I’ve had several occasions recently to evaluate video upload/player options for clients, and as a result, I am recommending that, budget permitting, they stay away from YouTube, Vimeo and other “free” services due to what I believe is an unnecessary risk to reputation.

Every free video service, and even some of the paid video distribution networks, have what I call “drag.” They pull along a little red wagon full of undesirable content behind them. Positioned alongside this often questionable content, your message could end up sending a viewer to a competitor, or worse still, cause them to be offended.

This tag-along content comes in several forms.

Advertising

Many video upload/viewing sites present advertising messages alongside videos. Revver for example presents subtle Google Ads or banners, such as an ad for Verizon, at the top of the page. I did a search on “women entrepreneurs” and above and alongside serious business videos I was presented with ads for a wacky Martin Lawrence movie, jewelry, and a banner ad promoting a medication for bipolar disorder.

Ads on some sites are extremely inappropriate, offering Viagra and Cialis, or dating services, adding an undesirable sleaze factor to the viewing experience. Perhaps worse is the prospect, quite real, of a viewer being hijacked by an ad for a competitive product or service.

This is not true of all sites. YouTube and Vimeo do not seem to have this problem. I can’t say unequivocally whether this is universal for these sites, but I did not see advertising, other than promotions for other videos, while I was browsing these sites.

Related Videos

Another area of risk is in “related” videos offered by many services that by virtue of a few keywords become informally linked to yours. YouTube, for example, offers a scrolling list of related videos. This offers a multitude of ways for your message to be diluted or connected with something you’d prefer not to have your company associated with.

Delta Airlines ran a contest and identified a real employee to record a safety video, which the company then posted on YouTube. The campaign was a big success, gaining national media attention, and the video has close to one million views (more I would argue than live flight attendants have received in the history of aviation.)

If you visit the YouTube page displaying the video (you get there either by going to YouTube, searching “Delta Flight Safety,” and playing the video, or by seeing the video somewhere else and clicking on the embedded player,) you’ll see YouTube’s list of related videos, which includes one from a disgruntled passenger titled Delta Flight 6499, SEVEN HOURS on the tarmac. Does Delta really want to drive viewers to this?

Comments

Video upload sites that offer viewers the opportunity to comment also pose risks. This is really a problem on YouTube, where it seems there are thousands of people with nothing better to do than leave comments like “this video sucks” and “fail!” Maybe your video IS bad, but a hundred comments confirming this fact don’t help.

There are other ways to upload and play video without exposing your company’s message to these kinds of scenarios. I don’t claim to know everything about either all free video services or paid services, but I do know there are alternatives.

A lot of companies are using Brightcove for example, where you pay by the month based on number of streams viewed. You can “skin” the player with your logo and company colors. It is embeddable, so it can be inserted into a company blog post, social media newsroom page, or on a third-party blog just like a YouTube video. The difference is, you’re now driving traffic to YOUR site instead of YouTube. Sure, more people are visiting YouTube, so if large numbers of views is your goal, I recommend BOTH approaches. Do you own branded embed on your company sites and then upload the same video to YouTube. Brightcove also manages hosting, so you don’t have to worry that demand spikes and bandwidth will be a problem.

There are a number of similar offerings to Brightcove, such as Permission TV, Maven Networks, KIT Digital, The FeedRoom, and VMIX, Twistage, and Move Networks. I have singled out Brightcove not because it is the best of these (though it may be), but because I am familiar with it.

Many of the services I’ve listed above, and many others, also offer streaming video, and this is generally done with an embeddable player, so most of the same concerns apply.

So if you want to upload video as part of your communications strategy, remember you have many options, and things might not be as simple as they seem. Make sure that your company’s message isn’t tarnished by being presented in the wrong context.

Tags: Brightcove, Vimeo, YouTube, Permission TV, Maven Networks, KIT Digital, The FeedRoom, VMIX, Twistage, Move Networks, embeddable video player, enterprise

How many “kinds” of blog posts are there, and which are the most effective and interesting in a corporate environment? Is it possible to categorize all blog posts this way?

I was working on a blogging training presentation for a corporate client last night, trying to answer these questions. Here’s what I came up with:

Experiential: The experiential post uses personal experience to tell a relevant story. It is distinct from the trivial post, which can also be a narrative, because the experiential element is a story telling technique, but the larger story in the post is relevant to the company’s business. An experiential post might be based on observations made at a conference, solving a customer problem onsite or by phone, or even of a longer term experience, such as bringing a product to market, or hiring a new management team. A well written experiential post can be interesting and engaging. I write speeches for executives, and have always found that personal anecdotes are extremely effective and credible in bringing the company’s products and services alive.

Trivial: A trivial post is an off-topic post about personal experiences such as travel, or the purchase of the latest consumer electronics gadget. These do not generally relate to the business, but they can be useful in helping the blogger connect with his or her audience through shared experiences. The typical trivial post covers things like “should I get one of the new iPhones?” and “the cable company made me wait four hours.” From an emotional standpoint, the biggest byproduct of Web 2.0 is that people are empowered to whine and complain about things frustrate them, and this is often the kind of content found in a trivial post. While it does create a bond between the blogger and readers of the blog, it can become tiresome, and may reflect poorly on the executive’s public persona.

Strategic: An executive blog is perfect for communicating strategic information, such as quarterly results, a product announcement, a launch, or the goings-on at a major company event. Strategic posts are “deliberate,” that is they are designed and timed and not spontaneous. In a large company they are likely to be group efforts (despite all the hoopla about authenticity) in order to align with approved messaging and comply with financial disclosure requirements and other regulations. (Don’t let any CEO of a large company tell you that he or she does these posts solo. It just doesn’t happen that way.)

These tend to be important, particularly in terms of offering blog visitors something to comment on, but are not as interesting or effective as experiential or analytical posts.

Analytical: An analytical post offers an in depth discussion of a particular technology, industry trend, socioeconomic situation, business strategy or other topic. These posts are most like traditional print commentary in that they involve research, and while espousing the blogger’s point of view, should show balance and quote credible third party sources. A well written analytical post is great for “selling” the company’s strategy, or helping explain why the company chose a certain approach to a product or service. This kind of post also helps the executive be seen as engaged and knowledgeable about things that go on outside the four walls of the company.

Responsive: The responsive post is generally a rebuttal or reaction to another blog or a column. It isn’t really an altogether different post category, but since it is a response, the structure and the tone are unique. It can have many or all the elements of the analytical post. The responsive post may be driven, for example, by the need to get the company’s point of view into the conversation in reaction to a highly critical post, or to make people aware of a highly complimentary post. It’s also useful for generating topics when you’re not sure what to blog about, but when instead of reacting, you “blog first,” you start the conversation and you control the agenda. By starting the conversation, you better demonstrate originality, and the courage of your convictions, instead of taking a reactionary, and often defensive stance.

TOH Link: Many bloggers like to publish favorite links with little or no commentary and some even maintain separate link blogs for this purpose. The Tip-Of-the-Hat link post is the little brother to the responsive post. It is often just a few sentences long, and may start “great post by Dave on why social media is like the Peloponnesian War…” with a link to the post. Without at least a few lines on why Dave’s post is so great, and a few reactions or contributions that expand the conversation, these kinds of posts are of little utility in a corporate environment.

Educational: The educational post is often Web 1.0 content in disguise, but if the blogger is knowledgeable about the topic and involved in writing the post, it can be effective. These often have titles like “Top 10 Strategies for Long Term Data Archiving,” or “Popular Models for Utility Computing.” (You can see from all of the hypotheticals in this piece that I have spent WAY too much time in IT.) A former Google engineer told me that the Google algorithm loves numbered lists. This kind of post also has the potential to bore readers and evoke cries of “marketing hype.”

Crisis: The crisis post is a special case and difficult to critique in this framework. These are an unusual kind of responsive post in that they are based on reactions to events, announcements and other critical situations that may seriously affect the company’s reputation and its financial health. This type of post doesn’t really fit in this discussion, because it’s not something you make a strategic choice about. My advice: try not to have crises. If you do, post as soon as you can, briefly and honestly.

There are no doubt 100 varieties of blog posts that I haven’t covered here, but I thought I’d share this in case you find it useful. I’ve used similar explanations to help new bloggers answer the question, “what should I blog about and what tone should I use?”

In the past week I have become aware of a number of, how do I describe them, unusual Web 2.0 services/sites.

The first is ZobZee, an amazing new service that skips APIs, keyboards, SMS, RSS, and even the USPS to allow users to directly connect their sizable intellects with their social networks.

This evening, the irrepressible Stephen Streight pointed me to two more entries in the race to be the ultimate Web 2.0 destination, The dullest blog in the world, and Zombo, where “everything is possible.”

I hope you’ll take a look at these revolutionary new entries into the world of Web 2.0 innovation. It’s good to know that the “industry,” or whatever the heck we are, has a sense of humor because many of us take ourselves WAY too seriously.

Update: Morton Fox let me know about the mother of all aggregators, FriendFeedFeed.

If you know of other sites/services with a similar value proposition, please add leave a comment and add them below.

Tags: Zombo, ZobZee, dullest blog in the world

I’ve seen a few discussions recently regarding blog comments and whether they constitute “a conversation.” Since I have been on Twitter, and have been writing for Talent Zoo, the number of comments on my blog has gone up. There are a couple of dozen regular readers of this blog that often comment, and their insights have always helped round out the discussion.

Last night I posted the Tale of Little Weasel and Big Weasel, a cautionary contrast of two stories of ethical misbehavior in the blogosphere. Little Weasel’s story came from a blog post written at the beginning of this year by Sabrina Dent, a popular Irish blogger. Sabrina left a comment on my blog indicating that she did not think I had accurately related the story. We both started out with rather critical comments, and as we “discussed” things, both of us began to see each other’s point of view, to learn new facts, and to come to a fundamental agreement on the most important aspects of the story. While perhaps there are better ways to get to know someone, I can honestly report that I know more about Sabrina now, and that I respect her opinion, candor and analytical thinking. I would like to think we are “friends.”

I respond to comments from time to time, but generally tend to write my post and step aside to let commenters weigh in. Often, comments will reference other comments, and additional conversations will go on. I love it when that happens.

I also love to leave comments on blogs. It might surprise you to know I am very opinionated. A comment is also a compliment to the person who wrote the blog, and it is a courtesy to show that you read and understood the post, and that it elicited a reaction strong enough to encourage a response.

I’m not suggesting making a habit of leaving comments just to make people feel better about themselves, although that’s a perfectly fine idea, too. I am suggesting that we all take better advantage of comments, by leaving them more often and going back and continuing the conversation when we receive them.

There is one case in which, clearly, blog comments are not part of a conversation. When an A-list blogger writes a popular and/or controversial post, and the comments can run into the hundreds, I see no value to adding a comment except to say, “hey, I talked to Michael Arrington!” I generally don’t bother commenting on these blogs.

As for the many comments on my blog, there are so many missed opportunities here for me to continue the discussion. If you write a blog, how many times have you asked yourself, “what in the world am I going to blog about next?” There are a couple of really sharp comments that I should have used as guidance in this regard. There is a conversation going on, and if all I do is count comments without responding, I’ve wasted my time and everyone else’s, and I’ve failed to understand and take advantage of this wonderful communications tool.

What do you think? Are blog comments part of a conversation? Do you comment on blogs? When you do, does the person writing the blog respond? Or are comments merely a badge of honor for a blogger to wear?

Tags: blog comments, conversation, sabrina dent

This is the tale of two corporate spokespeople who committed online ethical gaffes. Neither of these stories is breaking news, but together, they represent an interesting contrast between two markedly different ends of the social media ethics spectrum.

The story of Little Weasel is one of anonymous blog commenting run amok. On January 29, a popular Irish blogger, Sabrina Dent, blogged about her experiences with Moli, a Dublin-based start-up that Dent described as “social networking for grownups.” She writes that she was impressed by the service which emphasizes its privacy controls in its marketing. She says upon sign-up that Moli “broke her heart.”

“For all the positioning and talk of ‘protecting your privacy’ MOLI fails at the most basic hurdle. Because it doesn’t cloak new joins; in fact, it has to be displaying them somewhere, because within 15 minutes of joining, the spam started.”

Here’s where the fun begins. A visitor to the blog, Hawk5721 (hereafter known as Little Weasel) left a comment in support of Moli “MOLI is awesome. Exactly what grown ups and business have been waiting for.”

A little snooping by readers of the blog revealed Little Weasel’s comment came from inside Moli. When confronted on the blog about his identity, Little Weasel left this obtuse comment “As far as where i work of course i want to stick up for the company that is going to change the market place.”

At that point, commenters let loose with vicious character attacks, obscenities and name calling. Obviously, Little Weasel had received some counsel, as he decided eventually to reveal that he was actually Moli’s Director of Customer Service, in a no longer anonymous comment:

“Please accept my apologies for using my personal alias when commenting to you about some mis-information I believe you blogged about the company. It was my responsibility to include my company name and title. In the future, I will include my name and title in all posts about company information.

In my capacity as Director of Customer Service, I simply wanted to address, in an informal way, some of the issues that you raised which are well intentioned but do not accurately reflect how privacy works on MOLI.

My email is ddifiore@moli.com and I would be happy to address any additional questions that you may have.”

Obviously too little too late. Five months later in fact, Little Weasel continues to receive blogosphere beatings for his gaffe. In fact, we discussed this case study last week at a PRSA panel in Mountain View.

His behavior was inexcusable, but so was Dent’s and that of the visitors to her blog. I will not reproduce here the foul language and names used to describe Little Weasel, but they would shock all but the coarsest of us. In their own way, all of the people who attacked Little Weasel are guilty of a similar ethical violation: using the relative anonymity of the blogosphere to behave in an incredibly uncivil way. If you were to unleash this kind of vitriol in a business meeting, you would find yourself on the street in ten minutes.

As to the original issue, a couple of things are clear. Little Weasel should have known better. He made a gross error in judgment. He was deceptive. He broke a cardinal principal of social media ethics and when confronted, he dug in and continued the deception.

Little Weasel was not guilty of astroturfing, as Dent asserts. Astroturfing is not a single act of misrepresentation in a blog comment. It is a bogus grassroots campaign, an organized, broad based effort at deception, and there is no evidence that Moli embarked on any such thing. This was a single albeit incredibly stupid act by one ill informed person.

Little Weasel did apologize, a bit late in the game, but the merciless beating on the blog and elsewhere continued. This is because, for some, our friend Daniel stopped being a person and became a case study and a stand-in for all companies that don’t “get” social media, privacy, authenticity, etc.

What else can Moli do at this point? They need to do a little internal social media training. They need to keep Little Weasel off of the blogs for a bit. They need to ask themselves how their positioning as a company concerned with privacy affects how they need to conduct themselves in the blogosphere.

Personally, I think Little Weasel has learned his lesson, and I lost all sympathy for Dent and her supporters once the name calling and obscenities were unleashed. I’m not sure who committed the worst of the ethical breaches that took place here.

Enter Big Weasel

Big Weasel is John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, who came under fire last year when it was revealed he used a pseudonym to make derogatory comments about competitor Wild Oats in Yahoo finance forums at a time when Whole Foods was in discussions to acquire Wild Oats.

While investigations were under way, and the company was under the spotlight, Big Weasel took time off from his blog and his other “online diversions.” Now that he’s been cleared by the courts and the regulators, Big Weasel is back with a sweeping blog post explaining why, despite everything that happened, it was OK to do what he did.

My first reaction: shut up John. I lost a lot of respect for Mackey and Whole Foods when all of this came out last year, and I am losing more with this return performance. It’s like finding out that the founders of Ben and Jerry’s had been hanging out with Eliot Spitzer and were referred to in court documents as Clients 10 and 11 respectively. He does apologize in the post, but with so much justification that the apology gets completely watered down.

Let’s look at some of what passes for Big Weasel’s reasoning. In defense of his failure to disclose his identity on the Yahoo forums, Big Weasel (or more likely his corporate communications people) writes:

“In online communities such as Yahoo!, the use of screen names is the normal custom as it allows posters to totally engage in the various discussions and debates that were taking place there. An online screen name is a great ‘equalizer’ between people.”

Nonsense. This would not apply to the officer of a publicly held corporation. Admittedly, some 60-year-old truckers use screen names like hotteencheerleader472, to equalize things, but we expect more from someone in Big Weasel’s position.

“The true identity in the outside world is irrelevant for purposes of participation in these communities.”

Uh, not according to the SEC’s financial disclosure laws (aka “Reg FD“), or Sarbanes Oxley. Officers of publicly held companies have special obligations when communicating materially about those companies.

Big Weasel then goes on to claim an error in judgment. Again — hello? You’re the CEO of a publicly held company. Your campaign on Yahoo was carried out deliberately over a period of years. The fact that you hid your identity is damnable. Your suggestion that you misinterpreted the situation and suffered a monetary lapse in judgment is insulting to your customers and shareholders.

Big Weasel also asserts that he was simply exercising his First Amendment right to free speech. Any first-year journalism student knows that the First Amendment does not guarantee unlimited freedom to speak. It guarantees freedom of speech, which includes the right to be free from harmful speech.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., said in Schenck v. United States “The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theater and causing a panic.” We also have laws against hate speech, and in commercial enterprises, against making misrepresentations of product superiority or company financial performance. These laws are designed to protect consumers, and we know from the excesses and outright theft perpetrated on them by Enron and others during the dot-com bust, that such protections are necessary.

That Big Weasel would play to the obviously liberal bias of Whole Foods’ customers and shareholders with a First Amendment ploy like this is transparent (a new adventure for Mackey) and reprehensible.

I cannot believe that someone as smart as John Mackey, who built the Whole Foods empire, and has been at the helm of the company for 28 years, could not know he was in ethically dicey territory.

A 16-word comment on Big Weasel’s blog sums the situation up quite nicely: “A corporate officer anonymously posting about their own company and their competitors. Seems unethical to me.”

So, in the case of John Mackey, aka Big Weasel, I am unable to find sympathy. He has the public trust, and he represents a corporation who’s fortunes directly affect the lives of thousands of people. He is answerable to all of these people, and to the SEC, FASB, the FTC ahead of his desire to indulge his misdirected sense of justice or need for self expression.

If I ran Whole Foods corporate communications, I would ban Mackey for life from blogging or otherwise having any kind of direct social media presence.

Such are the stories of Little Weasel and Big Weasel. Both men committed ethical lapses, though clearly, of totally different magnitudes. Is one worse than the other? I think so.

Tags: Moli, Sabrina Dent, Whole Foods, John Mackey, astroturfing