To Be As Trusted As Walter Cronkite
It's No Longer About Building A Warroom, It's About Building A Newsroom!
I never met Walter Cronkite but I trusted him.
My parents trusted him. My grandparents trusted him. Pretty much everyone I knew trusted him.
Many of you reading this may not even know who he was, but he was "King of the anchormen". He was a trusted face in news and broadcast journalism for nearly 60 years.
Nineteen of those years he was the top dog at CBS Evening News. Before cable news, HULU, Neflix, YouTube and a host of other media alternatives, we had just a handful of options for obtaining our news.
The big 3, ABC, CBS, and NBC, pretty much were the extent of our news choices back then.
But it was Walter Cronkite who was considered "the most trusted man in America".
But why? Why was Walter Cronkite someone who came across with such impeccable credibility?
As I said, I never knew the man. My parents never knew the man, but there he was, invited into our home, night after night, year after year, dependably unquestioned as the source for all that we needed to know.
But it wasn't by accident that Cronkite rose to prominence as a journalist. He worked at it. As a college dropout he had to hone his craft to become the renown "Uncle Walter" that he affectionately was referred to as.
So much so that he learned to speak at 124 words per minute so that everyone could understand him while his colleagues were trained at 165 words per minute.
He took great care to make sure that his message...his words...were listened to, understood, and most importantly, believed.
Every night he signed off by telling us that we had heard everything we needed to know.
“And that's the way it is” became the declarative statement of the evening.
Was it really the way it was? Was there any other news that we needed to know? Surely in a land as big as America there were more stories to be told.
Nope...that's it. Why? Because Uncle Walter said so!
As we remember the assassination of John F. Kennedy we also remember who told us. We remember who cried with us.
Like a true uncle, Walter Cronkite let us know that the President had been killed. He grieved with us and comforted an entire nation.
As far as I know, Cronkite never turned water into wine or walked on water. He was an ordinary guy who simply did what he did, the best way that he could.
And he set a standard that is so high that guys like Martin Bashir couldn't ever hope to attain.
Whether he was or not, he came across completely authentic and trustworthy.
As a marketer I’ve studied men like Cronkite and I’ve tried to deliver messages that resonate with as much credibility as possible.
After all, as Seth Godin so eloquently has said, All Marketer’s Are Liars. So often we’re asked to promote products we don’t believe in, would never use, never eat or bring home to our families in exchange for a big retainer check.
I know animal lovers that push hamburgers. I know ad execs who hate commercials. Most of what marketers do is a facade. Which may be why so many traditional advertisers loathe social media.
We’re in the age of Walter. We’re in the age where people can sniff out bulls@#t. Authenticity is no longer something to strive for, it’s a prerequisite for doing business in a social world.
He who can tell the most effective story wins. It’s that simple. We no longer want to be interrupted by commercials and ads. We’ll actually avoid them any way that we can.
But we’ll seek out your story. We’ll look for your messages…if you are giving us what we want, how we want it and when we want it.
When you are busy telling stories to people who want to hear them, you’ll be tempted to tell stories that just don’t hold up. Lies. Deceptions. This sort of storytelling used to work pretty well.
Joe McCarthy became famous while lying about the “Communist threat.” Bottled water companies made billions while lying about the purity of their product compared to tap water in the developed world.
The thing is, lying doesn’t pay off any more. That’s because when you fabricate a story that just doesn’t hold up to scrutiny, you get caught. Fast.
So I ask you, what makes more sense as a marketer? Building a warroom to “monitor conversations” in the social realm only to respond with overwhelming copyspeak that is wholly disingenuous, or does it make more sense to provide relevant, trusted messages that create meaningful conversations?
The Big Brother-like warroom is so 2013. It had it’s place but it’s now passe. With the software platforms available today it’s quite easy to monitor mentions across multiple networks and respond accordingly. You don’t need an entire room of monitors and fancy data aggregators to get the job done of executing timely and relevant responses.
That ship sailed over the last 6 months. Let’s be real. Most brands don’t get enough mentions to warrant a warroom and most agencies don’t have the authenticity to respond in any meaningful way in them.
Having agencies respond to idle conversation with coupon offers and copyspeak is doing more harm than good. You can be sure Uncle Walter wouldn’t respond with canned messaging that everyone can see as being inauthentic pablum.
Worse is having a warroom full of inexperienced, low paid “social media specialists” who are trying to be funny or engaging in monkey business. (pardon the pun)
If you’re not creating substantive, contextually relevant content and seeking a value exchange with your audience your wasting time and money.
It’s time to understand that building a brand newsroom is vital. Whereas most agencies have a few copywriters and a couple of foot soldiers writing mundane tweets and meaningless Facebook updates, the social newsroom is staffed with professionals.
The ideal newsroom would be populated with:
- a videographer with editing skills
- a photographer
- 3 or 4 staff members with a journalistic background who are proficient in crafting stories
- and a director, executive producer editor type of person who keeps everything running smoothly
Response without trust is meaningless. Posting on social media without contextual relevance is an exercise in futility.
People want content that entertains, educates, inspires,and is informative. No one raises their hand and asks for commercial messaging. The essence of storytelling is to do just the opposite.
As Godin advises, telling the story is tantamount to success. Especially as we operate in a digital age of massive transparency.
If what you’re doing matters, really matters, then I hope you’ll take the time to tell a story. A story that resonates.If it doesn’t resonate, tell a different one.
When you find a story that works, live that story, make it true, authentic and subject to scrutiny. All marketers are storytellers, only the losers are liars.
I know there will be those who read this and choose not to believe it. There will be those who have to defend their vocational existence by denying the truth.
And there will be those who are incapable of adapting to the changes taking place in a socially driven marketplace.
But that’s okay. Because they will be forced to innovate…or die.
“And that's the way it is”
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