An important topic to discuss…

Thanks, Dee. We began discussing this in class just this evening - the first time we’ve been back together since the story broke. It is also just after Rick Murray’s visit to Auburn. He was a very kind, open and generous guest, by the way. I’ll be posting about that at my blog later.

Along with Dee’s links, I’ll also offer up these links I’ve been gathering for a post I’ll write at infOpinions.

Jeremy Pepper on Quick Thoughts on Kryptonite … I mean Walmart, and Constantin Basturea writes about Edelman, Wal-Mart, and WOMMA’s Code of Ethics where he has a long list of links to many posts discussing the issues.

It all hit the blog world, as we discussed this evening, after Shel Holtz wrote Edelman and the one-sided conversation and then there was the techmeme discussion that ensued from that post.

And, as we discussed in class, there is now the Richard Edelman post - A Commitment which has also been followed by another techmeme discussion.

For those following this discussion in Marcomblog, for clarity on one of the ways we are also discussing this issue, we talked in class about the controversy and particularly the way “digg-style” sites are playing a role in spreading the meme about the controversy. I offer that to add clarity of my reasons for posting here about the use of “digg-style” sites (like techmeme) to spread discussion. I think the classes will use that site to also discuss the various articles listed in all of those memes I’ve linked to above. I will meet the second class tonight and we’ll discuss it further, too.

Thanks, Dee. I’m glad we’ll be discussing it here in this post, too.

By the way, for Dee and the other Marcomblog contributors, as well as other visitors to this site - please feel free to join us and visit Marcom Meme and submit stories about this issue and any other issues of interest. Then, use the discuss link on each story to comment, also.

The most simple and basic mistakes in public relations seem to be the most damaging, don’t they? The main points in every foundations of pr class say: 1. you should always be transparent and open with your actions and information and 2. You should always act quickly when a crisis takes place. It is surprising to me that a firm with such a prestigious reputation has disregarded this important advice. Withholding certain information about the identities of the bloggers could be an honest mistake made by anyone in our field, and I can almost even see the point in it. But to remain silent when you are exposed and leave your publics to come up with their own answers, that is never a good idea. Silence only leads to rumors, more false information, and eventually a bigger mess to clean up than the one you started with. But, we are all prone to mistakes, even international, award-winning firms. I look forward to seeing what actions Edelman takes to repair this situation and to prevent similar occurrences in the future.

Edelman made a mistake- not uncommon for everyone once in a while. They perpetuated their error by not responding quickly. The PR profession demands honesty and urgency. If news isn’t timely, it isn’t news. Rumors surface and the stories get spun by conjecture if crisis are not immediately addressed.
The point of interest in this particular scenario rests on the ethics of the situation. Edelman pretty much wrote the book on WOMMA standards, then became the first to break them.
The question remains: if journalists are held to an unrelenting standard of honesty, why do PR practitioners get off the hook so easily?

Edelman is blazing a trail with social media in a large firm environment. As a pioneer and leader in bringing this new form of communication and marketing to some of their biggest clients, Edelman is bound to slip up along the way. As far as transparency goes, I believe Edelman could have done a better job.
I think that everyone involved and all those watching have learned a valuable lesson in what not to do with relation to social media and its implications for large clients.

It wasn’t a mistake, it was a purposely misleading campaign. A mistake is calling the reporter you just called by the wrong name. This is ethical malfeasance. We can’t excuse it by saying “ah well, we all make mistakes” or “not everyone is a saint.”

Edelman is not the leader in social media, they just have the loudest voice. Leaders don’t yell, they do. Edelman is like the Yankees. Mr. Edelman, like George Steinbrenner, paid a bunch of social media stars to come lead the way for the agency. And they still lost. Because of mismanagement and over-inflated sense of ability and skill.

Many other agencies are executing social media strategy quietly and effectively.

Public relations isn’t considered a profession because of its lack of a body to enforce its code of ethics. WOMMA is the closest thing we have to that, and most PR folks aren’t trusting they will hand down sanctions because of Edelman’s involvement. Perhaps the absence of an “enforcer” is the reason for this large outcry. Since there is a possibility no one will be handing down sanctions for this breach of ethics, those that practice PR are handing down their own judgments.

It seems that everyone is apologetic except for one of the writers of the blog, Laura. In her “Final Word” entry, she is defensive and unwilling to acknowledge that there was anything wrong with her connections to Edelman and Working Families for Walmart. Someone might want to let her in on that one. The lack of transparency is flawed, especially for Jim Thresher who has an entirely different code of ethics about which he should be worried.

Richard Edelman has done the right thing by taking responsibility for a project of which he might have known nothing. That takes leadership, love for a company and a desire to see a client truly succeed.

I was so upset when I heard about this PR blunder. Rick Murray had just recently come to Auburn to talk to us about how Edelman “gets it” and how important it is to be transparent. I do not think that Rick Murray was aware of what was going on with the Walmarting across America campaign, so I’m not putting the blame on him. However, with Edelman being such a big firm it is important to have checks and balances. We talked about how in class sometimes the little, less experienced guy has to stand up to the boss. If I had worked at Edelman on this Walmart campaign I hope that I would be able to stand up and say what we are doing is wrong.

I understand that Richard Edelman wanted to make sure he had all the facts before he commented on his blog about the situation. However, it should not have taken days to get the facts straight. Had he commented as soon as the news broke, even just saying ‘We are very sorry, I’m trying to get all the information, I will let you know when I know…blah blah blah’ that would have warded off some of the malicious comments in the blogosphere. Silence, in this case, was NOT golden.

Wow, big blunder for Edelman PR. Like the other comments have said, transparency and quick response time are keys to good PR. However, I think it’s interesting that you bring up the point that maybe this is just a part of “getting it” for Edelman PR. I agree with your point, if there were to be a blooper, they would be the ones to make it.

Even though they did mess up in the beginning, I think the on-going effort by Richard Edelman and staff to make up for the blunder is inspiring. They have now addmitted thier wrongs and are constantly updating their blogs in response to people’s posts.

I was sad to hear about this Edelman incident. Even though this blunder has happened, I am sure Edelman PR can bounce back from this and this can soon be forgotten. The Edelman company and business is a thriving one and people are constantly aware of the accomplishments they have achieved.

I look up to the company and their leadership skills. Obviously, Edelman is taking care of what happened in a mature and professional way. Edelman has taken responsibility and will come out again with a bang. It is great following this company through up and downs because everyone can learn from company lessons like this one.

Hey Dee, Hope everything is going well for you in Colorado!! We have discussed this issue in class and I have been thinking about how I feel about it. I think, as many already pointed out that the first problem was the delayed reaction from Richard Edelman and others. I know that he was apparently out of the country but I still feel that this is a big enough issue to be dealt with no matter which time zone you are in. I have looked at some of the comments on his blog and people have been very brutal but it’s understandable. One of the things Richard Edelman prides himself on is responding to everyone’s blogs, but all he does is say the same thing the each person over and over. What good does that do? There are a lot of people who look to Edelman as being leaders in the Social Media revolution (or that is what I think??) so this is a pretty big set back for the company’s reputation.

I have just been catching up on some of the controversy.

Good for Edelman for taking responsibility, but If the whole thing sounds a little icky, it should. Obviously, Eldeman has been a staunch advocate of the WOMMA guidelines on transparency, which they helped to write.

Here is what I find absolutely striking, because it points to what I see is at the heart of all this “new” dialogue between company and the individual. Giving up control to get control. Look at Edelman’s passage 6 days earlier on the same blog when he is talking about PR and Corporate Social Responsibility.

“Ms. Jones, while I respect your opinion, implicit in your view is a conviction that corporate reputation is a PR game played by those who “spin” for a living. For you, reputation management is risk management, a damage control exercise. If you believe in a CSR process of Dialogue, Assurance and Partnership, then trust in a corporation is the essential asset that enables it to work effectively with its multiple stakeholders to find mutually advantageous solutions.”

The rawness of having these two statements side by side is staggering. But you have to give him credit. By exposing himself so blatantly to the challenge of hypocrisy he is giving up control and is walking it like he talks it. How humbling and yet how powerful.

This has been a topic of discussion in many of my classes. As a professor said, this is something that looks bad on Edelman’s part, but will be forgotten in the near future. What baffles me is the time taken to make an apology/comment on the mishap. As in many professions, waiting and waiting to come out with a statement only makes the entire situation look worse. The quicker you can confront the situation head on, the better and more credible you look as a company. It is understandable that Edelman wanted to “get all the needed information”, but being the number one independent PR firm in the world and taking 5 days or so, this is just pathetic. Also, I believe that if Edelman is going to take his time “gathering information”, he should stay away from responding to every comment on his blog. It is admirable that he trys his best to respond to each (esp. with the position he holds in the company). but I would advise to make an extended, in-depth response to all instead of dodging the issue
in each comment…Just my two cents..

None of us knows to what extent Richard Edelman, Phil Gomes, Steve Rubel et al where involved in the conception and execution of this “flog” as it has been called. I would like to think that they would be smart enough to know that it wouldn’t fly, if not ethical enough. But not everyone at Edelman fully believes in the conversation. The creator[s] of the Wal-Mart blog certainly didn’t. They created the appearance of a “person like me” and controlled their message all the way to the ears/eyes of the consumer. Now that’s not conversation!

But then again, how could Edelman let go of a company image that consumers loath and have nothing good to say about. The “conversation” doesn’t work for companies like Wal-Mart. It only works when the product/company/image is something inherently good–something that people want to say good things about.

The good thing about conversation is that it is honest and real. The bad thing about Wal-Mart is that the truth hurts. I think blogging can work for corporations, but I’m yet to see it work for this particular one.

Edeman made a big mistake, one that we can all learn from. But not an unforgivable one. The outline of steps that Edelman is taking to educate employees on ethics is a good start, but I don’t think it will be enough to convince all of the critics. WOMM may not have punished the firm for breaking the rules, but the blogosphere certainly has. It will be hard for Edelman to regain the trust of bloggers, but I think they can do it…we’ll see.

I was a bit blown away that whoever thought to do this at Edelman thought that they would not get caught. It is obvious is today’s world that not many things are left mysteries. But, that is not the point.

I am disappointed in Edelman that they took so long to speak up about the matter. They did however chose to receive all the facts, process the information and then make a statement. They probably should have said something while they were in the process of looking at the information, but it is respectable that they wanted to get all the facts.

It does show the risk of using the Internet, but if it is used ethically and to the standards of WOMMA then there would be no problem. I am not that naive to think that this could work because there is no body of enforcement, but if people really became educated on this issues, it would help a lot. That education has to come from these large firms educating their employees.

I was also shocked at this mistake made by Edelman. We started to discuss it in class right after Rick Murray came to visit(who was, by the way, a very nice man and completely willing to indulge a bunch of college students with answers to all of the questions we asked).Our teacher was so blown away by what happened that we talked about it for almost the entire class period. It’s so funny that we as a society think that just because a company is powerful that they don’t make mistakes. This is just proof that anyone can make a mistake, no matter how large and in charge they are. I was really surprised that Edelman didn’t step forward right away to admit a wrongdoing. Hopefully this will serve as a lesson to everyone in the PR world, I wonder if Edelman has a crisis plan for something of this nature?

Robert French’s classes recently had a run-in with Rick Murray and I wish this would have come into play during our 3 hour meeting.

He visited the class to discuss social media networking and some new products Edelman is working on, but never mentioned this little fiasco.

I think this is rude and inconsiderate to everyone who has ties with the company. Edelman has issued an apology on its site and this PR tragedy by no means should be considered a mistake. What they should do, is figure out how to put themselves back in the light with the public. Obviously, there are a ton of Edelman bashers out there who would love nothing more than to see the company go down in flames.

This obviously has not been the greatest thing to happen to Edelman, but I don’t think it’s going to be their downfall. More than likely, Edelman and the cheif officers of the company probally had no idea that this was going on. One thing that could hurt them is the response time it took them to reach the public. Even though Edelman accepted full responsibility for his companies actions he still needs to find out who let this happen. This seems like something that most people would understand is a bad idea and would be stopped before it even started. I have not seen any of this on any of the news programs or traditional media so I don’t know how big of an impact this will have on Edelman. I’d like to hear what Edelman has to say once he is done figuring out what happened.

I think the biggest mistake Edelman made here was their lack of acknowledgement of what was going on in the blogosphere. It took them way too much time to issue a statement and for Richard Edelman to make a comment. People in Edelman must have know about this as soon as it broke, people like Steve Rubel apologized for the late remarks and claimed no involvement but someone should have spoken up in appropriate time. We are taught in all our classes be transparent, be honest, be ethical- but it is much better to see examples of this in the real world and this is just not the case we need to be looking toward as an example of transparency and ethical standards.

Edelman considers itself to be the number one company that “gets it” when is comes to social media-yet they totally didn’t get it when it had to do with their own company.

I have read a lot of what people are saying out there in the blogosphere and I agree and disagree with the things people are saying. Sure everyone makes mistakes, but I think this is a bit bigger than a mistake, I am not really sure what the word is but mistake doesn’t seem to cover it for me.

When you label yourself as a leader in anything you have to expect to be under the microscope. In the blogging world people were watching the moves the Edelman made because of this claim. Unfortunately for them this means when they mess up people are going to notice. I was surprised that it took so long for Edelman to respond to the problem. One of the first things you learn in crisis management is to respond quickly. One of the problems could be older PR tactics meets blogging. Most people do not get blogging and do not want to understand it at all. You just have to wonder if the people in charge of this campaign knew what they were doing. This situation just goes to show you that even if you are a leader you have to follow the same rules as everyone else.

It is amzing but also sad how one mistake in PR can attract this much attention and perform this much damage to the company. Props go to Edelman for trying out this campaign first and for actually working on improving social media for our society. However, if you are an organization or PR firm this large and with this much prestige- you absolutely have to take more time in researching and planning out your campaigns! If you do not, mistakes will happen that will really damage your credibility because all the rest look up to you. When you are on the top, be prepared for people to try to knock you down. If this had happened with a PR firm that was very small and unheard of, it would not have received this much attention or damaged their perception by society too much. If you want to be the best and remain the best, you have to put that extra work and time into EVERYTHING you do- that is what got you at the top and it will take even MORE to keep you there! As Richard Edelman himself explained, they failed in being transparent about the identity of the two bloggers. However, Edelman did accept 100% blame and error, taking on the responsibility and making sure the client was not considered at fault by any means. Trust was lost by many when this mistake was made by Edelman, however there is full confidence that they can recover from this and build back up the trust that was lost.
Thanks for the thoughts!

We all know that as public relations practitioners we should be forthright and honest about every bit of information we distribute to the public, but let’s be honest. In the public relations world, this does not always happen. It’s unacceptable, but faulty information gets out. The lines are blurred, and areas that should be black and white become gray. Once again, it’s unacceptable to be dishonest, and it makes it difficult for public relations practitioners to gain trust in the media, but it still happens.

The things that set this Edelman mistake apart from other blunders are two things: the fact that Edelman Worldwide is a huge and widely respected public relations firm with a high profile client, and the fact that this mistake happened in the blog world. With the scale of Wal-Mart, Edelman should have known to treat this client especially carefully. Edelman represents lots of big clients, and by publicly messing up, they may injure their image and lose current and future clients. Edelman didn’t just injure their name, though. With blogs, pr practitioners already struggle to gain faith since the Internet isn’t monitered and there’s no gatekeeper. Now, after this mistake, pr practitioners have twice the struggle to prove that their information is trustworthy and accurate.

This campaign was definitely a mistake, but somebody would have made it if Edelman didn’t. And we all know that Edelman is not the only firm making these mistakes. If the family in the Wal-Mart parking lots really existed, it would have made for a great story. But it didn’t happen that way. All Edelman can do now is acknowledge their mistake, and move forward. This brings up another mistake Edelman made. They didn’t move fast enough. Damage control is a daily activity in the pr world, and Edelman didn’t do it quickly enough.

There were obvious errors on the firm’s part, and other pr practitioners were damaged by this mistake, too. But this isn’t the first time it’s happened and it won’t be the last. It is our responsibility as pr practitioners to prevent these mistakes so that our work is acknowledged as truth. The public needs to have faith in us and trust the information we give them.

Obviously the big mistake Edelman made was not acknowledging the mistake, not making a statement, doing nothing. In crisis pr we are taught to to make an informed and unified statement as soon as possible. Edelman let us down.
I know that everyone makes mistakes, even huge corporations who “get it,” but those who make mistakes usually acknowledge their mistakes and apologize or explain in a timely manner. Don’t they?
Well, all humans make mistakes, this is not the first time an error in judgement has been made and I doubt this will be the last. Let’s just hope that next time, the company or person at fault will be a little quicker in the response time.

I definitely think Edelman has dealt with this Wal-mart flogging scandal in the best way possible. They admitted what they did was wrong, and they are coming out directly to the public to ask for feedback and comments to engage them in debate about what happened. Edelman is a PR firm, and they know that the most important part of this scandal is to be honest with the public with all the facts and to have a good spokesperson deal directly with the public. Because Edelman has such an impeccable reputation, I don’t think this flogging scandal will have any effect on its business. My perception of Edelman has not been altered because of this scandal. Good luck to Edelman and I hope the scandal blows over!

Although the actions that led to this incident were unethical, cheap, short-handed, etc., it is interesting to me that the emphasis is placed on Edelman’s slow reaction time. This is a lesson to me on the importance of crisis management and more specifically the importance of reacting very quickly when a situation comes up. It’s almost like the public is OK with people messing up on occasion, they just want the details, quick. We can all learn a very valuable lesson from Edelman’s mistake here, and not just from their bad business practices.