Monday Morning Media Minute

How does your story benefit me?  That’s always an important question.  It’s especially important if you’re trying to do something controversial.  A lot of things are controversial.

Colorado’s casinos are asking voters to let them raise their stakes to $100 a bet – a big jump from the current maximum of $5.

Colorado agreed nearly 20 years ago to let three old mining towns – Central City, Black Hawk and Cripple Creek – open small-stakes casinos.  Since then, a number of towns have tried to win approval for similar proposals.  They’ve all lost.

So, the casino owners knew they had a losing hand without a good reason for voters to let them raise their stakes.

Their answer?  A ballot proposal, known as Amendment 50, directing that a major portion of the additional taxes they’ll pay on their increased revenue go to the state’s community colleges.  In fact, the campaign for the proposal calls itself Coloradans for Community Colleges.

How effective is their tactic?  We’ll know for sure on November 4.  But I’ve already had two friends who don’t give a rip about gambling urge me to vote for the ballot proposal because it’ll help community colleges – something both of them care a lot about.

Any PR professional worth his or her salt knows about using third-party advocates to help tell your story.  But the backers of Amendment 50 have taken it a step further.  They’ve given people who would otherwise vote against their proposal a reason to vote for it.

The strategy’s a good one.  And one that doesn’t get used often enough.  Do you have a controversial idea you want to sell?  Figure out everyone who can impact the outcome.  Then give as many of them as possible a reason to support you by giving them a stake in you winning approval for your proposal.

That’s my two cents’ worth.  What’s yours?

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The Monday Morning Media Minute is now available as an eBook.  My eStore features five eBooks based on the Media Minute.  To check them out, visit my eStore and buy early and often.  The eBooks come as PDF files.  You don’t need special eBook software to read them.

Having the law on your side isn’t always enough.

Wal-Mart learned that lesson when it lost a very visible David v. Goliath fight involving an employee who suffered severe brain damage in a car wreck.

You probably saw the story: Wal-Mart’s health-insurance plan paid $470,000 for the medical expenses of Debbie Shank, whose car was broadsided by a truck. Her family sued the trucking company and won a judgment that netted $417,000 for a trust fund to pay for her long-term care.

But the judgment meant Wal-Mart was legally entitled to get its money back under the terms of its health-insurance plan. So, Wal-Mart sued – and won. And that meant Wal-Mart was legally entitled to recover its money, which would have taken away all the money in the trust fund paying for Debbie’s care, plus some.

Freely acknowledging Wal-Mart was legally entitled to reimbursement, Jim Shank (Debbie’s husband) took his story to the news media. And the media quickly painted Wal-Mart as heartless for trying to take the money needed to pay for Debbie’s care.

Clearly losing what quickly became a highly visible public relations battle, Wal-Mart’s first line of defense was to point out – correctly – that other companies also have clauses in their employee health-insurance plans allowing them to recoup medical expenses paid on behalf of employees who win financial compensation for their injuries.

Predictably, that defense didn’t work. Saying other companies are doing the same thing just makes matters worse. It raises the odds I’ll be the victim next time.

Another common line of defense, often used by companies subject to government regulation, that doesn’t work: We complied with whatever rules or regulations were in place. The public doesn’t care if you played by the rules if the rules won’t protect them against injury.

After several days of highly visible negative coverage, Wal-Mart surrendered and said wouldn’t collect the money after all. Wal-Mart also had the good sense to announce it’ll change its health insurance plan keep its hands off legal judgments paid to other employees who find themselves in similar circumstances.

That’s Crisis Communication 101: Fix the problem (let the family keep the money) and tell the rest of us what you’re doing to make sure it won’t happen again (change the insurance plan).

If you’re the “Goliath” of the story, it’s hard to win a public relations battle with a “David” who’s been badly injured through no fault of their own if you’re seen as having caused the injury or as doing something that will make the injury worse.

Surrendering before the story turns negative often is your best strategy.

That’s my two cents’ worth. What’s yours?

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The Monday Morning Media Minute is now available as an eBook. My new eStore features five eBooks based on the Media Minute. To check them out, visit my eStore and buy early and often. The eBooks come as PDF files. You don’t need special eBook software to read them.

© 2008 Jerry Brown

Is Roger Clemens turning himself into another Pete Rose – a star athlete destroying his own reputation by breaking the rules and then denying the undeniable?

Or is he the victim of a no-win media mugging where he’s “guilty” no matter what he says or does and with no way to get his reputation back?

I have my answers to those questions. If you care about the Clemens saga, you probably have yours.

If Clemens is guilty of illegally using drugs to help his baseball career, then his strong denials are the worst possible strategy. The louder and longer he protests, the higher the cost and the bigger the loss of credibility if and when he’s proven guilty. In Clemens’ case, definitive proof of guilt could put him in prison because it would also be proof of perjury.

It’s easy to see why star athletes like Rose or Clemens (if guilty) get themselves into the position of defending the indefensible.

Their whole careers are based on being best. The financial and ego rewards that go with being the best are a big part of who they are. The stakes are extremely high for them.

But they’re not the only ones who wait too long to admit mistakes and do what they can to fix them.

Anyone familiar with Crisis Communication 101 knows better than to keep denying the undeniable. The trick is to step up to the challenge of doing the right thing – or getting your clients to step up to doing the right thing.

One more point. From where I sit, all the participants in last week’s congressional hearing on the Clemens saga come out of the hearing as losers.

Fairly or not, Clemens looked guilty. Trainer Brian McNamee may have hurt Clemens. But he certainly didn’t come across as a Boy Scout trying to do the right thing. He looks like someone trying to cash in on his notoriety.

And members of House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform who held the hearing? How did they manage to turn this hearing into a partisan fight? Did anyone who watched the hearing believe committee members had any legislative purpose for the hearing? Their agenda seemed pretty straightforward – election-year politics.

The moral of this part of the story for the rest of us?

Like it or not, what you say is only part of your message. The context in which you say it will be part of your message when you deliver it. So, crafting the right words is only part of your challenge. The right words won’t do you any good if the context in which you deliver them means they won’t be believed.

That’s my two cents’ worth. What’s yours?

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The Monday Morning Media Minute is now available as an eBook. My eStore features five eBooks based on the Media Minute. To check them out, visit my eStore and buy early and often. The eBooks come as PDF files. You don’t need special eBook software to read them.