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The first of two guest posts from Phil Jones, Sales and Marketing Director of technology brand Brother.

It’s super, it’s shiny and the “twalk” of the town.  So, is Twitter just another social networking tool being hyped up by the media luvvies as a way to earn fee income in a flat market?  Or is this a new tool that business should be paying proper attention to?  If we’re to believe it, untold riches, overwhelming customer demand and speaking engagements are only 140 characters away, so should we drop everything and rush at Twitter as our economic saviour?

Show me the money….

If that’s your basic expectation - time in = money out - may I nudge you to read Seth Godin’s book Meatball Sundae or The Soul of the New Consumer by David Lewis to understand where the world is at now in terms of buyer behaviour.  It’s not about the traditional business model of instant cash, it’s about engaging in the big conversation that’s going on out there amongst your customers, then using that conversation or credibility to draw people towards your business.

Fad or Twend?

Interestingly many businesspeople I meet are simply put off by the name Twitter, arguing that it sounds silly and unserious.  The issue isn’t necessarily about Twitter; Twitter is merely the platform that allows people to “connect” up, discuss, make new contacts, share instantaneously, join tribes and interest groups, learn and push forward their contact base, in a very dynamic way.  This is a macro trend, not a fad.  The fad might be Twitter as the micro-blogging platform, in the same way that myspace was overshadowed by Facebook.  Someone else might come up with something new.  What about a business-only version called Bitter (laughs out loud)?  Google won’t  stand by for long; they’ll either acquire Twitter or do it themselves, and Twitter will dissolve into the background as the pioneer who didn’t keep up.

How does business get a “Twicket” to the party?

To the uninitiated, it can seem like there’s a big party going on that you haven’t been invited to.  However, before you rush to put your party outfit on, stop and think a minute.  Is this a party you need to be at?  Is it one you’re going to enjoy?  Are you going to go and leave early?  Are the people there your kind of people?  Are you going to turn up and then not talk to anyone?  If so, might be best not to go.  Right now, I’ve held off from a brand perspective but went with it from a personal perspective to learn it inside out.  Now I have, expect something soon.

The thing is, it is worth going if you fully understand that the world is changing as people continue to divide and divide again into interest groups, seeking like minds in an increasingly hostile and lonely society.  Web 2.0 genuinely has changed the world as we know it.  The big conversation is going on all around us in the ether, like a scene from The Matrix.  Twitter offers a way of tapping into that dynamic conversation in real time.

I would advise any business to register, create a profile and start listening.  In the early days, you don’t need to do so much talking.  After signing up, do this:

• Type the names of people you know (customers, contacts or staff) into the “Find people” search function at the top of the screen. When you find someone you know, follow them.
• Type your company name into the search box and see if any conversations are being had about your company or brand. Do the same for your competitors.
• Sit back and watch it for a couple of weeks before you jump in and start Tweeting yourself. See the tone, the style, the content of what people say in your “Twittersphere”.  Authenticity is everything; people won’t want to interact with a marketing machine or automated service.

Phil Jones is Vice-President of Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce and Sales & Marketing Director of technology brand Brother.  He writes a daily blog at http://thecorporatebubble.blogspot.com/ and can be found on Twitter @Philjones40.The second post on this subject will appear on PR Media Blog tomorrow, Friday 19th June. 

A few months ago I wrote about discovering via twitter that the French actor Guillaume Depardieu had died.  Six months ago it seemed an oddity that ordinary individuals would break news ahead of the major media sources.  It appears now that this is an established phenomenon.  The sad news of Natasha Richardson’s fatal skiing accident was spread via twitter, blogs and social networks long before the strictures of the established media allowed them to confirm the details.

At around 4pm UTC today (19th May) twitter started trending with the news that actor Patrick Swayze had died of pancreatic cancer.  But within half an hour or so the story had flipped to a denial.  The actor it appears is alive if unwell and continuing his battle against cancer.

Whilst trending topics on the web add a new dimension to breaking news inaccurate rumours can take hold.  The established media brands adhere to a largely common set of journalistic conventions that moderate the motivation to break news fast with the imperative of accuracy.  That’s why they are trusted.    

War reporting - whether factual or literary - has an illustrious history with some big names dominating the battlefront, from Robert Capa in the Spanish Civil War and Edward Murrow in World War II to our own Kate Adie and Martin Bell covering more recent conflicts.

But now, through the advent of blogging technology - you know, that thing that turns punter into publisher overnight - stories from the front can come directly from the keyboards of those fighting the war.

Such is the case of Colour Sergeant Michael Saunders - featured in the above BBC clip - whose blog posts from Afghanistan are being posted physically by his sister, Tracey Tyrls, in the Worcester pub where she works.

Apparently the blogs are well read by the drinkers and, as one customer says, they really “brings home what day to day life is like” in Helmand province.

Clearly, the content of Sergeant Saunders’ blogs will be what the Ministry of Defence will consider fit to print, and rightly so when soldiers’ lives are on the line.

But this instance of communication is instructive for businesses too: having a blog that enables you to communicate from the front line of your business activities hands you the opportunity to talk to your customers in a way unfettered by traditional media. Not that media coverage of your press releases and commentary is undesirable - in fact, third party filtering of your company’s claims to fame by journalists can carry added credibility. But with a blog, your corporate voice has licence to have an authenticity, personality and candour that gives your business the human touch.

And, as in the case of Tracey Tyrls, why not share your blog posts in a physical form by sticking them up on the notice board - as not everyone working in UKplc is glued to a computer screen all day.

Valeria Maltoni over at the Conversation Agent blog has a useful summary of corporate blogging dos and don’ts, along with examples of corporate blogs to whet your literary whistle.

Think of it as part of your business’s battle plan where, mercifully, you are building and protecting your company’s reputation rather than dodging mortar fire.

SXSW Flash Panel: Corporations & Social Media from Kipp Bodnar on Vimeo.

Once you’ve got over the initial impression that this is a convention of intellectual truckers, the above film is a great insight into how and why US companies are using social media - and particularly blogs - to facilitate a conversation with customers and understand what they really want.

Social media evangelist, Chris Brogan, brought together people from companies including GM, Crocs, Best Buy, Pepsico, AMD and Jet Blue to share their ways of working online.

And as one commentator on Brogan’s blog succinctly puts it, the value companies get from using social media is being able to say to their customers: “This is me. Love me. Hate me. But ultimately, tell me how to be better.”

There’s a great line in Al Pacino film, Carlito’s Way, when his eponymous ex-mobster character delivers a stark lesson to corrupt lawyer, David Kleinfeld, played by Sean Penn. After Penn has killed the head of an Italian-American crime family with a tyre iron around the head, Pacino recommends he keep a loaded pistol close at hand because: “You a gangster now, Dave”.

This makes me think of the shift one makes when having the power to press “publish” on your blogging software and bring your carefully crafted thoughts to the world. To paraphrase Pacino, “You a publisher now!”

And in the new dawn of social media, that’s something PR Media Blog is encouraging companies to do, alongside a chorus of others persuading them that the customer (consumer, B2B or public sector) is no longer expecting the internet to consist of well-designed but static websites of one-way communication, but a dynamic stream of compelling content and mutually beneficial conversation. Hence, whatever line of work you’re in, publishing such material online - that demonstrates your expertise and creates a dialogue - should make good business sense.

But while we urge you to press “publish”, we also urge you to beware. One of the critical lessons learned at journalism college is about the laws of libel and slander. They are there to protect those whose reputation has been unfairly sullied by the written word, though they are also used unfairly by powerful, vested interests to scare away journalists willing to probe and uncover wrongdoing.

But publishers are used to this and have lawyers well-versed in libel law on standby. That’s the nature of the game; sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. But if YOUR business has launched a blog, has a Twitter feed, populates a Facebook page or contributes to online forums, regardless of whether you make concrete mixers, cable ties or cola, that makes you a publisher too.

This week at the High Court, several newspapers and a broadcaster have agreed to pay “substantial damages” to a mother who felt she was wrongly accused of poor parental supervision, after the party her daughter organised through a social network ended up with some minor damage, but not the destruction the newspapers had alleged.

A pertinent element of this publishing saga is the fact that comments added to the newspapers’ online versions of the story (n.b. people should be able to add comments to your blog posts too) turned out to be false, which doesn’t help your case if you’re defending your right to publish and be damned in the High Court.

The likelihood is that most of what you’d ever want to say online will be, in the eyes of the law, “fair comment”. The same goes for those who decide to comment on your blog posts or interact with you elsewhere in the world of social networks and forums. But there’s substance in the old proverb that “the pen is mightier than the sword”; so seek good advice from those accustomed to publishing material online and just pray that David Kleinfeld doesn’t end up your lawyer.

A bit of indulgence from me here. One of my clients is a corporate lawyer, advising the tech community, both investors and companies looking for funding. His name is Richard Eaton and he works for Orrick.

He’s started a discussion on the Long Room, the FT’s discussion forum for City-types, re the prospects for tech companies seeking investment to start-up or continue in 2009.

The Long Room is a closed forum i.e. you have to be a member to contribute, so I thought I’d post here to offer an open forum for the new media community to view and/or comment.

RIP Good Times - VC is dead, long live VC

Posted by reaton (The lawyer to the technology community) on Feb 13 16:13.

It seems that Sequoia’s words of warning last autumn are staring to be echoed over here:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/b6426bf0-f87d-11dd-aae8-000077b07658.html

But does it matter if some of the less successful companies go to the wall now?  We keep being told that failed companies are a badge of honour for entrepreneurs, so now is the time for many to earn their merit badges.  The technology, if it is good, and, crucially, if it is capable of making a profit, will not die, but lots of it will be recycled.  The entrepreneurs will start again. 

The fact is that there are three key elements to the success of any growth company: the technology, the management and the market - what is the point in having technology so bleeding edge cool that is incapable of making money, or is backed by management that would not have looked out of place running a bank?  But companies with good technology, that have good management that is capable of adapting to a changing world will survive: Google was born out of the dot.com crash.  Ten years later it is a mature company.  In this country, Autonomy continues to be one  of the most attractive stocks in the FTSE100, because it has the basics in spades. 

What does this mean for VC funding?  Well without doubt, the market for funding is extremely poor.  Poorer than any of us can remember.  Expect to see VCs pull in their horns, drip feed money to their best companies, merge their ok companies and cut loose the rest.  Yes there will be new funding, but on terms, and at the rates, that hark back to 2002.  In ten years time, the best run companies with the best money making technology will be bigger and stronger.  Will £1bn of government money help?  To secure people’s jobs, it might do.  To build great technology companies, I wouldn’t bet on it.

Every now and then we should remind ourselves that traditional media brands have a strong part to play in social media.

Newspapers are a big part of our society and we turn to them for help in interpreting the events of the day. The problem lies in trying to adapt to modern expectations of how and when we get that information and how involved we want to be in it.

10/10 to the Birmingham Post for the way they covered a key event affecting their community i.e. the long-awaited announcement from the governement on the help it will give the automotive industry, upon which so many livelihoods in the Midlands depend.

They live-blogged Lord Mandelson’s statement, led by social media guru/journalist, Joanna Geary but drawing in comments from experts on the Post staff such as the business corr, motoring and politics staffers.

And guess what? Readers were allowed in too. Anyone can jump in and add to the conversation with the journalists, rather than them having a dialogue between themselves that the rest of us watch down below.

This is embryonic so I guess if the Post had data on viewership of the event, they wouldn’t release it. But they’ve proved it works as very simple content and it didn’t exactly take a lot of resource. It was largely a conversation that the journalists would have been having in the office anyway.

Take a look at an archive version here 

It’s official ‘Twitter’ is on the agenda for Jonathan Ross’s comeback show on BBC One this week.  Stephen Fry revealed it in a “tweet” shortly after the recording of the show, which also features Tom Cruise and Lee Evans with music from Franz Ferdinand.  

TV programme makers have tried to clamp down on ‘twitter leaks’ by both Ross and Fry because of the speed with which they are now being picked up by the mainstream media, although their twitter streams could almost be regarded as minor media channels in themselves; Stephen Fry has almost 55,000 followers.  Fry also revealed a soft spot for Tom Cruise in his micro bulletin.

“All over. Won’t reveal too much as press seem anxious to be all over this. JR & I discussed Twitter. Hope it makes the cut. Cruise charming !” @stephenfry

Ross’s twitter stream has so far been silent on the subject. This represents another step towards the mainstream for twitter and a rise in the use of twitter by celebrities to engage directly with fans a trend predicted in this blog last September.   

I’ve been taking a close interest in the extent to which Eastern European leaders, especially Dimitry Medvedev, have been making attempts to position themselves strategically in the UK media - an FT comment piece here, an interview on Today programme there.

Why bother? Well, the likes of Medvedev need to work their international audience in order to get things done globally, so explaining their actions and pitching a more positive narrative that challenges the old KGB villain-type image will help.

They’ve gone a stage further now with a social media strategy, an interactive video blog that enables Medvedev to give something of his personality (we’ll see whether that’s a good thing or not!) and get into a dialogue. Full marks for trying.

Pulling back, its fascinating to see how international figures use foreign media to play back into their homeland. US globetrotting political consultants like Sawyer Miller were masters of this. Check out how the firm used the US media in the Philippines to unseat Ferdinand Marcos.

They figured that the domestic TV channels, being state controlled, were unlikely to play fair so they used the US TV networks and the likes of the New York Times, which were recieved along with so much US culture, out in the Philippines, and to influence the White House, who at the time were protecting Marcos.

Currently there’s a mini-power game taking place amongst Russian political officials and exiled oligarchs. Whether its billionaires ingratiating themselves into Western society or looking to expose dodgy dealings in their home nation.

In this spirit its fascinating to see the bid for the Evening Standard by ex-KGB agent and Russian billionaire, Alexander Lebedev. He’s known to be an opposition figure in Moscow, a critic of the regime.

It was thought that the days of a rich man looking to own a national newspaper, funding large losses, in return for access and prestige was ebbing away as multi-media strips away the power of the old brands. Perhaps there’s now a new generation of rich men seeking that sort of trophy?

Guido makes an amusing comparison with a figure from years gone by.

Marshall McLuhan, the Canadian philosopher and professor said that media themselves and not the stories they carry are important; their characteristics being more significant and influential than their content.  He famously proclaimed that “the medium is the message”.

With the myriad reports of the decline of newspapers and broadcasters it is tempting to believe that what McLuhan pronounced is in the process of being disproved.  It is argued that the channel is not important, the stories, if good enough will find us.  Content rules supreme.   Well yes and no.   By way of example I cross posted the same story in two blogs last week.  Here at PR Media Blog and on PR and The Social Web.  The story (about real and fake celebrity twitters) gained more than double the number views here at PRMB, because this is the blog with more authority, both in the literal sense and in the Technorati sense. (Google the words PR and Blog if you need confirmation).

Whilst new arrivals on the web battle to gain trust and authority much of the media old guard arrives on the web with their authority established.  Journalistic ethics and accuracy will continue to carry weight no matter how easy it becomes for arrivistes to establish a presence through the web.   There is good reason for this; we can trust traditional media because we have learnt that the trust is well placed and because they operate checks and balances to ensure quality and veracity.   In time many print newspapers will disappear but the best will survive, thrive and continue to set the news agenda, with their pixellated versions gradually replacing the ink and paper.