by Emma King (@EmmainSA) So, how is your corporate communications policy structured? Is it free and open, or is it rigid, sluggish and fear-inducing? Because, watch out, the way that you communicate, both internally and externally, says a lot about you to the outside world.
Category archives: Dissident Spin Doctor – Emma King
The Dissident Spin Doctor: 10 things I learnt in 2013
by Emma King (@EmmainSA) This time of the year is rife with all the predications of what the ‘trends’ will be this year. But just as helpful is to be reflective and to look back at what’s happened over the past year and to think about what has been learned.
The Dissident Spin Doctor: Four steps to avoiding a reputational s**tstorm
by Emma King (@EmmainSA) There are some simple things that should be done which have proved, time and time again, to be more effective ways of dealing with a reputational storm.
The Dissident Spin Doctor: Collaboration and the letting go of ego
by Emma King (@EmmainSA) Ours is not an industry for the softly spoken or the faint-hearted. It’s one in which, often, those who make the most noise are the most respected (or at least, the most well-known). And it’s one in which, I often think, success does not necessarily come to those who are the most experienced or competent, but rather those who have an opinion (credible or otherwise) and the confidence to fight for it and execute it well.
The Dissident Spin Doctor: Collaborative economy not ‘marketing bollocks’
by Emma King (@EmmainSA) ‘Collaborative economy’, as bollocksy as it sounds, is interesting and also very relevant to the modern marketplace.
The Dissident Spin Doctor: Dear brand manager — vanilla is irrelevant
by Emma King (@EmmainSA) In the compulsion to be cool, to be the popular ones, perhaps the cool kids forgot how to develop a personality. They tried to be everything to anyone, to conform to the appeal of the masses and not to stand out. They became vanilla. I wonder sometimes whether this is true, too, for brands.
The Dissident Spin Doctor: Dear Brand Manager, your social brand strategy bores us
by Emma King (@EmmainSA) We’ve all been cornered at some point in our lives. Cornered by an acquaintance or co-worker into listening to lengthy and detailed descriptions of holidays (we did not get to have), all while living through a computer avalanche of accompanying slides.
Surely, they know we don’t care.
We see brands spending more money and time trying to tell stories about themselves to their consumers, and it’s becoming ever more prevalent as we see digital and social media channels as a way to pump out our stories – our ‘content’ – to the reluctant consumer. Brands have become the yapping co-worker who cornered us to listen to a detailed account of their holiday itinerary.
Do we care that your brand product, for example, was first formulated by a nomadic people, eking out an existence in a remote jungle by making vodka from a rare root, distilled over the pure leaves of a rare orchid?
I’m not sure we do. In fact I’d go as far to say that all most of us care about is that the products tastes good (or feels good, or looks nice), is as cheap or as expensive as our wallet demands, and essentially makes us look cooler/hotter/thinner/more trendy when we are seen consuming it.
The Dissident Spin Doctor: Preparing for the booze marketing clamp down
by Emma King (@EmmainSA) Proposed amendments to liquor laws and restrictions on the sales and marketing of alcohol have once again become hot topics of conversation. Boardrooms, newsrooms and braais are seething with debates about what should or shouldn’t be changed, and who has the right to make decisions about how other people behave.
My personal opinion? Well, I get pretty pissed when people dictate when or how I can do something, and that extends to being able to sip a glass of chilled Chardonnay on a Sunday afternoon.
I don’t deny that we have a serious issue with alcohol abuse in this country. But, having worked in the alcohol industry in some form or other for all of my career, and having worked with mountains of research and closely with experts on the matter, I’m not convinced that prohibition (i.e. the restrictions of sales in various manners) or the outright banning of alcohol advertising is necessarily the answer.
What cannot be denied is the need for real intervention at grassroots level to change behaviour: robust enforcement of current laws, working with outlets to trade responsibly, and a concerted effort to tackle issues that go hand in hand with alcohol abuse – education, unemployment, and crime.
The Dissident Spin Doctor: Bloggers, freebies and the readers’ right to know
by Emma King (@EmmainSA) This week I was bemused to read the British papers up in arms over the revelation that BBC bosses accepted free tickets and hospitality to various Olympics event. The chattering classes and BBC critics were alarmed that their supposedly objective media may have been swayed by something akin to bribes.
It seems almost laughable here in South Africa. We’ve become almost immune to stories of corruption and bribery, and our state owned media outlets have given up most pretence at objectivity.
However, it raised a question for me, and got me thinking about the power of the freebie – and how it’s taken for granted in the world of PR.
We know that if we want a journalist to review a product, we need to send them that product to try out. Or if we’re running an event that we want them to cover, or have them interview a client, we cover the costs. Make sense. Fair play.
But when does this cross the line? When does a free sample become a gift? When do travelling costs become all expenses paid holiday? And what is demanded in return? At what point does it become akin to Faustus making a deal with the devil?
The Dissident Spin Doctor: In this market the greatest risk is standing still
by Emma King (@EmmainSA) So, hands up who saw the recent demise of HMV, the UKs biggest music retailer, coming?
“It was obvious,” we all scoff.
“We could all see that was going to happen,” we scorn.
“They didn’t move fast enough and they didn’t keep up with the times,” we nod wisely. “And they didn’t diversify quick enough to develop a business model around online purchases.”
But what about Atari, another company that also went bust this year? An old company, but one with a strong brand synonymous with gaming, the new ‘music’. How did they get it so wrong as to become obsolete? What does that mean for the rest of us?