2008 September

Attending seminars and workshops that claim to explain what Web 2.0 is, and why we should care, has become a bit of a game for me. In my experience, one of two things usually happens. Everyone in the room is already steeped in Web 2.0 and is a social media practitioner in some shape or form – so it’s a case of preaching to the converted.

Alternatively it’s what I call the furrowed brow outcome – people leave the event so confused and overwhelmed by what it all means and the only take away is that they need to start a blog, but they are not entirely sure why.

Not so with Jamaaludeen Kahn, owner of Jayz Internet Solutions. I tagged along to his free Web 2.0 seminar at the Bandwidth Barn in Cape Town last week to see him in action, as in my opinion he is one of the few people who can successfully explain Web 2.0 concepts, and how we should be using them.

A natural-born teacher, Jamaal combines some great audio-visual material, personal anecdotes and tips about reference material to check out. All through the seminar his Twitter and Facebook feeds are going ballistic on the side of the screen. Friday’s seminar was the 2 hour speed version of what usually takes a day, but I can see how companies and individuals trying to get their head around Web 2.0 can benefit from the full training.

I particularly like Jamaal’s common sense approach to Web 2.0 and social media. The reality is that Web 2.0 provides “new channels for how humans [already] communicate”. So the bottom line for me is, use what makes sense, phase in new channels of communication, and definitely take an integrated approach to your communications plan.

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US ad spend has seen the steepest quarterly drop since 2001, according to TNS Media Intelligence. Ad spending during the second quarter of 2008 was off 3.7 percent versus last year for the same period. While the economy is partially the reason, the report also sees marketing spend moving to media that offer the opportunity for more targetted campaingns.

“While expenditures are certainly indicative of the challenges being presented by the economy, they also suggest the continuation of the long-term trend of marketing dollars migrating to media such as the internet, cable TV and syndication that provide the ability to more effectively target specific audiences,” said Dean DeBiase, CEO of TNS Media.

“With advertising budgets and CMOs under pressure and uncertainties continuing to exist relative to consumer spending, it appears marketers are placing an emphasis upon enhanced efficiencies for their brands and the ability to engage with well defined audiences to ensure ever greater return on investment.”

Read more here.

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It seems strangely appropriate that in the middle of one of the craziest weeks in South African politics (and goodness knows we’ve had our fair share of interesting times*) the bulk of the country took a breather to celebrate the Heritage Day national holiday.

The holiday was originally instigated to recognise “aspects of South African culture which are both tangible and difficult to pin down: creative expression, our historical inheritance, language, the food we eat as well as the land in which we live” according the SA government information site.

Prior to the newly elected South African government revising public holidays, the 24th of September was an informal holiday in KwaZulu-Natal, commemorating the Zulu king Shaka.

As the description above itself says, the holiday now recognises difficult to pin down aspects of our culture. Frankly it’s a bit of a mystery to me what I should be celebrating. So I love that the holiday now has been sub-titled National Braai Day. Sure, this came about as the result of a media campaign, and I am sure the supermarkets love it, but in my opinion South Africans of all shapes, sizes and cultural backgrounds have hijacked this concept and made it their own.

This is a great example of an emerging popular culture attaching its own meaning to something that could previously have been considered a loaded symbol. For many a braai used to be a symbol of a white-male dominated, Afrikaans cultural activity.

This gives me great hope for the future of South Africa. It is a great indication of the emergence of a unified South African identity, which has successfully subverted previous negative connotations attached to national symbols.

Most importantly, this is a fairly spontaneous uprising by the general population, and not a top-down programme of cultural identity building.

This is a lesson many companies could do well to take note of. You can hold culture and value workshops until the workforce is able to recite the company mission statement off by heart. But unless the culture and values are reflected in the workforce at large, and more importantly actively endorsed by the staff, this is, in my opinion, just an expensive waste of time.

From the point of view of Brand South Africa – it is things like this that will unite us around a national identity to take to the world, and proudly shout from the rooftops.

*Interesting times is of course said to be the first in a series of Chinese curses.

It’s also the 17th book in the Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series.

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On Friday I caught the tail end of Dan Gillmor’s trip to South Africa at a Huddlemind-hosted lecture on citizen journalism. There has been much frothing at the mouth recently about the role new technologies play in how we communicate, and I was interested to hear what Dan would have to say.

With any Tom, Dick and Harry always armed with a video camera and access to the Internet, in the form of their mobile phones, we’ve recently seen some amazing first-hand footage of global events that would never have been so immediate in the past. However, at the same time the opportunity for mischief and manipulation grows simultaneously.

Dan’s take is that he “would rather have more content to choose from, than less in controlled hands.” But as we all know – too much of a good thing can sometimes be a curse rather than a blessing, and simply to aid the reader/viewer to sift through the masses of information consolidation is inevitable.

The good news, according to Dan, is that “the reader is in charge… and will vote with their brain, eyeballs, ears and mouse pointer.” This for me was the nub: with increased freedom comes increased responsibility and Dan set out some great pointers for both consumers and creators of media.

Newsmakers be warned
Firstly he gives newsmakers a word of warning: it is now, more so than ever before, difficult to keep secrets. This applies equally to governments, companies and individuals, in my opinion. Dan advises, “More transparency solves a lot of these things.”

Just say no to walled gardens
According to Dan, media creators (ie. the publishing houses, broadcasters and so on) need to change their role from all-knowing oracle, to collaborative guide. They shouldn’t pretend to know everything, and shouldn’t be scared to send readers away via useful external links if the information exists elsewhere. Dan maintains that this is the way to earn the reader’s trust and ultimately bring them back to the original content.

Along with disliking the walled garden approach, Dan also feels strongly that citizen journalists deserve credit and compensation for their work.

Basics for journalists
These don’t seem to have changed too much since my days at journalism school: thoroughness, accuracy, fairness and independence. Dan adds in transparency – which I agree is hugely important for establishing and maintaining trust. I would hope that the citizen journalists who practise these traits, whether through intuition, integrity or formal training, will rise to the top.

New media literacy
My slightly rosy-tinted spectacled view above does hinge on the media consumer though, and their level of digital media literacy.

Dan highlights four great principles for active consumers:

1. Be sceptical about EVERYTHING
2. Use your judgement though – you don’t have to be equally sceptical about everything. You probably need to be more sceptical about a trashy tabloid than Time Magazine.
3. Research – be an active consumer, ask questions. As consumers we can now engage with newsmakers and content creators in an unprecedented way.
4. Finally two techniques to help you navigate the deluge of new media information. Move outside of your personal comfort zone and read things that “make you angry”. Also learn about digital media techniques – how information is captured and how it can be used to manipulate and persuade.

It was a fascinating lecture and great summary of where we are. Ultimately my take away though was that the more things change, the more they stay the same. I can imagine very similar conversations taking place when TV was introduced, for instance. Consider the nervous hypodermic models of mass culture, and how long the South African government took to allow TV into the country.

Yes we are living through one of the most radical changes to our channels of communication, but the same principles apply that have probably applied since the first cave drawing was done. What people like Dan Gillmor are doing though, is the all-important job of keeping these principles fresh, up-to-date and relevant.

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Other things to remember about tech PR:

Know your subject. Use your client’s product. Or ask for a full demonstration early on. See the lights flashing and the messages whizzing past. Touch it. If possible, get the journalists, bloggers, key customers and analysts to trial the product or service.

Understand the wider market. Know that something called the Application Service Provider (ASP) model is now called Software as a service (SaaS) and why it is important to your client. (I told you, you would have to learn a new language – and most of it is in TLAs).

You will become very familiar with TLAs, or three letter acronyms. For a bit of fun, here’s some info on TLAs from Wikipedia:
•    There are potentially 17,576 TLAs possible if you add up all the combinations of letters of the alphabet from AAA, AAB to ZZZ.
•    Probably the most common and well known tech TLA is WWW, or worldwide web. Ironically this is the longest possible TLA to pronounce: it takes 6 syllables to say abbreviation and only 3 for the full term.
•    This is a fun one that I hadn’t heard of before: Y-A-B-A, or YABA, or yet another bloody acronym. Apparently the malevolent forces that sit down and think up TLAs check if something is YABA compatible, ie the abbreviation doesn’t form a rude word. Would you want to be a computer related application programmer (yes I know that’s a 4LA, but it’s funny ☺)

So here are some other translation issues you might stumble across:

Especially if you work as the local PR arm of a multinational company – know your local market. Be an expert on the SA landscape. Know what your journalists, bloggers, end users want and expect and be an ambassador for this in the context of the global team. Don’t underestimate the role you play in localizing a story. And conversely, look for the international angle in local stories – you’d be surprised how often it’s there.

Remember also we work in a global environment, even if you are pitching to a local publication; it is going to end up on the web, which knows no borders. So your challenge is to keep the spirit and relevance of a local story, within the framework of global corporate messaging and positioning. You can’t have a customer getting conflicting messages from a company, even if they don’t sit in your territory.

Another thought on working as part of a global team, which fortunately ties into my translation theme ☺ – you will need to get used to working with some very different business cultures to those we are used to in South Africa.

Even if your colleagues speak English, you are going to have to learn to speak and understand a new business language. Especially if you work with a team based in Silicon Valley – which frankly sometimes feels like another planet.

Before I close – a couple of tips: read widely around your topic and talk to people both in and outside your client’s company. There are a host of resources, glossaries and so on on the Internet that you can use to help you navigate this world. Make friends with an employee of your client that you can ask stupid questions and get useful information. If you are part of a global team, insist on access to all the current and past resources so you can get up to speed and understand the thinking.

Bottom line – tech has to interest you. If it doesn’t, you will experience misery. If it does, you will seldom have a dull moment, you will get to make a real difference in some great South African companies, you get to play on a global stage, and you will really get to ply your craft. And frankly it’s a hot space to be in right now.

[This is an extract from a presentation I gave in March 2008, prior to my founding Twokats Communications.]

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So you are thinking of taking on a tech client? Here are a few guidelines to engagement:

•    Find out what your potential client wants from PR. Not only the marketing person that hires you, but the exec that pays the bill and the person you are going to be relying on for time and information.
•    Is it simple brand awareness they are after?
•    Do they want to be positioning as a thought leader and expert in their field.
•    Or are you expected to educate the market as to WHY they need your client’s product or service?
•    Are you expected to be almost part of a lead or sales generation arm?

These are important things to pin down at the outset and to decide whether you are on the same page as your client.

With budgets getting tighter, and I bet this isn’t only happening in tech – PR is expected to do so much more than just generate editorial. Sometimes I get the impression that editorial is tertiary to all the other things going on. Especially with releases flying straight into execs’ inboxes without any mediation from any sort of editorial creature, and the execs not knowing the difference.

Decide if you have the stomach to take on these additional roles, or whether you want to stick to your core offering.

Once you have decided to plunge into the wacky world of tech – for me there are 2 vital things you need to do to succeed.

Firstly REALLY REALLY know where your client’s potential customers are and what is keeping them awake at night. Don’t take your client’s word for it. Your client will think that their customer is lying awake at night gnashing their teeth in angst because they don’t have the latest service your client has launched. But Vanessa, it’s got a 180 gig doo hickey with 50 times more widgets than its closest competitor – how could they not want it?

Believe me, they don’t. Your client’s customers are lying awake at night wondering how they can keep costs down, or get sales up, or keep customers coming back. They don’t care how many widgets your product offers,

They care about what’s in it for them and how is it going to make their lives easier, and how much is it going to cost and how hard is it going to be to make happen.

So they aren’t scouring the IT pubs looking for technical features or lengthy technical white papers. They are reading the one or 2 trusted publications in their space that talks to them in a language they understand. That understand their business issues, and can offer practical ways to solve their problems.

So we are back to that translation thing again – you need to translate all the tech babble into real business benefits, appropriate for a certain group of customers, and then sell it into Vegetable Sellers Weekly, or Car Manufacturers Monthly, or whatever it is your potential customers are reading/viewing/listening to.

Linked to this idea is ruthlessly removing all the hype your client probably wants to add in. I call these the weasel words. Of course they are tremendously proud of what they have built, and that it’s got twice as many spickets as anything else on the market. But there is an understandable skepticism, weariness and wariness about tech hype. And anyway, where is all the good stuff about how this is going to improve your customer’s life?

So what is keeping your potential customer awake at night? And where are they going for a solution? What are they reading? Who are they talking to? Where are they researching?

Another important thing for me in tech PR is bringing in the human element. What does this mean for the person in the street? How can I use it? Why should I care?

A key element through all this is that you shouldn’t speak tech unless it’s appropriate. This is important. You shouldn’t speak tech, but you need to understand it to translate it into English!

The last in this series, part 4 coming up here.

[This is an extract from a presentation I gave in March 2008, prior to my founding Twokats Communications.]

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Why else would you want to work in tech PR? If you want a fast moving industry with a steady stream of newsworthy happenings, then tech is for you. Nowadays technology touches so many parts of our lives that there are limitless news hooks to hang a story on.

It’s probably worth mentioning the breadth of subject matter that tech covers: from the latest mobile phones, games and DVD players, to industrial strength software and databases, to boxes sold to service providers that make it all happen.

Of course I think that the mobile space is the most interesting – especially in South Africa where every one has a cell phone and use them in very very innovative ways – for instance, airtime is major currency in most of Africa.

In my case I am working for a relative start-up (well we are 8 years old now) and still working closely with the founders – and you get some very interesting personalities. Geeks are cool nowadays anyway! Entrepreneurs are fun, and challenging to work with, incredibly smart, but also make your life so much easier when you need to throw someone passionate and charismatic in front of a journalist. These aren’t just talking heads, they are almost organically part of the company. And that always adds more flavour and colour to a story.

Another big attraction for me is that it is typically, especially in South Africa, a fairly young environment. I am constantly amazed by the people 10 years younger than me with the drive, ambition and nous to not only have a good idea, with clear business opportunities, but to actually make it happen. This is always an interesting story to tell. Within our borders, a South African success story is always well received and there are a host of publications focusing on just that – SA Rocks, SA the Good News, SA info etc.

Abroad, SA really has a name for firsts and innovation, and we are seen as a breeding ground for interesting technology and business, so these stories may also be on foreign journos’ radars.

Some proof of this: Clickatell has this year closed a funding round in Silicon Valley – virtually unheard of for a non-US company. We’re funded by the same outfit that funds Yahoo!, Google and YouTube. Pretty good for an outfit with offices in Bellville.

Because the space is filled with young people, this also means that a lot of your community is early adopters and you get to use the cool new media channels we have nowadays. This is where these guys hang out.

Having said that though, on the flip side, tech topics are becoming more mainstream, both in the business publications and lifestyle media. This lets you tell your story in many different ways to reach many different audiences, or indeed the same audience in a variety of ways. So in the case of for instance a new SMS service to deliver sports results to your handset:

•    Iweek may cover the technology behind a service,
•    Brainstorm the business benefits to running a service over SMS and outsourcing the delivery,
•    and FHM the fact that you can get sports results directly to your handset even if you are at your sister-in-law’s wedding.

So you are thinking of taking on a tech client?

[This is an extract from a presentation I gave in March 2008, prior to my founding Twokats Communications.]

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The sub-title for this post is: “Teaching English as a foreign language”. It’s a presentation I gave to the PR-Net meeting in March 2008. I was asked to speak to non-tech PR folk about working with tech clients.

The presentation: What I would like to do is give you a bit of insight into my world, the good, the bad and the ugly. A bunch of stuff you are going to hear is going to sound quite familiar – good PR practices hold true whatever the vertical your client happens to be in, but I will try to show you particularly how they apply in the tech world. Other things are quite specific to tech, so hopefully I can give you a good picture of what it’s all about.

Firstly though – so who am I and why do I get to stand here and talk to you about this? I am currently the marketing manager for Clickatell. [This was in April 2008 remember] We’re a mobile messaging company that provides the plumbing for alert services like transactional alerts from your banks. I currently support sales offices in SA, the UK and across the USA, as well as an e-commerce business.  PR always been important to us both locally and internationally as well as online.

Previously I worked for a company in the UK called Band-X. It was also a start up, selling wholesale telecoms capacity by all sorts of clever new ways to telecoms operators and big companies. That was a roller coaster ride through the boom and bust years of the dotcom fiasco where I went from opening press offices across Europe, in Brazil, the US and India, to closing most of them down again less than a year later when the market started shrinking.

And believe it or not I started my career as a tech business reporter, writing for a publication called Total Telecom. That was a complete accident as I had a journalism degree and could do some HTML way back in 1997.

So the point is, my career has been steeped in tech to one degree or another for over 10 years – and I would be interested to hear how much of this applies to your areas as well.

So what’s tech PR all about then? The first thing that springs to mind is what made me think of this sub-title – Teaching English as a foreign language.

Yes, you are going to have to learn a new language, and then try to translate it into English. And then explain why you translated it in that way.

And you are either going to love it or hate it.

And there you have it – one of my top reasons for working in tech PR: You truly get to exercise your communication and PR skills – but more on this later.

Read more in part 2 here.

[This is an extract from a presentation I gave in March 2008, prior to my founding Twokats Communications.]

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