It’s Halloween - National UNICEF Day in Canada. As the PR agency for UNICEF’s Prairie Region, we’ve been very busy securing media coverage about this year’s Trick-or-Treat campaign. We’ve run several events this month and fielded interviews across Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

Our goal with this kind of campaign is to work creatively with our client and the media to ensure the messages we want are getting across and that the media is getting good stories to cover.

To do that, we staged our first ever celebrity pumpkin carving contest here in Winnipeg. We also organized three simultaneous school events in Regina, Saskatoon and Winnipeg where children ‘walked for water’ to simulate how millions of African children must walk to get their daily drinking water. We were on the phone to radio hosts for the past three weeks and collaborated with  Shaw TV and CityTV’s Breakfast Television to help them produce UNICEF-themed segments.

All in all, we’re very pleased that our ‘earned media’ was way up this year compared to last. We certainly hope that once all the money is counted that the ‘earned fundraising’ is also up this year too.

In addition to the widespread coverage on television and radio, here are a few of the stories we generated in print and online:

Winnipeg Free Press
Pumpkin carving is not for the fainthearted

Winnipeg Sun
Pumpkin Prowess

Regina Leader-Post
Coming together to make Halloween safe
Learning about life in Africa

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix
Walk for Water

If you haven’t donated to UNICEF this year yet, please do so at www.trickortreatforunicef.ca.  The campaign raises money to build and outfit schools in Rwanda and Malawi.

I just came back from the first annual UNICEF Celebrity Pumpkin Carving Contest at Kildonan Place and have to take the time to thank everyone for making it a wonderful success.

Thanks to Kildonan Place, Subway and Maggie’s Pumpkin Patch. And thanks to all our celebrities, including Fred Penner and his son, CTV’s Syliva Kuzyk, Doug Speirs of the Winnipeg Free Press, Dave Angus of the Winnipeg Chamber of Commerce, Clear FM’s Billie Jo and Jay, CBC TV’s John Sauder, Breakfast Television’s Jon Cameron and John Ljungberg, Jolene Bailie of the Winnipeg Contemporary Dancers, and MTC’s Mairi Babb and Peter Mooney, Hot 103’s Steve Adams and Bubba B, QX104’s Mike Alan, Peter Havens of Kildonan Place, and Tom Vaeth of the Winnipeg Goldeyes.

Our Judges’ Choice winner was Fred Penner. Scariest pumpkin went to Breakfast Television. People’s Choice went to Kildonan Place. Winnipeg Contemporary Dancers received Honourable Mention. And Hot 103 was Runner Up.

See our photos here.

We had a lot of fun, raised money for UNICEF’s Schools for Africa programme and put a lot of smiles on faces.

Dooley Communications manages the media relations and public relations efforts for UNICEF Canada’s Prairies Region, which overs all of Manitoba and Saskatchewan. We’ve run a number of events this October as part of the annual Trick-or-Treat campaign.  Our communications goals have been to support UNICEF’s mission of educating people about the needs of children around the world as well as to help them raise money to meet those needs. We’ve done that through publicity events, news releases, media advisories, social media (such as Facebook) and event management.

If you haven’t already, check out the blog we’re editing and writing on social media and user-generated content: snoo.ws.

The snoo.ws is a project of Dooley Communications client ICUC Moderation Services, one of the busiest online content  moderation companies in the world. We’re happy to provide our editorial and communications services for this daily news blog. We’re also working with ICUC on a number of other projects to build its business actively through social media, media relations and via speaking engagements.

But why is snoo.ws a cool project? Why does it make sense to do? Because over time the snoo.ws will demonstrate ICUC’s expertise in this field. They are really leading the pack in social media moderation - discussion forums, video, photos, text to screen, etc. - and this blog will help them cement that reputation. It also gives them an opportunity to reach out and connect with people in marketing and public relations fields who are tapping into user-generated content initiatives to drive market share and brand value for their organizations and their clients.

This is PR 101 for the 21st century.

I’m in the middle of reading The Snowball, the ‘authorized’ biography of Warren Buffett by Alice Schroeder, and it has made me realize what a master of public relations the old mega-billionaire is. I’ll go one further: I would say that Buffett’s razor sharp PR instincts were key to him becoming one of the richest people in the world. The public relations efforts he led saved (or earned) him billions over the years.

But he’s just an investor, you say? He’s a numbers guy. What does he know about RACE formulas (Research, Analyze, Communicate, Evaluate, for those who don’t know) and winning over ‘key stakeholders’ and all that good jargony stuff? It’s because he understands how important one’s reputation is and how hard it is to earn credibility.  In his words: “it takes a lifetime to earn a reputation, and five minutes to blow it.”

One of the best examples of his PR instincts came from the Salomon Brothers scandal of 1991. Buffett had parachuted in a few years earlier as a white knight investor to save the firm from a hostile takeover. With eerie echoes of today’s financial mess, Salomon was a brash, bullying investment bank that had run afoul of regulators by trying to corner the market on treasury bonds. When the scandal broke, Salomon was in a crisis to survive. Leveraged to the hilt, its lenders were calling its loans and the bank had to unwind huge investment and derivative positions around the globe. It looked as though the bank would fail and that a global financial crisis would ensue (sound familiar?).

As a board member, Buffett had been insulated from the shenanigans of the bond traders, and was the only person close to the situation who had the reputation and experience to take the helm of the sinking ship. He did so reluctantly, but he recognized that the credibility he had built so preciously over 50 years was about the only thing that could steady the bank.

He immediately held a news conference where he told all. He sat there for more than an hour taking question after question after question. The reporters were spent before he was, but he left no room for misinformation or obfuscation. The effect of his performance was to take the air out of the sails of the newshounds who were hunting for injured, scandalized fat cats. He talked about the wrongdoing. He expressed his huge disappointment with it and broadcast loudly that the old culture of Salomon would change immediately.

Then he also decided to cooperate so closely with investigators that he even waived attorney-client privilege for the firm so anything its lawyers discovered would be shared with regulators. Now, that’s transparency. Finally, he took immediate action to change policies (including compensation policies) at the bank, fired people who had to be fired and told everyone that the old ways were over.

In the middle of the storm, this is how he dealt with his PR firm:

Everything at Salomon was turned topsy-turvy as the new culture of openness went into effect… Buffett walked into a room at 7 World Trade Center for a meeting. Someone, acting on autopilot, had hired a new public relations firm. Around a large square table, two dozen people sat waiting for them. Some worked for Salomon, but most were public relations people and lobbyists who were billing by the hour. Buffett listened for fifteen minutes as they described how they wanted to manage the crisis. Then he stood up. “I’m sorry, but I’ve got to excuse myself,” he said. He leaned over, whispered in [lawyer Ron] Olson’s ear, “Tell them they won’t be needed,” and walked out of the room.

“It isn’t that we’re misunderstood, for Christ’s sake,” said Buffett afterward. “We don’t have a public relations problem. We have a problem with what we did.” (page 602)

I disagree with the last quotation… he did have a PR problem, but I agree that he didn’t need help to “manage a crisis.” He knew what to do. It was his reputation on the line and, at that moment, he was Salomon Brothers. I’d love to know what approach the firm had  pitched. Not that it would have mattered. Buffett was already following the perfect crisis communications plan. He did, however, need his communications and PR people to carry out that plan.

CEOs and business leaders should take note of this, as should public relations people. It is a perfect example of why it’s so important for a CEO to understand intuitively what needs to be done to protect a firm’s reputation. The first step is to build a good reputation in the first place. Be honest. Be credible. And do your thing.

In the end, Buffett’s approach to the crisis saved the bank, saved thousands of jobs and billions in shareholder equity. It burnished his reputation as a corporate do-gooder further.

I’ve worked with and for quite a few business leaders here in Winnipeg and, judging from what I’ve seen, more than a few of them could take lessons from this on how to relate to their publics. I remember one episode where I had to explain gently to a senior executive why a ‘no comment’ response to a potential crisis in his organization was the wrong approach. If I’d had The Snowball with me that day, I’d have liked to have thrown it at him.

Slasher flicks have always appealed to the basest parts of human beings. The recent spate of torture porn has managed to lower that standard so far that Mengele would blush and turn away. Sitting atop the heap of torture porn is the Saw franchise which is about to release its fifth installment (please, no more).

Well, it seems that not only can the filmmakers butcher their dialogue and plotlines as easily as their actors, they can also mangle their marketing efforts.

Check this story out: Saw is promoting itself with a web app that allows people to send creepy phone messages threatening murder and mutilation. The police have had to respond and have issued a warning about this stupid, reckless, hairbrained marketing gimick. I wonder if the producers will get invoiced for 9-1-1 nuisance calls.

I’m all for marketing and publicity efforts that get people talking, but not if it gets them talking to the cops.

This is why having a public relations agency is important. You don’t get stupid gaffes like this.

CPRS Manitoba is ready to start the preparations for the second annual Manitoba Communicator of the Year award. As past-president, I’m heading up the committee to oversee the award celebrations. We have plenty of energy already and great ideas on how we can make this year’s award celebration better than the last.

If you’re interested in volunteering, drop me a line at adooley@dooleycommunications.ca.

The award will go to the person or people who have demonstrated excellence in corporate communications and public relations. We had a tremendous field of nominees last year and I expect we’ll enjoy the same kind of response in year two.

As the country recovers from an uninspiring federal election campaign, I’m left wondering whether the Tories lost the election by trying to be too careful.

Much has been made about Stephen Harper’s controlling nature. As the leaders criss-crossed the country, it became very clear that no one other than Harper would be speaking for the Conservatives. Funny that, when he had more than 300 candidates. Only Finance Minister Jim Flaherty was permitted a microphone and that was only due to the extreme financial crisis that boiled over during the last two weeks.

Local Conservative candidates in Winnipeg skipped all candidates meetings. Trevor Kennerd - by most reports a decent guy with a good head on his shoulders - was attacked by critics who labelled him an extreme social conservative. Yet he did not respond in any substantive way. Minister of Agriculture Gerry Ritz even went so far as to make the media wait outside in the cold on election night rather than inviting them in to his headquarters as is the tradition. According to the CTV reporter last night, she was told he’d deign to give the media three minutes at the end of the night.

My theory is this kind of micro-management by the Prime Minister’s Office probably cost them their coveted majority. Preventing candidates from debating and discussing the issues is against democratic principles. It breeds mistrust, and acts contrary to the creation of a credible national party. Leaders need to trust their people; they need to be proud of their party and allow their people to do what they’re supposed to do; and they need to cultivate future leaders.

What I fear, however, is that Harper believes his team was too weak and not ready for primetime. He hoped he could skate through a few weeks without anyone really recognizing the lack of bench strength. We don’t know that for sure though and won’t until the Conservative leadership allows its MPs and candidates to have their own points of view.

What I find most perplexing about the muzzling strategy is just how impossible it is to control messaging this much in a blog-a-day, twitter-filled world. All it does is allow your opponents to frame the debate and position you as untrustworthy.

I’m not hopeful.

Client Services Manager

Winnipeg, October 14, 2008 - Dooley Communications has an immediate opening for a Manager of Client Services to serve our growing roster of clients. Dooley Communications is a small, fast-growing and innovative agency with a focus on providing senior level public relations and corporate communications services to corporations, government agencies and non-profits.

The Manager of Client Services will take a lead role on managing and executing projects for our clients. We are seeking a career communications professional with a minimum of two years experience working in a corporate or agency environment; very strong writing skills; confidence in oral presentations; a creative flair and a nose for quality and detail.

The position calls for someone with a post-secondary degree or diploma in communications, experience in media relations, issues management and at least some event management. The successful candidate will be a self-starter with an entrepreneurial attitude who can work independently in an unstructured environment. A desire to excel at client service is vital. You will be very comfortable working online, have an interest in the latest trends in communications and marketing, and a desire to consistently learn and improve your skills.

Dooley Communications offers a competitive package of salary, bonuses and benefits. Our motto is to be excellent, be urgent and be yourself. If that suits your personality, then drop us a line.

Please send resume and cover letter with salary expectations in confidence to Adam Dooley, President, at adooley@dooleycommunications.ca. Deadline for applications for this position is October 27, 2008.

I was subbing for Carl again today, this time for the full day program of PR diploma students. They are another good group and make me feel good about the future of public relations.

One thing that bugs me about teaching public relations is just how far behind the textbooks are on online communications. No mention of social media, a poor discussion of blogging and really no understanding of how people and organizations use search to conduct business on the Web. I’m teaching Public Relations Fundamentals II in January and I’ll have to keep my eyes open for a good resource.

Just wanted to say a quick thank you to the Public Relations Fundamentals class at the University of Winnipeg’s department of continuing education. I was substituting for regular instructor Carl Radimer tonight and had a great time. It’s a great class with a lot of thoughtful comments.

I enjoyed leading the discussion on issues management and how corporations and governments can use public relations to persuade, shape public opinion and  win over their various audiences.