By Lisa Lochridge, FFVA Director of Public Affairs

Been on YouTube or Face Book lately? Are you reading the latest posts on your favorite blogs? And did you remember to download that podcast of a radio news story you missed on your drive home last night?

Technology has completely made over the world of news and information. Companies are challenged these days to understand how it works and how it can work for them. That includes agriculture, where tradition bumps up against the warp-speed changes in how businesses are communicating with those who matter most to them.

HAVING ‘CONVERSATIONS’

Today’s technology has brought with it a whole new lingo. The Internet isn’t just about viewing Web sites anymore. Call it social media, new media or Web 2.0, communication these days involves all sorts of new terminology and techniques: blogs (short for Web logs), podcasts, wikis, MySpace, Flickr and Twittr. “Google” is now a verb.

Social media consultant and blogger Josh Hallett discussed new media as keynote speaker at the Agriculture Institute of Florida’s recent annual meeting. Hallett has consulted with numerous companies on blogging and recently joined a California communication company as “new media strategist.” He told the group that consumers no longer want information pushed at them in a one-way fashion. They want to interact – to have a conversation. Companies have to figure out how to do that and do it well.

“We say the word ‘conversation’ quite a bit in the social media world. But like some words, when you say it over and over, it sometimes loses all meaning.....sort of like ‘social media,’ ” Hallett writes in his blog Hyku. “I think when I say it [conversation], and hopefully when some of the organizations I work with say it, they mean they want a two-way dialogue. Both sides learn something from each other. There is a give and take.”

PUBLIC DEMANDS IMMEDIACY, TRANSPARENCY

Gerald Baron, a veteran in crisis communication, says in his book, Now is Too Late2 – Survival in an Era of Instant News, that companies have to build trust to survive in today’s world.

For the business world, that involves companies changing how they communicate on a day-to-day basis as well as during crises, experts say. Gerald Baron, a veteran in crisis communication and author of Now is Too Late2 – Survival in an Era of Instant News, says companies have to build trust to survive in today’s world. That involves two actions: Doing the right thing and then communicating about it well.

Building trust has never been harder, Baron told a group at the Public Relations Society of America’s international conference. People have high expectations for ethical and socially responsible performance, yet they also expect companies to fail in that regard. He asserts that the media and the public function in today’s world essentially as regulators, giving companies a “license to operate.” He cites as an example Arthur Anderson LLP. In the wake of financial scandal, the company died because of a lack of trust.

When it comes to getting information, the public also expects immediacy and demands transparency, Baron says. Americans learned about the Vietnam War on the evening news and in the morning paper. In contrast, with 24/7 cable news coverage and embedded reporters, people are seeing the Iraq war unmediated, as it happens. Regarding transparency, Baron says the public expects the straight story. “They’re saying, ‘If I find you’re not telling the truth, I won’t trust you again,’ ” he explains.

In a post-media world where the public insists on direct and immediate communication, every story has the potential to become global. Anyone with a blog and an audience is now considered a “citizen journalist.” Anyone with a cell phone can shoot photos and video that can immediately be made available to millions online. Baron said some estimates hold that 60 million new bloggers have sprung up this past year alone.

Traditional print journalists who cover agriculture have joined the blogosphere, using the Internet to post news and commentary in between editions. 

Tom Karst, national editor for The Packer, provides comment and analysis on industry issues and news of the day on his blog, Fresh Talk.

Tom Karst, national editor for The Packer, provides comment and analysis on industry issues and news of the day on his blog, "Fresh Talk." Besides his posts and comments from others, the blog features news headlines and links to other industry-related blogs.

Dr. Doug Powell, an associate professor and scientific director of the International Food Safety Network at Kansas State University, launched “Barfblog” in May to serve as “a central location where iFSN researchers provide rapid and brief commentary about food safety issues, post videos, PowerPoint presentations and podcasts.” While others contribute to the blog, most posts are from Powell.  

Many in the produce industry may not have completely embraced social media yet, Powell says, “but the people who buy their products do communicate this way. We’ve been preaching this for the past couple of years.”

“As an example, the American Meat Institute just put a press release out yesterday as a video on You Tube,” he added. “That’s the first industry group that’s done something like that,” he added.

TOUGH BUT POSSIBLE

Meeting the public’s demand for speed, directness and transparency is tough but possible. In Now is Too Late 2, Baron cites the U.S. Coast Guard as an example. In the days after Hurricane Katrina, the Coast Guard did the right thing, rescuing 30,000 people. But it also communicated well by sending out more than 250 news releases in a variety of formats including photos and video, successfully getting out the message that it was hard at work.

Jon Harmon, director of communication strategy for Ford, said this of the Firestone tire crisis: “The next big crisis or time something like this happens, the agitators will work the news cycle as usual, but they will also include new media, CGM [consumer-generated media], video and blogs. It’ll be a whole different kind of whirlwind for corporations to combat. I think that, unfortunately, most corporations will be fundamentally unprepared for this. This is an era where people, bloggers included, can use new media to drive the news cycle in a sophisticated manner.”