Seven social media lessons from Nestle's reputation crisis

Posted At : March 22, 2010 2:03 PM | Posted By : Andy Beaupre
Related Categories: Branding,Strategy,Crisis Management,Media Relations,Social Media,Commentary

If a company still doesn’t "get" how social media has changed the rules of branding by empowering consumers, look no further than the ongoing Nestle firestorm.

Nestle has been in trouble for awhile, mostly related to its continuing use of palm oil in its products. Palm oil is linked to environmental nastiness, including deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions and endangered species loss.

Caroline McCarthy of CNET News shared a balanced post about the Nestle brand crisis, triggered by ticked off consumers on Facebook. Nestle was clueless about the power shift enabled by social media and acted in an old-school authoritarian “we own the brand” way. It not only didn’t work, it backfired.

There are vital lessons from the Nestle debacle for professional communicators advising their execs or clients:

1. Before diving into social media, make sure key decision makers who think they want to go social media truly “get” how the game is played. It’s not a press release.

2. Make sure they understand how Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. aren’t one way vehicles (where the brand dominates the message), but an invitation to a never ending dance with constantly changing partners, some of whom are never your friend and may only want to dance if they can slap your ego and try to make you a better dancer.

3. Don’t go social media unless the brand is willing to take the risk of jumping off the cliff, giving up control to customers and consumers who will express their viewpoints, both positive and negative.

4. If your company or client wants to control the message, then social media isn’t for them. Look at how Nestle tried to tell people not to post their logos. It will incur a wrath not unlike "It’s not OK for people to use altered versions of your logos but it’s OK for you to alter the face of Indonesian rainforests? Wow!"

5. Creating LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter accounts is just the first step. The goal isn’t to tweet or post, it’s to build an active community and an authentic two-way relationship based on trust. It’s easy to get started in social media, but time-consuming and challenging to remain engaged and build a following.

6. Remember that even if your company or client decides not to engage in social media, this won’t stop rants, rebellion and revolution. People will find a way to express themselves and let it be known they’re disturbed, upset, confused, disappointed or whatever the view. The train has left the station, so be prepared.

7. As we’ve learned from Nestle (and so many others), people don’t want to be scammed, ignored or mistreated. It will come back to bite you. So if your exec or client wants social media to become a positive tool, the brand must be a concerned good listener prepared to take action to correct situations that aren’t right.

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Visiting Edward L. Bernays -Part 3- Actions speak louder than words

Posted At : March 4, 2010 3:04 PM | Posted By : Andy Beaupre
Related Categories: PR,Public Relations,Commentary

This is the third blog in a three-part series highlighting my one-on-one visit with Edward Bernays, the oft-named “father of public relations." Bernays passed away 15 years ago this week.

One of the takeaways from my visit with Ed Bernays was his belief in the power of doing vs. saying.

“I learned as a boy that actions speak louder than words. Words can lie. If I say ‘apricots are good for

Bernays with David Letterman

you’ maybe they are and maybe they are not. But if I get Johns Hopkins to report on the health value of apricots, that’s what I call good public relations. We didn’t rely on words, we relied on action.”

Bernays was very conscious of the words he used. “In the U.S., words have the permanence of the wind and are subject to change without notice.” With a gleam in his eye he remarked. “I used to use the word ‘gay’ as in ‘I went to the gayest party,’ but if I use that today, they would incriminate me.” He was very conscious of using non-sexist language, consistently saying “she” every time he said “he.” This was no surprise because Bernays' wife and partner was the first woman to insist on using her maiden name on her U.S. passport.

Bernays retained a zest for life. I gave him a Beaupre coffee mug and he said “Do you sometimes drink whiskey out of this?” (uh…)

Bernays was proud of the way he had practiced. “We never worked with a company we didn’t enjoy. We’d just tell them, 'I’d like to cancel my contract.’ We never took on a client unless we got a six month or one year contract. One year would turn into 30 years.” To illustrate his point, he said United Fruit and Procter & Gamble were clients of his for three decades. He was proud to have turned down Hitler, Franco and Somoza as potential clients.

Source: Museum of Public Relations http://www.prmuseum.com/

Bernays was living history. As I walked through his Cambridge home, the walls spoke a hundred tales. “Here I am with Eleanor Roosevelt in 1919.” “That’s Al Smith.” “This was the first flyer who flew to the U.S. from Europe.” “That’s when I worked for the State Department.” “That’s me and my wife on Fifth Avenue when we were first married.” “Here I am with the first television performer.”

Bernays was interested in people. While autographing his books for me, he asked about my personal situation. “That’s a French name.” “Are you married?” “Do you have children?" “You must have been married as a kid!” “Where did you grow up?” “What does your town do?” “Where did you get my books?” ”Are you going back to New Hampshire now?” “How long will it take you to get home?”

Bernays’s ego remained intact. As we walked through his library, I commented on his vast collection (he owned over 10,000 books). He remarked, “This is my ego shelf.” I asked him what he meant. He said, “All these books are about public relations or refer to it.” I asked if he had read all the books. He chuckled, “Well, I read the parts that referred to me.” Bernays had a hefty ego, loved to talk about himself and had many friends and contacts. He would have loved social media.

That last comment was classic Bernays. Too complex to broadbrush, he was a most energetic man with a zest for life. While people will endlessly debate his opinions, style and actions, he was one of the architects of the public relations business.

And a fascinating person to spend an afternoon with one-on-one.

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Visiting Edward L. Bernays -Part 2- PR profession would be stronger with licensing

Posted At : March 3, 2010 4:16 PM | Posted By : Andy Beaupre
Related Categories: PR,Public Relations,Commentary

This is the second blog in a three-part series highlighting my one-on-one visit with Edward Bernays, the oft-named “father of public relations." Bernays passed away 15 years ago this week.

Bernays was persistent. He never gave up on the idea that PR professionals should be licensed.

At the time he and I spent an afternoon at his Cambridge, Mass. home, Bernays was orchestrating the filing of a bill with the

Bernays through the years

Massachusetts Legislature calling for the licensing of public relations practitioners. The bill proposed a fine of not more than $1,000 for anyone who did not obtain a license but who used the words “public relations, communications or corporate communications” in their job title. The idea stimulated lots of debate, mostly negative, and never passed.

He believed that any state that got this done “would become a leader in the U.S. for giving a vocation a status comparable to lawyers, architects and doctors.” He spoke about this for over an hour and then handed me a “what is a profession” definition written in 1974 by the N.Y. Appellate Division of the Supreme Court.

Bernays was direct and feisty. He peppered his dialogue with many “in-your-face” words to make his point and command your attention. “Today there are 51 different names for public relations, and they don’t mean a damn thing. Any crook, nitwit, dope, charlatan or ignoramus can use them.”

Bernays with Walter Cronkite and his
mother, Anna Freud Bernays
(sister of Sigmund Freud)

I expressed my view that the need for licensing and regulation might become more urgent if clear-cut examples of societal damage were developed and shared. Bernays recalled specific occasions where this had occurred. “I was scheduled to discuss ethics with a public relations practitioner at B.U. (Boston University). The morning of the meeting, I read an article in The New York Times saying this person’s PR firm was actually behind a group which had been publicly attacking a company’s product … the same company the PR firm was trying to get as a client.” Bernays explained, “I told B.U., ‘I’m not going to discuss ethics with this guy.’”

Bernays’ sense of humor was visibly intact. He recalled the time a woman told him she was “in public relations.” Bernays said “What do you do?” She repeated that she was “in public relations.” “I didn’t ask you that,” Bernays repeated. “What do you do?” The woman replied “I give out circulars in Harvard Square.” He loved that story because it personified his ardent belief that the public needed to be protected. “People can be rooked by somebody who just wants their money without really knowing what the hell they are doing.”

In 1990, Bernays was named one of Life Magazine's 100 Most Important Americans of the 20th Century.

This wasn’t the first time Bernays was controversial. Earlier in his career, he helped shift societal views about women and smoking. His “Torches of Freedom” campaign showcased women smoking cigarettes in a parade down Fifth Avenue. There was no mention of Bernays’ client, the American Tobacco Company. Later in his career, he reversed his position and advocated against smoking.

In discussing PRSA (Public Relations Society of America), he said it did not take proper action in cases of ethical violations of members. “PRSA gives you an APR (Accredited Public Relations), but they don’t kick out APRs who are being unethical.” He went on, “When PRSA was being formed, I discussed organizing the equivalent of the American Bar and AMA for PRSA. But they were so eager to get money, they decided anyone with two friends and $15 could get in.”

Bernays was a teacher at heart. He patiently explained the historical basis for licensing and registration, that it was born in the Middle Ages and later formalized in England in the 1700s. “All kinds of new vocations– doctors, lawyers, surgeons, architects, accountants – were formed into associations. They were all worried to death, especially the surgeons, that anyone could use the titles without the credentials. They asked Parliament to license and register them with a Hippocratic oath with the individual agreeing to give up the title if ever convicted. This idea spread to the U.S. in the 1800s and the various existing states passed comparable laws. This is as true today as it was in the early 1800s.”

A lot of people disliked (hated) Bernays’ idea of licensing PR professionals. It was a violation of first amendment rights, stifling to entrepreneurialism and big brother domination.

But there’s a more complex reality in existence today than when Bernays was alive.

Like virtually every other business, the Web has dis-intermediated the public relations industry. Thousands of trained practitioners has given way to hundreds of thousands, a larger number of whom are not reputable and potentially damaging to our industry, their clients and society as a whole.

"Torches of Freedom"

No experience? No problem. Just launch a Web site and make any claim you want. You're a PR agency! A person with chutzpah and zero track record can open a shop and call himself/herself a public relations professional. Case in point: BSMP LLC founded by Sarah Palin’s 19-year old daughter Bristol Sharon Marie Palin. The paperwork says the new entity "intends to provide lobbying, public relations, and political consulting services."

Despite this reality, I’m guessing most PR professionals still dislike the concept of licensure. They would say ‘If a person wants to hire someone who’s not professional and doesn’t have reputable experience, then they have the right to do so. Similarly, the PR practitioner shouldn’t be denied rightful employment.’

While I understand and largely support these views, Bernays ultimately believed it was imperative to protect society from “charlatans.”

Personally, I’d like to see a middle ground solution.

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Visiting Edward L. Bernays -Part 1- People power is the most important force in the world

Posted At : March 2, 2010 3:57 PM | Posted By : Andy Beaupre
Related Categories: PR,Public Relations,Commentary

Edward Bernays with Eleanor Roosevelt

It was 15 years ago this week that Edward L Bernays – the oft-named and sometimes controversial “father of public relations” – passed away.

Four years before his death, I visited Bernays in his Cambridge, MA home. It was a memorable experience. We talked about a lot of things, including international politics, his impending 100^th birthday, religion, his well-known clients, people power, the impact of action vs. words and of course his most precious topic… his belief that public relations practitioners should be licensed and regulated.

I’ll post a Bernays blog on three successive days this week to capture everything.

A little background about Bernays

By way of introduction for the uninitiated, Bernays coined the phrase “public relations counsel” in 1919 and is widely considered the modern day father of public relations. He’s credited with building public relations into a major industry by making corporations and institutions understand the value of PR, and pay for it.

Bernays was the nephew of psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. His seminal first book – Crystallizing Public Opinion – published in 1923 – was instrumental in making public relations an academic discipline. He created the PR industry’s first code of ethics.

In partnership with his wife Doris Fleischman, he advised such clients as Enrico Caruso, Samuel Goldwyn, Thomas Edison, Eleanor Roosevelt, Henry Ford and presidents of the United States from Coolidge through Eisenhower. His list of corporate clients was a “who’s who,” including Procter & Gamble, General Electric, General Motors, United Fruit Company, Westinghouse, Time, CBS and NBC.

In 1990, Life magazine named him one of the 100 most important Americans of the 20^th Century. He lived a robust life, passing away at age 103.

One-on-one with Edward L. Bernays

Bernays with President Eisenhower

Bernays greeted me personally at the side-door kitchen of his century-old Lowell Street home. At that moment in time, he was 99 years old, less than two months from celebrating his centennial with hundreds of people at the Charles Hotel. No one else was home, not even his controversial live-in housekeeper of the time. It was just Bernays & Beaupre.

A diminutive figure with a neat moustache and time-worn jacket, he walked with unexpected ease over creaky floors and up a flight of stairs to his second story office, a narrow, long room facing Lowell Street with many windows. We settled in and I began peppering him with questions.

The first thing that struck me was the way he carried himself. Born in Vienna in 1892, he retained a gracious and mannered charm. The letters I received from him prior to my arrival were painstakingly written in longhand. He answered his own phone. He was cordial, considerate and polite.

"Joan of Arc of Lithuania" created by Bernays

"Joan of Arc of Lithuania" created by Bernays

The second thing that struck me was Bernays’ eagerness, an impressive attribute at the century mark. Sometimes it was hard getting a full question out of my mouth; he’d jump right in and start answering. He wasn’t being impolite, he just couldn’t wait to express his views. He had energy and zip to spare.

Bernays was alert, informed and his global perspective impressive. Major political change had occurred in the Soviet Republic at the time of our conversation, so I recalled Bernays’ quote from 1958 citing the “monolithic propaganda of Soviet Russia,” asking what he thought of the historic transformations.

“It shows that people power is more dominant than central power. That was proven during the time of Louis XVI, years after the American Revolution, when one of the most powerful monarchs of the time was eliminated, kicked out. It was one of the great manifestations of people power which is the most important force in the world.” He repeated this view in the context of China.

My topic of Russia was of great interest to him because Bernays was instrumental in making the country of Lithuania independent.

“What I did was find an attractive young woman (she was in fact a daughter of a Pennsylvania coal miner from Lithuania) and then we (The Lithuanian National Council) dressed her up in white as the ‘Joan of Arc of Lithuania.’ We’d write out what she should say and then we sent her aro Biography of an idea by Edward Bernays und on a tour.”

In Bernays’ Biography of an Idea (1965), he explained how she became a “human symbol” to represent Lithuania. “She fought hard for recognition of her homeland,” he wrote, and over time “our articles and activities swung editorial opinion… and the word ‘Lithuania’ began to have meaning for Americans.” On July 27, 1922, the U.S. officially recognized Lithuania. Lithuania became independent in 1919 and stayed independent until the Soviets took it over in 1940.

At the time of our get-together, Lithuania was being admitted into the United Nations as an independent country. I'm sure that was particularly rewarding to him.

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