Surviving Animal: Mr Moustache

Some professionals might think twice about appearing on radio show with a host sometimes called the "shock jock of the recruiting industry" and refers to you as "Mr. Moustache," but not me. I say go ahead and feed the Recruiting Animal. Sure, some people will claim he bites, but I think you'll respect him all the same.

At least that was my experience on his show "The Recruiting Animal Show", where for a little more than an hour we discussed whether or not there is such a thing as bad publicity. While there seemed to be some consensus that not all publicity is good publicity, not all who called in agreed.

While we agree on a great many things, Laurence Haughton disagreed on this point. Haughton, a writer, a speaker, and a management consultant, said that all publicity is good publicity because visibility is everything. I disagree, largely because publicity (especially bad publicity) is mostly a random roll of the dice and has the potential to mangle any message or established identity out in the field.

It seems to me that not all publicity has paid off in recent months. While JetBlue has captured headlines, it is fighting to reverse the negative impressions of a February storm. Steorn, which used publicity to market the claim of having free, clean and constant energy, has been slow to regain its credibility after a publicity stunt last year. The blogger Spocko, who was responsible for his own publicity as well as the negative publicity surrounding KSFO radio, has slowly dropped from his once glamorized position as a top search tag.

While these cases can be seen as extreme forays into crisis communication, I believe they have some commonalities. It seems to me that people, places, products, and companies that benefit the most from publicity are those who have exposure in their areas of expertise or in ways that closely align with their brand and identity. The further away the exposure is to their brand or identity, the greater the potential for damage or maligning their own message.

Don Imus is experiencing this now, after making statements that have been labeled racist. While some might argue these statements have given him exposure and may have briefly increased his ratings had he not been fired, several advertisers would NOT bank that all publicity is good publicity. They pulled their advertisements off the air. Staples Inc. and Procter & Gamble Co. were the first to leave, refusing to associate with the radio show host despite apologies. Would others have risen to replace them? Maybe. It's a dice roll that didn't happen because CBS wasn't interested in taking chances.

We touched on Imus briefly during the show, but with such an abundance of topics we sort of took a "salad bowl approach," as Amitai Givertz, called it before raising several brilliant points, including the benefit of transparency for companies who are mindful of their messages. He also helped me frame my feeling about the show: If there is one good thing about salad bowls, it's that someone will always find something they like in them: lettuce, carrots, radishes, dressing, and even a few Garbonzo beans ... we talked about them all.

Likewise, Dave Manaster made several excellent contributions, reinforcing the idea that there is indeed another step: you have to know what your message is before you can shape it. He's also right that crisis communication is often reactive whereas strategic communication is proactive.

"If you don't manage your message, your message will manage you." — Richard Becker

Manaster reminded us that crisis communication is not the norm and helped move us in a direction that takes communication to an individual level. Communication management is also where Animal seemed most skeptical, likening it to a Big Brother approach or creating company shills. It's a topic I'll save for next week, much like I'll work up a more definitive definition of the difference between publicity and public relations.

A thanks also to Jason Davis, who asked about the monetization of blogs that I alluded to but hardly fully answered. Of course, this makes sense given our salad bowl discussion (I think that's funny). While some questions were answered, many more questions were raised that could not be easily answered in the confines of a single show.

Good thing Animal and I were shamed into a second show together, er, some day, to address his millions of visitors. With no bite marks to speak of and not a single silver bullet spent this time around, I survived to live another day. As for Animal, as I have said before, he has a real winner of a show. The program, which is available online, is one several great segments that not only cover but also transcend the recruiting industry. Kudos all around.

Chatting With Animal: Copywrite, Ink.

On the last day of my "Writing for Public Relations" class at UNLV (a few weeks ago), I mentioned to my public relations students that I would be a future guest on an online talk radio show. Talking about the show made sense because it fit within the framework of our discussion: industry trends and the impact of social media. This show certainly qualifies.

They seemed very excited by the prospect that I would be actively engaged in what I talk and teach about (teaching is only a sliver of my time) and several of them asked for a time and date. "But wait," I said, hoping for a drum roll before revealing the details. "I haven't even told you whose online radio show... it's ... are you ready ... it's The Recruiting Animal Shooowww!"

Their enthusiastic expressions quickly turned to looks of sheer terror and inexplicable horror. Surely, their instructor had not lost all his marbles and taken to open discussions with someone who bills himself as "neither man nor wolf." Obviously, it must be a mistake. After all, experimenting with Recruiting Bloggers.com was one thing, but to openly engage the same person who, in their minds, vilified me with the moniker "Mr Moustache" ... well, that was something else all together. "Don't do it!" They warned.

Of course I will! Why not?

The topic, time, and date are set:

The Recruiting Animal Show.
Topic: Does bad publicity exist?
NOON EST (9 a.m. PST) on Wed., April 11
Call to talk: (646) 652-2754
Listen On: Windows Media
MSN Messenger: recruiting_animal@hotmail.com

On the show, I will attempt to answer the question "Does bad publicity exist?," strike a blow at the very heart of this erroneous myth that "all publicity is good publicity," mention the difference between publicity and public relations, and talk about a few publicity examples discussed on this blog, including (but not limited to) the public relations nightmares experienced by Jason Goldberg, CEO of Jobster (it is a recruiting industry show, after all).

Can I do it all or did I set myself up like the fine folks at JetBlue, with too many exceptions and not enough time to deliver?

I don't really know. I guess we'll find out this Wednesday. Whatever does happen, I'm almost sure it will be entertaining if not educational. In fact, the only thing I can be 100 percent sure of is that as much as I have grown very fond of the infamous character that is The Recruiting Animal, I'll be packing some silver. (You can never be too careful these days. Ha!)

Pushing Apologies: JetBlue Airways

On March 23, JetBlue Airways accepted delivery of its 100th Airbus A320 aircraft, complete with a one-of-a-kind 100-themed blue livery, giving the airline the world's largest fleet of A320 aircraft.

But what could have been a press conference about the growth and success of a low-cost, low-fare, value-oriented business model turns into more of the same: why talk about leg room when you can talk about being sorry?

It wasn't just at the JetBlue JFK hangar, decked out with balloons for about 200 JetBlue crew members. And it wasn't only in the March 20 follow-up YouTube video. It's anywhere and everywhere David Neeleman, founder and CEO of JetBlue Airways, happens to be or has anything to say.

It's in the Sun-Sentinel. It's in the Chicago Tribune. It's in the Baltimore Sun. JetBlue is sorry. Neeleman is sorry. All the employees are sorry.

And, when you get right down to it, this has gone on so long — apologizing for winter storms on Valentine's Day that left passengers stranded on airplanes — I'm even sorry, despite having never tried a flight on JetBlue. I'm sorry they didn't read my posts on Feb. 23 and Feb. 22 that both pointed to the same problem JetBlue would face if it did not stop saying "sorry."

It is estimated JetBlue has spent as much as $30 million in overtime, added crew costs, and free flights. Meanwhile, shares of JetBlue are down 18 percent this year. Its customer-first image, despite launching a "Passenger Bill of Rights" immediately following the debacle, remains in the toilet as exemplified by its name being crossed out on the cover of BusinessWeek in a story on companies with the best customer service. And why is this?

Well, when your most powerful and memorable message is entrenched in what some might call your worst mistake for too long, nearly two months and counting, it will become your only message. And in this case, it worked. Nevermind all the good stuff about JetBlue. The only thing that people think about now is that it had problems. And ironically, probably half of the people who know there were problems don't even remember what the cause of those problems were.

All they know, thanks to improper, overbearing, and too much negative messaging, is that JetBlue did something very, very bad and JetBlue is very, very sorry. So sorry in fact, that its endless apologies overwhelm all other messages.

For everything it did right as outlined by Richard Levick, president of Levick Strategic Communications, JetBlue is doing a lot of things wrong. Sure, it could lobby for new industry standards and get out in front of other airlines with sensitivity training designed to make employees think and feel like passengers as Levick suggests (smart stuff), but first and foremost, it needs to shift from negative messaging — over-apologizing — and get back to what makes it, as an airline, different from anyone else.

JetBlue needs to turn off the sob stories related to what Levick calls the "Valentine's Day massacre of passenger rights" and move off the tarmac and up into the clouds.

Unfortunately, it has been apologizing for so long, the transition will take that much longer. You see, from a more simplistic view of the world, it works something like this: negative messages are 8 times more powerful than positive messages. So if it takes 80 impressions to make a positive message stick, we might conclude it takes 640 impressions to erase a negative message. Neeleman and JetBlue have so masterfully elevated the awareness of one problem that the number of positive messages they need to get beyond Valentine's Day might not fit on a calculator. But, even before they can do that, they have to stop apologizing before it's too late.

You see, in addition to their own "problem-centered" messaging are scores of customers since Feb. 14 who blog about every little bad thing as evidence that no sweeping changes are being made. Usually, it doesn't matter whether one piece of luggage is lost for awhile or that a single flight has a delay (those things happen), but now these things mean everything to JetBlue.

The perception is that it had customer service problems, made promises to fix those problems, and cannot deliver on those promises, probably because those promises (in perception, not reality) were too big for anyone to deliver on in the first place. And the only reason this perception exists is because JetBlue made it so.

Look, I'm all for crisis communication as I've outlined and Levick has outlined, but there is also some common sense and practicality that is missing in this case study. It's something I learned as an intern (later, a communication consultant) at Sierra Pacific Resources.

As an intern, my first task was to write a letter of introduction to the communications department. I was so excited that I fired it off and placed it neatly on everyone's desk (no IMs in those days, hey). The next day, I was called into my mentor's office so he could point out two typos. Needless to say, I was mortified and immediately suggested I apologize with a second letter.

"Here's the thing," he said. "Ninety five percent of the department didn't see any errors because they read right past them, but they will all see them if you apologize. So the best thing you can do for the 5 percent, who think I may have made a mistake in picking you as an intern, is to causally address your mistake to them if they bring it up. More importantly, you need to make your first assignment for the company really shine."

Sound advice. No one ever mentioned those typos. And typos were not something they ever saw again, which is partly why I easily transitioned from intern to communication consultant.

Now, I am not suggesting that JetBlue did anything wrong by apologizing in the first place. That was smart. It was crisis communication on social media steroids and it worked.

What I am suggesting is that there is no possible way that JetBlue will ever overcome this crisis if they keep talking about it. As I have said before ... most people take long looks at car accidents (I'm not one of them), but a car accident can only hold their interest for so long.

However, if you force them to look at your car accident, in painstaking detail, long after they are interested in something else, then they'll become disenfranchised and tune out all your other messages. Or worse, they'll become disgusted or even angry at you and your company.

Counting Casualties: DraftFCB

Of all the casualties related to the Julie Roehm vs. Wal-Mart legal battle, the quietest past participant seems to be nursing the largest wounds. According to Noreen O'Leary's Apr. 2 story in ADWEEK, DraftFCB is still in the shadow of scandal.

Although there is no public evidence that the agency's recent account woes are linked to Wal-Mart, O'Leary writes that some claim reviews of the $1.5 million John Deere and $3.5 Applebee's account may both be linked to the scandal. (DraftFCB will not participate in these reviews). Along with these accounts, Qwest Communications, a $95 million client that generates about $15 million in revenue, confirmed it is launching a creative review. The story also implies that S.C. Johnson and Verizon Communications are less secure.

"Whenever there's negative press, there's going to be short-term damage. But I don't think there's any fundamental damage to Howard or his agency," said Michael Roth, chairman of Interpublic Group. "In this business, you're only as good as your last account win. This model of the future, of putting these two companies together and winning Wal-Mart, proves the validity of it. I'm still very bullish about this (the DraftFCB merger)."

Others disagree. One former FCB employee described the mood at the company's New York flagship as "grim," according to O'Leary. "Everyone knew from the beginning that Draft would take the lead, but still, it's as if 100 years of FCB heritage is being shredded by Howard Draft."

I think Roth might be right. If DraftFCB can land a major account that gives it the opportunity to demonstrate creative result-driven work (which has not been easy for the Draft side, some say), it may be able to reverse its course. However, this is a very tall order and will require a sympathetic high-profile major account.

Part of the challenge will no doubt be reflective of the ADWEEK poll that revealed 29 percent of the 2,400 respondents said Draft fared the worst in recent industry scandals, second only to Roehm, with 46 percent. Although recent publicity that revealed Wal-Mart's past electronic surveillance and other espionage missions against employees was extreme, only 10 percent said Wal-Mart fared worst.

Here's my unsolicited take for the three most visible parties might consider for turnarounds and wins in the months ahead:

DraftFCB — Since you already made amends by supplying e-mails to Wal-Mart, take a page from the JetBlue crisis communication plan (sans apologizing forever) and create an agency ethics guide. Take a breath and consider some Ragan Communications findings that suggest: more than 60 percent of mergers and acquisitions fail to deliver the benefits that are promised—often because of the poor quality of communication. You need a message beyond picking up 90 smaller accounts worldwide. The message you have, Draft ROI with FCB creative, doesn't seem to be working. Spark up some integrated social media pitches and that will frighten other agencies, after they stop laughing.

Julie Roehm — Stop calling yourself a "change agent," drop the suit, get out of the press, take an extended vacation, come back refreshed (perhaps a bit remorseful), and start your own "marketing 2.x" firm, whatever that is. Your first few clients will likely be smaller accounts, perhaps in the automotive industry, but sometimes smaller accounts can turn into giants if your ideas really work. (Bonus tip for Sean Womack: stay away! Stay far, far away!) Marriage counseling wouldn't be a bad idea either, even if you didn't do anything as you said. (By the way, I'm married. Don't e-mail me!)

Wal-Mart — Sure, you asked Roehm to pass on perks from vendors and it didn't work. It's not your fault. But the time has come to give up on the notion anybody will make you happy with traditional marketing. You do need something new, but new doesn't mean Roehm's "progressive" and "sexy" that would have never reached your target anyway. So the best advice for the fine folks working on your next campaign is simply this: to get back to basics and rekindle that grassroots shopping for common people concept you once had before all the public relations nightmares and bad communication consulting distracted you. Who knows? Maybe what I call "income marketing" would be right up your aisle.

"Income Marketing" is marketing that generates income instead of simply producing expenses so that even CFOs might like it. Sure, it sounds like something that goes against my shell game post, but one of my colleagues told me to call it something. Besides, that was part of Amitai Givertz's excellent comment at RecuitingBloggers.com.

Have a nice weekend and happy Easter!

Validating Critics: Jeff Hunter

While this post touches once again, ho hum, on Jason Goldberg, CEO of Jobster, it is not about Jason Goldberg. If you want another post on him today, visit Workfarce. It's not a great post, but it is an interesting continuation on communication myths that seem to creep in as well as a fine example of the the love-hate relationship some fans seem to have from the nosebleed section.

Personally, I'm more interested by a comment left by Jeff Hunter on Cheezhead, which originally sparked the revival of the Goldberg discussions. Hunter quoted President Theodore Roosevelt:

“It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions and spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly; so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat.”

Now, Roosevelt was an amazingly smart and astonishingly multifaceted man. He is one of my favorite leaders in American history and you can read more about him at Theodore Roosevelt Association. His quote, above, made a lot of sense within the context of what he was talking about.

However, and I mean no disrespect to Hunter, I don't think it applies to social media. Sure, it's the cornerstone of the argument that "only Jason Golberg knows what's happening at Jobster" so you have no right to write about him even though he wants to be written about, unless you're promoting his message, whatever that might be.

Perhaps because I've worked as a paid journalist/critic (about 10 years total experience or so) — dining reviews, show reviews, tourism reviews, company reviews, political reviews — it's easier for me to see the distinction between armchair quarterbacking, customer feedback, journalistic feedback, and what occurs within the context of social media.

Not always, but more often than not, the purveyors of blogs are more than merely critics. On the contrary, they are the very people whose faces are marred by the same dust and sweat and blood that mars the people they write about. And I, for one, do not see criticisms as criticisms as much as I see them as conversational discussions between industry leaders to guide the direction of the industry and ensure it is not shaped by someone who might very well be wrong.

This was one of reasons I began changing the format of my blog in mid-August last year. I saw people shaping the direction of communication through social media (and I am not saying they are all wrong), but they didn't know much about strategic communication. Many of them were too busy being "agents of change," willing to blow up everything in favor of, well, nothing … provided they can put their name on it.

While the thought is well intended, I don't agree with the idea that criticisms jeopardize any industry, provided that those criticisms are valid or at least lead to some other validity with open, honest communication (short of malicious intent).

Further, I don't believe it needs to be the obligation of industry leaders to lift every other industry leader up in the face of adversity for the betterment of the industry. In fact, I have been a board member of too many non-profit professional organizations where out of the well-intended notion that "we all need to support each other and every idea all the time" came erroneous actions that resulted in the death or near-death of an organization or program.

Ergo, criticisms are only invalid when the discussion of an idea gives way to popularity contests between people and not their ideas or undue polarization of an issue where people try to convince everyone that it is either all or nothing, black or white.

Recently, Jim Durbin rightfully took me to task when he wrote that I stretched too much in my attempt to take "a major issue issue (the January layoffs and Goldberg's December posts), and conflating them with other issues that are not related and of the same magnitude." While the stretch was intentional, though not obvious enough as I conceded, kudos for Durbin.

That is the way it should be. In fact, had it not been for his post, I may have never dug a little deeper and visited Blogpulse. If you trend "Jason Goldberg," you'll see my stretch wasn't all that far off. The largest spikes tend to be the result of negative news and commentary, including one some might call an insignificant disagreement between two bloggers.

In the realm of social media, it seems that exchange has as much impact as any. Perhaps even more telling is this: on the same day the "Knowing When To Post" went up, Richard S. Levick, president and CEO of Levick Strategic Communications, posted a comment on my February "Discussing JetBlue" post, which I responded to. Those two comments on JetBlue beat out Jobster 5-to-1. (Heads up: I'll revisit JetBlue on Monday.)

What does this mean? Well, that has never happened before. So could it be that interest in Jobster has waned? Maybe. At minimum, when bad rumor spikes begin to outweigh good news spikes, it's time to rethink your strategy. Sure, people gawk at car accidents, but car accidents will only hold their interest for so long.

Anyway, thank goodness for people like Durbin who take the time to ask questions and offer comments. If people like him stopped doing it, then entire companies, organizations, industries, and countries could be led in the wrong direction. But then again, what do I know?

I only know that not so long ago, a public relations professional engaged me in an e-mail exchange that insisted my critique on his non-recruiting client's release was unfair and unprofessional. Then, he basically asked me to shut up. Who am I to argue? If he wants to insist that silence is golden, then so be it. I won't write about his client again, which is a shame, because I had some good things to say.

So I wonder what would have been worse: writing up his second public relations debacle or not writing anything at all...

Critics. We don't always like them, but maybe we need them.

Covering Hot Topics: First Quarter 2007

Last year, we published a recap of our five most popular communication-related posts, based on the frequency and the immediacy of hits after they were posted. Today, we've decided to keep it simple, covering the top five of the first quarter.

Antonella Barba Buzzes Up American Idol

When photos of the presumably modest Catholic University student and American Idol contestant posing in front of the U.S. war memorial in Washington, D.C. surfaced on the Internet, everyone from the cruel and crude to the curious and complimentary surfed the Web to see what was there or perhaps not. For our purposes, Barba proved to be an excellent case study in publicity gone wrong. Although we were among the first to call the pornographic photos phony, Barba's insistence that she could sing despite some obvious inability, landed her a series of offers that suggests she has different talents. Recently, Star Magazine listed her as more foolish in Hollywood than no-talent American Idol Sanjaya Malakar. We know why. Do you?

Link: Barba

Julie Roehm Sues Wal-Mart For Her Behavior

Maybe it's because some people still think Julie Roehm sports some nude photos too or because "anything Wal-Mart" always seems to command attention. Either way, the suit and countersuit, that reveals scores of ethically challenged e-mails, raises dozens of questions related to business behavior in a new world with social media. Workplace privacy, business ethics, and the pitfalls of second-tier executives becoming public figures are all part of the equation. Perhaps we're oversimplifying, but our interest in this case study is about whether it pays to draw continuous attention to your own shortcomings. Roehm would have been better off leaving things alone than attacking a former employer who is tired of hearing her name.

Link: Julie Roehm

Jason Goldberg Can't Shake Bad Habits

Jason Goldberg, CEO of Jobster, presents the ultimate paradox in social media. In 2006, he used social media to float the rumor of layoffs at his company and everyone from the New York Times to (most recently) Wired Magazine, as reported by Cheezehead, has chastised him for it. Yet, as crazy as it sounds, social media saves him as often as it slays him. So in what has almost become one sequel too many for the story that would not die (much like the Halloween franchise), Goldberg seems to have taken some lessons to heart despite being unable to break bad habits. He has a nasty tendency to hint before taking action as evidenced by the layoffs, his brief 'engagement' of me, and recently, about the fate of much-loved Jason Davis at Recruiting.com, who is allowing his contract to end after Goldberg hinted that changes were in the works (Davis was not fired nor forced to resign). We're adding a post to this living case study tomorrow, hopefully to shed some light on the continuing confusion.

Link: Jobster

Royal Spring Water Dances With Creative Ethics

Although new, Royal Spring Water seems to be gaining traction as another case study to watch. Just a few days ago, we called the company on peddling fear with its anonymous publisher-produced direct mail piece that sold stocks and the end of the world. Hailing water as the new oil, Royal Spring Water seems to be coming under fire for questionable marketing practices, stock valuation, and its product, billed as "structured water." While most of the muck seems buried by a mountain of news releases about anything and everything to demonstrate momentum, we cannot help but to wonder what the future holds for a company headed by former filmmakers.

Link: Royal Spring Water

Blogging ROI Is Real With The Right Measures

We are always a bit discouraged knowing that bad news tends to trump good news in attracting attention (for traditional and social media alike), but one idea surfaced above the clutter this quarter. Although it is only a sliver of a bigger theory we're working on in between servicing our clients, the 5-in-1 tool concept for blogging accomplished its objective: we were hoping executives and communication-related professionals would think of social media as a very versatile tool rather than force cookie-cutter frameworks upon companies. Simply put, appreciating that social media is a tactic and not a strategy, we recommend looking at existing communication challenges and/or opportunities before attempting to apply social media. By doing so, it's easier to establish measurable objectives that can deliver a tangible ROI.

Links: Blogging ROI, Social Media

Those were the top five most read posts for the first quarter 2007. Runners up (no order) included: Julio "Assad" Pino, JetBlue, Social Media Influence, AP Style on Web site, Using The Force.

A special thanks to all those who dropped by, added comments, and continued to help us shape a blog that is hopefully more useful than entertaining, but sometimes entertaining all the same. Thank you very much. Until tomorrow.

Discussing JetBlue: Levick

Richard S. Levick is the president and CEO of Levick Strategic Communications, which was named Crisis Agency of the Year in 2005 by The Holmes Report. The report provides in-depth news analysis and features on trends and issues in the public relations business.

Levick's firm, which has offices in New York, Washington D.C. and London, directs high-profile communications, including: the Catholic Church scandals, the spinach e-coli crisis, large legal and regulatory actions globally, and a number of the most significant matters arising out of the Middle East and Latin America.

Levick has been making the rounds in the media, discussing JetBlue and giving it high marks in handling its crisis. Recently, in an interview with ConsumerAffairs.com he said "JetBlue has run to the crisis, taking responsibility not just for itself but for the entire industry."

Specifically, Levick outlined what he calls five key tenets of sound crisis management:

• Run to it. Avoid "duck and cover."
• All companies will have a crisis. Be prepared.
• Know your crisis team. Now.
• Make a sacrifice. Companies often want to win it all.
• Avoid saying "no comment." A crisis abhors a vacuum.

"The critical role is to run to the crisis," he told ConsumerAffairs. "People don't want to sue people they like and trust. What happens so often is that CEOs lawyer-up and say nothing."

On any given day of the week, I would agree with Levick. It's sound advice, pure and simple, except something with JetBlue has not sat well with me. In between discussing the finer points of introducing an abbreviated name in a new release to sharing some real life crisis communication situations I've worked on to about a dozen student public relations professionals last night, I think I decided what it might be. There are some fine details missed by JetBlue, and American Airlines might have noticed.

Anyone can write up some crisis communication points, but the devil in the details is how those points are interpreted and applied to a unique crisis communication situation. For example, if you overlay Moving Beyond Bad News, which we presented a few days ago, you might come up with the notion that JetBlue did everything right too. Or not.

Here are a few key points from that list that seem to be making a difference:

Have you satisfied the public interest? If you want to move beyond bad news, you have to commit to regularly reporting additional information until no public interest remains. In JetBlue's case, it may be oversatisfying public interest. It could very well be that it has apologized so much that the effectiveness of the apology is wearing thin.

Have you included positive steps being taken to address the situation? Naturally, this is being addressed by JetBlue's Customer Bill of Rights. Unfortunately, one might wonder if it forever branded the Customer Bill of Rights to the original crisis. Perhaps it would have been better to wait a few weeks, after resolving the remedy specific to the incident.

Did you offer restitution? As much as JetBlue has been apologizing, it seems to me it has buried the fact that it did indeed offer restitution. So much so, some people don't know that the airline's future plan includes giving passengers aboard departing planes delayed for three to four hours a $100 voucher if the voucher would be equal to the amount of their round-trip ticket. Given the amount of money spent on paid advertising apologies by the company, one might also wonder if that money would have been better spent with the passengers aboard the planes.

Perhaps it's these small weaknesses in the plan that reinforced American Airlines decision to beef up service at Kennedy and LaGuardia airports, a move that will put additional pressure on Delta Air Lines and JetBlue. American Airlines has said that its plans are unrelated to JetBlue, and the Newsday article includes that JetBlue folks believe the plan will not have any impact.

For public relations practitioners, I hope this also provides some conversation in understanding that formulas, bulleted action plans, are great for guidance, but are never absolute. Every crisis communication situation is different, and requires a modified course of action.

Worse, if everyone over apologized all the time about things that were at least partly out of their control, sooner or later, the public won't believe any of them, no matter how sincere or appropriate the message and its meaning. That said, please don't allow me to convince anyone that JetBlue is doing something wrong. Contrary to that, they are doing more right than most.

Jumping The Shark: JetBlue

JetBlue Airways has always been about innovating a new airline, one that offers value, service and style. It does things differently, from leather seats with 36 inches of leg room and free DIRECTV to name brand snacks and sommelier chosen wines. So maybe it's no surprise that the airline is deploying a slightly different brand of crisis communication, which includes appealing its apology to the court of social media and anyone who will listen.

At a glance, the crisis communication strategy that began after an ice storm caused the airline to cancel more than 250 of 505 daily flights and significantly delayed 10 flights on the tarmac with customers waiting on board for hours, seems pretty spot on. The airline was relatively quick (some say too slow) to acknowledge, apologize, explain, learn from, satisfy public interest, and offer restitution, and has taken all of this to the media, social media, company blog (flight log), and even YouTube.

A few people might notice I left empathy off the list, but not because COO David Neeleman missed the mark. On the contrary, Neeleman is one of the most credible corporate spokespeople I've seen appear during a crisis in some time. He obviously knows that sometimes the messenger is the message. In a net assessment of comments all over the place, it seems people want to believe him because it's nearly impossible to see anything but sincerity in the man. Personally, I believe him.

I'm not alone. Despite cutting earnings guidance for the quarter, traders on Wednesday sent JetBlue shares up about 2.2 percent to close at $12.19 on the Nasdaq Stock Market. Several analysts has even said JetBlue's numerous apologies may help stave off long-term pain for investors.

"We believe that JetBlue's PR efforts since the last weekend have been rather successful at expressing humility and embarrassment about the problems," wrote Morgan Stanley analyst William J. Greene in a note to clients, according to The Associated Press. "This mea culpa has likely gone a long way to mitigate customer frustrations."

Although some less trusting public relations practitioners are considering the "spin" factor, I remain unconvinced that JetBlue is simply spinning. However, I can agree that it may be jumping the shark. I'm not saying it is; I'm only recognizing the potential.

Can you apologize too much? Can you produce too many course corrections in the aftermath of a crisis? Can you make a crisis bigger than it needs to be, even with the best intentions? Can you reach out to too many people in an attempt to offset negative impressions, involving those who probably didn't need to be involved (how many YouTube enthusiasts fly JetBlue or how many JetBlue customers visit YouTube)?

I'm not saying what it has done is wrong or right as only time will tell, but maybe, just maybe, it has accepted too much responsibility, coming up just short of apologizing for an ice storm, which no one believes it caused. Sure, mistakes were made and it's admirable JetBlue identified several. The Customer Bill of Rights is a good idea, but I wonder if the timing was right. Some people think so, according to the Contra Costa Times.

"JetBlue is taking a mistake and using it not only to address their own mistakes, but to set new standards for the entire industry," Richard Levick, chief executive of Levick Strategic Communications Inc. in New York, said in an interview Tuesday. "David Neeleman is running to the crisis. He is everywhere, saying, 'I'm responsible and I'll fix it.'"

Without question, it is always an interesting case study when someone launches a public relations and advertising campaign out of a crisis communication plan, especially when the concept could perhaps head off congress imposing a federal Customer Bill of Rights (I hope the industry doesn't see increased government regulation and demonstrates it can be adept at governing itself).

So at the end of the day, we fall somewhere in the middle. There is little question that JetBlue has demonstrated savvy in crisis communication, but one wonders if the success of the initial effort will eventually lead it to jump the shark.

But even if it does, you have to recognize JetBlue will likely receive continued support from some of the most loyal customers in the industry. While I have never flown JetBlue, I know plenty of people who do. They always rave about their flights and look surprised when I mention I have yet to board that airline, as if one has not flown until they've flown JetBlue.

Managing The Message

“I still feel like a passenger on that JetBlue flight that's watching helpless on my seatback satellite TV as the plane I'm on makes a crash landing,” said one Jobster employee about the recent interest in Jobster, fueled largely by one of the most horrifically handled communication accidents in recent memory. Unfortunately, unlike JetBlue, not all passengers will be landing safely.

According to Jobster, the reorganization to better align its business to focus on the most efficient sales and support channels, as well as its Website, will result in the loss of 60 positions, primarily those supporting in-person sales and support efforts. From a communication perspective, Jason Goldberg and Jobster — which maintains their first priority was to inform affected employees who were left waiting for days to learn their fate in between ill-advised blog posts — lost much more than that.

Although it reads as one of the better posts ever presented under Goldberg's byline, one that causes me to sincerely hope Jobster's smaller and more focused vision for 2007 will return the company to the start-up success story it was in 2004, I wonder if it will be enough to erase the reputation damage it endured externally and employee morale flogging it weathered internally.

You see, reputation management, which includes crisis communication as noted in my last Jobster-related post, can be equal to if not superior to a successful product. When you lose control of it, which is relatively easy to do, it's difficult for anyone to believe your next message.

If we subscribe to the ideal that it takes 80 impressions to make a message stick (and that negative impressions are eight times more impactful than positive messages), Jobster's rebranding as a company and employer that can be trusted will be a difficult, though not insurmountable, task in the year and years ahead.

The reasons are simple enough. As much as we (especially those of us in the advertising and communication field) would like to believe that we control the definition of our company or clients' companies, we really don't most of the time.

Instead, companies are defined by everything executives and employees communicate about themselves daily (whether written, spoken, or by action); everything executives and employees say about the internal working environment; everything others (from members of the media and bloggers to customers and competitors) say about the company, whether real or perceived; and everything other companies (primarily competitors) say about themselves, which causes people to wonder if the company measures up.

At the end of the day, you add up all these messages and therein lies the "real" (not self-perceived) definition of a company. While there are strategies in managing all these messages, most companies or even advertising agencies do not know where to begin. I'll work harder at sharing some insight here and there for those who care to know; most answers take longer than the single confines of a post to appreciate (and that's not to say I have all the answers), starting with eight questions to ask yourself if you are managing your reputation, which I'll share tomorrow.

To all the other social media experts and bloggers who have contributed to (and will continue to contribute to) this living case study, my gratitude. To all the folks remaining at Jobster who read my posts, I sincerely hope you did not find my criticisms and comments too harsh, but an attempt to provide objective commentary. To Jason Golberg, I hope you keep up honest blogging, perhaps though, with a bit a more sensitivity to the message you want people to read. And to all those who are being asked to leave Jobster, this too shall pass. Good night and good luck.