Strange use of social media and social networking

A couple days ago I saw folks on Twitter mentioning a survey on the legal profession’s use of social networking and social media. Performed by Hubbard One, part of Thomson Reuters Westlaw, the survey looked like it had some interesting information on large law’s and in-house counsel’s use of blogs, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Discussion of the survey and bits of info from the survey were emanating, via Twitter, from the Marketing Partners Forum, put on by Hildebrandt, a division of Thomson Reuters Westlaw.

Discussing the legal profession’s use of social networking/social media here on my blog, in speaking engagements, and in talking to lawyers every day, I was interested in getting a copy of the survey. However the best I was able to get was a summary of a portion of the survey posted by Larry Bodine on his LawMarketing Blog.

I went to Hubbard One’s press releases. Nothing. Hubbard One’s blog. Nothing. Hubbard One’s twitter feed. Nothing.

So I emailed Gretchen DeSutter, Sr. Communications Specialist at Thomson West who is listed as the press contact on Hubbard One press releases, copying John Simpson, Managing Account Director at Hubbard One, asking for a copy of the survey. John, apparently attending the Marketing Partners Forum, had furnished Larry Bodine a copy the survey. I figured it wouldn’t take but a minute for someone to email me a link to the survey.

DeSutter kindly responded right away, not with the survey, but with the offer to ‘connect me with the person who conducted the survey.’ In that the person who conducted the survey had a medical emergency, DeSutter asked if waiting until next week would be okay. What else could I say than fine? DeSutter nicely followed up saying with Monday being a holiday, she’ll contact me Tuesday to ‘get this moving’ for me.

DeSutter appears to be a very nice person, extremely responsive, and a fine corporate communications professional. But I wasn’t looking to be ‘connected’ to the person who prepared the survey or to get my request moving. I asked for a copy of the survey which was already being released to bloggers.

Why do I get into all this? Because if you want to get word of your survey out, presumably as evidence of your knowledge on the use social networking/social media in the legal profession, you ought to be releasing a copy of the survey to anyone who asked. Especially after releasing it to one blogger and at least to those active and with some influence in the space.

Releasing a copy of the survey to one person and sharing snippets of the survey with people Tweeting from the audience at a conference put on by your company seems a terribly misguided use of social media and social networking.

With the advent of social media, the days of traditional PR, and its controlled release of information by large corporations, is coming to an end. Corporations cannot have their cake and eat it too, like here by making using of a blogger and few people using Twitter to release only what you want.

I suspect I’ll get a copy of the survey next week, if not sooner now that I blogged the story. I share this story as the type of public relations you want to avoid today. Especially if you’re holding yourself as consulting and providing services on social networking and social media.