I recently wrote at http://www.greenbanana.wordpress.com regarding a conversation with someone who felt that PR was only relevant when dealing with intermediaries – which I find a little odd, as like you, I think the ability to communicate direct is valid and relevant to PR as we should have strong personal communication skills.

Finally, thanks Ricky – your links are interesting. Again we seem to see a lot of so-called SM experts who don’t get the point of actually joining the conversation. Your examples are just like those customer relations folk who send you a letter or email that never actually addresses your issue. In SM, it is simple – talk with not at.

And here’s some of the philosophy behind it: http://tinyurl.com/czy6vx

As for PR belonging here, there are some unique benefits:

1) In a field where measurement is largely anecdotal (not entirely!), social media interaction provides a campaign with much needed hard data.

2) In what other medium are organizations (or agencies, or whatever) able to converse directly with the stakeholder?

3) Free, easy, stakeholder research.

4) Because blogs and forums have brought together so many folks with like-minded interests, targeting the customer audience is sort of like fishing for a whale in a wading pool.

Whether as Judy asks this means it is okay to ignore criticims, I don’t know. I was recently told by someone working for a well known brand that they’d turned down a high profile radio interview which was reporting a study criticising the company’s environmental activities. As a result, the show focused entirely on another company that did accept the interview. In this case, the oxygen of negative publicity was given only to the party that engaged.

The study is still out there if anyone wants to find it – but the most important thing, I think, is that the company should have considered why it was being criticised and whether it really could be guilty of “greenwashing”.

BTW Kristen, I never underestimate the value of questions – most of my posts (especially those that can be seen as critical) comprise lots of questions. Hence my personal perspective that conversation does involve listening – although I appreciate that’s not true for everyone.

I think it is idealistic to think that true listening is implicit in conversations. In French there is an expression “dialogue des sourds” (dialogue of the deaf), which means that everyone is too busy pushing their own view to listen to others. Sadly, I think this is too often true in real life and in social media. It seems to mean that most posts and comments argue one person’s perspectives rather than asking questions to better understand other people’s views. Anyone who has ever done any training in facilitation techniques (or psychotherapy) knows about the important of asking questions well and active listening.

And sometimes personal opinions are irrelevant. To take a more concrete example, let’s look at graphic art. I have struggled in the past to reach agreement on design when the other person’s judgment was based 100% on aesthetics and mine on a mixture of aethetics and communicating specific messages via the graphic art (in this case, a logo). I was willing to compromise on my aesthetic preferences in order to have a graphic object that I knew would convey a set of desired messages to target audiences. The other person wasn’t involved in the relationships with those audiences, has a very well developed sense of aesthetics and therefore felt that my logo was mediocre. Yet the target audiences have reacted very positively to it. By objective measures, it has been very successful. I’ll admit that I wouldn’t want to frame it and hang it over my couch, but that wasn’t the point.

Which brings us back to a question you raised: is the nature of the criticism subjective or objective? Because that may influence its relevance.

So yes, I think everyone has the right to their opinion, but unless we want to get mired in the total inaction that comes from trying to be all things to all people, we also have to learn when to give criticism currency and when to move on.

In at least four cases, the individuals in question have not responded to the criticisms. Not as a comment, not as a blog post, not even as a tweet. (And we know that SM people are all into self-monitoring tools for personal and blog names, so it’s not like they don’t know about the criticisms.)

The lack of response has been noted by more than one person and the feeling is that s/he hopes the “problem” (or issue) will simply “go away” with time, so there’s no need to address or respond, in any channel.

What’s your take on this? Is it a wise or foolish strategy?

(I think this post is timely and fabulous, BTW. First three comments are informed and thought-provoking, too.)

If you look at the issues you raise from a generic public relations professional perspective, it goes without saying that a specific program cannot be evaluated (or even measured) if its specific objectives and indicators have not been defined and agreed upon before you take it up.

The best practices come when the organization involves potentially affected stakeholders engaging them in defining the program, its objectives and indicators before it begins.

As much as this is almost common practice today amongst the most responsible organizations as regards their sustainability programs, the extension of this practice to quote traditional unquote communication programs happens very seldom.

But of course, I know very well that your arguments refer specifically to public relations practiced in social media.

From this more specific perspective it is my opinion that not only the originator (the architect?) should listen to all criticisms (I agree with Heather on the meaning of the term), but should do everything possible to stimulate them, discuss them and learn from them.

If not, then social media (as they in fact progressively are doing) will resemble more and more the typical top down models of mainstream media and other exchange and learning forums.
It is also true that the two (social and mainstream) seem to be converging and meeting somewhere around half way.

Mind you, however, I am not advocating leaving top-down for bottom-up, btu leaving both for left-right-left, where all participants interact and exchange at the same level.

I do not think you need to be an expert to criticize, yet it is the originator of the program who ultimately decides what to absorb and what to ignore.

Here however the point is that if everything and its contrary is always public and visible to all, a program which raises initially negative comments will probably fail before its finished…but this is also true in real life, although in different ways.

I also don’t think you need do need to have walked the same ground to criticise – do you need to be a top chef, film director, artist or social media expert, to express a considered and informed critique? They say many of the world’s best coaches never reached the top of the game, and few restaurant critics are masters of the kitchen themselves.

In the case of motoring journalists, most are neither engineers nor designers (and may not even own a car or cover its running costs) – but they can explain their viewpoint in such a way that it carries weight. Or I might prefer to rely on the criticism expressed by a bloke in the pub when buying a new car.

In the case of criticisms relating to PR in social media, either of the purposes you present are up for debate. One can certain reflect on the impact that PR has in social media, or the way in which it is practised.

In mentioning conversations and engagement, listening is implicit to me. Of course, you can simply lurk and eavesdrop on what is being said – but you could misunderstand what you hear. Better in my view to join a discussion.

So to the heart of things – does it matter if other people think your campaign is a flop. Well, yes and no. Firstly, to pick up on listening, the critics may be expressing views that your audience also feels and you can learn from this.

Isn’t the online discussion part of the outcome of any campaign? It is certainly open for anyone to find and follow – so what others think can be influential. So even if you ignore the nasty words, are your stakeholders? And, sometimes the playground jibes have some truth in them (or they can just be childish).

Also, is it really acceptable to hype up activities in social media – or not to expect others to comment. It doesn’t mean that critics are jealous or trying to steal clients (unless you are paranoid, as some SM gurus seem to be).