The REALLY BIG story of the Wal-Mart/Edelman fake blog situation

Plenty of people have been criticizing Edelman, so I've been sitting it out. It is now time to take a step back and look at the big implication: The PR and marketing professions must commit themselves to changing course now, or they will crash into the mountain of consumer control.

Let's face it, this could probably have happened to any big PR firm or company that is blogging these days. The fact that it happened at Edelman, one of the self-declared leaders in using social media with some of the highest-profile bloggers out there, says as much or more about the chasm the profession will have to cross as it does about any one individual company.

For a generation or more, PR has been about spin. Finding a clever story angle is what PR people are trained to do. Marketing is the same, except they call it "positioning". Each new strategy starts from the basic premise of how to magnify the positives and deny any potential negatives. Exaggeration, careful selection of facts, and creating enticing ways to present the messages are not only accepted, but the fabric of every day work. In advertising, they are limited only by truth in advertising laws.

But consumer mistrust of advertising and media make these unspoken assumptions obsolete and dangerous to the health of companies and their marketing/PR partners. Before we launch a campaign, we must begin to put its concept through a new filter. After we ask "Is it on strategy" and "Is it compelling to the audience?", we must now ask "Is it ethical?". And we must train everyone in our organizations, down to the entry level assistant account executive, media relations manager, and marketing associate to ask this question.

The WOMMA Ethics code is a great start on specific areas of honesty in relationship, opinion, and identity. (Disclosure: I am a member of the Board of Directors of WOMMA). Now it -- or some similar guidelines -- must be incorporated into the curricula, training programs, and OJT learning that takes place every day.

Marketing and PR have been on autopilot for decades. The collision warning system just alarmed us that we're heading straight into the side of a mountain.

What are you doing to change the course of your organization?

edelman walmart micropersuasion richard+edelman flog public+relations wal-marting+across+america