Lots of people sharing a Harvard Business Review blog about what it means to be professional in the social media era. It begins with a compelling example of how the Susan G. Komen Foundation bungled its recent image problems, while Planned Parenthood used social media to handle their controversies with aplomb. Nice case.

Then the article spins out of control…

It uses that one case and the usual tired cliches, stats and “experts” to argue that everyone should be “transparent” and embrace social media. It includes this table of old professionals vs. new professionals:

Source: Allison Fine, "What Does 'Professional' Look Like Today," HBR, 5/9/2012

Cute. My response?

• In 2009, John Mackey of Whole Foods wrote an editorial in the Wall Street Journal stating his opposition to Obama’s healthcare plan. Whole Foods customers (who tend to be limousine liberals) responded in anger with an organized (but short-lived) boycott using social media. That was Mackey’s reward for revealing his personal interests and passions. Given who most of his customers are, perhaps he should have reconsidered being so “transparent.”

• Apple, which has enjoyed enormous success, is one of the most secretive and least transparent companies in the United States, despite operating in the hotbed of social media startups, Silicon Valley. Apple does not use social media to any great extent. Meanwhile, one of Apple’s retail partners, Best Buy, wholeheartedly embraced social media, and the CMO, Barry Judge, was seen as a pioneer and visionary, blogging regularly about social media. Today, Best Buy is downsizing, and both Barry Judge and his blog are gone.

• Pepsi abandoned the Super Bowl to fully embrace social media with its “Refresh” campaign, attempting to bond with its Millennial customers over social and environmental issues. This generated a lot of buzz, but it didn’t generate sales, and Pepsi wound up losing market share to Coca-Cola, and its flagship soda sank to #3 in its market for the first time (behind both Coke and Diet Coke). Pepsi has since abandoned Refresh and gone back to advertising during the Super Bowl.

• Finally, this current political season shows the hazards of expressing one’s true interests and passions in any kind of media, since partisan extremists will insist that candidates toe a hard line, no matter how honest and competent they are. (See “Huntsman, Jon.”)

My point: there are just as many failures when it comes to being “transparent” and “social” as there are success stories. We can’t just use a few examples to prove anything; as advertising executive Bob Hoffman notes, “the plural of anecdote is not data.” Regardless of the hype du jour, we must conduct critical analyses of what works best for our brands in our markets.

So what is a professional?

A few years ago, I wrote my own take on the word “professional.” My key points involved respect, dedication, and being appropriate. On this last point I wrote:

“A true professional understands the environment, audience and occasion, then comports herself appropriately. Yes, this sometimes means wearing a suit, but at other times, it might mean wearing jeans and an ironic logo T-shirt. (Though at no time does it ever mean wearing Crocs.) She speaks at the level of her audience, never over their heads, but without pandering to their slang or mannerisms. Joking around is totally fine — even encouraged — as long as her tone is appropriate for the audience. (Some groups don’t mind a strategic f-bomb.)”

Note that it’s not about being “transparent” or “authentic.” Indeed, I have found the whole “authenticity” movement to be flawed, hypocritical, even reckless. Call me cynical, but instead of being “authentic” we need to be realistic about what works in a fiercely competitive marketplace. This notion of “just be yourself” is cute and idealistic, and perhaps it’s the way to go if you’re seeking a spouse; but when it comes to business, “be yourself” is the biggest lie that adults tell young people, since the adult world requires a lot of posturing, positioning and posing to get the job and to keep it. (Do people put on acts and cover up their flaws to get a job, a client, a promotion, a raise, or a foundation grant? People do.)

In today’s marketplace, you need to emphasize your expertise, not your peccadilloes. Why do you think people write for the Harvard Business Review in the first place?

• Related Article: Business Journal Makeover: Enter the Harvard Obviousness Review

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

- Steve Jobs, 2005

Enough "thick value" for ya? (photo by Stu Spivack)

In my ongoing quest to find anything of value on Twitter, I started following Umair Haque (@umairh), a strategy advisor who writes a  column for Harvard Business Publishing called “Edge Economy”. Haque recently let loose a blast at someone else’s article:

“i strongly rec everyone read http://bit.ly/GdroN and reflect on why its 1) bad business 2) ethically questionable + 3) lame.”

That micro-rant sounded like something I would write, so I had to check the offending article out…

What sent Haque into a Twitter tizzy (a twizzy?) is an article by Mike Speiser at GigaOm.com, “What We Can Learn About Pricing From Menu Engineers.” The article reported on self-titled “Menu Engineer” Gregg Rapp, who strategically crafts menus for restaurants. Rapp had openly discussed his tactics on the “Today Show,” so this wasn’t some dark surreptitious sorcery at work here. Indeed, his goal is simply to get customers “to look for the more profitable items” on the menu, like crabcakes.

If you object to that, you object to for-profit business in general. My leftist side can certainly understand that. But for all you seasoned capitalists, does Rapp advocate anything here that’s beyond the pale — or even that innovative? Consider that most supermarket floorplans and website layouts are designed to steer customers to spending more money. Just go to the wine section of your favorite store: notice how the cheap wines are on the bottom shelf and the more expensive wines are at eye level? Is that unethically manipulative, or just smart marketing?

To overcome price sensitivity, Rapp’s tactics include removing dollar signs from the menu and not calling attention to the prices. In addition, he recommends writing mouth watering descriptions… Oh noes! What a horrible man! He writes words that make customers want the product?! How dare he?! Lock him up!

The Dastardly Deed Called Reference Pricing

The NSX: sold right alongside commuter vehicles. How unethical!

The tactic that excites GigaOm’s Speiser the most is putting an outrageously expensive item on the menu that makes everything else look cheaper. Again, absolutely nothing new here. Car companies for years have put outrageously expensive items in their showrooms that few customers can afford, such as the six-figure Acura NSX in the 90s. The high-end sports car served several purposes: it created a “halo effect’ over the entire Acura brand; if one sold, Acura made a sweet profit; and it provided a steep “reference price” that made the $50,000 sedan appear downright affordable.

Others who practice reference pricing include high-end hotels (with their ultra-luxury suites), wines (with limited edition vintages), sports stadiums (luxury boxes for the mega-rich), computer companies (the 17″ fully loaded MacBook I crave rings up at $4500), and so on. Are they ridiculously expensive? Sure. Is anyone forced to pay those prices? No.

A Case of Anti-Semanticism?

The real problem here is semantics: “menu engineering” is a pretentious term that makes Gregg Rapp’s strategies sound more complicated than they really are, and which enables him to charge higher prices to his restaurant clients.

Hmm, maybe I should change what I do from “brand design” to “brand engineering”…

The face of evil: for his next trick, Gregg Rapp will try to sell you a PC (clip from the "Today Show").

If Rapp were simply a “menu designer” — and if he didn’t look like John Hodgman’s PC character in the Mac commercials — his story might not have created such a stir. Indeed, he probably wouldn’t have appeared on the “Today Show”; rather, he would have wound up in the back pages of Communication Arts.

Hell, the guy sure knows marketing.

The other problem is the hyperbolic GigaOm article, which contains tabloid-caliber passages like, “Have you ever gone to a restaurant and found some ridiculously priced item on the menu? Of course you didn’t buy it — you’re no sucker. Or are you?” and “He helps restaurants maximize revenue by hacking common flaws in human decision-making.” Gee, I didn’t realize GigaOm was part of the National Enquirer family of publications.

No wonder Umair Haque came out swinging. Haque normally analyzes such topics as the financial markets and political leadership. Anything that smacks of deception raises his ethical hackles, and I respect that.

But in the case of menu engineering, this is much a’twitter about nothing.

Menu engineering is simply smart menu design. Restaurants are for-profit enterprises, and they should think smart and hard about how they present their food in their menus. Are the photos top quality? Is the copy enticing? Will the prices scare customers away from a really good dish?

Menus, after all, are simply catalogs of edible products. Does anyone get on the case of catalog publishers for highlighting expensive products or writing enticing copy? In the online world, does anyone rip into Amazon.com for strategically featuring certain products or having professionally crafted product descriptions?

Think Beyond the Product: Defining “Real Benefits”

Haque tweeted me, “i suggest reading what i’ve written about thin vs thick value and reflect. does menu engineering ever have real benefits?”

You could ask the same question about any and all marketing practices: Are there real consumer benefits to having Michael Jordan endorse your shoes? To having the product come in a shiny package with a cool brand name? Or to having a Super Bowl commercial with a catchy song and a sexy actress?

Haque focuses primarily on product issues: how many direct benefits does the product provide? (“Thick value.”) That’s all fine and good, but it’s also critical to get consumers to try those high-value products you’ve invested all that time and money into developing. Business history is filled with great products that never took off, or that were crushed by inferior products with superior marketing — or simply a lower price. (Think VHS vs Betamax.) You can’t just make a “thick value” product; you have to get people to buy it.

So there is IMMENSE VALUE in getting customers to overcome their price aversion to try those $9.95 crabcakes instead of settling for $3.95 french fries. The customers might love those crabcakes, and be thrilled that they tried them. In the process, the restaurant earns a higher profit, the waiter makes a bigger tip (based on both price and customer satisfaction), and the customers might come back again — and refer their friends. Those are real benefits for all involved.

As long as the price and food are truly as advertised, “menu engineering” is just smart marketing under a scary name. And it works: I’ve engineered some serious hunger just writing this, so I’m off to find some crabcakes, regardless of the price.

Update 12/24/9: Everyone’s doing it, including gourmet Indian restaurants like Tabla in New York. According to the New York Times:

Tabla is just one of the many restaurants around the country that are feverishly revising their menus. Pounded by the recession, they are hoping that some magic combination of prices, adjectives, fonts, type sizes, ink colors and placement on the page can coax diners into spending a little more money.

Somewhere, Umair Haque is having conniptions and trying to coin new phrases to capture his indignation at marketing.

– Philosopher and Business Consultant Matthew Stewart, “The Management Myth,” The Atlantic Online, June 2006

‘Cause sometimes, you just gotta vent with silliness.