Mark Hanson

Berlusconi and the Media Love Machine

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:58:22 GMT

The much maligned Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, has set up a special 'Truth Taskforce' to love-bomb the international media, primarily any that write negatives about Italy and specifically any that write bad things about the Italian Prime Minister. Basically it's a crack team of journalists and PR's who will monitor the international media and whenever a report pops up that doesn't present the Motherland or it's great leader in a favourable light they will swoop with a rapid rebuttal of 'truths'.

Silvio bought his own television corporation and football club to make him look great, then botox and a hair transplant now he's using taxpayer cash to spend on PR.

Many Eastern European and South American regimes have for a long time done proactive PR aimed at the UK and US markets to present their leaders as pro-Western, pro-democracy and general good-eggs, but this is the first time I've heard it being done on such a reactive basis or by a Western European government. (Although Italy does have 'form' in this area).

I can't find any mention of how the news managers will handle social media but this serves as a salutary warning of the need to monitor and respond on an international basis.

Note to Berlusconi's team: all the usual rules of good engagement apply - listen to people's concerns, put your point of view across in a way that is constructive and show a willingness to pursue a genuinely two-way dialogue. If that fails, find out the other person's address and deposit a horse's head on their bed.

Obama Falls Out With Bloggers (In Pyjamas)

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 19:58:38 GMT

Interesting that the first web 2.0 President seems to be having tiffs with the social media community.

CNBC's Washington correspondent John Harwood reports an anonymous White House source (cough!) re how the Obama White House has handled gay issues as a problem with the "Internet left fringe." Harwood said on air that "one advisor told me today 'those bloggers need to take off the pajamas, get dressed, and realize that governing a closely divided country is complicated and difficult.'" This carries echoes of the Democrat establishment dismissing bloggers that fuelled the Dean campaign as like the aliens in the bar scene in Star Wars!

It could be that the equivalent of Josh and CJ reckon it would be good positioning for Obama to pick a fight with the social media-types at a time when he's losing favour with Middle America. But this isn't an isolated incident and the influential US version of TechCrunch carries an open message from the tech community on how Barack can make good on expectations that people had over using the web to deliver true open government.

From a distance it seems like folks are being a bit impatient about all sorts of things from healthcare to interactive government to world peace. But there is something interesting in how the Obama team is framing it's outreach strategy. Less about gossip-driven bloggers and more about how to reach specific online communities using the forum owner or manager as a gateway.

Apparently they are targeting communities in leading consumer and personal finance sites - Consumerist and Motley Fool. This has echoes of the Labour online strategy in the UK, where the Party has used 'engagement' with voters on specific interests as a key element and Yvette Cooper, whilst in the Treasury, had some successful results in the Moneysupermarket forum.

Problem is it doesn't generate the same media attention as the gossip blogs i.e. the ones that journalists use.

Political Blog Sold For....£1.3 million?!?

Wed, 23 Sep 2009 14:23:36 GMT

There's much discussion about the purchase by Tory Billionaire, Michael Ashcroft, of the blog sites, ConservativeHome and PoliticsHome, for a mind-blowing £1.3 million. Whilst there will be many bedroom-bloggers being re-energised by three year plans to similarly sell out to rich owners the rest of us are just left thinking 'why'?

I was involved in Labourhome when it was sold for a much lesser figure last year and we all thought that the attraction was the trusted brand amongst the grassroots. But a political blog, just like a blog about cars, tech, sports or whatever will find it difficult to maintain trust if it sells out to a corporate money-bags. Labourhome's editor, Alex Hilton, was savvy and chose exactly the right investor, a Labour-supporting media entrepreneur, who then left him firmly in charge. But why would Michael Ashcroft, whose office at Tory HQ is larger than even David Cameron's (reflecting relative importance) be interested in buying a site like ConservativeHome, traditionally a thorn in the side of the leadership? Hmmmm....

Sunder Katawala has an excellent analysis here and he makes the point that not all media moguls are like Robert Maxwell i.e. the good ones understand the usefulness of perceived independence and I'm sure Ashcroft will do all he can to reassure editor, Tim Montgomerie, that all will stay the same on that side. He has to. Unlike newspapers, the internet has low barriers to entry so if the site is no longer truly serving the readers then its much easier for someone to set up an alternative like the 'RealConservativeHome.com'. Any good site needs resources but hey, this is the Tories, there's always someone who can waive cash at them.

If we strip this down Ashcroft is really buying the plumbing that sits behind the ConHome/PolHome operation and that tells us lots about what it takes from a communications POV in the online space. Again, my good friend, Jag Singh, summarises perfectly elsewhere. Firstly, don't forget that ConHome owns the now defunct internet TV channel, 18DoughtyStreet, with it's TV quality production, editing, staff, graphics - basically everything you need to make the kind of attack ads the Americans are famous for and that Tim Montgomerie et al have already dabbled with.

They're also thinking of how they can use this to capture the attention and even coverage of mainstream media. Many bloggers compete for mindshare of the political press and see the willingness of print/broadcast journalists to use their stories, quote them or use them as talking heads as their ROI. The tools available here will be valuable in pumping out pictures that can go straight to news channels and be immediately noticed by journalists scouring for stories.

There is also the data i.e. the email addresses and profiles of Tory grassroots members and activists that is the sovereign currency of modern politics. All Parties measure campaign effectiveness in terms of number of email addresses collected but it's so difficult to pick up much more about your supporters and potential supporters in quantitative or qualitative terms. ConHome has all that thanks to the infrastructure and polling expertise of previous owner and YouGov founder, Stephan Shakespeare.

Labour has caught up online in the past 12 months. Now Ashcroft has raised the stakes.

Think Tank Uses New Media To Open Up Politics

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 16:33:25 GMT

I've been working with the ippr (Institute for Public Policy Research), dubbed 'New Labour's favourite think tank' and pioneers of some of the most progressive and forward-thinking policy ideas of recent years. My role is to assist them with the modernising of their communications, so that those cutting-edge discussions reach the right audience in an era when audiences are becoming ever more disperse and influence is becoming much less predictable.

We are midway through a body of work on how politics can be modernised in the context of the fall-out from MPs expenses, but also falling voter turn-out and general public apathy. One element of this is thinking about how Party conferences can be modernised to become more inclusive of Party members. Why should it only be those lucky enough to be given the golden lanyard through 'the ring of steel', mostly lobbyists, who are allowed to take part?

The ippr has a high-profile fringe discussion at each of the Party conferences, which all aim to debate key issues facing the Parties. Conference veterans will know that these events traditionally involve 'experts' sat on a panel, with an audience watching and receiving the wisdom. We wanted to make the sessions much more interactive, but, crucially, involve the grassroots of each Party, as it's they who the issues will affect and its they who will be asked to campaign on the doorstep in May, so their insight and opinion is vital and they badly need to be brought into the process.

So, we did deals with three of the biggest online communities i.e. one for each Party - Alex Smith (Labourlist), Mark Pack (Lib Dem Voice) and Michael Rock (Conservative Future). Each agreed to promote and help create an online focus group and answer a set of 10 questions - both closed and open.

As Lib Dems are first, their stuff is the most complete. They trailed the survey, ran a guest post from ippr's co-director, Carey Oppenheim about why the ippr is doing this and then started to post about the results to build momentum. This is the Labourlist set-up and the Conservative Future stuff will follow in a couple of days.

Each survey generates around 200 responses, with in-depth views and information. The events are 'live-tweeted' so that people outside of the event can view what's being said and ask questions via Twitter. This enables the grassroots to almost be our extra panel member at each event, acting as a counter to the views of the experts on the podium.

We hope to show political parties how simple new media tools can involve vast swathes of people in discussion and decision making, regardless of whether they are able to afford the time and expense of attending the conference showpiece.

Let me know what you think...

Twitter Innovates at Party Conferences

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 08:53:37 GMT

I've been following the quick evolution in how politicians are starting to use Twitter with varying success. It will also be interesting to observe some of the attempts to bring Twitter into use at the upcoming party conferences, which started this week with the Lib Dem jamboree in Bournemouth.

MessageSpace, the online political advertising consultancy fronted by my friend, the former US Democrat new media consultant, Jag Singh, is launching an innovative new service to target the party conference fringe circuit.

FringeList.com will be an online hub for comms and marketing teams to promote their fringe events with listings and a service that lets attendees register online and express their interest for an event. A couple of hours before those events start, they will be sent an SMS/text message reminder.

Using Amazon-style recommendations, FringeList will point users to all other events at the three main party conferences that people may find interesting. It’s also mobile-web friendly, which means users don’t have to flip through pages and pages of events within those conference handbooks to find the events they want to attend. They are also aiming to launch a dedicated iPhone app, and services will be integrated with Facebook and Twitter.

Interestingly MessageSpace will also be sending 'Twitter Ambassadors' to all three conferences, so that where attendees have a schedule clash or for people interested in a particular topic but can't attend conference, they will still be able to stay in touch with, and contribute to, the discussion in real-time. Some of these 'Twitter Ambassadors' are thought to include many of the well known bloggers who are closely associated with each of the main parties.

Organisers are also being offered access to the MessageSpace ad network so their events can advertised across the blogosphere, and on the New Statesman and Spectator magazine websites with a guarantee that adverts will be seen by the thousands of people attending the party conferences. The company operates a unique platform that enables advertisers to target and specify the groups that will ultimately view the ad by reading the IP address of the web user.

There are lots of similar experiments taking place. Fellow PR guy, Simon Redfern of Fishburn Hedges, has done a deal with Channel Four News to host a Twitter fringe, or 'twinge'. Panellists at the events at the Tory and Labour conferences, chaired by Channel 4 News anchor, Krishnan Guru-Murthy, will be able to respond to questions and comments tweeted onto a Twitterwall at the event by Twitter users as well as those posed by the audience in the room.

The event, entitled You tweet if you want to: the web is for opposition, not for governing will take place on the Monday evenings of both conferences. The debate will focus on the interaction of social media on politics, from Gordon Brown on YouTube to Barrack Obama's online campaign, the lessons that can be learnt and the new opportunities it brings.

I'll watch/tweet with interest.

United Supporters Go Social

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 10:09:46 GMT

I've just been sent something via LinkedIn about a Man Utd fan who has set up a social networking group for other, presumably business-savvy, fans. (I'm an Evertonian btw and this was passed on by another group).

Reds in Business is the idea of Duncan Drasdo, chief executive of the independent Manchester United Supporters' Trust, who believes that an association with the club could help drive business links.

It has already got a membership of 700 through word of mouth but believes the potential is global and limitless.

RIB promises "90 minutes of business networking, 90 minutes of social and 90 minutes of football", in addition to the appearance of a former player, to try and bring a networking element to match days at Old Trafford.

The first event kicks off on Saturday October 3 before the Reds' Premier League clash with Sunderland and networking guru Will Kintish will be in the chair.

The website says the group will be built via a social media campaign. I'd like to tell you more about that but there were no details and no way of me interacting with the group organisers via the site, or indeed anything social whatsoever, that would enable me to tell you about the social elements of the campaign, but I guess that comes when you join:) However I did find this LinkedIn group.

Tories Reach Out To Manchester Bloggeratti

Wed, 09 Sep 2009 09:35:32 GMT

The Conservative Party new media team are involved in an interesting initiative to reach out to the Northern bloggeratti to coincide with their annual conference, which this year is in Manchester. Craig Elder, the Party's Head of Online Communities, is identifying social media mavens in the locality and is using Manchester's Social Media Cafe, an informal grouping of social media enthusiasts that meets each month to talk all things web 2.0, to reach out. Interesting that Craig is taking advice on the approach from Lloyd Davis, one of the founders of London's version of the Social Media Cafe.

They tried something similar around their Birmingham conference last year by working with Screen West Midlands to gather together a group of local bloggers and give them ‘VIP access’. There was supposed to be access to politicians although I think Rishi Saha, Tory head of new media, struggled to get specific shadow ministers.

This is a small but positive move and reflects the approach in the US, where for example the McCain campaign has daily conference calls with bloggers, including UK Tory bloggers! Loic le Meur also used this on the Sarkozy campaign.

What’s fascinating here is that they have chosen non-political blogs to take part in this. The guests are blogging in the arts, culture and entertainment spheres. The aim is to build a groundswell of support amongst general opinion formers who may be persuaded to engage and debate Tory policies as opposed to rabidly backing or attacking.

It’s a laudable aim but my experience of the Northern blogsphere is that it is as resistant to Tory ideology as, well, the North in general. There is now an active Northern Labour blogging group, the Northern bloc, that is starting to meet, share ideas and work together on projects as well as being plugged in to the new media team at HQ.

The whole thing also needs to be thought through well. The danger with this kind of initiative in isolation is that the bemused bloggers are hurded into a backroom in Manchester for tea and biscuits, have an awkward Q&A with a bemused shadow cabinet member and then having ticked a box forget all about it. I followed up with the Brummie bloggers who attended last year and the feeling was it was a little bit of a damp squib for them DESPITE the best efforts of the Tory new media team.

Social Media Science

Fri, 28 Aug 2009 16:46:30 GMT

If there's one article that advertising and PR practitioners should read it's one that appeared in the FT (of all places) today.

It reinforces a lot of my own thinking in that the turf war currently going between the ad agency, the PR agency, the media buyer, the digital agency for who grabs the burgeoning web spend is becoming meaningless from the client's perspectives. They are buying outcomes. Outcomes that need to embrace a selection of skills but agencies are still trying to grab budget within the confines of their existing structures.

There may be a couple of senior people who 'get' the web and they may have a 'digital team' but ultimately the rank-and-file is still geared up for a commodotised version of the old world. My business is PR and I feel we make a convincing case for being the discipline that understands audience behavior and knows how to build relationships and score on 'earned attention'. But really, as with all agency models, most of the staff have grown up with a commodotisation of part of the discipline. In PR's case its writing press releases and contacting journalists on a press list. That's average media relations, not good public relations.

A client's communications outcomes are being redefined and agencies that genuinely understand their craft can adapt. Agencies that largely have just commodotised a bit of their craft and call that understanding their craft will just keep stretching and stretching until they break.

From my point of view a lot of my new business is coming in in partnership with my close friend who is a web developer. Clients are not paying for 'a website' in the new world either. Between us though we can produce online collateral that people want to use and that makes the client useful amongst the online networks it's interested in i.e. identifying and understanding audiences, building relationships and gaining a proper communications outcome.

It was interesting to see recently that many Madison Avenue ad firms are investing in number crunchers to sit alongside (or even above) the creatives and the FT piece says “Software engineers are the new rock stars of marketing”. I agree with all that. PR and advertising has to get more scientific and more analytical.

Increasingly the core skills will be language, understanding what turns a customer on/off, how to be social on the web, understanding networks of influence, where your client fits into them, your client's sector/industry issues and understanding emotion as well as the mainstream media, journalist likes/dislikes.

But there's still plenty we can learn from the best of Madison Avenue and the Dream Factory. It will still be about telling stories and selling dreams as we're still aiming at human beings, whether they're clients or consumers, and its emotion that turns them on.

Look at this for a lesson from The Master in turning something functional into something emotional.

Hannan's Willie Horton Moment

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 19:29:37 GMT

I can't work out what Daniel Hannan is up to. He's made a series of outbursts in recent months; starting with his rant at Gordon Brown in Brussels that became a YouTube favourite and lately he's been touring the right wing radio and TV circuit in the US having a go at the NHS.

We can have a discussion about whether his comments were played back to the UK accurately or whether we should be focusing more intently on the faults within the NHS. But anyone would keep their head down after the firestorm that was caused yet Hannan has been back on the US circuit, being interviewed on reason.tv and deliberately mentioning his admiration for Enoch Powell!

What's his strategy. Is he just being carried along on the hubris of his moment in the sun or is he deliberately trying to smoke out the Notting Hill set that surround the leader's office?

I'm not sure but one thing stands out. He's dangled some red meat to his fan base in the UK Tory party with the mention of Powell. Tories normally do this by mentioning Thatcher but would never risk referencing Powell, such a controversial figure with his 'Rivers of Blood' speech about the dangers of immigration.

Hannan has been clever though in that he's made no mention to race or immigration in the text of what he's said so it's easy to defend in the media. What he's done is appeal to the emotional element of the brain. This is common in US politics, where Hannan is making friends, and works by using certain words or imagery to imply something that activates the emotional side of the brain. It means to you can send signals, which if they were explicit, may cause an outrage, but by being subtle they make the desired impact. They're often referred to as dog-whistle issues.

A famous example was the Republicans' attack ad used against Democrat presidential candidate, Michael Dukakis, in 1988. The ad was about Dukakis' record at giving convicted felons early release. The example that kept being used was a black man called Willie Horton, who kidnapped and sexually assaulted a young couple while on weekend release.

This is a shocking crime but it was the use of specific words with the regular flashing of Horton, a black man, using unusual and manacing facial expressions that prompted feverish discussions about what the Republicans were trying to imply.

I'm not for a moment suggesting that Daniel Hannan is racist or anti-foreigner but his use of Enoch Powell and all that he represents to elements of the Tory party was very clever.

Football Club 'Does a Radiohead'

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 18:50:22 GMT

I've posted before about how social media is ideal for movements to unite behind a common aim and raise money through small donations.

My eyes were drawn to FC United, a non-league football club (or soccer team if you're part of the Inde's burgeoning US audience) and their initiative to generate funds for the start of the new season. This was the team that was formed by rank-and-file Manchester United fans who were disgusted by the Glazer family's takeover of the club. I've had my eye on FC United for a year or so as I think its good that the ordinary fan should strike back against the prawn sandwich brigade but also because the movement-building potential is so great using social media.

The potential has just been demonstrated by a Radiohead-style offer to fans, taking the unprecedented step of saying to supporters “pay however much you can afford for your Season Ticket”. Their aim was to raise £125000, which they have by selling more than 1000 tickets.

Jules Spencer spoke on behalf of the club: “A lot of people said we were brave and ambitious to introduce such a scheme, some questioned whether we were being foolish, but we said right from the start that we trusted supporters. Why shouldn’t we? It’s their club after all”

“It has worked exactly as we’d hoped it would. Some supporters who could afford to pay a bit more than they did last year, have done. But importantly those who could not afford to pay as much as the season before have been able to renew their tickets, by paying less”

Here here! Watch this space for more.

That Modern Media Parable

Fri, 21 Aug 2009 14:36:36 GMT

I blogged on Sunday about the row that blew up via Twitter about the announcement of Labour's new 'Twitter Tsar, Kerry McCarthy MP. The story was given to the national press embargoed for Monday with aim being to brief Labour bloggers on Sunday evening so that they didn't hear out it via the press.

Problem was that the political journalist who wrote it up for the Guardian filed into the newspaper box but her bosses snatched it and put it online.....leading over 50 congratulatory tweets for Kerry in the 20 minutes it took to get the Guardian to take it down.

There was a fair bit of Twitter debate about this on Sunday. Why should the Guardian 'break the embargo'? Their journalistic competitors were particularly annoyed. Social media mavens were decrying the use of embargoes full stop - the news should be set free not managed!

I have sympathy with both points but feel that while the newspapers and traditional media are so important, which they are, we need to have some agreement between PR folk and print journalists over publishing timings to make the process work. NOT to prevent citizens finding things out but to co-ordinate the timing.

However my eyebrow was raised when I saw this piece on the Twitter Tsar by Times pol-ed, Philip Webster. Nothing wrong with the piece but it was published a full TWO DAYS after everyone else?!

Pickles is Prescott-Lite (not light)

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 18:08:57 GMT

There's quite a bit of discussion pinging around this afternoon about Eric Pickles, Tory Party Chairman and his foray into YouTube. It seems he does a video each month aimed at talking direct to ordinary members.

I had a look at this month's and couldn't help feel he sounded familiar but just couldn't place where I'd seen a full-bodied, plain-speaking, Northern politician talking to the grassroots via YouTube before?!

I like Pickles on here though. For those of you that don't know, I'm a Labour Party member, so I'm not his target audience, but this is a really good effort.

You know there's a BUT coming........

.....but it's a tad rehearsed still (hangover from WebCameron) when this kind of video should engender immediacy and a feeling that it's natural, but all politicians are feeling their way. My main beef is that although I think its good for members to see a little more of what's going on at HQ, even if its literally just actually seeing inside HQ, what I saw was that the Tory staffers all re-enforced the stereotype - unlike Pickles they're all reeaaally posh!

Media Future - Audience Calls Out Churnalism

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 17:23:45 GMT

Sky News have made great strides in embracing social media and their 'Twitter correspondent', Ruth Barnett, obviously gets it and the way that Sky are using her to listen out for stories, angles and making contacts for the newsroom via Twitter is an innovative move. Many journalists are doing this in some capacity but this formalises the role.

But something really interesting happened today that was a strong test for this new approach. The Sky News website, whose business model is to churn wire copy and re-hashed press releases to draw in traffic via Google, posted a flimsy research story by a private health insurer with the story that a third of people felt that politicians couldn't be trusted to run the NHS properly. This comes fresh on the back of a momentous few days and the Twitter-based outpouring of support for the NHS.

This is bad timing but also focused attention on the amount of stories generated in my profession (PR) that are based on dodgy samples, by research companies you've never heard of and end up saying what the company who commissioned the survey has a vested interest in trying to sell.

This one was spotted and provoked a backlash from the people following them. This was a significant test. Mainstream media is making a big play of adapting to the new world by allowing comments, producing multi-media content etc. but they also have to listen to their audience and respond appropriately.

Ten out of ten to Sky who responded brilliantly by pulling the story and explaining what they'd done. This is a great example of the new world in practice. The internet far from eroding journalistic values is actually ensuring journalism raises its game. Biased reporting, smear stories with dodgy sources and lazy 'churnalism' are easy to spot. People genuinely are watching and now they can talk-back.

Announcement of Labour's Twitter Tsar - New Media Meets Old

Sun, 16 Aug 2009 20:11:49 GMT

You weren't supposed to see that Kerry McCarthy has been appointed as Labour's new media campaign figurehead until tomorrow. A handful of the newspapers were given the story under embargo for tomorrow, Labour bloggers were to be briefed on it tonight as its very, very important that those people hear it first, rather than finding out about it in the press. Labourlist, one of the largest Labour blog sites would run a very detailed 2,000 word Q&A with McCarthy tonight.

However the Guardian inadvertently published their story, written by political journalist, Allegra Stratton, for tomorrow's paper, online. As soon as it appeared many of Kerry's huge band of Twitter followers saw the news and immediately starting congratulating her and Retweeting the Guardian link. There were 50 Tweets in about 10 minutes. Amazing!

Of course this hacks off the hacks who are dutifully observing the embargo, including the Inde's Michael Savage, so Allegra Stratton was tracked down to A&E where she was awaiting treatment on crippling back pain and was horrified to find her news desk has slipped the story onto the website. She immediately emailed her news ed, Stephen Kahn, who took the story down.

As Allegra herself said: ''this is a very modern parable - new media meets old media''.

Tweetminster creator, Alberto Nardelli made a good point via Twitter....

-@kerrymp should have just made the announcement, and all the media would have picked it up anyway :)

and the last word should go to Kerry....

Just got back from a pleasant two hours at @wshed to discover everyone on Twitter knows what it's the papers ahead of me!

Observer Closure: An Inside Leak

Wed, 05 Aug 2009 09:56:06 GMT

I'm a PR person by trade, so it's been rather unusual wearing my media blogging hat and interviewing my journalistic contacts at the Observer to try and cut through the noise on the 'Observer to close' story, but here's what I've got.

- Huge anger at the Obs being seen to pay the price for bad strategic decisions taking by Rusbridger et al. Particularly the £60m sunk into bespoke printing presses that no one else is able to share. This kind of capital investment is always a drag on resources for news groups, which is why they often choose to partner with or lease the facilities to a competitor group. Not so with the Guardian's unique Berlinner kit. It seems even more foolhardy from an organisation that feels its future is digital.

There's also a feeling that the Observer could've gone tabloid to trump the Independent on Sunday' plans and effectively take them out of the game.

- Hopes are resting on the shoulders of the main Observer champions on the Scott Trust board; Will Hutton, columnist and former editor, and Larry Elliott. They are in a minority but are formidable. Significantly, the Guardian and Observer chapels merged the week before last and both voted to fight to protect the Observer.

- However, management has been clever in its restructuring. Roger Alton, weakened politically over the paper's support for Iraq, was forced to leave and replaced by John Mulholland, an altogether different level of player. He has a solid reputation as a newspaper technician but his nickname is Dougal after the wide-eyed and compliant Father Ted character. The main authority now rests with the 'Pod Heads' i.e. those people running the subject areas that cover all editions and multi-media. They are appointed by Rusbridger and they are empowered to make cuts, which often involves making cuts to Observer output and staff.

The recently axed Simon Caulkin column and the TV guide received a flood of email protest (over 100 in the case of Caulkin) from readers but Mulholland felt powerless to act.

The speculation about the Observer closing has been knocking around for a few weeks now but has only just hit the mainstream media. It could be this is a strategic leak so that when a less nuclear option is announced everyone feels relieved. It feels likely that the Observer will continue but be subject to death by a thousand cuts.

Buy The Politics You Deserve

Wed, 05 Aug 2009 08:41:09 GMT

Politics in the UK (and everywhere else) has been blighted by, amongst other things, the suspicion that politicians are in the grip of vested interests, many of whom are donors to political campaigns, and that trumps their duty to represent 'the people'.

The beauty of the internet is that it reasserts the power of 'the people' by enabling us to act as a group. This has profound implications for politics in this country and could reverse the reliance on a small elite band of lobby groups or rich and powerful individuals in favour of being relevant to something that feels more like democracy.

Trying to fund parties through small donations feels like such hard work compared to getting a cheque from a hedge fund manager over lunch in the Groucho but if you structure your message in the right way and provide the right 'ask' the signs are there that it can work here.

But now there is hope. Last week John Prescott put out a Facebook appeal to raise £2,000 to cover recent expenses incurred by his organisation, Go Fourth, to undertake successful campaigns like the 'Ban The Bankers Bonuses'. The message that each campaign they run is dependent on funding and that if you like their particular focus then you need to contribute was massively successful. They broke their target in a matter of hours from people giving in £10, £15 and £20 denominations.

Compass, the left-wing pressure group decided to campaign for a windfall tax on the energy companies and they published a shopping list of tactics e.g. some MORI research to create news coverage, along with the cost. By making it clear how every pound donated linked clearly to each action and its benefit people were motivated to donate thousands in a matter of days.

And guess what? Labour is seeing the benefits. They ran an appeal for funds to pay for campaign materials directly linked to the seats where the BNP posed a special threat in the recent Euro election. They raised over £12,000 in 12 hours. The most the party has ever raised in a day's fundraising.

From small acorns.....

Twitter Interview: Richard Baker, Virgin Trains

Tue, 04 Aug 2009 14:17:17 GMT

This afternoon I did a Live Q&A with Richard Baker, the head of Customer Services for Virgin Trains.

I was keen to do this as I use the trains sooo much and always have. I use Virgin almost weekly at the moment and must have traveled between London and the North West almost 300 times in the last 10 years.

Richard 'gets' social media i.e. that used properly it can:

- help you improve your product/service (not all the experts on a company's product actually work for the company!)

- it increases customer satisfaction as people feel listened to, which is one of a human being's most basic needs

- it increases that sought after but elusive peer recommendation

We decided to do a Q&A via Twitter as it's his social media tool of choice at the moment and because I'm experimenting a lot with Twitter and how it be used for so many different purposes.

We trailed this well in advance via our own Twitter alerts, offering people the chance to join in. It was Retweeted over 50 times!

Below is a rough transcript of my Q&A with Richard but there were some excellent Qs from other Tweeters who were watching the feed via the hashtag #virgintrains:

@helenlambert: Do you get much abuse (yet!) on Twitter from angry customers or do you tend to keep your head down?

@richard_baker: Ha! @Helen_Lambert No I don't keep my head down! It's my job to listen to customers. People value what I do generally :-) #virgintrains

@lucympowell: do you keep records of how many faulty loos on pendolinos - always seems to be a long walk on Manc/London train

@richard_baker: Thanks @LucyMPowell yes we do! We are ramping up our maintenance programme creating new jobs in Edgehill which will help

For the full exchange use Twitter search #virgintrains.

Here's my formal bit:

How did you take the decision to start tweeting?

I was promoted to a new role in Virgin Trains in a region I wasn't familiar with and wanted to build relationships with customers and stakeholders

What was your objective?

To understand what is important to my customers and stake holders and to support the delivery of customer service in my region

Did you have any idea what success would look like?

I hoped I would connect with people in the region and build effective relationships with them

Are you authorised to answer ANY question or do you have to get sign-off on certain topics?

I am trusted by the senior team to answer most questions. Any tricky questions or if I don’t know the answer I ask for help!

What kind of response do you get to tweets?

I have had an amazing response. Tweeters have been amazingly supportive, friendly and understanding.

Do you analyse the usefulness of various tweets?

I track the click through rate of any external links I tweet. The most popular are the ones where I refer to great value fares!!

How quickly did your follower rate take-off?

Quite slow at first but then I got some support from some tweeters with lots of followers which has helped boost numbers

What was the reaction internally to your tweeting?

People struggled to see the benefit initially. Luckily I had the support of our Comms Director, On Board Director and my team

How much more interested are people now?

Very. I have been able to demonstrate the power of this kind of communication.

How have you evolved as you've gone along?

I think I have relaxed a bit and have some fun with customers. After all we are Virgin!

Have your objectives changed?

Not really, just grown! I would like to build an internal network that supports Customer Relations

What are the hot buttons for getting buy-in internally?

Be lucky enough to have people in your org who are prepared to take risks, and to use twitter to demonstrate support for wider objectives

How long do you spend 'tweeting' and responding each week?

It varies! I tweet more in the evening. About 30 minutes a day at the moment but more when our TV ads are running.

Darren Bent: Twitter Guru or Tw*t?

Sat, 01 Aug 2009 17:35:00 GMT

Don't be alarmed by the language used in the headline. Politicians are saying it and I'm just following the example of their moral leadership.

Anyway, Darren Bent has used his Twitter account to register his frustration at his transfer to Sunderland making slow progress. Among his posts the striker wrote: 'Do I wanna go Hull City NO. Do I wanna go Stoke NO do I wanna go Sunderland YES so stop f***ing around levy.'

Levy i.e. Daniel Levy, the Spurs Chairman has slapped a two week fine on the petulant Bent and you might dismiss this another spoilt footballer spitting his dummy out of his pram. I actually think this is significant and could take the People's Game back in the direction of the people.

We all know football has been captured by the prawn sandwich brigade. It's not totally bad. The huge sums of money have overall given us a better quality game and viewing experience. But the players are definitely far more distant from the fans. Remember Carlos Tevez being unveiled by Man City, proudly signing autographs whilst surrounded by FBI look-a-like bodyguards? So many of the media interviews that are granted are done so under condition the player can plug his latest commercial endorsement and his agent can have copy-approval.

The players that the fans have the most affiliation with are the ones that feel real. United fans loved Keane more than Beckham, Liverpool fans worshiped Fowler but never took to Owen. It's asking too much for today's players to start getting the bus to the game with the fans - even the fans don't get the bus to the game anymore! It's also a fact of life that just going for a pint exposes stars to a whole lot of mither, potential honey-traps, abuse from rival/jealous fans.

But there are other genuine ways of showing fans you care or just giving your point of view or reflections on a game in an unfiltered way that sound real. I don't know whether Darren Bent responds to comments via Twitter but any player that grasps that one will 'connect' in so many ways. In doing so he'll boost his personal brand, enhance his place in the team and probably secure more commercial endorsements - all on the back of being the fans favourite.

Developments in the Afghan Web War

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 18:15:16 GMT

I posted last week on the Afghan presidential challenger who is using US/UK-style web tactics to target Afghan expats and local influencers within Afghanistan itself. However, news reaches us that the incumbent, President Hamid Karzai has used government levers to jam local access to four Web sites with President Hamid Karzai’s name in the address that are critical of the Afghan leader or have links to sites advertising locally taboo subjects such as online dating and mail order brides.

The Orwellian sounding Information Ministry ordered the country’s 25 Internet service providers to shut down access to four Web sites bearing Karzai’s name and one with the name of an Afghan Cabinet minister, the director of the Afghan Telecom Regulatory Authority

Coverage of the presidential race has been dominated by Karzai, while his 40 opponents complain they’ve received scant attention in state-run media, forcing them to campaign in person or on the Internet in a country where daily travel can be deadly and few have home computers.

The poll is due on August 20th.

Is Twitter Behaving Like An Old Media Proprietor?

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 12:08:53 GMT

If you're a social media anorak like me you'll be au fait with the notion of networks. The concept that audiences can't be broadcast at with one-way, top-down messages anymore.

In the old world the channel owners (Murdoch, BBC, Tony O'Reilly) were the kings. In the new world audiences coalesce in networks according to their interest. You'll be connected to many different networks and enjoy varying levels of interest in each.

The darlings of the new world were the super networks e.g. Facebook and Twitter. They would provide the platform for the masses to share, link and form relationships but facilitate would be the theme, NOT control. That was old world!

Well perhaps we've jumped the gun on that one, as this case shows, influence is there to wielded:)

Memetracker - the measurement of the news cycle

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 18:24:47 GMT

On a day when taxpayers money was used to pay to scientists to get people to swear when they put their hands in freezing water I was heartened to see clever people studying something that really matters - the news cycle or more specifically how long something is chattered about in the media bubble/blogosphere before it becomes old hat!

A new paper, “Meme-tracking and the Dynamics of the News Cycle,” has found that the traditional news outlets lead and the blogs follow, typically by 2.5 hours, according to their algorithm-based analysis of news articles and commentary on the Web during the last three months of the 2008 presidential campaign. The team looked for repeated phrases that appeared on news sites and blogs to find patterns of reporting of speeches, policies, attack-ads and so on that contained those distinctive word arrangements.

The largest and most significant pattern was found around Barack Obama's use of the phrase “lipstick on a pig” - his retort aginst McCain/Palin's claims to be the voices of change.

The team has set up interactive displays of their findings at memetracker.org, which is fascinating to play with as is the section that shows how far in advance of the reporting peak all the various blogs and sites are, or in other words how early they are with news that becomes big. The site shows the blogosphere tends to lag the likes of CNN and the top news brands but there are some exceptions such as Hot Air and Talking Points Memo.

Afghan Presidential Candidate Obama-ises Campaign

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 09:40:26 GMT

A fascinating story for anyone interested in social media campaigns and politics. One of the Afghan presidential candidates is trying to Obama-ise his campaign by deploying the latest internet campaigning tactics and he's turned to an innovative UK-based social media shop to make it happen.

Dr Ashraf Ghani, Afghanistan’s former finance minister and dubbed by Newsweek as the ''chief contender against the incumbent'', is using the web to target the 500,000-strong Afghani expatriate population in the West, which numbers 45,000 in the UK alone and to get campaign materials to local influencers out in the Afghan hills.

The campaign has two local language sites: http://ashrafghani.af/pashto and http://ashrafghani.af/dari. They encourage users where possible to host events at their homes and in their local communities to spread the campaign messages and policy commitments etc. The aim over the final few weeks is to publish very simply written policy documents, and encourage people to literally copy down the bullet points from the screen onto a piece of paper, so they can pass them on to their friends/relatives.

In terms of numbers, the campaign site gets anywhere from 500-1000 unique visitors per day from a wide range of countries. They've literally received tens of thousands of dollars in donations. Plus he is on Twitter and has launched a campaign video on YouTube. The campaign site allows people to set up their own events, email campaign messages to friends, sign up to email updates from the campaign and follow the campaign with news releases and photos etc.

The whole thing is being guided by Luke Bozier, a young guy that used to work on the new media team at Labour HQ but he's now doing his own thing via RedNarrative.

If you can make this work in Afganistan you can make it work anywhere!

Sarah Palin's Social Media Workshop

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 16:42:07 GMT

I was at a comedy club in New York during the US presidential campaign. We Brits only have a surface view of the 'real America' outside of the Euro-tourist destinations of NY, LA and San Francisco but this gig was a real sociology field trip for me. There were people in there from all over the US and all of 'em getting the p*ss ripped out of them by the comics.

There was a family sat near the front (some people never learn!) from a small town somewhere in Hickville - local population approx. 50, including the dogs and cats. They were ribbed endlessly by the host and they reacted in the right fashion, genuinely laughing along. In fact they laughed at everything. Except.....the jokes about Sarah Palin.

Of course over here we thought Palin was one long joke but as a communicator I got interested in Palin and the way her folksy style made her seem 'just like you and me'. Something that virtually all British politicians desperately need right now.

Palin has hit the news again with her surprise decision to quit as Governor of Alaska but her regular followers on Facebook and Twitter wouldn't have been surprised. Take this update: "We'll soon attach info on decision to not seek re-election... this is in Alaska's best interest, my family's happy... it is good, stay tuned."

The right-wing Republicans pioneered one-to-one communicating in US elections. Despite the hoo-hah over Barack Obama's web success it is the Republicans who own this territory, starting with direct mail lists in the 1970s, to talk radio in the 80s, cable TV in the 90s and social media today.

There's many things that Palin can teach us in this area. She is a marmite figure and the mainstream media treats her, at times, with a snobbish and condescending tone so she appreciates the importance of reaching out directly without those kind of elitist filters. Michael Hickens notes some other pointers:

Be unafraid of giving people unrestricted access to your pages, because your supporters will far outnumber your detractors. Palin has more than 594,000 "supporters."
Keep it conversational and rough, rather than edited and silky. Her Facebook notes are more than unfiltered by the mainstream media -- they are appropriate to the choppy, herky-jerky writing style that epitomizes 140-character thought-bites and Facebook updates typed on mobile devices with tiny keyboards and short battery lives.
Always keep it personal -- and not like a press release or advertisement aimed at millions. Her appeal at the end -- "with you" -- would feel like a sales pitch on a campaign flyer, but comes across like a genuinely personal appeal on Facebook.

Internet Gives Power To The Tyre-Kicker

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 15:40:15 GMT

The changes being brought by social media to how large corporations get consumers to buy things are particularly affecting the big motor manufacturers. They are old-style, sales-led, top-down centralisers. They've done business this way for decades and are kings of the big media-buy. The idea is to make grand gestures that get you to buy in to a lifestyle or a feeling - "buying this car will make you a winner''!

But society is changing and people rely less on mass media and more on each other for advice on what to buy. Technology has made it much easier to find 'people like you', folks who have no vested interest in getting you to buy a particular brand or model. BUT the recession has moved the needle even further.

People do much more research before buying a big ticket item now that every penny counts. A car-buyer will go to Google to see what other people are saying about 'BMW Z4's or 'good value family cars'. Google increasingly sees blog and forum discussions as more useful than corporate sites and savvy consumers are going straight to these discussions to navigate round online brochures.

But there's a fightback from the auto corporations and it's being led by the same Detroit monoliths that were cap-in-hand to Congress for bailouts in the US, with Ford the main innovator, led by social media guru, Scott Monty. Ford have twigged that a site should be useful to users, so useful that they don't have to go anywhere else for info. There's external sources and customers commenting and everything is made transparent, even the correspondence between the Chief Exec and Congress over that taxpayer appeal.

They've also recognised that if people are talking about their brand online they should be useful to those conversations as well. They've made rich resources easily sharable so that bloggers can use their images when writing about whatever concerns them, video is easy to pass on via Twitter/Facebook and the text-heavy resources are atomised so specific items are very easily linked to.

But what about us poor Brits I hear you cry? Don't panic. The UK operations have cottoned on. Volkswagen's People’s Reviewer campaign will make social media the focus of a VW campaign for the first time, with social networks including Facebook directing people to enter a competition to become VW’s official car reviewer.

VW intends the campaign to give a real-world perspective on the car, cashing in on the growing influence of peer-to-peer reviews across the web by asking users to compete to become the next big car critic, with the final prize being a VW Tiguan.

Viewers will submit ideas for creative, entertaining and informative ways of reviewing the car. Nine shortlisted people will then be given a Tiguan for the week, fully kitted out with video equipment, to carry out their idea.

This is a great initiative, ~~nicked from~~ inspired by Scott Monty's Fiesta Movement in the US and deserves to succeed. As does Toyota/iCrossing's blog/social media platform to promote the new Prius. They've fully embraced the social element offline, too. They're taking the car on a UK tour to meet people they engage with online and to emphaise it's good mileage capability.

If you're a keen Jaguar driver, or aspire to be, it might be worth staying in touch with the UK Jaguar Twitter feed, which I stumbled across today.

All of these should avoid the clanger dropped by Land Rover over after-sales problems it had with its Discovery model. A punter set up a blog to amplify his discontent and show the lack of one-to-one communication from Land Rover's customer service team. This solitary blog was so well linked to that it emerged as number one Google pick for anyone typing in 'Land Rover Discovery' into search. Although it's no longer live it sat there for months and months after the complaint had been settled and guess what? The customer offered it to Land Rover to use as a hub for customer complaints and queries but his offer was declined.

TORY SMEAR MACHINE BULLIES TRADE JOURNALIST

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 17:27:39 GMT

I nearly choked over my Sunday roast when I saw the name of Labour blogger, Alex Hilton, linked with Alistair Campbell, a pretty girl and a grand internet conspiracy via the Mail on Sunday.

In the piece by political editor, Simon Walters, author of an attack biography of Campbell, Alex (my fellow blogger at Labourhome) is supposed to be pulling the strings of his girlfriend, Sally Gainsbury, an investigative journalist with the Health Service Journal, to bring down the Tory Shadow Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley.

Gainsbury recently interviewed Lansley, where she quizzed him on his party’s plans for funding the NHS. She quoted him saying that ‘pay should be set in line with what is necessary to recruit and retain the workforce’. Her magazine press released the interview, the HSJ website ran the headline ‘Andrew Lansley waves a blank NHS pay cheque’ – and the line was reported by Sky News as ‘Lansley puts his foot in it with freelance pronouncements on future Tory spending priorities’.

Lansley, not for the first time, had gaffed and embarassed the Tory leadership on the sensitive issue of spending levels. Lansley tried to rapidly rebutt and 'kill the story'.

‘The Health Service Journal has got this 180 degrees wrong,’ he said. ‘Future NHS allocations will not be able to accommodate inflationary staff costs.’

According to the Mail on Sunday, "Ms Gainsbury reported it as ‘Conservatives pledge real terms cuts to NHS wages’, and this fresh angle was picked up by several national newspapers, including the Labour-supporting Daily Mirror, where Mr Campbell once worked."

Aaah, yes, Alistair Campbell used to work at the Mirror nearly twenty years ago. This conspiracy has more tentacles than an octopus!!

Lansley's team has resorted to old style bully-boy tactics now. They contacted Walters, a former drinking buddy of Damian McBride, on Thursday. A story was welded together that adds Hilton, at times a former irritant of McBride, and finds a way of squeezing in some names you've heard of i.e. Alistair Campbell and John Prescott (via his son, David).

The piece is groaning with insinuation and a lack of on-the-record, direct and original quotes. There isn't even any of the 'sources within Tory HQ' that are a hallmark of these kinds of Sunday 'exclusives'. A big chunk of it is lifted from a PR Week story of about two weeks ago and there's also the shock scoop that Gainsbury, Hilton and Campbell ''follow each other on Twitter''. I wonder if they all follow Stephen Fry as well? Perhaps he's the king-pin in all this?!

This whole thing is a bit of a laugh until you consider that the bully-boys are trying to smear a hard-working investigative journalist, who has won a string of awards, including Press Gazette News Reporter of the Year and Medical Journalism Association Health Trade Reporter partly through writing pieces that slam Labour policy e.g. NHS told to cap spending as more than half of £1.8bn surplus is lost and Health inequalities: wealthiest overfunded as the poor lose out

The Mail obviously think so as they often publish her stuff

The article takes up most of page 8 and there's a large photo of Ms Gainsbury. I wonder if so much space would have been allocated if the journalist being pursued was a middle aged, balding man?