The Public Diplomacy Blog: 2012-05-27

Friday

Blogathon India 2012: A high impact meet in New Delhi

Unlike in the West, where blogs have emerged as a serious form of commentary, in India, traditional media remains dominant. While niche blogs are becoming important in spaces like food, music, sports, travel, fashion, entertainment and gadgets, bloggers have a long way to go before wielding any serious influence on the public discourse. Blogs are important to expand the civic space and break the stranglehold of 'brahmanical' Indian media, where sometimes, vested interests can influence conversations.

It was therefore interesting to have a Blogathon in New Delhi recently, that saw more than 100+ bloggers getting together to interact and network. Blogathon India, a new network for Indian bloggers, concluded their first meet up called the ‘Dell Blogathon’ 2012 on May 26th, at The Second Sin, New Delhi. The theme of the meet up was aligned to the aim of the network .i.e.

"Celebrating the power of blogging together"

(From L t R: Ankul, Akshita & Karan)

The event was organized by Blogathon India co-founders Ankul Barar, Akshita Jain and communications professional Karan Bhujbal. The Blogathon saw an attendance of 100+ bloggers, across categories like technology, food, lifestyle, fashion, all together. There were bloggers who came in from other cities like Lucknow as well. There were bloggers who blog on the most unique of categories (for e.g. there was a Powerpoint blogger) at the event. It became a rage on social media and was trending on the number 2 spot in India and number 1 spot in New Delhi.

Post the event, I sought Karan Bhujbal's views on the following:

Q: What was the motivation for organizing a blogathon and what did you intend to achieve?

Karan: The insight for the event was that the blogger scenario today has witnessed a significant change, as a blogger’s influence is just not restricted to his or her blog, but permeates across all social networks they belong to. With an increasing number of people on social networks and an increasing amount of time spent by them on social networks, bloggers have become serious influencers for brands. Blogathon, hence, became a platform where brands meet bloggers.

Now meet ups of this nature have been done before, but the measure of success for me was to get all kinds of bloggers together (fashion, tech, food, travel etc.), on one stage, to celebrate the power of blogging together; and to do it in a manner that was enjoyable to all the attendees across the marathon blogger event.

Q. Are blogs acceptable as serios commentary? Do their opinions count? How & Why?

Karan: The thing with blogs and bloggers is, even if a particular blog has just 50 regular visitors to it, the credibility of that blogger amongst those 50 people is very high. There are more people today who are actually leaving their full time jobs to be professional bloggers too. And a proof point of their opinions being counted is the fact that more companies today, across industries, have a proactive blogger outreach, very similar to what is done for media.

Q. How do you feel about the way the event turned out to be?

Karan: The event turned out great. The event was sponsored by Dell and #dellblogathon trended on twitter on India at No. 3 and on Delhi at No.1. And it continued to trend in Delhi till 12pm on the next day! There are multiple requests for a next Blogathon to be planned sooner too.

We look forward to such meetups!

Suggestions/Critiques welcome.

-- Madhur

Sunday

Nation branding complications for China and Israel

Continuing from my last post, and discussion with American University researcher Efe Sevin, I thought it would be worthwhile to share two news items I read on the relation between soft power and nation branding efforts by countries.

Bloomberg view columnist William Pesek, in his piece Even $3 Trillion Can’t Buy China Love or Good PR talks about China's difficulty in sustaining a favorable image of itself in the light of the recent controversies, in his words,

"the Bo Xilai scandal, the diplomatic gymnastics over Chen Guangcheng, propaganda attacks on U.S. Ambassador Gary Locke, tossing out Al Jazeera’s lone Beijing correspondent and bullying the Philippines over a cluster of rocks in the ocean"

He talks of China as an insecure power, uncomfortable with the publicity that its massive investments in soft power is garnering for the nation and not very successful at managing the perception of a 'peaceful rise'.

On the other hand, writing for the Foreign Policy magazine, Aaron David Miller in the article, Israel's image revisited, tries to analyse why does Israel get bad PR consistently and the consequent erosion of it's image in the international stage. He states,

"In the eyes of the world, Israel has shed its image of a small state struggling against impossible odds. Israel now has "security needs" and "requirements" rather than existential fears; its power obligates it to be more magnanimous and forthcoming on peace issues; its strength should produce restraint, not excess"

and adds that the asymmetry of power that exists between a nation with GDP per capita of USD 31,000, 100 listed companies in the NYSE and a nuclear power that too, vis-a-vis its neighbors in the Arab world, strapped for resources and mired in political conflicts, significantly contributes to the erosion of Israel's image.

Both writers state that irrespective of what the world media has to say, true soft power is only gained by actions - by what these countries individually do. No amount of branding exercise can help their image if not backed by actions.

In marketing communications, we believe that you cannot sell a bad product. Once a good product is developed, marketers have to ensure it is 'seen' (hence promote) to generate demand. So nation branding technically can be an exercise in futility in political terms (focused efforts like investor relations or tourism etc can reap some benefits)

Now this is a tricky situation for both China and Israel. One can't help notice that both these countries are very unique politically,

China remains an authoritarian socialist state controlled by one party with limitations on freedom
Israel, on the other hand, is the only other country apart from Pakistan, in this world, that was born on the basis of religious identity (different from a theocratic state). In the history of the nation state, formed on the basis of cultural or linguistic identity, Israel remains 'exclusivist.'

In this context note that they are mostly talked about by an all powerful global media based in, and, controlled by liberal democracies be it in United States, Europe or India; for consumers with starkly different political attitudes when compared to both these countries. So the definition of a "good product" and a "bad product" is contentious. In addition, the standard of evaluation is distinctly different from the "Political Brand DNA," if I may use the term, of both China & Israel. This is a very pertinent example of how media becomes an independent power center in international politics and how nation branding for countries is a complex task. To shape the narrative, you have to become a part of the story...and get trapped!