APRIL 2, 2009

When Do You Know If You’re Overexposed?

Have you ever felt overexposed?  By that, I mean have you ever sensed you might have put yourself too much out there?  Tried too hard?  Reached your saturation point?

This comes to mind in part because I have seen so much of President Obama lately, and I have started to wonder, has he made himself too accessible?  Clearly, President Obama is a savvy communicator, and the fact that he is innovative in his outreach is to his credit.  Lately, however, it seems like he is everywhere, and I am curious to see what impact that might have on his popularity.

Recently, he held a traditional evening White House press conference, which evoked enough interest to generate prime time TV coverage.  He followed that up with a “web” town hall, taking questions directly from the American people.  Before that, he appeared on “The Tonight Show” with Jay Leno, becoming the first sitting President ever to do so.  He has held White House announcement events about stem cell research, small business assistance, and further restructuring of the automotive industry.  Add to that the expected coverage he received yesterday around his visit to the Queen and today’s G-20 summit.

Is this too much of a good thing?  President Obama promised an accessible and transparent government, and he is working hard to fulfill that commitment.   But is it possible that so much accessibility reaches a saturation point, where we stop paying attention to the messenger and his messages?

Companies have to consider maintaining the same kind of balance.  When they are in crisis, it is important to use every avenue to address public concerns and provide reassurance that steps are being taken to correct the problem.  Personally, I think the financial industry clearly forgot this lesson.  When a firm’s reputation needs to be managed, finding a strategic balance between advertising, grassroots events, social media outreach, and media interviews can be difficult. While the temptation might be to flood the airwaves and internet and push out numerous grassroots events with messages, I’d suggest that the smarter approach is to consider the collective impact of each opportunity to determine if the cumulative effect is one of oversaturation rather than persuasion.