Time To Delete 'Digital'

I started to write this blog 2/3 years ago as an outlet for aggression, after listening to anodyne powerpoints about the future of media. It's -1 outside in London, and I'm not hungover 22 floors up in Hong Kong - other than that, the status quo remains.

Still plenty of people who enjoy confusing clients and/or their bosses by using as many digital terms and phrases as possible. It's even more helpful if new apps launch regularly with stupid names. Knowledge/confusion = power and paranoia = hopefully a few quid.

I've been working in essentially PR since '95 and my job's not changed. I persuade people to buy products by getting someone they respect to tell them they should. For those of us who have always been in PR we're not doing anything new - it's just our skills and techniques have had to be radically reinvented.

In 95 I wrote a press release, faxed it and tried to carve a story via a chat with a journalist. If I want to do my job properly in 2009, I have to master the fact that the customer now starts at Google, or heads into their community of mates. I need to press buttons on a keypad and persuade someonethey respect to post, write, share a link, re-tweet my 140 characters or whatever it takes, to get them to say exactly the same thing..."Have you seen this?"

Competitive advantage comes from ideas first and foremost, not which buttons to press. If you have something exciting, exhilarating, moving, engaging - then naturally, people will want to share your ideas with others. Good ideas precipitate conversations that start with the phrase "have you seen this?" Everything underneath (the old skool press release, the Facebook group, the widget, the Twitter feed), is just simple professionalism to share that idea.

Using the term 'digital' as if that in itself is creative, is holding us back. Take it as a given. Shove it in the bin, move on, and move people with ideas 2009 style.

Comments

[Tim]

Lovely stuff

[Mee]

Very apt indeed.
In these parts people are so busy trashing apps that I think they may unwittingly END the Digital word indeed!:(
Thank God for the youth!

[Gurprriet Siingh]

Very appropriate and relevant. At 38 years of age, I always believed I hadn't aged much, and was young for my age. And then I realized, I didn't know what Twitter was. I didn't have a blog, I won't know what the hell W00t! means either..

While I was busy doing stuff, the world has changed. My kids gather and share opinion on Text messages and the internet, at the speed of light! They're far more opinionated and selective than I ever was. Brand loyalty..what's that? If you make one mistake you're dumped. And you could be dumped because you're uncool!

It was interesting reading this note, because I hadn't realized how much life is suddenly changing for PR folks. While celebrities continue to be influencers, the net has spawned a whole new tribe which looks up to an additional set of influencers.

I notice 2 people on Twitter who're always writing about new technology, and each has over 200,000 followers! Now that's influence.

Cheers!