PR | Media Culpa

Launch video unavailable when YouTube opens up in Sweden

As expected, YouTube today opened up a Swedish version of the site. A launch video is posted on the site in which a number of celebrities welcome YouTube to Sweden, including Google’s Chief Internet Evangelist Vint Cerf; Mona Sahlin, leader of the Social Democrats and Ulf Ekberg of pop combo Ace of Base. The video is also promoted on the front page of the Social Democratic Party webpage (!).

For some reason YouTube has made it very hard to embed this launch video and it took me a while to find the embed code.

What the video does not reveal is how a Swedish version is any different than using the global site. Everything on the site is still in English, a language most Swedes handle very well.

On top of this, the launch video is suddenly unavailable. Probably temporarily, because as I type this the video comes back up, becomes unavailable again, then up again.

Tags: sweden, youtube, mona sahlin, youtube, video. Ping.

Bigmouth strikes again at Ryanair

Michael O’Leary, CEO of low-cost airline Ryanair, has a reputation for speaking his mind in a way that is great if you belong to the school that believes all publicity is good publicity. If you on the other hand think that a CEO that, among other things, calls journalists “wankers” is a walking PR nightmare, then O’Leary is it. And now he is at it again. In a press conference in Düsseldorf, Germany he recently joked that “in economy it will be very cheap fares, say 10 Euros, and in business class it will be bed and blowjobs”.

I don’t think that there is one single female flight attendant at Ryanair that finds that comment helpful in their daily jobs. Last week I flew to London and in the row behind me some “senior” business men apparently felt they had the right to get better seats so that the three of them could sit together, instead of divided on each side of the aisle. The flight attendant was a pretty, young woman who they addressed as “my little friend” and “be a good girl now”, basically talking to her like she was a twelve year-old. Typical male suppression techniques in other words. Now, the plane was full so there was no chance for these passengers to move and they made it clear to the flight attendant that she let them down, these superior men that she should serve.

It’s not difficult to guess that this is the daily routine for female flight attendants and so many other women in service professions. And O’Leary is adding insult to injury. So, O’Leary, that joke isn’t funny anymore, to make another reference to the Smiths. But what really surpised me was that Ryanair apparently is trying to spin this in a positive way. On their website the company has issued a news release that claims the video is the most viewed video on YouTube’s travel section. While that in itself probably is a bit of a stretch, instead I would be worried about the company’s reputation that so many people have watched the video.

The news release continues with quotes like “Since then it is rumoured that the ‘Beds and Blowjobs’ debate comes up at most management meetings and everyone is cock sure, it would grow from strength to strength.” They also make a big deal out of the fact that the poor translator did not find any German word for blowjobs.

Remind me to stay clear of Ryanair next time I need a cheap airline ticket. It’s not worth it.

Note to Dagens Media: this is not what any sane person would call good PR.

Tags: chauvinism, public relations, ryanair, pr, ryanair, flyg. Ping.

Control and command PR backfires

Yesterday we could read that cartoon figure Dilbert is embracing web 2.0 by letting readers “create cartoon mashups, use widgets, rank comic strips, share favorite lists, subscribe to RSS feeds, and add commentary”. If it works out it could be a great example of how to give up control of your message and put it in the hands of consumers, who are encouraged to become brand champions and spread the word about Dilbert.

The exact opposite must be artist James Taylor who held a concert in Stockholm earlier this week. Apparently the organisers demanded that the media that were present signed a contract that limited the use of their own photos. As a result, both Dagens Nyheter and Expressen refused to publish any text or photos about the concert at all. And as you might have guessed, you only need to go to Flickr to find a few photos from the concert.

It’s quite ridiculous to try to limit the use of photos in this day and age, especially in a country with more than 100% mobile penetration. Instead, take a look at the way the Shins involved fans to create a video from 200 video clips from fans’ mobile phones and cameras.

http://current.com/e/76363822

Tags: james taylor, the shins, dilbert, musik, foto. Ping.

“PR agencies are slow”

Last week I attended the Disruptive Media conference in Stockholm with speakers such as Neville Hobson and Kristofer Björkman. The conference covered inspiring topics from online video advertising to blog monitoring and strategies for social media. Fredrik Svensson from Starcom also held a stimulating presentation with five tips on how to succeed with social media campaigns:

1. Start to tell the story but let the consumer finish it.

2. Make the consumer your media channel.

3. Create ambassadors.

4. See social media sites as partners.

5. If possible, go where your customers are, don’t force them to come to you.

During the day, the topic of blogger relations came up several times and although most agreed it is not rocket science, there were many examples of bad pitches. The most telling commment of the day came at the final panel debate about blogging. Roger Åberg, from the Feber blog network talked about how they get pitched with stories. He said that PR agencies are incredibly slow, when one of the Feber blogs blog about a story on Monday, the Swedish PR agency sends a translated press release on Wednesday. In my opinion, these PR agencies demonstrate at least two things:

1. They are not tuned in to the new media logic in which news are instantaneous. When everyone is a publisher, news can travel the globe within seconds. Online publishers in general and bloggers in particular don’t “save” stories to the next day or wait to get the local version. Instead they pick up ideas from around the world and publish without delay.

2. They are not monitoring the blogs they pitch. If they did, they would see that the story is already out.

Several PR agencies were present at Disruptive Media and I know there are a lot of smart PR people in Sweden who get social media. But apparently, many agencies still have a lot to learn about blogger relations. And clients also need to realize that news are global and that there is an increasing pressure to get stories out in most markets at the same time. It is no longer, if it ever was, a good strategy to expect the local agency to get ink on a story that is already out in the prioritized markets. Geography based launch programmes are not as effective in a web 2.0 environment.

Tags: digital pr, public relations, blogger relations, pr, public relations. Ping.

I’m joining Burson-Marsteller

I am happy to announce that I am joining Burson-Marsteller to head up its digital PR practice in the Nordic region. For the last four years I have been exploring blogs and other social media in my spare time, trying to learn what is is all about and how it affects the PR profession. Now it’s time to “walk the talk” and start to work with these topics professionally. I am very excited about this opportunity to work with businesses and organisations in the Nordic area.

Burson-Marsteller has an impressive global network and I hope to learn a lot from my new colleagues. I will start my new job on 1 April. More info about me at LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.

Tags: pr2.0, social media, Burson-Marsteller, public relations, pr, sociala medier. Ping.

Estonia opens embassy in Second Life

Perhaps you think that Second Life is yesterday’s news, but it’s not. It’s actually the news of Dec 4, because that’s when Estonia launched their embassy in Second Life. Sweden opened the Second House of Sweden in Second Life in May 2007.

“We expect people interested in Estonia, as well as people interested in foreign relations and foreign policy, to participate in events at the embassy,” said Secretary General of the Foreign Ministry, Matti Maasikas who also claims that more countries are planning to follow the same route.

Interestingly, in relation to the debate that PR firms supposedly don’t know how to handle social media, the project is being implemented by PR firm Hill & Knowlton.

Via Olle Wästberg’s newsletter.