Online pr - blog outreach - online reputation management

[Tom Chapman]

About an hour or so ago on Twitter (Sat 13th, 6pm) there were a few tweets surrounding Chris Brogan's blog post about Kmart as he received a bit of criticism over a blog post of his.

Although many regarded his post as open and honest (he did state he was paid to do the post) it did however raise a few questions about a key professional blogger's reputation and the fact that a $500 voucher was used in exchange for a blog post. The main issue was trust which is ultimately linked to loyalty as some readers were disappointed that Chris 'sold out' whereas others understood his motivations.

You can read the post here and also follow the track backs of posts that question Brogan's reputation:
http://dadomatic.com/sponsored-post-kmart-holiday-shopping-dad-style/

As a forum dedicated to online pr, I'm sure we have/will all look at the possibilities of approaching bloggers with influence on behalf of client brands to help create 'buzz' around a brand. However it would be great to discuss best practice of blogger outreach to avoid pitfalls with regard to paid for posts.

My take is that both the client brand and the key blogger's own reputation needs to be managed effectively. Should it be an agency/consultant's responsibility to plan and take into account the reputation management of both the client brand and key blogger you approach to blog about the product/service?
I did some research amongst social network users a few months back about whether or not they would want to receive a message from their friends about a brand/product they were paid to promote and it was definitely negatively perceived. They do not want to be sold to by their friends which is again related to trust. Some may regard a key blogger like Chris Brogan a friend so their trust and loyalty may have been put in the balance.
If I knew that my friends had bought the product/service themselves or even received a 'freebie to review' then I could be more receptive to their need to let me know.

What do you think?

[Jamie Burke]

Good call Tom. This is an interesting one.

When I first saw it I was surprised. As a p2p professional it felt a bit clumsy, ill thought out and not what I would expect Chris to be involved with.

By that I mean I struggled to see who actually benefits from this type of activity.

Does the blogger? Financially not really it's 500 bucks of which 100% has to be spent in one place. Hardly a retirement fund. In the eyes of some of his following his reputation was somewhat eroded and in more extreme cases some people actually got really pissed off. The fact that he is totally open about it didn't make it an easier pill to swallow but rather they found it arrogant and possibly even more offensive.

Did the community? Well my gut response was no. But then I had been lead into this following negative coverage through Twitter. And this is where it gets complicated. You see Chris has a large and varied following. On this particular blog it's about dads and fatherhood. Even though posts generally aren't about product reviews, which would normally rule out this kind of type of activity, if you read the responses of the regular readership they are almost totally positive. It's only when Chris's other following, the social media nuts / pros (like you and I), get involved that things turned nasty. And that’s the problem; we are talking about multiple communities: Dadomatic / Twitter and the rest of the blogo-sphere.

Sure they got coverage! They did even engage with this particular blog community even if the outcome turned into a shopping list. The undoing of the initiative was asking people to broadcast in Twitter. This is a totally different community that most likely doesn't care about this competition or the brand /products. They just got interrupted and spammed by their own friends. To folk like us, and that’s predominantly Twitter this is a cardinal sin and not what we expect one of our own to do. I think the misjudgment came in treating all these communities in the same way.

Would love to hear others thoughts on this.

[Jamie Burke]

I just did a more evolved response on my blog where I have included some others responses including a timeline to the events by Scott Henderson.

http://socialglue.wordpress.com/2008/12/15/blogger-for-sale/

[Pär Berglund]

I quite agree with you Jamie. The problem was created when Twitter was involved and his different roles were mixed in a way. People like to keep our different roles apart in what we do. We still trust a friend's recommendations in a normal conversation, even though the friend last week had a Tupperware party in our home. Because that is what they do.
On the other side of the scale, I was surprised when I watched spanish television a year ago. The host of a popular program, in the middle of the show, walked over to another sofa, sat down, and started talking about great telephone services, while a text rolled over the upper part of the screen, saying that it was a paid ad. Moments later it was over, and the show continued. Well, I didn't feel to comfortable with that as his roles were quite mixed up.
To answer Toms question: yes I do think a consultant need to consider these aspects.


Jamie Burke said:

I just did a more evolved response on my blog where I have included some others responses including a timeline to the events by Scott Henderson.

http://socialglue.wordpress.com/2008/12/15/blogger-for-sale/