Ketchum PR's No Blog Policy: Lame, Lame, Lame!

PR Week has an interview with Ketchum PR's Adam Brown that makes him, and his agency sound like complete dolts. Ketchum PR, which launched a blog practice but doesn't have a blog, just doesn't get it. And the more they say, the dimmer they sound. Some of my favorite quotes:

"eKetchum is a little more out-front now with the sexy new tools that everyone is talking about now like blogs and real simple syndication [RSS]. One of the things that has remained the same with eKetchum is our consistency." Yup. Consistently clueless. Talk is cheap. Name a client for whom you've created a blog.

"But for most clients right now, online is an annex. It's like you're doing something traditionally and want to do it online as well. For those type of clients, we think our offering is very appropriate." Online is most definitely not an annex. It is one of the most important communication developments since the printing press.Time to get your head out of the sand Ketchum!

Ketchum: We Don't Need No Stinkin Blogs
"We made a decision when we launched KPM to not have a blog, but to utilize the other online outlets [we have in place] to communicate. This is no different than how we counsel our clients that it's sometimes appropriate to have a blog and sometimes to not have one. That's not to say that we will not ever have a blog. That would probably be preposterous. We'll be doing something at some point." Preposterous is a good word to describe this point of view and the old-school PR-speak used to express it. How the hell can you open a blog practice and not have even a plan to blog?

"We wanted to make sure we're comfortable with our policy before we launched any kind of Ketchum blog initiative." If you are still comfortable with your policy, even after becoming the laughing stock of the blogosphere, I feel really sorry for your clients.

Better: own up to your mistakes and move forward. Don't keep defending this stupid policy.

And it's not just the lack of a blog that makes Ketchum lame. Constantin Basturea explained it very well:
"Ketchum failed to understand how to step in the blogosphere, although it’s selling its expertize in advising other on how to do it. It failed to put together a coherent plan and to implement it, although it had all the right elements for a successful launch. Ketchum launched quietly a website for demonstrating its expertize in weblogs, RSS, and podcasting, but failed to use it properly by ignoring each and every of the features that are making these tools valuable. Ketchum failed to understand bloggers’ expectations and to address them. It failed to respond swiftly to criticism. It failed to communicate in real time. When it decided to respond, it underminded its own credibility by failing to acknowledge any mistake, and by coming with "dog ate my homework"-type of excuses for the long silence.

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I think the best blog marketers come from the blogosphere. I've been spending hours a day for nearly three years as a blogger commenting and reading on various blogs. Then, and only then, did I start to think I could tell people how to converse with the blogosphere. It's always obvious to bloggers when someone from "up on high" comes into the blogsphere pushing a product or company. You need to live there for awhile before you can truly give directions on others on where to go and how get a seat at the table. Otherwise you're talking past the conversation instead of being part of it.

If my name was so similar to "ketchup", I would never use the word "consistency" in any corporate communications.

I seem to recall that inconsistency was one of the factors that contributed to Ketchum's loss of the Heinz Ketchup business...it seems not a lot has changed.... if I am not showing my age.