Ethics & Brand Content

2. Ethics & Brand Content • Marketing and Responsibilityin a Digital Age • Kathleen Bartzen Culver (@kbculver) • AAF Madison – October 2013

4. Brand content using digital publishing & social media to speak directly to consumers

5. A new media mix • paid • earned • owned • “every company should be a media company”

6. A new journalism mix • native advertising • BrandVoice • Forbes forecast • “The long life and fast-approaching death of the article page.” • “The new math of journalism (quality + quantity + variety = audience).” • “Content marketing by brands is the full employment act for editors and reporters.”

7. Key questions • how do brand content writers approach their jobs? • what similarities/differences mark their work? • how do they assess ethics in their work?

9. Sports in society

10. Sports in society NFL ’12 revenue: $9.5 billion

11. Sports in society Ohio State’s athletic budget: $127 million

12. Sports in society 534% increase in ESPN digital use from ’10 to ’12

13. Sports in society 28.5 million viewers for Packer opener on FOX

14. Methods • in-depth interviews • NBA, NFL, NHL, college • MLB excluded

15. Values in journalism • objectivity • fairness • truthfulness • inclusion • minimizing harm • transparency • independence

16. Sports & journalistic values • “the toy department” • professionalism as greatest concern • objectivity and fandom • conflicts abound “If a Chicago newspaper provided a visiting basketball team coverage as sympathetic as it provides the hometown Chicago Bulls, this would be understood as treachery, as if The Times of London had treated press releases from Hitler’s Germany with the same deference as those from 10 Downing Street.”

17. Similarities • covering a beat • staying current • audience focus • accuracy in context “The main thing is still get your facts straight ... Here, they trust me to see the story. My approach is the same as it was before. The only thing is that I take the smart aleck out of it when I write.”

18. Differences • selectivity in breaking news • no investigative reporting • reporting structures • competition • speed demands “The biggest difference is not breaking news ... As a reporter, it's not easy to know something and sit on it, not to be able say something about it. There are times when I know things and I'm not able to break those stories.”

19. Ethical approaches • knowing boundaries • earning trust • coaches, players, management • audience • honoring promises • focus on context “I know what can be said and what can’t. I know my ground rules. They don’t have to be communicated to me. That’s one reason I appeal to them (team management). They don’t have to babysit me.”

20. Social media • benefits • audience involvement • promotion • competition in media environment • clear concerns • Twitter and speed • accuracy • context • plagiarism & original work “In general, I think social media has hurt journalism. Anyone can be citizen journalist, but what we get a is a lot of white noise. It’s someone with a laptop in a basement. I still consider myself a professional journalist, but the worry we have is that people wouldn’t be able to differentiate.”

21. Constrained journalism • resolution of conflicts of interest • 3 approaches • emphasize org interests, different ethical obligations • emphasize duty to fans, cover difficult issues fairly • emphasize independence, share ethics of journalist • move between depending on story “If a Chicago newspaper provided a visiting basketball team coverage as sympathetic as it provides the hometown Chicago Bulls, this would be understood as treachery, as if The Times of London had treated press releases from Hitler’s Germany with the same deference as those from 10 Downing Street.”

22. Deeper concerns • Willard Bleyer, 1st brand journalist • brand content as • addition to journalism • route around journalism • government’s ultimate conflict of interest

23. Brand content & the future • health care • consumer goods • advocacy • developing ethics as an interaction between content producer and audience