Tumblin' Into the Forge

“It’s a small world after all.”
- Walt Disney

Happened across this brief on the state of small public relations firms earlier today while perusing PRSA’s most excellent “Issues & Trends” daily e-newsletter. First off, we were delighted to see our good friend, colleague and Chair of the Counselor’s Academy of PRSA Ann Subervi and her firm, Utopia Communications, quoted in the story. Ann’s one of the best professionals on the scene today and is a tireless promoter of ethics in public relations practice and business. Way to go, Ann!

Closer to home, though, we’re sad to see that so many firms continue to struggle in this ridiculously tough economy in this ridiculously long recession that just friggin’ refuses to end (no matter what the economists say about the recession “ending” last year …). Too many good people and too many good firms are having to shut the doors on promising practices as clients continue - understandably, mind you - to curtail, postpone and cancel initiatives. The sheer number of inquiries, applications and requests for referrals we receive is a clear indicator that, while our industry is projected to grow in the years ahead, there is still a lot of pain being spread around right now in virtually every corner of the business.

The fact that large firms are cutting rates to compete for the smaller pieces of pie on the table is not surprising (nor will it be surprising when they raise ‘em right back up where they were next year). They have to generate income, as well, to be sure. What is surprising, though, is how and why clients believe they are getting some kind of a bargain in this deal. The days of the mighty mega-firm ruling the sea are drawing to a close as business comes to understand that the agility, flexibility, specialization and personal attention from seasoned consultants in smaller firms will help them fare much better than from the traditional “Welcome to the Big Top!” approach. Innovative thinking and truly personalized client attention are rarely nurtured in the layers upon layers of AEs, SAEs, VPs, SVPs, EVPs and the rest of the alphabet soup that comprises large firms. Open innovation is the watchword of the world today, and as futurist Alvin Toffler recently said, the organizations that serve as connectors will be the ones who succeed in the years ahead.

Further - and this is where it gets interesting for firms like Forge Communications - more and more of the best, brightest and most experienced consultants are finding the world of the smaller firm a very attractive work environment. Rather than just managing account teams and pushing paper (or pixels, as the case may be) up the administrative mountain, they find that working with a small group of senior professionals affords them the opportunity to get back to doing what got them into the business in the first place: working one-on-one with clients to solve real problems. In the last one week alone, we have been approached by no less than three senior vice presidents who want to talk with us about our experienced this past year in transitioning to this business model.

As we approach the firm’s first anniversary, we are thankful for the support we’ve gotten from friends, colleagues, family and, most especially, our clients with whom we wouldn’t be here. We feel blessed to have had a strong first year and are confident that 2011 will be a year of continued growth and success for the Forge team. More to the point, though, it will be a year of dedicated service to our clients because that’s where our business begins and ends.

So let’s here for the entrepreneurs out there for they are the ones who by virtue of their agility and ability to innovate on a dime will help move the profession successfully forward through this seismic wave of change.

“Tell me more, tell me more!”
- “Grease”

Thanks to a good friend of ours, Chuck Norman, APR, of SA Cherokee here in the Triangle, we saw this brief from PRSA’s Tactics publication. What a terrific idea that is as powerful as it is innovative. While a large portion of the public does not - and likely will not - use QR technology regularly (half probably don’t know what it is), this tool offers unique value to those who do understand how to use it. Clearly, a driving force here is the continued growth of smartphones (heck, let’s just call ‘em what they are: hand-held computers that just happen to make phone calls, too) that make QR as easy as, well, pushing a button.

And while this article focuses on the use of QR in media relations and marketing, we can envision applying this technology in a host of public relations areas, including employee communications, investor relations and crisis communications. The key here is that we’re able to point stakeholders to a treasure trove of information online through an exceptionally simple - and easy-to-use - interface.

We’ll certain be including this technology in our recommendations to our clients and hope more and more of them will see the benefits of being in the Early Adopter Club.

A colleague of ours forwarded this terrific article from #FastCompany to us this morning.  What a brilliant and concise assessment of the concept of “Brand” (you know, that’s the one with the capital “B”) in 2010. 

Oh my.

In 10 brief paragraphs, Graham Button nails down the lid on the casket of - pause for dramatic effect — “The Big Brand” (cue: timpani, gong and dripping reverb).  As change is, in fact, the only constant, the development, understanding and role of “Brand” has evolved way beyond what most marketing and public relations professionals could have imagined just a decade ago.  A perfect storm of blindingly fast technological advancement, shifting social mores and expectations along with the rise of a new generation weaned on individual manipulation of data and experience has produced the prosumer.  And with the prosumer has come a reversal of the brand-customer relationship and the subsequent crumbling of the traditional brand.

What are marketing and public relations professionals to do?  We certainly don’t have the magic potion here at Forge, but we do know Button’s point in #8 is a critical ingredient:  “it’s about re-thinking how you do business.”

Here’s an interesting if ultimately unhelpful article on who “owns” social media (as if anyone could).

While the points Keath makes about how public relations folks have the goods to manage social media strategy are worth considering, the fact is most public relations firms - along with marketing firms and advertising firms - just “don’t get it” when it comes to social media.

More significant, though, is the fact that no one profession can “own” the social media space for their clients.  First, the whole point of social media is that no one can (or should) own it and that no one can (or should) control the social media conversation.  And second, it’s the client’s, not our, decision about who will manage social media initiatives.  If I can’t successfully persuade a prospect that I deserve to coordinate social media strategies on his or her behalf, then that’s my fault, not the fault of my competitors.

Posing the question about which profession should own social media is perhaps good fodder for debate, but ultimately it’s a fruitless effort.  Rather than arguing over who should be the one to hit the ball out of the park, we should take it upon ourselves to be prepared to take that swing whenever the opportunity arises.  And beyond learning how to hit that sucker over the wall, we have to take the initiative to step up to the plate in the first place.

Initiative: that’s what we can and should own

A very, very compelling argument from a February 2010 post I just ran across this evening.

Love this passage: “

It is about data — data in ways we have never before fathomed. The future of advertising is not about social, not about viral videos, not about mobile, not about any new medium or any new ad unit — but about data. Those who know what to do with this will be the new kingmakers, the new rulers of Madison Avenue — or the creators of a new Avenue of media.

Why is this so? Because the impression by itself is becoming worthless… .

“We have reached terminal velocity, the exponential, the moment when it is clear that the number of media vehicles and opportunities has far exceeded the ability for any marketer to manage without the use of technology. Welcome to the beginning of a seemingly infinite media world.”