Conversations Matter

Welcome to the new blog of Matter Communications.

As many of you are aware, Matter is become more and more involved in the world of social media (also sometimes called new media, Web 2.0 and a variety of other things!). The use of blogs, podcasts, wikis, etc. is changing the way companies and individuals communicate, collaborate, market, sell and buy. To help our clients navigate this largely uncharted territory, we have launched a new branded offering called SocialMatter™.

In recent weeks we have been introducing SocialMatter to our current clients. Interestingly, many clients (including ATG, Clark, IVT and others) have already asked for social media counsel and programs, creating an even greater sense of urgency for us to get up to speed and become actively engaged. Social media is largely something you learn by doing. That said, the Matter team also subscribes to the "practice what you preach" philosophy, and so we have launched this blog as a demonstrative way to join in the conversation on the web.

As you will no doubt find obvious, this is just a starting point as we tweak the design and functionality of this blog. We will also begin to populate it with posts written from various key spokespeople at our growing agency. We hope that you find value in what you read, and we encourage you to give us feedback in the form of comments.

The topics of our posts may range from praise or criticism of subjects relevant to not only the public relations industry and new media in general, but also to news and trends we are observing with clients and related markets.

Rather than continue to detail our intentions, it's probably about the time to start actually posting...

Enjoy!

One of the topics we discussed during recent social media training was the notion of credibility and transparency in a world where everyone can be a publisher. A recent example of how not to do it is the Edelman/Wal-Mart debacle. Earlier this week, Edelman apologized – a move that was met with a chorus of “Too little, too late! and “So, what are ya gonna do about it?” (For Jesse's thoughts on the matter read the first two posts here.) The firm today outlined its initial steps.

As more and more clients are calling on Matter to advise them in this arena, it can feel like quite dangerous territory. Certainly, look at what Edelman did and learn from it. But, really, if you apply common sense and act as you would in any other medium – with integrity, honesty and openness – it shouldn’t be all that hard."

The question now remains whether we are being too simplistic in accepting this response from Edelman. On one hand, we as an agency (and individually as seasoned PR professionals) understand the significance and value in making mistakes, learning from them, and using the newfound expertise to improve. On the other, if someone (or a collection of someones) proclaims to assume a position of leadership in a given territory, and then is found to have made questionable judgment calls, can't we expect more than a simple "I'm sorry, and I've learned?"

By now, most of you reading this are familiar with Matter Communications, and you're aware that we are a full-service public relations and marketing communications agency specializing in technology and business-to-business markets.

In the past couple of months, we have had some pretty terrific news including the announcement of several new clients and our most recent statement that the company has addressed its continued rapid growth by promoting several management-level professionals to senior positions. Over the course of the last year or so, we've opened an office location in Providence, RI, and we are continuing to experience a growth trajectory that includes many new clients and an expanding team of PR practitioners. This fall, Patty Barry, formerly senior vice president was named agency principal. Colleen Sheehan was promoted from vice president to senior vice president and Andy Meltzer was promoted from director to vice president.

We don't want to simply reiterate everything we said in the actual announcement, but we did want to point out that as we enter the end-of-year/holiday season (it sure came quick!), it's exciting to be able to talk about our expanding offering as well as our expanded team. We're already seeing compelling results from our entrance into the social media realm as more of our clients (and other companies, in general) grasp just how rapidly "web 2.0" has taken over the way that most of the media operates.

2007 is going to be an interesting year, that's for sure.

...Well, maybe not exactly. But many members of the PR team here at Matter were not-so-pleasantly surprised to open their email this morning and find upwards of 125 to 150 messages in Google Alerts, alone.

What gives? you might ask. Isn't that overdoing it?

Well, yes. The mark of a savvy PR professional is not just thinking proactively and implementing creative strategy on behalf of a client, but also includes the regular consumption of industry-relevant news and monitoring competitors, too. Of course, there are a variety of tools and resources which make this task more manageable, the simplest of which is the Google Alert. Yesterday, however, Google revealed that they've added blog monitoring (among other options) to their alert service, which means that every active Google Alert picked up the usual news mentions this morning by aggregating these links to all of us...and every other possible mention of the companies, terms, and products we're monitoring on every blog, group, or website.

Some of our junior staff members feel pretty strongly that Google overwhelmed a lot of unsuspecting users by simply making the switch for everyone previously monitoring news and web results, without regard to the fact that many of them use other services for blog purposes. Then again, maybe it's a blessing in disguise, as many people still do not "get" just how important new media is to the news industry, and this is just one type of wake-up call that will happen in the coming months.

What do you think?