Liars

The Interview (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I am never at my best in job interviews. I’m a disastrous candidate (I was once stopped in the middle of an interview to be told my ‘interview persona sucks’) and even worse as an interrogator. Never a great lover of formality, I find the stilted nervousness appalling.

The other day a candidate asked me what was the difference between PR and advertising. It struck me as an odd question to ask in an interview for a PR job, but I did my best to answer it. And my answer boiled down to this.

Public Relations - as I see it - is the communications discipline. It is about driving structured, benefit-led change. In my professional career, fifteen years now, in public relations I have never told a single lie. Never.

But advertising is all about lying. It's what they do, constantly. What amazes me is how we put up with it, consigning it to the dump bin of background noise when actually we should be protesting it. Look at HSBC's most recent radio ad in the UAE. "At HSBC, we believe that..."

No you don't. That's simply a lie. You do not collectively believe in personal loans with 'keen' (6.5% is competitive, apparently.) interest rates. It's not a corporate value. In fact, your offer is not driven in any way by a "belief", other than a commercial imperative. So why do you find it appropriate to so glibly misrepresent yourselves in this way?

Axe does not make men attractive. Oh, sure, it's an amusing way to highlight the 'brand essence' of the product. It's also a lie. It smells like toilet freshener. I have yet to meet a woman attracted by the smell of toilet freshener. Pantypads don't make you a more successful mum and microwave dinners don't mean more time to enjoy the family. Famously, I would contend a Mars a day doesn't really help you work, rest and play. It just tastes nice and is bad for you. There's no medical evidence to support the unsupportable claim.

It has long been a catechism for me that assertion without proof is a lie. And yet this is what advertising does constantly. Feel the radiance warm your skin, taste the joy of the open road. Dare to dream the dream. Oh, and while I'm at it, why does the 'Hundred reasons to buy a BMW' radio ad only ever feature reason 82? Do you think they even have a list of 100 reasons to buy their blasted cars?

And on and on we go through a litany that touches pretty much every commercial we see. A constant barrage of the untrue, indefensible and mis-characterised. And we let it wash over us rather than pushing back and asking brands to kindly just stick to the facts, the truth.

Which is what you have to do in public relations. Because if you don't, you'll get called out. In public. It used to be by journalists, now it's by every mobile phone in the country.

I can't say the interview was a great success. It contained some very long silences...

The ENOC Case Study Continues

Image via WikipediaSorry, but I started following this story and I can't seem to tear my eyes away from the wreckage even as I try. Today's newspapers report Dubai based petroleum company ENOC's denial of yesterday's Gulf News story.

Yes, that's right. ENOC Group suddenly had something to say after something like a month of obdurate silence.

Top honours to The National once more, which carries a better researched and more rounded story, taking the opportunity to recap the whole episode and referring to ENOC, with perhaps a grim smile as it rewards weeks of treating the press as if they don't exist or matter, as a 'troubled company'. Khaleej Times couldn't bring itself to name its long-term rival and refers to 'reports in a section of the English media'. Gulf News itself wasn't for stepping down, running ENOC's denial but affirming its report that 'sources in the oil industry confirmed the possibility that other retailers have shown interest in assuming responsibility for those [ENOC's] operations'

Breaking its long silence has certainly brought ENOC to the fore again and will once again step up the pressure from media and the public for some form of clarity. Sadly, there hasn't been a lot of that around but ENOC's statement to the media yesterday does rather protest too much when it accuses Gulf News of baseless speculation.

Here are five rules of Public Relations that may help:

Rule One
News expands to fill a vacuum
This is a Great Truth of Public Relations. If you do not speak clearly and with purpose, you leave room for speculation. The media, like the people it represents, will speculate. Experts, pundits, the public will all speculate. Many will happily speculate for the media to use in its own speculative stories. If you decide to issue 'no comment' or, worse, not to pick up the phone, you have invited speculation round to yours for dinner and have no right to complain when your paintwork gets scratched and your carpet ruined.

Rule Two
Responding to speculation legitimises it
If you respond to one speculative report, you respond to all of them. Many major corporates have a policy of not responding to rumour or speculation, precisely because you really don't want to start affirming or denying purely speculative plays. It's actually a journalistic technique, to speculatively assert something to see if you get a 'bite'. By all means respond to legitimate public concern and hard facts presented to you. But don't fail to respond to those and reserve your powder just to waste it on speculation.

Rule Three
Don't pretend to play hardball
ENOC's statement asks for an apology from Gulf News. This was, in my professional opinion, a basic error (one of very many). Gulf News hasn't apologised and has stood by its story. So where are you going to go now, big shot? If you just let that go now, you just affirmed the story, which only ever discussed a possibility in its original form. Discussing a possibility is, of course, pure speculation. Better not to have gone there in the first place, IMHO...

Rule Four
Tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth
Interestingly, ENOC's statement only comments on one aspect of Gulf News' story, the possibility that ADNOC will be given the running of ENOC stations in Sharjah and the northern emirates. It doesn't comment on part of the story that discussed ENOC requesting a lifting of the price cap or the strong rejection of proposed solutions by government officials. It only talks to one fact in the whole story, but has now established the principle that ENOC will comment to correct facts presented by media. It's not a rounded statement, where one was most certainly called for.

Rule Five
Have a communications strategy
Have an agreed strategy in place, don't just go knee-jerking all over the shop. The National today gleefully trots out the original statement made to media by ENOC, that the affected stations were subject to 'technical upgrades' and the subsequent lack of any evidence to that effect. Having made a statement that few, if any, believed and then followed that up by totally ignoring the media, the company has now arguably lost public trust. As one commentator in today's National story has it:

“I doubt they want to hang onto the whole network, otherwise they would have supplied them. We’ve gone beyond that point now. It’s all speculation of course, but Enoc may just be trying to get a better price for them.”

That's pretty cynical, no? But it's hard to see what the company's management of the media and public transparency aspects of this story has done to mitigate such cynicism from the public, pundits and media.

Silence. The New Comment.

Image via WikipediaI know I've been going on about this, but it really is such a brilliant case study. The Great Sharjah Fuel Crisis continues, with ENOC and EPPCO stations shut down last Friday by Sharjah police after having failed to supply fuel to residents in Sharjah and the Northern Emirates for a month.

As I predicted a while ago, the story started to internationalise - this story in the UK's Daily Telegraph (kind enough to quote yours truly) talks of 'baffled' residents in this oil rich nation unable to buy fuel. Tellingly it ends with these words: "No one from either ENOC or the other main petrol company affected, Emarat, was available for comment."

Bloomberg filed an excellent piece today, linked here, which continues the trend of international interest in the story. Being a newswire, the Bloomberg piece has made it into a number of interntional newspapers and websites. Bloomberg's story, an in-depth analysis of the situation, makes an important link between the ENOC Group issue and Dubai's indebtedness and economic stability, as well as drawing some interesting conclusions regarding political stability. The story isn't going away, in short, and now it's arguably starting to affect Dubai's reputation in a broader sense. I would humbly suggest this would not have been the case if there had been an agreed and effectively implemented communications strategy to start with.

Tellingly, the Bloomberg story contains these words: "An ENOC spokesman declined to comment when contacted by Bloomberg. A Dubai government spokeswoman didn’t respond to an email requesting for comment, and an official in Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. public relations division didn’t answer calls to his office and mobile phone"

Gulf News filed today with a follow-up story on the issue, which talks about the Sharjah government's resolution in solving the issue. You'd almost think journalists were keeping the story alive to punish the silent spokespeople, wouldn't you?

Somehow tenacious GN hack Deena Kamel Yousef managed to get through to the man so many journalists have failed to buttonhole and so the GN story contains this timeless quote from ENOC's Silent Spokesperson: "I cannot give a statement now, don't ask me questions I cannot answer. I agree that we should be more transparent, I agree 150 per cent, but we have directives not to talk about this issue now."

Deliciously, Deena twists the knife: "Pressed for answers, he made casual comments on the weather to change the subject."

Tellingly, the GN story also points out that: "Enoc's silent spell lasted for about two weeks while the spokesperson was on holiday after the trouble started. Repeated attempts by Gulf News to contact the company were unanswered."

On holiday? You're kidding, right?

As Bad As It Gets

It can't get much worse than this. The latest development in the UAE's petrol shortage saga is that the Executive Council of Sharjah, one of the seven Emirates that makes up the UAE, has demanded an end to the petrol shortages and a full explanation of what's behind them by the end of today from Enoc/Eppco.

It's a clear enough sign that the Executive Council doesn't buy the pump upgrade story, either. But then, did anyone?

How bad can it get for a company? When do you have to recognise that mendacity and silence won't wash any more - that you actually owe a duty to people? When a government is forced to call you to task publicly and demand answers from you? I guess that's about as bad as it gets.

As Matthias, son of Deuteronomy of Gath, tells us: "Worse? How could it be worse?"

Of Genies And Bottles

Apart from a vague and popularly considered mendacious statement about pump upgrades, the petrol station operators responsible for the fuel shortages in the UAE have remained silent. Both Gulf News and The National report today with sidenotes to the effect that no spokesperson could be reached from Enoc/Eppco or Emarat. And, in fact, The National notes that officials from Jebel Ali Port were also unavailable or not commenting.

Gulf News today played catch-up with The National, which sent reporters to Enoc/Eppco petrol stations to determine that no pump upgrade work was going on, as it reported yesterday. GN today files on 'sceptical motorists' who point out, as I have indeed found, that stations 'closed for upgrading' miraculously open after the supply truck has swung by. The National has, once again, done a sterling job.

The lack of transparency is so stunning, it's amusing. This is, indeed, humour of the incongruous. And, of course, by failing to tackle the very proper concern of the general public, the operators are making it all a great deal worse. The papers are rubbishing the statements and talking to petrol pump attendants, motorists, analysts - in fact, anyone who'll talk to them. The result is a rising tide of reporting and growing public alarm which is leading to panic buying. This, of course, is putting more pressure on those stations that do have fuel and now even Adnoc stations are running dry despite the fact that they don't actually have an underlying supply problem.

So by staying silent, the operators are creating an ever-larger rod for their own backs. Tell people what the problem is, how you're solving it and how long it'll take. It's not actually very difficult.

What's the solution? Well, even the most hide-bound of morons would have worked out by now that the genie is out of the bottle. Social media, that Internetty thing, allows people to share opinions and views - so we all know what the papers are trying to prove - the stations aren't closing for upgrades. They haven't got any fuel to sell us because deliveries aren't coming through. There is a very real and basic problem here and it's not logistics or maintenance. As Gulf News quotes Kate Dourian, Middle East editor at Platts:

"Emarat, like the other two main gasoline suppliers, Enoc and Eppco, has for years been operating at a loss because it buys product at international prices and sells at government-regulated prices below market value."

This GN story goes into some depth regarding the subsidies issue.

That's not an 'issue at Jebel Ali' or a 'pump upgrade'. That's a very real systemic problem that could well have medium to long term effects - the issue has been bubbling under for months, with incidents of shortages going back to last year. So this is hardly a new situation - there has been plenty of time to plan a better, smarter communications strategy than dumb silence and unsustainable assertions.

The irony is, of course, that if irate consumers withdraw their custom, these companies will breathe a sigh of relief! So why not just clam up and wait for it to all blow over? Once supplies are restarted, people will forget all about it and life will go back to normal. They're not answerable to any consumer association or ombudsman, so a strategy of silence won't do them any harm, right?

Wrong. It's yet more bad publicity for the country as a whole (the oil producer that ran out of fuel - wait for the internationals to pick that one up) driven by old-fashioned contempt for the media and public that has resulted in considerable concern and inconvenience for a large chunk of the population.

We can all see the genie. Perhaps it's time for the operators to tell us what they're planning to do about it. When they do, they can console themselves with this: there's no shame in telling the truth.

UAE Petrol Crisis. The Mystery Deepens

I retain my sense of wide-eyed amazement that this situation could be possible: a fuel shortage in an oil producing country. Today's newspapers are full of the story and a remarkable pattern is emerging of silence and mind-boggling mendacity on the part of the distribution companies being hit by the shortages.

In fact, The National (James Bond's favourite Middle Eastern newspaper, dontcha know) leads with 'Empty filling stations and the great fuel mystery', gleefully reporting that retailers Enoc and Eppco (two brands of the same company, in fact) have cited pump upgrades to their 167 stations across the country as being the cause of their empty forecourts. The newspaper's reporters visited a number of the stations and confirm what you already possibly suspect: there is no sign of any work going on to upgrade anything in any way whatsoever. I have personally seen closed stations opening again once a tanker has visited, so there must obviously be some degree of indecision regarding which stations to upgrade.

Gulf News contents itself with unquestioningly repeating the statements made by Enoc/Eppco regarding upgradation to the petrol pumping network facility terminal equipment. By the way, you can just juggle up the words from the last sentence as you see fit because whichever way you place them, they mean the same thing. Emarat has maintained a dignified silence throughout.


Meanwhile Dubai Eye Radio's The Business Breakfast interviewed an 'expert' who spent his time on air speculating that this could be some sort of pipeline issue.

Inside The National, we see mention of the issue of subsidies, regulated prices and supply that many are speculating is actually the issue behind the shortages - at current government-set prices and with oil prices hovering around the $100 mark, it's hard to retailers to do anything other than make massive losses - The National quotes Enoc's CEO as saying that selling fuel at the regulated price cost it Dhs1.5 billion last year - despite two very unpopular price rises taking place over the year. Adnoc, of course, refines its own fuel and so has been unaffected by the need to upgrade its pumps.

This remains speculation, however, as the retailers who have run out of fuel (sorry, who are upgrading their pumping infrastructure) have for weeks now either maintained a stoical silence or thrown out chaff in the shape of vague and arguably mendacious statements. That policy, so popular here but increasingly unrealistic in the age of online and social media resources, has led to a risible situation - everybody knows that something is very, very wrong but nobody is allowed to talk about it officially. It does rather remind me of the burrow in Watership Down where the society of well-fed, sleek rabbits who are being snared by the farmer who's feeding them are prohibited from using the words death or snare.

The TRA Responds

You may remember this post last week, in which I noted that the UAE's TRA, or Telecommunications Regulatory Authority was making efforts to get onto social media. They had arguably got a tad ahead of themselves by suggesting that everyone else might like to have a go at 'getting social'.

Finding the TRA on twitter, I rather grumpily asked, "Is there any move to regulate against the currently unusually high broadband charges levied by operators in the UAE?"

The TRA Tweeter duly directed me to their online query form. As I hadn't had my cup of tea that morning and was feeling unusually quixotic, I repeated my query on that form. You can find the TRA's query form here. It does ask for rather a lot of data from you, but then I suppose that could help to cut down frivolous inquiries from grumpy smart-alecs who haven't had their tea. I had absolutely no expectation of getting an answer back from them and, in fact, had forgotten all about it and moved on - specifically, I went and made a cup of tea.

Nestling in my inbox this morning was the response below:

Dear Alexander,

Thank you for contacting the TRA

The TRA does not directly set the retail prices for Telecommunications Services in the UAE. Retail prices are set by the licensees and approved by the TRA. This is because information relating to the cost of each service is best known by the operators themselves. The TRA believes that retail prices will fall as competition increases. To that end, the TRA is currently mediating negotiations between the licensees for each operator to share the other operators network. This will allow Etisalat and du to compete in the provision of fixed-line services on a national basis. The operators are at an advanced stage of testing the enabling technology and systems and the TRA expects competition in the provision of Broadband services to start at the end of this year. The TRA further expects that such competition will result in a decrease of the associated retail prices. This type of service based competition (as opposed to infrastructure based competition) is common in telecommunications regulation and will result in consumer choice.

Hopefully, the above clarified your inquiry.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, impressed the cotton socks off me.

FIFA Own Goal: Blatter Battered

I have just witnessed the most amazing press conference I have ever seen in a life peppered with colourful events. Sky News gleefully transmitted a live feed of the entire Sepp Blatter FIFA press conference and it was a display of the most breathtaking arrogance I have ever seen in my professional life. I only regret the camera stayed on Blatter and didn't register the appalled, shocked and angry press in the room.

I simply couldn't believe it - why the entire press corps didn't walk out when a disembodied voice announced 'one question only will be answered please' and the mic was switched off on a journo asking infuriated follow-ups after Blatter had simply refused to answer his (perfectly valid) question was a mystery to me. Blatter's refusal to take the first question of the entire Q&A on set the tone for the whole event. His grimacing, scrunched-up face spat defiance throughout his whole haughty peroration.

How marginal media were brought in among heavy-hitters, apparently an attempt to steer away from the 'big questions' was amazing. Blatter was strutting, incredibly formal and arrogant beyond belief. His performance screamed old skool; a man obviously beyond question by us mere mortals. At one stage, he seemed to suggest that FIFA was a nation and he was its president.

The messy break-up of the whole debacle was glorious: Blatter lecturing the media on 'respect' as they shouted back at him, the final German journalist having a good old go but eventually being silenced in what must stand as an all-time low point for football. The poor old PR guy trying to get Blatter off the stage (having cut short the entire awful thing, obviously leaving an incredulous press contingent with most of their questions still unanswered) must have died a million deaths as the man grabbed the mics and started to have a go back.

At one stage, at the end, Blatter's spittle-flecked antipathy gave rise to: "Yes, you may laugh!" Wonderful - until then, we didn't know the press was laughing at him. Now we do.

I don't care much for football - I only caught this because we were having a take-away and Sarah was watching TV. But I do care passionately for communications and our media. If for no other reason than his management of tonight's appearance, it is clear that Blatter has been too long accustomed to having too much power with too little accountability. Journalists at the event, talking on air after it blew apart, were enraged and rightly so - but they really should have stood up, as a man, and left.

He must, clearly, go. He's not fit, as the Sex Pistols tell us, to shovel anything...

Middle East Expert

Image via WikipediaWatching Sky News last night, I was infuriated to see, once again, a random person interviewed and billed on the strapline as a 'Middle East Expert'. It's something I hate with a passion, to the point where I got told off for talking at the TV again. Yes, I really am turning into a grumpy, spittle-flecked old bastard.

This awful, lazy habit of validating people with a label rather than a credential is a major problem with mainstream media. When we've got The Observer trotting out the canard that we need 'proper' journalists to give us more trustworthy sources of information than 'citizen journalists', we're obviously being told to sit back and trust our media, take whatever they feed us as gospel and meekly accept that someone who Sky News calls a 'Middle East Expert' is, indeed an expert. And on the Middle East, at that.

And yet that's a great deal less validation than I'd expect of a source on Twitter, say. Who says he's an expert? What's the measure of expertise? Why not give his title, which presumably would be Dean of Middle Eastern Studies at London University or Middle East Analyst at the United Nations? Or is the problem that he's a lobbyist, baker or perhaps a candlestick maker? Don't get me wrong: I don't care if he's a candlestick maker if he's making sense and putting forward a credible argument. But I still want to know what he is so I can filter my judgement of what he's got to say.

I see this process all the time myself. I'm the Group Account Director of Spot On Public Relations. I'm a PR guy. I'll accept communications consultant. Media don't like to put 'PR guy' out there against their nice, glib commentator, so they like to change my job title. I have been a 'social media expert' (ugh) and once, to my extreme, squirming embarrassment, a 'social media guru'. I have been, on many occasions a 'blogger' and even a 'prominent blogger' and, again once, a 'leading blogger'. Would you trust a 'leading blogger' or a 'PR guy'?

It's a no brainer, isn't it?

When I shot a scene for Piers Morgan in Dubai, I gave the producer my business card. On the segment, I appear in the desert with the immortal words, 'Ex-journalist and blogger' under my name. Not 'Group Account Director' or 'Public Relations Professional'. 'Ex-jounalist' neatly rubs away the vague, if evaporating taint that comes with 'blogger'.

So you can only begin to wonder at the vested interest disguised by 'Middle East Expert' or 'Defence Expert'. It infuriates me precisely because I know how very dishonest the practice is - from a media that insists on telling us that it is the only trustworthy source out there these days.

Google and Wael Ghonim - The Horns of a Dilemma

Image via WikipediaEgypt has a hero, albeit a reluctant one, in the shape of Wael Ghonim, the young activist behind the 'We are all Khaled Said' Facebook page. Imprisoned in a blindfold for twelve days, his release apparently brokered by Egyptian businessman Naguib Suweiris, Ghonim is now free and his first words to media were eagerly picked up and relayed around the world - his bravery and resolution were inspirational and are being widely credited with reinvigorating protests yesterday.

The media, as media does, scrambled for details on this new hero. Until his disappearance, Ghonim was an anonymous figure outside a small circle of activists organising the growing protest movement using online tools - although his Facebook page reached over 50,000 people. Luckily, he is a marketing manager at Google, so his official Google piccie was quickly procured and everyone had a nice, clear image of Ghonim. In front of a Google logo. The media also had a nice, snappy explanation of who Ghonim was. He was a 'Google Executive'.

'Google Executive' is brilliant. It's a neat, two-word characterisation that gives the guy some weight, some background, gives us a sense of just who this guy is. Together with the photo, it also neatly ties this young revolutionary activist who was at least partly responsible for bringing Egypt out onto the street and its government to its knees, to Google. Dubai newspaper Seven Days went even further today, with its splash screaming 'Google Chief Slams Traitor Claims'. 'Google Chief' reads so much better than 'young activist', does it not?

Google must be torn. On the one hand, there's little doubt that Larry Page, Sergei Brin and many others over at Goog Mansions would privately support and applaud the freedom of expression, activism and hope that Ghonim undoubtedly represents, let alone his courage. But on the other hand, this is a young man whose actions have helped threaten to bring down a government. His strong association with Google, which does business with, and increasingly depends on the support of, governments (some of which have much in common with that in Egypt), must be giving Google a great deal of pause for thought. It opens Google to the possible implication of involvement in all of this, if only  implicit involvement - surely, critics would aver, a company with the technological resources of Google would know what was going on here. The charge is bunkum, but that rarely stops charges being laid. And Ghonim must have been getting up to at least some of this stuff on company time, surely?

Yet Google can't sack Ghonim. The outcry around the world as this company that stands for the values of freedom and choice sacks a hero would be enormous. Can it champion him? Not without ensuring virtually every government in the world is deeply suspicious about the company, its motives and its staff. All governments, as Wikileaks has taught us, have something to be ashamed of. The best outcome for the corporate people at Google would probably be a quiet resignation and a few public words thanking Google and exonerating it of involvement.

You can imagine the conversation. 'You call him.' 'No, you call him.'

Benihana Kuwait. What you can do.

I'm sorry, I know I'm going on about this but I believe strongly that it is wrong and should be addressed by the very public that Benihana Kuwait has shown such contempt for in its actions.

I sent this message to Benihana Tokyo, the company responsible for the international Benihana franchise,  tonight. You can do the same - cut and paste mine, write your own, whatever. Just use the contact form linked right here.

Hi

I'm contacting you to let you know that I, and very many others across the Middle East, am angry and concerned that one of your franchisees has seen fit to issue suit against a blogger who posted a negative review of a poor experience in Kuwait's Benihana franchise.

The resulting online outcry will not go away, more and more mainstream media are picking up the story and it is highly likely to be covered by international media. It's a landmark suit - not only against Kuwait's most popular blog, not only unfair but also the first time that a company in the Middle East - a region with its own issues with censorship and repression - has sued a blogger.

Benihana Kuwait's maladroit handling of this issue has already created a social media case study that will run and run. It's time to stop this.

I urge you to pressure your franchisee into dropping this unwise suit. It has already caused untold damage to the Benihana brand in this region - you can act before it does so internationally.

The guys at 2:48AM shouldn't have to defend an expensive, scary and vicious - let alone frivolous - suit from a corporate company in this way for expressing their opinion as consumers. It's got to stop.

Thanks.

PS: A chronology of this goof-up is now up over at the UAE Community Blog.

Why The Benihana Story Matters

Image via WikipediaIt's been amazing to watch the Benihana Kuwait story spiral into the stratosphere. That the story has such a strong pair of legs is squarely down to the fact it matters deeply to very many people in the region and around the world - consumer opinion expressed in a blog crushed by a lawsuit filed by a company.

The story(I posted this yesterday which has more detail) was carried across a number of blogs yesterday (and will be in more today, doubtless). As SeaBee pointed out: "I wonder if they're beginning to understand how business works in the real world. You know, the place where customers have a say too. Where bullying and threatening creates a backlash."

It got taken up by a fast-growing community on Twitter (use the hashtag #BenihanaKUW to see the conversations) and then someone found that Benihana Kuwait had a Facebook page. The resulting flood of comments made it quite clear that public opinion was 100% against the idea of a company suing a blogger and expressed shock, outrage and a deep rooted anger.

Later in the day, the papers picked up on the story, The National, Gulf News and 24x7 all ran stories which, at least in the case of the first two, ran in print today. And now million-subscriber website The Next Web has picked it up - which is the start of what, IMHO, is an inevitable move into the international media.

Why so much outrage? It's a complicated mixture - most of the online people who have commented know perfectly well that Benihana's reaction is unacceptable today. Consumers have a new freedom to express their views and opinions in ever-expanding forums and it's a right we're not willing to give up easily. We're not going to tolerate being bullied or seeing the truth repressed. On a larger scale, that same sense of empowerment and fairness is driving some reasonably large collections of people, a million of them on the streets of Cairo today. Without wanting to 'big up' the Benihana story, I do believe it is a microcosm of the bigger one we're watching unveil in Tahrir Square.

We're talking to Kuwaiti blogger Mark on the Dubai Eye Techno Tuesday show today at 11am Dubai Time. If you're Dubai-based, you can catch it on 103.8FM or if not you can listen to the livestream at http://www.dubaieye1038.com  and follow the hashtag #DubaiToday.

Update: Here's the AudioBoo of today's talk between Jessica Swann, myself and 2:48AM's Mark  As many will know, this afternoon Benihana Kuwait chose to delete the comments from its Facebook page, one of the most obnoxious gestures of absolute contempt for the views of the general public - its customers and potential customers.

Talker

Image by notacrime via FlickrI'm doing quite a lot of conference speaking thingies this Autumn, so apologies in advance to anyone who suffers in one of those audiences. I'm particularly looking forward to the MediaME Conference in Amman on the 8th and 9th November, I'm genuinely pumped (but retained as a consultant by, so please take a pinch of salt) about the MENA ICT Forum taking place in Amman on the 10th and 11th October and I'm speaking on a panel thingy tomorrow at the Global Arab Business Meeting in Ras Al Khaimah.

There's more, but I've forgotten them. It's not arrogance, I've just got a brain the side of a dried pea.

I think tomorrow might be interesting. I'm a panellist on the topic of The Sustainable Corporation - "How the corporate sector may embrace socially responsible strategies" and I'm planning to set a cat or two among the pigeons. You see, I think the Middle East's corporate sector must embrace socially responsible strategies or die - but I'm not talking about giving a few thousand Dinars to some centre that's backed by an influential figure. Believe me, I have seen enough of 'ana mudhir' companies doling out cash to well supported causes (which they laughingly call 'CSR') to last me a lifetime, and railed against it every time I've encountered it (often to little effect). I'm not talking about that tomorrow. I'm talking about true social responsibility.

Try this on for size:

Be transparent.
Your ability to obfuscate and dissemble is being limited day by day because of the sharing and access that the Internet is driving. We know much more about you than you think - and we share a lot more opinion about you than you'd like. That movement of opinion, that tide of consumer-driven feedback is actually becoming increasingly important.

Be truthful
If there's a leak, you can not longer go out and say "there is no leak" and depend on a mendacious PR company and a compliant media. We're sharing the video of people sloshing around as you're pretending there is no problem (Sorry, 'issue'). When you need people to believe in your integrity, you'll find that you've already undermined it.

Be honest
Companies make profits. It's what they do. We don't believe for one second that your move to expand your operations is driven by a commitment to the market or a clear response to the needs of the community. It's about profitability and that's okay. But stop trying to dress up clearly commercial decisions as community commitment. And you can stop the greenwashing stuff right there, buddy. Oh, and one more thing. I'll buy a mobile network based on price and quality of service, bess. Your "giving back to the community" lip service is not a factor for me. If you were a true and active member of my community, now that's interesting. But you're not, you're just bankrolling stuff.

Be responsible
We all make mistakes (as the hedgehog said, climbing off the toilet brush). You can actually engage with communities, your customers, and explain why you made a decision (get a spine) or why you made a mistake and how you'll put it right. We expect no less.  When you don't do this, your customers with gather together and talk about what weasels you are.

Be led by your customers
Too many companies in the Middle East splosh 'customer-centric' in their brand values and then go on to treat customers like dirt. Take a close look at the telco sector and you'll see how those organisations have been punished by customers. God knows, I've taken diabolical glee in every piece of work I've done breaking a telco monopoly and you would not believe how low that fruit lay every time. You're a monopoly? Play nicely, because winds of change are abroad and they can change things a damn sight faster than you think.

Last but by no means least - be digital.
What do I get when I Google you? Do you know? TripAdvisor makes hoteliers sweat, but many other Middle East businesses are unaware of the flow of opinion - and are not searchable, responsive or digitally competent. Which is a shame, because an increasingly large number of your customers are. You can assert what you like about your company, it's products and brand. But you are no longer in control of the process of communication - your customers are talking on a wonderful scale. Your assertions are being tested by third parties with more reach than you have.

That's all I'll have time for - and believe me, my list is a sight longer than that. But I'm looking forward  to the reaction...

A Corny Tale

Image via WikipediaHigh fructose corn syrup is one of a number of things in food that I avoid like the plague – I’m really no fan of any form of processed food and prefer to buy my ingredients raw, basic and ready to cook from scratch.

HFCS is a nasty, insidious ingredient in much processed food, particularly of American origin (over 55% of all sweetener in the USA, which means the average American consumes something over 60 pounds of the stuff a year) but also favoured by high volume food processors around the world. It’s basically the cheapest form of highly processed sweetener that’s not aspartame and the scientists behind processed food (many of whom, I suspect, would hesitate to eat their own creations) love it because shareholders love cheap and we all love sweet. We lurve da fat, we lurve da sweet.

HFCS is produced, oddly enough, from corn, typically Genetically Modified corn because of the vast production of GM corn in America and a range of subsidies that make this gloop cheaper than real sugar there. The corn is ground up to produce cornstarch. This is mixed with water to make a slurry treated with the addition of a number of enzymes including alpha-amylase (also used in bread improvers and detergents) and Xylose isomerase. Nice, eh?

With 58% of Americans citing a level of concern over the ingredient, thanks in no small part to a number of exposes, documentaries and public information efforts carried out over the Internet, it’s little wonder that the people that make this awful shite are feeling the pinch. In fact, demand for the instant fix sugar rush that many have blamed for America’s rise to becoming the earth’s Most Morbidly Obese Nation has dropped to the lowest level in twenty years. Which is no bad thing, really.

Now the American Corn Refiner’s Association, reacting to this drop in popularity, wants to give High Fructose Corn Syrup a quick image-buffing and rename it “Corn Sugar”. The idea is that the evil High Fructose Corn Syrup tag on the packaging that scares moms away gives way to nice, friendly ‘corn sugar’, because HFCS, says the ACRA, is just the same as sugar.

This isn’t the first time the Association has tried. Two years ago it launched a major PR initiative, “Changing the Conversation about High Fructose Corn Syrup” which aimed to characterize HFCS as a ‘natural’ product. Critics point out that a slurry of genetically modified cornstarch treated with enzyme infusions (themselves containing synthetic chemicals) is hardly natural. Sadly for the PR effort, the FDA agreed with the critics and a spokesperson said that HFCS should not be labeled ‘natural’.

You only need to go to the Association’s current corn sugar promoting website and see the pictures of happy families tucking into mountains of fruity goodness to know that there is a fundamentally evil force at work here. Click on the video and wander through fields of lovely corn with a slick, pretty actress, oh sorry, “A mother navigates through a maze of confusing information and learns whether it’s corn sugar or cane sugar, your body can’t tell the difference.”

Amusingly, someone's been trying to edit the Wikipedia entry for High Fructose Corn Syrup to introduce the 'Corn Sugar' name, but the Wikipolice are on top of it.

To my immense amusement, the sister website to the insidious SweetSurprise.com, cornsugar.com is blocked by Etisalat. I can only imagine it's something to do with corn dogging, but then second guessing Etisalat is a surefire trek down the road to flailing insanity.

But of course the argument’s not really about whether this awful, processed syrupy gloop is natural or not. And, perhaps surprisingly, it’s not about whether HFCS ‘short cuts’ the body’s satiety response and leads directly to obesity. It’s about the fact that the stuff is absolutely everywhere – particularly in sodas which are responsible, apparently, for some two thirds of its total consumption in the US. Some manufacturers, including Snapple, Coke and ketchup maker Hunts have removed it from their products, but HFCS is in drinks, bread (particularly processed brown breads. I mean, you really, really do not want to know what’s in Subway’s ‘wheat bread’, but I can tell you HFCS is the fourth largest component of the stuff), fruit mixes, lollies, cakes, biscuits, chocolates, crisps, soups, yoghurts and ice cream. In short, if it’s a processed food, it could well be delivering you a belt of gloop.

Thank God we at least have regulations that insist on products carrying a label with a full list of ingredients by weight, so it's there to see on the label. Whatever they call it.

BTW, other 'Yew, is that what's in my food?' related posts include this one on what's in Pringles and this one over at The Fat Expat on Palm Oil.

Sammy The Survivor

Image via Wikipedia

You've got to hand it to whale shark Sammy, the girl's a survivor. When we all thought she'd popped her clogs or was on death's door and being released clandestinely, she actually turns out to have been tagged by Mote Marine Laboratory and sent on her way swimming as free as only a happy whale shark could be.

The nocturnal release of the big fish with no video or photographic evidence made many cynical souls doubt - particularly as it came at the end of an extended period when Dubai's Atlantis Hotel was being pilloried for keeping the whale shark. There was more than the odd whiff of sulphur to the whole story, with undercurrents roiling regarding the actual nature of the whale shark's 'rescue' - whether it was caught to order or just wandered in for tea and decided to stay.

We get the news that Sammy is alive and well earlier than we normally would, because we should really have had to wait for three months to hear from the whale shark. Fortunately, the tag 'popped off' early and now Sammy's free to swim the waterways of the Gulf and beyond, free of tagular encumbrance.

Hooray! Thank goodness there are no links between Atlantis and Mote that would allow nasty cynics to question the tale of Sammy's good fortune.

Attacked by Blogs

 The recent breakfast cereal incident reminded me of this piece, which ran in Arabian Business, as well as on the blog, a while back. I thought it worth sharing an updated version of the piece just in case it's useful to someone.

What should you do if a blog slags off your company or makes snarky comments about your customer service? What are your rights and how can you fix the damage? Here’s a handy ten point guide for companies that feel themselves wronged by blogs.

1. Think
Before you rush to make a dim-witted comment on the blog, think about it. What has the blogger said that you disagree with? Is it an opinion or a factual error? Can you back up your assertion that there is a fundamental error? Can you provide evidence that the opinion expressed is ill-founded or at odds with the majority of people? If you work with a PR or communications agency, get their counsel before you act. Cast around for any other mentions, conversations or expressions of opinion/fact on this issue. Once you've commented, monitor the reaction and feedback and be ready to continue the conversation.

2. Remember: it’s a conversation
If you’re being attacked by blogs, it may be worth taking a look at the situation they’re highlighting and seeing if the point is valid and addressable – and then addressing it before going online and saying so. If the attack is invalid, then it’s worth acknowledging the point that’s been made before making your, well-argued, counterpoint in a measured, respectful way. The more aggressive the blogger, the more a measured tone will position you as the reasonable and authoritative participant in the conversation. It’s literally just like a face to face conversation – and wagging fingers or shouting will just get people’s backs up – even if in response to someone who’s obviously infuriated. Think how you’d behave in a customer service situation. Well, bloggers are just customers with an audience. Typically, although not always, people express frustration or annoyance online because the offline system has failed and they haven't felt as if anyone has listened to them.

3. Most blogs don’t matter
Before you go making a great big song and dance, consider doing absolutely nothing. Most blogs are read by an average 1.1 people – the 1 being the blogger. Is the blog well respected and well read? Will it influence opinion? Just because someone in the company has emailed a link to the blog around every member of the management team doesn’t mean that the blog is normally well read. A few hundred visits to a marginal blog prompted by that email, by the way, will just let the blogger know that they’re onto something that gets them more readers. So they’ll likely do more of it, not less.

4. Blogs can matter very quickly
I’m going to be very Delphic now. In deciding to ignore a blog, do bear in mind that blogs can go from zero to hero in absolutely no time. A lot of today’s journalists spend a lot of time on blogs and the oddest things can result in a huge amount of interest. There have been instances of a blog post making national front page headlines within 48 hours in Europe and gaining over 2 million readers as a consequence and Middle East blogs have also broken stories that have moved into mainstream media. And then there are companies that have turned expressions of customer dissatisfaction made on blogs completely to their advantage. The success story is built around actually listening to what people are saying, not ignoring it.

5. Don’t hide your identity
Like the Ray Bans ad says: don’t hide. There may be an urge to post a positive, balancing comment on the blog under an anonymous handle or a pseudonym. Do be aware that most bloggers have access to tools that allow them to track back visitors to the blog. You make a comment on my blog? I know who you are. I also know where you are, what browser you use, what version of Java you have, what operating system, where you came from and where you went to. So if you work for a major daily newspaper or a telco and you don’t like what I’ve got to say, have the guts to say so under your own name so that your comment is honest and balanced by your vested interest. Because I’ll know anyway and just ‘out’ you for being a custard. And so will many other people who write blogs.

6. Find out who the blogger is
No, I don’t mean set the secret service on ‘em. I mean take the time to read some of the blog at least, look at past posts and comments and see if the blogger is authoritative or a loose cannon. There’s nothing more awful than watching some corporate flak try to make a fool out of a widely respected expert because they didn’t bother finding out who the blogger was – regardless of whether they blog under their own names or pseudonyms, bloggers have an ‘identity’ in the overall conversation. (Please do note that I do not, under any circumstance, intend 'widely respected expert' to refer to myself. I'm just a goon.) Take a look at the blogs that link to/are linked to out of the blog. Look at Technorati and find the blog’s rating. There are other tools you can use too, including alexa. See if the blog attracts any comments and also take a few minutes to look at Twitter, because Twitter is probably the greatest blog-traffic driving tool in the blog-traffic driving toolshed. And don't forget Facebook, too! Perhaps also do a google or two and find out how the blog ranks on search. Authority is about tone, resonance and reach.

7. Take some time out to understand blogs in general
Know what a troll is? Or a trackback link? Understand the importance of RSS and feed readers? Know what IMHO stands for? If not, find a younger member of your staff and get them to explain it all to you before you start blundering around crashing conversations. By the way, if you want to know what blogs, Twitterers and others are saying about your company, consider setting up a Google alert. If you're ready to be slightly more sophisticated about your online presence, you'll want to engage an online monitoring company.

8. Don’t crash the conversation
Think of it all like you’d think about joining a real-life conversation. In posting to my blog, I’m putting something into the public domain that I think people will find interesting or that I just want to get off my chest. Usually both! It’s a bit like standing on a soap box. A few people are kind enough to drop by and listen to me – some have a chat with me at the end of the lecture. And I go to their lectures too – to listen and have a chat afterwards. It’s all pretty civilised most of the time. It’s relatively easy to join the conversation as long as you don’t crash in without having bothered to listen to the preceding debate. Again, just as in real life you wouldn’t rudely barge into a group and vent your opinion on a topic without taking the time to find out what the prevailing opinion and tone of debate was like. Well, not unless you want the group to all round on you and tell you to shove off, that is...

9. You can’t make it go away
Blocking access to a blog from within the corporate network because it has attacked your company will just ensure all your staff go home and take a look at what all the fuss is about. I worked with one company that did just that, in the face of our advice, and we watched in frustration as they embarked on a futile and highly visible witch-hunt that resulted in scoring 11,000 visits to a blog that wouldn’t have got 11 visits otherwise. For one reason or another, you have earned the attention of a blog. Depending on the situation, it’s likely that the best and most advisable course of action is to engage with that blog’s author and balance the POV with your own or even, gasp, act on the input.  By the way, consider search when you're commenting. The greatest crime of the cereal commenter was naming the clients who weren't otherwise named, ensuring that search brought up the post (try Googling 'Kellogs fake diet'!). SEO can also be your friend - investing in a good SEO strategy means your voice turns up first on search and these days that's actually a business essential.

10. Consider blogging as a tool
Don’t think of blogs as purely a dangerous manifestation of unfettered opinion and irresponsible ‘citizen journalism’. Blogs are so much more than that. They are a powerful medium of expression that is increasingly becoming an important barometer of public opinion and source of public voice. They are self-correcting in a way that conventional media aren't - people will correct a mistake on a blog faster than you can say 'nmkl pjkl ftmch'. And they're part of the revolution in social media that is changing the way people today communicate. They're not about to go away, in other words. By the way, this post is a very good case in self-correcting point!

You can actually use a blog as a highly effective platform for your company to engage with customers. Take some time out to have a look around and you’ll find that they’re actually a neat tool. You don’t have to have a million readers for a blog to matter, either. It’s better to have a few hundred people that want to interact with you than advertise to 100,000 that don’t. Remember, this is the era of the ‘long tail’. So think about joining ‘the conversation’. I think, after a while, you’ll be glad you did.

The Devil's In The Comments

Image via Wikipedia

An interesting thought (well, to me at least) to end the week. We've got this little phrase, 'the devil's in the detail', a version of 'never look a gift horse in the mouth' and many other similar wee pieces of wisdom that boil down to 'that looks like a great deal, why don't you take a good, long, hard look at it and make sure you know precisely what you're getting into here.'

When we're looking at information and opinion posted online, the devil's actually not so much lurking in the detail as in the comments - whatever you've got to say, it's how people, the 'community', reacts that's perhaps more telling. Take this example, the article that sparked my thinking about this. It's a really, really nice piece that tries to take a reasoned, moderate tone about the whole controversy revolving around the infamous South Park/Prophet Mohammed debate (and, by inference, the original Danish Cartoon Saga and the recent 'Let's All Draw The Prophet' saga). It basically asks Muslims to consider what the Prophet himself would do and counsels them to, effectively, turn the other cheek. I liked it.

But read the comments. Read how quickly that feedback descends into vituperation, unreason, hatred and bigotry.

What amazed me is how much stronger it all made the original post and how much the howling of the 'haters', directed at a moderate and well-argued voice, made that voice seem more reasoned and even more powerful.

The devil, these days, is certainly in the comments. But sometimes devilment doesn't half backfire!

Cereal Killer

Image by Sam Cockman via Flickr

The post I put up on Tuesday was at least partially influenced by a chat I was having with Dubai-based personal trainer Kai Mitchell in a few off-air moments during a Dubai Today radio show I co-hosted a few weeks ago.

It was Kai’s discomfort with the practice of selling people content-free breakfast cereal based diets that turned me on to the whole issue in the first place – and it was Nestlé’s atrocious ‘pull pull’ radio advertisement that pushed me over the edge into Tuesday's wee slice of grumpy bloggery suggesting you might like to eat paper instead of breakfast
cereal products as part of your new dietary regime.

You can only imagine my delight when the blog post attracted a couple of anonymous comments. I'm not a big fan of  these as they're often used to express negative sentiment without the grace of culpability.
Anonycomments can also come from people working for companies who are trying to influence debate without being open about who they are. This is infrequent precisely because it is widely considered as dishonest, egregious and stupid behaviour. And, as eny fule no, you can be traced even if you’re ‘anonymous’. I have written about this in the past, offering guidance to companies engaging with blogs.
Anonymous comment one came at just after 11am. I haven’t (obviously) edited it:

before you go ahead and diss ads make sure you know which is which :)

the tasteless "pull pull oh my god my fat thighs into a dress is worse than labor" is a Nestle Fitness ad,the 2 weeks challenge is a Special K line that has nothing to do with Nestle..
and ps. two totally different cereals, and at least they are promoting a relatively healthy weight loss program,as opposed to the other crazy fad diets out there

In this case, the comment was saying I had mistaken one ad for another, which I did not do. I also didn’t mention Special K or, indeed Nestlé. I purposefully referenced ‘the breakfast cereal people’ and not those nice, searchable brands Nestlé and Special K, let alone the Special K two-week challenge. Special K is a Kellogg's brand.  You know Kellogs? The breakfast cereal people represented by advertising agency Leo Burnett in the Middle East?

The second comment came 14 minutes later. Having obviously reconsidered the original response, ‘anonymous’ added (again I haven’t corrected the text) this:

You know i agree that that particular radio ad was HORRIFIC. And i would probably NEVER buy that brand. But not all low-fat cereal brands preach "get skinny by eating our brand."

Some brands, specifically the ones that offer the 2-week diet, target people who have unhealthy eating habits. The are not talking to the kind of people who are already health conscience and eat organic-type food. And in order to break any habit you need to have a disciplined amount of time doing the opposite. Why do you think there are a minimum of 21 days for rehab? Becuase research shows that it takes 21 days to break an addictive habit such as alcoholism. Similarly, 2 weeks is enough to get you off of junk food/fast food AND offers you an incentive (a little weight loss) to START leading a healthier lifestyle. And im sorry but at least THIS diet is healthier than starving yourself!
Plus,cereal is MUCH better food then the greasy crap people are used to eating now a days. It probably has more vitamins than they know existed!
So the ad you mentioned really does degrade other cereal brands that are honestly trying to help women become healthier.
Lastly, please don't take my comments personally. Everyone is entitled to their opinions but i believe that informed opinions are worth listening to more.

Of course, both comments – posted as ‘anonymous’ come from the same source: a place SiteMeter identifies only as 80.227.101.130 (Leo Burnett Middle East).

Now don’t get me wrong. The commenter may well not work for Leo Burnett. The IPs could have been mixed up or the commenter might have been a random, albeit arrogant and illiterate, visitor to Leo’s offices ‘camping’ on their wireless. I mean, we don’t want to jump to conclusions now just because some dribbling idiot has wagged their fingers at us in a mildly offensive and patronising manner, do we? So let’s stick to the facts.

As a direct result of these two comments, it is now likely that any number of search strings with permutations consisting of either of these two brands and questions regarding diet will bring this post (and therefore the original one linked again for your convenience here) relatively high into Google search results. That has the potential to drive thousands of people to read my little nag about the attempt to foster the uptake of breakfast cereal diets of questionable nutritional benefit who otherwise would never have bothered.

What do YOU think? I’d be particularly interested in your views if you are employed by the Kellogg Company, the world's leading producer of cereal and Kellogg's convenience foods, including Kellogg cookies, Kellogg crackers, Kellogg toaster pastries, Kellogg cereal bars, Kellogg fruit-flavored snacks, Kellogg frozen waffles and Kellogg veggie foods. You might have concerns regarding the whole Kelloggs two-week challenge promotion, or have worries about sugar levels in Kelloggs’ foods, the use of high fructose corn syrup as a cheap sweetener in breakfast cereals  or even iron content (for instance the Danish government’s 2004 ban on Kelloggs products because of the high added vitamin content and, apparently, non-dietary iron added to its products).

If you do, you might like to add a comment. I’d really prefer it if you could do so only if you are prepared to put a name to it. If you work for an organisation with a vested interest, perhaps you’d like to declare that – or just wait until you get home so that your IP doesn’t track straight back to your company’s network and expose your idiotic attempts at corporate mendacity by proxy.

PR, Advertising and Damn Lies

Image via Wikipedia

I occasionally appear as a guest lecturer at EMDI, the Insititute for Media and Communication. This gives me the chance to rage at classes of stunned-looking students, somewhat in the manner of 'Hitler discovers public relations', for a good couple of hours. It's not unusual for me to see them looking like they're about to reach for the mace but don't want to be impolite. I usually work with the PR stream, but have also talked to the events management bunch and also the advertising lot.

It was when talking to the advertising stream that I was asked the question, 'Yes, but isn't public relations just lying?'

The question stopped me in my tracks, I can tell you. I realised that standing there in front of the class just looking like an electrocuted guppy at the girl who had asked the question was beginning to look rude and pulled myself together.

My answer was something along these lines. In all my time as a public relations practitioner, I have never told a lie in my professional life. I have told the truth from all sorts of angles, have highlighted the positive at the expense of the negative and have generally promoted the bejaysus out of all sorts of things, but I have never told anyone an untruth. I have never made a claim I cannot demonstrate or an assertion without proof.

PR cannot function on untruth. You have to have fact - incontrovertible, provable, demonstrable fact to back up your assertions and arguments. If you say you're the market leader, you have to be able to prove it. If you say this product has positive medical benefits, you have to be able to stand them up with research, expert endorsements and the like. Without the facts, PR falls down - publicly, embarrassingly and disastrously. That's one of the reasons we have journalists - to test this stuff and make sure that it passes a standard that our public can accept. Believe me, there's nothing a journalist likes to find more than a PR pushing a lie.

And yet this assertive question comes at me from someone about to embark on a career in an industry that is based on direct lies, telling absolute untruths and misleading people as its most fundamental tenet. The sloganeering of the advertising industry, the use of deliberately misleading images, words, phrases and ambitional role models has never been less than mendacious.

A Mars a day helps you work rest and play. Remember that one? Does it? Really? Or does a Mars a day slap your waddling, sedentary body with 245 calories and a fat content of almost a quarter of its overall volume?

What about Axe? (Or Lynx in some markets) The clear inference is constantly drawn in its campaigns that using the product will pull you chicks. It's so clear that an Indian man is suing Unilever because he's been spraying himself with ammonium skunkate or whatever the stuff is made out of for seven years and hasn't pulled. It's a clear lie - a deodorant won't pull women or make them go crazy. Oh, sure, it's ironic and created for purposes of amusement only. It's playful! But your job isn't amusing, people it's selling. And you're playing with a product benefit that doesn't exist - it's not provable. Show us that 9 out of 10 women find men who wear Axe are hotter than men who don't and you're home and dry.

Or what about all the 'feminine products' that let you be the woman you are? Or the antibacterial airfreshener that makes you a better mum? Or the cheesy Italian stereotypes that punt their animated schtick to pimp a tomato sauce with an Italian name that's made by a British corporate to a recipe conceived in Australia? Wear the Dolmio smile? My butt. What about the yummy seafood for cats that has barely any fish in it - a great case study of how image and language are combined in advertising and product definition to wilfully and knowingly mislead consumers? Or the hair products advertised by a celebrity wearing a wig that looks better than her real hair? Truth?

I'm not going to get bogged in examples - there are a million of them out there. The fact is that advertising has held the megaphone for so long, it is no longer able to see the growing tide of consumers unhappy with being screamed at with slogans that we know don't reflect reality. But consumer voice is growing even in the Middle East, let alone in markets such as Europe (where consumer voice tends to be stronger, oddly, than the US).


We have become used to accepting that companies make claims in their advertising that are simply unsustainable. However, more and more consumers are unwilling to meekly accept those claims - the number of visits to this blog alone researching Pringles and their contents as well as Aquafina, the tap water that would like you think it was natural - are testament to that. And now I'm getting hit after hit on American Food is Crap. People are waking up to this stuff - and to the fact that they're being sold a pup by the advertising industry.

Do PRs tell lies? No, they don't. When they do, they get caught and exposed - and quite right too. Now what's happening is we're starting to apply the same standards to high street brands and, yes, to advertising. We are starting to demand more honesty, more transparency and better standards of accountability.

I'm not saying we should take the creativity out of advertising and promotion. Far from it. But I am saying that you need to base your creative treatments on the truth and not unsustainable assertions - or lies, as I prefer to call them.

Etisalat's Emails - Phish off!

You can only imagine the joy deep in my  black heart this morning when I received an email from the telco that everyone who's not a Du subscriber loves to hate, Etisalat, snappily titled "Security Alert - Beware of Email Fraud Disguised as Official Emails".

We've all got these stupid mails from Weisatwit before. I've blogged about 'em before too. Surely they must have learned by now from the online howls of derision that accompany these well-intended but knuckle-headed emails. Apparently not.

The email, immortally, once again contains the words: "Etisalat will never email links, or call you, asking for such information." as well as, of course, a number of links to online forms asking for your name, email address and telephone number ('personal information'). The site itself also requests a user name and password as a log-on.

Of course, we could all rest assured that the user base has already been educated about computer security by the pathetic radio ads being run by UAENic, which purport to be raising 'public awareness', in which a voiceover artist doing a bad fake of an Emirati with a cold trying to English tells us 'I am Salim. Don't download undrusded zoftwares widge good arm your gombuter.' I initially thought this would at least be one of a series ('Don't run wiz zizszors in ze ovice'; 'Don't drawl born sites wizout bobub bloggers') but sadly, no. It's just the one repeated piece of useless advice that is of no utility whatsoever to anyone with enough intelligence to successfully switch a computer on. And who the hell is Salim anyway and why do we want to know?

You have to wonder about the security standards being applied to public networks and resources here when the standard of communication regarding security is so utterly woeful.