Old PR Needs to Learn to Love Not Loathe the People

Strumpette published an article by John Bell called Bell on Who Owns “Conversational Marketing”? Nobody owns conversation marketing. Conversation marketing is not a thing, it is an understanding and an agreement. It agrees that PR, advertising, marketing, politics, and business will stop resenting and reviling its very own clients, “the people.” Firstly, since when did the people become “them?” I am a person. You are a person, right? Oh, no! I forgot, you are a senior communications executive director.

Well, I own marketingconversation.com — and marketing conversation is really what new media marketing should be. I spent three years working at New Media Strategies, promoting movies for Buena Vista and TV shows for Sci-Fi “on behalf of” the client — and it works.

The true problem, in my very humble opinion, is that old PR — and Edelman is surely old PR, as I discovered in a mere 90-appalling days — really disrespects “the people” the way loverboys essentially disrespect women. They want them, they need them, but they feel essentially superior to them, feeling entitled to use them for fun and profit.

The title of this piece highlights the issue: “Who “owns” conversational marketing? PR, Advertising or The People!” — aren’t we all the people? Aren’t you and I — expensive consultants, PR wonks, and Admen — people too?

I taught a creative writing course to high school kids. One of the kids was much wealthier than the rest. One day, he came to me to tell me that the rich were people too. Well, Admen, PR wonks, and marketing consultants are people too.

Loud, inauthentic, and bombastic surely work when one is busy — in the short run.

Oh, and the award for the most naive thing said this week is, “Conversational marketing isn’t right for every client. But when it is, we need to be pushing our client forward into that conversation.”

Truth is, the movie “Singles” said it best with the quote, “not having a thing is your thing.” What “the people” are responding to is the grotesque feeling of entitlement that Old PR feels — the level of noblesse oblige that advertisers, politicians, marketers, and PR professionals feel… when I was told that I needed to write copy that aimed at 7th grade reading ease, it was not said out of love, it was said out of loathing.

What differentiates old PR from new PR is this: old PR loathes its clients and “the people” while new PR — or the most effective Cluetrain PR — must love its clients and “the people.” I guess I can boil it down to “love the sinner, hate the sin.”

While most PR folks cherish their address books, their contact files, and their lists of Times, Post, and Tribune reporters, very few of them realize that the men and women who run message boards, organize WoW guilds, build islands on Second Life, run television prediction market sites, organize IRC channels, and publish blogs are the new reporters, publishers, and editors.

I wrote an article called, “Online Communities are Real Communities of Real People” where I ask, “Do you think that people who play Second Life, World of Warcraft, Xbox Live, MMOGs, and MMORPGs are freaks? Do you consider message boards, forums, virtual realities, and virtual communities to be a waste of time, populated by losers?” and then answer, “If so, then you need to leave online advocacy, new media marketing, online brand promotion, online word of mouth marketing, online outreach, blogger relations, and brand ambassadorship to someone who has lived, loved, and connected to people in real ways online. And continues to do so.”

So, if you are saying that Old PR needs to stay away from New PR until it gets over itself, then yes, I agree; otherwise, I do have to hand it to Very Old PR Agencies like Edelman Worldwide for at least going out there and making all the mistakes in the book.