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Archives for 2009

A Super-Simple Website Checkup

The holiday season has begun, and it’s also nearing the end of the calendar year.  That means the workplace is either extra-busy or extra-lazy, or (more likely) an unpredictable combination of both.  So you might find an hour or two available for a little creative research.  Why not assess your company’s Career site?

Here’s a speedy approach that will hit the highlights and produce some useful insights.

First Impression. When a visitor arrives at the home page of the Careers site for the first time, they will instantly have an impression along one of these lines:

Positive:

1. Bold/energetic
2. Crisp/professional
3. Warm/friendly
4. Interesting/unusual
5. Inviting/appealing

    Negative:

    A. Messy/confusing
    B. Dull/lifeless
    C. Cold/formal
    D. Typical/boring
    E. Superficial/not worth my time

      There could be a few other variants, but that’s enough to work with.  And different people will have different reactions–but the majority of visitors will probably fall into one of these categories for any given site.  So . . .

      Step 1: Look at your company’s Careers site and decide where most people would put it.

      Step 2: Decide whether the majority impression fits the company accurately.  If the impression is positive (1-5) and the fit is accurate, jump to Step 3.

      If the impression is negative (A-E) . . . now it gets harder.  Is the website Dull/lifeless or Typical/boring because the company is?  Or because the company refuses to invest in a better site?  If either, stop reading and find something more useful to do.

      But if not—that is, if the website is Cold/formal but the company is actually Warm/friendly (for example)—then you have identified an opportunity. Add it to the opportunity stack, and move on to Step 3.

      Step 3: Count the number of clicks it takes to find some jobs, using reasonable criteria.  Now go to your company’s two nearest competitors and do the same thing.  Compare the ease of search, and find out if your site is at an advantage—or a disadvantage.

      Step 4: Repeat Step 3 for a job application, but use minutes instead of clicks.

      Step 5: Count the number of interesting/useful items on the site.  Count the number of useless/uninteresting items on the site.  Which number is larger?

      If the comparisons in Steps 3, 4, and/or 5 reveal weaknesses, you have identified additional opportunities.  Add to stack.

      Step 6: Review the opportunities and decide which ones could be addressed under current circumstances in this company.  If none, put a reminder on the calendar to review again in future.  If several, prioritize and add to task list, or pass on some suggestions to the appropriate people.

      Done!

      PS:  For another approach, revisit a previous post titled Test Question.

      Complete Twitter Strategy Rules Guide for Investor Relations – Creating Official Corporate Tweets

      Twitter mania is everywhere. Whether the quickly deafening crescendo heralds a change in the world’s communication paradigm, or the impending pop of the social networking bubble remains to be seen. What cannot be ignored is that businesses are embracing Twitter for the benefits they can gain from direct, real-time, two-way communication with consumers and business partners. It is only a matter of time before shareholders and company executives alike start asking, “Where is the company’s investor relations on Twitter?”

      Twitter Is Different for IR

      Jumping on the Twitter bandwagon and establishing a corporate presence is a simple task. The most difficult part of the whole process might be chasing someone off of the username that is the company’s registered trademark.

      Otherwise, creating a Twitter account with a username, and typing in sub-140 character messages is a no-brainer. Bragging about company achievements, talking up new products, sending out links to coupons, or even just reminding the business’ followers about the company are par for the course when it comes to business Twitter usage.

      Unfortunately, for the Investor Relations Department things are not so easy. There are legal pitfalls to Twitter for business use, as well as regulatory requirements for publicly traded companies on Twitter. Don’t forget, that the whole Twitter business is moot if the tweets the company sends out don’t add up to the kind of Twitter feed that people follow. Between the prospect of getting the company in legal trouble, developing a robust following, responding to shareholder concerns in a fast-moving forum, and just coming up with something to say in the company’s tweets, can tie the most technically savvy IR department in knots.

      Fortunately, Twitter for Investor Relations can be broken down into an easily manageable process that provides tangible benefits for the corporation, the shareholders, and IR. This guide provides a step-by-step plan to get a business Twitter strategy running quickly. After all, quick communication is what Twitter is all about.

      Rules and Strategy Guide to Twitter for Business Investor Relations

      1) – Tweet Officially

      a) Link to Official Twitter Account – Don’t make shareholders or analysts guess about your intentions. If you are going to use Twitter or other social networks to communicate with shareholders and others, make it official. Have a link directly from the Investor Relations landing page to the IR Twitter account along with a statement that this is the official Twitter account for corporate IR news. You don’t have to explicitly say it, but the implication is that anything else out there on Twitter, is rumor, innuendo, or speculation from non-official sources.

      b) Have a Specific Twitter Account For Investor Relations – Do not use an umbrella corporate Twitter account. Do not share a Twitter username with any other department or purpose other than Investor Relations. Any lawyer with 5 minutes of experience knows that the quickest way to defeat legal protections is to show examples where these were violated, ignored, or otherwise misused or unused. In other words, your carefully crafted disclaimers, tweets, and links will all be for naught if the marketing guys throw up even a single tweet with hyperbole that proves not every precaution to ensure all information posted on Twitter is accurate. Use an IR only account and include IR or some other identifier in its name.

      2) Create A Disclaimer Specifically for Twitter – The temptation to just use one of the standard disclaimers for Twitter is understandable. However, Twitter is unlike any other form of communication already engaged in, and it needs its own disclaimer. Do include as much of the standard boilerplate disclaimers as necessary, but also include Twitter specific information.

      3) Post Twitter Disclaimers – Immediately next to your link to the official Twitter account, place a Twitter disclaimer. There will actually be two Twitter disclaimers required. The first is the short and sweet one that goes with the official link to the official Twitter account. The second is the one that is as long as the lawyers want it to be. The last sentence of the short one should be an “important note” that this is only the quick disclaimer and a link to the full disclaimer.

      4) Create Twitter Terms of Use or Twitter Terms and Conditions – Disclaimers are one thing. Terms or Conditions of usage are another. Draw up Twitter specific terms to help protect the company against mistakes. Wal-mart created a stir with its laundry list of terms, which it has relabeled as “Twitter Discussion Guidelines.” The provide an excellent starting point for creating Twitter TOS.

      5) Require Acceptance of the TOS or TOC – The software industry pioneered the concept of forcing consumers to agree to something without actually asking. CDs or Floppy Disks came in envelopes that said by opening the envelope you agreed to a whole list of terms and conditions. U.S. Courts have repeatedly upheld these “contracts” as valid. Do the same thing for your Twitter account. Use the “Bio” section to include a sentence which states that following or reading the posts on Twitter constitute acceptance of your terms of use.

      6) Accept Limitations on These Safety Features – Disclaimers and Terms and Conditions can go a long way toward shutting the door on many avenues of liability. However, what stands up against a tort claim in court, and what stands up against the actions of a governmental regulatory agency such as the SEC, are two very different things. However, do not neglect these important safeguards. For every avenue of attack the company eliminates, the less chance there is for something to “stick.” – Following the rest of this IR Twitter guide will help provide more legal and regulatory protection.

      With official Twitter accounts, disclaimers, and terms in place, the company’s investor relations department has done everything it can reasonably be expected to do in order to protect the company from unforeseen Twitter liability issues. Now, investor relations  is ready to Tweet.  What to tweet and how to keep what IR posts on Twitter from causing trouble is the next piece of Twitter strategy to get into place. Getting the corporate IR Twitter posting strategy right is next.

      What’s in a Name? When Companies Rebrand

      Remember in 2007 when Apple changed its company name from Apple Computer to just plain Apple?  Don’t worry.  Most people can’t remember.

      And that’s the point.

      The Apple brand name had become so powerful that the ancillary word which could have pigeon-holed the company into a single line of business had already become meaningless.  Consumers barely noticed a change when Apple dropped Computer from its name shortly before the iPhone hit the marketplace.  Today, most people can’t even remember a time when Apple was followed by Computer at all.

      That’s successful branding!

      So what can we learn from Apple’s story and other companies that have found themselves in similar positions where their names limit their growth potential (you can read a few more stories in this New York Times article)?

      First, it’s important to have foresight when it comes to branding.  Great brands live for a long time and the world around that brand is likely to change.  While it’s great to have a brand name that is specific and clearly defines what the brand is and stands for, it’s even more important to ensure that brand name can withstand the test of time.  A company like Apple began with a narrow focus, but as happens to all companies, growth creates expectations for more growth.  Typically, in order to keep growing, a company needs to expand into new businesses.  What happens when your company or brand name doesn’t fit with those new businesses? You have two choices — don’t expand (not usually an option) or change your brand name.  The latter is usually the preferred choice.

      The biggest problem in changing an established brand name is giving up the equity that you’ve built into that brand name over the years.  Fortunately for a company like Apple, dropping a word from the company name had no impact on the business, but many companies aren’t lucky enough to find themselves in a similar position.  That’s often the case after a merger or acquisition.  Even companies with similar product lines and consumers have been known to merge and be afraid to let go of one or both company names for years (consider Price Waterhouse Coopers).  The investment in establishing awareness, recognition and trust in a new brand name can be big in terms of money and time.

      Of course, there are some companies that attempt to insulate themselves from similar branding problems.  For example, Johnson & Johnson operates in a decentralized manner with the Johnson & Johnson company name being a secondary piece of the branding puzzle.  Instead, individual business units and specific product brand names are the ones promoted to consumers, and that’s where the company’s investments into building brand equity are made.

      There is no way of knowing where your company will go in the future, but it’s best to think big.  Position your company and your brand for long term success by considering the best case scenario for your company’s growth, and develop the branding strategies that are likely to help you reach those goals in the most flexible manner.

      Consider this story as an example of what not to do — in the United States, there was a fast food restaurant that began in 1985 and grew in the early 1990s called Boston Chicken which served a variety of rotisserie chicken meals.  Boston Chicken got fairly popular and began to expand from its New England roots across the country.  As time went on and more healthy fast food choices were introduced to major chains, Boston Chicken began to lose business.  In 1995, the time came to expand the menu to include non-chicken items.  What’s a company called Boston Chicken to do?  The name changed to Boston Market.  It was a small change, but for a brand that was still fairly new, the timing and necessary investment were not good things.  In 2000, McDonald’s purchased Boston Market for its real estate but left some locations open primarily because the brand name still held some value.  McDonald’s sold Boston Market to a private investment company in 2007.  I’m not saying that Boston Market failed because of the brand name change, but it certainly didn’t help — just an example of a narrow branding mistake to learn from.

      The Sharp End of CSR

      mobile phone explosion

      It’s not beyond the realms of imagination to say that on 10th March 1876, in a small electrics shop in Boston, Massachusetts, one of the bloodiest conflicts in African history received a significant boost.

      On that day, Alexander Graham Bell said “Mr Watson, come here. I want to see you.”  In the next room Thomas Watson heard these words through the magic of the telephone.

      Nearly 100 years later, on June 30th 1960, The Republic of Congo gained independence from Belgium and a long tussle over its mineral wealth began.  This has been especially intense in the past decade, with over 3 million people lost as a result. [Read more…] about The Sharp End of CSR

      Another Example of Unintended Messaging . . .


      Man and Woman Small

      Recently, I went looking for a report on the website of a fairly well-known company, so of course I stopped by their Careers page—and through a series of events, I ended up noticing something that wouldn’t be obvious to most visitors.  But even if it won’t be seen by the public, I think it’s important for two reasons:  (a) no one caught it in-house, and (b) it suggests a pattern of thinking that seems problematic, even though it’s surely not intentional.

      In order to be kind to the company in question, I’ll disguise the specifics, but here’s slightly altered version of “the scoop”:

      To get the report I wanted, I had to register.  To register, I had to select a “title.”  Let’s say my selected title was “Channel Manager.”   There didn’t seem to be any special benefit to having a title, but once I had picked one, it followed me to every page on the site.  And next to my title at the top of the page was a small picture (it definitely looks like a stock photo, not a real employee) which is presumably meant to represent a “Channel Manager.”

      I couldn’t help wondering what the purpose of the whole title idea might be, so I decided to try on different titles and see what changed.  Actually nothing important seemed to alter according to my title, in terms of the information presented.  But–I did see a different picture every time.  And that’s where I noticed . . .

      Stereotyping!

      If you took a list of the two dozen or so possible titles and had ten random people divide the titles into “gender piles,” I’ll bet the piles would exactly match the pictures on this site.  Titles/descriptions that had words like strategy, architecture, or infrastructure got a man’s picture.  Titles that had something to do with marketing or managing got a woman’s picture.  A couple of exceptions, but overall, a pretty noticeable pattern.

      As mentioned, this pattern probably won’t be noticed by visitors, because most won’t try out more than a couple of titles.  And if you go straight to the Careers page without registering on the main site, you won’t even have a title, so it’s moot.  But if you do register, the title will show up any time you go to the Careers page, and that’s how I got started down this particular rabbit trail.

      Once I focused on the Careers page, the plot thickened a bit.  Let’s set aside the whole matter of titles, and just assume the visitor came to the Careers page without any previous picture experience.   As they looked around the site, they would find (all on a single tab) four employee profiles, each with a real photo of a real person.  And all four are men.

      I doubt very much that this company is a hot-bed of stereotyping or gender bias.   I doubt anyone there even realizes that this unintended message has taken shape on the website.  But–that’s exactly the problem.

      One other note:  The “title” pictures were also somewhat lacking in ethnic diversity, but I left that out in order to focus on the gender point.  As for ethnic diversity in the employee profiles . . . zero.  So at that point, you really do have to wonder who’s minding the messaging.

      Will News Corp and Microsoft Bing Change the Future of the Internet?

      Earlier this month, I published a post about News Corp’s plan to block all of its content from Google searches.  Considering that Google controls more than 60% of online searches, that sounds like a crazy idea.  Now, it looks like News Corp has a different idea that involves partnering with Microsoft to provide News Corp content through Bing.

      Crazy?  Or the first step in redefining the Internet?

      The debate is on.

      According to The New York Times, News Corp. and Microsoft are discussing a deal wherein Microsoft would pay News Corp to exclusively provide its content through Bing searches.  Currently, Bing controls less than 10% of online searches.

      News Corp leader Rupert Murdoch has made it no secret that he plans to find a way to monetize his company’s online presence.  Having a search engine pay for exclusivity is just one step I assume we can expect to see from News Corp.  The question is whether or not anyone cares from a consumer perspective.  The world of publishing has changed significantly and offering content exclusively through a single search engine doesn’t sound like the best option for News Corp.  However, if the move does mark the first step in redefining online content distribution, then I think the issues go much deeper than consumers are likely to realize in the short term.

      I think it’s safe to say that if News Corp. successfully strikes a deal with Microsoft, other news organizations will want to follow suit.  Afterall, they want to find ways to monetize their online efforts, too.  The challenge for companies like News Corp may be competing against citizen journalists and the social Web where information spreads faster and farther than ever before.  It’s not enough to just provide news anymore.  People can find that anywhere.  Today, news is a commodity.

      Brands that are likely to withstand the growth of the social Web and content sharing are the ones that find ways to let their content spread and build relationships with consumers by adding value.  Hiding content through exclusive deals runs counter to the lifeline of the social Web.  As consumers, we can only hope that the openness of the Internet doesn’t change, but from a corporate perspective, it’s a matter of making money or dying.

      The question remains — which company will step up to the plate and find the magic ticket to meeting the needs of both sides of this debate?