Far too often, we get in trouble by attempting to be all things to all people.   And the reason we get into trouble is really quite simple – it never works.

A very wise man once gave me his theory of audience diversification.  Take any contentious issue, and you can split your universe into five “S’s.

• Supporters -   Your friends through thick and thin.  2% of the audience.
• Sympathizers.  Mostly supportive, but occasionally not impressed by you or your conduct.5  % of the audience.
• Straddlers.  Don’t know you, don’t care about you, don’t care about the issue.  End of story.  A whopping 86% of the audience.
• Skeptics – Don’t like you, but will, on rare occasion, back you up.  5% of the audience.
• Splenetics.  Dedicated to “venting their spleen on you.”  No matter what you say or do, they will hate you.  Approximately 2% of the audience.

We spend all our time with the two folks at the opposite ends of the spectrum – the supporters, because they’re comfortable.  And the splenetics, simply because they make the most noise.  And why are we wasting our time trying to win over the splenetics?  It’s because far too often, people confuse volume with importance.

Just because a television camera shows up at your door demanding an answer doesn’t mean you have to supply the answer they’re looking for.  Simply because an angry activist group stages a protest doesn’t mean you have to respond to the allegations in a way that satisfies them.  Your job is to satisfy the supporters (easy), the sympathizers (still easy), the straddlers (sort of easy, depending on whether they care), and the skeptics (much tougher – but far simpler than talking to a splenetic.)

In other words – respond THROUGH splenetics, don’t respond TO splenetics.

Case in point – a man in Britain claims religious discrimination because he is asked to remove his hood.  His claim – as a member of the Church of Jedi, he is required to wear a headcovering at all times.  You read that correctly – the Church of Jedi.  For those who are unfamiliar – Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader of Star Wars fame were both “Jedi Knights.”

Most people would assume (correctly, I may add) that becoming a member of the Church of Jedi is roughly equivalent to serving under GI-Joe, or legally changing your name to “Barbie.”  You can handle this in one of two ways.

• Example one:  A job centre issued a public apology to the ‘offended individual.’  They took a splenetic and tried to give him what he wanted.  Regardless, he announced he is still planning on suing them. Total communications victory points?  Zero.
• Example two:  Tesco Supermarkets spoke THROUGH an offended Jedi and publicly said “Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda and Luke Skywalker all appeared hoodless without ever going over to the Dark Side and we are only aware of the Emperor as one who never removed his hood.  If Jedi walk around our stores with their hoods on, they’ll miss lots of special offers.” Total communications victory points?  Lots.  Plus, come on now – it’s funny.  You and I are now discussing Tesco.  As a complete “straddler” on the Jedi issue, I’m now a Tesco Sympathizer.

A point to remember – ignoring your enemy by speaking through them is NOT the same thing as not responding.  One requires a deft touch, a thick skin, and the ability to withstand criticism.  But simply ignoring an issue requires a good liability lawyer or a bankruptcy specialist.

Obviously, not responding implies the problem will eventually ‘go away.’  A media vacuum isn’t going to simply ‘go away.’  After all, your enemy splenetics started this fight – they are more than happy to continue it.   Why let them continue to score free points at your expense?

It comes down to this – if people are going to be talking about you, you want them to be doing it on YOUR terms – not theirs.  Counter a splenetics point by talking through them.  Then hold on and get ready for the hair pulling and gnashing of teeth that will inevitably follow.

Sure… back in October, it was a rough week.  Just when they thought they could lift their head up…  just as things were starting to calm down, what happens?

Drudge decides, for some inexplicable reason, to run the headline, again.

The screenshot below is from the December 1st Drudge Report, taken at approximately 11:30 am.  The headline links to an old Reuters story from October so either it was an administrative error by Drudge, or for some reason, Matt Drudge thinks old news about sick turkeys is just plain fascinating.

Either way… it just goes to prove that bad news really does stick with you.

‘United Breaks Guitars’ became a veritable anthem for all that is wrong with big, corporate North America, ignoring the ‘normal, everyman.’  It became a microcosm of incredibly poor customer service and corporate arrogance.

Which is why this is just so… awkward?  Tragic?  Funny?  You can’t make up what I’m about to tell you folks:  “On a recent trip to Denver to speak to customer service executives, “this Everyman symbol of the aggrieved traveler was treated, well, like just another customer,” Christine Negroni wrote for The New York Times. “United lost his bag.”

Let me emphasize a point here.  United Airlines LOST the one bag they can’t afford to lose.

Seriously – if I was United Airlines, I’d treat Dave Carroll’s bags with slightly more care than the nuclear football. 

Wow.  Just… wow.  Stand by – I sense a third version of his song in the making.

And I truly mean everyone – all three levels of government have promised to ‘explore the issue.’ Several studies have spent several millions of dollars exploring possible routes, timetables, scheduling and logistics.

Why hasn’t it happened yet?  Well, there’s the obvious issue, money.  But I have to wonder if it’s also in no small part to idiotic decisions like this.

Forgive me, but you’ve got the money lined up.  The link could remove 5 million people from the roads each and every year… but “18 conditions stipulated by the Ministry of the Environment could set the plan back.”

One of those conditions?  “The trains must use clean technology that is still in development.”

So to clarify – the Ministry of the Provincial Government responsible for cleaning up the environment says in order to take advantage of new, environmentally friendly transportation, you have to use a non-existent engine.

“John Gerretsen, Minister of the Environment, says he believes the technology SHOULD be complete by 2015.”  Pardon me if I don’t hold my breath.

Does anyone want to take odds on whether or not our grandchildren will be complaining about the lack of high-speed rail between Union and Pearson?

The Guelph Storm are a junior hockey team based in the midwestern Ontario, Canada community of Guelph.  For those who are unfamiliar with the various levels of hockey, think of it as a double A baseball team.  They attract several thousand fans per game.

They are easily the most popular team in this city of 100,000 people.  As a result, their season-ticket’s list reads like the Who’s Who of the Guelph business community.

So I imagine some of those businessmen are going to be awfully upset when they find out that their email address is now public information to every fellow season-ticket holder.

The Storm were promoting a charitable luncheon, and did so via email.  Unfortunately, in a classic mistake that happens to the just about anyone (Hillary Clinton’s campaign made the same mistake), the Storm did the unthinkable and publicly listed everyone’s address in the “To” field.  As a result, anyone who received the email can easily see every address.

This is NOT a good way to endear yourself to your most important customers – season’s ticket holders.

So how should they fix it?  To send out another email will run the risk of flagging that very weakness to those who hadn’t noticed it the first time.  In effect, it’s like saying “I’m sorry I have this security flaw in my website.  Please don’t take advantage of it.”

I suspect it may be a moot point.  It’s only going to take one upset person to tip off the local newspaper before the Guelph Storm Management are going to be dealing with a very public black eye – in which case, nothing more than an abject apology is going to suffice.  In the meantime, it’s time to think preemptively.

Perhaps a snail mailed apology, along with a voucher to bring a guest to a future Storm game for free?  Or perhaps a coupon for something as simple as a free hot-dog or snack?  Anyone who hadn’t noticed the original mistake may be happy to receive a freebie, while those who are upset are somewhat mollified.

What do YOU think?

Long story short – Amanda Bonnen has a Twitter account.  She’s hardly an active user… she’s got about 30 followers.  In Twitterverse, this makes her so small as to be insignificant.  She tweeted “Who said sleeping in a moldy apartment was bad for you? Horizon realty thinks it’s okay.”

That got her sued by Horizon Realty – for $50,000.

I don’t even know where to start with the absolute insanity of this.   I’ll leave the whole ‘they’re right to sue/they’re stupid to sue’ argument off of the table for now.  Let’s just examine the communications here.

Either a) Horizon had mold, and had an upset customer, or b) Horizon didn’t have mold, but a customer was trying to claim they did.  One would assume that the reason for her tweet was simply to vent – after all, with so few followers it’s not like she has a large public following.

Horizon has to be naturally worried about statements like this driving people away from their properties.  That makes sense.

So what’s a prudent course of action here?  Did they call her and ask how to make her a happy customer?  No.  Did they investigate her complaint to determine whether or not there was any veracity to her claims?  No.  Did they send her a nasty letter written in crayon, complaining because she wasn’t playing nice?  No.

They sued her for $50,000.  My favourite line of the whole story is “Bonnen wasn’t contacted before the suit was filed or asked to remove the Tweet, (Horizon Realty’s Jeffrey Michael) said: “We’re a sue first, ask questions later kind of an organization.”

So here’s my sole point – in terms of communications, you can’t buy this type of publicity.  Nor would you want to – with coverage across North America, I would suggest that the “good name” of Horizon Realty is going to require a much more vigorous defence after today than before.  In short – it was a collosal, enormous blunder.

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If anyone from Horizon cares to respond, I’m more than happy to print their response verbatim.  It beats getting sued.  Although I’d like to point out that a) I’m in Canada, where if you sue me and lose, you have to pay my court costs and b) as a sole entrepeneur, I doubt you could find enough worth suing over anyway.