NevOn

McDonalds deceives with fake blog

What do you make of this? Kevin Dugan writes about a website and faux blog from McDonalds as part of their advertising in yesterday's Superbowl:

[...] Anyway, I dutifully visited the site and was intrigued initially to see it also had a blog. Then I realized it is a fake blog. Even the post comments are bogus. Boo. Hiss. What's the point? No one in their right mind would believe the blog is real. So while it is not deceptive, it still stinks. The site is so very camp to begin with; the fake blog is simply trying too hard.

A faux blog is one thing as part of a marketing and advertising campaign. All part of today's marketing mix, it seems. But, note what Kevin says - the comments to posts are fake.

That looks like deception to me. And some people say PR has an ethical problem!

Upholding PR standards starts with the small things

"Will you join with me and other PR bloggers in a grassroots blogging campaign to help raise the perception of the public relations industry?" asked Steven Phenix of The Alliant Group in Austin, Texas, in an email yesterday.

Happy to, I replied. PR's been getting a lot of, well, bad PR lately, as illustrated by the Armstrong Williams and Ketchum ethics issue that's had lots of blogosphere discussion. Also see an interesting analysis by Nick Wreden (thanks, Colby, for the link) with some pithy suggestions on what Ketchum should have done once the scandal became public. Then take a look at CNN's report last week when President Bush denounced paying commentators, referring specifically to this matter.

In light of all this, Steven's request has had me thinking: help raise the perception of the public relations industry. That's seems to be quite a tall order.

Let's look at a couple of definitions of PR:

• The Public Relations Society of America says: "Public relations helps an organization and its publics adapt mutually to each other" (and see the PRSA page for a detailed analysis of this definition).
• The Institute of Public Relations in the UK says: "'Public relations practice is the planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain goodwill and mutual understanding between an organization and its publics."

Well, many people say that PR certainly hasn't served anyone's publics in light of 'Ketchumgate' or whatever you want to call it. When US press critic and writer Jay Rosen slammed the PR bloggers for not taking a stand on the ethics issues, that generated lots of lively discussion to his post, and resulted in subsequent posts with more discussion.

What I noted in the comments to Rosen's posts were far too many people adding opinions saying, basically, that they weren't surprised because all PR does is spin things and tell untruths, so no one should be surprised at all to read about payola in PR.

What a sorry situation for a profession! Yet this isn't new, neither is it just the PR profession (and we all know those bad jokes about lawyers - what does that say for what people think about that profession?). That's certainly not excusing it, just saying it's not new.

Other than every PR professional taking an individual stand in the absence of any stand for the profession by any professional association, what's to be done? What can any PR professional do to raise the perception of PR as an honourable profession?

I think each one of us can do many things on our own account. Here are just three:

1. Do your job to the best of your ability, in the most professional way you can.
2. By your deeds, demonstrate to your employer and/or your clients that you are professional, are honest and have high personal standards of integrity.
3. Make your own personal commitment to follow your professional association's code of ethics to the best of your ability. A good guide for this is IABC's Code of Ethics.

The thing is, individually we can't change an awful lot, especially when it's just a matter of time before the next Ketchumgate arrives. Yes, that may look like a cynical view but I think it's just realistic. Unfortunately.

But be true to yourself. It's the small things that do make a difference.

[Technorati tags: Public relations | PR | Advertising | Marketing]

Related NevOn post:

• Taking a stand on ethics

Taking a stand on ethics

This morning, I left a lengthy comment on Jay Rosen's blog in his Bloggers Are Missing in Action... post on ethics in PR that generated lots of blog posts and comments on posts yesterday (go to Rosen's post to see the many comments there, and see my post yesterday for a recap on what this is all about).

In my comment to Rosen's post, I said:

[...] What surprises and disappoints me is the absolute lack of meaningful comment from any of the professional associations. The PRSA or IABC, for instance (I don't count as 'meaningful' any statement made so far by the PRSA). Organizations like these are the "ethical glue" that binds the profession together (yes, a bit like The Force) to provide a framework for how people in the profession behave professionally. As with any grouping of people, there will be bad apples, in which case it is one of the profession's responsibilities to weed them out.

I've already been accused of being naive with such an opinion (which is fine: I blog, so I have a thick skin), but if our professional associations don't take a clear stand on behaviours that run counter to the codes of ethics those associations stand by, why should anyone else? Indeed, what's the point of ethics codes if some don't abide by them - and then get away with it. Worse, they're clearly seen as getting away with it.

I've been a member of IABC for over 15 years. I will continue to be a member and a highly committed one at that. Each year when I renew my membership, I have to re-affirm my commitment to IABC's code of ethics - which, in my view, is a benchmark standard. I actually do read it each time. (Which also makes me wonder - is anyone at Ketchum an IABC member? I haven't checked but, if so, how does what the people concerned did gel with IABC's code?)

What I want to see, and very soon, is a clear stand by my professional association on this ethical issue.

Also this morning, I read Jeremy Pepper's post late yesterday on this sorry affair.

In his post, Jeremy says:

[...] As already noted, PRSA put out a tepid response against Ketchum, the Council of PR firms defended Ketchum ... and IABC said nothing. These are the three biggest PR associations, but they are not doing it for PR.

Now, IABC is just suprising. The chairman of IABC, David Kistle, has a blog. The Ketchum story broke two weeks ago in USA Today, but Kistle's most recent blog post reads like a church newsletter. We have new accredited PR people! We're doing a webinar! Aren't we neat!

The chairman of IABC has a venue, a forum to speak out on industry issues. Why didn't he use that venue to speak out against the first big issue affecting public relations in 2005?

It's a good question, Jeremy. Perhaps this post on Wednesday in the Business Week Tech Beat blog might lead to an answer.

Ethics and professional responsibility

US press critic and writer Jay Rosen takes a hefty swipe at PR bloggers, with a blanket accusation that they have ignored a pay-for-promotion case in the US that has significant ethical implications for the public relations profession:

Bloggers are supposed to be a little more curious than most. They are supposed to apply a second degree of scrutiny as they do "their job" in the new ecosystem of news. When the press pack goes that-a-way they ought to look this-a-way more. And they should be alert to events in the moral life of the people whose world they chronicle. [...] but somehow [it's been] nearly invisible to PR bloggers, who, aside from a few mentions here and there, have neglected this juicy and far-reaching story.

Here's what this is about:

• The Bush administration paid Armstrong Williams, a prominent black pundit, $240,000 to promote the law on his nationally-syndicated television show and to urge other black journalists to do the same.
• The payment was made via Ketchum Communications, one of the largest PR firms.
• The US Education Department, through Ketchum, arranged with Williams to use contacts with America's Black Forum, a group of black broadcast journalists, "to encourage the producers to periodically address" No Child Left Behind (which is legislation designed "to ensure that children in every classroom enjoy the benefits of well-prepared teachers, research-based curriculum and safe learning environments")
• Neither Williams nor anyone else disclosed these arrangements, which became public after USA Today broke the story on 6 January

Williams has subsequently issued a public apology.

As a business communicator in Europe who blogs about PR and related communication issues, I'll hold my hand up - I haven't posted commentary about this story until this post (but see below). I was aware of it - I'd read Richard Edelman's commentary on the issue - yet it seemed to me to be a particular US issue. None of the US newspapers that I read had reported on it. Yet another case of ethics in US business taking a nose dive, I thought.

Whoa, wrong. It's actually a huge issue, one that ought to be a lively discussion point for PR professionals. So, Mr Rosen, thanks for the swipe.

Yet I feel that Rosen is being somewhat disingenuous in his commentary. He seems to write with some glee about how PR bloggers have dropped the ball while the press have scored a try and made the conversion (sorry, I can't do American football metaphors: that's a rugby one). Otherwise I'd likely, albeit a bit reluctantly, agree with Rosen's sweeping accusation.

This isn't only a US issue; it has implications for the PR profession as a whole. I don't think anyone will disagree with that.

In which case, where are the condemnations - or at least some clear and meaningful public comments - from our professional associations? The Public Relations Society of America (PRSA)? The Institute of Public Relations (IPR) in the UK? The Public Relations Institute of Australia (PRIA)? The International Association of Business Communicators (IABC)? Or is it only leaders in the profession like Edelman who take a clear stand?

Going back to Rosen's post yesterday and his commentary that none of the bloggers he checked had posted anything about this story, let me say that you need to include podcasts these days when you do such checking.

In the latest For Immediate Release: The Hobson and Holtz Report that Shel Holtz and I do each week, recorded last Monday 17 January, we had a specific segment in which we discussed this very issue. Shel raised the topic and stated quite clearly that he had major concerns about this ethical issue and what it means for the profession (and he had posted commentary on his blog on 14 January). You can download the podcast here (MP3, 24.9Mb); the discussion on the Ketchum-Williams case starts 33:07 minutes into the show.

In any event, Rosen's post has served one purpose - this topic will firmly get more PR bloggers' attention now. I'm more interested in seeing what our professional associations have to say.