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21st June, 2012

Cross-posted from the EML Wildfire blog

As part of my work with the PRCA’s Digital Steering Committee, I’m part of a consultation process that is trying to create a set of guidelines for the PR industry to help it better understand and interact with Wikipedia.

PR people shouldn’t touch Wikipedia. This is a common viewpoint amongst Wikipedians. And, considering the negative press that has often surrounded PR dealings with the encyclopaedia, and the bad practices that are all far too common, it is easy to see why.

Time and time again, PRs and PR agencies have become unstuck. So the CIPR and PRCA have both made efforts over the last few months to engage with Wikimedia and begin to develop a series of guidelines to help the industry.

Philip Sheldrake has been a chief advocate of this work and, on the latest issue of CIPR TV had some good advice for PR professionals. Essentially Wikipedia is a community and, as with any community, you have to abide by its rules. That might mean you don’t end up with the decision you initially were after, but that is just the way it goes. PRs in particular should be familiar with this type of relationship having worked with journalists!

Wikipedian David Gerard was also on the show and made the point that Wikipedia is not owned by anyone and all Wikipedians are striving for is a neutral point of view. If you don’t have a neutral point of view (e.g. PR), you shouldn’t edit. You should go to the talk pages and participate there. If that doesn’t work, then there are escalation procedures in place that can be used.

Get involved in the consultation

The consultation process is on a Wiki on the Wikimedia site and the initial phase will end this Sunday. I’d encourage anyone in the PR industry to get involved, share your viewpoint and think about how this might affect your own dealings with Wikipedia.

continue reading: PR and Wikipedia – let’s push for a better relationship...

27th January, 2011

Edelman’s annual Trust Barometer has some very interesting findings. For example, it reveals that while online search engines are the first place people go to for information about a company, traditional news still ranks as the most trusted source the UK.

It also reveals that 83% of people in the UK need to hear information more than three times before they believe it, while 27% need to hear it six to ten times. This level of scepticism is rivalled only by the US.

These are all important learnings for PRs.

However, for me, the most interesting research to come out of the study centres around who we trust to get information from.

Recent politico-economic events were good for social

With the background of the economic crisis, bankers bonuses and MP’s expenses, the ‘establishment’ has taken a bashing in recent years.

It’s not hard to see how this might have had an adverse effect on the levels of trust we have in people who hold ‘official’ positions.

And, according to Edelman, this has been the case. Except that, this year, the study shows trust is returning. This year, CEOs rank among the top credible people globally. Two years ago they were in the bottom two.

The backlash continues

This is interesting, because it mirrors a move of scepticism when it comes to social media.

It’s as though as our trust in CEOs and the like recovers, we are become less trusting of social channels.

While we like to get the thoughts and opinions of our peers through social channels, when we want to get information, we naturally migrate back to ‘trusted’ sources, including traditional media.

I’ve talked before about the social media backlash more from a marketing perspective, but there seems to be a growing backlash in other quarters too. If you’re interested in learning more about this backlash, there was a really interesting article by Paul Harris in the Observer last weekend.

Clearly, it is hard to base this entire theory on the back of just one consumer survey, but it is certainly a trend I’ll be watching carefully over the next year or so.

continue reading: The social media backlash continues; our trust in CEOs grows...