Friday Thoughts...

I've been kicking around the idea of writing a weekly-ish article on, well, something. There's so much to discuss in the world of tech, reputation, and communications strategy. I'm currently landing on a "Winners/Losers of the Week" idea, with one sentence lessons from each.

A couple of asks -- 1) please weigh in and tell me if this is useful, overkill, fun, stupid, interesting, ponderous, or evokes any other response or emotion. Can't promise that I will take it into account, but I'd like to hear from you. And 2) if you see something and say "wow, what a great job" or "what were they thinking??", drop me a line. I don't catch everything, and I have my own biases.

Since this is the inaugural effort, I'm going back a couple of weeks to highlight what jumped out to me. Here goes...

Winner: The Biden Administration. Not the war, but the newscycle battle over the House Republicans' impeachment inquiry. Regardless of your political bent, any strategic comms person had to recognize the brilliance of last Friday's letter from WH Counsel to Speaker Johnson demanding that they drop the inquiry. Of course, that letter has no legal standing, or even demands a need to respond. But, it generated a response nonetheless, one that required the impeachment effort leaders to have to explain their case to the American public from a position of weakness. Strategic comms leaders for companies can learn a lot from politics. Lesson: Contrary to the advice to not shine a spotlight on the controversy you are in, a bit of communications jujitsu can work to your advantage by forcing a competitor to explain and defend an unpopular position. We had a lot of fun at Realtor.com doing this to a competitor that was playing fast and loose with the truth - ask me about it some time. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/end-biden-impeachment-bid-white-house-urges-johnson-letter-2024-03-15/

Loser: The Windsors, and UK Royalists everywhere. Gonna keep this short because too much ink has been spilled on this already. But holy hell has this been mismanaged from the start. Classic case of an entrenched bureaucracy not being able to keep up with the changing media environment. After weeks of controversy, the best they can do is release a some grainy footage from a farmer's market that begs more questions than it answers? If Kate was well enough to walk around and carry a shopping bag, surely she was well enough to sit down and record a 3 minute "Thanks for your concern, I'm fine" video -- informal, maybe with her adorable kids running in and out of the frame asking for a Gogurt or something. Just a total clusterf*&k. Lesson: First rule in crisis comms -- do no harm - you're digging out, not down, and trust presumably is at a historic low, so ask yourself how any action will be seen by the most cynical person in your audience.

Winner: Disney, in its proxy fight versus Nelson Peltz and Trian Partners. Again, this is a battle-not-war situation. In nearly all proxy fights, the Board loses something -- just a matter of degrees. But Disney's communications strategy around this attack has been impressive. Leveraging big, well-known shareholder names like George Lucas and activating it's massive and passionate retail shareholder base are smart moves. Framing this as a "magic vs. bean counters" battle is inspired messaging. And their use of multiple channels -- landing site, LinkedIn, earned media blitz and paid video ads, is the right strategy. Lesson: Proxy battles are not fun and often costly, but meeting shareholders where they are with an omnichannel effort that delivers messaging that resonates emotionally maximizes the chance of maintaining control over the future of the company. https://www.axios.com/2024/03/21/disney-proxy-fight-nelson-peltz-defense-strategy

Loser: Shohei Ohtani and the Los Angeles Dodgers. This bums me out, because I love Shohei and think he's the best thing to happen to my beloved sport in a generation. But this gambling scandal with his interpreter is going to break wide and get worse before it gets better, fueled by the complete mismanagement of Ippei's and then Shohei's responses. Craig Calcaterra of Cup of Coffee has the best take here: https://cupofcoffee.beehiiv.com/p/cup-coffee-extra-breaking-shohei-ohtaniippei-mizuhara-story. Whoever let Ippei and his people speak first made a grave error, and now everyone looks shady. Lesson: In a crisis, speed matters, but message and accuracy matters more -- if you ever find yourself in a position where you have to walk back something in the first 24 hours, you are in big trouble.

I have more in the can for next week; please give me feedback and your suggestion for things to highlight. Argue with me. Agree with me. Tell me to stuff a sock in it. Weigh in via comments. Repost if you'd like with your own thoughts. I'm also taking suggestions on a name just in case this becomes a regular newsletter.

I advise companies on strategic communications needs, and I am also available for fractional CCO work. If you want to talk, please reach out!