Still there is people within the industry that claim for the need of professional journalism, among other things, to sustain democracy. If so, I wonder why none is willing to pay for it? Neither consumers nor advertisers or government, as far as I can understand?

As citizens, we would like to know what’s going on, keep ourselves informed. We would like to hear about the latest in the topics we’re interested in. We would like the truth from sources we can rely on. We would like the overview and the details. We want the hard core facts combined with vivid descriptions. And so on.

But we want to express ourselves, as well. Especially in subjects we are engaged and interested in and masters. But we also want share experiences and happenings that just cross our ways or minds, stories we think matters for the neighborhood.

As you well know, the journalists have always been the middleman to meet our needs in this matter, because they’ve been the only ones that got the exclusive opportunities to investigate, refine, edit, produce and distribute stories. And their media have become the gatekeeper or the bottle neck as communication channels. To such an extent that we’ve been prepared (or forced) to pay for it. As consumers or advertisers, each in his special way. But the willingness to pay decreases.

Now days, journalism is a fabulous mix of millions of citizens sharing their experiences and knowledge with each others, via thousands of web services and devices that take care of editing, refining, publishing, packaging and distributing parts, as well. Sometimes in collaboration with professional journalists and media. But mostly not.

The question is what the professional journalists really can bring to the table? And who’s willing to pay for it? No light in the tunnel, what I can see. The news business seems to be broken. And “the owner of the media fumbles in the dark” as Fredrik Strömberg and Jonas Nordling says in Mediavärlden (in Swedish)

A few weeks ago I attend to Berlingske Media international conference about – What Professional Journalism Means for Democracy – as a speaker.

Lisbeth Knudsen, the Chairman of The Berlingske Foundation, wrote in the invitation letter:

For decades, professional journalism has played an important role in our democracies. It still does. But the traditional commercial media business is challenged in its traditional publishing role. The old business model is dead, and the new ones are still not profitable enough to support the same number of professional journalists that the old model could finance.

Being the DNA of our democracy as public watchdogs and creators of the local and national forums for debates, the traditional media business needs to find new ways of financing the expensive part of their business: producing original, investigative, indept journalism.

Can we generate a political debate, political awareness and political involvement on news snacks, news copies and entertainment media?

In Denmark newspapers provide 70% of all original journalism reporting. What are the consequences for our democracy, if professional journalism continues to shrink?

Does it matter at all? How important is quality journalism to our society? Can companies, individuals, institutions, governments, WikiLeaks and others inform us directly? Does our democracy need professional journalistic filtering?

With speakers like Dan Gillmor, Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, Anne McElvoy – the discussion became truly hot. But we never agreed on whether professional journalists are needed or not.

From my point of view, I’ve hard to believe that Denmark’s newspaper is providing 70% of all original journalism reporting. And I don’t think the traditional media is the DNA of our democracy as public watchdogs. I do think, though, that the wisdom of the crowd are the “new watchdogs”. Or as the New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen says: “the more people who participate in the press, the stronger it will be.”

One of millions great example of that is Maria Hägglöfs trip with the subway a couple of days ago.The wagon she were sitting in caught fire, and people got scared. She began to report from the scene; shooting photos and videos, writing tweets, etc.

After some time professional journalists of all kind found her tweets and contacted her. And the story got coverage all over.

No big deal, just crowd source that it use to be, right? But what did surprise Maria was that none of these professional journalists actually brought anything new to the table. Maria wrote in her blog post:

“I would say that if journalists today weren’t so incredibly lazy, if they actually strive to do something more than what I’ve already done….”
“… today’s journalists often don’t do more than what citizens have already done via Twitter.”

Ironically, this happening took place on her way to one of the first unconferences about journalism in Sweden, where one of the topics were about who would pay for the  “professional journalism”.

“What happens when journalism is everywhere?” does Mathew Ingram wonder in his post in Gigaom. He writes:

“We are beginning to find out. And while it may be a frightening prospect if you are a traditional media company, there is a lot to be optimistic about if you are just interested in the news. A world where everyone is a journalist may be a bit more chaotic and a bit more complicated than the one we are used to, but it will also be a bit more free, and that is clearly a good thing.” Because: “Freedom of the press becomes a lot more important when everyone is the press — or rather, when the internet itself becomes the press.”

To be continued…

To add… a slice of media history

In the first place these social networks giants was created for people to connect with people. Or “friends and family” as Facebook use to call it. With their “profiles” as a basis for the communication within the network.

Then the time came for the companies to engage with their target audience. With their “pages” as a basis for their communication. And I guess the battle has just begun.

As far as I can see and understand both of these giants have just ended up into a massive clash! Where the value proposition for their users (as companies, brands, and others) is very much the same.

Of course they both have advantages and disadvantages. The SiliconIndia says for an example:

The greatest benefit of branding products in Google plus will be the link up with search engine. The search engine will track the brands on Google plus pages easily and will bring them to the top list in the search engine. Just typing “+Google” will take the user directly to the company’s profile page.
Facebook has again got something that will affect their market. The like button of Facebook is similar to the +1 button on Google plus. The hangout button is simpler to use when compared to video chat in Facebook with Skype. Now Google plus also going corporate will be a tough completion to Facebook pages.

Well – as I said – the battle has just begun… and I’ll will follow this war with great interest.

Now – I’ve just created my own “Google+ page” and I’m looking forward to see yours, and follow your point of view in this matter. Mashable show you how to get started.

So what was everyone talking about? “Engagement” of course. Engage with the people that matters. Find them, listen to them, understand their needs, serve them and treat them as humans, because they are humans, like everybody else. Not once in a while. But continuously – 24/7.

They were talking about engagement with influential people. Particularly about people with more influence than others. Some of them are (still) journalists. But these day, many of them are thought leaders, customers, industry spokesmen, blogers, and others, or a mix of these as well.

Words and phrases like “conversation”, “social media”, “share”, “followers”, “trust”, “transparency” and others, all of them intimately connected with the concept of “engagement”, were on everyone’s lips as well as on banners, magazines, give aways.

I think Pitchengine’s ad, in the program sheet, described the situation pretty well:

“I have listened to the same social media presentation over and over again. I have heard the word “engagement” 27 times today. What I need is the real thing.”

Unfortunately – I think Pitchengine stumbled at the finish line when the company claimed to deliver the entire solution as “the real thing”. Because they don’t. Maybe they  should have written: “What I need is to show engagement”, and also offer that kind of platform?

But Pitchengine offers a sharing platform for content. Maybe one of the hottest on the market right now. And invites their audience to “create your own media empire”. Great! But where’s the real engagement thing?

Marketwire, Businesswire, Cision, PRNewswire, Vocus, Meltwater Press, Mymediainfo – they’re all stucked in their solutions in terms of mediadatabases and distributionslists. Some of them, like Meltwater Press and Cision (Cision Influence), have added (or will add) value to the profiles of the targets, in form av their social preferences and previous works. And that’s great, as well! But – still – where’s the real engagement?

As a matter of fact, all of these companies (still) offer their clients “management tools” with which they can organize and manage their “target groups”. Most of them are offering monitoring services to let their clients get an idea of what’s going on out there. Some of them are brilliant, like Traackr, which let their customers to find their most powerful influencers.

But – then again – what happens with the real engagement, in terms of understand and serve this VIP’s, based on what they’re saying and eventually asking for?

As far as I can see and understand, the real engagement take place in communities and networks, not in or as a result of “management tools”?

Chris Brogan – one of the key speakers at the conference, and the author of “Trust Agents: Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation and Earn Trust” recommend his audience to use Google Reader to build their “listening stations”. Exactly what Eric Schwartzman, co-author of “Social Marketing to the Business Customer”, did during his Social Media Boot Camp work shop.

Chris Brogan says in his book:

“Once you have determined where your community is on the web, or perhaps after you’ve built your own online presence as  a meeting place for a group that doesn’t yet have a place to belong, the next step is to engage a community.
This community may be a loosely joined group of people with individual minds and opinions who share some common interests or passions via their own unique perspective.

Here are five steps to help you reach into your community and learn:

1. Listen comes first. Pay attention to where people (that matters to you) interact.
2. Measure the conversations.
3. Take small steps. The first actions you make shouldn’t be intrusive. You just want the community to know you’re there and you’re friendly. Create opportunities for small, memorable exchanges. Build you profile as someone know by being around and monitoring conversations, recognizing who’s a regular and who makes decisions.
4. Lead a new initiative. When the time is right and you’re a bit better known, try making a move to bring your self more into the center of things.
5. Profit! Okay, we’re kidding. But seriously, small, daily action helps. And being inside the right community is a great way to build business, glean insider knowledge, and get an edge in your niche.”

So why do PR practioners insist to organize and manage their fellows rather than engage with them? I just don’t get it.

PRSA Facts:
Chartered in 1947, the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) is the world’s largest and foremost organization for public relations professionals. PRSA is responsible for representing, educating, setting standards of excellence, and upholding principles of ethics for its members and, in principle, the $4 billion U.S. public relations profession.

The PRSA International Conferences are one of the largest and most renowned in the U.S PR industry.

A few month ago I wrote a post about “Why Marketers Should Care About Content Curation”. As a matter of fact I didn’t write it. I just curated another post by Derek Edmond from Search Engine Land with a similar headline “Why B2B Search Marketers Should Care About Content Curation”. And he wrote it from a SEO perspective:

“B2B search engine marketers realize new content creation is a critical tactic in an effective SEO strategy. But it is also realized, as illustrated in the Marketingsherpa chart below, the level of effort required to successfully develop new content may be significant, in comparison to other tactics. Therefore, with limited resources and immediate lead generation goals, it is not surprising when we find that new content generation falls behind other SEO initiatives on the priority list. Enter content curation. While not a substitute for new development, content curation can help B2B organizations provide important information to their market.”

Since Google launched the Panda I don’t know If this matters anymore? Because as you might know, Google Panda is the “filter designed by Google to spot low-quality content”, as Catch Pope from the Australien “Curated Content Agency” put it.

If you’re not sure what “low-quality content” is, maybe Amit Singhal, Google’s head of search, explanation on the official Google blog, make sense? He says:

“Below are some questions that one could use to assess the “quality” of a page or an article. These are the kinds of questions we ask ourselves as we write algorithms that attempt to assess site quality. Think of it as our take at encoding what we think our users want.

• Would you trust the information presented in this article?
• Is this article written by an expert or enthusiast who knows the topic well, or is it more shallow in nature?
• Does the site have duplicate, overlapping, or redundant articles on the same or similar topics with slightly different keyword variations?
• Would you be comfortable giving your credit card information to this site?
• Does this article have spelling, stylistic, or factual errors?
• Are the topics driven by genuine interests of readers of the site, or does the site generate content by attempting to guess what might rank well in search engines?
• Does the article provide original content or information, original reporting, original research, or original analysis?
• Does the page provide substantial value when compared to other pages in search results?
• How much quality control is done on content?
• Does the article describe both sides of a story?
• Is the site a recognized authority on its topic?
• Is the content mass-produced by or outsourced to a large number of creators, or spread across a large network of sites, so that individual pages or sites don’t get as much attention or care?
• Was the article edited well, or does it appear sloppy or hastily produced?
• For a health related query, would you trust information from this site?
• Would you recognize this site as an authoritative source when mentioned by name?
• Does this article provide a complete or comprehensive description of the topic?
• Does this article contain insightful analysis or interesting information that is beyond obvious?
• Is this the sort of page you’d want to bookmark, share with a friend, or recommend?
• Does this article have an excessive amount of ads that distract from or interfere with the main content?
• Would you expect to see this article in a printed magazine, encyclopedia or book?
• Are the articles short, unsubstantial, or otherwise lacking in helpful specifics?
• Are the pages produced with great care and attention to detail vs. less attention to detail?
• Would users complain when they see pages from this site?”

And as you might see, some of these bullets seems to criticize the curated content; or at least some of the curated content seems to be “low-quality content”. And Google might punish your site for that, seen from a SEO perspective? But… I still think marketers (and others) should care about content curation, because that’s a great way to share interesting stories etc with your stakeholders, the people you care about. And not to forget – it’s not just about sharing, it’s about contribution and reflections as well.

Therefore I was not surprised when Richard MacManus recently wrote the article “How Tumblr is changing journalism” for Read Write Web.

As you might know Tumblr is a super easy and smooth blogging tool, but also a sharing tool, or a content curation tool. Becuase that’s pretty much how people are using it. Tumblr themselves says the tool “lets you effortlessly share anything”.

And I don’t know if the curation trend is one of the reasons why Tumblr, with it’s 12 billion page views per month, just hit knockout on WordPress, which is not a curation tool?

So I think it was just a question of time before the journalists, who are already experts on rewrites, would start using the tool (or others) “to power” their news websites, as Richard MacManus put it.

He mention the Tumblr-powered news service, ShortFormBlog, as an example.

“The concept behind ShortFormBlog is very simple: to publish really short posts throughout the day. The site publishes over 200 posts per week, an average of about 30 per day.”

Pretty successful as far as I know.

So now we’re waiting for the trend to really take off in marketers and PR staff’s newsroom.

As a matter of fact, IBM were using Tumblr when they already in November, 2008, launched the Smarter Planet project to help people grasp IBM’s Smarter Planet initiative. The site “uses frequently updated, “microblogging” entries to illustrate how the Smarter Planet vision is unfolding across IBM and across the world.”

Vinny Lingham, Entrepreneur & Search Engine Marketer, wrote the 13th of Juni 2007 that “Facebook is the new internet”. He said:

“I am constantly astounded by what FaceBook is doing – they just get it! Yahoo should have really paid the $2bn they asked for them last year – they’re probably worth $5bn by now! If FaceBook becomes another Google – I think everyone at Yahoo will probably revolt!
I personally think that MySpace sucks – and they are a bunch of Generation W’s that just don’t understand what the web is about! FaceBook will overtake MySpace globally well within 18 months – that’s my prediction!”

He was probably not the first guy that realized that something big was going on. But he was one of them. And I remember I did laugh at his headline by then. Maybe I shouldn’t. I knew that Vinny didn’t mean exactly that. Nor did Mark Zuckerberg when I once met him during an early FOWA conference in London, even though he already had some delusions of grandeur.

But – seriously – what’s going on – really?

Nielsen just released their Social Media Report Q3 2011, which shows that “the Social networks and blogs continue to dominate Americans’ time online, now accounting for nearly a quarter of total time spent on the Internet. In the U.S., social networks and blogs reach nearly 80 percent of active U.S. Internet users and represent the majority of Americans’ time online. Americans spend more time on Facebook than they do on any other U.S. website.”

Since Vinny’s post, hundreds of engaged people has speculated if Facebook is the new Internet or not.

From my point of view, I still don’t think that Facebook will become the new Internet, if you may call it so, but what I do understand is that people are social, and we love services that treat us like that, with all of our social needs and wants. It is beyond any reasonable doubt that Mark Zuckerberg has succeeded in doing just that – to provide social services for social people. And it is becoming increasingly clear that other web services haven’t responded to our requests on that point.

Around that time when Vinny Lingham wrote that “Facebook is the new internet”, Jeff Jarvis wrote the historical quote from Mark, in the Guardian, when the “powerful newspaper publisher beseeched Mark Zuckerberg” in Davos “for advice on how he could build and own his community. The famously laconic Zuckerberg replied “You can’t.” Zuckerberg went on to explain that communities already exist and the question these magnates should ask instead is how they can help them to do what they want to do. Zuckerberg’s prescription was “elegant organisation”.”

So as long as no one else will organize the web to help people “to do what they want to do” on the Internet, maybe Facebook will continue to take lead on that. The question is how far they could go?

From my point of view – not so far. Facebook is and probably will be one of the most important network for socializing, and – yes – we might book our flight tickets there as well. But… The most likely scenario is that the whole world wide web will be “Facebookalized”. Facebook will work in symbiosis with the rest of the web and vice versa. Thousands of small web applications will permeate Facebook. And thousands of Facebook applications will permeate the entire web. “Like buttons”, “Sign up with Facebook”-features, are just a few examples. I think the web – the Internet – will be socialized, and we have to thank Mark for inspired lectured the rest of us to execute on that.

Mark won’t organize the whole web for us; the crowd will. But Mark is one of them. A true thought leader. Thank God (Mark) for that

And – no – this is video doesn’t show the entire life of Alex Droner, but it might show a tiny part of it.

Today, a few years later, they’ve obviously been taken another maybe even more important step towards relationship; they have launched a communication strategy that should aim to create relationships between different stakeholders and that will be a key competitive advantage for the Swedish Armed Forces as an employer. Traditional one-way communication is no longer an effective method for an organization in transition and evolution.

One of the initiatives is their today launched blog portal, where Erik Lagersten, Communications Director, is writing the post “From information to relationship”. He says:

“Few areas have changed so fundamentally that information or communications in recent years. Technological evolution and the people’s ability to “establish connections” has foiled many ingrained behaviors. Conventional authority communications in particular. These days it’s the target groups needs and wants that matters, not the communicators. Once there’s too big a gap between the target group and the communicator, there’ll be a gap of credibility as well, that can be difficult to bridge. We’re also aware of that the most trustworthy stories comes from our employees. Whether the content is perceived as positive or negative. The more voices the stronger organization.”

This might be a small step for the Swedish Armed Forces – but I tell you – it’s a huge step for the PR industry that most of you guys (readers) are a part of.

I’m really looking forward to see many government authorities as followers.

PS. Check out their video about their communication strategy as well. It’s in Swedish though. DS.

And why not read the Bisonblog about the same topic as well…

But what’s their socializing status? Really? God knows.

71% of the companies (which?) are using Facebook, 59% are using Twitter, and 39% are using blogs in their “marketing”.

My experience though is that many of the companies are still using social media as another channel for their content. Take a look at their Facebook pages for an example. Some of the companies are just pushing their stories out, without listen, and then they’re counting the numbers of “likes” without answer the questions: Am I really committed to my audience? Am I engaged? Who is really engaged? If the likers never comment the companies updates or never contribute with anything to the wall. And vice versa… what’s left of the social part?

Let me refer to what Kevin Roberts, CEO World wide, Saatchi & Saatchi, says in his book “Lovemarks“:

“Forget the information Economy. Human attention has become our principal currency. Job number one for any marketer these days is competing for attention. Whoever you are. Wherever you are. But once you’ve captured that attention, you’ve got to show you deserve it.

The process really only has two steps – so why does everyone find it so hard? I think I’ts all because we obsess over the attention part and forget about why we need that attention in the first place…. We need the relationships.

Emotional connections with consumers have to be att the foundation of all our cool marketing moves and innovative tactics.So it’s time to stop racing after every new fad and focus on making consistent, emotional connections with customer and stakeholders. If you stand for nothing, you fall for everything.

The great journey from products to trademarks and from trademarks to brands is over. Trademarks are tablestakes. Brand are tablestakes. Both are useful in the quest for differentation and vital to survival, BUT they’re not winning game-breakers.

Today the stakes have reached a new high. The social fabric is spread more thinly than ever. People are looking for new, emotional connections. They’re looking for what they can love.”

At least my conclusion was that I don’t think the company itself nor the brand itself has a social graph. Because a brand is not a human being. Anyone may be connected to, and even have relations with brands but not social relations. Because you got to be human to socialize. But your brand is a social object and your products as well. Because people are talking about them. Some are more engaged than others, and some more angry than others. But people are sharing their thoughts about your brand. And I guess the sum of these people, that have your company (and/or your brand) as a social object, are the same thing as the company’s social graph, or at least the sum of the parts of their social graphs that are related or relevant to the company and/or their brand. We’re talking about the company’s employees, customers, stakeholders, and others.

Further on – if that’s the case – I do think the company can use and cultivate that kind of a social graph – with an extreme outcome. I’ll tell you why and how further down in this post. But first – let’s take it from the beginning:

We’re all human beings, right? We’re people. And people are social. We group ourselves into social networks, and talking to each other about different kind of social objects, and engage ourselves in communities.

It doesn’t matter if we’re consumers, suppliers, communicators or journalists. We all got to understand how we socialize, which is “the process of inheriting and disseminating norms, customs and ideologies through conversations, behaviors, practices, rituals and education”…. that “provide the individual with the skills and habits necessary for participating within their own society”.

A network is just elements connected to each other. But social network is individuals connected to each other.

And the Social Object is “the node” in these social networks. The Social Object is the reason why two people are talking to each other, as opposed to talking to somebody else.

And a group of individuals that have these social objects in common and share these interests with each other – are members of a community. Everyone on this planet is a member of a community, I guess?

Then Mark Zuckerberg took a part of this social environment to the web, and more or less invented the term “Social Graph” which describes the relationships between individuals online. Frankly it’s the global mapping of everybody and how they’re related.

My experiences are that companies and their marketing staff intellectually do understand the situation, and are in some sort of consideration phase, but that they are truly stressed about this “social graph” and the relationship-humbo-jumbo talk.

But if we do agree that “the sum of the people, that have your company (and/or your brand) as a social object, are the same thing as the company’s social graph, or at least the sum of the parts of their social graphs that are related or relevant to the company and/or their brand”. Then it wouldn’t be to hard for the company to benefit from this social environment. Let me give you a few examples what you as a communicator can do:

1. Identify who’s connected to your brand.
2. Find out if your brand is a social object (with sub subjects), and if that might have resulted in different kind of communities.
3. Find out how these communities look like.
1. Who are members.
2. What exactly are they talking about.
4. Become a member by yourself and serve the other members in these communities.
5. Inspire those who are only connected to your brand but not talking about it, to become members and engage, the company’s employees in particular.
6. Help these communities to grow and flourish as a whole.

I think for an example these guys (and organizations) might be connected to your brand, among many others:

• Employees (and former employees)
• Members of the Board
• Owners
• Customers (and former customers)
• Supppliers
• Retailers
• Partners
• Industry spokesmen and thought leaders
• Industry colleagues
• Competitors
• Ambassadors
• Journalists

They know your company. And they are all connected. And they all are important to you. But that doesn’t mean they are talking to each other nor with you or your staff about your brand. They might only be connected. They might be connected to your brand and talking to each other about it, but not with you and your staff. They might be connected to your brand, yourself and your staff as well, but not talking about it with anyone. Or they might be both connected to your brand, yourself and your staff, and talking about it with everyone.

These ones who are talking about your brand, have for sure different kind of needs and wants. And they probably talking about that specific angle of your brand in different kind of forum, in different sub communities.

No matter what group they belong, they all can be a member of these communities that talking about your brand.

Can your company own a such communities? Probably not. You can’t own a social object. You can’t even own your brand as a social object. They all are parts of the social environment!

But you can help an existing community to grow and flourish. Especially the ones who are connected to your brand.

You can be a proud member of the existing ones. You can invite other peoples to the existing ones. You can also set up “your own” (another) forum for an existing community to help it grow. And you can call that “your community” if you like. Just because that’s the community you’re involved in, or created a new forum for (as the owner / administrator).

But a community is boundless. Some of the members can easily pop up somewhere else, and the rest of the members will follow.

If you’re interested in this topic, please read “Your company has a social graph” as well.

Then you should create a business page for Google+. But hold it! Maybe you should wait for a while, until Google show you the green light.

Some companies like Ford just run into the field for action. They created a personal profile as a company brand. Exactly what business did in the good old Facebook era when pages didn’t exist.

Google is of course aware of this, and telling us not to.

Google+ Product manager, Christian Oestlien, says on his profil:

“We have been watching Google+ take shape over the last week and we’ve seen some really great companies get involved. But frankly we know our product as it stands is not optimally suited to their needs. In fact, it was kind of an awkward moment for us when we asked Ford for his (or was it her?) gender!

How users communicate with each other is different from how they communicate with brands, and we want to create an optimal experience for both. We have a great team of engineers actively building an amazing Google+ experience for businesses, and we will have something to show the world later this year.”

But also add that:

“If you represent a “non-user entity” (e.g. business, organization, place, team, etc.) and would like to apply for consideration in our limited program (and be amongst the first to be alerted when the business product launches) you can sign up here:”

http://goo.gl/zq95C

One small paradox is that Christian Oestlien uses his personal profil for business matters like this… It’s a mess, isn’t it?