Tiger Woods Sets New Crisis Communications Standard

Golfer Tiger Woods at press conference 19 February 2010. (Photo courtesy of Getty Images).

Although he waited three months to publicly address the rumors and allegations of marital fidelity, Tiger Woods today set a new Crisis Communications standard for others to follow. (Here’s a link to Tiger’s complete statement.)

Here’s what Tiger did well:

• The press conference was held in a public forum open to the media.
• He controlled the environment (no questions were allowed).
• He admitted his mistakes (he stated clearly the he “was unfaithful”).
• He apologized for his actions — to his wife, family, employees, partners, the PGA, the PGA Commissioner, his fellow golfers and fans.
• He said he was sorry (multiple times).
• He called himself out: “I was wrong. I was foolish. I don’t get to play by different rules.“
• He called his behavior “irresponsible” and “selfish.”
• He explained that he has been in “in-patient therapy” receiving treatment (treatment that he will return to tomorrow).
• He chastized the paparazzi for chasing his kids and the media for disclosing the location of his 2 1/2-year-old daughter’s school.
• He also strongly stated that his wife Elin had “never hit” him on “that night or any other night” — that “There has never been an episode of domestic violence in our marriage, ever” — and that “Elin deserves praise, not blame.”
• He strongly denied allegations of using performance-enhancing drugs.
• And he asked that someday those who had believed in him in the past “to one day believe in me again.“

Here’s what Tiger did NOT do well:

• He waited almost two months before addressing the public and media.

That’s it, seriously. I think he did quite well today.

Now . . . the proof will be in the pudding:

1. How long before Tiger plays golf again professionally? (If he plays in the Masters, will today’s apology be seen as sincere? Does he need to take all of 2010 off from golf? Personally, I think not, but that’s me.)
2. Will he and Elin be able to reconcile?
3. Will Tiger be able to stay faithful? {Hopefully, he understands that he now has a Gary Hart-like target taped squarely on his back and journalists of all types will be looking to catch him straying again.}
4. Will he do anything to try and provide a level of public restitution, a penance if you will, such as a donation to a non-profit that supports abandoned wives and families?

But these questions and more are queries for the future.

For now, I believe that Tiger Woods (and his public relations team) have set a new standard for issuing a public apology in a Crisis Communications setting.

Keep Your Profiles Updated

I had a significant change in my life on December 31, 2009, as that was the day my family and I sold off our ownership positions in SOAR Communications to my former business partner.

Interestingly, it didn’t hit me until two days ago that I needed to make changes to all of my various public Internet-based profiles (and biographies) to accurately reflect my new reality. Which leads to the point of this blog post:

When was the last time you reviewed and/or updated your public profiles (and/or bios)?

For me, it had been WAY TOO LONG.

In taking a personal accounting, I realized I’ve got profiles on

• Facebook,
• LinkedIn,
• Plaxo,
• Google,
• Flickr,
• Twitter, and (of course)

on two blogs/Websites:

• Politis Communications, and
• The Betty Factor.

So I’ve now started that process (as shown in the photo above), and I plan to spend this morning reviewing and updating ALL of my public profiles/biographies.

And if you haven’t done so lately, I recommend you do the same:

Review and update each of your public profiles and biographies today.

I’m going to add this as a once-a-quarter task to my calendar to make sure I stay on top of this task in the future. I hope you do so too.

FAIL: Intuit Customer Service Unit Closed as W-2 Filing Deadline Looms

If you ran a company that generated billions of dollars in annual revenue by providing customers will invaluable software products and services and you knew there was a major deadline coming up that would impact a large percentage of your customers, don’t you think you’d make sure you had more and more customer service reps available as that deadline approached? Makes sense, right? At least that’s what I do and my firm doesn’t generate billions of dollars in annual revenue.

This is how I feel about Intuit's decision to NOT have QuickBooks payroll customer service reps available the weekend before W-2 forms have to be filed.

But that’s apparently NOT how Intuit feels (NASDAQ: INTU) because their Payroll Support team is  ONLY available Monday through Friday, 6 a.m. to 6p.m. (PST).

Most of the time, that’s probably adequate. BUT employers have to file/distribute W-2 forms on/before February 1 (that’s this coming Monday).

So I’ve been messing around with Quicken/QuickBooks for the better part of four hours now, been on the phone with Intuit customer support reps in India three times today, only to finally be told they can’t help me. I’ll need to call back on Monday morning when the Payroll Customer support group is working. AAAAAARGGGHHHH!!!!!

To the credit of the supervisor I spoke to in India, he did suggest I call at 8 a.m. (PST) on Monday as that’s a time with very little call volume. And to be honest, I appreciate that suggestion.

But with an IRS-imposed deadline looming and QuickBooks failing me (at least when it comes to accessing, preparing and printing W-2 forms today), I have one thing to day to Intuit management:

What in the heck were you thinking? The one customer support group who can handle specific issues is closed at the very time when your customers HAVE TO use a specific portion of your products. What a bone-headed decision!!!!

In case you were not clear on the point, I am NOT HAPPY WITH INTUIT right now!

UGH, UGH, UGH!

FAIL, FAIL, FAIL!!!!!!

Intuit DEFINITELY wins a Sad Betty Award over this approach to customer service.

iPad Name Equals Apple PR Blunder

Early indications are that Apple made a mistake using the term iPad to name its newest product (an eBook-reader).

The Apple iPad (photo courtesy of iLounge)

Within minutes of the official disclosure of the iPad name, the first negative missives began to hit the Internet, equating the term “pad” within iPad to a feminine hygiene napkin.

Soon the term iTampon began appearing on Twitter, with many tweets chastising Apple’s public relations and marketing department for not contemplating that at least some women might be offended with the iPad name. Other tweets provided indecorous comparisons between a feminine pad, the iPad and a tampon — hence, the emergence of the mocking, farcical term: iTampon.

In fact, by 4:30 p.m. (PST), iTampon had supplanted iPad in microblog posts on Twitter and had become the No. 2 “Currently Trending” term on Twitter (according to Tweetstats).

Look, it’s bad enough that my wife makes me buy feminine hygiene products for her and our girls at the grocery store. But iPad?!?! Are you kidding me?

I’m surprised someone inside of Apple’s distortion reality field didn’t stand up and say,

“Steve, ya know, half of the potential customers for this product might think of a sanitary napkin when they hear the name iPad.”

But maybe that’s just me. Am I off base here or not?

I think not. I’m convinced Apple made a major PR faux pas with the iPad name, a real marketing blunder.

That’s why I’m giving Apple a “Sad Betty Award” for launching this new product as the iPad.

Last thought. Expect the late night hosts to start joking about the iPad as early as tonight, but no later than tomorrow for sure!

Becoming a Better Writer

What makes a good writer? What is it about a blog post, story, letter or column that makes it engaging, that makes someone want to continue reading? How can I become a better writer?

If you’re in the public relations, marketing, investor relations and/or strategic communications world, perhaps you’ve already asked yourself these or similar questions. I know I have.

The snap answer, of course,  is to write. I’ve heard and read that answer more than 100 times — “If you want to be a better writer then you have to write.”

Okay, duh! But in my experience writing alone is not enough, especially if you’re not a particularly good writer to begin with.

I believe that the most important part of improving your skills as a writer, to becoming a better writer, is to have a good editor (or a good teacher, as the case may be).

In other words, I want someone who is better than me looking over my metaphorical shoulder prompting, prodding and pointing out specific examples of how and where I can improve my writing.

This point was brought back home to me this morning when a long-time friend asked me to review something he had written, and for the record, he told me I could “let him have it from every angle.” So here, in part, is what I wrote to my friend.

•  
  • new,
  • unexpected,
  • controversial,
  • insightful,
  • thought-provoking or
  • out-of-the-ordinary.

Are the items I mention above hard and fast rules? Of course not.

But I know they helped me to become a better writer - that and having a good editor.

Betty Benton Mann, the “Betty” Behind the Betty Factor, Died Friday Morning

Betty Mann (of "The Betty Factor" fame)

Betty Benton Mann, my 83-year-old mother-in-law and the inspiration behind The Betty Factor, died in her sleep early Friday morning, December 4, 2009 of health matters incident to old age and having her gall bladder removed earlier in the week.

Here is a copy of her obituary.

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After 83 wonderful years on earth, Betty Benton Mann returned home to her Father-in-Heaven, the Savior, Jesus Christ, many loving family members and friends, and her beloved husband, Ray, on December 4, 2009, nearly two years to the day after Ray’s passing.

Born July 3, 1926 in Boise, Idaho to Mamie Thompson and Otto G. Benton, Betty was the fifth of nine children. She was raised in Boise, Twin Falls, Idaho and Redondo Beach, California.

From the day she first walked herself to services as a young child, Betty was a devout member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS). As a teenager, she was president of her ward Golden Gleaner organization and helped plan and run the first ever LDS Youth Conference in southern California.

After graduating from Redondo Union High School, she moved to North Salt Lake to help her oldest sister, Wanda, care for her children, and it was there that she met her future husband, Ray Elwood Mann.

Betty and Ray were married in the Salt Lake Temple of the LDS church on May 4, 1948. They settled in Bountiful, Utah where they raised three daughters and two sons, while she also worked as a dental assistant for many years. Betty was active in the PTA in Bountiful where she ran the Halloween Carnival for three years and served as PTA president for two year.

After their youngest children graduated from high school in 1975, Betty and Ray spent an adventurous year in 1976 in West Germany for Ray’s employer, Chicago Bridge & Iron. The next year, Ray was transferred to world headquarters in Chicago where they lived until 1984. During their time in Naperville, Illinois, Betty filled an eight-year volunteer assignment with LDS Social Services working with out-of-wedlock mothers, including service as a counselor to birth mothers and transporting newborns to adoptive parents. She also served for a time as a member of the Relief Society presidency in the Glenbard Ward in Illinois.

Betty and Ray moved to Sandy, Utah in 1984 where they made their home for the rest of their lives. In Sandy, Betty served for 18 years in the LDS church’s Data Entry Program in the Canyon View Stake. She and Ray also served a one-year LDS Service Mission in 1994 near Bakersfield, California for the Home Management Department.

Betty was preceded in death by her parents, five siblings, her husband, and one son, Clyde. She is survived by four children, Linda, Pam (Harold) Egginton, Todd, and Allisha (David) Politis; 18 grandchildren (evenly divided between boys and girls); and 14 great-grandchildren.

A viewing will be held at Mountain View Mortuary at 3115 East 7800 South in Cottonwood Heights, Utah from 6 to 8 p.m. on Tues., Dec. 8, 2009. The funeral will be held at the same location at 11 a.m. on Wed., Dec. 9, preceded by an additional viewing from 9:45 a.m. to 10:45 a.m. Interment, on site, will follow immediately after the funeral.

The family extends its heartfelt thanks and admiration for all of the fantastic doctors and medical providers who worked with Betty in addressing her health concerns during the past few years. In addition, Betty (and Ray) loved living at South Towne Ranch in Sandy, Utah where they made many wonderful friends.

Betty had a sharp mind and wit her entire life, and she loved studying the gospel of Jesus Christ and learning about LDS church history. She was a devoted and loving wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother and friend, and although she will be missed, we are happy she has “graduated” from this life to be reunited with her husband and best friend, Ray.

Goodbye for now, Betty.

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Although we had some initial son-in-law / mother-in-law challenges early in the 28 years of our relationship, we both grew to love and respect each other over time, and I’m grateful Allisha and I were able to have both Betty and Ray live so close by as we raised our five children.

She was a good person and taught me much, not the least of which was to always remember to work and work and work to make sure what I wrote could be easily understood by anyone, even my mother-in law.

To that end, I will always use the phrase “The Betty Factor” as a shorthand reminder of that lesson. I will also keep this blog alive in her honor and as a way of continuing to teach about the importance of keeping all marketing messages simple and on-point.

Thank you, Betty, and for now, goodbye. 

More Than 50 PR Tips and Counting

I mentioned two weeks back that we’re crafting a free list of Politis PR Tips on the Politis Communications web site.

Well . . . we’re still at it and we’re now at 50 tips (and counting).

They cover a whole raft of topics, ranging from media relations to news releases and from research tips to social media / social networking.

Enjoy!

Becoming Socially Ambidextrous

Why Using Two or More Social Networks is Becoming the Norm

Today’s blog post by Brian Solis (”The Competition for Your Social Graph“) got me thinking:

• Do I use more than one social network?
• And if so, why?
• And if you don’t, “Why don’t you?”

When I was growing up in San Carlos, California, my best friend was Alan Daines. Not only were we best buds, but Alan was unique among my friends in that he could bat and throw with both hands. By definition that means that Alan was ambidextrous (or could use both hands equally well).

Alan was a lefty by birth, so he ended up playing first base for the San Carlos High School Dons. But he also taught himself to first bat righthanded, and then to throw righthanded as well. Man, that was cool!

After a lot of work I learned how to bat lefthanded; but throwing? Nah, that was another matter.

I’m Not Socially Ambidextrous - I’m Actually Socially Multidextrous

When it comes to my use of social networks and social media, however, it turns out that I’m socially multidextrous. By this I mean that I’m not dedicated to using one social network, tool, service or media to the exclusion of others. No, I actually use multiple social networks/media/services/tools, and sometimes I use more than one at the same time.

My first exposure to social networking was MySpace. I signed up years ago because we were trying to get my daughter, Melea, into the entertainment industry as a singer. (Tough, tough world, by the way.)

Today I visit/use MySpace rarely as I find its focus on music and entertainment to be overrun with skanks, ho’s and people typically interested in their next hookup. (No thank you.)

Facebook, however, is another thing. I now visit nearly every day and use it for both professional and personal networking and staying connected.

Twitter is the same for me. I use it almost every day, especially through HootSuite (which has some great tools for managing URL shortening and providing stats on people who click through URLs you embed into tweets).

I also use two business-focused social networks: LinkedIn and Plaxo. Of the two I like and use LinkedIn the most, although I really like the ability within Plaxo to send e-Birthday cards to my friends.

I also use a number of other social media/network tools/services, depending upon what it is I’m trying to do that day, especially services and tools tied to Twitter. Of these, I probably use

• HootSuite,
• TweetChat, and
• Hashtags

the most.

Why I Use Multiple Social Networks, Media, Services and/or Tools

What works for me is using different social networks, media, services and tools for different purposes.

For example, I use Facebook (in part) because it’s so dang big — more than 300 million members at last count. That’s a massive potential marketplace, and we advise ALL of our clients to use and be on Facebook.

I also use FB because it allows people to create and post multiple types of content onto their “Walls,” profiles and other users’ Walls, especially longer posts/content. This can be a good thing (if not used to excess).

Additionally, I have the ability to filter who is actively following (or Friending) me on Facebook. That can be important from a “noise” standpoint.

The microblogging service Twitter, on the other hand, is great for instantaneous, short messages, which makes sense since you are limited to a total of 140 characters max on Twitter.

(NOTE: If you want others to retweet, or re-post/re-tweet, what you’ve written, however, I’ve found it’s best to keep your Twitter posts/tweets to around 120 characters instead of using all 140. People are less likely to shorten your tweets this way.)

I also like the fact that I can “legally” have more than one Twitter account (as per Twitter’s Terms of Service). {You’re not supposed to do that on Facebook, with the exception of having a FB profile and a FB Fan Page.}

Ergo, I currently have one main Twitter account that I use most of the time (@dpolitis), but I also have several other Twitter accounts that come into play depending upon my particular area of interest or need.

LinkedIn, however, is all about business and networking for business purposes, and I use it as such. (And to be honest, I use LinkedIn a LOT more than I use Plaxo for two reasons:

1. LinkedIn has more than twice as many users as Plaxo (50MM+ vs. 20MM+), and
2. I get fewer random (read spammy) connection requests on LinkedIn vs. Plaxo.

And then as I wrote above, I use other social services and tools based upon what they allow me to do, especially with other social networks and media.

So . . . how about you?

• Do you use social networks/services/media/tools for your marketing and sales efforts?
• And if not, why not?
• And if so, which one(s) do you use the most (and why)?
• Or are you socially ambidextrous? (Do you have two favorite social networks you use all the time?)
• Or . . . are you really socially multidextrous, using multiple social networks/media/tools/services to engage with your customers, partners, investors, etc., all in the name of selling more products and services?

Tell me what you’re doing with social networks (and why) by posing your comment below. Thanks.

35 PR Tips and Counting

Call it a sales/marketing ploy; call it an altruistic effort to give back and/or pay it forward; either way, it doesn’t matter to me what you call it.

But I started a little effort a few months ago on the Politis Communications Website called Politis PR Tips. And I’ve now got 35 different tips published there.

Not a ton, but not insignificant either.

Topics covered so far range from writing tips and ideas to research recommendations, and from social media/networking suggestions to etiquette rules.

Anyway, I hope you’ll check ‘em out the Politis PR Tips, and maybe you’ll even find one or two tips useful. 

PR Hoax Hurts Integrity of National Press Club

Whether you work in the field of Public Relations or just happen to be a news junkie, chances are you already know about the PR hoax perpetrated this Monday to call into question the stance taken by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on climate change.

In fact, a quick search of Google news for the terms “chamber commerce climate change” (not inside quotation marks) finds several hundred news stories on the subject.

The event was staged at the National Press Club (in Washington, D.C.) by an activist organization that calls itself the “Yes Men,” and it’s a group that has punked the news media before. As reported in the New York Times, the fake press conference also featured fake journalists and fake press materials designed to look as if they were produced on Chamber of Commerce materials. And a number of major news outlets were fooled by the hoax, notably CNBC and Reuters (both of which later corrected and retracted their stories).

However, lost in all the hubub, hoopla and news coverage about the hoax is one critical point: I’m convinced that the Yes Men organization have also attacked and hurt the integrity of the National Press Club. Call it another example of the Rule of Unintended Consequences.

Certainly there are widespread examples of biased news organizations or media outlets that lean one political direction or the other. I get that, and I hope that most people are savvy enough to understand this fact too.

Regardless of one’s viewpoint on any subject (including climate change), the United States of America was founded on several key principles, one of which is freedom of the press.

The National Press Clubbills itself as “The World’s Leading Professional Organization for Journalists,” and none other than noted CBS commentator, Eric Sevareid called the NPC the “sanctum sanctorum of American journalists.”

By choosing to hold its fake news conference at the National Press Club, the Yes Men organization have besmirched the good name and integrity of the National Press Club.

Please note that I am NOT suggesting that the Yes Men were wrong to stage a fake press conference. I’m only suggesting it should not have been held at the National Press Club.

And for that, I bestow a Sad Betty Award on the Yes Men for choosing to stage their PR hoax at the National Press Club. 

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P.S.  To get a sense of what happened during the press conference when it was interrupted by a real representative of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, you might check out this YouTube video. It’s about six minutes long.