Shameless self-promotion
Self-flacking goes against every PR bone in my body. But that hasn’t stopped me from blasting my friends with a link to this blog (leftbrain), feeding it to Twitter (@rfdarius), and putting it in my signature (nor did it stop my co-blogger Yan from self-promoting his recent MOVE! article).
If the whole point of PR is to get unbiased third parties to sing your praises, what good does it do to shill for yourself? You’ll always be biased towards yourself and thus less believable. This has been compounded by the advent of microblogging and Facebook statuses, where many people a have grossly expanded sense of self-importance, further diminishing their credibility and draw.
But Web 2.0 tools have also expanded the number of basic outlets for promoting oneself that could be considered acceptable and even necessary. Here’s a short, categorized list:
- Necessary: Sometimes you need to respond directly to your audiences, especially in times of crisis. Politicians and CEOs come to mind, although their self-promotion is often unnecessary and under quite shameful circumstances. As WIRED put it:"self-promotion is an art form. Do it poorly, and you risk coming across as a narcissistic boor. Do it well, and it can lead to the presidency."
- Acceptable: Often, your means (or necessary means for a – necessary means) will prevent you from being able to get the word out about something you’re doing via traditional channels. In this case, Web 2.0 has been incredibly empowering. For example, musicians have been given the ability to promote themselves for free through MySpace. Same goes for photographers on Flickr.
- Routine: Announcing your own presence via email and setting up feeds should be routine. Adding your blog to Technorati and asking for blogroll love from fellow bloggers are all things that should automatically be done when establishing an online presence.
- Less than Classy: This is self-promotion you have to pay for. It can be acceptable, but not entirely organic. Maybe something like those Sprint commercials where CEO Dan Hesse talks about the wireless revolution. While he’s not using PR to get his message out, he’s also (probably?) not getting paid to do that commercial.
- Shameless: And then there are the ones that can make you sick. Paris Hilton, Donald Trump, Howard Stern, David Blaine, self-help book authors…they all promote themselves at the expense of others with questionable benefit or meaning
- Nefarious: Even worse than shameless. Self-promotion can be unethical and border on illegal. Remember when Sony got caught editing rival Wikis, or Fox, or when Edeleman’s fake Wal-Mart blog was exposed?
Where do PR and corporate blogs fit into this? Well, it depends on the blog. Some are very self-serving. Others are more engaging. In the end content is always king. And that’s where PR comes into play. The level of shamelessness will often depend on the tone and method of delivery. PR professionals spend their days working out those nuances (albeit sometimes unsuccessfully), and can find the appropriate channels for getting your messages out.
Who’s your favorite (or least favorite) self-promoter? Or your favorite elf promoter for that matter?
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