Which risk is bigger -- communicating, or not communicating?

I was one of 100 people to attend the presentation of the findings from Edelman's 2012 Trust Barometer survey yesterday. This annual global survey takes the pulse of trust in business, institutions, and industries. It was a conversation between Richard Edelman, CEO, and my longtime contact David Armano, who's now Edelman's Executive VP of Digital Innovation.

This year's survey saw drops in trust of the "big boys" -- government officials and CEOs paramount among them.

My takeaways:

• Consumers trust companies that listen to them. This means empowering average employees to share the message and listen, not just senior management.
• Corporate reputation and brand reputation are now intimately linked.
• Younger employees often drive change in organizations, showing their companies how to listen and educating them about digital literacy. 
• Media is more trusted than ever -- both "big" media and social media.
• CEOs: to foster trust, be a real person, tell stories about people. Transparency is key, and give yourself and your employees permission to fail. Why doesn't this happen now? The Edelman folks posited that the higher an employees are within an organization, the more lawyers get involved. At that point, they need to ask themselves a question: Which poses a bigger risk -- communicating, or not communicating?

In my book, and I think the trust survey agrees, it's better to communicate honestly.

To learn more, see the stream of Tweets from this event and similar ones held in other cities across the globe.

(It was also a great event -- wonderful space, good food, and lots of folks to connect/reconnect with. Thanks to Social Media Club for arranging and promoting it!)

Content Strategy for Pinterest

As Pinterest has gotten more media attention over the past several weeks, I've been getting more followers. That's great news for me, but I'd like to put out a handful of do's and don'ts about using it effectively and joining the community.

1. DO decide who you are on Pinterest. Are you getting married, promoting your real estate business, collecting cool things for yourself? That can certainly evolve, but it's a good idea to start somewhere.
   
2. DO start your Pinterest experience by pinning some things -- pictures from newsletters, blogs, websites, or your computer...infographics, photos, recipe images, aspirations, etc. I've found the "Pin it" browser plugin to be really helpful.
   
3. DO explore who's on Pinterest and see what they do and how they use it.
   
4. DON'T follow people before you have some boards set up. I follow people because I like their taste and feel that I can relate to what they put up. If you haven't put anything up, I don't know whether to follow you or not.
   
5. DO add your own comments to things you repin. Your voice is a great asset to you on Pinterest!
   
6. DO comment on what others pin -- also a great way to lead other curious folks to your page. (Another reason to have boards set up and populated -- to inspire people who visit your page to follow you!)

Do you have any others?