The “Giving Your Position before it was asked for” Letter to the market—good or not so good?

We live today in a world dictated by public relations. The Presiden has a spokesperson, Britney has a spokesperson—heck even the current loser on American Idol has one. We’re spun, messaged, handled, and fed lots of BS all in the name of controlling the message.

The world of business technology press is no different. In such a competitive marketplace, companies are looking for every inch of advantage, and sometimes, getting out in front of the story is the best way to come out ahead. But other times, the person or company going first overshoots or misses the mark, and is so far out in front of everyone else that they’re less a leader, and more conspicuous for their bravado.

Earlier in our career, we were witness to the fine line between managing the message and market backlash. Our company had just announced a pretty large acquisition—certainly the biggest in our company’s history, and our VP of Marketing wanted to ensure that the press and analysts had the points in hand that our organization wanted to make on the announcement. We wanted our position out there first before competitors could start their own spin cycle. And it was a successful strategy. The articles and briefs by and large had our talking points in there, and the market seemed to be receptive to our message.

Fast forward a few months to when one competitor of ours bought another. Again, we wanted to get out in front and try to dictate the talking points on how the market would spin this acquisition. Bad move on our part. While in the first mass email blast people bought what we were selling, this time they thought our VP was out of line and butting into a situation that didn’t ask for his input. We paid for that email for months with analysts and press people. It became clear that when it affected us, they were happy to hear what we thought, but since the 2nd acquisition wasn’t about us, us trying to make it about us didn’t do us any favors. Follow?

I mention this in conjunction with the previous link to the Finance article on the Oracle/Hyperion acquisition and how some vendors were quick to get out in front of the news and talk about how this was great for them and bad for everyone else (I generalize a bit here). But from the analysts and press folks we’ve talked to, that approach doesn’t seem to have bee wholly effective, and has likely weakened their position in the market. Why? Because just as we saw wit h our 2nd email blast, it comes across a bit desperate—the whole “me doth think thou protesteth too much” line of thinking. Or put in a more modern context “if I wanted your opinion I would have asked for it.”

It’s a fine line when there’s so much on the line, and depending on your market position, taking the high road and waiting for someone to come to you and get your thoughts isn’t always an easy route to take. But based on the brush-back pitches and changes in vendor perception we’ve seen first hand from both a few years ago and in recent weeks, it might be the best route to take.