Controlling conversations – A PR perspective to online reputation management

I’ve picked up numerous quotes on how online reputation management (ORM) tools are important to be able to control the messages of your brand online. I couldn’t disagree more, we have never had control of what people say about your brands, we have always been attempting to influence them, but never been able to control them.

I think these comments on controlling the message only prove why ORM functions needs to sit outside of the marketing function (who traditionally attempt to control the message) and more in the communications function. Public relations teams have never had control and are comfortable with letting go of the message. Anyone disagree?

Hold the bloggers accountable too!

Going into first world markets and experiencing the advancement of online outreach created a desire within to see the South African market advance to the same level of online engagement. I became frustrated at the lack of local online engagement, and I’m starting to wonder if it’s not the public relations space that is behind in this space but rather the blogger community.

Nic Haralambous at the recent Alt.conference argued that bloggers in South Africa lack a niche focus. He illustrated this with examples from the SA Blog Awards façade where bloggers such as Christopher M won an award for his ‘technology blog’ when very little of his blog has much to do with technology!

Many PR folk are all over Twitter, we are using online monitoring tools and tracking online conversation. When we start finding real online influencers with niche relevant markets then the two way conversation will start, until then I expect the focus to remain largely on traditional media.

Nic haralambous speaking at the Alt.conference on his passion. Picture by Paul Jacobson on Flickr licensed under Creative Commons.

Application for inservice traning

I got a rather amusing application for “inservice traning in Public relationsorCommunications field” today.

I feel rather bad for the poor guy, his email to me was so shocking I feel that he will never stand the chance of getting a job. Normally when someone sends me a CV with a spelling mistake I get irritated, stop reading it and hit delete. In PR there is no margin for spelling errors, I learnt this the hard way. In this case the application was just too bad to hit the delete key:

Hit delete on bad applications

“RE: Application for i inservice traning in Public relationsorCommunications field Kindly please recieve my application for inservice training.My name is n************* e******** d******** and I am currently registerd for my third year in Public relations Management at Durban University of Technology. As I am studying my lust year I am requerd to complite my 12 months working integrated learning that will give me practical experience in the field of public relations management, I therefore request you to allow me to complete my work experience with your organisation.

I have send my Cv in case you need it and it capts in your files

my contacts is ************ or ***************”

There are so many things wrong in this email besides the obvious spelling errors, for example how does this person think they are going to complete work experience while studying when their varsity is in Durban and our agency in Johannesburg? It’s very scary to think that this guy is in 3rd year! It really doesn’t say much for the standard at Durban University of Technology.

In many ways I want to help this guy, let’s be honest he is never going to get a job without it. At the same time I can’t say that I want to set this guy onto any company who hired him off the cover letter that I helped write. Let me know if you think we should help the poor guy out!