Turns out I was wrong. The platypus may not be the ninja of the animal world after all. I feel like I’m a little behind the times only posting this now – I saw it on the Today Show this morning. A kangaroo broke into a house in Canberra and the owner had to take it down wrasslin’ style in just his undies.
“My initial thought when I was half awake was [that] it’s a lunatic ninja coming through the window,” Mr Ettlin told The Associated Press.
In the comments of a previous post Mark asked: “when it comes to presenting a message, how clear are the boundaries between persuasion, influence and manipulation?” As I’m a renowned “PR Spin Twit” (according to the local paper’s nasty “Magpie” column) I feel I’m qualified to tackle that question.
The organisation I work for is a “marketing” and “economic development” body – by our very nature we engage in all three of the above. We promote North Queensland as a tourism, relocation and investment destination – that involves an element of persuasion. All marketing should – otherwise what’s the point. Obviously you have to have faith in your product or you’re getting into a pretty murky area.
Public Relations as an industry has often been dismissed with the pejorative “spin” label. Which is largely unfair. Public Relations should be about taking a product you believe in and presenting it to the public in a way that can be digested. In other words – relating it to the public.
The Queensland Government has been mocked relentlessly for employing more journalism graduates than anybody else in the state – and for having such a massive public relations machine at its disposal. I would argue that the Government has been elected to govern, and make decisions, and we’ve elected them because we believe they’re the best available people for the job – so we should want their point of view on things. Then it’s the media’s job to keep them accountable.
Election ads featuring Lawrence Springborg bumbling through a press conference show the importance of managing your media well – badly handled questions by journalists come back to bite.
If the government of the day can’t persuade us of the benefit of their new policy (eg workchoices) then we can vote them out. I’m down with the importance of persuasion when presenting a message.
Objectivity is important (for the media) – but objectivity doesn’t necessarily mean not subjective to persuasive – it means coming to the facts without prior bias.
From a “spin” perspective you hope that the media accept your angle on things as the best, most objective understanding of them. That usually comes because you or your organisation has a reputation of credibility.
When I studied a subject on persuasive writing at uni I wrote about why pineapple shouldn’t be put on pizza, and why intelligent design shouldn’t be taught in science classes (but in philosophy or religion classes). I remember the basic elements of persuasion we were taught were pathos (use of emotion), stats, and I think having a clearly defined idea of your arguments and the benefits of subscribing to your view. There were probably more. I’ll check at home. But that says more about the mechanics of persuasion than the nature of persuasion – which is simply to move people to your point of view.
If you’re not a decision maker – but you want a decision to be made – you become a lobbyist (or using our politically correct terminology “an advocate”). Here’s where influence comes into play. Again, influence comes (or should come from) from a position of believing what you do is the right thing. As we saw in our recent climate change debate there are many views on one issue, and at the risk of sounding like a relativist, all of them have elements of rightness to them. It is right to care for the environment. It’s also right to care for people. I just tend to think one is more right than the other (and that one does not equal the other) – so I’ll try to influence people that way. By what I say, what I select to use to back up my arguments and how I respond to people with contrary views.
I don’t see a lot of difference between influence and persuasion – except perhaps in the dynamic of power. I’d say that persuasion comes from those in power, and is an exercise of power in order to bring people round to a view. By contrast influence is what you try to do to change the mind of someone in power (or with the ability to act on your wishes). That’s a little simplistic because both words can be used in many contexts. However, in the context of “messaging” that would be the best point of difference between the two.
Manipulation would, if being used in the context of presenting a message, seem to be an abuse of power.
I think though there’s an element of manipulation in any spin. There are plenty of things that our organisation pursues that people disagree with (new refineries anyone?). Some of the “persuasion” we undertake through the local media probably borders on manipulation – we try to make it seem wrongheaded to protest about these things that are putting food on the table for local families. Manipulation tends to misuse pathos, employing overly emotive language, rather than the facts generally employed by “persuasion”. But facts are pretty easily manipulated too.
Anyway, that’s a long answer to a short question. If there’s anything you thought I’ve missed, or you’d like to add, go for it in the comments.
Can you spot the problem with the following sentence from this story?
“Rumoured to of signed a four-year $450,000-a-year deal with the Sea Eagles back in 2005, Orford would likely have to take a pay cut to remain on the northern beaches with the club battling to reward last year’s premiers and remain under the salary cap.”
If yes, please apply for a job sub-editing Fox Sports Online. The story was from AAP so if you want to be a journalist go get a job there.
“Journalist arrested for links to hitman from Sydney’s seedy underbelly” – it’s almost the perfect opportunity for ACA to run a cross promotional Underbelly story. Only he’s one of their own. Ben Fordham. I can’t believe I missed this last week. Now the hitman (a nephew of Sydney’s mayor) has been arrested. No doubt he’ll come up with a plea bargain that sees the journo and his producer chucked in the slammer as an example.
Ben Fordham’s career as a corporate speaker will no doubt take off. He also has the added benefit of a PR manager – his famous father.
I remember watching the original story – where Fordham bravely foiled a “hit” and thinking they were crossing into some murky grey area of journalistic entrapment. Turns out it was murky enough for criminal charges.
I’m not sure how I feel about this. Personally, from a journalistic perspective, I loathe the sensationalism ACA and Today Tonight pursue. But I also think journalists should be able to become as involved in the story as they do. ACA ran an interesting piece last night where their journo, Martin King complete with prosthetic nose, lived as a homeless person for a period of time and explored the way Melbourne’s homeless are treated. It’s worth a watch.
Ben Fordham is getting a reputation as a bit of a toe rag. The police also cautioned him after an interaction with Belinda Neal last year. He was also the guy who brought us the controversial story about the “last tribe of cannibals” and their prospective dinner, Wawa. Who Nine didn’t rescue – and Fordham allegedly blew the whistle on Seven as Today Tonight made an illegal attempt.
So, what do you think? Should the courts thank Channel 9 for aborting this hit via their story, or should they throw the book at the guy?
Channel 9 (and regional counterparts WIN) seems determined to force as much Underbelly down our throats as they can through a diet of cross-promotion and re-runs.
Last week they ran a two minute news story in the Queensland statewide news about the fact that the happenings documented in Underbelly were real. They happened 30 years ago. I thought news was meant to be timely.
Seven’s relentless cross promotion of their programming during the Australian Open was bad enough.
But this constant diet of Underbelly takes the cake. It was even featured on Getaway tonight. With a Sydney restaurant that’s a regular feature in the new series.
It’ll be on Here’s Humphrey next in the one where Humphrey gets whacked by a gangster, or the cast will bring a famous Mafia pasta dish to the set of Fresh.
What took the cake for me was last night’s A Current Affair. I try not to watch it often. But last night it looked like they were going to have something serious to say about the Pakistani terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan cricketers.
But no – it was about the “seedy underbelly” of Pakistani cricket – lumping terrorism, match fixing and corruption into a package that used the word Underbelly about eight times – and then even showed a clip from the show.
This Sunday morning Underbelly is the advertised feature of the Today Show.
Underbelly is this year’s Gordon Ramsay – and we all know what happened to him. He appears to have been ignominiously pulled from Channel 9’s Thursday schedule, and his family man image is damaged beyond repair. That’s what happens when Nine flog you to death.
No doubt the Footy Show will also have an Underbelly themed segment next Thursday night. And then it will all start over again when there are DVDs to sell.
The “Where the bloody hell are you?” campaign went down like a lead balloon. So tourism boffins in Spain will be a little worried after this little slip up. From the Spanish Prime Minister. When announcing a new campaign.
“”There is a big increase in the number of Spanish tourists heading to Russia, the number is at 500,000, we have therefore decided to sign an agreement to stimulate, to favour, to f—,” he said, pausing briefly before ending the sentence with “to support this tourism”.”
Apparently the Spanish words for “to support” sounds very similar to the alternative he used.
I inadvertently deleted my link post from yesterday’s google reading – I reposted it, but it didn’t pull in everything I’d highlighted. Of particular interest was the account from a non-practicing Jew of his year of reading through the Bible (only the OT). He blogged the experience. And he’s written a book.
And engaged in an interesting discussion with some people here. It’s worth reading. Especially when he answers the following question/statement from an angry atheist:
“Washington, D.C.: Wow, I find your assertion that everyone should read the Bible as smacking of so much relativism, I can’t believe it. I have read the beginning of the Bible and I found it so silly and laughable that I stopped. I’d really rather the chatters and your readers get caught up on history, science, literature, etc. instead of a book of fables. Would you also push for the teaching of satanic texts? I’m so tired of people acting so high and mighty about their religious preferences. Write an article on the truly important texts that people have never read (Plato, Aristotle, Copernicus, da Vinci, etc.) and I’ll take you seriously.
David Plotz: This seems to me a peculiar criticism. You live in a society that is shaped in every possible way by the Bible. The language you use, the laws you obey (and disobey), the founding principles of your nation, the disputes about abortion, homosexuality, adultery—these and so much else in your world are rooted in the Bible. You don’t have to read it for its truth value. You should read it to understand how your world got the way it is, the way you would read the constitution or Shakespeare.”
Did you know that HMV, the music shop, is so named for the famous picture of a dog and gramophone featured on the record above. It’s called “His Master’s Voice”.
This could easily be a post about guidance and the “voice of God”. Based on the title, anyway. But it’s not. It’s about my job.
My CEO is leaving soon. She’s been here for five years. I’ve been here for three. In that time I’ve learned her “voice” to the point that I can write quotes for her without them being chopped and changed. I used to get a fair bit of red pen scribble on my draft releases. Now I get none. Or not much. If I do it’s because I’ve been too heavy handed in my haranguing of politicians.
We’ll no doubt have a new CEO soon. This presents a problem. A new CEO means having to master a new voice. And more red pen. I hate red pen. I feel a bit like the dog in that painting – who was apparently listening to his dead master’s voice on the gramophone.
The reason I write this now – is that I’ve just written a media release with some quotes from a former manager at Townsville Enterprise – whose voice I used to write also. And she said “that’s just the way I would have said it”. Which is nice. It seems once you’ve learned a voice it’s like learning to ride a bike.
Incidentally – I use blogging as much to develop my written voice as I do to procrastinate. It’s useful. Particularly for one so accustomed to the weasel words of corporate media speak.
Do you have a “voice”, written or otherwise?
I’m not sure how to define “voice” – it’s about style, choice of words, length of sentences, nuance, emphasis, syntax, and phraseology. Some of those things are the same. Others are different. There are certain words, particularly adjectives, that often pop up when I’m writing for particular people.
One of the elements of longevity for media coverage of the aftermath of a disaster is a good name. The twin towers attacks will always be synonymous with September 11. Or 9/11. The Boxing Day Tsunami had the fortune of hitting on a public holiday.
As I listened to the news on the Today Show before heading to work this morning I heard the Victorian Bushfires called the “Black Saturday Fires”.
Is that the best the media could do? Surely it wouldn’t have taken a marketing genius to call them the “Black Sabbath Fires”.
Who gets to choose these names anyway?
They should sell naming rights to the highest bidder. Insurance companies would love that.
That is all.
I hate stupid legal proceedings. And this one takes the cake. The court in the UK should be absolutely ashamed of this.
Here’s the summary of the story:
The couple’s nightmare started in October 2003 when Mrs Webster took their second son to hospital with a swollen leg.
He was found to have a number of small fractures which doctors said could be caused only by physical abuse.
The following year they were permanently removed and put up for adoption after a one-day court hearing.
Medical experts later concluded that the injuries were not caused by violent twisting and shaking, but were symptoms of rare case of scurvy.
Mr Webster, 35, and his 27-year-old wife fled to Ireland in 2006 to stop their fourth child, Brandon, being taken into care at birth.
The Appeal Court ruled on Wednesday that even though the Websters ‘may well’ have been victims of a miscarriage of justice the adoption order on their eldest three children could not be revoked because the youngsters are now settled with their adoptive parents.
Apparently the principle of “innocent until proven guilty” and a parent’s fundamental right to raise their children are both things of the past in the UK.
A Swedish woman had a nice surprise when checking her bank balance yesterday – she found an extra billion dollars thanks to a “bank error in her favour”… unfortunately it doesn’t seem like she gets even $200. It seems Monopoly is not like real life after all.
There’s a PR lesson here though. For some reason the general public expect big corporations to pay up when they make mistakes like this. It’s like the Townsville couple who thought they’d won big at the Casino due to a Pokie malfunction. It’s as though the “customer service” obligation we enjoy at supermarkets when things are priced or processed wrongly has become our normal expectation.
The bank should – if they want some free positive international coverage from the event – give the woman a nice little bonus. She’s be an ambassador for life then – all the TV and radio interviews she’s no doubt doing around the world right now would be much different if the bank had given her even$1000.
Unfortunately if you want to comment on this post you’ll have to avoid using the word bank. Because I’ve had 90 spam messages containing “bank” in the last two days it’s currently on the blacklist.
It seems I was right. Apparently The Wire, Underbelly and The Sopranos – and any other media “text” that demonise Strip Clubs are on the money.
The Courier Mail reports that Queensland’s adult entertainment businesses are regular law breakers and dens of iniquity.
Treasurer Andrew Fraser made a comment that I’m sure the Courier Mail story delighted in presenting in an almost out of context fashion…
“Treasurer Andrew Fraser yesterday defended his department’s enforcement, saying many “cowboy outfits” had been removed in recent years.”
I believe he was talking about businesses not complying with legislation – rather than a Western theme.
I promise this will be the last time I write about strip clubs. But it’s interesting to note that they aren’t particularly nice places after all. Remember that Mr Prime Minister.
The political coverage in the SMH today is all about one thing. The schism in the Liberal Party. It’s nice to have the Herald’s attention drawn so far away from any other schism.
Here’s a nice little analogy that even Ben – analogy hater of some renown – is sure to appreciate. Crabb argues that Costello is waiting in the political wings. Costello keeps saying “I’m doing nothing.”
“But Costello is like a hippo in a ballerina skirt – he’s kind of noticeable even when he’s not doing anything.”
I wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for Philip Jensen. Possibly. He conducted the marriage of my parents. And was the minister at the church where they met – where he was under strict instructions to make sure mum didn’t marry anyone dodgy. His success or otherwise at that is debatable.
Anyway, I digress. Philip Jensen is the Dean of St Andrews Cathedral in Sydney. He has a blog. Of sorts. His latest post is about TV and the immorality – or otherwise – of modern television. It’s an interesting tie in to the post I wrote on the Wire. He starts off talking about Channel 10 news:
“It is hard to watch TV without, gratuitous violence, sexual exhibitionism, vulgarity of speech, dehumanising of the body in grotesque forensic murder investigations and comedians who rarely rise above toilet humour.”
No, sorry, that’s about all TV.
Here’s what he says about the news (with a note on their need for compelling disaster content:
“The alternatives are to watch the news and the sports shows. But the news is distorted by the need to have visuals (e.g. they love bush fire season, floods and train wrecks) and by the agenda of politically motivated journalists. And the sports shows appear dominated by gambling, the abuse of alcohol and overpaid professional celebrity athletes.”
He makes a lot of interesting points – worthy of consideration by Christians from the consumer standpoint – and against censorship – which is the natural position of Christian lobby groups when it comes to “inappropriate content”…
“As a society we do not want censorship. Censorship is always dangerous – as the censor’s power grows, truth is often his victim. Instead our society has chosen individualism and “community standards” as the basis of public entertainment. This assumes that what is watched does not affect community standards. It opens the door for the steady descent of the community into accepting decadence. So far only child pornography has been left as a taboo. “
He also makes the point that we’re all indirectly paying for free-to-air television (not just the ABC).
“The solution that is given to us is: “If you do not like it then switch it off. Nobody forces you to watch it and it is not costing you anything.” It is true that we do not have to watch it but it is not true that it costs us nothing. Taxpayers pay for the ABC and the free-enterprise taxation system called advertising pays for the commercial stations. All products we buy are more expensive because of TV. Whether or not you ever watch it – you are paying for TV.”
He likes DVDs of TV series as alternatives to the tripe that we’re dished up when we turn on the box.
“Of recent times I have purchased and watched DVDs of TV series. This means I can see what I want to, when I want to, without the intrusion of commercials (that for some reason are always louder than the show they interrupt). It means that I can better monitor what fills my mind. God, in Philippians 4:8, commands us to fill our minds with whatever is true, honourable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent, and praiseworthy. Given the cost of DVDs one wonders whether in the future parish churches will develop community libraries to pool our resources of quality viewing.”
A library of quality viewing isn’t a bad idea.
I couldn’t think of an Apple pun better than that. Sorry.
Marketing expert Martin Lindstrom has released Buyology, a book on modern marketing, covering the results from a study onto response to common marketing methodologies and global brands.
The findings, featured in The Australian, suggest that sex no longer sells. And that Apple is probably a cult. But we all knew that.
They found an enormous correlation between a powerful religion and a powerful brand. Precient points are:
“In a world where religion in many societies has begun fading away, brands have begun to take over the role of belief. We as human beings need something to believe in and brands have become almost mini-religions,”
“Think Apple, they have their own ‘temple’: their flagship store; their own religious leader: Steve Jobs; their own cross: the Apple logo; their own rituals (hundreds — just ask an Apple fan); their own enemy (Microsoft) … you name it.”
“These days sex isn’t as mysterious any more as it is everywhere, so that’s the reason why sex doesn’t sell.”