HALL OF FAME- OPRAH SIGNS OFF

This week's perspective from Bob Reid: She is the undisputed Queen of media. From having the highest rated talk show for a solid quarter century to her publishing, film, radio and web empires, Oprah Winfrey has been a one-woman media phenomenon. She’s obviously a savvy businessperson, but first and foremost, she is a brilliant communicator and brand-builder. Few have been so capable of reaching – and motivating – audiences, with her views and calls for action on issues, philanthropic campaigns or picks for favourite books or presidential candidates. Throughout her career, Oprah has walked her talk – meaning what she says and saying what she means. And on those rare occasions when things seemed grim, i.e., allegations of impropriety at her African charity operations, she addressed and dealt with those issues forthrightly and without delay. Oprah Winfrey is far from finished, but we think it’s an appropriate time to put her in the TD&F Hall of Fame.

NOT WITH A BANG, BUT WITH A FUMBLE

This week's perspective from Joe Chidley: Untold thousands around the world reacted with shock and horror to news that the world did not come to a terrible end this month. But for those followers of Harold Camping, there is still, er, hope – at least according to 89-year-old Camping, the ersatz American religious leader who got a lot of play out of predicting the Rapture to occur at around 6 pm on May 21. (The May 2-4 weekend, no less!) True believers, by Camping’s way of thinking, would get an express ticket to heaven, while the rest of us would be damned to apocalyptic meltdown. (We’re presuming that we here at TD&F are exempt from salvation, having toiled for so long amid the infernal machines and mephitic vapours of the media.) When the Earth somehow managed to survive the fated day, Camping apologized for not having “worked out as accurately as I could have” the date. Now, you’d think that for a matter of this importance, you might double-check your math. But from a communications perspective, the lesson here is that on matters pertaining to future events, you should try to avoid being too declarative – it’s one thing to say the world is going to end someday soon, or that you expect increased profits next year, or that you’re against tax increases, and quite another to say doomsday starts at 6 p.m., or you’re going to earn 10 bucks more a share in 2012, or that people should read your lips when you say “No new taxes.” Guidance, in other words, is a difficult game, best practiced with care if it’s practiced at all. That said, Camping did get one thing right: when his guidance proved inaccurate, he rolled with the punches and adapted to the new situation quickly. The end of the world is now officially delayed six months, to October 21, 2011.

FUMBLE: HONDA'S SECURITY BREACH

This week's perspective from Bob Reid: We were dismayed to read about yet another theft of private customer data this week, when The Toronto Star broke the news that personal information on 283,000 Honda Canada customers had been stolen in a security breach. The Star obtained a letter that the company had sent out to affected customers on May 13, alerting them to the breach and warning of “possible improper access of information.” The theft involved names, addresses and vehicle identification numbers, not financial information, and Honda assured customers that they were not at direct risk of fraud or identity theft. Fair enough, we suppose. But why did this problem take so long to get to the media? Maybe it seemed prudent to try to avoid wider exposure. But following on the heels of Sony Corporation’s embarrassing series of security breaches, in which delay to disclose was a real reputational issue, we wonder why Honda Canada would not have simply released the information to the press and be seen as staying out in front of the problem. In fact, it seems to us that this was a situation where the media could have been useful in letting affected customers know about the breach. More to the point, waiting for the media to “obtain” a letter to customers makes it look like you’re trying to hide a problem rather than acknowledge it. And with nearly 300,000 letters circulating out there in the community, what are the odds that one of them wouldn’t end up in the hands of a reporter?

FUMBLE: FACEBOOK MESSES UP THE SMEAR CAMPAIGN

This week's perspective from Joe Chidley: We’re all grown-ups here, right? So we won’t pretend to be shocked and appalled that Facebook hired a PR firm to encourage media to talk trash about Google. What's shocking and appalling is how badly the whole thing seems to have been conceived and executed. The smear surfaced after media outlets began receiving anti-Google pitches from the firm, Burson-Marsteller, and blogger Christopher Soghoian exposed them in a tweet: “Just pitched by PR firm wanting to ghost-write an anti-Google op-ed for me. I am quite capable of authoring my own anti-google stuff thank you.” Newshounds and bloggers glommed onto the story, and Facebook was eventually identified as Burson-Marsteller’s client. The campaign was targeted at Google’s Social Circle, a service that lets Google Mail users see information derived from public Facebook data. Facebook didn’t much like the idea, hence the push to get media to write about what an invasion of privacy Social Circle is. You might think that’s good business or bad business - we believe that depends on a number of variables. But what’s unforgiveable is to be so sloppy. Seems to us that the whole thing got off to a bad start with the ghost-write offer. In this day and age you absolutely can’t get away with ghost writing a smear piece. Particularly in social media where “authenticity” is the Holy Grail. You also can’t forget that the other Holy Grail of social media is “controversy,” and what Facebook and Burson-Marsteller managed in this case was to transgress one imperative while serving up the other. Analyst Rob Enderle, quoted by Computerworld, summed up the fumble succinctly: Facebook “realized they needed to do battle – they just misused their weapon,” he said. “Either stop doing this kind of thing, or do it well.” Somebody should get their money back.

TOUCHDOWN – HARPER PUTS HIS BOOTS ON THE (SOGGY) GROUND

This week's perspective from Bob Reid: The lessons from the George W. Bush Fumble in the wake of Hurricane Katrina have been carefully learned by virtually all leaders, and Stephen Harper is no exception. Sure, the PM flew over the Manitoba flood zone, but he did so not in his official aircraft but in a Canadian Forces chopper, following a briefing by military and emergency management officials and Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger. Unlike Bush, Harper was seen on the ground, on the scene, actively engaged in the growing disaster, and giving assurances that Ottawa is already flowing relief funds. And while it’s a Touchdown overall, I do think Harper lost a bit of yardage for not having prominent messages of empathy in human terms for the people directly affected. I’m sure he would have made such comments, but they didn’t break through prominently in the overall media coverage, and that suggests he didn’t lead with that aspect strongly enough. But otherwise, well played by the PM.

TOUCHDOWN – CLEMENT CALLS BIG OIL TO OTTAWA

This week's perspective from Bob Reid: Federal Industry Minister Tony Clement is being criticized by some for announcing that he will have the heads of the major oil companies appear before a Parliamentary committee to explain exactly why the pump price of gasoline spiked to record levels this week, even though crude prices are far below their own previous highs. The critics say this has all been examined thoroughly before by government, that no evidence of oil company collusion has been found, and that it’s ultimately just a high-profile PR exercise. I say it’s a communications Touchdown. People are angry, frustrated and confused. They want SOMEBODY to be held accountable and to explain why they paid more for a tank of gas than any other Canadians in history. And that’s exactly what Clement’s exercise answers. Whether it accomplishes anything of substance or not is a separate matter; the communications maneuver says “we’re listening, we get it, and we share your frustration.” Being seen to be responding and taking action is essential for any in a position of leadership – something Clement and his boss understand.

FUMBLE: HACKS AT SONY

This week's perspective from Joe Chidley: It’s hardly an immediate fumble when a large multinational corporation suffers a security breach at the hands of increasingly sophisticated hackers. Happens all the time. The trouble starts when the hackers access the personal data of your customers – and you take your sweet time letting your customers know. And that’s exactly the core mistake Sony Corp. made when it discovered that an unknown person had accessed personal information about the PlayStation Network's 77 million users – and then took a week to warn those users that their names, dates of birth, and e-mail addresses had been stolen. Not good enough. Eventually, Sony apologized to its customers and pledged that it had taken steps to ensure such invasions would not happen again. But the very next day, the company had to shut down another of its networks, the Sony Online Entertainment System, after it found out that a hacker had gained access to personal information on the network’s 24 million users – including credit card details. Cue another apology from Sony CEO Howard Stringer, who, by the way, had recently announced he was stepping down in two months to be replaced by Kazuo Hirai, head of Sony’s networked products group, who is taking a lot of the heat for this fumble. Two screw-ups here: the company came across as covering up a problem rather than fixing it, and when it communicated that it had fixed the problem, it really hadn’t. Now Sony looks out-of-touch with customers and incompetent – a deadly combination – and has to play serious reputational catch-up.

TOUCHDOWN – OBAMA REFUSES TO “SPIKE THE FOOTBALL”

This week's perspective from Bob Reid: They got him. Almost a decade after 9/11, U.S. forces found and killed Osama bin Laden this week. For President Barack Obama, with an election year looming and leading a wounded party that has been traditionally painted as weaker on terror than the Republicans, there may have been temptation for a victory lap. He did, appropriately, address the nation last Sunday to confirm the news. But, as he told 60 Minutes in an interview to be broadcast this weekend, “there’s no need to spike the football” by releasing grisly photos of bin Laden’s body. And Obama walked his talk yesterday at ground zero in New York, making no public speech, only quietly laying a wreath after meeting privately with 9/11 families, firefighters and other heroes from that awful day. Sometimes it’s what you don’t say that speaks loudest. Kudos both to the current president for his New York visit and to his predecessor – George W. Bush has also resisted any temptation to crow publicly about the elimination of bin Laden. Classy. Appropriate. Touchdown.

2011 FEDERAL ELECTION WRAP-UP

This week's perspective from Bob Reid: Obviously there are a bazillion variables at play in any election, so I’m certainly not suggesting it was all about communication – but that said, campaign messages and how well they are articulated is certainly a key dimension, and that was indeed the case in the now concluded federal election. Conservative Leader Stephen Harper had the most solid and consistent narrative. If Bill Clinton’s campaign mantra was “it’s the economy, stupid” Harper’s might as well have been “it’s the stupid economy.” By tying everything back to the need for Canada to stay the course amid a still-fragile global recovery – and folding into that the need for a majority government in order to be able to do it – he struck the chord that resonated strongest. To be fair to Michael Ignatieff, he never made a crippling Fumble, yet the Liberal leader was unable to break out of the “frame around his neck” (as he put it post-vote) that the Conservative ads and campaign messaging had constructed. Ignatieff tried in the first half to fight fire with fire and engage in a debate about character and trust versus Harper, but he didn’t have enough voter confidence in the tank. Then there’s Smilin’ Jack Layton. Critical of his opponents but always with a smile, and always pointing back to the people-oriented aspects of his platform, Layton’s high-road campaign resonated strongest with those who were definitely not going to vote Conservative, especially in Quebec. A tip of the TD&F hat to all who go put their names on the ballot and put themselves (and those around them) through the grueling communications exercise that is an election campaign: our democracy and our country are always the better for it, regardless of which party comes out on top.