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March 08, 2006
Wal-Mart’s blog strategy
I’ve seen two stories in the New York Times in the last few weeks about how Wal-Mart is using blogs and their like in communications efforts.
1. Three weeks ago, Steven Greenhouse and Michael Barbaro (the story was also reprinted in the International Herald Tribune ) looked at Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott’s communications with his employees in a confidential internal web site called “Lee’s Garage.” Scott solicits employee questions and answers one every week or two. The Times also posted PDFs of three years’ worth of Lee’s Garage, supplied to it by Wal-Mart Watch, who got them from a disgruntled manager.
Scott’s communications to employees are pretty frank. For example, he suggested to a store manager who pointedly asked why Wal-Mart couldn’t offer retirees medical benefits that the manager might be better off seeking employment elsewhere. I see two lessons here: Never assume that an internal publication will remain secret. And perhaps it's just as well Lee Scott doesn't have a public blog, where the questions would be tougher still.
2. The Times’s Barbaro wrote yesterday that Wal-Mart is including bloggers in its media relations strategies, counseled by the PR firm Edelman. Let’s start out by saying that our BlogWorks practice reaches out to bloggers on behalf of clients to promote products and news. It’s a big new media world out there, and corporate communicators need to jump in. The Times rap is that some bloggers seem to be cutting and pasting Wal-Mart news directly into their blogs. Blogger Brian Pickrell says the Times piece is biased, but leaving that aside, I’ve gotta say, Hey, is this this news? Anybody who’s spent any time in a small-market newsroom knows that the never-ending search for fresh news often leads to cutting and pasting, or using video or audio news releases without attribution. It’s not good journalism, it’s sausage-making. But it happens.
Likewise, there are many publications with diligent reporters, editors and fact-checkers, and bloggers who wouldn't dream of pasting anyone's corporate spiel into their blog. Doubtless, some of those bloggers received and ignored the Wal-Mart pitch about health care.
In his blog, Edelman CEO Dick Edelman writes about the Wal-Mart stories, “Of course we give information to bloggers, just as PR people for generations have done with print media, and I'm a little surprised that the print and broadcast media are surprised.”
And a Slashdot poster wrote: “The interesting thing in this story is not so much the astroturfing, which is old news, but the transformation of blogging from a personal statement to a corporate bullhorn. The bloggers mentioned in the story, who presumably are able to articulate their own opinions, received Wal-Mart email and began to simply copy the PR text into the blogs. What is the use of a blog if bloggers are just going to copy sentences and sentiments from the puppetmaster's email?"
Well said. How about if we flacks keep trying to tell our clients’ stories, while bloggers and reporters keep using their best judgment?
Posted by Laurie Mayers at March 8, 2006 01:53 PM
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Comments
The media landscape is so big, that it seems easy to take a point and run with it.
It's easy for the larger, and more staffed media outlets to crow about how some bloggers may copy and paste submitted material.
Didn't any of them start out with the local paper? Or, even a trade outlet?
As you said, it's not uncommon.
As long as we in PR continue to promote and maintain high levels of integrity and provide media -- bloggers included -- with accurate information, we'll have a role in the news-making business.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Driehorst at March 9, 2006 09:00 AM
Of course we should target bloggers ... but for God's sake Laurie, let's not use the "f" word ... no, not that "f" word. I am not a flack. You are not a flack. We are not flacks. And let's not call them hacks.
Posted by: Roger Pynn at June 30, 2006 11:44 AM
