When surveying the social media scene, it’s disheartening to see so many “experts” preaching ways to get more followers (with the end goal, I presume, of increasing the value of each individual’s “brand” and “reach”). Marketers are looking for ways to “use” social media to get their messages out and the easiest way for them to do that is to simply have a lot of followers.
What I don’t see a lot of them doing, however, is providing added value that would make them worth following. Sure, they promise a few lucky winners a free iPod or iTouch or iPad or iTunes gift card (why not a free Blackberry?), but the result of that is a lot of dropped followers once the contest is over. I would love to see a good campaign where people follow a brand because of the value of their content alone.
I know that there are many local examples, such as the famed “cookies are out of the oven” or “here’s our special brew of the day” tweets, but I’m not sure a BIG brand has yet found a way to be a “must-follow” tweeter because of their “must-have” content. Sure, that’s more expensive then a free iPod every month.
But maybe it’s OK to not have 10,000 followers. Maybe it’s alright to just have a couple hundred key followers who will spread your content far and wide when you do have something sensational to share. It is social *networking* after all. I appreciate viral campaigns that people spread because they’re just so cool or because the informations is just so vital. There are benefits to the brand marketer when their message spreads through the network rather than having the message arrive on the audiences’ virtual doorstep via their own direct tweets.
People listen to other people they know and trust and respect. They do not value as much the marketing messages that come directly from the brands themselves. It’s advertising, after all, and Yankelovich studies have shown that 60% of American consumers don’t believe companies tell the truth in advertising. On the other hand, Nielsen reports that 78% of social media users find consumer recommendations credible, and MarketingSherpa says 84% trust user reviews more than “expert” reviews.
When something arrives in my Twitter stream or Facebook homepage or via another social media platform from someone I know saying “this is cool,” I check it out. When it comes from a brand I am likely to skip over it, knowing that the brand itself is not an unbiased party when talking about its own products.
When a brand selling coffee, provides lots of useful information about brewing and beans and baristas to coffee aficionados, they are providing a service. When said aficionados ask questions and the coffee brand responds with useful answers, they’re being good social media citizens. This earns them the right with their audience to slip in a marketing message now and again. This strategy might not get them ALL coffee drinkers as a direct audience (i.e., they won’t have a million coffee drinkers as “followers,” although they might have 1,000 aficionados). However, when the aficionados re-tweet or forward information from the brand to *their* followers, the brand now has earned the benefits that come with third party endorsements, which are much more powerful.
That said, I do enter some of the contests now and again. I doubt I’ll win an iPad as a result. But maybe. I do know that the brand that made me follow them in order to be eligible to win is unlikely to get a long-term follower out of me as a result. I haven’t seen one of the contest tweeters yet provide enough content to keep me interested.
I’m much more interested in the real people having a real dialog about what they (and I) love (even if that means I have to follow some of their silly foursquare meanderings). So, I follow people who love GR (because I do). I follow people who love PR (because I do). I might even follow some people who love hockey (because I do). I don’t follow people who cram the same message into my feed day after day, because they’re not honoring the social agreement — this is a two-way dialog, after all!
In the media training I helped lead last week we discussed the slow response of certain business leaders in the wake of crises affecting their brands. With social media, what once was just a little slow would today be considered glacial.
One case study we discussed was the emergency landing by Captain “Sully” of US Airways Flight 1549 on the Hudson River a little more than a year ago. The successful emergency landing on the river, famously captured on a cell phone camera, occurred at 3:30 p.m. The evacuation onto the wings of the Airbus A320 happened quickly, and within minutes nearby commercial ferries were taking on the passengers. Capt. Sully, who first walked through the plane twice to ensure all passengers had been evacuated, emerged as America’s newest hero.
At 4:55 p.m., fire crews began to stand down. All the cable news channels had extensively covered the situation. Many interviews of experts and witnesses and analysts had been conducted. By that time, there was little that the American public didn’t know about what had happened. A jet airliner landing on the river in NYC?! Post 9/11, the media are super-prepared to be all over a situation like this.
At 5:07 p.m., US Airways CEO Doug Parker issued a statement during a news conference at the airline’s headquarters in Tempe, Arizona, confirmed that there had been an accident. He didn’t really say much more than that. He didn’t use the opportunity to praise Captain Sully, with whom he had already spoken on the phone. He didn’t say, ”We’re thrilled that the expertise of our flight staff prevented this from being a much more dire situation.” After all, all 155 occupants of the ditched jet survived! By the time he stood at the podium, he knew his airline had just been presented the biggest gift ever — an accident that couldn’t be avoided, but only minor injuries and some property loss.
Now, 90 minutes isn’t that much time, especially if a number of meetings and discussions had to occur before the hastily assembled news conference. That said, more information needed to come from Mr. Parker and, more important, some emotion. People know that some accidents are going to happen and are unavoidable. But, people want to see a human reaction to crises … not some “don’t-say-too-much-for-fear-of-lawsuit” statement.
For weeks, the crisis at Toyota has been building. A little less sensational, but affecting many more people. Quality issues have now resulted in the recall of 9 million cars worldwide. Again, people don’t expect mechanical things to be perfect, but they do expect the manufacturers of mechanical things to not only fix the problem, but to publicly acknowledge the errors and demonstrate some *human* remorse. Not just a statement. Not just a policy. Not just a fix. They want to see real people saying real things about real situations.
Toyota’s president, Akio Toyoda (grandson of company founder), was part of a hastily arranged news conference Friday night (earlier today) and apologized, taking personal responsibility for the problems. “I deeply regret that I caused concern among so many people,” he said. “We will do our utmost to regain the trust of our customers.” He acknowledged this is a crisis (Really? You didn’t know that earlier?) and he also apologized to shareholders for the 20% drop in company stock.
That he is apologizing and taking this seriously is great. That it’s happening a few weeks after the news first broke is not so great. And while I believe shareholders are indeed an important audience, an apology to them should be done through a shareholder-only communication. Doing so in the news conference only indicates that the only reason Mr. Toyoda is up there is because the crisis is affecting financials, rather than the fact that his faulty cars are affecting people.
I appreciate good brakes. This morning, while I was taking a left out of a parking lot, some oncoming cars were stopped to allow me through. Little did I know, however, that another car was barreling down the left turn lane. The driver/cell phone talker, however, did have good enough sense and brakes to come to a skidding stop as I inched across the lane. Thank you for good brakes to unknown car maker (I don’t remember what make of car it was … it could have been a Toyota!).
I want Toyota to say, “We’re sorry that a faulty process has led to this. We will do our utmost to ensure this doesn’t happen again and to make sure every Toyota owner has complete confidence in their car’s mechanical abilities!” I don’t own a Toyota personally, but I believe I drive next to many of them every day.
And I want them to say these things early in the game and not weeks later when their stock is crashing. That’s all I want.
Decay and Renewal
This week I’ve had plenty of time to think. Think about what I’m doing and want to do. Think about where I’m at and how I got here. Think about the new chapters that are yet to be written in my life. Think about those around me and what’s going on in their minds.
I had a meeting with the head of a company based just off Chicago Drive and, when the meeting was done, I took Chicago into downtown. The thoroughfare that is Chicago Drive was once a main route in and out of Grand Rapids, before they built I-196 tracing the same route. It was a highway of industry. Today, I saw lots of decay. Padnos, one of the businesses on Chicago, thrives on the scraps of decay, converting “things” back into their raw materials, to be used again in new “things.” The buildings I passed by had seen better days, but are still put to good use by businesses providing valuable and necessary services. Not fancy, but honest and hardworking.
On the radio, listening to WYCE, I heard a soulful rendition of the hymn ”Amazing Grace” sung to the tune of “House of the Rising Sun,” the ballad popularized by The Animals in the ’60s. The bluesy rendition made me think of renewal from multiple perspectives. From a faith-based perspective. From an artistic perspective, bringing new meaning to two different songs by combining the lyrics of one with the tune of the other. All while driving through streets in various stages of renewal … some refurbishing and repurposing old buildings, others tearing down and starting over.
I took a right on Wealthy Street and made my way to The Sparrows (aka, my “office” away from home), a coffee shop in an old building with plenty of character. Along the way to Sparrows, I thought about “Wealthy” Street and what a grand thing it must have been to say “I live on Wealthy Street” in years gone by.
A hundred years ago, Wealthy was the route taken by a street car system, bringing GR’s well-heeled populace out to Ramona Park on Reed’s Lake in East Grand Rapids. Closer to downtown, Wealthy was an artery through beautiful homes built for the owners and executives of furniture companies, banks, and other important businesses in West Michigan’s regional center.
A little further down Wealthy, at a midpoint between GR and EGR, immigrant dutch built their homes. The area immediately surrounding The Sparrows, where I’m sitting right now, was where the smaller homes were built for workers in the greenhouses. As the dutch became more established, they built their middle class neighborhoods in the many blocks south and north of Wealthy, and they built their CRC and RCA churches and the created Calvin College. The brick streets that had been common in their homeland became a quaint feature of their new home.
Inevitably, the decay came. It always does. As their homes and business fronts and brick streets aged, many that lived on these streets headed for (literally) greener pastures on the edges of Grand Rapids. In many cases, their churches followed them a few years later. Calvin left too, having outgrown its hemmed-in campus on Franklin Street. It found the space it needed to expand on Knollcrest Farms.
In more recent years, this area was better known as the stomping grounds for The Wealthy Street Boys, a gang known for drugs and killings. When I was in college, I lived a few blocks from Wealthy, and the Boys threw a brick through the back window of a roommate’s car. The neighbor told me they must have thought it was his because he was a member of the rival Gangster Disciples.
I lived there because I was a college student and it was cheap. Others lived there because they were poor, and it was cheap. People just abandoned certain neighborhoods where crime was too rampant, with those remaining behind the ones who had no other options.
Efforts are being made to restore the vitality of these old neighborhoods. The Wealthy Theater renovation and the launch of new stores and restaurants have helped revive interest in restoring neighborhoods, similar to how the Van Andel Arena spurred redevelopment efforts south of what was considered the “safe” parts of downtown a decade ago. Many of the houses are quite sound and, restored, very beautiful. As the “disposable” mentality shifts to one that places great value on recycling and reuse, these neighborhoods, too, will rebound.
What’s old can become new again.
And that’s something I need to remember for me. And maybe you need to remember that for you too. The shell of you grows older and the need for what you do (or did) might lessen. Or maybe others with different value systems just move on, seeking some greener pasture and leaving you behind. You can be renewed and start over. That is what I’m in the process of doing, and I hope to help others do the same.
The Media Trainers
Yesterday I spent a wonderful day conducting media training for a major corporation with two media trainers I highly respect. One, Bill Salvin, is an excellent trainer I used for many years while at Amway. He started working with us back in the ’90s when he was with The Conner Group, founded by Tim Conner. The other tainer I worked with was Tim Conner himself.
I’ve always enjoyed working with Tim, an accomplished trainer with extensive experience working with the aviation/aerospace, defense, energy, high tech and healthcare industries. He’s conducted hundreds of programs for companies such as DuPont, BP, Lockheed Martin, United Space Alliance, NASA, Starbucks, Expedia and more. Plus, he’s a Commander in the Navy Reserve and, between his service and his consultancy he’s worked on six continents and nearly all 50 states and 20 foreign countries. He was an award-winning journalist earlier in his career and covered presidential primaries, interviewing Bill Clinton and George Bush as part of his work.
Tim, with whom Bill started his media training career, has an equally incredible career spanning four decades and touching nearly every corner of the communications industry. He developed training programs for and consulted with some of the world’s largest corporations. From airlines and energy companies to retail fashion and government agencies, Tim is one of the most sought after communications consultants. He too began his career in the media, starting as a writer and reporter in radio and television while earning his degree from Coe College in Iowa. He alter earned his graduate degree in communications from Syracuse University, then flew jet fighters for the Marines for five years.
Having dinner with Bill and Tim essentially is tapping into a wealth of expertise and history and stories. I enjoy both of these guys so much. A company that hires these two guys to do media training, meanwhile, taps into some of the best training available to prepare company executives and spokespeople to represent their organization in front of the cameras during a crisis.
SO, working with them this week to train 15 execs of a major U.S. corporation was a GREAT honor for me. I’ve done media training internally at Amway for many years and have helped prepare a few clients for the cameras as well. Working with Bill and Tim, however, is really working in the big leagues, and I think our sessions went really well. I did practice interviews and provided counsel to four of these execs, helping them understand some basics about going into media interviews with an agenda and using simple bridging tactics to get to their key messages.
I’m looking forward to future opportunities to work with Bill and Tim and to providing media training to my own clients as well. I truly believe that the things we taught during these sessions will help the trainees not only in times of crisis but also as we prepare for just about any meeting they go into. How prepared are you for your next crisis? How prepared are you to talk from the podium? How prepared are you for your next staff meeting?
I’ve always been a bit of a night owl, often still up after the 11 p.m. news to see who is up to what on the talk shows. For the past decade, my preference was Letterman. I just didn’t think Leno was that funny. I know that for others, it is the exact opposite.
Even I have limits, and I didn’t typically stay up for O’Brien’s Late Show. He always pushed a little too far over some boundaries on his later slot, in my opinion, but when he moved into The Tonight Show, I thought he was reined in nicely and was very smart and funny. For the first time in more than a decade, I actually had to choose between two night shows (usually, scheduled guests were the deciding factor). Many of the Leno loyalists moved on, I guess, and as a result The Tonight Show dipped in the ratings (as did the new Leno show in the 10 p.m. slot — no surprise).
So, NBC president Jeff Zucker decided to cry “do over!” and put everyone back where they were. Except Conan wasn’t going and, by contract, didn’t have to. And that’s where the fun began.
Conan began ripping on NBC. Dave began ripping on Leno (and NBC). Leno kind of tip-toed through the whole situation, although he took some shots back at Dave. Leno also had Jimmy Kimmel on his show, who used the opportunity to take many jabs at Leno’s expense. And the rest of the world was taking sides. On Twitter, swarms of people used the #TeamConan or #ImWithCoco tags to demonstrate their support. There were few taking Leno’s side. On Facebook, I was only involved in one conversation about the situation, and most in that dialog seemed to like Leno better.
So, here’s my assessment of reputation winners and losers in this one. Please note: This has nothing to do with whom I think is funnier or more deserving of the show. Just observations.
Conan O’Brien – Hard to say that the guy who lost his seat behind one of the most coveted desks in comedy is a winner, but the huge public rallies held to demonstrate support and the outpouring of sympathy on the part of guest celebrities seem to indicate that Conan will have his show (Fox? Comedy Central? Something on the web?) and will be able to write new chapters of late night entertainment. Oh, plus he got his mega-millions payday just to walk away. He earned additional reputation points for getting severance packages for his staff, for the huge ratings he delivered in the final weeks and, last but not least, his final show, which included a raucous guitar performance on Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Free Bird (with Will Ferrell and an all-star band) and a goodbye speech that thanked NBC for the opportunity to realize his dreams and begged viewers to not by cynical. Instead, “If you work really, really hard, and you’re kind … amazing things will happen to you.” Sounds a little like what I was talking about in my last post! In any case, Conan can walk away with his head held high.
Jay Leno – He comes back to The Tonight Show, but it’s really hard to understand why a guy would want to gain it back in that manner. Sure, he has his fans and they’ll come back. But I bet there will be a goood chunk of people who will stay away on purpose. I have a feeling there are even certain guests who might not come back (although, if you’ve got something to promote, it would be hard to stay away). Jay didn’t say a lot to hurt his reputation, but he also didn’t just walk away from the mess and give Conan the chance to rise or fall on his own merits (he would have been welcomed back a year from now had Conan continued to flounder ratings-wise). Further, Dave Letterman ripping into Jay, claiming this was “vintage” behavior from the comedian, further sullies his reputation.
Dave Letterman – Dave benefitted from Jay’s departure to primetime, since Conan’s struggles resulted in a ratings boost for his show. With Jay coming back, some of those new viewers will likey return to their Jay roost. Some of Dave’s routines this past week were very funny, targeting ex-employer NBC as well as Leno, the man who stole the show that he had thought would be his birthright after Johnny Carson’s departure. At the same time, however, he may have come across seeming a little mean-spirited. In the end, he’s not host of The Tonight Show and he’s going to lose some viewers back to Jay. He does serve as an interesting model for Conan to follow though.
Jeff Zucker – OK, reputation-wise this man’s in a free fall. His programming acumen is in serious doubt. His handling of this entire situation has been lacking. He is being lampooned throughout the media critic circles. But he probably doesn’t care.
NBC – The network has seen better days. I still remember when they ruled nearly every segment of television. They owned primetime, they owned news ratings, they were the leaders in sports. And they had the venerable Tonight Show. They’re no longer the network king of the hill, which is a shrinking hill anyway as a billion cable channels siphon off viewers left and right.
Jon Stewart etal – Alternatives like Comedy Central’s Daily Show with Jon Stewart and Colbert Nation with Stephen Colbert will continue to chip away at the networks. They too, of course, will see ratings erosion as people turn away from watching live or recorded TV altogether to just watch clips online. Jimmy Kimmel has a very specific audience, and I don’t think anything going on between Dave & Jay & Conan had an impact on him. Jimmy Fallon and Craig Ferguson are on too late to matter in these discussions, unless someone were to be pushed back into a later slot (as was NBC’s suggestion for Conan).
In the final analysis, I’m not sure how much reputation matters in TV, especially the late night variety. But it’s fun to watch. It was “reality tv” at its finest. Like Survivor, its “Outwit, Outplay, Outlast.” Jay might have suffered a reputational blow, but in the end he’ll still share some chuckle-inducing banter with guests and viewers and ride home on his Harley, knowing he won the game.
You just never know
Last year, I was part of a small group that became active participants in the life of the East Hills (Cherry Street) neighborhood of Grand Rapids. We were exploring the area as a possible site for expansion of our Presbyterian church. That never panned out, but we developed some nice relationships with some community activists, with the neighborhood business organization, and with the underserved elementary school in the area.
Related to that effort, I wrote a brochure promoting investment in the Wealthy Heights Initiative, a six-block area along Wealthy Street. The first meeting to talk about that initiative was at The Sparrows, a coffee shop that, in recent months, has become my “office” (free wi-fi, good coffee and music, creative atmosphere) now that I am an independent practitioner. I wasn’t planning on needing an office away from home last year when working on the Wealthy Heights Initiative.
As part of our community outreach, I attended a meeting last summer about a tree study in the East Hills area. I learned a lot about the economic, environmental, and “quality of life” benefits of trees at that meeting. For instance, how does cutting all the trees along a city street affect the property values and resulting taxes? What is the impact on air quality with the loss of each broad-canopied tree? What about water run-off issues and habitat for wildlife and the benefits to home heating and cooling costs and, well, the pure aesthetics of a well-treed neighborhood.
When a potential client with a product to save ash trees (rather than simply cutting them down due to the spread of the Emerald Ash Borer, which has been the approach taken by many municipalities) approached me yesterday, I already knew the topic well based on that meeting last year. When I went to that meeting at what was once the Diamond Street fire station, I wasn’t planning on getting a call from this company; providence has a way of preparing you for what you don’t know is going to happen.
After talking to the prospective client yesterday, I was sitting in The Sparrows mulling over in my mind what I remembered of that tree study meeting. In walks Johannah, my contact for the Wealthy Street Initiative — the first time I’d seen her in six months. She sat down and we caught up and she immediately knew all the people I needed to talk to and, further, suggested a few additional people.
Last summer I thought we were doing a church plant. Since that didn’t happen, it could have been considered a failure. Instead, it led me to a cool community that has provided an ”office” away from home, contacts who can help me with potential clients, and good friendships. You never know how the relationships you build today will help you at some point in the future. I don’t necessarily believe in karma, but I do believe that adding value to the experience of others you meet is more likely to reward you later than simply being a “recipient” in your relationships.
What happens when a person who has added no value to anyone else’s experience loses their job? Who is there to help them? Who is there to provide encouragement, advice, job leads, a cup of coffee? Rich DeVos spoke at Calvin College’s “January Series” of lectures the other day, and from the news coverage I see that he spoke about being a “life enricher,” a topic that he’s spoken on many times before.
When you are a positive force in other peoples’ lives, you help them and you help yourself. Because, as I have come to find out, you just never know.
For the past few months I’ve been working with ShowSpan to publicize their Grand Rapids Camper, Travel & RV Show, which opened yesterday. I have been very impressed with ShowSpan’s “behind-the-scenes” operations supporting the show, which is one of many they produce (they also do the auto show, the home & garden show, the golf show, and others). ShowSpan works with an ad agency as well, of course, to place ads on TV, radio, print and billboards. They have a good online presence. And they have me.
For the past few weeks, I’ve helped keep ShowSpan spokespeople pretty busy. This morning we had Fox17 out here between 6 and 9 a.m. which also meant that the show manager was here as well as a few of the vendors we were featuring. Later this morning the RV show will be featured in an EightWest segment on WOOD TV8, the result of a taping yesterday with Rachel Ruiz. Last night the show was on Fox17’s evening news and was featured as part of WGVU TV’s “Ask The Expert” with Shelley Irwin. WZZM13 also has been here and that show appeared yesterday.
Last Sunday The Grand Rapids Press featured the show on the back cover of the sports section and John Gonzalez made the RV Show one of Gonzo’s Top Five picks for the week. Add in all the radio interviews and the media interest the show will continue to generate (NASCAR favorite Johnny Benson’s here tomorrow … that’ll bring a crowd), and it all equals a lot of exposure for the RV industry. One result of that was record crowds arriving for the Thursday open of the show, now in its fourth year.
The exposure increases interest which generates traffic which, hopefully, results in sales for the RV industry. Talking to some of the RV dealers who are showing their wares at the show, interest is high among show attendees to buy. That’s a good sign, because the RV industry is a leading indicator for the overall economy. It’s the first to decline when the economy softens, and it’s among the first to rebound when confidence rises.
SO, I’m not a trained expert in this field, but I do sense a strengthening economy and hope that my role supporting one show in one city for one industry is a part of the solution. As for you, it’s time to plan your vacation, and you should at least explore RVs as an option. Benefits include family bonding, flexibility, cost benefits, and more. I’ll send you the news releases if you’d like. 
Travels With Charley revisited
For the past few months I’ve been working with ShowSpan to promote the Grand Rapids Camper, Travel and RV Show that starts this Thursday. The discussions I’ve had with area RV dealers and manufacturers has reawakened in me the desire to travel across this great country on the road, one mile at a time. I’ve been all over the U.S. and my native Canada, but mostly via air travel, dropping in on a city for a few days and departing when my business was finished.
When I was a teen, I read John Steinbeck’s book Travels With Charley, about his cross-country trip in 1960 to rediscover America with his french poodle Charley. I don’t remember a lot about his travels, other than the fact that he documented experiences that reflected a country that was simmering and no longer lived up to his expectations. That, and the fact that he created a special camper to meet his own tastes and needs. I recall he created a special “clothes washer” that churned and agitated on rubber bands while he drove.
Ever since that time I wanted to do something like that … travel across the country and stop wherever I wanted, with no particular schedule or destination (or, obviously, financial limitations). Steinbeck made the trip in the twilight of his life. His son later said he thought his dad took the trip because he knew he was dying and wanted to see America one last time. Of course, I don’t have the same sort of motivations Steinbeck may have had. As a journalism and English major in college, Steinbeck and Hemingway were my heroes. I appreciated Hemingway’s journalism background and Steinbeck’s documentation of the human condition. Travels With Charley was a first-person narrative and brought home the power of sharing your experiences with audiences.
What I like about the RV show this week is that there is a movement toward simplicity. As one dealer stated, “our industry is on a bit of a diet,” which is to say that consumers are looking for a little less RV and a smaller pricetag right now. Much of that is driven by the economy, of course, but also by a growing concern for environmental “footprints.” The cool thing is that the industry is responding with lighter RVs that require less horsepower (and fuel) to pull or drive, streamlined profiles that have less wind drag, and use materials that are renewable and provide healthier environments for their human occupants.
Last week I talked to the owner of EggCamper, a company in Grandville that produces two RVs that are super light, made almost entirely of molded plastic, yet very strong and kind of retro looking. I’m looking forward to seeing them in person. The smaller one, the Teardropp, is very petite and would be perfect for a couple looking to get away and “sort of” camp, rather than simply vacation in a “rolling house.” With four kids, I doubt the cozier versions of the RV lifestyle are in my near future. But someday.
For exactly half my life now I’ve called Grand Rapids home. I came here from Canada to go to college and since my Junior year I’ve never gone home for more than a week at a time.
West Trenton
Home for me was the small town of Trenton, Ontario, with a population of about 15,000. Most people in Canada would only know Trenton as the home to one of the country’s largest air bases. Many of the factories that once provided valuable jobs for the town have left that area, although I believe Domtar is still there. You could always smell the creosote treatment of railway ties when entering Trenton from the north. When I’ve gone back in recent years, I’ve been saddened a little that the town seems to have fallen on rough times. Last summer I went home for a week and revisited some of the places of my youth. Let me just say that, although there was an element of nostalgia, I was happy that I have a new hometown — Grand Rapids.
When I first came to Grand Rapids in the late ’80s, I was happy with a city that offered so much more than the small-town I grew up in. Don’t get me wrong, I like Trenton and my upbringing there helped make me the person I am today (which is to say, I’m happy with who I am!). What’s amazing about that statement is that Grand Rapids is so much better today than it was 20-some years ago!
The complete renaissance of downtown Grand Rapids has been nothing short of amazing. Shortly after graduating from Calvin College, I went to work for the Grand Rapids Business Journal which, at that time, was based in the Trust Building on the corner of Pearl and Ottawa. It was exciting to work downtown near the bustling office buildings, restaurants and traffic. After five o’clock, however, downtown pretty much emptied out and became a ghost town. Now, with the Van Andel Arena, DeVos Place, Civic Theatre, numerous condo developments and scores of restaurants and bars that didn’t exist just 20 years ago, downtown has become a destination for the region.
Grand Rapids Skyline
Now, with events like ArtPrize and festivals and celebrations and spontaneous, social media-driven events, there’s a buzz around the city’s core. That buzz extends to the edges too. Meijer Gardens is a beautiful attraction bringing people from all over to our city. The Whitecaps and their beautiful ball park were still just a vision when I first came here, and now they’re well-established and sometimes an afterthought with everything else that’s going on around here.
I love the neighborhoods of Grand Rapids. I’m in Alger Heights, which has been a wonderful place to raise my children. I hang out in coffee shops in Wealthy Heights and East Hills and Gaslight Village and savor the unique attributes of each micro-community. I love that West Michigan businessmen have stayed loyal to their hometown and contributed greatly to maintaining its viability and vitality. I love my own neighbors and the fact that there are very few fences on my street, allowing our kids to run back and forth to enjoy each others’ companionship.
Since September, I’ve been working on establishing my own public relations consultancy. It’s slow, hard work to gather together new clients and service their needs. I am asked all the time by friends, “How’s your new business?!” and have to reply, honestly, it’s a lot of work and it’s very slow to get started. I remain confident in my abilities, however, and in the fact that the economy will improve and that I will be well-positioned to obtain and service new clients when it does.
That said, other opportunities are out there. By that, I mean in other places. And while I work hard to establish myself here, I owe it to my family to explore other options as well. The few interviews I’ve done have been for jobs in other cities. And if the right opportunity with the right employer comes along, I’ll have to go.
In the meantime, I’m gonna continue to love GR and hope the city loves me back! It has for more than two decades. It’s provided me with education, employment, entertainment, family and friends. And now I’m hoping it’ll provide enough clientele to help Luymes Public Relations not only survive, but thrive, in a way that will help me give back to this community for the decades to come!
As I entered my office (aka The Sparrows) today, I noticed a cooler right next to the Jones Soda cooler labeled Naked, a brand of fruit juices. It reminded me of a blog post I wrote a few years ago on Getting Naked. I thought I’d revisit that topic here.
At the time, I was preparing for a WOMMA conference at which I was speaking on managing online corporate reputations. It’s a theme I’ve tried to carry through on my site and business cards and in my practice of public relations: Honest, Open, Transparent communications (HOTcomms).
If HOTcomms were practiced by all companies and organizations, the public relations profession itself wouldn’t have its own reputation issues. When organizations use their “PR” function to obfuscate or “spin” or perform some other sleight of hand to distract their audiences from the plain, bare truth, the public simply loses trust in the organizations AND anything labeled “PR.”
When will CEOs, political candidates and others realize that eventually their disingenuous communications will come back to bite them in the butt? There may have been a time in the past when you could get away with tricking your audiences, but today there are millions of people online ready to correct the record or shed light on a topic they feel is being “spun.” Candidates espousing a particular position are reminded of previous statements or actions indicating a different viewpoint in the past. Companies hiding information related to their financials are usually discovered these days. Ask Enron or any of the hundreds of companies listed online that have tried to get away with unethical practices.
Social media — a vast online conversation surrounding just about every topic — has nearly ensured that the truth will eventually come out on just about any topic. If more than one person knows a secret, eventually they’ll talk. And that secret will quickly spread throughout the online universe, because that’s what happens with secrets. The more you try to hide something, the bigger the “aha” moment when it’s discovered.
Robert Scoble and Shel Israel wrote about being open in Naked Conversations, and Don Tapscott and David Ticoll covered similar territory in The Naked Corporation. In April 2007, Wired Magazine had a series of articles themed “Get Naked and Rule the World.” All of them pointed out that, increasingly, there are no secrets. Information “wants to be free” and quickly becomes so online.
With this new reality, businesses and organizations that will advance to the next level are those committed to transparency, adapting to consumer needs as expressed by the consumers themselves, and providing a level of unprecedented participation. There are many examples of brands that have succeeded in creating productive, engaged conversations around their brands. Those conversations are not always positive, but the willingness to allow critique results in a “double positive.” The honest, open and transparent brands get good marks for what is already positive about their brands, and they get good marks for openly discussing what’s not completely positive (provided that consumers see movement in the right direction on those negatives).
People don’t always expect perfection. But they expect not to be lied to. They can forgive a company when things don’t always go right. But they don’t forgive attempts to spin or cover up or outright lie about what hasn’t gone right. My advice always is to “out yourself before you’re outed by others.” If you allow someone else to tell your bad news before you, you’re already digging yourself out of a hole. By presenting the not-s0-great information yourself, you’re able to also tell your key audiences what you’re doing about the situation.
So, my advice back in 2007 and for 2010 is to “get naked.” While HOTcomms may not always be the way to quick success, it is fundamental to long-term success.
