Yesterday on the Guardian website, Hazel Blears sent out a (thinly) veiled criticism of Gordon Brown and, in particular, his recent YouTube video (above), the reception to which has been pretty poor to say the least.
Blears comments:
“People want to look their politicians in the eyes and get their anger off their chests. We need a ministerial “masochism strategy”, where ministers engage directly and hear the anger first-hand. I’m not against new media. YouTube if you want to. But it’s no substitute for knocking on doors or setting up a stall in the town centre.”
In uttering this statement, Blears demonstrates her ignorance of social media (done properly). Say what you like about her communication strategy (some think this was a perfectly timed outburst for the Blarite, others feel it will do her own career a great deal of damage), but her real attack here is not against YouTube, but against the way it has been used.
Pick the right medium for the right person for the right message
Putting Gordon Brown on YouTube, where he clearly doesn’t feel comfortable, is as much a mistake of his publicists and spin doctors than anyone else. And the above is essentially political suicide. Especially when the comparisons with Mr Obama are plain and just too easy to make. That is a battle the PM is never going to win.
So perhaps Blears is onto something. Brown should focus on what he knows and is comfortable doing. Whatever you think of his policies (and I fear he won’t last the summer), you have to admit that this does him no favours at all.
I don’t want to suggest that politicians should focus on trying to become public-friendly celebrities or that they should be PR-ed to the hilt (that did and didn’t work for Tony Blair). But a little bit of positive coverage could be vital for the beleaguered PM.
Thought leadership without a thought leader
But then perhaps the problem lies deeper. Perhaps this isn’t about mediums or personalities.
As PRs and marketers, we are all working with what we have. Is everything marketable? Only to a certain extent. Don’t expect someone to write about your product if its not a purple cow. You can’t sustain thought leadership without a thought leader.
Far too often, we try and take something mediocre and put a (false) gloss on it. Sometimes it works, usually it doesn’t. And you feel that part of the ‘bad press’ the PR and marketing industries get is purely down to this.
And, increasingly, social media is being seen as a magic wand for this stuff. Traditional techniques aren’t working, so let’s just set up a YouTube channel or start twittering or blogging.
This is a dangerous strategy, where the ‘online world’ is less forgiving; Number 10 has been forced to close comments on the above video! This is especially dangerous. Why use social media if you disable the ‘social’ element. And this from a government that harps on about transparency.
The desires of Ms Blears – We need a ministerial “masochism strategy”, where ministers engage directly and hear the anger first-hand – is easier to do with social media than anywhere else. But not when the strategy and its output is so shortsighted.
So what does this tell us about the above video, the Prime Minister and the current government?
Something is wrong here. Is it the message? The messenger? Or the medium? I expect YouTube will still be around, long after the current PM and his policies have been confined to the history books.