart’s Detractors Come in From the Cold”). It’s a great case of why it is so critical to know your badvocates, understand why they badvocate, and authentically respond to and/or act upon their criticisms.
Wake-Up Wal-Mart is a union-backed campaign group that often criticizes the business practices of Wal-Mart. The group claims Wal-Mart offers its employees substandard wages and health care benefits. Wal-Mart Watch is another agency whose mission is to benefit Wal-Mart communities. Three years of pressure from these groups prompted Wal-Mart to expand its health care coverage to workers (although not to the extent the unions would like) and increased its “green” programs. Given such progress, Wal-Mart and these groups have concluded that it is more effective to engage one another on the issues than to live as adversaries.
While both Wake-Up Wal-Mart and Wal-Mart Watch report that they will remain vigilant watch dogs of the world’s largest retailer despite progress, some signs that they are, as the NY Times writes, lowering their pitchforks are:
•Wal-Mart disbanded a campaign-style war room to deal with these groups
•Wal-Mart disbanded their own advocacy group, Working Families for Wal-Mart
•Wal-Mart Watch and Wake-Up Wal-Mart both reduced their staffs
Badvocacy can be deflated when companies are willing to face up to the damage badvocates can cause, recognize legitimate concerns of their badvocates and inoculate themselves from badvocacy by doing the right thing. At the same time, badvocates need to know when they can back off from their campaigns so that future criticisms and actions will be considered credible. Here’s to healthy badvocacy!
B
eing an advocate for your university can help drive share price? How does that work? Harvard Business School and the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business found that university ties can make a difference among equity analysts. Essentially, information flows more tightly in security markets among those who attended the same schools. Interestingly, ivy league school advocates fare no better than non-ivy league school advocates. Essentially the research by professor Lauren Cohen found that
equity analysts outperform on stock recommendations when they went to the same university as the company’s management. The information flow is clearly more liquid and far-reaching among university networks than previously thought. Apparently the old school ties can help equity analysts make the right picks and recommendations. Public company managers might want to handpick those sell-side analysts who share common university ties and turn them into true blue advocates. A thought as the markets close for memorial day in the U.S.
Happy holiday.
Nielsen Online recently released a study that finds that blogger buzz around sustainabilility grew by 50 percent in 2007. Early 2007 buzz was dominated by global warming, but issues such as renewable energy and resource conservation increased.
The study also reports that corporations that greenwash their advertising and PR will quickly turn bloggers into the dreaded Badvocates. Sustainability bloggers’ number one greenwashing discussion topic is “contradictory actions.” As most companies know these days, there is no hiding from Badvocacy, so they need to be sure their messages are consistent with their products and services.
It’s not really a new concept…a company enlists its customers to protest an establishment, rule or convention that might be inhibiting its business (regardless of whether or not the enlisted customers actually realize a profit motive or even care). Advocacy at work, right? Or would you say Badvocacy? Hmmm.
Burton, the snowboard manufacturer, provides a magnificent case study in how to drive advocacy through badvocacy (or is it the other way around?). It has launched a campaign to pressure the four US ski resorts which still don’t allow snowboarding to open their trails to boarders through the “Sabotage Stupidity” contest. Contestants “poach” these resorts by snowboarding down their trails. The purse is $5,000 for the boarder who submits the best video documentation of a trail poaching experience. Rest assured, Burton encourages its contestants to be respectful and law-abiding “brofessionals.”
Legal questions aside, the campaign seems to be a worthwhile business opportunity, as Evo Gear, the ski and snowboard retailer, joined the effort by adding another $5,000 to the contest pool. And one of the four resorts, Toas, just announced that it is lifting its snowboarding ban in March. Just imagine the financial rewards from the sales and rentals of boards and accessories as a major resort opens its doors to such a target so passionate about its sport.
Some quick parting lessons…
1. Advocacy vs. badvocacy depends on your perspective
2. Exploit your advocates to be your rival’s badvocates
3. Beware your competition’s advocates
4. There’s badvocacy in all of us, cash helps it surface
So…what do you readers think? Did Burton launch an advocacy or badvocacy campaign? Or does it even matter as long as a company gets what it wants in the end?
Last week I was interviewed by PR Week on the European Brand Advocacy research that Weber Shandwick conducted across Europe. The video is a useful summary of what we found and what we believe business and brands should be considering when building their communications strategies.
Congratulations to the editors of PR News for their new blog. Diane and Courtney share some refreshing perspectives and blunt commentary about things that are happening in the PR industry — something we need much more of in the industry.
In particular, Courtney’s post about the recent CMO Leadership Forum in NYC was spot on. After several hours of hearing speakers talk about PR-related topics like social media, customer advocacy, thought leadership, word of mouth, measurement and other initiatives — but never once mentioning “PR” in their comments — Courtney spoke up and challenged them on it. Which is *exactly* what we as a PR industry need to be doing on a regular basis. Thanks, Courtney, for “representin’”!
As an advocate for advocacy, one of the most shocking things I saw last year was Sprint’s announcement that it was going to “fire” about 1000 customers for being too high maintenance. Now, granted, some customers are unprofitable and some might complain too much. But a mass firing? Of vocal complainers? Who are already frustrated with Sprint’s service?
Yeah, this one’s obvious. And not surprisingly, six months later, the “price of badvocacy” became very clear and very tangible via an unplanned announcement Sprint Nextel had to make Friday. The bottom line: Sprint Nextel lost 885,000 customers during the quarter — and now has to lay off 4,000 staff, cut a bunch of contractors, close 125 retail locations and eliminate 4,000 third-party distribution points.
Of course, Sprint’s bad performance isn’t entirely attributable to bone-headed customer service decisions. But I’m sure every Sprint employee must be wondering: Will the brainiacs who fired those 1,000 customers now be on the firing line themselves?
[Disclosure: Weber Shandwick represents Verizon Wireless. I don’t work on the account, and I share this not to attack Sprint, but to remind other companies of the “price of badvocacy” as they make their own daily business decisions.]
For C-level executives, what better way is there to advocate your company, product or issue than at highly acclaimed business conferences attended by the people you want to impress the most: your competitors, vendors, customers and targeted talent pool?
Apparently, a growing number of the world’s most elite C-level execs find the conference circuit a worthwhile advocacy platform. Reflecting the trend, the number of events available for such opportunities is multiplying.
We just issued the results of an analysis of speaking engagements at top-tier, or “Five-Star,” events among CEOs, CFOs, CMOs and CTO/CIOs from companies appearing on Fortune’s top 50 World’s Most Admired Companies list (”All-Stars”). Here are the big findings…
*The number of Five-Star events increased 50% from 2005 to 2007 indicating the rising popularity of executive conferences.
*All-Star CEO speakers at Five-Sar events increased 35% from 2005 to 2007. In all, more than four-in-ten (43%) have spoken at these events in the past three years.
*C-team executives (CFOs, CMOs, CTO/CIOs) have increased their visibility at these events. In 2005, only 4% of them spoke at these important conferences while in 2007, 25% of them spoke - a five-fold increase.
Companies are certainly leveraging the major forums as advocacy podiums. More will likely join the wave, as business leaders realize that advocacy is a strategic force of influence.
Weber Shandwick made an important announcement last week. The appointment of Leo Rayman from the adv agency DDB as European Head of Planning. Leo sent me a book over Xmas - Pollitt on Planning.
Stanley Pollitt is considered by some to be the father of modern day advertising account planning. I believe his story holds important lessons for the PR industry.
Stanley introduced the role of “strategic planner” to the ad industry as “someone who would decide when research would be done and what information was relevant to the creative development process and would remain independent of the pressures of the client and the creative directors”. Fundamentally Stanley saw the role of the strategic planner as the data literate consumer champion who would ensure that the agencies output was always kept on track.
The PR industry has transformed itself in recent years, by putting measurement at the heart of its agenda. Today insight is increasingly being adopted as the new agenda as clients provide increasingly complex challenges that require much deeper insights into the influences behind today’s customer behaviours. As a result we are commissioning research reports, buying into new consumer panels and uncovering new streams of data in a way that never happened before. And this of course is the issue. Does a fantastic publicity person also have the necessary skills to sift through all of this data and identify what is relevant or not? Can a creative guru always separate dreams from reality? Can the slick account man say no?
Historically the PR industry hasn’t divided its roles in the same way as the ad industry. But, as clients see the growing importance of advocacy within their marketing mix and recognise that PR is best equipped to deliver against their needs, things are changing. Every agency man knows that clients buy on trust and for the PR industry that trust is coming from demonstrating, consistently it’s ability to navigate client brands through an increasingly complex and cluttered world. It’s an exciting time for the industry and an exciting time for my company. Welcome on-board Leo!
Came upon 2 insightful advocacy articles from academia recently about the power of influence. The first, “How Valuable is Word of Mouth” comes from Harvard Business Review” written by V. Kumar, J. Andrew Petersen, and Robert P. Leone. The authors advise businesspeople to gauge customer value based on those who bring in the most referrals: “In these interconnected days, how your customers feel about you and what they are prepared to tell others about you can influence your revenues just as much.” The article provides a model for measuring a customer’s total value, not just his lifetime value which so many companies have embraced as being the ultimate measure in the world of CRM.
The second, “Influentials, Networks, and Public Opinion Formation,” is from the Journal of Consumer Research, authored by Duncan Watts (Columbia University) and Peter Sheridan Dodds (University of Vermont). This paper expands upon the segment of consumers known as Influentials – the minority of individuals who influence an exceptional number of their peers. The authors find that “large cascades of influence are driven not by individuals, but by a critical mass of easily influenced individuals.” This provides added dimension to what we have always been told about WOM.
Both papers are worth a read and are a great advocacy resource.
Today’s New York Times includes a story about how Wal-Mart’s badvocates are retreating (“Wal-Mart’s Detractors Come in From the Cold”). It’s a great case of why it is so critical to know your badvocates, understand why they badvocate, and authentically respond to and/or act upon their criticisms.
