Paul LaMonica devotes yesterday's CNNMoney Buzz column to Wal-Mart's purchase of Vudu, a technology company that has technology licenses with major TV manufacturers that could help in delivering online video.
This morning, Portfolio's Daniel M. Harrison writes about the problems Google is experiencing with the launch of its Google Buzz product.
Both stories illustrate how reputation can work against a market leader when it tries something new. Companies that are undisputed leaders of their core businesses like Google and Wal-Mart create an expectation that everything they try will succeed. The reality is that they don't. Google makes all of its money from search advertising and Wal-Mart is the world's best brick-and-mortar retailer.
My father the retired security analyst covered Dow Jones & Company when it owned The Wall Street Journal. He used to say that whenever Dow Jones management tried to do anything except run the WSJ and Barron's, it was time to sell the stock. He was referring to their purchase of Telerate and launch on the Financial News Network but there were other examples.
LaMonica makes the same observation about Wal-Mart today.
But once again, Wal-Mart (WMT, Fortune 500) may find it's getting into a crowded market too late. Wal-Mart had a movie download service that it launched with the help of Hewlett-Packard three years ago. That was a flop. Before that, Wal-Mart tried and failed to out-Netflix Netflix in the online DVD rental business.
Portfolio's Harrison points to Google just waking up to the fact that not all of their ideas will work.
Within the glass-and-steel tower of its Mountainview, California, headquarters, engineers at Google have grown accustomed to a certain routine after their alma mater goes live with one of its funky new products. Grab a latte, plunk yourself down on a brightly colored beanbag, and casually high-five your colleagues while another knocks out a victory tune on the baby grand piano in the corner.
There has been little music at the Googleplex in the last week, however. Instead, the world’s most loved company has found itself in a rare position: having to vociferously defend and constantly modify its latest product rollout.
Both articles are strategic reading for PR people representing market leaders on how to apply Murphy's Law to whatever you are trying to do. When you represent a company that is used to winning and are part of a PR team that might be a small appendage of a massive sales, marketing and advertising, it your role to be the person who plays devil's advocate. You need to break out of viewing the launch as a "we" and experience how it might be to use.
In the case of Wal-Mart, you would need to play the role of the investor and ask why this plan to take over online retailing is going to work better than the last one.
It's no fun to be the skunk in the garden when everyone else is getting ready to celebrate success - but it is PR's job as the owner of earned media.
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