Author: Christopher Carfi

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Chevy Careens Out Of Control (Or Do They?): A Roundup Of The Tahoe / Apprentice Ad Flap

PeakoilThe writing has been fast-and-furious over the weekend, with opinions flying on whether Chevy royally screwed the pooch with their current ad campaign for the Chevy Tahoe, a tie-in (somehow) with the TV show The Apprentice. To summarize: Chevy has set up a site where anyone can create his or her own commercial, splicing together a number of video clips and background music supplied by Chevy. More importantly, these user-generated commercials can have text floating over the images of the creator’s choosing. Therein lies the rub. It’s no surprise (to anyone with an IQ above room temperature) that this has unleashed the creative juices of a number of folks who have found the perfect platform for their messages.

A couple of examples that C|Net has archived can be found here. (Go ahead, check them out if you haven’t seen them. We’ll be here when you get back.)

Thoughts on the situation so far:

Tara Hunt: “[Chevy] should taking advantage of the valuable (even if it is vitriolic) feedback that they are getting and use this as an opportunity to change direction and survive into the future of this community-driven market.”

Doc: “Watch.”

B. L. Ochman: “Proving that execs at big companies, and their agencies, don’t monitor what’s being said online over the weekend, Chevy left thousands of anti-Chevy consumer-made ads on the Chevy Apprentice make-your-own-commercial site this weekend.”

Seth Godin: “Chevy is learning this the hard way with their Tahoe campaign… in which the best commercials are the ones that say, ‘Don’t buy me!'”

TechDirt: “It seems like perhaps GM understood what would happen a lot more than the so-called ‘experts’ give them credit for. In this day, anyone opening up such a contest has to know that it’ll be used for ‘anti’ ads. It’s happened so often that they must have expected it. In fact, by then being open about it, GM is getting even more mileage from this campaign, and making it appear that they are more open to listening to those who disagree with them…So, it’s questionable as to whether or not GM was ‘slow to react’ or if they are simply doing everything according to plan.”

AdRants: “Negative things will always be said about a brand. Understanding and accepting opposing views does far more for a brand’s mojo than killing off divergent opinion. Let’s hope this is what’s happening at Chevy and not that the ads are still up because it’s the weekend and big companies don’t work weekends.”

Carl: “I don’t understand how otherwise rational people look at this campaign as a positive. It would be like letting people create print ads for McDonalds, and publishing all of the ads that talk about cholesterol, fat, calories, carbohydrates and fat kids. And then patting themselves on the back for letting people ‘speak their mind’ and for ‘understanding social networking.’ This campaign can only damage the brand by reinforcing the negatives. Isn’t this marketing 101? The best GM can hope for is to convince all of the people who already hate the product that GM is a cool company with products they hate.”

And a whole bunch more.

I think there are a few things to think about here. One perspective that that this is, in some ways, akin to the LA Times wikitorial fiasco. If that’s the case…the GM didn’t consider the possibility that people would create ads that were not in line with GM’s vision of what should be done…then shame on GM. Any opportunity for “user-generated” media in any topic where there are strong feelings will generate the same spectrum of responses. If that’s the case, GM was simply Not Thinking. Any subject that evokes passionate responses will naturally have this outcome.

A thought: Perhaps a worthwhile tactic to take in these types of situations is to proactively set up areas/categories for the primary viewpoints that are likely to emerge. In the LA Times case, setting up two wikitorials (one “pro-war” and one “anti-war”) may have radically changed the outcome of their experiment. In Chevy’s case, allowing the “directors” of the videos to classify them as “pro-SUV” and “anti-SUV” would have been one way to proactively address the problem. It’s what Scoble did here (“Let The Venom Flow!“), and it’s a very effective tactic in cases where this type of activity is likely to occur. It’s going to happen. Might as well embrace it.

So, it seems from my vantage point that there are three “standard” things that Chevy could do. The options…

  • Option 1: Pull the negative ads
  • Option 2: Leave the negative ads, do nothing (It’s the Marc Canter approach: “I don’t give a damn about what anyone says about me, just spell my name right.”)
  • Option 3: Leave the negative ads, engage

Option 1 is the Bad option. If they go down that road, they’ll get crucified.

Option 2 is an OK option. They may be called “clueless,” but they’ll still be getting some buzz out of the campaign. (And, pragmatically, the folks who are creating the negative ads — as well as the individuals who find that the negative ads resonate with them — probably aren’t going to be buying an SUV anytime soon, anyway.)

Option 3 is a Pretty Good option. In addition to leaving the ads up, trying to understand what the negative-ad-creators are attempting to communicate and putting some plans in place to ACTUALLY address the concerns could rocket GM forward in this regard, if they are able to make some commitments and meet them. There’s some upside here, if they get their act together.

What do you think GM should do, if anything?

UPDATE:

Chevy responds in the NYTimes (registration or bugmenot req’d). The money quote, from Chevy representative Melisa Tezanos:

“We anticipated that there would be critical submissions. You do turn over your brand to the public, and we knew that we were going to get some bad with the good. But it’s part of playing in this space.” (via Adrants)

So, it’s at least Option 2. Wanna trade that and go for door #3, Melisa?

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As a footnote, it’s worth noting that not all the ads are anti-Chevy or anti-SUV. Some are chuckleworthy. Examples:

Snakes On An SUV! (not advised for those with an aversion to profanity)
Badgerbadgerbadger (disclosure: we did this one, inspired by this)
Way too Emo (for Kathy Sierra, apparently)

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And A Benevolent Dictator At That

Will writes:

“when i’m boss of the universe . . .

Two words I’d like to remove from the Universe:

deets – The word is “Details,” not “deets.” “deet” is an important ingredient in insect repellent.

peeped – Did you look at it? Then you saw it. You did not “peep” it. And your friends? They are your friends. They are not your “peeps.” Your “peeps” are tasty little marshmallow chunks, shaped like birds and covered with enough sugar to give you type 2 diabetes after one box. They are especially tasty if you let them reach the perfect point of almost-too-stale before eating them.”

Heh. (And any post with Peeps in it is all right with me.)

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Lame, But Lame

In a post entitled “Lame, But Smart,” Nick Carr writes:

“On the other hand, I think it provides a fair overview of the various ways that corporate bloggers can get their companies into hot water – even without meaning to. Corporate blogs are corporate speech; there’s no way around that.”

He then goes to reprint a list of the “legal risks inherent in employee blogging.” This list includes things such as:

  • Defamation and Privacy Torts. Companies may be held liable if their employees post content to the corporate blog that defames or invades the privacy of third parties. The company and employee in question would then need to look for the assistance of a California defamation lawyer or another legal team that also specializes in defamation.
  • Intellectual Property Infringement. Posts that include a third party’s intellectual property, such as copyrighted material or trademarks, may expose the company to liability for infringement.
  • Gun-Jumping. While a company is in registration, statements made on a company blog “hyping” the company could be deemed a prohibited offer of the company’s securities, in violation of federal securities laws.

Nick, corporate speech is corporate speech, isn’t it? It doesn’t matter if it’s on a blog or not. It could be in email. It could be in a memo. It could be in a public, oral presentation done by the CEO. When Salesforce.com’s IPO got pushed back (multiple times, if memory serves), it was due to statements that Marc Benioff made in the press and in public, not in a blog. Tying the points above to blogging is a red herring; it’s off-base and sensationalist.

A professional, acting in a sensible manner, will avoid the “risks of blogging” in the exact same way he or she would when speaking at a conference, or when speaking to a reporter, or when creating a document. Singling out the points above as “risks of blogging” is unneccessarily focusing on the medium; the real issue is in the message.

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Congrats To Coghead On Their First Round Funding

FINALLY can talk about this.

Paul McNamara, Greg Olsen and the rest of the team have had a big day. (Paul and Greg are the ones who generated the “Going Bedouin” concept that’s been buzzing around the last few weeks.) Big news today on two fronts:

1) They announced the new name of their company: Coghead. Love it? Hate it? Tell ’em here.

2) Coghead has announced $3.2 million in first round funding from El Dorado Ventures.

Congrats again, guys! Check out their new site here.

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Bill Brantley Groks Haystack

Bill Brantley writes:

“I was first lured to Cerado’s site by their “Web 2.0 or Star Wars Quiz” which challenges you to determine if a term is a Web 2.0 concept or a Star Wars character. Anyway, I clicked on their Haystack link which appears to be a MySpace for business folks. Now, it took me a couple of reads to understand the concept but what I think you do is you register your organization and have members of your organization create profiles. Then you can find other similarly-minded folks in other organizations and voila – instant business networking. Each profile links to the person’s blog (if they have one) and the profiles are tagged which enhances the chances of finding a good match.”

Bill…Yes! (Only thing I’d add to that off-the-cuff is that there are a bunch of other use cases as well.)

Read more here.

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It Looks Like Moore’s Law Applies To Personal Hygiene, Too

The Economist writes: “It took a leisurely 70 years after King Gillette invented the safety razor for someone to come up with the idea that twin blades might be—or, at least sell—better. Since then, the pace of change has accelerated, as blade after blade has been added to razors in an attempt to tech-up the “shaving experience”.

For the most cynical shavers, this evolution is mere marketing. Twin blades seemed plausible. Three were a bit unlikely. Four, ridiculous. And five seems beyond the pale.”

Read the whole thing here.

(hat tip: Mike Yamamoto)

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On Disclosure, Transparency and Ethics

We started out talking about cell phones, and somehow have ended up at the foundations of right and wrong. NetworkWorld’s Paul McNamara writes about Sprint’s promotion originally discussed here.

McNamara:“Sprint didn’t ask me to be an ambassador. Perhaps that’s because my blog is new. Or maybe the company is savvy enough to realize that professional journalist-bloggers operate under ethical restrictions that generally preclude accepting freebies. (Or maybe it’s the fact that my blog is, ahem, relatively undiscovered.)
Whatever the reason, it was never going to be.

But reading the posts written by Carfi and Dowdell did get me to thinking: Might it be time to rethink those ethical restrictions that would have forced me to decline the invitation Sprint never offered? I mean Carfi demonstrated quite emphatically that a credible voice cannot be bought for the price of a free cell phone.

Shouldn’t professional journalists be afforded the same benefit of the doubt by their bosses and readers?

The mere suggestion will be considered heresy by many a journalist — and they’ll have a good case. After all, credibility is everything in this business and we have enough challenges maintaining it without adding on another.”

Here’s my disclosure: I strongly feel that, ultimately, these issues fall to the individual. A typical code of ethics (here’s a snippet from the New York Times) states:

“Staff members and those on assignment for us may not accept anything that could be construed as a payment for favorable coverage or for avoiding unfavorable coverage. They may not accept gifts, tickets, discounts, reimbursements or other benefits from individuals or organizations covered (or likely to be covered) by their newsroom. Gifts should be returned with a polite explanation; perishable gifts may instead be given to charity, also with a note to the donor. In either case the objective of the note is, in all politeness, to discourage future gifts.”

The Times assumes that neutrality can’t be maintained. Or, perhaps more correctly, it feels that readers may assume that any good words (or the lack of bad words) are a result of a perquisite, and not the true feelings of the writer.

Perhaps it is time for this thinking to evolve a bit. We all have printing presses now, and every one of us has a point of view that is colored by our experiences. That is a fact. In some cases, those experiences are geographic and cultural; they are the experiences of the environments in which we live. In other cases, those experiences are interpersonal; they are the results of shared time with friends and colleagues, or perhaps a debate with someone with whom we disagree. What if, instead of trying to achieve objectivity (which is a fool’s errand), we instead disclose the items that we realize are forming the bases of our opinions?

Jay Rosen writes:

“I used to teach that the ethics of journalism, American-style, could be found in the codes, practices and rule-governed behavior that our press lived by. Now I think you have to start further back, with beliefs way more fundamental than: “avoid conflicts of interest in reporting the news.” If you teach journalism ethics too near the surface of the practice, you end up with superficial journalists.

The ethics of journalism begin with propositions like: the world is basically intelligible if we have accurate reports about it; public opinion exists and ought to be listened to; through the observation of events we can grasp patterns and causes underneath them; the circle of people who know how things work should be enlarged; there is something called “the public record” and news adds itself meaningfully to it; more information is good for it leads to greater awareness, which is also good; stories about strangers have morals and we need to hear them, and so on. These are the ethics I would teach first.”

and David Weinberger expounds:

“Is there something we can meaningfully refer to as “the public record,” as Jay says?

The Public Record (caps, singular and definite article) has become A Record Filtered by the Incumbents. We now also have a public space that is self-documenting. Now that there are also public records — plural, lower case and indefinite — The Public Record has become less authoritative, and, we hope, less authoritarian.”

It is now trivially easy for anyone — journalist, blogger, customer, neighbor — to document their experiences in words, pictures and video. There are public records and The Public Record (which can be self-correcting).

So the question: Do disclosure and transparency and personal reputation make up the foundations of a set of “new ethics” that are coming into being?

[Update: Elizabeth Albrycht is poking at a different side of this today as well, in Transparency and Possibility. And John T. Unger pushes things way ahead in the comments below.]