Going Public: Business Publicy

I have been stewing for several weeks about this piece by Stephanie Clifford of The NY Times, about companies and individuals airing their business disagreements in public, as a new way to bring pressure to bear:

- Stephanie Clifford, Corporate Antagonism Goes Public

When Time Warner Cable was tussling over fees with the News Corporation, it did something that would have been unthinkable in the backrooms where deals were once struck: it hired a political consultant to mount a public campaign against its own client.

Scripps Networks drew fans into its spat with Cablevision via the I Love Food Network site. Scripps owns the Food Network.

Bruce Haynes, a Republican strategist and managing director at the Washington firm Purple Strategies, helped create ads asking customers if Time Warner should “Roll Over or Get Tough” over fees with the News Corporation’s Fox division. In November, a month before its contract with Fox expired, Time Warner Cable began running television, Internet and print ads.

“We said, we ought to get some political advice and frame it, somewhat, from those lessons,” said Sam Howe, chief marketing officer of Time Warner Cable. “Name names, and give customers some information.”

Fox and Time Warner Cable are playing nice now — they announced an agreement on Jan. 1. But the episode is just one example of how once-private business negotiations are spilling into public view.

Two weeks ago, Conan O’Brien released a statement criticizing NBC in an attempt to reach as many people as possible. The same day, Google, rather than conducting backroom negotiations with Chinese officials, posted a blog item saying it would no longer adhere to censorship policies on its Chinese sites.

And in another nasty cable fight that was resolved just last week, Scripps Networks recruited its stars from the Food Network and HGTV in ads complaining that Cablevision, a New York-area cable provider, had removed the channels from the service. In retaliation, Cablevision ran ads encouraging viewers to complain directly to the Scripps chief executive.

One way to view this is simply the decline of clubbiness in executive boardrooms. When all the CEOs had gone to Harvard, Princeton, or Yale together, and hung out at the same clubs and mansions in Newport, business negotiations — even acrimonious ones — were generally hammered out in smoke-filled rooms, behind oaken doors.

The end of WASP domination of corporate America has led to a relaaxing of the clench-jawed ethics of the post war era, and now it seems that anything goes.

Or perhaps more specifically, the game of business is being played on a larger board: one that includes the public as a player, and the sort of emotional narrative that introduces drama. And whay is this happening now? Social tools make this possible, and inexpensive:

- Stephanie Clifford, Corporate Antagonism Goes Public

Part of the reason for the public shift is technological. With Twitter, Facebook and Web sites, companies can solicit support easily. “If you go back 20 years, it would’ve been very, very hard to solicit feedback from millions of customers,” said Chris Nelson, director of crisis management at the public relations firm Ketchum, which advised Time Warner Cable on its strategy. “Now, it’s a piece of cake.”

On Jan. 12, Google took what spokesman Gabriel Stricker characterized as “an unusual step,” publishing a blog post announcing that human rights activists had been targets of computer attacks from China, and in response, Google would stop censoring search results in China.

“The outcome we were hoping for here is the same thing we’ve always hoped for: to be able to operate securely in China and in a way that increases access to information for our users in China,” Mr. Stricker said via e-mail.

But another outcome was a turnaround in Google’s reputation. Long criticized for acting monopolistically, Google is getting commendations from civil liberties and privacy groups and even from young people who are leaving flowers outside its offices in China.

These public postures can lead to a major shift in public sentiment, as the Google example shows.

So, it is fairly safe to say that all businesses will consider playing the publicy card in the future when confronted with a recalcitrant business partner, or when involved in formerly private activities that touch the public interest, such as negotiations with a government.

But a move like Google’s can create deep ties with groups that self-identify with the positions being advocated by the company taking their grievance public, and can create lasting connections, much more potent than conventional advertising or PR (although Google’s Superbowl ad was great).