First posted on ReadWriteWeb

So it’s happened again: a company comes under fire for some misdeed — per­ceived or actual — and gets a few crit­ical com­ments on their Face­book Page. And their crisis com­mu­nic­a­tions strategy is to pour gas­oline on that little flame by deleting those comments.

The latest folks to do this are the people at Chap­Stick, who ran a print ad that offended a few folks. Those critics posted their com­plaints on ChapStick’s Face­book page (most of them quite civil). ChapStick’s page admin­is­trators then deleted the com­ments; this case adds an ironic new wrinkle because of the ad copy pointing people to their Face­book pres­ence, which reads “Be heard.”

After enduring a torrent of cri­ti­cism for deleting the cri­ti­cism, Chap­Stick posted an apology for the ad and a sort-of explan­a­tion for deleting the com­ments, saying they follow Face­book guidelines and “remove posts that use foul lan­guage, have repet­itive mes­saging, those that are con­sidered spam-like (mul­tiple posts from a person within a short period of time) and are men­acing to fans and employees.” Which, with most of the com­ments, wasn’t the case.

It seems to bear repeating: brands, learn to take some cri­ti­cism on your social web pres­ences. Why? Because…

• Accus­a­tions of sup­pressing those com­ments are often more dam­aging than the ori­ginal cri­ti­cisms themselves.
• The pres­ence of crit­ical com­ments gives the con­ver­sa­tion hap­pening on your Face­book Page, blog or other pres­ence a sense of authen­ti­city. That means the pos­itive user com­ments carry more weight than they would if your site had nothing but obsequious flattery.
• A crit­ical comment can be an oppor­tunity for engage­ment on your part. It’s your chance to answer a cri­ti­cism, resolve a com­plaint, correct some mis­in­form­a­tion. And you may be catching a little issue before it becomes a much bigger one.
• A crit­ical comment can be an spur to par­ti­cip­a­tion and con­ver­sa­tion by your com­munity. Let’s face it; for most brands and organ­iz­a­tions, excess par­ti­cip­a­tion usually isn’t the problem with their Face­book pages.

So maybe it’s time to learn to love the neg­ative. A thicker skin not only saves you from the sting of a little cri­ti­cism; it can let you realize from genuine benefit… and keep you from becoming the latest high-profile case study in why comment dele­tion can backfire.

You know how Gandhi said “Be the change you want to see in the world”? Oh, I know the New York Times says there’s no evidence he ever said it… but I can point to a gazillion bumper stickers and Twitter bios that say they’re wrong.

Anyways.

I firmly believe that before you can be the change, you have to put it into words: a pithy statement of belief. In short, something that a man (or a really, really determined woman) could pee in a snowbank.

And in that vein, I’m pleased to announce Pee the Change You Want to See in the World, a series of cards I’m selling in my Zazzle store. I’ve started with a few changes: Peace, Social Justice, Equality, Better Smoothies and Open Web Standards. And I’m open to requests (provided they’re not for causes I disagree with – authorial prerogative and all).

Enjoy!

Browse other personalized gifts from Zazzle.

• “On a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is mild irritation and 10 is spitting foam-flecked rage, how do you feel about the redesign?”
• “If you could be any animal, what kind of animal would you be? And would you be prepared to dress up as that animal if we asked you to?”
• “When you receive our e-newsletter, do you delete it without reading? Or does your spam filter catch it first?”
• “Thinking of the last time you used our app, which Franz Kafka character did you feel like?”
• “In a moment, I’m going to blow a piercing whistle into the phone while I drag my fingernails down a blackboard. On a scale of 1 to 5, where 1 is ‘quite similar’ and 5 is ‘much better’, please compare it to your last customer service experience with us.”
• “Let’s say you were given the choice between three minutes on the phone listening to our hold music, and an eternity chained to a rock while an eagle eats your liver. Would you prefer a bald or golden eagle?”

“Why won’t they blog?”

That’s a lament I hear from community managers, social media practitioners and communications directors who are begging, cajoling, coaxing and wheedling coworkers, trying to get them to post something to their organization’s or company’s blog.

It can be tempting to throw your hands up. “If your team hates blogging, you need a new team,” suggests one post. The author adds, “They don’t really hate blogging. They hate their job: and that’s a problem beyond the fact that you can’t get them to blog.”

True, someone who hates their job is unlikely to blog about it – at least, not in a way that would make their employer happy. But that isn’t the only reason that people say they hate blogging. Here are a few others… and some ways you can respond before you give up on your coworkers:

Do they hate blogging… or do they hate the time it takes?

If your workplace is like many others, employees have seen their workloads grow, with less support for getting the job done. If you’re expecting them to crank out blog posts, but you haven’t taken anything off their plates to compensate, you may want to look at some adjustments.

Do they hate blogging… or do they hate the kind of blogging you’re asking them to do?

Are you expecting detailed, lengthy posts from busy people? Consider starting off by asking for contributions that have a much lower footprint on their time and attention. Are you asking them to write puff pieces about what a fantastic organization they work for? Give them the latitude to be more authentic, and to talk more about their own work passions without having to pump up your brand.

Do they hate blogging… or do they hate doing something they don’t think they’re good at?

Have you offered training – not just in the technical details of your blogging platform, but in how to write blog posts quickly and easily? Do you encourage them to start out small – for instance, with one-paragraph contributions to a longer post – and work their way up? Have you considered an informal peer mentoring system, group workshops, or assigning a communications specialist to help them write their first few posts?

Do they hate blogging… or do they hate being exposed to the public?

Some people love being in the public eye (cough). Others find the idea intrusive, or even terrifying. Try finding an area of their work they feel more comfortable sharing with the world. Give them the option of starting out by blogging on the intranet, where their exposure is limited to their coworkers.

Do they hate blogging… or do they hate doing something they think is pointless?

More to the point, something that’s pointless to them. Look at it from their point of view: maybe you’re asking them to put their urgent work on hold so you can get some content for a trendy blog they suspect will be a flash in the pan. You can – and should – talk to them about the blog’s significance for the organization. But you should also figure out how the blog can advance things they care about, like a professional passion, their profile within the organization, or a cause they’re committed to.

Do they hate blogging… or do they hate being the first on the dance floor?

You’ll often find it harder to get contributors to a new communications vehicle than an established one. And even if the blog has been around for a while, people may not want to be the first ones from their department or job function to post. But there are still ways to break the ice – for instance, by writing a series of posts based on brief interviews with a few of the kind of individuals you’d like to see contributing. That can be the spark they need to jump in.

Do they hate blogging… or do they hate, well, you?

Okay, not hate. But could your relationship be stronger? Do you have bridges to build with other departments before you can start asking for their help? Have you worked as hard to understand them as you would with an external audience you want to reach?

Do they hate blogging… or do they hate what it means in your workplace’s culture?

Is yours an organization that welcomes honest conversation, or are people legitimately worried about inadvertently saying the wrong thing? Do you have a “tall poppy” culture where it’s safer to keep your head down and blend in? If you’re having trouble getting one or two people to participate, then maybe – maybe – the problem’s on their end. But widespread resistance to blogging may alert you to deeper issues. If that ends up spurring your organization to make badly needed changes, then that refusal to blog may turn out to a valuable contribution after all.

Update: This tip no longer really works that well; the feed from the tag now requires you to authenticate as the user who created it, and the tag itself has to be chosen from your list of folders. I’m sorry.

Some big changes came yesterday to Google Reader, the venerable RSS newsreader that has become part of the texture of daily online life for a lot of us. The design has changed dramatically, in line with changes made to most other Google services. But there are big functional changes too, as Google aims to consolidate social activity in Google+.

That means the end of nearly all of Google Reader’s sharing features. There’s no more Share link; no more Followers; and no more public pages for starred or shared items. Instead, you click Send To under any post, and share it through one of a variety of web services (most notably Google+).

For many people, that will work just fine. But some of us have been heavy users of that Share link… and at least in my case, it’s been a great way to populate an RSS* feed of posts I come across in Reader. That feed can then do everything from generating Twitter posts to updating a widget on my blog.

If that’s one way you’ve been using Reader, then good news: you can still create an RSS feed of blog posts you flag from inside Reader. Better yet, you can draw on one of Reader’s lesser-known features – tags – to createseveral RSS feeds.

Here’s how it works:

• Look at the bottom of any post in Reader. You’ll see several links: star, +1, Email, Keep unread, Send to, and – most interestingly – Edit tags.
• Come up with a short distinct keyword that you want to use for shared items. Maybe it’s just the letter “s”. From now on, you’ll be tagging any item you want to add to that RSS feed with that keyword.
• Click the Edit tags link. Enter your sharing keyword.
• Once you click Save, the keyword becomes a hyperlink. Click it, and you’ll be taken to a page listing all of the posts that you’ve tagged with that particular keyword.
• Click on the Folder settings… button at the top of the page. Then click “View details and statistics” in the menu that appears.
• Hurray! You’ll see an URL for the RSS feed for this tag. Use it the same way as the RSS feed for Shared Items.

Note that this isn’t a new feature – you’ve always been able to find an RSS feed for any particular tag. But the latest changes mean it’s just become even more useful.

* Actually, it’s the Atom format. But people seem to be more familiar with the term “RSS”, so I’m using it generically here.