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Public Relations in the Web 2.0 era? A new white paper has been produced by Squiz in association with Text 100 PR called Communications 2.0. It’s available here (registration required).

The paper discusses what Web 2.0 is, how businesses might adopt some of the approaches it brings, how their PR will change as a result and ends with a ‘manifesto’…

To practise Communications 2.0 is to:

1. Cede a portion of editorial control to your users – give them proper channels where they can get involved
2. Treat your web site as a database of content, not a static publication – use open standards-based technology
3. Incorporate user-generated content into your web site to help cross and up-sell your services – offer comment sections, forums and content-tagging
4. Place a web component within every single communications exercise – all your audiences are on the web so this is mandatory (to ignore the web would be like having an early 20th century ad campaign without newspapers!)
5. Look before you leap – Listening and monitoring through tools such as blogs should become a no-brainer. It’s an excellent way to dip your toe into the water, understand what’s going on and even get input from your community on the best way to pursue further engagement
6. Assess your organizational readiness and prepare your engagement carefully - you need to consider HR, legal and IT issues before you embark on a new ‘communications 2.0’ strategy
7. Develop a new PR policy – decide what you should do, why you’re doing it and then, in the words a famous sports shoe manufacturer, JUST DO IT!
8. Consider the use open source software in order to deploy new communications channels cost-effectively – don’t reinvent the wheel: the solution is out there somewhere
9. Introduce new web-based tactics quickly and often – you have nothing to lose - everyone remembers the successes and forgets the (inexpensive) failures
10. Measure everything that you do, all of the time – it’s easy with the web. Make sure you get your hands on decent web site stats and talk to your PR/web agency about how you can track campaigns more effectively
11. Invest in the tactics that are working and pull the one’s that aren’t
12. Approach the discipline of communications as a process, a dialogue – don’t be afraid of the market talking back….embrace user comment and content and put mechanisms in place that encourage it – it’s far cheaper than a focus group

I know the paper wasn’t really intended for public consumption but I find this a little disturbing. They’re talking about the Web 2.0 era or attitude purely as a way to flog more stuff (check number 3). User content as a cheap focus group (12). Also, don’t 6, 7 and 9 contradict each other? Either you act quickly because failures don’t matter (9) and JUST DO IT (7) or you plan carefully (6). For me, one of the key advantages of this brave new world for companies is that it gives them the chance to be better and make better stuff. The paper doesn’t say anything about that. But maybe that’s just me in my little dream world.

I’m sure that my PR colleagues Simon, Simon, Antony, Drew and Stuart - who actually have some expertise in these matters - will have more to say on this subject.

While marketers are keen to test the waters with viral campaigns, the evidence for their effectiveness remains pretty shakey. Remember Snakes on a Plane anyone? From Internet Retailer:

20% of online advertisers surveyed by Jupiter Research say they plan to test viral marketing in vehicles such as blogs this year—but Jupiter also found that most consumers don’t trust product information they get on social media sites. The winning advertising campaigns will plan for this by supporting viral campaigns with more conventional forms of online advertising…

…The Jupiter report points out that because the social media space is just emerging, viral marketing within social media is faced by a degree of mistrust from consumers. The survey determined that 69% of consumers don’t trust the product information they get on social media sites. Consumers were twice as likely to trust product information on a company web site or professional review site.

It seems odd to me that the report suggests that greater familiarity with viral campaigns on social media sites are likely to increase their success. I would have thought the opposite would be the case: if I know someone is trying to market to me, surely I’m likely to be more resistant to that effort?