I have hesitated to write this because I think a lot of what is going on in the economy and business climate is due to a contagion of panic and fear. I don't want to add to this via a post that acknowledges certain realities, but do want to provide advice that I hope some will find useful.
The realities that I am talking about are that the mood of the day feels an awful lot like the post-911 period and the dot com meltdown.
Although the stresses to the tech sector in terms the realities of cash flow and profits may be more imagined (or anticipated) than real, here and now, the net effect is the same. Companies – both vendors and their customers – are being conservative in their spending and VCs are asking their portfolio companies to make cash last longer while pulling back on investments in new ventures.
There was lots of buzz and panic in the tech community in the wake of a report from Sequoia (see Sequoia Rings the Alarm Bell on GigaOm).
PR people and agencies are not powerless in all this, and, as I have been blogging, there is no better time to prove our value and deliver solid results and ROI. At the same time, we need to adjust our strategies, themes and messages to fit the mood of the day in the tech sector.
Soft benefits are out and hard ones in, in terms of cost savings or the ability increase the top line. Happy talk about cool features, and next generation breakthroughs just do not cut it now. People are less interested in bold vision and more interested in bottom line results.
So take a good hard look at your key messages and campaign themes and adjust them accordingly, otherwise you will sound out of step with the tenor of the times and will just get mocked or ignored.
In particular I am thinking about the social media and enterprise 2.0 spaces. Some of the coverage has started to turn negative. There is a Crash 2.0 meme that has been brewing.
I personally feel that there is great potential in the technology, and it is not just a distraction to IT departments as some articles would have you believe. Social technologies are changing the way that we communicate. Just like the Internet forced a sea change in how companies and people work and do business, the new social Web has similar potential and thus will be ignored at the peril of those who do so.
Just the same, we are advising clients in these spaces that now is a great time to shift from talk about cool features to documented, real results and returns from the technology.
