May '11 PR Rankings Issue - Odwyerpr.com

OPINION
Caution: tweeting may be hazardous to your rep
By Fraser Seitel
If you think Japan is the only radioactive
place on the planet, try tweeting.
Twitter, the five-year-old, 150-million
user, social networking service with the
prodigious following
and the dubious
profit potential, is
rapidly becoming
the quickest way to
annihilate your reputation
and lose your
job, in one 140-character
swoop.
Fraser P. Seitel has
been a communications
consultant, author and
teacher for 30 years. He
is the author of the
Prentice-Hall text, The
Practice of Public
Relations.
52
Latest to fall victim
to “execution by
tweet” was Cappie
Pondexter, a Rutgers
graduate and shooting
guard for the
New York Liberty
of the Women’s
National Basketball Association.
Ms. Pondexter, for a reason known only
to her, saw the carnage in Japan and
tweeted, “What if God was tired of the
way they treated their own people in
there own country! Idk guys he makes no
mistakes.”
A day later, after somebody evidently
suggested a Henry Kissinger she was
not, Ms. Pondexter tweeted, “I wanna
apologize to anyone I may hurt or offended
... the least thing I wanted was to hurt
or offend.”
In an instant, because of her nitwit
tweet, Ms. Pondexter’s reputation was
toasted, not to mention the reputation of
Rutgers, which saw fit to award a degree
to an apparent illiterate.
Ms. Pondexter’s learned international
tweet-mentary, of course, followed a similarly
thoughtful tweatise on Japan from
erstwhile Aflac spokesman Gilbert
Gottfried and another tweet by a Chrysler
social media PR consultant that questioned,
in most spicy language, the
driving competence of Detroiters.
As a result of said tweets, Ms.
Pondexter lost her reputation, Mr.
Gottfried his Aflac gig, and the PR
consultant his job.
And that’s the point.
While Twitter might be great for rallying
the populace and bringing down
dictators, it can positively destroy you.
Indeed, the reputational risk/reward
ratio of tweeting for any individual inter-
MAY 2011 WWW.ODWYERPR.COM
ested in earning a living — including
celebrities and sports stars and CEOs —
is questionable. While a persuasive tweet
might marginally assist a marketing
effort, an errant tweet can ruin a
reputation.
The indisputable fact is that just
because you are a Hollywood celebrity or
a professional athlete or even the top
executive in a major corporation doesn’t
mean you’re all that bright or attuned to
public sensibilities. And unless you’re
Charlie Sheen, 50 Cent or some equivalent
multi-millionaire sociopath, you
need to think twice before tweeting.
And “thinking twice” in terms of
Twitter translates to the following:
Have a reason to tweet.
The top tweeters, based on followers
are: Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber and
Britney Spears.
The latter is selling a comeback record
album, the middle one is selling a documentary
film, and the former is selling
anything she can get her hands on —
music, apparel, electronic equipment,
you name it. (In fact, if you want to learn
something about modern merchandising,
look no further than the brazen bombshell.)
The point is that these people are all
“selling” something; they have a reason
to tweet.
They’re not doing it on a whim, e.g.
defaming Detroit drivers or bashing the
Japanese.
Tweet as part of a larger plan.
Twitter absolutely should be an element
in a marketing/public relations plan.
Smart companies, like Starbucks coffee
or Southwest airlines or Zappos
shoes, use Twitter, along with Facebook
and other traditional and social media
tools, to boost their brands and sell their
products.
Similarly, smart celebrities, like Oprah
and Shaq and Madonna (and even twonamed
celebs) use Twitter as part of a
larger strategic plan to boost their causes
and themselves.
With just 140 characters, Twitter is best
used as an “enticer,” a “grabber,” a
“catalyst,” not as a marketing or public
relations end in and of itself.
Use Twitter to break news.
For big celebrities, Twitter as “news
breaker” has become its most potent use.
When Sarah Palin wants to jump into
the Arizona gun debate or Lindsay Lohan
wants to “apologize” in advance of a
Professional Development
court hearing or Lady Gaga wants to
insert herself into the gays-in-themilitary
debate — they do it on Twitter.
Their PR people then issue releases
pointing reporters to the tweet, and bingo,
“instant news.”
This, of course, is an admittedly calculated
use of this seemingly “scriptless”
medium, just as a news release or a
speech or a media advisory is used to
stimulate coverage.
Which leads to this final suggestion:
Seek help before tweeting.
Of course, this is heresy to every redblooded
social media supporter of spontaneity.
To the zealots, “falsifying” tweets
is the most egregious violation of
Twitterquette. A Twitter “conversation,”
they say, should be just that — real,
unedited, and unscripted by a paid
advisor. Anything less, they argue,
destroys credibility.
Oh you poor misguided saps.
Not even Biz Stone (look him up!) is
naive enough to think that Bill Gates or Al
Gore or Martha Stewart or Shakira or
Oprah — Oprah, for goddsakes! — actually
have time to author all their own tweets.
Public relations people get paid for
advising clients on the strategy and implementation
of their communications
weaponry — from releases and speeches
to memos and presentations. Part of that
21st century arsenal are blogs and
podcasts, Facebook postings and tweets.
And they, too, should be influenced by
counselors expert in the fine art of
strategic communication.
Here’s why:
Designer Kenneth Cole was ostracized
after tweeting that his new spring collection
was inspired by the unrest in the
Middle East.
New York University deep-sixed a wellknown
research Fellow after his insensitive
(some would say, “insane”) tweet badmouthing
a CBS broadcaster sexually
assaulted in Cairo.
The Indiana Attorney General was
sacked for tweeting that the Wisconsin
police should use live ammo to fight union
protestors.
And then, of course, there were Gilbert
and Chrysler and Cappie.
All would have benefited from wise
public relations counsel — not to mention,
robust editing — before tweeting their
reputations away.
Sorry Twitter nation.