The Friday Wrap is my weekly collection of news stories, posts, studies, and reports designed to help organizational communicators stay current on the trends and technology that affect their jobs. These may be items that flew under the radar while other stories grabbed big headlines. As always, I collect material from which I select Wrap stories (as well as stories to report on the For Immediate Release podcast, along with stuff I just want to remember to read) on my link blog, which you’re welcome to follow. If you want to make sure you never miss an edition of the Wrap, along with extra material only for subscribers, sign up for my weekly email briefing.
News
News outlets selling political coverage—Say goodbye to the wall between earned and paid media. Several politics-oriented publishers are selling special services at the Republican and Democratic conventions. Politico, The Economist, and The Atlantic are among those offering pay-for-play, and The Hill is charging $200,000 for (among other things) a promise of an interview that will appear as earned-media coverage on a dedicated page and promoted across the publication’s digital and social media channels. The Economist is offering a package that includes lunch or dinner “with top policy experts from…The Economist” that will be livestreamed “so your reach extends beyond the room.” The takeaway: Stay away from these offers lest you be tainted by the staggering ethics challenges they present. While these practices are clear indications of the struggles publications are having generating revenues, tearing down the earned-paid wall is beyond troubling. Read more
China requires publishers to verify information found on social media—News outlets everywhere has inadvertently published information sourced from social media that turned out to be untrue, but it’s now against the rules in China. The Cyberspace Administration of China—the bureaucracy behind China’s Great Firewall—has introduced new regulations forbidding websites to “not specify or to falsify news sources and to use hearsay to create news or use conjecture and information to distort the facts.” While the regulation could be viewed as a way to require publishers to produce more credible content, scholars believe it “is another attempt by the government…to tighten the vise around the practice of journalism and to restrict the flow of information online.” The takeaway: The old saying says that “information wants to be free,” but repressive regimes resist the idea. This is why an effort is underway to reinvent the web so it cannot be controlled (via censorship such as that imposed by China and other governments or by big corporations like Facebook and Google). Read more
Snapchat introduces permanent messages—A new Snapchat product dubbed Memories lets users store photos and videos to view later, a departure from its core feature: disappearing messages. Another new Snapchat feature that has long been available on Instagram and other messaging apps: the ability to share photos and videos you took earlier using your phone or tablet.The takeaway: While Snapchat’s initial appeal was based on vanishing messages—they enabled people to interact more openly knowing that what they shared wouldn’t be part of a permanent record—its adoption as a mainstream messaging tool is leading the company to introduce features more common in competing apps. Read more
Ashley Madison admits some paying customers were talking to bots—Some of the women on the website for people—mostly men—who wanted to cheat on their wives turned out to be chatbots (or, in this case, “fembots”) instead of real people. “They thought they were cheating, but they were actually alone,” according to a CNN report. Use of the bots in North America ceased in 2014 but continued to be employed internationally until 2015. The company also announced new leadership along with revealing that it was being investigated by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. The takeaway: While tricking people into parting with their money by making them think they’re talking to real people is the worst kind of ethics violation, the fact that so many men were fooled does demonstrate the utility of chatbots. Read more
Advertisers aren’t flocking to Twitter Moments—The $1 million cost of advertising in Twitter’s curated Moments section is too high for advertisers. Moments was introduced in an effort to attract users with a collection of popular tweets, but the budget brands would use to have a presence in the feature seems to be going to Snapchat instead. An agency executive complained that Twitter provides no reporting on Moments engagement or impressions. The takeaway: I haven’t been in Moments since taking a look when it was first announced. Have you? Read more
Pinterest will introduce image search—Soon you’ll be able to point your smartphone camera at an object and Pinterest will search its inventory of 75 billion images for items that match. The idea is to make it easier to find items to buy. See a friend wearing shoes you want? Take a picture and find out where you can buy them, possibly even directly from within Pinterest, which hopes to become an ecommerce platform. The takeaway: As visuals become ever more important, visual search is going to take off, though it may take a while for consumers to adopt this new behavior. If there’s a strong visual component to your business, consider how visual search might enhance your online presence. Read more
Twitter tests customer service features—On some profiles, Twitter is testing a display that shows when the accounts are most responsive. For example, publishing platform Medium’s Twitter account shows that it is most response between 12:30 p.m. and 5:30 a.m. A Featured Tweets tab is also being tested. Both features are useful for companies providing customer service via Twitter. The takeaway: These and other features could also make Twitter more appealing as a customer service channel for companies that aren’t yet using it for that purpose. Read more
Trends
Kellogg’s opens branded cafe in Times Square—If you don’t think experiential marketing is a big deal, consider you can now pay up to $8 for a bowl of Kellogg’s cereal at its new restaurant that just opened in Times Square. Kellogg’s has partnered with chef Anthony Rudolf to serve pistachio- and lemon-infused Frosted Flakes and Special K, and ice cream topped with Rice Krispies, strawberries, and matcha powder. The idea is to provide customers with the ability to interact with a brand rather than just consume it. Other food experiences include M&M’s World stores and Chobani SoHo. Pepsi has one planned. The takeaway: I have already seen people sharing pictures from inside the restaurant on Facebook. As consumers increasingly demand experiences—on which they’re more willing to spend money than acquisitions—brands will need to consider how they can deliver. Don’t confuse experiential marketing with the customer experience, though. They’re two different things. Read more
PR departments grow as companies recognize communications’ importance—Corporate communications is become a more important element of business strategy, leading to an increase in department size and budgets, as well as what communications leaders are paid. The top communicator is also reporting more to the CEO in more companies, according to a report from The Conference Board. Among the challenges for communications teams: improving crisis and emergency readiness. The takeaway: The communicators needed to work in these departments are those with a solid understanding of business and the competencies needed in a modern communication function. When was the last time you inventoried your competencies (or your team’s) and took steps to fill in the gaps? Read more
More data reinforces trend toward getting news from social media—Six in ten U.S. adults get their news online—84% among those from 18-29 years old—and 72% get their news on a mobile device. Among the key finds from a new Pew Research Center study: Friends and family are important sources of news, with 15% getting news from people they are close to; news organizations remain the top source at 36%. Only 4% of web-using adults trust the information they get there a lot, while 30% trust it some. And television remains the top source for news, with 57% getting their news there; newspapers lag behind at 20%. The takeaway: You need to work on getting your fans and ambassadors to spread your news, but earned media coverage through mainstream news channels has not diminished in importance, contrary to some popular beliefs. Read more
Chatbots won’t replace sales teams—While there is some speculation that chatbots will render sales teams obsolete, B2B salespeople can rest easy. The process of buying complex products and services requires human interaction. In fact, interaction with salespeople is the most important factor influencing a purchase decision, according to a Gartner survey. However, chatbots will expedite the process with artificial intelligence interpreting and remembering what customers say, delivering relevant information during a conversation with a customer, handling a variety of tasks (like scheduling meetings and updating CRM records), and making suggestions on how to steer a conversation. The takeaway: Chatbots will do more than just respond to a query. The ability to listen in and interact with the salesperson rather than the customer will remove a lot of the guesswork from sales calls. Don’t expect this to become part of the sales process overnight, though; it’s probably years away. Read more
Another Internet of Things network has gone live—The Netherlands was the first country to introduce a network designed for smart devices to communicate with each other. Now, South Korea has rolled out a nationwide IoT network. SK Telecom is pumping heavily in the network; the phone carrier will charge users a monthly fee to add their devices—such as refrigerators and printers—to the network. The takeaway: A lot of communications work will result from the mainstreaming of IoT. What message will your printer send to your phone when it needs a new toner cartridge? Somebody has to write that stuff. More important, communication strategies will arise from the “calm design” (technology woven into daily live, such as Amazon’s Echo) that is inherent in IoT. Read more
Research
Most consumers engage businesses through mobile messaging—More than three-quarters of consumers have received SMS text messages from businesses (notably banks, healthcare organizations, and retailers) and 65% have engaged with companies via chat apps. According to a report from the Mobile Ecosystem Forum, financial services companies are most active in messaging and healthcare is a key growth area. The takeaway: Messaging represents the biggest gap in organizational communications right now. While consumer and industry use is on the rise, I talk to few organizational communicators who have even looked into mobile messaging as a channel for engaging audiences. Read more
Marketers lack customer experience skills—Most companies recognize the need to deliver a great customer experience. According to Accenture Interactive and Forrester Consulting, less than half of companies have “taken action around customer experience activities, like improve analytic capabilities or creating more valuable content.” The reason: employees don’t have the skills required to deliver the customer experience. The takeaway: Here’s another reason communications and marketing teams need to inventory competencies and make plans for acquiring those that are missing from the team but necessary to execute a communications strategy. Read more
Integrated Measurement Framework is more complicated than it looks—Attention measurement geeks: There’s a new measurement tool in town, an interactive version of the measurement framework introduced a couple years ago by the International Association for the Measurement and Evaluation of Communication (AMEC). Communication measurement thought leader Katie Paine warns that the interactive tool is “as challenging to fill out as the earlier version because all the problems inherent in the old framework still exist.” Katie took the system out for a test drive and her observations are worth reviewing. The takeaway: The framework is designed to make it easier to employ AMEC’s Barcelona Principles, a set of guidelines for ensuring relevant measurement of communications. Despite its complexity, the framework is worth adopting. As Katie advises, you just need to do your homework first, understanding what is meant by (and who owns the data for ) objectives, inputs, activities, outputs, outtakes, outcomes, and impact. Read more
Virtual and Augmented Reality
Google is bringing VR to websites—If Google’s vision pans out, surfing the web will be a Virtual Reality activity. The team behind Chrome is at work on a “VR shell” that will allow users of Google’s Cardboard or Daydream VR headsets browse the web. The experimental feature is available for activation now, but isn’t fully functional yet. The takeaway: While I doubt users will migrate from their current web habits to do all their surfing in VR, being able to access the web when you’re already using a VR headset will make life easier, and it’ll be great for launching VR files and 360-degree videos and images from within a website. At some point, companies will need to ensure their sites are capable of working when visited from by a user wearing a headset. Read more
Second Life is preparing a VR virtual world—Remember Second Life? The virtual world was all the rage about a decade ago, but it turned out to be too difficult for most people and companies to use. But Linden Labs—which continues to be profitable and maintains a robust Second Life community—is using its experience to develop a new VR platform, currently dubbed Project Sansar and touted as “the WordPress or the YouTube of VR.” The idea is to introduce “the equivalent of a massively multiplayer online platform…on top of which anybody can build their own immersive experience.” A limited number of people will have access to the platform next month; it is scheduled for a broader rollout later this year. The takeaway: The idea behind Second Life was always sound; it was the complexity of hosting “islands” on your own server and building worlds that got in the way of more widespread adoption. The VR version is eliminating those barriers. The idea that you’ll be able to put on your headset to shop in a virtual store or attend a conference is still appealing, and if it’s easy enough, Second Life could have its own second life. Read more
Mobile
People just don’t look at mobile ads—A neuroscience study from Light Reaction, a WPP agency, found that people don’t pay attention to ads when they’re looking at news on smartphones. People spent less than 200 milliseconds looking at a mobile ad. Interstitials did slightly better at just over 800 milliseconds. Those stats were called “insignificant” by a scientist involved in the research. Most of the time spent on the ad was devoted to finding the “X” used to close it. The takeaway: Mobile advertising is red hot, but probably not best employed on news apps or sites. In general, companies need to find a better way to use paid media on mobile devices to engage with customers and prospects. Read more
Snapchat gains ground with older users—Fourteen percent of U.S. smartphone users 35 years old and older are using Snapchat and for those between 25 and 34, the number is 38%, and the numbers continue to climb as the messaging app goes mainstream. Don’t expect the same reaction from younger users that Facebook experienced when its audience trended older and young users stopped using it to message one another. Snapchat is inherently a closed system—that is, your messages to your friends can’t be seen by your parents. The takeaway: As Snapchat becomes the new go-to messaging app, communicators need to consider how they can begin using it to reach audiences in useful ways. One possibility that intrigues me: bringing your employee advocacy teams up to speed so they can reach their friends with relevant, authentic company information. Read more
New metrics for mobile apps—Businesses should reevaulate the metrics applied to mobile engagement, according to Apptentive, a mobile customer engagement software company. Apptentive’s released “State of Mobile App Engagement: 2016 Benchmark Report,” which details new approaches to measuring in-app survey response rates, distribution of app store star ratings, and customer engagement and responsiveness, among other metrics. Apptentive found the average response rate for mobile surveys is 13% (the industry standard for web survey responses is 1%). The study also found that companies interact, on average, with 9% of customers via mobile app, and that most customers—62%—respond to companies’ outreach efforts via mobile. The takeaway: While Apptentive’s metrics may or may not be recognized as an industry standard, it is important to establish some baselines to determine the effectiveness of companies’ app efforts. It’s also important to start moving beyond the app and establish some metrics for chat performance, given the shift underway from apps to chat. Read more
This week’s Wrap image of Barley Sugar Sweets is courtesy of krhessy‘s Flickr account.